Todor Svetoslav

Bulgaria and its principalities around 1300

Todor Swetoslaw Terter (also: Theodor II. Svetoslav or Theodor of Bulgaria , Bulgarian Тодор Светослав Тертер ; †  1322 ) was Tsar of Bulgaria from the house of Terter from 1300 to 1322 . He was the son of the Bulgarian Tsar Georgi I Terter and Maria Terter .

Life

Childhood and youth

It is believed that Todor Svetoslav was born in the capital of the Bulgarian Empire Trnovo in the early 1270s. In 1279 Iwan Assen III. Become a Bulgarian tsar with Byzantine help . The powerful Boljar Georgi I Terter, father of Todor Swetoslaw, was not only his first adviser, but also his brother-in-law. Todor Svetoslav and his mother were taken hostage to Constantinople ( Nicaea ).

As Iwan Assen III. Had to flee himself in 1280, Georgi I Terter became Bulgarian tsar. One of his first acts was to annul his marriage to Ivan's sister and to get his first wife and son back from captivity. He also tried to fight the political turmoil in Bulgaria. In captivity around 1284/85, the young Todor Swetoslaw was betrothed to the daughter of the Thessalonian Sebastokrator Johannes Dukas . In 1284 his mother, Maria Terter, returned from captivity thanks to an agreement.

In the case of Todor Swetaslav, the Bulgarian Patriarch Ioakim III could not . , who accompanied a delegation to Constantinople in 1285, achieve success. The young Todor was to marry the daughter of the Byzantine nobleman Johannes Synadenos at a later date , but he did not. After returning to the Bulgarian capital, Todor was appointed Mitzar (co-emperor) by his father.

A little later, Tsar Georgi Terter became dependent on the Golden Horde under Khan Nogai and became its vassal . Todor Svetoslaw was sent into Tatar captivity for protection. He stayed there for about 15 years. When the Bulgarian tsar could no longer hold out around 1292 and lost his throne after a Boljar conspiracy, he himself fled to Byzantium. With the approval of Khan Nogaj, the new Bulgarian tsar became the Boljar Smilez . This put Todor Svetoslaw in a difficult financial situation. Thanks to the Khan's wife, Efrosine (an illegitimate daughter of the Byzantine Emperor Michael VIII Palaiologos ), Todor was able to marry the granddaughter of a wealthy merchant. The marriage was not of a political nature, but it did improve his financial situation.

Accession to the throne and internal consolidation

Coin of Todor Svetoslav

The death of Nogai around 1299 sparked fighting between his son Tschaka Nogai and Toktai , the Khan of the Golden Horde . Chaka lost and fled to Bulgaria in autumn 1299 with his wife (daughter of Georgi I Terter) and Todor Swetoslaw, where he took the throne of Ivan IV Smilez . Todor Svetoslav overthrew him the following year and was proclaimed Bulgarian tsar by the Boljar Council, whose majority he had previously secured.

After his coronation as Tsar of Bulgaria, he had Chaka killed and his head returned to Toktai. The “friendly gesture” not only gave Bulgaria back its independence, but also gave Bessarabia a gift. Mavrocastro at the mouth of the Dniester became the northernmost Bulgarian fortress. The new tsar also sought the guilty party for Bulgaria's dependence on the Tatars in previous years. He took tough action and also made before the Bulgarian patriarch Ioakim III. not stop. Ioakim III, who organized a conspiracy by Boljars against the “foreign” Tsar, was arrested and thrown from the fortress wall in Trnovo.

The consolidation of the Bulgarian Empire was not in the interests of Byzantium . For this reason, Emperor Andronikos II fueled the internal disputes in Bulgaria. In 1301 he financed and supported Michael Tich Assen , the son of the Bulgarian Tsar Konstantin Tich Assen , with troops . Byzantine chroniclers state that Andronikos was asked to do so by Bulgarian nobles. This is countered by the fact that Michael was unable to find support from the Bulgarian nobles after crossing the border and was also abandoned by his army.

Andronikos II started a second attempt with the Sebastokrator Radoslaw , brother of the Bulgarian Tsar Smilez . He supported him in his family property to take the despotate of Kran , which was ruled at this time by Eltimir , an uncle of Todor Svetoslav. However, the despot was able to defeat Radoslav. Radoslaw was captured with 13 Byzantine generals, was blinded and handed over to Todor Swetoslaw. The Bulgarian Tsar exchanged the captured military leaders for his father Georgi I Terter , who was in Byzantine captivity.

Wars with Byzantium

Todor Svetoslav's struggles with Byzantium

After consolidating the Bulgarian empire, the tsar directed his efforts against Byzantium, whose diplomacy had instigated the Tatars to attack and pillage Bulgaria. This started another phase of the Byzantine-Bulgarian wars .

In 1303 Todor Svetoslaw marched into Thrace with his army . He took several small fortresses on the southern slopes of the Balkan Mountains and many cities in the Sagore region . After that he turned to the Black Sea coast cities and was able to take Ktenia , Rusokastro , Mesembria , Anchialos , Sosopolis and Agathopol . The Byzantine emperor, who had his troops gathered at Bizye in 1304 , sent his son Michael IX. who moved along the Via Pontica towards Bulgaria. Both armies met on the banks of the Skafida river, near Faros (today's Burgas ). In the battle that followed, the Byzantines were defeated (→ Battle of Skafida ).

In the Battle of Skafida the Bulgarian prince (despot) Wojsil (brother of Smilez and Radoslaw) supported the Byzantines, which is why he had to flee to Byzantium. After the battle, Svetoslav moved towards Adrianople.

Michael IX. made another push against Bulgaria the following year. He devastated the Sagore region and took the coastal cities south of Sosoplis again. Todor Slwetoslaw was able to recapture it in the same year. When taking Sosopolis, John XII fell. Kosmas , Patriarch of Constantinople, captured in Bulgaria. After Bulgarian rule over the coastal cities was restored, Todor Swetoslaw and Eldimir marched through the Byzantine Thrace, plundering.

In 1305, the Byzantine diplomacy Eltimir, who was also Smilez's brother-in-law, was able to win over another plot against the tsar. When he found out about this, he surprisingly entered the despotate of Kran with his army, disempowered his uncle and dissolved the despotate. Its strategically important areas in the Balkan Mountains were now directly subordinate to the Tsar.

In 1306, 16,000 Alans who were in the service of the Byzantine emperor asked for asylum in Bulgaria, which was granted to them by Todor Svetoslav. To help them escape, he sent a company of 1,000 men. However, on the Bulgarian border, they were attacked by the Catalan mercenaries of the Byzantine emperor. Impressed by the fighting strength of the Catalans, Todor Swetoslaw sought peace. The negotiations with their leader, probably Berengar du Rokafort, in which the tsar offered him his sister (the widow of Chaka) as a wife, failed.

At the end of 1306, Todor Svetoslaw sought direct negotiations with Byzantium and offered peace. Andronikos II did not want to accept the loss of the coastal cities and dragged the talks on. When famine arose in Constantinople in winter, Todor Svetoslaw sent two ships with grain. This enabled him to gain the sympathy of the citizens of Constantinople and put pressure on the negotiations.

The Balkan Peninsula after the peace of 1307

A peace and thus an end to the war could only be concluded in 1307. Byzantium pledged to pay tribute and recognized the status quo after the Battle of Skafida. Bulgaria secured the cities of the southern Black Sea coast as far as Agatopolis and the Sagore region . The Bulgarian Tsar then married Theodora Palaiologina , daughter of Michael IX, which also contributed to peace. The wedding took place in 1308 in the Tsar's monastery on the island of Sweti Ivan , near Sosopolis. In the years that followed, the monastery expanded into an important cultural center, supported by both the Bulgarian Tsar and the Byzantine Emperor.

The rest of the time, Todor Svetoslav tried to live in peace with his neighbors. The traditionally good relations with the Republic of Venice were maintained and the Tsar has been described as a friend in several Venetian documents. In 1315 there was a conflict between the Genoese colony in Kaffa and the Bulgarian Empire, which was settled the following year.

Around 1299 the Bulgarian-Serbian relations deteriorated when Anna Terter , sister of Todor Swetoslaw, was expelled by her husband Stefan Uroš II Milutin, King of Razia . In 1310 the Serbian King Stefan Milutin visited the Bulgarian capital Tarnowo, which normalized Bulgarian-Serbian relations.

Armed conflicts between the Bulgarian Empire and the Despotate of Vidin have also not been recorded. For this reason, it is believed that there was peace between the two empires and that the despot Shishman recognized the Bulgarian tsar.

In the last years of his reign, Todor Svetoslav intervened in the internal politics of Byzantium when Todor's brother-in-law died in 1320. He offered support to Andronikos III, who was contesting the Byzantine throne of his grandfather Andronikos II. Andronikos III. considered a possible kidnapping and rejected the offer. At the same time, the tsar twice gave Tatar associations free passage to plunder Byzantine territory.

Todor Swetoslaw died of natural causes in 1322. His son Georgi II. Terter followed on the throne . Todor Swetoslaw has given its name to Terter Peak , a mountain on Greenwich Island in Antarctica , since 2005 .

family

1. Theodor II. Svetoslav ⚭ Evrosina
   1. Georgi II. Terter , Tsar of Bulgaria (1322-1323)
2. Theodor II. Swetoslaw ⚭ 1308 Theodora Palaiologina , sister of the Byzantine emperor Andronikos III. Palaiologos

literature

• Jordan Andreev, Ivan Lazarov, Plamen Pavlov: Koj koj ev srednovekovna Bǎlgarija . Sofia 1999, ISBN 954-402-047-0 .
• Jordan Andreev: Bǎlgarija prez vtorata četvǎrt na XIV vek. Veliko Tǎrnovo 1993.
• Jordan Andreev: Tsar Ivan Schischman 1371-1395. In Bǎlgarskite khanove i zare VII-XIV vek. "Petar Beron" publishing house, Sofia 1998, pp. 208-217, ISBN 954-402-034-9 .
• Ivan Božilov: Familijata na Asenevci (1186-1460) (Bulgarian). Sofia 1985.
• John VA Fine, Jr .: The Early Medieval Balkans. University of Michigan Press, Ann Arbor 1991, ISBN 978-0-472-08149-3 .
• Gerhard Podskalsky : Theological literature of the Middle Ages in Bulgaria and Serbia 815-1459. Munich 2000, ISBN 3-406-45024-5 .

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Чолпанов, Б., Гюзелев, В., Бележити българи, том I, София, 1967, Държавно военно издателство, стр. 289

Web links

Commons : Todor Swetoslaw  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

predecessor	Office	successor
Chaka Nogai	Tsar of Bulgaria 1300–1322	Georgi II. Terter