Northeastern Bulgaria in the written sources during the barbarian invasions in 11th – 12th c

Authors:

Pages: 215-233

Abstract:

During the last decades of the 10th and the beginnings of the 11th the Byzantine idea about elimination of the Bulgarian kingdom has been realized after fifty years war later called Bulgarian epopee. The events are described with details in the chronicles of contemporaries like Leo the Deacon, John Skylitzes, George Kedrenos. After nearly half a millennium, Byzantium was again involved in a long continued fighting with another wave of invading barbarians across the Danube – Pechenegs, Uzi and later Cumans. The territories south of the river, mainly former provinces of Misia and Scythia, merged into the new theme Paristrion, again were subjected to devastation, looting and destruction of the population. The permanent settlement of the Pechenegs between the Danube and Hemus contributed to the inevitable change of the ethnic setting. In the second half of the 11th c. the Empire lost actual control of these lands for nearly half of century. These crucial events for Byzantium are mentioned in writings of authors like John Skylitzes, Kekaumenos, Michael Psellos, Michael Attaleiates and Anna Komnene. Besides from the written sources we have data from various treatises, letters, official documents – imperial novels and charters, taktikons, and a numbers of hagiographuc writings and documents of church administration and vitae. We receive information from the works of some Eastern and Western writers, contemporaries of the events and later compilers. Unfortunately the native sources about these events are only few – Bulgarian apocryphal chronicle and some inscriptions. For these events from the end of the 11th until the beginning of the 13th c. we have numerous and quite full and detailed written sources of contemporaries and later compilers – Byzantine authors Anna Komnene, Nikephoros Bryennios, John Kinnamos, John Zonaras, Michael Glycas, Nicetas Choniates, George Akropolites, Theodore Skutarios and George Pachymeres. We find in the text of the geographer Al-Idrisi many important data on trade, economy, roads, shipping and general situation in the Empire during the 12th c.

Keywords:

Byzantium, Northeastern Bulgarian lands, 11th – 12th centuries, Pechenegs, Cumans, Uzi

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