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| | MSN Encarta - Byzantine Empire |
 | | Between 634 and 642, Arabs, inspired by a new religion, Islam, conquered Palestine, Syria, Mesopotamia, and Egypt. |
 | | Constantinople weathered major Arab sieges in the 670s and in 717-18, and Byzantine Asia Minor survived almost annual Arab raids. |
 | | Byzantium, by a process that remains controversial among historians, transformed its armies into an elite expeditionary guard named tagmata and into army corps called themes (themata). |
| encarta.msn.com /encyclopedia_761561530/Byzantine_Empire.html (1107 words) |
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