Принципи интеграције неромејских етничких скупина у тематски систем на Балкану

Abstract

In the early 7th century the Byzantine Empire faced a crisis that deeply shook its foundations. The Late Roman military and administrative system collapsed and the socioeconomic pillars of the state crumbled under an onslaught of invading armies. However, the medieval Byzantine Empire rose from the shaken foundations of the Late Roman world, finding a foothold in and drawing its strength from a militarized administrative system known in scholarship as the theme system. Restoring its power in the Balkans from the 7th to the 11th century, Byzantium encountered various peoples whose different language, religion, laws and customs distinguished them from the Rhōmaioi. In view of these distinctive features, these peoples were integrated into the theme system on a special basis, with a certain degree of self-government. Various means were used in their integration, and the choice of the means used depended primarily on the way each of these individual ethnic groups had come into contact with the Byzantine territory and on the nature of its relations with the Empire. To reflect this fact, non-Rhomaic ethnic groups examined here have been grouped into three categories. The first group includes newly settled peoples that had conquered former Byzantine territories by the sword, such as the Slavs and Bulgars. In contrast, the second group includes the native population, i.e. the descendants of the former inhabitants of the Roman Empire, who had lost direct territorial and political ties to their motherland due to the settlement of Slavs and Bulgars. This led to their decades-long and, in some cases, even centuries-long isolation, which meant that they developed their own forms of self-government, detaching their identity from that of their mother state. This group includes the Sermesians, Vlachs and Peloponnesian Mainotes. The third group comprises the peoples who arrived in the Balkans owing to colonization measures implemented by Constantinople, such as the Mardaites and Khurramites. The Slavs and Bulgars, who had captured Rhomaic territories by force, i.e. without the Empire’s consent, were to be subjugated by force. On the other hand, the integration or, more accurately, reintegration of isolated indigenous groups or peoples who had arrived as the result of planned settlement and hence did not engage in hostilities against the imperial authorities, was usually implemented without resorting to violence; the only exception was the forced dispersion of Khurramites throughout the Empire after their revolt. Extant sources inform us about two main types of military-administrative divisions used to integrate non-Rhomaic communities into the theme system in the Balkans from the 7th to the 11th century: ethnic archontiai and tourmai. An archontia was the usual form of organization for peoples with a developed selfgovernment which had only been sanctioned by Constantinople and as such integrated into its provincial framework. This practice was usual for newly settled peoples such as the Slavs, who had brought their own traditional form of government, as well as for indigenous groups, who had, having lived for decades or centuries amidst a sea of newcomers, developed their own autochthonous organs. An ethnic tourma enjoyed a slightly lower degree of self-government than an archontia. This form of governance was characteristic of tribes and peoples under Constantinople’s tighter control – groups that had been settled as the result of colonization measures. In the case of most ethnarchies in the south of the Peninsula, both Slavic and indigenous, integration into the theme system was completed by the mid-10th century. In the second half of the 10th century the Empire began to experience a great surge in military power, which allowed Constantinople to finalize the process of reoccupation in the Balkans and the integration of local peoples into the Byzantine military-administrative system. The final step in this process was the defeat of Samuil and his successors at the hands of Basil II. Basil’s policy of introducing new civilian and military government after 1018 excluded the existence of self-governing territorial divisions rooted in the ethnic characteristics of the local population. Although some themes from this period had ethnonyms in their names, they cannot be considered as autonomous forms of administration. For the Balkan Slavs, the only means of manifesting their distinctive identity was the autocephalous Archbishopric of Ohrid with Slavonic as its liturgical language. However, the results of Basil’s actions were eventually put to the test, as evidenced by the later rebellions of Serbs and Bulgars. Therefore, the Byzantine policy of integrating non-Rhomaic ethnic groups can be seen as a lasting success only in the case of the sklabēniai in the southern Balkans and the abovementioned indigenous groups and colonized communities in the southern part of the Peninsula.