Download PDF | Francis Dvornik - Byzantine Missions Among the Slavs_ SS. Constantine-Cyril and Methodius-Rutgers University Press (1970).
520 Pages
Foreword
An important feature of the Byzantine Empire as a political and cultural entity was its transmittal of its own cultural forms to the surrounding barbarians, thereby bringing these barbarians within the orbit of civilization. This it did not so much by force of arms as by its missionary activity. Conversion to Christianity was, of course, the immediate objective of that activity but meant a great deal more than just the exchange of one religion for another. It meant the introduction, among those converted, of the Graeco-Roman cultural] tradition as that tradition had crystallized in Christianity, with some additional elements drawn from Judaism. The dissemination of Christianity meant, therefore, the dissemination of forms of art, of literature, of law, even of government.
The missionary activity of the Byzantine Empire is the subject matter of the present book by Francis Dvornik. Dvornik is no newcomer to scholarship; for over forty years he has explored the history of the Slavs and various problems relating to Christianity and the Church. At least three of his books have become classics. Byzantium as the civilizing agent among the Slavs attracted his attention very early. Byzantium, he wrote once, “moulded the undisciplined tribes of Serbs, Bulgars, Russians, Croats even, and made nations out of them; it gave to them its religion and institutions, taught their princes how to govern, transmitted to them the very principles of civilization — writing and literature.” The Byzantine mission has been, therefore, one of Dvornik’s principal objects of investigation. Much of what the present volume contains, Dvornik is saying here for the first time. He has also wisely drawn upon much that he established in earlier work. Thus the book as a whole is an imp»rtant contribution to Byzantine scholarship. It is important because of its integrating qualities, of the synthesis which it makes of the missionary activities, of the Byzantines and the political and cultural repercussions that these activities entailed. It is a pleasure indeed to publish it and a further satisfaction to add it to the Rutgers Byzantine Series.
Peter Charanis
General Editor Rutgers Byzantine Series
Preface
In 1963, the Slavic world celebrated the eleven hundredth anniversary of the arrival in Moravia of SS. Constantine-Cyril and \lethodius. At that time, I was asked to contribute to this anniversary with a new work, but I declined to do so, as I had already treated the problems concerning the activities of the two Greek brothers, and their contributions to the Slavic culture, in two earlier publications: first, in my thesis at the Sorbonne, Les Slaves, Byzance et Rome au IX° siécle (1926), which was awarded a prize by the French Academy, and again in 1933, in Les Légendes de Constantin et de Méthode vues de Byzance. Both works are being reprinted in 1970 by Academic International (Hattiesburg, Miss.), with the addition of extensive introductions in English to complement the texts.
The unexpected archaeological discoveries made in Moravia from 1949 to 1963, which I was able to study when I visited my native country after twenty-five years, consist of the remains of sixteen stone churches from the ninth century, and rich finds of jewelry, together with other objects from the surrounding cemeteries. These have shown me that this new and surprisingly rich archaeological material gives a clearer picture of that period, and that the history of the Byzantine mission in Moravia should be re-examined in the light of these new discoveries. However, I did not want to limit myself just to problems concerning the history of Great Moravia and of the activity of its Greek missionaries, SS. Constantine-Cyril and Methodius. I have approached the problems raised by the new discoveries from the Byzantine point of view, and have tried to illustrate what Byzantium did toward the Christianization of the Slavic nations, exposing in this framework not only what the two brothers did in Great Moravia but also stressing the importance of their religious and literary activities in the cultural and religious development of the Slavic nations during the early Middle Ages.
The successful excavations made by Serbian archaeologists in ancient Praevalis, modern Montenegro, helped me to re-evaluate the role of the Latin coastal cities and of Byzantine Dalmatia in the Christianization of the Croats and the Serbs. The excavations have also revealed similarities between Moravian church architecture and that of Byzantine Dalmatia and Istria in that same period. In the present book I have completed the research begun in my previous works, and I have reviewed some of the publications issued at the time of the eleven hundredth anniversary of the two brothers.
I wish to express my thanks to J. V. Richter, Professor at the University of Brno, for his permission to reproduce the sketches of the foundations of the sixteen churches discovered in Moravia, and published by him in Magna Moravia (Prague, 1965); I also thank the Czechoslovak archaeologists J. Filip and V. Hruby, J. Poulik and A. Tocik, for providing me with reproductions of archaeological material discovered by them, which is in part published in this book. I am especially obliged to Dr. V. Vaviinek for the many useful suggestions he gave me during our discussions of Cyrilo-Methodian problems throughout his stay in Washington in 1967 as Visiting Fellow at Dumbarton Oaks. I am indebted to Professor Peter Charanis, who included this work in the Rutgers Byzantine Series, and who has provided a foreword for the reader. My sincere thanks also go to the Director of the Dumbarton Oaks Center for Byzantine Studies, the Honorable William R. Tyler, for granting a subsidy toward its publication.
I am dedicating this work to John S. Thacher, in gratitude for his understanding and support of my scholarly activity at Dumbarton Oaks, where he functioned as Director from 1940 to 1969.
Francis Dvornik
February 1970 Washington, D.C.
I. Byzantine, Roman, and Frankish
Missions among the Southern Slavs
Establishment of the Slavs in Central Europe, Pannonia, and Illyricum—The Emperor Heraclius, Rome, and the Christianization of the Croats—First results—The role of the coastal cities of Zara and Split and of Aquileia—Foundation of the bishopric of Nin by Pope Nicholas I in 860—Christianization of the Serbs and of the Slavs on Byzantine territory—First traces of Christianity in Bulgaria—The Bulgars and the Franks.
F.,, many centuries Byzantium, capital of the eastern part of the Roman Empire, had a difficult Slavic problem on its hands. It was one of many problems, deriving from the upheaval caused by the great migration of nations. First there was the Germanic wave which swept over the Roman fortifications on the lower Morava and Vag rivers and on the Danube. Death prevented Marcus Aurelius in a.p. 180 from subjugating the German and Sarmatian tribes on the left bank of the Danube, and from extending the Roman Empire to the Carpathian Mountains. Because of this the Roman provinces of Pannonia and Dacia were exposed to constant danger from the wandering Germanic tribes. The Goths conquered the Greek cities on the Black Sea coast and, in the middle of the third century a.p., Dacia became their prey. The short-lived Gothic empire was completely destroyed by the new invaders, the Huns, (a.p. 370), and modern Hungary became the center of their empire under Attila (435-453).
At that time, there were already a few Slavic tribes in Hungary and in Southern Russia; these tribes had also followed the Goths from their primitive habitats in the region between the Vistula and Dnieper rivers. The main Slavic influx into Central Europe and modern Hungary began during the fifth century and the beginning of the sixth, when the Germanic tribes, who occupied these regions, moved westward and southward to other lands after the collapse of the Hunnic empire. Thus Bohemia, Moravia, and Slovakia were definitively settled by the Slavs, and the Slovenes pushed through the Alps towards Istria. It was then that the real Slavic problem began for Byzantium. These tribes reached the river Danube and, after 517, according to Byzantine writers, they crossed the Danube to raid Macedonia, Thessaly, and Epirus.
Justinian (527-565) seems to have fought against them, and forced the tribes established beyond the lower Danube, under the leadership of the Antes, probably of Sarmatian origin, to become federates of the Empire. This success added to Justinian’s titles that of Anticus. In spite of this, the invasions of Illyricum continued, becoming more and more dangerous as the Slavs occupied the invaded territory.’
These incursions were violent, but a slow assimilation of the newcomers by the natives in lands with a high level of culture seemed possible. The example of the Antes demonstrates this. But these chances were spoiled by the arrival of new invaders, the Avars, a nomadic Turkic tribe. They first destroyed (after 558) the loose political formation of the Antes, allied themselves with the Lombards (c. 565), with the help of their allies exterminated the Gepids in what was previously Dacia, and occupied the whole of modern Hungary after the Lombards had left for northern Italy (after 573). All the Slavic tribes in Central Europe became their subjects. Then serious trouble began for the Byzantines. With their Slavic subjects, the Avars invaded Illyricum and Dalmatia.’ All the cities of Pannonia’® and western Illyricum were destroyed, only those on the Adriatic Sea managed to survive, and the Slavs took definitive possession of what is today Yugoslavia. As a consequence of this, almost all traces of Christian life disappeared in Pannonia, Dalmatia, and the western part of Ilyricum. These provinces, which once possessed flourishing Christian cities and bishoprics, were once again pagan territory.
There was great danger that even Macedonia and Greece would meet with a similar fate. Both lands were invaded, and by about 578 the Slavs had penetrated as far as the Peloponnesus, where two of their tribes, the Milingues and the Ezerites, established themselves.’ In the last quarter of the sixth century, further Slavic colonies were founded in Greece, even in the neighborhood of the famous classical cities of Thebes, Demetrias, and Athens.° In 597 Thessalonica was unsuccessfully besieged by the Avars and Slavs. The citizens attributed their deliverance to the intervention of their patron saint, Demetrius, but the environs of the city were to a great extent Slavicized.
The situation was growing more dangerous as the Empire was also menaced by the Persians. The Emperor Heraclius looked for allies among the neighbors of the Avars. In 619 he concluded an alliance with Kuvrat (Kurt), Khagan of the Bulgars, then established north of the lower Danube.® It is not impossible that Byzantine diplomacy also sponsored the uprising of the Slavs north of the upper Danube in Moravia and Bohemia.’ The rebellious Slavs found an able leader in the person of Samo, a Frankish merchant,* who became the head of the first Slavic politica! state, which lasted until his death thirty-five years later (658).
The year 626 was extremely critical, as Constantinople was hesieged by the Persians, Avars, and Slavs. Their defeat under the walls of the capital signalled the growing decline of Avar power. Another diplomatic move by Heraclius speeded up the decline— an invitation to the White Croats to help defeat the Avars in Dalmatia and Illyricum, and then to settle in those provinces. Originally the Croats were most probably a Sarmatian tribe who had been forced by the Huns to flee from their settlements near the Caucasus towards the northwest. They settled among the Slavic tribes in modern Galicia, Silesia, and southern Bohemia. The Slavs accepted the leadership of these warriors, who soon lost their national character and were Slavicized. They had escaped Avar supremacy and accepted the emperor's invitation.
It is dificult to say by which route they had reached Dalmatia. It is generally thought that they travelled through the Moravian Gates, Pannonia, and the former Noricum. The way through Moravia was perhaps open, after the successful insurrection led by Saino. Pannonia was, however, still in Avar hands, and the way through that country was certainly well guarded.
However, it seems more logical to suppose that Heraclius wanted them near the capital, which was besieged by the Avars in 626. A safe and easy route could be found along the great rivers behind the Carpathian Mountains, towards the lower Danube, and thence along the coast to Byzantine territory. It should be recalled that at that time the lands from the lower Don southwards to the Caucasus—the Old Great Bulgaria—were under the rule of Kuvrat (Kurt), who had liberated himself from the Avars with the help of the Byzantines and was an ally of Heraclius.
The cities of the former Roman provinces of Scythia, Moesia, and Thrace were destroyed during the invasions, but the old Roman road along the coast still existed. It can be imagined that the approach of a new allied army from the North accelerated the retreat of the Avars, who were pursued by the liberated Byzantine army and the emperor’s new allies. In this way we can perhaps explain how the Byzantines succeeded in reoccupying Singidunum-—Belgrade. Constantine Porphyrogenitus relates that a number of White Serbs, another Sarmatian tribe which had been overtaken by the same fate as the Croats and had settled among the Slavs in modern Saxony, left their country and asked Heraclius for a new home. The emperor settled them in the thema of Thessalonica, but the majority of them were dissatisfied and decided to return to their original place. They got as far as Belgrade, but were persuaded by the Byzantine commander there to settle in the land which became the nucleus of the future Serbia. This must have happened soon after the liberation of the besieged capital.
It could be imagined that the Byzantines directed the Croats from Macedonia to the coast. They could reach Dyrrhachium along the old Via Egnatia and begin the war against the Avars from the province of Epirus and the Adriatic coast, where remnants of Byzantine possessions still existed. With the help of the Slavic subjects of the Avars, and the remnants of the Greek and Latin population, aided perhaps by the Byzantine navy, the Croats succeeded, after a fight which lasted several years, in expelling the Avars from Dalmatia. Constantine relates that, after this achievement, some of them also occupied lower Pannonia and Epirus, which was at that time called Illyricum. One tribe also seems to have liberated the Slovenes of Carinthia. The Croats Byzantine, Roman and Frankish Missions 5
settled in the liberated countries, and assumed the overlordship of the Slavs living there.°
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According to the Emperor Constantine Porphyrogenitus (913959), Heraclius thought that after this success it was necessary to Christianize the Slavs. He describes Heraclius’ plan as follows:*° “By command of the Emperor Heraclius, these same Croats defeated and expelled the Avars from these parts, and by mandate of the Emperor Heraclius they settled down in that same country of the Avars, where they now dwell. These same Croats had at that time for prince the father of Porgas. The Emperor Heraclius sent and brought priests from Rome, and made of them an archbishop and a bishop and elders and deacons, and baptized the Croats; and at that time these Croats had Porgas for their prince.”
This report by Constantine is rejected by most subsequent historians, including the best Serbian historian, C. Jireéek." It was thought that Byzantium and Rome were not on good terms, and that, if Heraclius had desired to reintroduce Christianity into Ilyricum, he would have sent Byzantine missionaries. However, there is no reason why Constantine’s report should not be accepted. Byzantium and Rome were not always quarrelling, as is so often believed under the shadow of the later schism. On the contrary, Pope Honorius, to whom Heraclius may have addressed his request to send missionaries, was on very good terms with the emperor. We must not forget that the whole of Illyricum, which embraced all the provinces trom Pannonia through Greece to the Peloponnesus, with their Latin and Greek populations, were subject ecclesiastically to the Roman patriarchate.’? This situation was only changed in 732 when the iconoclastic Emperor Leo III, in order to punish Pope Gregory III for his condemnation of iconoclasm, detached what was left of Illyricum from Roman jurisdiction and subordinated it to the Byzantine patriarchate." This explains Heraclius’ move. He could not overlook this fact, and was bound to acknowledge the right of Rome to send missionaries to Dalmatia and the reconquered part of Illyricum.
This was the first attempt at the Christianization of the Slavs, and it was initiated by Byzantium. Unfortunately, we have no direct information about the progress of Christianity among the Croats at this early period. However, the emperor’s statement must have been founded on some facts.'* It seems most probable that Heraclius, after the liberation of Dalmatia from the Avars, reorganized the ecclesiastical situation in the Dalmatian cities on the Adriatic. There is a local tradition in Split (Spalato) which attributes the erection of an archbishopric in this city to this period. Split claimed the inheritance of Salona, the metropolis of Dalmatia, which was destroyed by the Avars in 614. Thomas the Archdeacon, who died in 1268, the author of a history of Salona," even mentions the name of the first archbishop of Split—John of Ravenna. He says that the pope had sent him as his legate to Dalmatia and Croatia on a special mission to reinforce Christianity among the surviving natives. John is said to have fulfilled his mission well. He encouraged the Christians to conserve the ancient ecclesiastical organization by transferring the metropolitan see from Salona to Spalato (Split). He was elected archbishop by the local population and confirmed in this dignity by the pope.
Some scholars have thought, however, that Thomas confused this archbishop with Pope John IV, a native Dalmatian (640-642), or with Pope John X (914-929), who, in his reorganization of the Dalmatian and Croatian clergy, subordinated the whole country to Split.*° There may, however, be some good reasons which explain this intimate connection of Byzantine Dalmatia with Ravenna, and which would seem to justify the choice of a priest from Ravenna for a special mission to Dalmatia.
First of all, the place of Dalmatia in the organization of the Roman provinces should be re-examined. It is generally assumed that it was a part of Eastern Illyricum.’” This opinion appears to be confirmed by the letter sent in 592 by Pope Gregory the Great to Jobinus, prefect of Eastern Illyricum, in which the pope asked the prefect not to give any support to Natalis, the Bishop of Salona, who was accused of an uncanonical attitude and was unwilling to obey papal orders.** The main object of this letter was the recommendation of an envoy to administer the papal patrimony in Illyricum. The pope only mentioned Natalis because his case was foremost in his mind at that time, as is shown by several papal letters concerning this bishop, written in the same year. There was a danger that Natalis might seek the prefect’s support at the imperial court.
There are, however, in the papal register several letters concerning the affair of Natalis’ successor Maximus (594-620), who, with the support of Marcellinus, the proconsul of Dalmatia, had ousted Honoratus, the archdeacon who had been canonically elected. Maximus had made himself archbishop of Salona and was then confirmed in office by the emperor on the recommendation of Marcellinus, and was accepted by all the suffragans, with one exception, as their metropolitan. The pope protested this action and forbade Maximus to exercise his episcopal functions." Gregory wanted first to learn whether the imperial sanction really had been granted. The Emperor Maurice replied to Gregory that Maximus should not have been ordained without the pope’s permission. This the pope disclosed in the letter to the deacon Sabinus, his representative in Constantinople.” In the same letter Gregory directly accused the distinguished men (gloriosi viri) of Romanus, exarch of Ravenna, of having accepted bribes from Maximus and allowing him to be ordained metropolitan of Salona. The pope probably meant the proconsul Marcellinus of Dalmatia and certain high functionaries of Dalmatia and of Ravenna.
Gregory's envoy at the court obtained from the emperor an order that Maximus, who had invoked the emperor’s intervention, should appear in Rome and justify himself in the presence of the pope.” The affair was becoming increasingly annoying for both the court and the pope. The new exarch Callinicus asked the pope to accept Maximus as the legitimate metropolitan,” but Gregory persisted in his demand that Maximus should first be judged for his deeds according to Canon Law. Callinicus and Marcellinus made a further attempt to change the pope's attitude, but in vain. ** Finally, Marcellinus himself convinced Maximus that he should give some satisfaction to the pope. Because Maximus refused to go to Rome, the pope ordered the metropolitans of Ravenna, and of Milan, to act as his representatives and to pronounce judgment in Ravenna where Maximus was willing to appear. Again the pope informed the exarch of this decision.* After submitting to penance, Maximus was accepted by the pope as the legitimate metropolitan of Salona. In his letter announcing this Gregory again stressed that he had shown his benevolence toward the metropolitan because of the intervention of the exarch Callinicus.”°
All this would appear to indicate that intimate relations must have existed between Dalmatia and the exarchs of Ravenna. It seems to be established that in 549, and in 579, Dalmatia was not a part of Illyricum. This is confirmed by Procopius and Menander who separate Dalmatia very clearly from [llyricum.** We have seen that the argument derived from the letter of Gregory the Great to Jobinus, prefect of Illyricum, cannot be regarded as proving conclusively that in 592 Dalmatia was a province of Illyricum. The letters of Gregory I on the affairs of Maximus, which reveal the prominent role played in Dalmatian ecclesiastical affairs by the exarchs of Ravenna, Romanus and Callinicus, seem rather to indicate that in the seventh century Dalmatia formed a part of the exarchate of Ravenna.
This would further indicate that Justinian, having liberated Dalmatia from the Goths in 538, had reinstated the old status. According to all this, from the time of Diocletian’s reforms, Dalmatia—with the exception of a very short period in the fifth century*’—tormed a part of the prefecture of Italy.
Unfortunately, no trace of this is found in Justinian’s legislation. Since Dalmatia was adminstered by a proconsul in Gregory the Great’s time, as is attested by his correspondence, E. Stein”® has advanced the theory that Justinian instituted the proconsulate of Dalmatia after 538, probably at the time when the exarchate of Ravenna was established. The existence of the latter is only attested for the year 584 by a letter of Pope Pelagius II to the deacon Gregory.”® But Stein’s opinion that Dalmatia was incorporated into [llyricum*° some time before 592 cannot be accepted, as we have seen. If one hesitates to think of Dalmatia as a part of the exarchate, one should, at least, conclude from all this that Dalmatia was directly subject to Constantinople, without the intermediary of the prefecture of Illyricum. Such is the opinion of J. Ferluga who, however, rejects the thesis that Dalmatia belonged to the exarchate of Ravenna.*? What we have found in Gregory's letters seems to contradict this opinion. On the other hand, the fact that Dalmatia was governed by a proconsul does not exclude the possibility that a proconsul could be subject to a prefect. Peter the Patrician,*® a contemporary of Justinian, speaks of a proconsul of Achaia who was subject to the prefect of Illyricum. A similar situation might have existed in the exarchate. The proconsul of Dalmatia could have been responsible to the exarch. The interest of the exarchs in the ecclesiastical affairs of Dalmatia can be explained in this way.*°
If we accept this, then we are entitled to suppose that this situation continued until the end of the exarchate in 751, when the Lombards took Ravenna. We also find an echo of this old tradition in Constantine Porphyrogenitus’ work De thematibus. When speaking of Dalmatia, the emperor simply says that it is a part of Italy.** He probably had the geographical location in mind, but this suggests that, because of the geographical factor, Dalmatia had been included in the administrative system of Italy.
There is yet another fact which seems to support the close connection of Dalmatia with Italy, Rome and the exarchate of Ravenna. In his ecclesiastical organization Justinian respected the special position of Dalmatia and, although it was a Latin province, he did not subordinate its bishops to Justiniana Prima. Only the bishops of the two Dacies, of Illyria, Dardania, Praevalis, and Pannonia were subject to the metropolitan of Justiniana Prima,” who also became the pope’s vicar in Western Illyricum. The metropolitan of Thessalonica continued to represent the Roman patriarch in Eastern Illyricum with its Greek population. This explains why the clergy of Milan, in its letter concerning Vigilius attitude to ecclesiastical policy,** distinguished very clearly between the clergy of Ulyricum and that of Dalmatia. So also did the African bishop Facundus.*’ All this seems to indicate that Justinian had restored Dalmatia to the prefecture of Italy, or the Exarchate of Ravenna. This also explains why Gregory the Great dealt with the bishops of Dalmatia directly, as he did with the bishops of Italy.
If this was so, then the request of Heraclius to the pope to Christianize the new inhabitants of Dalmatia, who were regarded as the allies of the Empire, becomes more logical. The sending of a native of Ravenna to the Croats on a special mission can also be explained in the light of the relations between Ravenna and Dalmatia in the past.
If we accept the testimony of Constantine Porphyrogenitus that the initiative for the re-establishment of a Dalmatian hierarchy and the Christianization of the Croats came from Heraclius, there are three popes who may be thought of as executors of the imperial will, namely, Honorius I (625-638), Severinus (638-640), and John IV (640-642). Honorius enjoyed friendly relations with Heraclius, who granted him permission to use the gilt bronze roof tiles of the temple of Venus and Rome for the basilica of St. Peter.** If it was Honorius who was asked by the emperor to send priests to Dalmatia, he could hardly have done so before 630. Assuming that the Croats had arrived at the invitation of the emperor in 626, or soon afterwards, their iight with the Avars had lasted several years, according to Porphyrogenitus. During that time the question of converting them could hardly have existed.
Also it seems that, after the settlement of the Croats in the conquered land, there were conflicts of interest between the new masters and the remnants of the native Christian population. Such conflicts are mentioned by Archdeacon Thomas in his history of Salona and Spalato.*® According to him, the remnants of the population of Salona first took refuge on the Adriatic Islands and only began to return to the mainland later. They were molested by the Slavs, who prevented them from leaving the palace of Diocletian (Spalato), where they had settled. The citizens then sent an embassy to the emperor who gave them permission to take up their abode in the palace, and through a “sacrum rescriptum” ordered the Slavs to leave the native population in peace. The Slavs obeyed and, from that time on, there was peaceful coexistence.
There is no reason for us not to accept this report of the archdeacon. His information is certainly based on local tradition. The expression he uses when speaking of the emperors order—sacrum rescriptum dominorum principum—emphasizes this. It could hardly have been invented in the thirteenth century. Also the words dominorum principum aptly describe the political situation in Byzantium. In 613, Heraclius made his infant son Constantine co-emperor.*’ The rescript was therefore really sent in the name of two emperors—Heraclius and Constantine.
If all these events took place during the reign of Heraclius, the peaceful coexistence between the Croats and the natives could only have begun during the last years of the pontificate of Honorius. He could, thus, have been the pope to whom the emperor made the request to initiate the Christianization of the Croats. His successor Severinus (638-640) could hardly have done anything in this respect because he was only confirmed in his dignity by Heraclius in 640. ** John IV was confirmed and consecrated as early as December 640. During his pontificate the situation in Dalmatia was already stabilized, and it could be accepted that he was the pontiff who implemented the request of Heraclius and re-established the hierarchy in Dalmatia.
John IV was born in Dalmatia, and showed his interest in his native land by sending Abbot Martin there, and to Istria, with the mission of collecting the relics of the saints in the ruined churches, and of redeeming the Christian prisoners. *? The Croats, being the emperor's allies, were not supposed to hold the native population in slavery, but they certainly kept the prisoners taken by the Avars after the defeat of the latter. The pope gave the abbot a large sum of ruoney, and great numbers of Christian prisoners were freed. They settled on the coast among those of their countrymen who had escaped captivity. The abbot collected the relics of the saints and brought them to Rome; they were deposited by the Pope in an oratory near the basilica of St. John in the Lateran Palace.
This indicates that the situation in Dalmatia was not only peaceful, but that friendly relations already existed between the new settlers and the remnants of the Latin population. Such an atmosphere was very favorable to the realization of Heraclius’ plans. It could thus be accepted that, if there is any truth in Thomas’ statement concerning the transfer of the metropolitan status from Salona to Spalato, it was effected by John IV in 640, the last year of the reign of Heraclius.
There is one objection which may be made against this supposition, namely, that it is vain to search in the Liber Pontificalis for any mention of any pope re-establishing hierarchical order in Dalmatia. However, a perusal of the short biographies of Honorius I, Severinus, and John IV leaves the impression that the author of the Liber Pontificalis was interested only in the deeds of those popes in Rome itself. He goes into detail describing the erection or restoration of churches by the popes, or of complications with the local militia, or the exarchs. But he limits himself in regard to the ordinations of bishops, quoting only the number of ordinations which each pope had held and the number of bishops and priests he had ordained “for different places.” It is probable that not even the mission of Abbot Martin would have attracted the attention of the biographer of John IV, if the relics collected in Dalmatia had not been deposited in a special oratory in Rome, constructed and decorated by John IV for the purpose. Of course, it would have been a great help to historians had the author given us the names of the bishops ordained, and of the bishoprics they were to occupy, but, unfortunately, the writer of the Liber Pontificalis was more interested in other matters less relevant to Church historians.
Fortunately, an archaeological discovery has come to the aid of the historians. A sarcophagus discovered in the Cathedral of Spalato bears an inscription which testifies that it contained the body of the “feeble, useless sinner, Archbishop John”.** The archaeologists were not unanimous as to the date of the sarcophagus. L. Karaman* dated it as being of the second half of the eighth century. Its plastic decoration could point to this period, but its archaic form suggests that it may also be from an earlier period. The recent discovery of a church portal in Sucurac, in the vicinity of the former Salona, helped to make further progress in the dating of the sarcophagus.** Its simple plastic decoration is definitely archaic, pointing to the last phase of antiquity, and this style of decoration was not used after the seventh century.
The epigraphy of the two documents is almost identical. Both monuments must be from the same period, although the sarcophagus may be one or two decades later than the portal. This eliminates the opinion that Thomas of Spalato had confused John of Ravenna with John IV, or John X, and confirms that there did exist in the seventh or eighth century a prelate John who called himself archbishop. He could only have been the archbishop of Salona-Spalato.
The dating of the sarcophagus as being of the end of the seventh century is more probable. This confirms the testimony of Thomas of Spalato that John of Ravenna became the first archbishop of Spalato, successor to the metropolitans of ancient Salona. The supposition that John IV had been instrumental in transferring the metropolitan status from Salona to Spalato also becomes most probable, thanks to these two archaeological discoveries. This, of course, does not exclude the possibility that Heraclius’ request to re-establish the hierarchy in the reconquered lands, was accomplished by one of the successors of John IV. In any case, John of Ravenna did exist and he was the first archbishop of Spalato.
The discovery of the church portal in Suéurac also confirms Thomas’ other information, namely that John of Ravenna, when ordained by the pope, began to restore the ruined churches and to preach the Gospel to the new inhabitants.*° The restoration of a church in Su¢urac indicates also that the conversion of the Croats was making progress in the seventh century. Sucurac was not situated in the part of Dalmatia which belonged to the territory of Spalato, but was on Croat soil, and later became a royal domain.
A further archaeological discovery made in Spalato in 1958 reveals another deed of the same archbishop of Ravenna. This is the finding of the sarcophagus of St. Domnius (Dujan) in the Cathedral of Spalato. The inscription on the sarcophagus says that ‘the body of the blessed Domnius, archbishop of Salona, disciple of St. Peter, the prince of the Apostles, was transferred from Salona to Spalato by John, the archipresul of the same see.”*’
This again seems to confirm the report by Thomas in the History of the transfer of the remains of Domnius and of Anastasius from Salona to Spalato. This transfer must have taken place in the early vears of John’s bishopric, because Thomas says that the discoverers of the relics hurried to Spalato, being afraid that the Slavs might interfere with their operation. The relics of St. Anastasius are also said to have been transferred by him.
It was generally believed that the relics of Domnius were brought to Rome by Abbot Martin. If this is true, then we should suppose that Spalato later acquired a part of those relics from Rome,** or that the relics found by the citizens of Spalato in the ruins of Salona were not genuine. The inscription on the sarcophagus recalls, however, the epigraphic style of the two inscriptions mentioned above. It should also be noted that the name of Domnius is not mentioned among the relics brought by Martin. On the mosaic representing the Saints whose relics had been deposited by John IV in the oratory of St. Venantius, Domnius is also shown, although his relics were not transferred to Rome. John IV desired to have him represented there because he was the first bishop of Salona, the pope’s native city, and the patron saint of Dalmatia. It is quite logical to think that the Spalatans wished to keep the body of the founder of the metropolitan see of Salona which had been transferred to Spalato. It is quite possible also that the moving of the relics of Domnius to Spalato was made in agreement with Abbot Martin.
We have thus sufficient reason to believe that the reorganization of the Dalmatian hierarchy was really effected in the first half of the seventh century, on the initiative of the Emperor Heraclius, who was responsible for the settlement of the Croats in that province. It was, most probably, Pope John IV who established the first metropolitan in Spalato, considered to be the heir of Salona. The choice of a cleric from Ravenna is explained by the fact that Dalmatia was still, in the seventh century, a part of the exarchate of Ravenna. The exarch Isacius most probably influenced this choice. He had declared his interest in Christian refugees from the territories invaded by the Lombards, by constructing a cathedral in Torcello in 639 for the new bishopric created for them.*° He tried to use the Croats also in his struggle with the Lombards. Desiring to obtain a direct connection between the exarchate and the Byzantine possessions in southern Italy, he was, most probably, the initiator of the maritime expedition of the Croats against Siponto.*° Their attack was, however, unsuccessful. It was the second time that the Croats had acted as imperial allies against the enemies of the Empire.
We can also accept another statement by Porphyrogenitus, namely, that the Croats were converted under their ruler Porgas. He says that the Croats fought against the Avars under the leadership of Porgas’ father, whose name he does not give. The latter was, most probably, one of the five brothers who came with their nation to Dalmatia, perhaps Kloukas, who is first mentioned by Porphyrogenitus, or Chrobatos.*? The first generation of the Croats fought against the Avars and ensured their leadership of the Slavs whom they found in the country. The second generation was more inclined to listen to the Christian message.
Rome continued to manifest its interest in the Christianization of the Croats. This can be concluded from the letter which Pope Agatho sent to the Emperor Constantine IV in 680. There he discloses that many of his “confamuli” were working among the Lombards, Slavs, Franks, Gauls, Goths, and Britons. The Slavs mentioned in the letter can only be the Croats. If the “confamuli” should be bishops—and the context seems rather to indicate it— then we can see in it a reference to the newly re-established Latin hierarchy in the Adriatic cities which was charged with the conversion of the Croats.
This would seem to be confirmed also by another report of Constantine's. In the same chapter he writes that the “baptized Croats will not fight foreign countries outside the borders of their own; for they received a kind of oracular response and promise trom the pope of Rome, who in the time of Heraclius, emperor of the Romans, sent priests and baptized them. For after their baptism the Croats made a covenant, confirmed with their own hands and by oaths sure and binding in the name of St. Peter the apostle, that never would they set upon a foreign country and make war on it, but would rather live at peace with all who were willing to do so; and they receive from the same pope of Rome a benediction to this effect, that if any of the pagans should come against the country of these same Croats and bring war upon it, then might the God of the Croats fight for the Croats and protect them, and Peter the disciple of Christ give them victories.”
The account has a strong legendary aspect. In spite of that, it must be based on something real. It seems to indicate that peaceful relations between the Latin coastal cities and the Croats were established thanks to the missionary activity of Roman priests among them.** We are entitled to go even further and suppose chat Constantine may have found in the imperial archives a report sent to Heraclius by Honorius or John IV, announcing that the first result of the missions—the establishment of a hierarchy and of peaceful relations between the coastal cities and the Croats of the hinterland—had been realized. The repeated mention of Peter in Constantine’s report sounds like an extract from or an echo of a papal letter. Constantine had no special reason to mention St. Peter in this connection. His name was, however, repeatedly invoked in papal documents™.
After the disappearance of the exarchate in 75], and during the eighth century, the Croats were politically directly under Byzantine supremacy, which was rather nominal. Ecclesiastically, however, Dalmatian Croatia remained under direct Roman jurisdiction, as before. Although no reports are extant on the progress of Christianization among the Croats, we can suppose that, during the second half of the seventh and the eighth century, churches had already been constructed, or ruined churches restored, by Latin missionaries from the coastal cities to the Croats, especially those from Zadar (Zara) and Split.
One should imagine that this first wave of Christianization could reach only the tribes in the neighborhood of the coastal cities. Their Latin population had first to recover from the onslaught and increase the number of its priests. In this, the citizens were most probably assisted by their compatriots from Italy and by the papacy. The penetration of Christianity into the interior of Dalmatia must have been slower and could be accelerated only in the second half of the eighth and the beginning of the ninth centuries.
The city of Zara, which had not suffered during the invasion, seems always to have had a bishop.** According to Porphyrogenitus even the great islands of Arbe (Rab), Vekla (Krk), and Opsara, (Osor) remained intact, and many Latin Dalmatians found a refuge there. Rab possessed a bishopric in 530 and 533. It is listed in the Acts of synods held in Salona in these years.** Because Rab had not been invaded, it is legitimate to suppose that its bishopric continued to exist. The Chronicle of Grado *™ records that Elias, the Patriarch of Grado, had announced at his synod in 579 the foundation of sixteen new bishoprics in Istria and Dalmatia, and among them were the bishoprics of Vekla (Krk) and Opsara (Osor). Even if the existence of the synod is questioned by some specialists, it seems certain that these two bishoprics were founded in the second half of the sixth century. It appears that this foundation is connected with the opposition of the metropolitan of Aquileia-Grado to the condemnation by the fifth general council (553), at the request of Justinian, of the three Chapters containing the writings of Ibas of Edessa, Theodoret of Kyros, and Theodore of Mopsuestia. The bishop of Rab joined the patriarch, who founded new bishoprics in order to strengthen his position. It is probable that when Candianus, the Patriarch bishop of Grado (607-612), had ended the schism with Rome,® the bishoprics of Rab, of Vekla, and Opsara—both situated on the territory of Rab— returned for a short time to Salona before the city was destroyed.
We can thus name five bishops in the neighborhood of the Croat territory whose prime interest was to work on the conversion of the Croats. The higher civilization displayed by the Latin cities must naturally have attracted the Croats. The missionaries sent to the mainland by the bishops of the coastal cities and islands were aided in their work by the remnants of the Christian population which had found refuge in the mountains. These survivors of Christianity in Croat lands are mentioned in the chronicle of the Priest of Duklja®® and also in some documents published by G. Marini. The existence of such Christian islands in the pagan sea cannot be doubted.
It is also possible that all the churches in Dalmatia were not completely destroyed and that some of them could be used by the remnants of the Christian population and by the new converts. Archdeacon Thomas mentions such a church in Delmis (Duvno) where a church, consecrated in 518 by Bishop Germanus of Capua, on his way to Constantinople, was still in use in the thirteenth century.” Croat archaeologists may find more cases of this kind.
Unfortunately, we have no information on the progress of the Christianization of the Croats during the eighth century. It has been thought that the subordination of Dalmatian bishoprics under Constantinople in 732 by the Emperor Leo III had hampered this. There is still a lively controversy among historians concerning this change in Dalmatian religious status. In order to punish Pope Gregory III (731-741) for his opposition to the emperor s iconoclastic decrees, Leo III confiscated the patrimony of St. Peter in the prefecture of Illyricum, in the exarchate of Sicily, and in the duchy of Calabria. At the same time he detached all the bishoprics of these countries from the Roman patriarchate and subordinated them to the patriarchs of Constantinople.
Because it was believed that Dalmatia had been a part of Illyricum, it was concluded that, from 732 on, the bishops of Dalmatia were under the jurisdiction of the patriarchate of Constantinople.*? We have seen, however, that Dalmatia was not a part of Ilyricum, but, down to the year 751, of the exarchate of Ravenna. Because of this, the decree of Leo III in 732 did not affect the Dalmatian bishoprics. This seems to be confirmed by the letter of Nicholas I to Michael III in 860°* in which the pope demanded the return of the detached provinces under his jurisdiction. Dalmatia is not mentioned, which shows that it had never been detached from the jurisdiction of Rome. It should be stressed also that Dalmatia never appeared in the Byzantine Tactica, the lists of bishoprics under the patriarchate of Constantinople.* After the disappearance of the exarchate, Dalmatia was directly under Constantinople, probably as an archontia®* with an archon-dux who resided in Zara. Zara was chosen to become the political center of Byzantine Dalmatia because the city was the best preserved and best developed of the Latin coastal cities and, perhaps, also because it was nearer to Istria and Venice, which were still in Byzantine hands.
The Croats also were nominally under Byzantine supremacy. Constantine Porphyrogenitus says that “from the Croats who came to Dalmatia a part split off and possessed themselves of Ulyricum and Pannonia.”® It is not quite clear if the emperor here means only Pannonia, which used to be part of Western Ilyvicum or, if besides Pannonia, he hints at Epirus which was in the later period identified with [lyricum. The circumstance in which Constantine speaks only of one “sovereign prince, who used to maintain friendly contact, though through envoys only, with the prince of Croatia,” would indicate that he had in mind only the prince of Pannonia of the ancient western Illyricum.*’ It is however, quite possible that the Croats had extended their sway over all the Slavic tribes of former Praevalis and parts of Epirus.** This would be most probable if we could assume that the Croats had begun their struggle against the Avars from these provinces which were still partly in Byzantine possession. We know that these lands had suffered heavily during the invasions and almost all the bishoprics in Praevalis and Epirus had disappeared. It is thus quite possible that some of the Croat people went there and subjugated the Slavs living there.
The Byzantines were in no position to reinforce their authority in the lands freed from the Avars by the Croats. But the bishoprics of the coastal cities were under direct Byzantine rule, although under Roman jurisdiction, and Byzantium enjoyed friendly relations with Rome after the liquidation of the first phase of iconoclastic quarrels (787). Therefore, there was no reason why the progress of Christianity among the Croats could not have continued during the eighth century. There is a report by the chronicler of Duklja, written between 1149 and 1153,” of a national assembly held in the plain near the former Delminium (Duvno), in the presence of the representatives of the Byzantine emperor and of the pope. If this event is dated in the year 753, as was recently proposed,” we would have here new documentary evidence of the development of Christianity among the Croats. Unfortunately, the report is highly unreliable and so full of confusing reminiscences, that it cannot be taken as evidence that Croatia was already completely Christianized by the middle of the eighth century. There is, however, further evidence showing that at least some of the Croat chiefs were Christians by the end of the eighth century. There is the inscription which the Zupan Godeslav (780-800) ordered to be made in the Church of the Holy Cross in Nin (ancient Nona), which he had constructed. Nin was also the residence of the first known Croat prince—ViSeslav (about 800), who was certainly a Christian.”
Moreover, certain Croatian words from the realm of Christian terminology indicate that Christianity came to the Croats at an early stage from the coastal cities, where the Latin terminology formerly used in Dalmatia and Illyricum had survived. The patron saints of the coastal cities were also popular among the Croats.‘* Other saints whose cults were favored by the coastal cities and later by the Croats include names which indicate that Eastern, Italian, and Roman influences were prominent in the primitive Christian community in Dalmatian Croatia. The cults of Moses, Daniel, Elias, Demetrius, Michael, St. Sophia, Sergius, George, Theodore, Stephen, Cosmas and Damian, Plato, Zoilus, Andrew, and others could only have been imported from the East. The cult of Peter, Appollinaris, Vitalis, Alexander, Benedict, Cassian, Cyprian, Dominicus (=Dinko), Isidore, and others came from Rome, Ravenna, and Italy in general.** This influence is also documented by the transformation of the Latin sanctus into sut in Dalmatia (in Istria also sat). In this way we encounter in the Dalmatian popular calendar and toponomy curious combinations, like Sutpetar (St. Peter), Stugjuragj, Sujuraj (St. Georgius), Sutvara, Sveta Vara (Sancta Barbara), Sutikla (Sancta Thecla), Sutomiscica (Sancta Eufemia), StoSija (Sancta Anastasia), etc.”
It is also important to note that at this early stage of its history the Croatian Church was unaware of the system of proprietary churches, according to which ecclesiastical institutions became the property of the founders, who claimed certain rights in the appointment of priests in these institutions. This system was a Frankish invention, and the fact that the Croats did not accept it indicates that knowledge of Christianity must have reached them at an early stage from another center, which ignored this system. This can only be the area of the Adriatic coastal cities, or Rome itself.
All this leads us to believe that Christianity penetrated into Slavic Dalmatia from Rome and Italy, through the intermediary of the Latin coastal cities. Rome never lost its interest in the newcomers to Dalmatia and in what was left of Illyricum.
On the other hand, however, a new power was rising on the northern frontier of Dalmatia—the Frankish Empire under Charlemagne. In 788 Bavaria was added to the Empire, and Byzantium lost Istria. The Slavs of the former Noricum became Frankish subjects. The Pannonian Croats, with their prince Vojnomir, accompanied Charlemagne in his campaign against the Avars (791; 795-796 ) and became his subjects. The Margrave Eric of Friuli, whose territory also comprised Noricum, Istria, and Croatian Pannonia, made an attempt in about 797 to subjugate the Dalmatian Croats, but the vain attempt cost him his life.”* The war between Byzantium and the Franks, which started after Charlemagne’s “usurpation” of the imperial title in 800 permitted the successor of Eric, Cadolah, to intervene in Dalmatia and to force the Croats to recognize Frankish sovereignty (803). In 805 even Paul “dux Jaderae, and Donatus, bishop of the same city, appeared before Charlemagne at Diedenhofen (Thionville), to plead for their country.” The peace of Aix-la-Chapelle in 812 finally confirmed the Byzantines in the possession of Venice and of the Dalmatian coastal cities. The Croats, however, remained under Frankish suzerainty.
From the beginning of the ninth century on our information about Dalmatia is more precise, and it is still often believed that the Christianization of the Croats only began seriously during this perod, and that the conversion of the Croats was effected by Frankish missionaries, sent especially by the patriarchs of Aquileia,”* the nearest Christian center in Frankish territory. The metropolitans, and later the patriarchs of Aquileia, extended their jurisdiction over Venetia, Istria, western Illyricum, Noricum, and Raetia Secunda in the fifth century, and then, after the destruction of Sirmium, as far as the frontiers of Pannonia and Savia. The barbarian invasions restricted their influence, but their missionary zeal may have been awakened at the beginning of the eighth century, when they were definitively reconciled with Rome; but their quarrels with their rivals of Grado seem to have consumed most of their energies.
In any event, we have no information concerning the missionary activity of Aquileia among the Slovenes living between the Drava and the Adriatic coast, although Salzburg, which had inherited jurisdiction over Pannonia and Raetia, had developed considerable activity among the Slovenes of Carinthia. Only after Charlemagne had conquered Lombardy and Istria, or rather after his destruction of Avar power in 796, did the Patriarch Paulinus, at the request of Alcuin,’® manifest an interest in missions among the Slavs. In spite of this, we have not learned of any results of Aquileia’s missions under Paulinus and his successor Ursus. Only after Charlemagne had definitely fixed the frontier between Salzburg and Aquileia on the Drava in 811, did Aquileia appear to be interested in missions among the Slovenes within its jurisdiction.*° This seems to suggest that Aquileia could only have manifested an interest in Croatia after 803, when Charlemagne, at war with the Byzantines, had forced the Dalmatian Croats to accept Frankish supremacy.
In reality, Aquileia found easy access to the territory of the Pannonian Croats. Vojnomir, the prince of the Pannonian Croats, accepted baptism between the years 805 and 811. His successor Ljudevit was also a Christian. The work of Aquileian missionaries among the Croats was interrupted by the insurrection of Ljudevit in 819. The Frankish army was defeated, and the Dalmatian Croats were forced to recognize Ljudevit as their ruler after his victory over the army of their prince Borna, and even the Slovenes of Istria joined his realm. Only in 822 did the Franks succeed in forcing Ljudevit out of Dalmatia. In the next year he was assassinated, perhaps on the orders of Vladislav, successor to Borna.**
The rivalry between Aquileia and Grado was evident even during these events. Fortunatus, the Patriarch of Grado, supported Ljudevit, furnishing him with Italian specialists for the construction of his fortresses. After Ljudevit’s defeat, Fortunatus left Grado and found refuge in Constantinople. This incident seems to reveal that Byzantium had not lost all support in Istria.
The fact that Borna remained faithful to the Franks indicates that Frankish influences had begun to penetrate into Dalmatian Croatia, as is shown by the spread of the cult of certain Frankish saints among the Croats.®? These influences are especially traceable in the western part of Dalmatia.
On the other hand, the princes Mislav (about 835-845) and Trpimir (845-864) entertained cordial relations with archbishops Justin and Peter I of Spalato. Trpimir, when introducing the Benedictines into his realm and building the first monastery in Croatia, addressed himself not to Aquileia or to other Frankish religious centers, but to Peter, the archbishop of Split, with the request that he supply him with the necessary silver for the making of sacred vases. Giving thanks for this service, Trpimir not only confirmed the donations made to the archbishop by his father Mislav, but considerably increased them.**
In his deed confirming the donations, Trpimir quotes a passage from a letter addressed to him by the archbishop asking for the confirmation of the donations. In this Peter I calls his see a metropolis over lands as far as the river Danube, almost over the whole Croat kingdom.** These words are often regarded as an interpolation from the tenth century when Spalato was seeking the recognition of its supremacy over the whole of Croatia.** From what we have seen, these words may be perfectly genuine. Spalato was the metropolis of Croatia, and the two rulers treated the archbishop as their metropolitan. This explains also why they did not think it necessary to have new dioceses erected in their realm. The bishops of the coastal cities were their hierarchs.
The main objection to this interpretation is the erection of a Croat bishopric in Nin (Nona). Its creation is often regarded as a result of the efforts of Frankish missionaries among the Croats. It is said to have been founded from Aquileia and to have been subject to the patriarchate. The problems connected with this foundation therefore need to be re-examined.
The erection of a bishopric in Nin was preceded by the construction of the Church of the Holy Cross, which was built by the Zupan Godeslav between 780 and 800. However, even the construction of this first known Croatian sanctuary seems to be linked not with Aquileia but with Zara. M. M. Vasi¢, in comparing the architecture of this church with that of St. Vid (Vitus) at Zara, stated that the architecture of the church in Nin followed the pattern of that in Zara (now destroyed), which was older than that of Nin.*
He found a similarity between the pattern of the church in Zara and that of St. Catherine in Pulj (Pola), which dated from the sixth century.’ This again shows the intimate connection of the Byzantine coastal cities with Istria.
The date of the foundation of the bishopric of Nin has not yet been clearly established. The document, by which in 892 the Croat prince Mutimir confirmed Peter II, archbishop of Split, in the possession of the Church of St. George in Putalj, is claimed by F. Sisi¢ * to provide proof that the bishopric of Nin existed before 852. In this document Mutimir spoke of the dispute between Aldefred, bishop of Nin, and Peter II of Split, and the manner in which the quarrel is described *° seems to suggest, according to Sisié, that the church in Putalj, which had belonged to the bishopric of Nin before 852, was given by Trpimir to Peter I of Split, but that after the death of Peter I about 860 it was again claimed by Nin.
This interpretation, although suggestive, can be questioned. It is not clear from Trpimir's description whether Nin had reclaimed possession of the church after Peter I’s death, or whether the church had been in the possession of the bishopric of Nin before it had been donated to Split by Trpimir in 852. Although the words with which Aldefred defended his rights, suggest that at the time of the complaint he was in possession of the disputed church and its property, the bishopric of Nin could have come into possession of it upon the death of Peter I, or on another occasion.
Such an occasion occurred in 887, when Theodosius, bishop of Nin, was elected archbishop of Split. During his episcopacy, the properties of both dioceses were in his possession until his death. His successor in Nin, Aldefred, may have taken possession of the church, pretending that Trpimir’s donation was meant only for the lifetime of Peter J.*%° This supposition explains more clearly why the dispute started in 892 and not earlier, for thirty-two years had passed since the death of Peter I. We conclude therefore that this document can hardly be used as proof that the bishopric of Nin already existed before 852.
Only one official document is extant to indicate the existence of this bishopric—the fragment of a letter from Nicholas I to the clergy and people of Nin.®’ In it, the pope defends his rights to erect bishoprics. To stress this, he points out that not even basilicas can be consecrated without papal authorization.
It should be noted that the letter is addressed not to the bishop of the city, but to its clergy and people. This suggests that when the letter was sent Nin had no bishop, which could mean that the pope was announcing to the clergy and people of Nin his intention of erecting a bishopric in their city. The reason why the pope stressed his exclusive right to found a bishopric is also easily understandable. In Nicholas’ time, the influence of the Frankish clergy in Croatia must have been considerable, and Aquileia may already have considered the possibility of creating a bishopric in Croatia, to be subject to itself. The patriarch of Aquileia may have thought that, because of the work of his missionaries in that area, he had a right to harvest the results. Therefore, the pope thought it necessary to stress that it was his exclusive privilege to erect new bishoprics.
Could Pope Nicholas have conceived this idea at that time? The most favorable moment was the year 860. The letter * sent in September of that year to Emperor Michael III, in which he expressed his suspicions concerning the legitimacy of Photius’ elevation to the patriarchal throne, indicates that the pope was very much concerned about regaining jurisdiction over the whole of Illyricum, which the papacy had lost in 732. He requested Michael to restore to him his right, and enumerated all those provinces which had been detached from the Roman patriarchate. The struggle over Illyricum started with this request.
We must not forget that Dalmatia was always under Roman jurisdiction. The pope could not accept the loss of a part of it to a see under Frankish influence. In order to prevent the danger, he founded the bishopric of Nin and subordinated it directly to Rome. The foundation of this bishopric, most probably in 860, marked the first success of the papacy over the expansion of the jurisdiction of Frankish hierarchy in territories which had been directly subject to Rome. It was a warning indicating that Rome would extend its claims to other lands which had been part of the former Illyricum.*
The fact that the first Croatian bishopric was erected not near Split but in the neighborhood of Zara, nearer to the Frankish border, cannot be invoked as proof that Frankish missionaries were mainly responsible for the preaching of the Gospel to the Croats.** It is true that Split claimed the inheritance of Salona and the ecclesiastical leadership of the coastal cities and of Croatia, but the political leadership under Byzantine supremacy belonged to Zara,®* and Nin * was, at the beginning of the ninth century, the residence of Prince Viseslav, considered to be the first known Christian Croat prince.
The fact that Nicholas subordinated the new bishopric not to Spalato but directly to Rome can be explained by the apprehensions harbored by the pope at that time, concerning his relations with Byzantium. The bishoprics of the coastal cities, although under Roman jurisdiction, were under Byzantine supremacy. By subordinating the new bishopric directly to Rome, Nicholas issued a warning not only to the Franks but also to Spalato, in case ecclesiastical relations between Rome and Byzantium should deteriorate with the opening of the antiphotian offensive. Spalato may have resented this, and if so, it would explain why, in 945, when the reorganization of the Croatian bishoprics was under way during the famous Spalatan synod, the archbishop requested and obtained the suppression of the first national Croatian bishopric in Nin.
Nicholas was correct in foreseeing a danger to papal interests from the complicated political affairs of Dalmatian Croatia by supporting the claims of Zdeslav, son of Trpimir, who, deprived of the succession by Domagoj, had found refuge in Constantinople. The bishops of the coastal cities seem not only to have supported Zdeslav, but also to have recognized the authority of the patriarch of Constantinople. The situation was saved for Rome by Theodosius, the bishop-elect of Nin, and by the Croat aristocracy, which did not like the supremacy of a foreign power. The revolt, led by Branimir, was successful and Zdeslav was killed (879).
Theodosius and Branimir informed the pope, and John VIII expressed his relief and thanks in his letters. He addressed a long missive also to the Church of Spalato whose see appears to have been vacant in 879, and to the Dalmatian bishops, exhorting them to return to the Roman obedience following the example of their predecessors. He exhorted the clergy and people of Spalato to elect an archbishop who would come to Rome where he would obtain the pallium “more pristino,’ which implied according to the custom of his predecessors.
The pope’s exhortation seems to have had its effect, the more so as Byzantine political intervention had met with a reverse. The elected archbishop of Spalato might have been Marinus who, however, seems to have asked Walpertus of Aquileia to conse- crate him. But he was succeeded by Theodosius of Nin, who held both dioceses initially but, after the protest of Stephen V, retained the archbishopric of Spalato and obtained the pallium from Rome.”
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According to information given us by Constantine Porphyrogenitus, Heraclius made the first attempt to Christianize the Serbs. After enumerating the parts of modern Serbia occupied by five Slavic tribes, he says,** “and since these countries had been made desolate by the Avars (for they had expelled from those parts the Romans who now live in Dalmatia and Dyrrhachium), therefore the Emperor settled these same Serbs in these countries, and they were subject to the Emperor of the Romans; and the Emperor brought elders from Rome and baptized them and taught them fairly to perform the works of piety and expounded to them the faith of the Christians.”
Constantine regards all Siavic tribes in ancient Praevalis and Epirus—the Zachlumians, Tribunians, Diocletians, Narentans— as Serbs. This is not exact. Even these tribes were liberated from the Avars by the Croats who lived among them. Only later, thanks to the expansion of the Serbs, did they recognize their supremacy and come to be called Serbians.*°
We have no reason to doubt Heraclius’ initiative in the Christianization of these Slavic tribes and of the Serbians. Their country was a part of Western Illyricum and was under Roman jurisdiction. Unfortunately, we have almost no information as to the progress of this work. The nearest center whence Christianity could have begun to spread to the Slavic tribes was Ragusa, founded by the Christian refugees from the Roman city of Epidaurum, destroyed by the Avars during the seventh century. It is most probable that the episcopal see was transferred from Epidaurum to Ragusa when the refugees began to reorganize their life. Because Epidaurum seems to have depended on Salona, even the re-established episcopal see of Ragusa depended on Spalato—heir of Salona. There exists a false Bull, attributed to Pope Zacharias (741-752),’"" which pretends that the pope had promoted Andrew, bishop of Epidaurum, to metropolitan rank with jurisdiction over the kingdoms of Zachlumlja, Serbia, and Travunje, with bishoprics in Cattaro (Kotor) Risan, Budva, Bar, Ulcinj, Skadar, Drivasto, and Pulati. The forgery was made in the eleventh century and was invoked by the bishops of Ragusa from the end of the twelfth century to support their claim to metropolitan status.
The only documents which confirm the existence of a bishopric at Ragusa (Dubrovnik) are the Acts of the Spalatan synods of 925 and 928." At that time Ragusa was subject to the archbishops of Spalato. It can be supposed, however, that an operation was enacted here similar to that accomplished in Spalato, on the initiative of Heraclius, about the year 640. The bishopric of Epidaurum was transferred to Ragusa, whence the first knowledge of Christianity could have penetrated to the Slavs of ancient Praevalis.
All this shows us that the first attempts to Christianize the Slavs in Dalmatia and in Western Illyricum were made by the Byzantines in the seventh century in close collaboration with Rome. The first missionaries came from the Latin cities of Byzantine Dalmatia. There was yet another power, with Latin traditions but under Byzantine supremacy, which was interested in strengthening Christianity in Dalmatia and in sending missionaries to the Slavs—namely, Venice. One of the Slavic tribes—the Narentans, who settled on the river Neretva and along the coast—were dangerous pirates, interfering in the commerce of Venice with Southern Italy. Before 830, the Venetians sent a maritime expedition against them with some success, for, as we learn from John the Deacon, and from the Chronicle of Dandolus,'*? the Narentans sent an envoy to Doge John asking for peace. At the exhortation of the Doge the pagan envoy accepted baptism. This was the first success of Venetian missionaries amongst the Slavs. However, it must have been very limited, because both sources complain that in 834-835 the Narentans captured a Venetian commercial delegation returning from Benevento.
So it happened that Dalmatia and the western part of Illyricum were pacified to a great extent and thus, even when the territory of the Croats could not be kept under Byzantine supremacy, no immediate danger threatened Byzantium from that side. But there still remained the problem of those Slavs who had invaded the eastern part of Ilyricum—Epirus Nova, Epirus Vetus, Macedonia, Thessaly, Hellas, the Peloponnesus, Moesia, Dacia, and even Thrace. The Byzantines called the regions occupied by them simply Sclavinia. Various emperors tried in vain to stop, or push back, this wave. Justinian IT (685-695) was partially successful in 688. He took thirty thousand prisoners on his expedition and moved them to Asia Minor. The transplantation of these Slavs permitted the Byzantines to bring the Slavs of Macedonia into a more dependent position. In order to strengthen his position in Central Greece, Justinian II raised Hellas to thema with a strategos, a military and civil governor. Leontius, strategos of Hellas, is mentioned in 695. This was the second thema to have been created in Europe aside from that of Thrace, which was elevated most probably by Constantine IV (668-685) against the Bulgarian and Slavic menace.*™
The invasions created great havoc in Byzantine ecclesiastical organization even in these provinces. In Epirus Nova only Dyrrhachium survived the onslaught and her bishopric never seems to have been vacant. Nicephorus, bishop of Dyrrhachium, was present at the Seventh Oecumenical Council (787).1% He is the only bishop from the end of the eighth century whose name is known to us. His immediate successor is not recorded, but we learn of a bishop of Dyrrhachium, who must have lived during the first half of the ninth century, from a letter of St. Theodore of Studios. Theodore calls him Anthony, and in another letter he speaks of an archbishop of Dyrrhachium, but does not name him.’** Most probably he has the same person in mind. In the Life of St. Theodora of Thessalonica we also find mentioned an archbishop of Dyrrhachium called Anthony,’” who is said to be Theodora’s brother. According to the Life, he must have governed the Church of Dyrrhachium up to the time that Leo V, the Armenian, reopened the iconoclastic controversy (815). Anthony was ordered to appear before the emperor and to profess iconoclasm, but he defended the cult of images in a long discourse. The emperor exiled him, but, unfortunately, the author of the Life does not tell us where. The ban was lifted by Michael II (820829), but Anthony was ordered to live privately. He may have returned to Dyrrhachium, but we are not told when, nor for how long. After the victory of the iconodoules, he was elected metropolitan of Thessalonica but died soon after, on November 2, 843.
It is most probable that Theodore’s Anthony is identical with the brother of St. Theodora. They both lived in the same period and were opponents of iconoclasm. It is strange that both documents refer to an archbishop in Dyrrhachium and not a metropolitan. Dyrrhachium had been a metropolis with seven suffragan bishops, all of whom disappeared, with the possible exception of Aulindos, during the Avar and Slavic invasions into Epirus. However, this does not mean that the metropolitan of Dyrrhachium, left alone in Epirus, became archbishop, without suffragans, under the direct jurisdiction of the patriarch. It would seem rather that the metropolitans were sometimes called archbishops. In the Acts of the Seventh Oecumenical Council, for example, even metropolitans are called quite simply bishops. The existence of a metropolitan in Dyrrhachium at the beginning of the ninth century shows us that ecclesiastical life in the provinces was becoming normal. This normalization was effected also in the political organization. St. Theodore, in one of his letters, speaks of a chartularius in Dyrrhachium whose name was Thomas.’ The office of chartularius was held by one of the most prominent members on the staff of a strategos.'*’ The chartularius of a thema, with the title of hypatos, or consular order of the Senate, was in charge of the military rolls, and was responsible for the payment of officers and men, and, as such, was responsible also to the central government. The reference to such an officer in Dyrrhachium by Theodore shows that Epirus was reorganized into a thema with a strategos in Dyrrhachium. Since Theodore died in 826, this reorganization must have been effected before that date, and his letter seems to have been written during the reign of Michael II (820829) after the iconoclastic persecution subsided. Theodore’s other letter,*'® in which he speaks of the monk Dionysius who, although absolved by the archbishop of Dyrrhachium from his lapse into the iconoclastic heresy, asked for absolution from Theodore, should also be dated in the reign of Michael, probably from 821, when the exiled bishop Anthony may have returned to his see.
However, this does not mean that the thema of Dyrrhachium was founded by Michael. Nicephorus, bishop of the city, spoke of himself, in the Acts of the Seventh Oecumenical Council, as bishop of the province of Dyrrhachium of the eparchy of Illyricum.’ This could mean that he still considered himself the head of the ecclesiastical province of Epirus which had been destroyed, but since he uses the word “chora” of Dyrrhachium, part of the Illyrian eparchy, this may indicate that in 787 Dyrrhachium and its surrounding territory were regarded as an autonomous part of lyricum, governed probably by an archon. Archontes of Dyrrhachium are mentioned in the Tacticon of Uspenskij.’”* This first attempt at the reorganization of the province can be attributed to the Empress Irene (780-802) who in 783 sent the logothete Stauracius to fight against the Slavs in Hellas.’** His victory was of great importance in the pacification of the Slavs and in the reorganization of the European provinces of the Empire. It made possible the foundation of the Macedonian thema (between 789 and 802), and it seems that even the thema of the Peloponnesus was created after this success, the see of the strategos being in Corinth.***
Having this in mind, it is unlikely that Irene and Stauracius would overlook the need to strengthen the position of the Empire in the Epirus region where Dyrrhachium was the most important outpost. It is thus quite possible that the archontia of Dyrrhachium was founded at the same time as the themata of Macedonia and of the Peloponnesus. We could, of course, attribute this first attempt at stabilizing the situation in Epirus to Constantine IV (668-685) who is said to have introduced or, at least, strengthened the system of themata in Asia Minor and in Thrace, leaving the rest of the European provinces under the prefecture of Illyricum.*?? Anyhow, in 787, judging from the Acts of the Seventh Oecumenical Council, Dyrrhachium was still a part of the eparchy of Illyricum, although probably governed by an archon.
It is not easy to determine when Dyrrhachium and its territory was promoted to a thema with a strategos.’* If it did not take place in the last years of the reign of Irene, we might attribute its foundation to the Emperor Nicephorus (802-811), or to Leo V (813-820). Nicephorus can also be considered the founder of the thema of Cephalonia. Its existence at the end of the eighth century does not seem warranted,’ but we know that in 809 the strategos of Cephalonia, Paul, commanded the Byzantine naval operations against Pepin in Venice.*'® The thema must thus have existed before this date. Not only the danger from the Arabs, but also the expansion of the Franks in Istria and in the Adriatic had forced the Byzantines to build a solid naval base in the Adriatic. This could only be Cephalonia.
One is tempted to date the establishment of the thema of Dyrrhachium, not during the reign of Leo V, but rather at the same time as that of Cephalonia. Dyrrhachium was an important outpost, not only against Slavic expansion, but also against Arab and Frankish attempts to gain a foothold in Dalmatia. It is thus quite probable that the archontia of Dyrrhachium was elevated to a thema by Nicephorus at the beginning of the ninth century. The reorganization of the thema of Dyrrhachium was very important, not only in strengthening the Byzantine rule over ancient Praevalis and Epirus Nova with its important coastal region, but also for the re-Christianization of the coastal region and of both Slavs and Ilyrians who occupied most of this territory.
The former province of Praevalis, now a part of Montenegro, was invaded by the Avars and Slavs at the end of the sixth and the beginning of the seventh centuries. Its ecclesiastical organization, of course, perished with the destruction of its main cities— Scodra, Dioclea, and Elissus (Lissus). The last mention of a bishop of Elissus, John, is from 592 and of a metropolitan in Scodra from 602.*"° The Christian population was scattered, but many had found refuge in the fortress and city of Decatera (Kotor), as is testified by Constantine Porphyrogenitus in his De administrando imperio,’*° and in other city fortresses on the coast which had survived the first onslaught. This may have been the case with the ancient city of Licinium (Ulcinj), which seems to have reorganized its municipal life in the eighth century. Others may have followed the last bishop of Lissus, who took refuge in Italy and was transferred by Gregory the Great to an Italian bishopric.
These remnants of the Roman population seem to have found a new chance for survival during the reign of Heraclius (610-641), who had settled the Serbs in the devastated regions. Some kind of arrangement concerning the newcomers and the natives must have been made by the emperor, because Porphyrogenitus attributes to him the Christianization of the new inhabitants by priests called from Rome. This may also mean that the emperor helped the remaining Latin Christians to reorganize their religious life. One may presume that the refugees started to return and to build new cities in their former home. It appears that in this way the city of Antibari (Bar), opposite the Italian city of Bari, was founded, probably by the refugees from Doclea (Dioclea). Old Olcinium (Licinium, Italian Dulcigno, Slavic Ulcinj), which was situated between Antibari and the river Bojana, was also revived, along with Elissus ( Lissus, Alessio, Ljes) on the Drin, near Scodra (Skadar). Budua (Budva), between Kotor and Ulcinj, must also have been resurrected from ruins in the seventh century. Many of its native inhabitants might have survived the invasion, because the old city was built on an island which was not connected to the mainland until years later. Even the Roman Risinium (Risan) seems to have found new inhabitants.
As for Budua and Risan, the two cities must have been rehabilitated, at least during the last half of the eighth century, because the Arabs, when attacking the littoral of ancient Praevalis in 840, thought it worthwhile to pillage and destroy them. Heraclius must also have made a change in the political organization of the former Praevalis with its remnant of Christian population. It became a part of Byzantine Dalmatia. Only much later did Dyrrhachium start claiming part of it. The Slavic tribes continued to be ruled by their own Zupans who were nominally under Byzantine suzerainty.
We do not know if Heraclius had taken any measures for the reorganization of the ecclesiastical order in the former province. The only bishopric which may have survived the catastrophe was that of Cataro (Kotor). However, its existence from the sixth century is not well documented. The only evidence is the signature of bishop Victor who assisted at the synod of Salona in 530. He called himself bishop ecclesiae Martaritanae. As such a city is unknown in the provinces under the jurisdiction of Salona, one may be entitled to read Cateritanae or Decateritanae which means Catara (Kotor).'” It is probable that, if there was a bishopric in Catara before the invasion, it may have survived the onslaught with the city. Heraclius can be supposed to have stabilized its existence, or if there was no bishopric, to have established it. It is also quite possible that Heraclius had transferred the bishopric of Doclea (Dioclea) to Antibari (Bar), where the refugees from the destroyed city seem to have gathered. This could explain why later (see below, p. 256) the bishops of Antibari, claiming a metropolitan status, pretended to be successors of the bishops of Dioclea. They were wrongly giving to Dioclea a metropolitan status, since Scodra and not Dioclea had been a metropolis in Praevalis.
It could also be presumed that the Italian hierarchy, especially the bishops of Bari, the capital of Byzantine Apulia, were espe- cially interested in the re-Christianization of the coastal regions on the other side of the Adria. It is probably from this region that Heraclius obtained the Roman priests for the Christianization of the Serbs as it is mentioned by Porphyrogenitus. Thanks to this help coming from Byzantine Apulia, and perhaps also to new immigrants from that province and the return of refugees, the remnants of the Latin population in former Praevalis were able to reorganize their municipal life during the eighth century.
Their vital interest was to live in peace with the Zupans of the Slavic tribes in their neighborhood. This may have been facilitated by the fact that the newcomers were, at least nominally, subjects of Byzantium. The second stage of their reorganization were attempts at the Christianization of the Slavs. In reality the Christianization of the Serbian tribes did start from the remnants of the Latin population of these cities.
Thanks to recent archaeological discoveries made by Serbian specialists in modern Montenegro, at least some traces of this activity can be detected in the ruins of a number of churches dating from the beginning of the ninth century. Latin inscriptions found there testify to the Latin character of their founders. Let us enumerate the most important discoveries shedding more light on these first attempts.’”
In 809, during the episcopacy of John in Kotor, a wealthy citizen named Andreaci built a church of St. Tryphun which became a cathedral church. Andreaci also built a sepulchral chapel of St. Mary for himself. The church of St. Peter in Bijela, between Risan (Risinium) and Draéevica, also dates from the beginning of the ninth century (between 797 and 809). Some reliefs and a Latin inscription mentioning a bishop—probably John—are preserved. Pre-Romanesque reliefs were also found near the Gothic Church of St. Andrew near Zelenica. It seems to indicate that an ecclesiastical building had existed there, probably in the ninth century. In the former zupa of Ston the pre-Romanesque church of St. Michael also testifies to the missionary activity of the Latins which must have continued during the reign of the Nemanjids. The constructions of the churches of St. Jurij in Janina on PeljaSac and of St. Ivan in Lopud must be dated to the beginning of the ninth century. This seems confirmed by remnants of reliefs and of a Latin inscription by the founder. A most interesting example of ecclesiastical architecture is revealed by the foundations of a church discovered in OSlje dating from the ninth century. It was a centralized structure in the form of eight half-circular apses. In Dioclea the Church of Our Lady should also be dated in the beginning of the ninth century. It was constructed on the ruins of an early Christian basilica. The same can be said of the Church of St. Peter in Bijela. The Church of St. Stephen in Ragusa, built about 815, also replaced a destroyed early Christian basilica.
In ancient Licinium (Olcinium, Ulcinj) the foundations of a small church with an apse were excavated. The Latin inscriptions on the ciborium indicate that the church was built between 813 and 820. Northwest of Bar (Antibari) in the ruins of the Benedictine Abbey St. Mary of Ratac, which had flourished during the early Middle Ages, two reliefs have been found which should be dated to the beginning of the ninth century. This does not mean that a Benedictine abbey had existed there at such an early period, but the find presupposes the existence of an ecclesiastical structure from that time.
A Latin inscription found on the ruins of the Church of Our Lady in Budua testifies that this church was constructed in 840. Later the Benedictines built around this church their Abbey, called Sancta Maria de Punta. The Church of St. Stephen in Vranovici probably should also be dated in the beginning of the ninth century. Near Tival was a Church of SS. Sergius, Nicholas, and Demetrius, founded by the deacon Alberinus, son of Bergolinus. According to the Latin inscription, the foundation should be dated in the second half of the ninth century. The cruciform Church of St. Thomas in Preanj probably was also constructed in the ninth century.
As for the founders of these churches, most of them were built by wealthy citizens of the Latin cities. Bishop John of Cattaro seems to have been particularly active in the Christianization of the Serbs. He is probably the founder of the church in Bijala. The founder of the church in Vranoviéi calls himself Churog and his wife Dana. His family name seems to be Turkic or rather Avar. If it is so, we have here an evidence that some of the Avars had advanced as far as the Latin littoral and been absorbed by the native populations. If the name of his wife Dana should be regarded as Slavic, we can see in this case an indication that Slavic elements were penetrating into the Latin cities already at that early period. There is no trace in these foundations of the Ger- manic practice of proprietary churches, as we have also stated concerning the early Croat Christian life.
Although remaining Latin and under the ecclesiastical supremacy of Rome, the citizens were loyal to Byzantium. This is confirmed by the construction dates of two of the churches. The founder of the Church of St. Tryphun in Cattaro mentions the name of the Emperor Nicephorus I (802-811), and the ciborium of the church in Ulcinj bears the date “Sub temporibus domini nostri PIS PERPETUO AGUSTI DN LEO ET DN CONSTAN...” This could mean only the reign of Leo V and of his son Constantine (813-820).
Also, the names of the founders and of the saints venerated in the Latin cities present a mixture of Latin and Greek hagiology: John, Thomas, Tryphun, Sergius, Nicholas, Demetrius, Stephen, George, Michael, Spirido (Greek Spiridon), and Guzma (Slavic form of Latin Cosma, but a female name). The locality of Sustiepan near Herzeg-Novog reveals the same Slavization of the name Sanctus as we have noticed in Croatian Dalmatia.
Besides the Latin coastal cities, Dyrrhachium was also active in the Christianization of the Slavs residing in the territory of its thema. The first results of the Greek missionaries are revealed by the Notitia of bishoprics, compiled under Leo the Wise (886912).*°* Nearest to the Latin coastal cities was the bishopric of Lissus (Ljes) which had disappeared at the end of the sixth century. The bishopric was restored in the ninth century and, although it had been under the jurisdiction of Rome before the citys destruction, it was now subject to its new founder, the metropolitan of Dyrrhachium. The same Notitia enumerates three more bishoprics revived during the ninth century by Dyrrhachium, that of Kroja, of Stephaniakia, and that of Chunabia. The latter bishopric is certainly a new foundation in a region of the thema occupied predominantly by Slavs.
The metropolitans of Dyrrhachium continued their missionary activity during the tenth century. Moreover, they tried to extend their jurisdiction also over the bishoprics of the Latin cities. A Notitia dating from the eleventh century enumerates, besides the four bishoprics indicated in the Notitia of Leo the Wise, the following Latin bishoprics: Dioclea, Scutari (Skadar), Drivasto, Pulati, and Antibari. In addition to these sees, Dyrrhachium counted six more: Glavinitsa (or Acrokeraunia), Auloneia (Va- lona), Lychnidos (probably Icinium, Dulcigno), Tsernikios (perhaps in the region of Cerminika, near El-basan), Pulcheriopolis (perhaps Belgrad, modern Berat), and Graditzios. Glavinitsa, Tsernikios, and Graditzios recall Slavic names and may be regarded as new foundations in regions inhabited by a Slavic population.*** The Notitia reveals that great changes had been made in the re-Christianization of the thema of Dyrrhachium and in the coastal regions since the reign of Leo the Wise. The Notitia dating from his reign, as we have seen, counted only four bishoprics under Dyrrhachium.
It is difficult to say when these new sees were created.**®? We can attribute this lively activity of re-Christianization to the initiative of the Emperor Basil I. Constantine Porphyrogenitus gives us interesting information on how this happened.?** He says that the Roman Empire “through the sloth and inexperience of those who then governed it and especially in the time of Michael from Amorion, the Lisper (820-829), had declined to the verge of total extinction, the inhabitants of the cities of Dalmatia became independent, subject neither to the Emperor or the Romans nor to anybody else, the natives of those parts, the Croats and Serbs and Zachlumites, Terbunites and Kanalites and Diocletians and the Pagani, shook off the reins of the empire of the Romans and became self-governing and independent, subject to none.” Constantine here enumerates the Slavic tribes which inhabited South Dalmatia, former Praevalis, and Epirus Nova. They were governed, “not by princes but by Zupans”; moreover, the majority of these Slavs were not even baptized, and remained unbaptized for a long time. “But in the time of Basil, the Christ-loving Emperor, they sent diplomatic agents, beseeching him that those of them who were unbaptized might receive baptism and that they might be, as they had originally been, subject to the empire of the Romans; and that glorious Emperor, of blessed memory, gave ear to them and sent out an imperial agent and priests with him and baptized all of them that were unbaptized of the aforesaid nations, and after baptizing them he then appointed for them princes whom they themselves approved and chose, from the family which they themselves loved and favored.” Then Constantine reports that even the pagan Narentans who had remained unbaptized, “sent to the same glorious Emperor and begged that they too might be baptized, and he sent and baptized them.”
Constantine oversimplifies the history of the conversion and subjection of the Slavs of this part of Eastern Illyricum, presenting it as effected by the initiative of the Slavs themselves. The actual motivation is not so simple. It was rather the attack by the Arabs on Dalmatia and on the thema of Dyrrhachium in 866 which brought about these events. In the same chapter Constantine describes how the Arabs from Africa appeared in the Adriatic with thirty-six ships, taking the cities of Budva and Rossa. The fortress of Decatero (Kotor) seems to have been left untouched, but the lower city was taken. The Arabs then blockaded Ragusa for fifteen months; the citizens asked for help, and Basil sent a . fleet of one hundred ships to the Adriatic Sea. The appearance of such an imposing armada not only forced the Arabs to abandon their blockade of Ragusa but persuaded the Slavic Zupans to seek friendship with the emperor.
Constantine admits that although the majority of the Slavs were unbaptized, there were a few who had been converted previously. These may have been the remnants of the first efforts of Christianization made by Heraclius, and of further attempts made by the Latin coastal cities in the eighth century and in the first half of the ninth century. Of course, this activity increased after the naval demonstration and the initiative taken by Basil to bring the Slavic tribes closer to the Empire and to the Church.
However, the Latin missionaries must have penetrated even earlier into the land which was to be Serbia. The first Christian names in the dynasty of the Viseslavié ruling over Raska, the cradle of the Serbians, are Stephen, son of Mutimir, and Peter, son of Gojnik. Both names were very familiar in the coastal cities and the Zupas of ancient Praevalis. Peter is said by Porphyrogenitus to have ruled between 892 and 897. He may have been baptized about 874. Stephen with his brother Bran defeated Vladimir, the son of the Bulgarian Khagan Boris in 860.'*’ Stephen may have been born and baptized between 830 and 840. These are the years when the missionary activity of the Latin citizens had started to flourish. It is thus quite possible that their activity had reached even the ruling family of RaSka. There are some other indications showing that the central region of Serbia started to be Christianized about the end of the first half of the ninth century. Already Mutimir who, with his brothers Strojmir and Gojnik, had succeeded Vlastimir (about 830-860) appears to have been Christian.’** This seems to be confirmed by a letter sent to Mutimir by Pope John VIII in 873.1? The pope exhorted him to join with his people the metropolis of Pannonia, as a new metropolitan (Methodius; see below, p. 150) had been ordained by the pope. The letter is interesting, as it reveals the policy of the papacy concerning ancient Illyricum and the religious situation in the lands forming the cradle of the Serbians, later called RaSka. Thus, exhorting the prince to join the diocese of Pannonia as his predecessors had done, the pope reveals a poor knowledge of the situation in this part of the ancient Illyricum. He regards Mutimir and his people as ancient inhabitants of these parts, ignoring the fact that they were new arrivals who had replaced the autochthonous inhabitants. All of Mutimir’s predecessors—ViSeslav, Radoslav, Prosigoj, and Vlastimir—were pagans. When the pope castigates the prince, saying that his land is full of priests coming from everywhere, with no superiors, and conducting religious services contrary to the canon laws, he thus discloses the religious situation in Serbian lands. It was a missionary territory, not yet ecclesiastically organized. The words seem to reveal also the rivalry between the missionaries. This is quite understandable, because Greek priests from the metropolis of Dyrrhachium were as zealous in their Christianizing missions as the Latins, who came from the coastal cities and perhaps also from Dalmatian and Pannonian Croatia.
The presence of Latin missionaries in the cradle of the Serbian race is further revealed by the early religious architecture of this region. Some of the early churches of this region recall the architecture characteristic of the Latin coastal cities, thus revealing the influence of early missionaries who had begun their work in the ninth century and continued it in the tenth."*° For example, the Church of St. Peter in Ras is circular in plan, with the cupola resting on pendentives, and with an apse. It is dated from the ninth to the beginning of the tenth century. Other churches of a very early period can also be found. In Stara Pavlica there is a cruciform church, and although that of Zaton is ruined, it nevertheless reveals a threefold plan.'** This region has not yet been completely examined by Serbian archaeologists. It is possible that, in the future, the ruins of other churches will be found to document further the activities of the Latin missionaries from the coastal cities who—on orders from the Emperor Basil I and sup- ported by the strategos of Dyrrhachium and the emperor’s envoys —penetrated into the land which is now modern Serbia and Christianized the inhabitants. Constantine describes Basil’s rule over the Zupans in the years that followed as being a lenient one.
In the Roman province of Epirus Vetus, the ecclesiastical situation was normal during the reign of Pope Gregory the Great (590-604), as we learn from his letter to the bishops of Epirus.’ The province had suffered heavily during the time of the invasions, but the see of Nicopolis survived. We find the name of Anastos of Nicopolis in the Acts of the Seventh Council, which are also signed by Philip of Corcyra.’** These appear to be the only two sees which survived up to the ninth century without interruption. It is possible that the bishopric of Hadrianopolis of the ancient province also survived, since we find the name of Cosmas of that see in the Acts of the Council of 870.***
Nicopolis must have suffered further setbacks during the eighth century. It lost the metropolitan see, which was transferred to Naupactos, but we do not know when this occurred. The list of bishoprics composed during the reign of Leo the Wise (886-911 ) does not even mention a bishopric of Nicopolis among the eight suffragans of Naupactos.*** Even the political reorganizaticn of this part of Epirus seems to have been effected later than that of Dyrrhachium. This thema is listed in the Tacticon of Uspenskij (compiled between 845 and 856), while the thema of Nicopolis does not appear. However, this does not mean that the thema of Nicopolis could not have been established during the regency of Theodora. Her prime minister Theoctistus was very much preoccupied with the situation in Hellas and the Peloponnesus, where the Slavs continued to be restless. In 842 he sent a military expedition into the Peloponnesus and succeeded in subjugating the rebellious Slavic tribes. In order to strengthen the Byzantine position in these provinces, he transplanted those fierce warriors, the Mardaites, from Syria, to the themata of the Peloponnesus and Cephalonia and also into the territory of ancient Epirus Vetus. By this manoeuvre he hoped to prevent the danger of an Arab invasion and to keep the Slavic tribes subjugated.’** It is, thus, quite possible that it was Theoctistus who had created the thema of Nicopolis. This could have happened after 853. If the Tacticon of Uspenskij was composed in this year, or some year after this date, this would explain why the thema of Nicopolis was not listed by its author. But the thema must have been established during the ninth century, for we have a seal belonging to the strategos Leo from this period, and one of Constantine’s, also from the ninth or the beginning of the tenth century.’*” The ecclesiastical reorganization of this territory followed the political stabilization. The metropolis was established in Naupactos. Among its eight suffragans who are enumerated in the list of Leo the Wise, we find the see of Bounditsa. The name seems to reveal that it was founded for the new Slavic converts, perhaps by Michael III, or more probably by Basil I, as a result of the definite Christianization of the Slavs settled in the ancient province of Epirus.
The reorganization of Macedonia was ended by the foundation of the thema of Thessalonica. This seems to have been effected during the reign of Theophilus (829-842), since a strategos of Thessalonica is already mentioned in 836.1°° This reorganization was very important because the Slavs were settled in the very neighborhood of the city. The region of the river Strymon was a part of the thema, governed most probably by an archon. This area was almost completely inhabited by Slavic tribes and was elevated to a thema at the end of the ninth century.’*® The land between the mountains of Rhodope and the Aegean Sea was called Boleron **° and seems to have enjoyed a kind of autonomous status under the strategos of Strymon. This meant the end of the political reorganization of the European provinces.
This reorganization was followed by a complete reorganization of the episcopal sees in these provinces. This was accomplished at the beginning of the ninth century, as is revealed in the list of bishoprics compiled by a certain Basil.‘*t Only then could serious attempts at the Christianization of the Slavs in Greece be made. The superior culture which these Slavs had found in their new home attracted them, and facilitated their Christianization. Unfortunately, we have only two documents which give information as to the progress of this work among the Slavs, namely, the list of bishops who attended the union councils of 879-880, and the list of bishoprics compiled during the reign of Leo the Wise (886-912). Among the bishops who attended the Union Council was Agathon, bishop of Morava, Damaius, bishop of Ezero, and Peter of Drugubitia.’*? All three sees were established in Slavic territory. Moravia can only be a small city at the confluence of the rivers Morava and Danube, in modern Serbia.’**? The Ezerites were a Slavic tribe, the majority of whom founded settlements in the Peloponnesus. Some of them must have stayed in Hellas. The Drugubites settled in Macedonia.
During the reign of Leo the Wise ™** there is listed among the bishoprics of Hellas, under the metropolitan of Larissa, a bishopric of the Ezerites. The same catalogue lists under Thessalonica two Slavic dioceses, that of the Drugubites and that of the Serbs. The latter bishopric must have been erected for the White Serbs, who had preferred to stay there after they had reached the Byzantine borders under Heraclius. Constantine Porphyrogenitus says that the majority of them were not satisfied with the territory allotted to them by the emperor, and that they left to return home (which is now Saxony), but were persuaded by the strategos of Singidunum (Belgrade) to settle with the Croats, fighting against the Avars.’*® It seems thus that some of them preferred to stay in the territory given to them by the emperor.
The conversion of the Slavs in Macedonia must have started after their defeat by Justinian II. The catalogue of Leo the Wise lists two bishoprics with Slavic names under the metropolitan of Philippi, that of Velikia and that of the Smoljans. Other bishoprics listed in the same catalogue—that of the Ljutici, of Velikia, of Ioannitsa, and of Dramitsa in Thrace (under Philippopolis )—also had Slavic populations.
Among the bishoprics of Greece itself,’*° we do not find names which can be regarded with certainty as Slavic, but the complete reorganization of its ecclesiastical provinces indicates that the Christianization of the Slavs settled there must have been completed by the ninth century.
In this respect, it seems that the Slavs who most resisted Christian influence were the Milingues and Ezerites in the Peloponnesus. Only in the fourteenth century was a special bishopric for the Ezerites founded. This can be explained by the fact that those tribes had settled in the mountainous region of Taygetus.’*’ The Christianization of the Slavs transported by Justinian II to Asia Minor seems to have been more rapid. A catalogue of bishoprics dating from the seventh century lists among the sees of Bithynia at least one whose name is Slavic, that of the Gordoserbs.***
Of course, the Christianization of the Slavs in Greek territory meant also their assimilation and Hellenization. This process had already begun in the seventh century. On several occasions the Byzantines used Slavic troops in their armies, and the names of a few Slavic generals are known.’** The most famous of these was Thomas, a Slav from Asia Minor,'*’ who led the revolution against the iconoclastic Emperor Michael II (820-829). The Patriarch Nicetas of Constantinople (766-780) was also of Slavic origin, and the domestic staff of the Emperor Michael III included a certain Damian, of Slavic extraction.1*! This assimilation and Hellenization was a natural process. The Slavs in the purely Greek provinces did not form large, homogeneous groups, and they were unable to resist the attraction of a higher cultural environment. The situation was different in the lands of future Serbia, fully occupied by Slavic tribes. But, at least, after their conversion, these Slavs were won over to the Byzantine religious tradition and civilization. These events took place between 867 and 874.**
Byzantine influence would probably also have reached the Slavs between the Danube and the Black Sea, if their resistance had not been strengthened by the appearance of the Bulgars. The pressure of a new Asiatic invader, the Khazars, a Turkic tribe, had forced Asparuch, the son of Kuvrat, to move south, and about the year 679 he appeared with his horsemen on the Danube.*** He was welcomed by the Slavs, who inhabited this region, and thus the foundations of a new Slavic state, Bulgaria, were laid. The Bulgars, not being numerous, were gradually Slavicized. Political disorders in Byzantium helped the successors of Asparuch to consolidate their new political structure to such an extent that not even Constantine V (741-775), despite eight successful campaigns, was able to destroy this menace.
From that time on, Bulgaria presented a difficult problem for the Byzantines. Reciprocal hostility made the penetration of Christianity into Bulgaria very difficult. Khagan Krum (c. 802-815) reorganized Bulgaria and became the most dangerous foe of Byzantium. Two emperors lost their thrones through disastrous expeditions against Bulgaria. Nicephorus (802-811) was killed on the battlefield, and his skull, mounted in silver, later served as a cup for the khagan at solemn banquets. The emperor's son Stauracius, severely wounded, escaped, but died soon after. The Emperor Michael I (811-813) was deposed after a calamitous battle. Krum extended his sway over more Byzantine territory, destroyed Serdica (the modern Sofia), and caused great havoc in Byzantine territory, devastating the land and destroying the cities. He died suddenly while facing the walls of Constantinople with his armies. Only when his successor Omortag (814-831) had concluded peace with Leo the Armenian did the situation become more propitious for the penetration of Byzantine influence into Bulgaria.***
The native Greek population had not completely disappeared after the Slavs took possession of the land. These groups formed the first Christian islands in the pagan sea. They were augmented by numerous war prisoners, whom Krum had brought from various areas after his victorious expeditions. There were many priests among them, even bishops, from the cities taken by the khagan. They worked not only among their compatriots, but also among the Slavic population. They must have been successful, because Omortag, seeing that Christianity was taking firmer root in his lands, began to persecute the Christians. He is said to have put to death four bishops and three hundred and seventy-seven prisoners. Their memory was celebrated yearly in Constantinople on January 22, and their martyrdom is vividly described in the Greek Synaxarium.**°
This report is completed by the Menologium of Basil II ** and in a Slavic prologue to the translation of the Menologium.?” According to this information, the first persecutors of the Christians were the boyars Tsok and Ditzeng, who seem to have risen to power after the death of Krum, before his son Omortag was able to assert his succession. It was Ditzeng who ordered the mutilation of Bishop Manuel’s arms. Tsok is said to have invited all Christian prisoners—“officers, priests, deacons, and laymen’— to abjure their faith. After their refusal to do so, he had some of them decapitated and others killed after prolonged torture. The chief victim of this persecution was the metropolitan of Adrianople, Manuel, who had already been maimed by the boyar Ditzeng. The Continuator of Theophanes *** confirms that Manuel died as a martyr under Omortag.
This indicates that the most determined enemies of Christianity were the Bulgar boyars. The Slavic population was more responsive to Christian propaganda emanating from the original Christians who had survived invasion, and with whom the Slavic lower and middle classes were mingling.
The discovery of a short office in honor of the Bulgarian martyrs in the Vatican Greek manuscript 2008 throws more light on the persecution of the Christians by Omortag.*** It was written by an hymnographer called Joseph. Two authors of this name lived in the ninth century, one called Joseph of Studios, who died in 832, and Joseph the Hymnographer, who flourished in the second half of the ninth century.’®’ One is inclined to attribute this office to Joseph of Studios, because his monastery seems to have been particularly interested in the history of the Bulgarian martyrs. We shall see that St. Theodore of Studios spoke of this persecution in his Little Catechism. At any rate, the office was composed by an author of the ninth century who used a contemporary source for his hymn.
The hymnographer mentions all the names listed in the Synaxarium, with the exception of Sisinius. Instead of Marinus, he speaks of Martinus. This may be the same person. He pays special homage to a layman named Peter, to his wife Mary, and their children. About twenty-five other names listed by the hymnographer were currently used by the Byzantines of this period. The martyr Arabios was probably one of the Arabs in the army of Nicephoros mentioned by Theophanes.’* Artabazos and Bardanes were members of the Armenian colony which is known to have existed in the region of Adrianopolis.* More interesting are four other names: Aspher and Cupergo recall strangely those of Aspar, Asparuch, Isperich, and Kuber, used by the _protoBulgars.*** This should indicate that the Christian missionaries had converted even some of the Bulgar boyars. Two other names, Lubomeros and Chotiameros, are evidently Slavic, i.e. Lubomir and Hotomir. This, again, is an indication that the Byzantine missionaries were successful among the Slavic population. The two martyrs mentioned by the hymnographer were most probably men of some standing, perhaps Zupans of Slavic tribes under the Bulgars.'*
The episode related by Theodore of Studios **° must have taken place during the reign of Omortag. He describes how the Christians in Bulgaria were forced to break the Church’s regulation on fasting and were made to eat meat in Lent. Fourteen souls refused to do so. One of them was killed by the khagan, and his wife and children sold into slavery. But even this example did not induce the rest to break the rule of fasting, and they were all executed.
In spite of their hostility to the Christian religion, the Khagans were unable to resist the attraction of the higher culture of their enemies. Krum was not particularly anti-Christian, and he appreciated the services rendered to the State by the Greek artisans among the prisoners and the remainder of the Christian population. Omortag also availed himself of their services to a large extent. Inscriptions recording his deeds were composed in Greek and inscribed in stone by the Greeks. He even acceptd the Byzantine title of “ruler (archon) established by God.”*** His palace in Pliska reveals a marked relationship to Slavic structures in Byzantium.**’
Despite the fact that he was at peace with the Byzantines, Omortag looked unfavorably on the spread of Christianity among the Slavic population, for he had to reckon with the strongly antiChristian attitude of the non-Slavic boyars. It was only natural that the prisoners and the Christian subjects should consider the Byzantine emperor as their liberator and religious leader. The khagan thus felt he had sufficient reason to doubt their loyalty. His persecution was dictated more by political than by religious motives.
Theophylactus, archibishop of Ochrid,*® relates an interesting story which illustrates the missionary zeal of the Greek prisoners. One of them, Cinamon, who was particularly able, was given by Krum to his son Omortag. The latter became very much attached to him, but because Cinamon refused to renounce his faith, he was imprisoned by Omortag.
Omortag was survived by his sons, Enravotas, Svinitse, and Malamir. The Slavic names of the last two, although Enravotas seems to have had a Slavic name also, that of Vojna, make it clear that the Slavic element had penetrated into the khagan’s court and his family. Omortag favored those Slavic nobles who were inclined to foster his autocratic tendencies, rather than the nonSlavic boyars. But, after his death, the boyars demonstrated their influence in state affairs. Neither Enravotas nor Svinitse was given the succession. The boyars, fearing that the elder sons of Omortag would continue their father’s policy, chose the youngest son, Malamir (831-836), as khagan, hoping that they would more easily be able to control him. In fact, during Malamir’s reign, one of them, Isboulos, seems to have exercised the greatest influence on state affairs.
It is possible that there was also another reason which influenced the boyars in their choice of the inexperienced youngest son. Enravotas and Svinitse may have been suspected of being less hostile to the Greeks and their religious beliefs than was their father. This happened to be true concerning Enravotas. Theophylactus says in his story that the latter asked his brother to release Cinamon from prison and to give him to him as a slave. Cinamon must have been a very able man and a zealous Christian. Enravotas not only became very attached to him, but Cinamon even succeeded in converting the prince to Christianity.
Malamir was alarmed when he learned of his brother's conversion. The pagan boyars saw it as a betrayal of the national cause. The conversion of a prince would certainly encourage the Christians in Bulgaria. In vain Malamir exhorted his brother to renounce the Christian faith, and finally he felt obliged to put him to death.’
The mistrust of the Bulgarian rulers toward Christianity is quite understandable. Thus far they knew Christianity only in the Byzantine form and were constantly more or less hostile towards the emperor, who was regarded as the head of orthodox Christians. This hostile attitude could be tempered only if the Bulgars were in touch with other Christians free from any influence of the Byzantine emperor in religious matters. This became possible only when the Bulgarian rulers began to expand their realm toward the West, where they came into contact with the Christian Franks.
The defection of the Slavs of the Timok Valley and of the Abodrites to the north of the Danube, who looked to the Franks for help, and the affirmation of Frankish rule over the whole of Dalmatian and Pannonian Croatia after the defeat of Ljudevit, induced Omortag to negotiate with the Franks in order to limit the frontiers of their realms. The evasive answers given by Louis the Pious to the embassies of 824, 825, and 8267” exasperated Omortag, and in 827 he invaded Pannonian Croatia, which was under Frankish sovereignty, and forced the Slavs to accept his authority.’ Louis the German tried in vain to reverse the situation in 828. The war dragged on under Malamir (831-836), and was only concluded under Presjam (836-852) to the advantage of the Bulgars. The Peace of Paderborn (845)'” left the region of Sirmium, and a part of Pannonian Croatia, in Bulgarian possession.
\Malamir remained on good terms with the ranks until the end of his reign. About 839 the Bulgarian army, led by Presjam,?” whom the Serbs called khagan, invaded the Serbian territory governed by Vlastimir under nominal Byzantine sovereignty, but had to withdraw without success.*”
A successor of Presjam, Boris, son of Svinitse, renewed the treaty of 845 when he sent an embassy in 852 to Louis the German, who held a Reichstag in Mainz.’** But according to the Annales Bertiniani,‘“* he seems to have soon afterwards attacked the territory of Louis the German. The attack appears to have been supported unsuccessfully by some of the Slavs. This can only have affected Pannonian Croatia, then under Frankish sovereignty.
Prudentius, the author of the second part of the Annales Bertiniani, chronicled certain rumors, according to which Boris’ attack against the territory under Louis the German’s sovereignty was made at Frankish instigation. If this is true, the initiative could have come only from Charles the Bald, then king of Western Francia, which would indicate that Boris was on rather intimate terms with the Franks. The Slavs who supported Boris’ attack cannot be the Moravians, as was thought by Zlatarski ‘7’ and Bury,’ for they were too well known to the annalist, and he would hardly have called them simply “Sclavi’, as we read in his report.**® He could only have had in mind a local Slavic tribe discontented with Frankish supremacy. Theophylactus of Ochrida **° probably had this defeat in mind when writing that at the beginning of Boris’ reign a Frankish cloud had covered the whole of Bulgaria.
Boris tried his luck also in Dalmatian Croatia, which he was able to reach through the territory of Sirmium, which formed part of his realm. The Croatian prince Trpimir (845-864) successfully defended his lands with the result that, as Constantine Porphyrogenitus stresses, the Croats were never subjugated by the Bulgarian forces. He can mean only Dalmatian Croatia, because Pannonian Croatia was for some time under Bulgarian supremacy during the reign of Omortag prior to the conclusion of the treaty of Paderborn, probably from 827 to 838.** Boris was also unsuccessful in his attempt to annex Serbia, probably in 860.
Prince Mutimir, with his brothers Strojmir and Gojnik, defeated the army of Boris, and even captured his son, Vladimir, together with twelve boyars.**? This incident ended amicably, and from that time on Boris continued on good terms with Mutimir and the Serbs.
By concluding peace with the Serbs, Boris at least secured the boundary of his realm in the southwest. He extended his kingdom to the mountains of Albania and to the Pindus, including all the lands around Lake Ochrid and Lake Prespa. He was now free to pay more attention to events developing in the northeastern part of his vast territory.
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