Battle of the Masts

Battle of the Masts
	Part of the Arab–Byzantine wars
	; The Battle of the Masts, as portrayed in Tārīkhunā bi-uslūb qaṣaṣī (Our History in a Narrative style), published 1935
Date	655
Location	Off the Lycian coast at Phoenice, Mediterranean Sea; (modern-day Finike, Antalya, Turkey) 36°16′55″N 30°15′39″E / 36.281898°N 30.260732°E
Result	Rashidun Caliphate victory
Belligerents
Rashidun Caliphate	Byzantine Empire
Commanders and leaders
Muawiyah I; Abu al-A'war	Constans II
Strength
200 ships[citation needed]	500 ships[citation needed]
Casualties and losses
Light[citation needed]	Almost all[citation needed]

The Battle of the Masts (Arabic: مَعْرَكَة ذَات الصَّوَارِي, romanized: Maʿrakat Dhāt al-Ṣawārī) was a naval battle fought in 655 between the Rashidun Caliphate under the command of Abu al-A'war and the Byzantine Empire led by emperor Constans II (r. 641–668).

The battle was part of the earliest campaign by Mu'awiya, the governor of Syria, to reach Constantinople and is considered to be "the first decisive conflict of Islam on the deep".^[1]^[2]

^ Ridpath, John Clark. Ridpath's Universal History, Merrill & Baker, Vol. 12, New York, p. 483.
^ Cite error: The named reference :3 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).

[1] Ridpath, John Clark. Ridpath's Universal History, Merrill & Baker, Vol. 12, New York, p. 483.

[:3-2] Cite error: The named reference :3 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).

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