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The Crown and the Veil: Titles, Spiritual Kinship, and Diplomacy in Tenth‐Century Bulgaro–Byzantine Relations
Author(s) -
Mladjov Ian
Publication year - 2015
Publication title -
history compass
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.121
H-Index - 1
ISSN - 1478-0542
DOI - 10.1111/hic3.12228
Subject(s) - byzantine architecture , diplomacy , politics , bulgarian , emperor , history , empire , ancient history , ceremony , ruler , historiography , christianity , indigenous , law , classics , political science , philosophy , archaeology , ecology , linguistics , physics , quantum mechanics , biology
When it comes to diplomatic relations, the phrase “too close for comfort” perfectly describes the relationship between the medieval Byzantine and Bulgarian states in the Balkan peninsula. In the early 10th century, shortly after Bulgaria's conversion to the Eastern rite of Christianity, the two states engaged in a bloody and lengthy conflict over not just territory and wealth but also over the now exacerbated issues of diplomatic equality and prestige. Marching on Constantinople, the Bulgarian monarch Simeon I demanded the imperial title itself and was partly accommodated by the Ecumenical patriarch Nicholas I in an idiosyncratic ceremony that has caused much debate among Byzantinists and Slavicists. This study explores the main features of the historiographical debate and attempts to find the correct answers in the testimony of the relevant sources. And while the incident under investigation might appear self‐contained, it lies at the heart of a major preoccupation of Byzantine diplomacy: Byzantium's monopoly on the political heritage of Rome and the Roman imperial title. Correctly interpreted and compared to Byzantium's diplomatic relations with the Frankish ruler Charlemagne, Simeon's recognition as a non‐Roman emperor and peer of his Byzantine counterpart in 913 suggests a pattern of grudging and incomplete accommodation designed to guarantee both the safety and the identity of the Byzantine Empire.