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Basil II personally led two punitive expeditions against the Fāṭimids in Syria, but otherwise his eastern policy was to hold and to consolidate what had already been gained. The gains can be measured by the number of new themes (provinces) created by the early 11th century in the area between Vaspurakan in the Caucasus and Antioch in Syria. The annexation of Armenia, the homeland of many of the great Byzantine emperors and soldiers, helped to solidify the eastern wall of the Byzantine Empire for nearly a century.

The dissatisfaction of the nakharars with Arshak II led to the division of Armenia into two sections, Byzantine Armenia and Persarmenia (c. 390). The former, comprising about one-fifth of Armenia, was rapidly absorbed into the Byzantine state, to which the Armenians came to contribute many emperors and generals.

For something like five hundred years, Armenians played an important role in the political, military and administrative life of the Byzantine empire. They served as soldiers and officers, as administrators and emperors. In the early part of this period during the seventh and eighth centuries, when the empire was fighting for its very existence, they contributed greatly in turning back its enemies. But particularly great was their role in the ninth and tenth centuries when as soldiers and officers, administrators and emperors they dominated the social, military and political life of the empire and were largely responsible for its greatness. So dominant indeed was their role during this period that one may refer to the Byzantine empire of these two centuries as Graeco-Armenian; 'Graeco', because as always, its civilization was Greek, 'Armenian', because the element which directed its destinies and provided the greater part of the forces for its defense was largely Armenian or of Armenian origin. It was a role, moreover, of world-wide historical significance for it was during this period that the empire achieved its greatest success, when its armies triumphed everywhere, its missionaries spread the gospel and with it civilization among the southeastern Slavs, and its scholars resurrected Greek antiquity, thus making possible the preservation of its literature.

Thus, every emperor who sat on the Byzantine throne from the accession of Basil I to the death of Basil II (867--1025) was of Armenian or partially Armenian origin.

If Armenia was strongly influenced by Byzantium, Byzantium was influenced by Armenia in return and, to paraphrase Toumanoff, Armenia gave more than it received. Apart from the Armenians living directly under imperial rule, a continuous stream of Armenians entered the empire for one reason or another over a period of several centuries: adventurers, scholars, clerics, refugees, and large numbers of common people—including the heterodox Paulician sectarians, forced to migrate from Byzantine-occupied Armenia to other parts of the empire by the imperial government itself. These immigrants early distinguished themselves in three environments: the army, the administration, and the general population.
Armenia, as we have seen, was a society dominated by a class of warrior nobility. Thus, when driven from their homeland for whatever reasons, it was natural for Armenian princes to enter the Byzantine military service, and from the time of Justinian I, we find them reaching the highest rank. Justinian himself, who fought wars on three fronts, had no fewer than nineteen Armenian generals in his service, including Narses of the house of Kamsarakan, who was probably the greatest general of his time. Thereafter, we hear of nearly two hundred Armenian officers who distinguished themselves in the imperial service: generals, admirals, officials, exarchs, provincial governors, courtiers, and members of the emperor’s entourage.
In the Byzantine administration, civil and ecclesiastical, Kaisar Bardos (Vard), who reestablished higher instruction at Constantinople in the ninth century, Leo the Philosopher, who was the most eminent scholar of his day, and the patriarchs Photios (858-857, 877-886) and John the Grammarian (837-843) were all Armenians. In a surprisingly short time, we find Armenians reaching the imperial throne itself, for the Armenians not only served the empire, they ruled it as well, and did so for almost a third of its history. No fewer than sixteen emperors and eleven empresses were of Armenian origin, including Mavrikios (Maurice, 582-602), Heraklios (Heraclius, 610-642), John Tzimiskes (969-976), and Basil II (976-1025), and Armenians founded three imperial dynasties: the Heraclids (of royal Arsacid origin, 610-711), the Basilids (876-1056), and the Lekapenoi, who interrupted the Basilids for twenty-five years (920-944). In addition, there were a number of isolated emperors of Armenian origin: Bardanes (Vardan, 711-713), Artabazdes (Artavazd, 742-743), Leo V “the Armenian” (813-820), and John Tzimiskes (969-976), who, though an emperor, was one of the greatest Byzantine military commanders as well. In addition, there were many Armenians who attempted the throne but failed to achieve it (Mzez Gnuni, his son John, another Bardanes, etc.). In the ninth century, the throne, the patriarchate, and the command of the imperial armies were all held by Armenians, and the empire was, in effect, in Armenian hands. Most of these Armenians, of course, were thoroughly hellenized, membership in the Greek Church being the sine qua non for advancement in the Byzantine world. Others such as the protospatharios John, who commissioned an Armenian Gospel manuscript that still survives, remained linked to their own culture. Yet as the Armenians became hellenized, there seems to be evidence that they, in turn, added something to the oriental influences that pervaded Byzantine civilization, and, as Der Nersessian notes, these appear to have been particularly strong in the realm of decorative arts precisely in the ninth and tenth centuries, when the role of Armenians in the highest levels of Byzantine society was at its height.
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Armenians were a significant minority within the empire. In the sixth century, Justinian I's General Narses was Armenian. The emperor Maurice (582-602) may have been Armenian. In the ninth and 10th centuries there were several Armenian emperors, including Leo V, Basil I, Romanos I Lekapenos, and John I Tzimiskes. Theodora, the wife of Theophilios, was Armenian.

Romanus I Lecapenus, (born c. 872—died 948), Byzantine emperor who shared the imperial throne with his son-in-law Constantine VII and exercised all real power from 920 to 944.

The Phokades too followed a traditional path to success. Either the descendants of a converted Arab from Tarsos or, much more likely, of an Armenian family from Iberia, in either case by the mid-ninth century the Phokas family were established in Cappadocia on the Byzantine easter frontier, where in the 870s they attracted the notice of Basil I.