Literary sources for the origin of the Romanians
Encyclopedia
- See Origin of the Romanians for a multidiscipline approach of the subject.
Most of the literary sources for the origin of the Romanians have been interpreted in various ways by the adherents of divergent scholarly theories. Works on this subject have also been colored by political considerations, since the ethnogenesis
Ethnogenesis
Ethnogenesis is the process by which a group of human beings comes to be understood or to understand themselves as ethnically distinct from the wider social landscape from which their grouping emerges...
of the Romanians
Romanians
The Romanians are an ethnic group native to Romania, who speak Romanian; they are the majority inhabitants of Romania....
(who share the “Vlach
Vlachs
Vlach is a blanket term covering several modern Latin peoples descending from the Latinised population in Central, Eastern and Southeastern Europe. English variations on the name include: Walla, Wlachs, Wallachs, Vlahs, Olahs or Ulahs...
” exonym with other peoples speaking an Eastern Romance language
Eastern Romance languages
The Eastern Romance languages in their narrow conception, sometimes known as the Vlach languages, are a group of Romance languages that developed in Southeastern Europe from the local eastern variant of Vulgar Latin. Some classifications include the Italo-Dalmatian languages; when Italian is...
) has been the subject of a spirited controversy.
The followers of the theory of the Daco-Romanian continuity emphasize that the continuous presence of a Romanized
Romanization (cultural)
Romanization or latinization indicate different historical processes, such as acculturation, integration and assimilation of newly incorporated and peripheral populations by the Roman Republic and the later Roman Empire...
population (the ancestors of the modern Romanians) on the territory of present-day Romania
Romania
Romania is a country located at the crossroads of Central and Southeastern Europe, on the Lower Danube, within and outside the Carpathian arch, bordering on the Black Sea...
can be detected in the written primary source
Primary source
Primary source is a term used in a number of disciplines to describe source material that is closest to the person, information, period, or idea being studied....
s even after the Roman withdrawal from Dacia province in the 270s. Their opponents, who are convinced that the ethnogenesis of the Romanians occurred on the central territories of the Balkan Peninsula, state that no extant primary document proves the presence of the Romanians’ ancestors before the 12th century on the territories north of the river Danube
Danube
The Danube is a river in the Central Europe and the Europe's second longest river after the Volga. It is classified as an international waterway....
.
The adherents of the divergent schools concur that their debate cannot be decided based purely on literary sources, and the results of other academic disciplines (such as archaeology
Archaeology
Archaeology, or archeology , is the study of human society, primarily through the recovery and analysis of the material culture and environmental data that they have left behind, which includes artifacts, architecture, biofacts and cultural landscapes...
, linguistics
Linguistics
Linguistics is the scientific study of human language. Linguistics can be broadly broken into three categories or subfields of study: language form, language meaning, and language in context....
, and human genetics
Human genetics
Human genetics describes the study of inheritance as it occurs in human beings. Human genetics encompasses a variety of overlapping fields including: classical genetics, cytogenetics, molecular genetics, biochemical genetics, genomics, population genetics, developmental genetics, clinical genetics,...
research) cannot be ignored.
The article, following the sources’ chronology, summarizes some important literary sources, and it also presents a set of the competing interpretations of the cited documents.
Descent of the Romanians
Byzantine Empire
The Byzantine Empire was the Eastern Roman Empire during the periods of Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, centred on the capital of Constantinople. Known simply as the Roman Empire or Romania to its inhabitants and neighbours, the Empire was the direct continuation of the Ancient Roman State...
document describing the events of the rebellion of 1066-1067 in the hinterland of Larissa
Larissa
Larissa is the capital and biggest city of the Thessaly region of Greece and capital of the Larissa regional unit. It is a principal agricultural centre and a national transportation hub, linked by road and rail with the port of Volos, the city of Thessaloniki and Athens...
(in Greece
Greece
Greece , officially the Hellenic Republic , and historically Hellas or the Republic of Greece in English, is a country in southeastern Europe....
) may be the first account of the Vlachs
Vlachs
Vlach is a blanket term covering several modern Latin peoples descending from the Latinised population in Central, Eastern and Southeastern Europe. English variations on the name include: Walla, Wlachs, Wallachs, Vlahs, Olahs or Ulahs...
, a generic term describing Romance
Romance languages
The Romance languages are a branch of the Indo-European language family, more precisely of the Italic languages subfamily, comprising all the languages that descend from Vulgar Latin, the language of ancient Rome...
populations, in Southeastern Europe. Its author states that these Vlachs descended from the Dacians
Dacians
The Dacians were an Indo-European people, very close or part of the Thracians. Dacians were the ancient inhabitants of Dacia...
, and he implies a southward migration of these Vlachs. The document suggests that these Vlachs’ “homeland” used to lie south of the Danube, and it also mentions the Bessi
Bessi
The Bessi were an independent Thracian tribe who lived in a territory ranging from Moesia to Mount Rhodope in southern Thrace, but are often mentioned as dwelling about Haemus, the mountain range that separates Moesia from Thrace and from Mount Rhodope to the northern part of Hebrus...
(an ancient Thracian tribe living south of the Danube) among their ancestors.
A 12th-century Byzantine chronicle
Chronicle
Generally a chronicle is a historical account of facts and events ranged in chronological order, as in a time line. Typically, equal weight is given for historically important events and local events, the purpose being the recording of events that occurred, seen from the perspective of the...
r, when describing the events of a Byzantine attack on Hungary
Kingdom of Hungary
The Kingdom of Hungary comprised present-day Hungary, Slovakia and Croatia , Transylvania , Carpatho Ruthenia , Vojvodina , Burgenland , and other smaller territories surrounding present-day Hungary's borders...
, incidentally mentions that the Vlach recruits
Army recruit
Recruit or army recruit is a term often colloquially used to refer to the lowest military rank in various armed services. It usually implies that the soldier so labeled has not yet completed basic training....
is said to have descended from Italian settlers.
A 13th-century Flemish
Flemish people
The Flemings or Flemish are the Dutch-speaking inhabitants of Belgium, where they are mostly found in the northern region of Flanders. They are one of two principal cultural-linguistic groups in Belgium, the other being the French-speaking Walloons...
Franciscan
Franciscan
Most Franciscans are members of Roman Catholic religious orders founded by Saint Francis of Assisi. Besides Roman Catholic communities, there are also Old Catholic, Anglican, Lutheran, ecumenical and Non-denominational Franciscan communities....
missionary
Missionary
A missionary is a member of a religious group sent into an area to do evangelism or ministries of service, such as education, literacy, social justice, health care and economic development. The word "mission" originates from 1598 when the Jesuits sent members abroad, derived from the Latin...
, in accordance with his conception concerning the origins of the Danube Bulgars
Bulgarians
The Bulgarians are a South Slavic nation and ethnic group native to Bulgaria and neighbouring regions. Emigration has resulted in immigrant communities in a number of other countries.-History and ethnogenesis:...
from the Volga Bulgars
Volga Bulgaria
Volga Bulgaria, or Volga–Kama Bolghar, is a historic Bulgar state that existed between the seventh and thirteenth centuries around the confluence of the Volga and Kama rivers in what is now Russia.-Origin:...
, derives the Vlachs from a certain people (Illac / Ulac) living near the Bashkirs
Bashkirs
The Bashkirs are a Turkic people indigenous to Bashkortostan extending on both parts of the Ural mountains, on the place where Europe meets Asia. Groups of Bashkirs also live in the republic of Tatarstan, Perm Krai, Chelyabinsk, Orenburg, Tyumen, Sverdlovsk, Kurgan, Samara and Saratov Oblasts of...
.
A chronicle
Chronicle
Generally a chronicle is a historical account of facts and events ranged in chronological order, as in a time line. Typically, equal weight is given for historically important events and local events, the purpose being the recording of events that occurred, seen from the perspective of the...
written in Hungary in the 1280s is the first source identifying the Vlachs with the “Romans’ shepherds” who were described as the inhabitants of Pannonia
Pannonia
Pannonia was an ancient province of the Roman Empire bounded north and east by the Danube, coterminous westward with Noricum and upper Italy, and southward with Dalmatia and upper Moesia....
by earlier documents.
The Florentine humanist
Renaissance humanism
Renaissance humanism was an activity of cultural and educational reform engaged by scholars, writers, and civic leaders who are today known as Renaissance humanists. It developed during the fourteenth and the beginning of the fifteenth centuries, and was a response to the challenge of Mediæval...
, Poggio Bracciolini (1380–1459) thought that the descendants of Emperor Trajan's settlers lived in the western part of Eastern Europe
Eastern Europe
Eastern Europe is the eastern part of Europe. The term has widely disparate geopolitical, geographical, cultural and socioeconomic readings, which makes it highly context-dependent and even volatile, and there are "almost as many definitions of Eastern Europe as there are scholars of the region"...
. Aeneas Sylvius Piccolomini (1405–1464) supposed that the Romanians were the descendants of the Roman soldiers who had been sent to fight against the Dacians, and they had been named after their military leader, a certain Pomponius Flaccus
Flaccus
Flaccus was a cognomen of the ancient Roman plebeian family Fulvius, considered one of the most illustrious gentes of the city. Cicero and Pliny the Elder state that the family was originally from Tusculum, and that members still lived there in the 1st century.As usual for cognomina, "Flaccus" was...
. Antonio Bonfini
Antonio Bonfini
Antonio Bonfini was an Italian humanist and poet who spent the last years of his career as a court historian in Hungary with King Matthias Corvinus....
(1427/1434-1502), who lived in Hungary from 1486, wrote that the Romanians had descended from Trajan’s legionnaires.
A chronicle recorded in Russian
Russian language
Russian is a Slavic language used primarily in Russia, Belarus, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan. It is an unofficial but widely spoken language in Ukraine, Moldova, Latvia, Turkmenistan and Estonia and, to a lesser extent, the other countries that were once constituent republics...
annals
Annals
Annals are a concise form of historical representation which record events chronologically, year by year. The Oxford English Dictionary defines annals as "a narrative of events written year by year"...
reproduces a tradition in Moldavia
Moldavia
Moldavia is a geographic and historical region and former principality in Eastern Europe, corresponding to the territory between the Eastern Carpathians and the Dniester river...
of the origin of the Romanian people. The text presents the complete lack of its anonymous author’s historical and critical sense, but it demonstrates the memory of Rome in the origin, genesis and past of the Romanians. The chronicle narrates that a certain “King Ladislaus” granted land to the ancestors of the Romanians in the Kingdom of Hungary
Kingdom of Hungary
The Kingdom of Hungary comprised present-day Hungary, Slovakia and Croatia , Transylvania , Carpatho Ruthenia , Vojvodina , Burgenland , and other smaller territories surrounding present-day Hungary's borders...
.
The oldest Muntenian chronicle, attributed to Stoica Ludescu, also preserved a popular tradition among the Romanians:
Roman conquest and colonization of Dacia
Roman province
In Ancient Rome, a province was the basic, and, until the Tetrarchy , largest territorial and administrative unit of the empire's territorial possessions outside of Italy...
Dacia by Emperor Trajan (98-117 AD). Their opponents emphasize that the early sources suggest that the Dacian participation in the Romanization of Dacia province was minimal; on the other hand, the sources’ statements may be exaggerations.
Ancient sources suggest the massive and organized colonization of Dacia province with Latin
Latin
Latin is an Italic language originally spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. It, along with most European languages, is a descendant of the ancient Proto-Indo-European language. Although it is considered a dead language, a number of scholars and members of the Christian clergy speak it fluently, and...
-speaking ethnic elements.
The Roman withdrawal from Dacia
Aurelian
Aurelian , was Roman Emperor from 270 to 275. During his reign, he defeated the Alamanni after a devastating war. He also defeated the Goths, Vandals, Juthungi, Sarmatians, and Carpi. Aurelian restored the Empire's eastern provinces after his conquest of the Palmyrene Empire in 273. The following...
(270-275) had Dacia province evacuated in good order when he decided to withdraw the Roman military units from the territory. Authors from antiquity
Classical antiquity
Classical antiquity is a broad term for a long period of cultural history centered on the Mediterranean Sea, comprising the interlocking civilizations of ancient Greece and ancient Rome, collectively known as the Greco-Roman world...
imply that Dacia province had already been lost during the reign of Emperor Gallienus
Gallienus
Gallienus was Roman Emperor with his father Valerian from 253 to 260, and alone from 260 to 268. He took control of the Empire at a time when it was undergoing great crisis...
(253-268).
A 6th-century author, who was raised in Moesia, only referred to the legions leaving Dacia.
Sources on the territory of present-day Romania in the Migration Period
Latin
Latin is an Italic language originally spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. It, along with most European languages, is a descendant of the ancient Proto-Indo-European language. Although it is considered a dead language, a number of scholars and members of the Christian clergy speak it fluently, and...
ophone individuals or groups living on the territories north of the Danube.
4th-5th centuries
Documents written in the 4th-6th centuries suggest that Dacian-speaking CarpiansCarpians
The Carpi or Carpiani were an ancient people that resided, between not later than ca. AD 140 and until at least AD 318, in the former Principality of Moldavia ....
, Indo-Iranian peoples
Indo-Iranians
Indo-Iranian peoples are a linguistic group consisting of the Indo-Aryan, Iranian, Dardic and Nuristani peoples; that is, speakers of Indo-Iranian languages, a major branch of the Indo-European language family....
, Germanic tribes, and Huns lived on the territories north of the lower Danube at that time.
Diplomatic mission
A diplomatic mission is a group of people from one state or an international inter-governmental organisation present in another state to represent the sending state/organisation in the receiving state...
sent by Emperor Theodosius II
Theodosius II
Theodosius II , commonly surnamed Theodosius the Younger, or Theodosius the Calligrapher, was Byzantine Emperor from 408 to 450. He is mostly known for promulgating the Theodosian law code, and for the construction of the Theodosian Walls of Constantinople...
(408-450) to the court of Attila the Hun
Attila the Hun
Attila , more frequently referred to as Attila the Hun, was the ruler of the Huns from 434 until his death in 453. He was leader of the Hunnic Empire, which stretched from the Ural River to the Rhine River and from the Danube River to the Baltic Sea. During his reign he was one of the most feared...
(434-453) implies that “the language of the Ausones
Ausones
The Ausones were an ancient Italic tribe settled in the southern part of Italy. Often confused with the Aurunci, they share with them only a probably common origin.-History:...
” (the Latin) become a real international language
International auxiliary language
An international auxiliary language or interlanguage is a language meant for communication between people from different nations who do not share a common native language...
in the space of the territories north of the Danube. On the other hand, the diplomat
Diplomacy
Diplomacy is the art and practice of conducting negotiations between representatives of groups or states...
makes no mention of Latinized
Romanization (cultural)
Romanization or latinization indicate different historical processes, such as acculturation, integration and assimilation of newly incorporated and peripheral populations by the Roman Republic and the later Roman Empire...
people beyond the Roman Empire
Roman Empire
The Roman Empire was the post-Republican period of the ancient Roman civilization, characterised by an autocratic form of government and large territorial holdings in Europe and around the Mediterranean....
: among the Huns only those spoke Latin who had more contact with the Empire.
The diplomat’s account of a village, located by Romanian historian Stelian Brezeanu in the Banat
Banat
The Banat is a geographical and historical region in Central Europe currently divided between three countries: the eastern part lies in western Romania , the western part in northeastern Serbia , and a small...
, is regarded by the same historian as a proof that the migratory peoples
Migration Period
The Migration Period, also called the Barbarian Invasions , was a period of intensified human migration in Europe that occurred from c. 400 to 800 CE. This period marked the transition from Late Antiquity to the Early Middle Ages...
preserved almost entirely the structures of the sedentary society
Sedentism
In evolutionary anthropology and archaeology, sedentism , is a term applied to the transition from nomadic to permanent, year-round settlement.- Requirements for permanent settlements :...
.
6th-7th centuries
The territories north of the lower Danube were a SlavicSlavic peoples
The Slavic people are an Indo-European panethnicity living in Eastern Europe, Southeast Europe, North Asia and Central Asia. The term Slavic represents a broad ethno-linguistic group of people, who speak languages belonging to the Slavic language family and share, to varying degrees, certain...
“homeland” for the 6th-century authors who wrote about them. The “Sclavenes” seem to appear in the sources as an umbrella term
Umbrella term
An umbrella term is a word that provides a superset or grouping of concepts that all fall under a single common category. Umbrella term is also called a hypernym. For example, cryptology is an umbrella term that encompasses cryptography and cryptanalysis, among other fields...
for a multitude of groups living north of the Danube frontier, which could not be classified as either “Huns” or “Gepids”.
In the episode of the “phoney Chilbudius”, the Roman general
Legatus
A legatus was a general in the Roman army, equivalent to a modern general officer. Being of senatorial rank, his immediate superior was the dux, and he outranked all military tribunes...
, Chilbudius
Chilbudius
Chilbudius or Chilbuldius was a Byzantine general, holding the rank of magister militum per Thracias in the early 530s. He was apparently killed in battle c. 533, but an impostor claimed his identity c. 545-546. The only source for both men is Procopius.- Origin :According to some scholars...
is reported to have disappeared in an expedition on the left banks of the Danube; shortly afterwards, an Ant
Antes (people)
The Antes or Antae were an ancient Slavic-Iranian tribal union in Eastern Europe who lived north of the lower Danube and the Black Sea in the 6th and 7th century AD and who are associated with the archaeological Penkovka culture.- Historiography :Procopius and Jordanes mention the Antes as one of...
slave strikingly resembled with Chilbudius, came to the Roman authorities, pretending that he was the imperial commander and he
Some scholars interepreted this episode as evidence for the fact the Roman prisoner
Prisoner of war
A prisoner of war or enemy prisoner of war is a person, whether civilian or combatant, who is held in custody by an enemy power during or immediately after an armed conflict...
s in the Wallachian field
Wallachia
Wallachia or Walachia is a historical and geographical region of Romania. It is situated north of the Danube and south of the Southern Carpathians...
spoke Latin and used it as a lingua franca
Lingua franca
A lingua franca is a language systematically used to make communication possible between people not sharing a mother tongue, in particular when it is a third language, distinct from both mother tongues.-Characteristics:"Lingua franca" is a functionally defined term, independent of the linguistic...
. In addition to Priscus of Panium's reference to the "language of the Ausoni" and Pseudo-Maurice's above-cited report, the episode confirm the importance of the circulation of the Latin language in the lands north of the Danube. On the other hand, the episode does not prove that the “phoney Chilbudius” mastered Latin north of the Danube. Nevertheless, contemporary sources attest the use of more than one language by individuals whom their authors viewed as Antes or Sclavenes: the “phoney Chilbudius” was able to claim successfully a false identity, that of a Roman general, because he spoke Latin fluently.
In fact, language shift
Language shift
Language shift, sometimes referred to as language transfer or language replacement or assimilation, is the progressive process whereby a speech community of a language shifts to speaking another language. The rate of assimilation is the percentage of individuals with a given mother tongue who speak...
s were inextricably tied to shifts in the political economy in which speech situations were located; this is shown by the episode of the Gepid taken prisoner by Priscus’ (a Roman general) army, during the 593 campaign. He was close to the Sclavene “king” Musocius and communicated with him in the “king’s language”; he betrayed his leader and cooperated with Priscus presumably using Latin as a language of communication.
In 568, the Avars
Eurasian Avars
The Eurasian Avars or Ancient Avars were a highly organized nomadic confederacy of mixed origins. They were ruled by a khagan, who was surrounded by a tight-knit entourage of nomad warriors, an organization characteristic of Turko-Mongol groups...
occupied the Carpathian Basin, and their power extended into the Pontic-Caspian steppe
Pontic-Caspian steppe
The Pontic-Caspian steppe is the vast steppeland stretching from the north of the Black Sea as far as the east of the Caspian Sea, from western Ukraine across the Southern Federal District and the Volga Federal District of Russia to western Kazakhstan,...
until the 630s. Thenceforward, the numbers of those who eventually moved into the Middle Danube region were greatly increased by repeated migrations from the steppe of separate, different groups; moreover, early sources prove that groups of Gepids were still living in the Tisa region.
By the 7th century, the Carpathian-Lower Danubian region had become a land of Slavs
Slavic peoples
The Slavic people are an Indo-European panethnicity living in Eastern Europe, Southeast Europe, North Asia and Central Asia. The term Slavic represents a broad ethno-linguistic group of people, who speak languages belonging to the Slavic language family and share, to varying degrees, certain...
which was recorded even by a faraway Armenian
Armenians
Armenian people or Armenians are a nation and ethnic group native to the Armenian Highland.The largest concentration is in Armenia having a nearly-homogeneous population with 97.9% or 3,145,354 being ethnic Armenian....
geographer
Geographer
A geographer is a scholar whose area of study is geography, the study of Earth's natural environment and human society.Although geographers are historically known as people who make maps, map making is actually the field of study of cartography, a subset of geography...
. On the other hand, the information provided by geographical sources is limited in value, because they show a rather vague understanding of the geography of Southeastern Europe.
8th-9th centuries
In the 9th century, the Slavs from the region appear in several documents by the names TimočaniTimocani
The Timočani or Timochani were a medieval South Slavic tribe that lived in the territory of present-day eastern Serbia, west of the Timok River, as well as in the regions of Banat, Syrmia and west Moesia....
, Abodriti
Obotrites
The Obotrites , also commonly known as the Obodrites, Abotrites, or Abodrites, were a confederation of medieval West Slavic tribes within the territory of modern Mecklenburg and Holstein in northern Germany . For decades they were allies of Charlemagne in his wars against Germanic Saxons and Slavic...
, Prædecenti, and Osterabtrezi, although their geographical situation
Geography
Geography is the science that studies the lands, features, inhabitants, and phenomena of Earth. A literal translation would be "to describe or write about the Earth". The first person to use the word "geography" was Eratosthenes...
cannot be defined on the basis of these sources.
10th-11th centuries
A nearly contemporary source suggests that around 892, the salt mineSalt mine
A salt mine is a mining operation involved in the extraction of rock salt or halite from evaporite deposits.-Occurrence:Areas known for their salt mines include Kilroot near Carrickfergus, Northern Ireland ; Khewra and Warcha in Pakistan; Tuzla in Bosnia; Wieliczka and Bochnia in Poland A salt mine...
district in southern Transylvania
Transylvania
Transylvania is a historical region in the central part of Romania. Bounded on the east and south by the Carpathian mountain range, historical Transylvania extended in the west to the Apuseni Mountains; however, the term sometimes encompasses not only Transylvania proper, but also the historical...
was under the control of the First Bulgarian Empire
First Bulgarian Empire
The First Bulgarian Empire was a medieval Bulgarian state founded in the north-eastern Balkans in c. 680 by the Bulgars, uniting with seven South Slavic tribes...
.
Simeon I of Bulgaria
Simeon I the Great ruled over Bulgaria from 893 to 927, during the First Bulgarian Empire. Simeon's successful campaigns against the Byzantines, Magyars and Serbs led Bulgaria to its greatest territorial expansion ever, making it the most powerful state in contemporary Eastern Europe...
attacked the Magyars, inciting against them their eastern neighbors, the Pechenegs. The destruction brought by the Pechenegs forced the remaining Magyars to embark on another migration, which took them into the Carpathian Basin.
Around 948, the land of the Pechenegs (Patzinacia) was divided into eight “province
Province
A province is a territorial unit, almost always an administrative division, within a country or state.-Etymology:The English word "province" is attested since about 1330 and derives from the 13th-century Old French "province," which itself comes from the Latin word "provincia," which referred to...
s”, and four of them were located west of the river Dnieper; thus the entire steppe
Steppe
In physical geography, steppe is an ecoregion, in the montane grasslands and shrublands and temperate grasslands, savannas, and shrublands biomes, characterized by grassland plains without trees apart from those near rivers and lakes...
corridor between the rivers Danube and Dnieper was under Pecheneg control.
Records on the people called N-n-d-r who lived on the territories between the Slavs and the Magyars are also interpreted as a references to the ancestors of the Romanians; on the other hand, nandor was the ancient name of the Bulgars
Bulgars
The Bulgars were a semi-nomadic who flourished in the Pontic Steppe and the Volga basin in the 7th century.The Bulgars emerge after the collapse of the Hunnic Empire in the 5th century....
.
A Varangian runestone
Varangian Runestones
The Varangian Runestones are runestones that mention voyages to the East or the Eastern route , or to more specific eastern locations such as Garðaríki ....
from Gotland
Gotland
Gotland is a county, province, municipality and diocese of Sweden; it is Sweden's largest island and the largest island in the Baltic Sea. At 3,140 square kilometers in area, the region makes up less than one percent of Sweden's total land area...
commemorates a merchant (Hróðfúss) who was traveling to Constantinople
Constantinople
Constantinople was the capital of the Roman, Eastern Roman, Byzantine, Latin, and Ottoman Empires. Throughout most of the Middle Ages, Constantinople was Europe's largest and wealthiest city.-Names:...
and was killed by the Blokumenn. The traditional interpretation of the ethnonym
Ethnonym
An ethnonym is the name applied to a given ethnic group. Ethnonyms can be divided into two categories: exonyms and autonyms or endonyms .As an example, the ethnonym for...
Blokumenn is Vlach. An alternative explanation is that the term means “black man”, though of what kind is not clear; the term may stand for the mixed tribes that are called “Black Hats” in the Russian
Kievan Rus'
Kievan Rus was a medieval polity in Eastern Europe, from the late 9th to the mid 13th century, when it disintegrated under the pressure of the Mongol invasion of 1237–1240....
sources.
12th-century
Primary Chronicle
The Primary Chronicle , Ruthenian Primary Chronicle or Russian Primary Chronicle, is a history of Kievan Rus' from about 850 to 1110, originally compiled in Kiev about 1113.- Three editions :...
relates that the Volochs attacked and subdued the Slavs living in the Carpathian Basin. If the Volochs are identical with the Vlachs, the chronicle’s entries in question are among the first references to the Romanians’ ancestors. On the other hand, the text shows explicitly that the Slavs had inhabited the area before the Volochs; and therefore the Volochs must be identical to the Franks who occupied part of the Carpathian Basin at the end of the 8th century.
A 12th-century Byzantine author reports that Emperor Manuel I
Manuel I Komnenos
Manuel I Komnenos was a Byzantine Emperor of the 12th century who reigned over a crucial turning point in the history of Byzantium and the Mediterranean....
(1143–1180), in 1166, launched a combined attack on the Kingdom of Hungary
Kingdom of Hungary
The Kingdom of Hungary comprised present-day Hungary, Slovakia and Croatia , Transylvania , Carpatho Ruthenia , Vojvodina , Burgenland , and other smaller territories surrounding present-day Hungary's borders...
with an extraordinary corps crossing the Danube from Dobrudja, and the corps included a large number of Vlach recruits.
A Byzantine historian’s record on the capture of Andronikos Komnenos
Andronikos I Komnenos
Andronikos I Komnenos was Byzantine Emperor from 1183 to 1185). He was the son of Isaac Komnenos and grandson of Emperor Alexios I Komnenos.-Early years:...
by Vlachs in 1164 also proves that these Vlachs had already been living north of the Danube (probably somewhere in present-day Moldavia
Moldavia
Moldavia is a geographic and historical region and former principality in Eastern Europe, corresponding to the territory between the Eastern Carpathians and the Dniester river...
) by that time.
The Nibelungenlied
Nibelungenlied
The Nibelungenlied, translated as The Song of the Nibelungs, is an epic poem in Middle High German. The story tells of dragon-slayer Siegfried at the court of the Burgundians, how he was murdered, and of his wife Kriemhild's revenge....
(“The Song of the Nibelungs”), written between 1191 and 1204, describes Attila the Hun accompanied by the Vlachs whom their duke Ramung was leading.
13th-century
Gesta Hungarorum
Gesta Hungarorum is a record of early Hungarian history by an unknown author who describes himself as Anonymi Bele Regis Notarii , but is generally cited as Anonymus...
(“The Deeds of the Hungarians”) records the Romanians’ presence in the Carpathian Basin prior to the arrival of the Magyars. According to the Gesta, the Magyars came across three Romanian cnezates (dukedoms
Duchy
A duchy is a territory, fief, or domain ruled by a duke or duchess.Some duchies were sovereign in areas that would become unified realms only during the Modern era . In contrast, others were subordinate districts of those kingdoms that unified either partially or completely during the Medieval era...
) when invaded the Carpathian Basin around 895. On the other hand, the chronicler’s methods are those of a historical novel
Historical novel
According to Encyclopædia Britannica, a historical novel is-Development:An early example of historical prose fiction is Luó Guànzhōng's 14th century Romance of the Three Kingdoms, which covers one of the most important periods of Chinese history and left a lasting impact on Chinese culture.The...
ist. The chronicler had no knowledge of either the actual circumstances of the Magyar Conquest or the Magyars’ real enemies, and thus he defined the ethnic bond of the leaders hostile to the Magyars on the basis of the ethno-political circumstances surrounding Hungary around 1200. For example, the history of the first years of the Second Bulgarian Empire
Second Bulgarian Empire
The Second Bulgarian Empire was a medieval Bulgarian state which existed between 1185 and 1396 . A successor of the First Bulgarian Empire, it reached the peak of its power under Kaloyan and Ivan Asen II before gradually being conquered by the Ottomans in the late 14th-early 15th century...
gave rise to the appearance in conjunction of Bulgars, Vlachs and Cumans in the Gesta.
An early 13th-century biography of St. Olaf of Norway
Olaf II of Norway
Olaf II Haraldsson was King of Norway from 1015 to 1028. He was posthumously given the title Rex Perpetuus Norvegiae and canonised in Nidaros by Bishop Grimkell, one year after his death in the Battle of Stiklestad on 29 July 1030. Enshrined in Nidaros Cathedral...
, which is preserved in a late 14th-century manuscript known as Flateyjarbók
Flateyjarbók
The Flatey Book, is an important medieval Icelandic manuscript. It is also known as GkS 1005 fol. and by the Latin name Codex Flateyensis.- Description :...
mentions Blokumenn among the allies of Grand Prince Sviatopolk I of Kiev
Sviatopolk I of Kiev
Sviatopolk I Vladimirovich was the Kniaz' of Turov and Velikii Kniaz of Kiev whose paternity and guilt in the murder of brothers are disputed.-Early life:Sviatopolk's mother was a Greek nun captured by Sviatoslav I in Bulgaria and married to his lawful heir...
(1015–1019).
14th-century and later
The “Black Vlachs” mentioned by a PersianPersian people
The Persian people are part of the Iranian peoples who speak the modern Persian language and closely akin Iranian dialects and languages. The origin of the ethnic Iranian/Persian peoples are traced to the Ancient Iranian peoples, who were part of the ancient Indo-Iranians and themselves part of...
historian were certainly the Vlachs in Transylvania or the Carpathian Mountains though their precise location is uncertain.
The oldest Turkish chronicle
Turkic peoples
The Turkic peoples are peoples residing in northern, central and western Asia, southern Siberia and northwestern China and parts of eastern Europe. They speak languages belonging to the Turkic language family. They share, to varying degrees, certain cultural traits and historical backgrounds...
, the Oghuz-name, which is preserved in a copy incorporated into a 17th-century text, relates that Kipchak, the eponymous hero
Eponym
An eponym is the name of a person or thing, whether real or fictitious, after which a particular place, tribe, era, discovery, or other item is named or thought to be named...
of the Cumans, had defeated many nations, including the Ulâq (Vlachs), no doubts those previously mentioned in Norse
Norsemen
Norsemen is used to refer to the group of people as a whole who spoke what is now called the Old Norse language belonging to the North Germanic branch of Indo-European languages, especially Norwegian, Icelandic, Faroese, Swedish and Danish in their earlier forms.The meaning of Norseman was "people...
sources.
An anonymous Italian author, writing in Tuscany
Tuscany
Tuscany is a region in Italy. It has an area of about 23,000 square kilometres and a population of about 3.75 million inhabitants. The regional capital is Florence ....
in the 14th century, drew up a description of the world. Among the populations inhabiting the Kingdom of Hungary
Kingdom of Hungary
The Kingdom of Hungary comprised present-day Hungary, Slovakia and Croatia , Transylvania , Carpatho Ruthenia , Vojvodina , Burgenland , and other smaller territories surrounding present-day Hungary's borders...
, this author mentioned the Romanians and the Vlachs (i Rumeni e i Valacchi), not knowing the names referred to one and the same people.
Sources on the Vlachs and "Wallachias" / "Vlachias" south of the Danube
From 976 onwards, various written sources mention Romanians (Vlachs) in Thessaly and the Balkan MountainsBalkan Mountains
The Balkan mountain range is a mountain range in the eastern part of the Balkan Peninsula. The Balkan range runs 560 km from the Vrashka Chuka Peak on the border between Bulgaria and eastern Serbia eastward through central Bulgaria to Cape Emine on the Black Sea...
. One theory holds that the Romanized Dacians, who had lived between the Danube and the Balkan Mountains, was obliged to seek refuge in the south and southwest when the Slavs settled down south of the Danube; the opposing theory argues that the Vlachs living on the territories south of the Danube were the ancestors of both the Romanians and the Aromanians
Aromanians
Aromanians are a Latin people native throughout the southern Balkans, especially in northern Greece, Albania, the Republic of Macedonia, Bulgaria, and as an emigrant community in Serbia and Romania . An older term is Macedo-Romanians...
, Megleno-Romanians
Megleno-Romanians
The Megleno-Romanians or Meglen Vlachs or Moglenite Vlachs, are a small Eastern Romance people, currently inhabiting seven villages in the Moglena region spanning the Pella and Kilkis prefectures of Central Macedonia, Greece, and one village, Huma, across the border in the Republic of...
, and Istro-Romanians
Istro-Romanians
Istro-Romanians / Istrorumeni are an ethnic group living in northeastern Istria, currently spanning over a small area of Croatia and a...
.
7th-10th centuries
In the war of 587-588, the Byzantine commander ComentiolusComentiolus
Comentiolus was a prominent Eastern Roman general at the close of the 6th century, during the reign of Emperor Maurice . He played a major role in Maurice's Balkan campaigns, and fought also in the East against the Persians.- Life :...
lead his armies from Marcianopolis
Devnya
Devnya is a town in Varna Province, Northeastern Bulgaria, located about 25 km away to the west from the city of Varna and The Black Sea Coast. It is the administrative centre of the homonymous Devnya Municipality...
(Devnya, Bulgaria) to the Eastern Balkan Mountains
Balkan Mountains
The Balkan mountain range is a mountain range in the eastern part of the Balkan Peninsula. The Balkan range runs 560 km from the Vrashka Chuka Peak on the border between Bulgaria and eastern Serbia eastward through central Bulgaria to Cape Emine on the Black Sea...
in the vicinity of the river Kamchiya
Kamchiya
The Kamchiya is a 244.5 km long river in eastern Bulgaria, the longest river on the Balkan Peninsula to flow directly into the Black Sea...
. Sources written in the 7th century record the episode that the order among the marching soldiers was lost, because someone speaking in a “native language” called on the one ahead of him to turn around (torna, torna) and other soldiers thought that a command was given to retreat (because at that time, the language of command was Latin in the Byzantine Army).
The Byzantine authors’ works describe the drama of the prisoners captured during the raids of the migratory peoples in the Balkan provinces. In 680, the Avar khagan
Khagan
Khagan or qagan , alternatively spelled kagan, khaghan, qaghan, or chagan, is a title of imperial rank in the Mongolian and Turkic languages equal to the status of emperor and someone who rules a khaganate...
, however, could not prevent a group of rebel subjects from leaving the empire and moving to the outskirts of Constantinople. The rebels were the descendants of a group of captives brought to the Avar heartland from the Balkan raids of the early 7th century and settled in the environs of the former city of Sirmium
Sirmium
Sirmium was a city in ancient Roman Pannonia. Firstly mentioned in the 4th century BC and originally inhabited by the Illyrians and Celts, it was conquered by the Romans in the 1st century BC and subsequently became the capital of the Roman province of Lower Pannonia. In 294 AD, Sirmium was...
(Sremska Mitrovica
Sremska Mitrovica
Sremska Mitrovica is a city and municipality located in the Vojvodina province of Serbia, on the left bank of the Sava river. As of 2002 the town had a total population of 39,041, while Sremska Mitrovica municipality had a population of 85,605...
, Serbia).
A number of political leaders spoke two or more languages, and only in exceptional cases is this fact mentioned in our sources. For example, the Bulgar leader Mavros who had escaped from the Avar khanate in the late 7th century spoke four languages: Greek, Latin, Slavic and Bulgarian, and this versatility made his secret plots against Thessalonica so dangerous.
The eastern lands of the Balkan Peninsula were overrun by Slavs, the more western territories (western Bosnia
Bosnia (region)
Bosnia is a eponomous region of Bosnia and Herzegovina. It lies mainly in the Dinaric Alps, ranging to the southern borders of the Pannonian plain, with the rivers Sava and Drina marking its northern and eastern borders. The other eponomous region, the southern, other half of the country is...
, Croatia
Croatia
Croatia , officially the Republic of Croatia , is a unitary democratic parliamentary republic in Europe at the crossroads of the Mitteleuropa, the Balkans, and the Mediterranean. Its capital and largest city is Zagreb. The country is divided into 20 counties and the city of Zagreb. Croatia covers ...
, and Dalmatia) seem to have chiefly suffered Avar raids. But the fate of the indigenous population is not as clear. Many were killed, while others were carried off beyond the Danube; still others withdrew to the mountains or remote regions, and their descendants reappeared later as Vlachs or Albanians
Albanians
Albanians are a nation and ethnic group native to Albania and neighbouring countries. They speak the Albanian language. More than half of all Albanians live in Albania and Kosovo...
.
11th-12th centuries
The Vlachs are mentioned in connection with the events of the rebellion of 1066-1067 against a tax surcharge imposed by Emperor Constantine X Doukas (1059–1067). The leaders of the rebellion were all prominent men of Larissa (in ThessalyThessaly
Thessaly is a traditional geographical region and an administrative region of Greece, comprising most of the ancient region of the same name. Before the Greek Dark Ages, Thessaly was known as Aeolia, and appears thus in Homer's Odyssey....
), two of whom are specifically mentioned as being Vlachs, and Bulgarians are also mentioned among the rebels. The source implies that the Vlachs had more or less permanent settlements in the mountains of Bulgaria and they were possibly involved in transhumant pastoralism
Transhumance
Transhumance is the seasonal movement of people with their livestock between fixed summer and winter pastures. In montane regions it implies movement between higher pastures in summer and to lower valleys in winter. Herders have a permanent home, typically in valleys. Only the herds travel, with...
.
The following record also confirms that the Vlachs and the Bulgars lived side by side, in close proximity. This is also the first source that implies cooperation between the Vlachs and the Cumans.
A Jewish explorer describes the Vlachs as mountain people in Boeotia
Boeotia
Boeotia, also spelled Beotia and Bœotia , is one of the regional units of Greece. It is part of the region of Central Greece. It was also a region of ancient Greece. Its capital is Livadeia, the second largest city being Thebes.-Geography:...
. He learned about the Vlachs living in the mountain region near Lamia
Lamia (city)
Lamia is a city in central Greece. The city has a continuous history since antiquity, and is today the capital of the regional unit of Phthiotis and of the Central Greece region .-Name:...
(in Phthiotis
Phthiotis
Phthiotis is one of the regional units of Greece. It is part of the administrative region of Central Greece. The capital is the city of Lamia. It is bordered by the Malian Gulf to the east, Boeotia in the south, Phocis in the south, Aetolia-Acarnania in the southwest, Evrytania in the west,...
, Greece), a region he called “Wallachia
Great Wallachia
Great Wallachia , also Thessaly Wallachia, was a medieval state of the Aromanians , which included the region of Thessaly in Greece, the southern and central ranges of Pindus and extending over part of Macedonia.Anna Komnene in the second half of the eleventh century was the first author to write...
”.
13th-century
The sources cited above yield a perfect explanation why Bulgars, Vlachs and Cumans became the common enemies of Byzantium on the eve of the liberation movement in 1185. The revolt was sparked by a tax that Emperor Isaac II AngelosIsaac II Angelos
Isaac II Angelos was Byzantine emperor from 1185 to 1195, and again from 1203 to 1204....
(1185–1195, 1203–1204) decided to levy in order to cover the expenses for his wedding.
In accordance with the important role the Vlachs played in the liberation movement that had led to the foundation of the Second Bulgarian Empire
Second Bulgarian Empire
The Second Bulgarian Empire was a medieval Bulgarian state which existed between 1185 and 1396 . A successor of the First Bulgarian Empire, it reached the peak of its power under Kaloyan and Ivan Asen II before gradually being conquered by the Ottomans in the late 14th-early 15th century...
, the new country separating from Byzantium was called Blacia in the Latin sources. In the second stage of development, the terms Vlakhia and Bulgaria appeared, but this double designation referred to the whole territory of the Second Bulgarian Empire. At a later date, the overlapping terms separated, and each was used to designate distinct parts of historical Bulgaria. The fourth and final phase in the history of these terms was characterized by the dominance of the term Bulgaria and the disappearance of Vlakhia.
A 13th-century chronicler when narrating the events of the First Crusade
First Crusade
The First Crusade was a military expedition by Western Christianity to regain the Holy Lands taken in the Muslim conquest of the Levant, ultimately resulting in the recapture of Jerusalem...
mentions that the crusader
Crusades
The Crusades were a series of religious wars, blessed by the Pope and the Catholic Church with the main goal of restoring Christian access to the holy places in and near Jerusalem...
s passed through “Blachia”.
A Persian historian when narrating the Tatars’ operations on the right bank of the Danube refers to the “city of the ūlāqūt” (the city of the Vlachs) which must have been situated in Bulgaria.
Proselytism and church organization
Romanian language
Romanian Romanian Romanian (or Daco-Romanian; obsolete spellings Rumanian, Roumanian; self-designation: română, limba română ("the Romanian language") or românește (lit. "in Romanian") is a Romance language spoken by around 24 to 28 million people, primarily in Romania and Moldova...
are of Latin origin which suggests that the Christianization
Christianization
The historical phenomenon of Christianization is the conversion of individuals to Christianity or the conversion of entire peoples at once...
of the Romanians’ ancestors was done in Latin. Although during the Roman rule, Christianity
Christianity
Christianity is a monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus as presented in canonical gospels and other New Testament writings...
could not manifest itself freely in Dacia province, but after 274, there was no obstacle in the way of its affirmation. The Gospel
Gospel
A gospel is an account, often written, that describes the life of Jesus of Nazareth. In a more general sense the term "gospel" may refer to the good news message of the New Testament. It is primarily used in reference to the four canonical gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John...
was not limited to the Germanic populations, and it was not addressed to them in a first stage. The primary sources record that Bishop Wulfila preached in Greek, Latin and Gothic; on the other hand, this cannot imply that he preached in Latin north of the Danube, because the Gothi minores (the people of Wulfila) settled in the Empire in 348, and his translation of the Bible
Gothic Bible
The Gothic Bible or Wulfila Bible is the Christian Bible as translated by Wulfila into the Gothic language spoken by the Eastern Germanic, or Gothic Tribes.- Codices :...
suggests that among the Goths the sermon
Sermon
A sermon is an oration by a prophet or member of the clergy. Sermons address a Biblical, theological, religious, or moral topic, usually expounding on a type of belief, law or behavior within both past and present contexts...
s were preached in Gothic.
The author of a poem addressed to Nicetas
Nicetas of Remesiana
Saint Nicetas was Bishop of Remesiana, present-day Bela Palanka in the Pirot District of modern Serbia, but which was then in the Roman province of Dacia Mediterranea.-Biography:...
, Bishop of Remesiana
Remesiana
Remesiana was an ancient Roman city built after the Roman conquest of Moesia, in the area of the Dacian town Aiadava. It is located all around and under modern day city of Bela Palanka, Serbia....
(Bela Palanka
Bela Palanka
Bela Palanka is a town and municipality located in the Pirot District of south-east Serbia. According to 2011 census, the population of the town is 8,112, while population of the municipality is 12,051. In ancient times, the town was known as Remesiana...
, Serbia), who carried out an active mission south of the Danube and wrote in Latin, praised the bishop for having preached successfully to the Bessi settled around Naissus
Niš
Niš is the largest city of southern Serbia and third-largest city in Serbia . According to the data from 2011, the city of Niš has a population of 177,972 inhabitants, while the city municipality has a population of 257,867. The city covers an area of about 597 km2, including the urban area,...
(Niš, Serbia). The author also emphasizes the universal pacifying and civilizing power of Nicetas’s Christianizing efforts among the Bessi, the Schythians, the Getæ and the Dacians.
The foundation of the Archbishopric of Justiniana Prima
Justiniana Prima
Justiniana Prima is an archaeological site near today's Lebane in southern Serbia, It was a Byzantine city that served as the seat of an Archbishopric that had jurisdiction of the Central Balkans...
in 535 could also contribute to the emergence of a new Romance language
Romance languages
The Romance languages are a branch of the Indo-European language family, more precisely of the Italic languages subfamily, comprising all the languages that descend from Vulgar Latin, the language of ancient Rome...
within the archdiocese on the central territories of the Balkan Peninsula.
In 1020, the Byzantine Emperor Basil II
Basil II
Basil II , known in his time as Basil the Porphyrogenitus and Basil the Young to distinguish him from his ancestor Basil I the Macedonian, was a Byzantine emperor from the Macedonian dynasty who reigned from 10 January 976 to 15 December 1025.The first part of his long reign was dominated...
determined the jurisdiction of the archbishopric of Ohrid
Bulgarian Archbishopric of Ohrid
The Archbishopric of Ochrid was an autonomous Orthodox Church under the tutelage of the Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople between 1019 and 1767...
and authorized the archbishop
External links
- The English translation of the Gesta Ungarorum
- Duke Ramung of Wallachia in the Nibelungenlied
- The Roman Law Library by Professor Yves Lassard and Alexandr Koptev
Sources
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- Choniatēs, Niketas (Author) - Magoulias, Harry J. (Translator): O City of Byzantium - Annals of Niketas Choniatēs; Wayne State University Press; ISBN 978-0-8143-1764-8
- Clari, Robert of (Author) – McNeal, Edgar Holmes (Translator): The Conquest of Constantinople; Medieval Academy of America, 1999; ISBN 0-8020-7823-0
- Comnena, Anna (Author) - Sewter, E. R. A. (Translator): The Alexiad; Penquin Group, 2003, London; ISBN 978-0-14-044958-7
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- Jordanes (Author) - Mierow, Charles C.Charles Christopher MierowCharles Christopher Mierow was an American academic.He had a Princeton Ph.D. in classical languages and literature, and was known as a translator. In years the 1923-1924 and 1925-1934 he was president of Colorado College...
(Translator): The Origin and Deeds of the Goths; BiblioBazaar, 2008; ISBN 978-1-4375-0974-8 - Kéza, Simon of (Author) - Shaer, Frank (Translator): The Deeds of the Hungarians; Central European University Press, 1999, Budapest; ISBN 963-9116-31-9
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- Whitby, Michael - Whitby, Mary (Translators): The History of Theophylact Simocatta: An English Translation with Introduction; Oxford University Press, 1986; ISBN 978-0-19-822799-1
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