The Danubian region in 1000–1004

a new campaign led by basil ii in 1002 targeted the western part of the Danube region, the area around vidin, an important city conquered after a difficult siege, which lasted from March to December. the navy made again use of the “Greek fire,” much like at Dristra in 971, but the besieged were able to extinguish it. the strength of the precinct wall made the con-quest difficult, and it seems that only the depletion of resources available to people in vidin made possible basil ii’s victory.205 as nicolae iorga has suggested, vidin was perhaps the center of an autonomous polity within Samuel’s state.206 that city and its hinterland were now to the theme of Dristra. the empire has become a neighbor of hungary.

two coalitions emerged in the Danube region in 1002. the aggressors were byzantium and hungary, both powers aiming to take control over the area. On the defending side there were bulgaria, and a duchy that had just rebelled against the hungarian king. the information about that duchy in the region now known as the banat is included in the Legenda Major Sancti Gerardi,207 the vita of the first bishop of Morisena-Cenad.

Morisena was the residence of a duke called ahtum, who rose against the King Stephen i of hungary. two dates have been advanced for the rebel-lion and the subsequent war: 1003–1004, and sometimes between 1028 and 1034. the second interpretation208 supports the later chronology because ahtum was allied with the “Greeks”, as it is written in the source. in other words, the war against ahtum was waged at a moment of decline for the byzantine power in the region, namely after basil ii’s death in 1025. the relation recorded in the tenth chapter in the surviving text of the Leg-enda Major Sancti Gerardi contains several confusions and anachronisms, which make difficult any attempt to establish a clear chronology and the context of the events. for instance, ahtum is said to have owned the for-tresses of Severin and vidin. however, this is more likely the situation of the 13th and 14th centuries, when both fortresses belonged to hungary, and not that of the early 11th century. no fort existed in (turnu) Severin during the latter period. On the other hand, because the byzantine army had conquered vidin in 1002, it is unlikely that ahtum possessed it after that. the most important objection concerns the international relations.

205 Skylitzes, Basil II and Constantine, 30 (ed. thurn, 346; transl. flusin, 289; transl. Wort-ley, 328); Zonaras, Xvii, 8.13–14 (ed. büttner-Wobst, 560); Kuzev 1968, 37–44, 55; Kuzev, Gjuzelev 1981, 103–105; Stephenson 2000, 65; nikolov 2001, 151; holmes 2005, 496; Strässle 2006, 168, 275.

206 iorga 1937, 14.

207 Srh, ii, 480–560.

208 bálint 1991, 116–117.

What reasons would the byzantines have to support an enemy of their ally, King Stephen i of hungary, who had fought against bulgaria together with basil ii in 1002, as well as later?209 the real enemy of the byzantines in the Danube region after 1017 were the pechenegs, not the hungarians (see below), and the pechenegs were also the traditional enemies of the hungarians. until at least 1028, byzantium had no interest to support an enemy of hungary. the same alliance is unlikely for 1002, when Stephen i is known to have provided military assistance to basil ii. no military con-flict is mentioned between hungary and the byzantine empire during the period between 1002 and 1038 (the latter year being the latest date so far advanced for ahtum’s rebellion and his war with Stephen). the only solu-tion is that before 1003, ahtum was in fact Samuel’s ally. Some have there-fore maintained that the “Greeks” mentioned in the text were bulgarians, whose name had been replaced since in the late 11th century (when the text was written) bulgaria was a byzantine territory.210 the name “Greeks”

is therefore interpreted as a generic designation for eastern monks, regard-less their ethnicity. it follows that the date of the war between ahtum and Stephen i should be placed around 1002.

ahtum is said to have been baptized in vidin before the byzantine conquest of that town, at a time when he was allied with Samuel and vidin was under the jurisdiction of the bulgarian patriarchate in Ochrid.

Samuel’s 997 campaign into Dalmatia and present-day Serbia was the opportunity for a rebellion against the hungarian duke vajk (the future king Stephen i). in that year, Gabriel abandoned his hungarian wife, which brought bulgaria in conflict with the hungarians. in 1002, Samuel was therefore in conflict not only with basil ii, but also with Stephen i.

this strongly suggests that ahtum was Samuel’s ally.211 Stephen i’s goal in attacking ahtum was to take over the control over the salt trade along the Mureş valley. in brief, the conflict between Stephen i and ahtum must be regarded as a side development of the larger confrontation between basil ii and Stephen i, on one hand, and Samuel, on the other hand, for the domination of the Danube region between vidin and braničevo.

according to some recent interpretations, basil ii entered a peace treaty with Samuel in 1005, whereby he recognized the bulgarian state,

209 for the participation of Stephen i, see Györffy 1964, 149–154; Kosztolnyik 2002, 33.

210 fehér 1921, 152–155; Györffy 1964, 149.

211  the same opinion in Strässle 2006, 155, 333. Makk 1994 a, 27–29 accepted that Samuel was in conflict with Stephen i, but thought that ahtum was his vassal, fighthing against Samuel.

but only in Macedonia. at that moment, the emperor’s intention was not to eliminate bulgaria, for he was satisfied with the recovery of the region between the Lower Danube and the Stara planina, as well as of the city of Dyrrachion on the adriatic coast, a position of considerable strategic and economic importance. the future of bulgaria was that of a client state.212 however, in 1014 basil ii changed his mind and decided to occupy all of bulgaria. he launched a campaign aimed at the conquest of Ochrid, the bulgarian capital. the decisive victory took place in the Kimbalongon mountain pass on the Strymon river, on July 20th, 1014. the hungarian king Stephen i took part in that campaign as basil’s ally.213 the follow-ing bulgarian emperors Gabriel (1014–1015) and John vladislav (1015–1018) continued the fight, but without much success. the last counteroffensive was organized in 1017 by John vladislav in cooperation with Krakras, a local ruler from pernik. the campaign ended in failure when tzotzikios, the strategos of the theme of Dristra, learned about their plans. the bul-garians tried to recruit the pechenegs on their side, but the nomads did not budge.214 this suggests that in 1017 the pechenegs or at least some of them, were again hostile to the byzantine empire, and that the army of the theme of Dristra was able to prevent their invasion.

the remaining part of Macedonia, including Ochrid, the last capital of bulgaria, was occupied in 1018. the theme of bulgaria was organized in the same year and included the central region of the balkans conquered from bulgaria after 1014, but without the region by the Danube, which remained attached to the province of Dristra. the residence of the duke of bulgaria was in Skopion (Skopje), and the first to occupy that position was David arianites, former duke of thessaloniki.215 this book is not dealing with

212 Stephenson 2000, 69–70; Stephenson 2003, 117–120.

213 Skylitzes, Basil II and Constantine, 35 (ed. thurn, 348–350; transl. flusin, 291–292;

transl. Wortley, 331–332); Zonaras, Xvii, 9.2–10 (ed. büttner-Wobst, 563–564); Györffy 1964, 151; Stănescu 1968 a, 413; fine 1991, 198; Makk 1994 a, 30; Whittow 1996, 387–388; Stephen-son 2000, 71–74; StephenStephen-son 2003, 117–119; Strässle 2006, 333. Kimbalongon is the Grecized version of the vlach name Câmpulung (“long field”). according to Strässle 2006, 182–184, Kimbalongon is the rupel pass.

214 Skylitzes, Basil II and Constantine, 36–38, 40–41 (ed. thurn, 350–359; transl. flusin, 293–299; transl. Wortley, 332–339); Zonaras, Xvii, 8.10–26 (ed. büttner-Wobst, 564–567);

bănescu 1946, 70; barnea, Ştefănescu 1971, 93; Jordanov 1995, 210; holmes 2005, 415, 418;

Strässle 2006, 334, 410; božilov 2008, 95. Skylitzes gives the name Tzitzikios, but the real name was tzotzikios, identified with pherses tzotzikios, anthypatos, patrikios and strategos of Cappadocia (McGeer, nesbitt, Oikonomides 2001, 120–121, nr. 43.13) or, better, with his nephew (Stepanenko 2009, 237, 245).

215 Skylitzes, Basil II and Constantine, 41 (ed. thurn, 358; transl. flusin, 298; transl. Wort-ley, 339); bănescu 1946, 118–120; Stephenson 2000, 72–74; holmes 2005, 419–422; borisov 2007, 71; Krsmanović 2008, 55–56; Jordanov 2011 c, 179–180.

the history of that theme, except in relation to the changes in its organiza-tion taking place after 1071, when a part of the Middle Danube region was attached to the theme of bulgaria.

the region along the Danube to the west from vidin made up a dif-ferent province, created after 1019, when the byzantine army moved into the north-western parts of bulgaria, all the way to Sirmium (Srem-ska Mitrovica), a city said to have been under a bulgarian “strategos.”

the name Sermon given for this commander by Skylitzes appears to be a confusion with the name of the city.216 Gold imitations of byzantine nomismata, struck by a certain Sermon stratilates (the latter word being the Greek term for “general”) and said to have been found somewhere in the Danube region have been attributed to that bulgarian commander.217 they are nothing else but forgeries dated ca. 1870.218 following some strat-agem, the commander of Sirmium was killed by the general Constantine Diogenes. the theme of Sirmium was thus created in the north-western territory, perhaps on the basis of the former theme of Morava. the new province included the cities of belgrade and braničevo, which, like Sir-mium, had been part of bulgaria since the early 9th century. the first commander of the theme of Sirmium was duke Constantine Diogenes, who later moved to the theme of bulgaria.219 the theme of Serbia, which is sometimes mistaken for the theme of Sirmium,220 was actually in what is now Montenegro. that theme was administrated by local Serbian rul-ers, like Ljudevit, who is mentioned in 1039 with the title of strategos of Zachlumia and Serbia.221

it appears that the theme of Sirmium had a bridgehead on the left bank of the Danube, at Kuvin, the purpose of which was the defense of the

216 Skylitzes, Basil II and Constantine, 44 (ed. thurn, 365–366; transl. flusin, 303–304;

transl. Wortley, 345); bănescu 1946, 26–27, 120–123, 135 Stephenson 2000, 66; nikolov 2001, 149–150.

217 Schlumberger 1925, ii, 417–418, 420 (the image of the coin); iorga 1937, 9.

218 Metcalf 1979, 54; Oberländer-târnoveanu 2005, 188, 190; Jordanov 2011 d, 135–139. the forgeries may be attributed to a bulgarian or a Serbian person, someone well acquainted with the medieval history of the region, for Sermon appears to have been taken as a symbol of the unity of the southern Slavs (bulgarians and Serbs), during the period just before the liberation of bulgaria from the Ottomans (1878) and while Serbia existed as an autonomous kingdom supported by russia.

219 Wasilewski 1964, 473–474; Kühn 1991, 233–235; bálint 1991, 104; Stephenson 2000, 66, 74, 124; holmes 2005, 423, 425; Strässle 2006, 406; Krsmanović 2008, 198–199; Krsmanović 2009, 76.

220 Laurent 1957, 185–195; Wasilewski 1964, 465–472.

221  Maksimović 1996, 54–56; Stephenson 2000, 66, 74, 123, 126–129; Stephenson 2003, 122–124.

ford at braničevo. i have demonstrated elsewhere that Kuvin is the same as Dibiskos mentioned in 1019 and 1020 as a parish of the bishopric of braničevo.222 the existence of a parish integrated into a byzantine eccle-siastical structure implies that the byzantine administration extended on the northern bank of the Danube, the strategic value of which would be obvious in the subsequent conflicts with hungary. there is, however, no proof that the theme of Sirmium extended any farther into the banat.

in 1019, therefore, two byzantine provinces existed along the Danube—

Dristra and Sirmium (see fig. 4). the first one was extended along the lower course of the river, all the way to its mouths. the boundary between the themes of Dristra and Sirmium must have been somewhere in the iron Gates region around vidin. it is not known for how long after 1002 did the katepanate of Western Mesopotamia continue to exist in northern Dobrudja, but the absence of later testimonies suggests that it was soon after that incorporated into the theme of Dristra.

222 Madgearu 2001, 80–84.