First Bulgarian Empire (681–1018)
During the late
Roman Empire, several
Roman provinces covered the territory that comprises present-day
Bulgaria: Scythia (
Scythia Minor), Moesia (Upper and Lower),
Thrace,
Macedonia (
First and
Second),
Dacia (
Coastal and Inner, both south of
Danube),
Dardania,
Rhodope (
Roman province) and Haemismontus, and had a mixed population of
Byzantine Greeks, Thracians and
Dacians, most of whom spoke either
Greek or variants of
Vulgar Latin. Several consecutive waves of
Slavic migration throughout the 6th and the early
7th centuries led to a dramatic change of the demographics of the region and its almost complete Slavicisation
.
In the beginning of
8th century Byzantine emperor Justinian II asked
Khan Tervel to create a union against
Arabs invading from the south. The union defeated the Arabs and Khan Tervel received the
Byzantine title "khesar", which stands for "next to the emperor". Under the warrior
Khan Krum (802-814) Bulgaria expanded northwest and south, occupying the lands between the middle Danube and
Moldova rivers, all of present-day
Romania,
Sofia in 809 and Adrianople in
813, and threatening
Constantinople itself.
Krum implemented law reform intending to reduce poverty and strengthen social ties in his vastly enlarged state.
During the reign of
Khan Omurtag (814-831), the northwestern boundaries with the
Frankish Empire were firmly settled along the middle Danube. A magnificent palace, pagan temples, ruler's residence, fortress, citadel, water mains and baths were built in the
Bulgarian capital
Pliska, mainly of stone and brick.
Christianization[edit]
Under
Boris I,
Bulgarians became Christians, and the
Ecumenical Patriarch agreed to allow an autonomous Bulgarian Archbishop at Pliska. Missionaries from Constantinople,
Cyril and Methodius, devised the
Glagolitic alphabet, which was adopted in the
Bulgarian Empire around
886. The alphabet and the
Old Bulgarian language that evolved from Slavonic[32] gave rise to a rich literary and cultural activity centered around the
Preslav and
Ohrid Literary Schools, established by order of Boris I in 886
.
In the early
9th century, a new alphabet —
Cyrillic — was developed at the
Preslav Literary School, adapted from the Glagolitic alphabet invented by
Saints Cyril and Methodius.[33] An alternative theory is that the alphabet was devised at the
Ohrid Literary School by
Saint Climent of Ohrid, a Bulgarian scholar and disciple of Cyril and Methodius.
By the late 9th and early
10th centuries, Bulgaria extended to
Epirus and
Thessaly in the south,
Bosnia in the west and controlled all of present-day Romania and eastern
Hungary to the north. A
Serbian state came into existence as a dependency of the Bulgarian Empire. Under
Tsar Simeon I of Bulgaria (
Simeon the Great), who was educated in Constantinople, Bulgaria became again a serious threat to the
Byzantine Empire. His aggressive policy was aimed at displacing
Byzantium as major partner of the nomadic polities in the area. By subverting the principles of
Byzantine diplomacy and political culture, Symeon turned his own kingdom into a society-structuring factor in the nomadic world.[34][35]
Simeon hoped to take Constantinople and become emperor of both Bulgarians and
Greeks, and fought a series of wars with the Byzantines through his long reign (893-927).
At the end of his rule the front had reached the
Peloponnese in the south, making it the most powerful state in contemporary
Eastern Europe.[35] Simeon proclaimed himself "
Tsar (
Caesar) of the Bulgarians and the
Romans", a title which was recognised by the
Pope, but not by the
Byzantine Emperor. The capital Preslav was said to rival Constantinople,[36][37] the new independent
Bulgarian Orthodox Church became the first new patriarchate besides the Pentarchy and Bulgarian translations of
Christian texts spread all over the
Slavic world of the time.[38]
After Simeon's death, Bulgaria was weakened by wars with
Croatians,
Magyars,
Pechenegs and
Serbs and the spread of the
Bogomil heresy.[39][40] Two consecutive
Rus' and
Byzantine invasions resulted in the seizure of the capital Preslav by the
Byzantine army in 971.[41] Under
Samuil, Bulgaria somewhat recovered from these attacks and managed to conquer
Serbia and
Duklja.[42]
In 986, the Byzantine emperor
Basil II undertook a campaign to conquer Bulgaria. After a war lasting several decades he inflicted a decisive defeat upon the Bulgarians in 1014 and completed the campaign four years later. In 1018, after the death of the last
Bulgarian Tsar -
Ivan Vladislav, most of Bulgaria's nobility chose to join the
Eastern Roman Empire.[43] However, Bulgaria lost its independence and remained subject to Byzantium for more than a century and a half. With the collapse of the state, the Bulgarian church fell under the domination of Byzantine ecclesiastics who took control of the Ohrid Archibishopric.
- published: 17 Jan 2015
- views: 401