The Byzantine Empire, as the successor of Roman traditions, adopted a significant part of the urban culture and military affairs of the Roman Empire. One of these phenomena is the Byzantine military triumph, which seemed to be an important element of state and religious propaganda. The paper identifies the specifics of the preparation and conduct of the triumph based on the text «De Ceremoniis aulae Byzantinae», and pays special attention to the role of Arab prisoners as mandatory participants in the procession. The author concludes that the Byzantine military triumph, despite the Roman tradition, had a number of distinctive features due to Christian dogma and the formation of a more humane attitude towards prisoners, which we can observe since the middle of the IX century, despite the ongoing religious, ideological and military confrontation.
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