Bulgarian Empire

Bulgarian Empire

The origins of the Bulgarian Empire are usually traced to the Bulgaro-Slavic state established by an alliance between the Bulgar Khan Asparuh and the league of the seven Slavic tribes around 679. Although this state had been founded within the bounds of the Byzantine Empire, Emperor Constantine IV was compelled to make a treaty with Asparuh in 681, which acknowledged the existence of the Bulgaro-Slavic state and agreed to pay it an annual tribute.

Slavs made up an overwhelming part of the population of the new state, but its leadership was Bulgar. What differentiated the Bulgars from the Slavs, apart from language and ethnicity, was their highly developed sense of political organization, in addition to a formidable military reputation. The assimilatory processes between the two groups were long and not always smooth, but by the 10th century the Slavic language had become the official language of the state, while Bulgarian became its official appellation.

The study of the Bulgarian Empire is generally divided into two periods: the First Bulgarian Empire (681–1018) and the Second Bulgarian Empire (1185–1393). In both periods, the Bulgarian Empire had to contend with external pressures coming from Byzantium in the south and various migratory invaders from the north, as well as domestic dissent among the aristocracy.



The First Bulgarian Empire

Initially the First Bulgarian Empire enjoyed almost a century of expansion. After Asparuh’s death, supreme power passed to Khan Tervel (700–721). He not only continued to expand the new state in the Balkans but also intervened in the internal affairs of Byzantium. Tervel sheltered the exiled Emperor Justinian II and assisted him to regain his throne in Constantinople in 704. In 716 Tervel forced a treaty on Byzantium, which awarded northern Thrace to Bulgaria and reiterated Constantinople’s annual tribute.

Because of this treaty, Tervel came to the aid of Byzantium during the Arab siege of the town in 717, crucial to averting the fall of Constantinople. Tervel’s attack surprised the Arab forces, and many of them were slaughtered (some count 100,000). After Tervel’s death the remainder of the eighth century was a time of internal strife, until the rule of Khan Kardam (777–802).

Kardam inflicted a number of severe defeats on the Byzantine army and in 796 forced Constantinople to renew its annual tribute to Bulgaria. It was Kardam’s successor Khan Krum (803–814) who achieved one of the greatest expanses of the First Bulgarian Empire.

Krum is believed to have spent his youth establishing his authority over large swaths of modern-day Hungary and Transylvania. When he became khan, Krum added these territories to Bulgaria. Thus his realm stretched from Thrace to the northern Carpathians and from the lower Sava River to the Dniester, and bordered the Frankish Empire of Charlemagne along the river Tisza. Krum’s expansionist policy brought him into conflict with Byzantium.

In 809 he sacked the newly fortified town of Serdica (present-day Sofia) and surged into the territory of Macedonia. The imperial army destroyed the Bulgarian capital at Pliska. Krum, however, besieged the Byzantine troops in a mountain pass, where most of them were massacred. Emperor Nikephoros I lost his life, and Krum ordered that Nikephoros’s skull be encrusted in silver and used it as a drinking cup.

After his military success Krum unleashed a total war against Byzantium, laying waste to most of its territory outside the protected walls of Constantinople. He died unexpectedly in 814 in the midst of preparations for an attack on the metropolis.

The emphasis on Krum’s military prowess often neglects his prescience as state-builder. He was the first Bulgarian ruler that began centralizing his empire by providing a common administrative and legal framework. His son Khan Omurtag (r. 814–831) followed his father in further consolidating the state. Omurtag’s main achievement was to improve the legal system developed by Krum. He was also an avid builder of fortresses.

Bulgarian army

Under Omurtag’s successors, Malamir (r. 831–836) and Pressian (r. 836–852), the First Bulgarian Empire penetrated further into Macedonia. Their reign, however, saw an increase in the internal crisis of the state because of the spread of Christianity. Both the Slavs and the Bulgars practiced paganism, but a large number of the Slavs had begun converting to Christianity.

However, the Bulgars and especially their boyars (the aristocracy) remained zealously pagan. Krum and, in particular, Omurtag became notorious for their persecution of Christians. A new kala in the history of the First Bulgarian Empire was inaugurated with the accession of Khan Boris (r. 852–888).

Boris confronted the social tensions within his state as a result of the distinct religious beliefs of the population. In 864 he accepted Christianity for himself and his country. With this act, Boris increased the cohesion of his people. Internationally he also ensured the recognition of his empire, as all the powers of the day were Christian.

In 888 Boris abdicated and retired to a monastery. The throne passed to his eldest son, Vladimir (r. 889–893), who immediately abandoned Christianity and reverted to paganism, forcing Boris to come out of his retirement in 893. He removed and blinded Vladimir and installed his second son, Simeon, to the throne.

The reign of Simeon the Great (893–927) is known as a golden age. Simeon extended the boundaries of the Bulgarian Empire west to the Adriatic, south to the Aegean, and northwest to incorporate most of present-day Serbia and Montenegro.

He besieged Constantinople twice, and Byzantium had to recognize him as basileus (czar, or emperor); the only other ruler to whom Constantinople extended such recognition was the Holy Roman Emperor. In order to indicate the break with the pagan past, Simeon moved the Bulgarian capital from Pliska to nearby Preslav. In Preslav, Bulgarian art and literature flourished with unprecedented brilliance.

Despite these exceptional developments, Simeon’s reign was followed by a period of political and social decay. His son Petar (927–970) was involved in almost constant warfare; the nobility was engaged in factionalist strife, and the church fell to corruption. The general corrosion of the state was reflected by the spread of heresies among the Bulgarians.

By the end of the 10th century the Bulgarian Empire was in rapid decline. In 971 the capital, Preslav, and much of eastern Bulgaria was conquered by Byzantium. Under the leadership of Czar Samuil (997–1014), Bulgaria had a momentary resurgence, with the capital moving to Ohrid. Under Samuil the country expanded into present-day Albania, Montenegro, and parts of Thrace.

However, in 1014 Emperor Basil II “Bulgaroktonus” (the Bulgarian-slayer) captured 15,000 Bulgarian troops and blinded 99 out of every 100; the remainder were left with one eye to guide their comrades back to their czar. When Samuil saw his blinded soldiers he immediately died. By 1018 the last remnants of Bulgarian resistance were quashed and the First Bulgarian Empire came to an end.

The Second Bulgarian Empire

The Bulgarian state disappeared until 1185, when the brothers Petar and Asen organized a rebellion against Byzantium. The revolt initiated the Second Bulgarian Empire, whose capital became Turnovo (present-day Veliko Turnovo). In a pattern that became characteristic of the reconstituted state, first Asen and then Petar were assassinated by disgruntled boyars. It was their youngest brother, Kaloyan (r. 1197–1207), who managed to introduce temporary stability to Bulgaria.

Second Bulgarian empire

At the time, most of the troubles in the Balkans were coming from the crusaders. In 1204 they captured Constantinople and proclaimed that the Bulgarian czar was their vassal. Offended, Kaloyan marched against the armies of the Fourth Crusade and defeated them in a battle near Adrianople (present-day Edirne).

Kaloyan captured Emperor Baldwin and took him as prisoner to his capital, Turnovo, where he died. The Bulgarian forces also decapitated the leader of the Fourth Crusade, Boniface. Kaloyan himself was assassinated shortly afterwards, by dissident nobles, while besieging Thessalonica.

After Kaloyan, Boril took the throne (1207–18). In 1218 the son of Asen, Ivan Asen II, returned from exile and deposed Boril. His reign (1218–41) saw the greatest expansion of the Second Bulgarian Empire which reached the Adriatic and the Aegean.

Besides his military successes, Ivan Asen II also reorganized the financial system of Bulgaria and was the first Bulgarian ruler to mint his own coins. After his death, decline quickly set in. The external sources for this decay were the Mongol onslaught of Europe and the rise of Serbia as a major power in the Balkans.

The royal palace in Turnovo saw 13 czars in less than a century. Perhaps the most colorful of those was the swine-herder Ivailo, who rose from a common peasant to the Bulgarian throne. With a band of determined followers, he managed to defeat local detachments of the Mongol Golden Horde and push them across the Danube. In 1277 he entered Turnovo and personally killed the czar. His rule lasted only two years, and he was removed by troops dispatched from Constantinople.

The defeat of the anti-Ottoman coalition in the battle of Nicopolis in 1396
was the akibat blow leading to the fall of the Bulgarian Empire.

The end of the Second Bulgarian Empire came during the rule of Czar Ivan Alexander (1331–71). He managed to consolidate the territory of Bulgaria, and the country enjoyed economic recovery. Ivan Alexander was also a great patron of the arts. However, he contributed to the breakup of the Bulgarian realm. He separated the region of Vidin from the Bulgarian monarchy and set up his eldest son, Ivan Stratsimir, as a ruler there.

He proclaimed the son from his second marriage, Ivan Shishman, as the inheritor of the Bulgarian throne. As czar, Ivan Shishman (1371–93) fought a losing battle both against the Ottoman Turks and against the breakaway ambitions of Bulgarian boyars. Turnovo fell to the Ottomans in 1393, and three years later Vidin also succumbed, causing the end of the Second Bulgarian Empire.

Bulgar Invasions

Bulgar Invasions

The earliest records of Bulgar invasions in Europe come from the fifth century. In 481 Emperor Zeno employed Bulgar mercenaries against the Ostrogoths who had invaded the Danubian provinces of the Eastern Roman Empire. During the reign of Emperor Anastasius (491–518), the Bulgars made several incursions into Thrace and Illyricum.

During the sixth century the Bulgars raided the Balkan Peninsula twice, and in 568 hordes of them surged into Italy from central Europe. Further invasions of Bulgars into present-day Italy took place around 630. At the time, the bulk of Bulgar invasions were focused on the lands of Byzantium south of the Danube River.

The original homeland of the Bulgars was somewhere between the northern coast of the Caspian Sea and the expanses of Central Asia and China. The name “Bulgar” is of Turkic origin—from the word Bulgha, which means “to mix.” This derivation underlines the complex ethnic makeup of the Bulgars and suggests that they were a hybrid people with a Central Asian, Turkic, or Mongol core combined with Iranian elements.


The Bulgars were stockbreeders, who chiefly raised horses. The Bulgar army was dominated by its fast-moving cavalry. It is often argued that the semilegendary leader of the Bulgars, Avitokhol, who allegedly commanded them into Europe, was none other than Attila the Hun (406–453).

During the sixth century the Bulgars consolidated much of their European possessions into a state called Great Bulgaria, which extended over the North Caucasian steppe and what is now Ukraine. The capital of this state was at Phanagoria (modern-day Taman in Russia).

The leader of Great Bulgaria was Khan Kubrat (c. 585–650). After his death his five sons divided the Bulgar tribes and continued invading European territories. The eldest son, Baian, remained in Great Bulgaria. The second son, Kotrag, crossed the river Don and settled on its far side.

The descendants of either Kotrag’s or Baian’s Bulgars (or both) are reputed to be the founders of Volga Bulgaria in the eighth century, which is considered to be the cultural and ethnic predecessor of the present-day Tatarstan in the Russian Federation. Kubrat’s fourth son, Kubert, moved to Pannonia and later settled in the area of present-day Transylvania. The fifth son, Altchek, moved on to Italy and took Pentapolis, near Ravenna.

Kubrat’s third son, Khan Asparuh (644–701), moved his part of the Bulgar tribes in southern Bessarabia and established himself on an island at the mouth of the river Danube. From there he began attacks against the territory of Byzantium. By that time, Slavs had colonized most of the territory of the Balkan Peninsula. Asparuh entered into an alliance against Byzantium with the league of the seven Slavic tribes, which occupied the territory between the Danube and the Balkan mountain range.

Soon the Bulgars began settling in the territory south of the Danube River. Around 679 a Bulgaro-Slavic state was formed with its center at Pliska (in modern-day northern Bulgaria). Under the leadership of Asparuh the new state defeated the armies of Emperor Constantine IV in 680. This forced Byzantium to recognize the existence of an independent Bulgaro-Slavic state within the territory of its empire in 681.

Although the Bulgar invasions were to continue in the following decades, these became wars for the establishment and enlargement of the new Bulgaro-Slavic state. The Bulgaro-Slavic state established by Asparuh grew into the Bulgarian Empire and became the predecessor of modern-day Bulgaria.

Lazar I

Lazar I

Since at least the 19th century Serbs have memorialized the defeat and death of Lazar I at the Battle of Kosovo in (1389) as an event of central significance in the nation’s history. The defeat of Lazar’s forces by the army of Ottoman sultan Murad I is frequently used to mark the end of independent, medieval Serbia and the beginning of Turkish rule.

Popular songs and poems dating back to the 16th century or earlier recount the martyrdom of Lazar, who according to tradition was visited by an angel the night before the battle and offered a choice between a heavenly and an earthly kingdom.

Choosing the former he was then betrayed by a rival prince secretly allied to Murad. Some versions of the story include a Serb nobleman who demonstrated his true loyalty by sneaking into the Ottoman camp and killing the sultan before the battle.


The traitorous prince is commonly identified as Vuk Brankovic and the loyal noble as Miloš Obilic, both supposedly sons-in-law of Lazar and rivals for his attention. Nationalist writers have used this tale of divine selection, betrayal, loyalty, and deceit to symbolize the historical destiny of Serbia and explain its subsequent incorporation into the Ottoman Empire: 1299–1453.

Between the 12th and early 14th centuries Serbia was united under the Nemanyich dynasty, which consolidated Serb control over much of the central Balkans. The last ruler of the dynasty, Czar Stephan Dušan (r. 1331–55), built a short-lived Serbian empire, extending his control over Albania, Macedonia, and much of Greece, and promoting the elevation of the archbishop of Ipek to the position of patriarch of the Serbian Orthodox Church.

Following Dušan’s death his son Uroš proved unable to maintain his father’s legacy, and real authority quickly slipped into the hands of a number of regional lords. In 1371 one of his supporters, Vukašin, was killed at the head of a large Serb army in battle with the Turks on the Maritsa River. Uroš died two months later, ending the Nemanyich dynasty and with it any real hope for the revival of the Serb empire. The country disintegrated into a number of independent but weak principalities, each vying for territorial control.

The strongest of the remaining Serb rulers was Lazar Hrebeljanovic of Kruševac. In 1374 a gathering of Serb nobles at Ipek recognized him as their leader. Lazar consolidated his position by concluding marriage alliances with the leading nobles in Kosovo and Montenegro, Vuk Brankovic and Gjergj Balsha. He also developed close relations with King Tvrtko of Bosnia, the strongest ruler in the region.

To further bolster his position, he cultivated the support of the Serb patriarch by granting the church additional lands and founding the monastery of Ravanica. Though successful in establishing and defending his role as the leading prince in Serbia, Lazar was unable to reunite a Serb state.

As for other Serb rulers, Lazar’s relations with the Ottoman Turks were complicated. In the 14th century Ottoman influence in the Balkans was growing rapidly, capitalizing on the internal disorder and decline of the Byzantine, Bulgarian, and Serbian empires. Numerous Christian rulers entered into alliance with the Turks or accepted vassalage in return for Ottoman support in their struggle with neighboring princes.

Christian forces were commonly found fighting on the sultan’s campaigns and Turkish soldiers were occasionally lent to Christian princes. Throughout, the Ottomans steadily gained territory and strength, emerging as the leading power of the region.

In 1386 Murad seized Niš from Lazar and two years later raided Bosnia. The following spring the Ottomans prepared to occupy Lazar’s possessions in Kosovo as a prelude to an attack on Bosnia. Lazar called on the assistance of Tvrtko, who provided a large force, as did Lazar’s son-in-law, Vuk Brankovic.

The two armies met at Kosovo Polje on June 15, 1389. Both armies suffered heavy casualties and Lazar and Murad died in the battle, at the end of which Lazar’s army fled. Though the Ottoman army controlled the field, Murad’s son Bayezid I abandoned the campaign in the Balkans and led the remaining Turkish forces against his brother in Anatolia in order to secure his succession to the throne.

There is no direct historical evidence supporting the details of the popular legends associated with the Battle of Kosovo. The identification of Vuk Brankovic as Murad’s secret ally in the battle and the betrayer of Lazar is unlikely given his subsequent, firm resistance to the Ottoman advances in the region.

Similarly the suggestion that Lazar’s defeat marked the end of the medieval Serb empire and the beginning of Ottoman rule fails to account for the dissension of the Serb nobles following Dušan’s death, their continued independence in the half-century following the battle, and their frequent cooperation with the Turks throughout the period.

Though it was likely not the epic confrontation described in Serb folk traditions, Lazar’s defeat in the Battle of Kosovo, as the battle on the Maritsa in 1371, marks the gradual decline of Serb resistance to Ottoman expansion in the late 14th and early 15th centuries. In both cases, the Serbs suffered large casualties. After the battles Serb princes were divided in their reaction to Ottoman victory, with some continuing to resist and others seeking to accommodate the Turks.

Moravia

Moravia in europe map

Moravia was an independent Slavic kingdom that ruled the middle Danube in the ninth century c.e.. Very few historical records exist to document its history, and the precise origin and territorial extent of the kingdom of Moravia are not known.

Byzantine emperor Constantine VII Porphyrogenitos in his political geography De administrando imperio (c. 950) identified the kingdom as consisting of the territories surrounding Morava, referring either to the Morava River in present-day Moravia or to a so-far unidentified city of Morava, perhaps near the Sava River in northern Serbia.

Slovak historians consider the kingdom of Great Moravia to have included lands along the Morava and Danube Rivers and stretching across modern-day Slovakia. Other historians have placed the center of the kingdom farther south, in Hungary and Croatia. The earliest known inhabitants of the region were Celts, who were joined and ultimately displaced by Slavs arriving sometime before the sixth century.


Historical sources mention the brief existence of an independent Slav kingdom along the Frankish border in central Europe in the second quarter of the seventh century. Following the defeat and destruction of the Avar empire by Charlemagne at the end of the eighth century two political centers emerged in the region, the principalities of Nitra and Morava.

In 828 Prince Pribrina of Nitra invited the archbishop of Salzburg to send missionaries to the principality and establish the first Christian church. Five years later Prince Mojmir I of Moravia defeated Pribrina and forced him into exile in the Frankish kingdom. Mojmir then united Nitra and Morava to form Great Moravia.

In 863 or 864 Mojmir’s successor Prince Rastislav asked the Byzantine emperor to send missionaries to Moravia. By turning to Byzantium for support, Rastislav hoped to strengthen his position and secure independence from the Frankish kingdom.

Moravia coat of arms

The emperor sent the brothers Cyril and Methodios, Byzantine church officials who were conversant in Slavic languages. To promote Christianity in Moravia, Cyril developed an alphabet for the Slavs and translated the Gospel into their language.

The written form he introduced, Old Church Slavonic, served as the basis for subsequent Slavic literary development. The Cyrillic alphabet he invented is used in many Slavic languages, including Russian, Bulgarian, and Serbian.

Between 871 and 894 Prince Svätopluk I led Great Moravia, successfully resisting Frankish attacks and defending Methodios’s missionizing efforts (Cyril died in 869) from interference by the archbishop of Salzburg.

In 880 Pope John VIII recognized Methodios as the head of an independent archbishopric in Great Moravia, appointed a bishop for Nitra, and sanctioned the use of Old Church Slavonic as a fourth liturgical language, alongside Latin, Greek, and Hebrew. Great Moravia reached its height at the end of Svätopluk’s reign, controlling Bohemia and parts of Hungary and southern Poland, as well as present-day Slovakia.

Following Svätopluk’s death, his sons Svätopluk II and Mojmir II fought each other for control of the kingdom. Their struggle weakened the state and left it vulnerable to the attacks of Magyar raiders entering the region from across the Carpathian Mountains.

Both princes were killed in battles with the Magyars sometime between 904 and 907. The defeat of the Bavarians by the Magyars near Bratislava in 907 marked the permanent setlement of Magyar tribes in the middle Danube and the clear end of Great Moravia as an independent force in the region.