Tomislav

The title of this article is ambiguous. Further meanings are listed under Tomislav (disambiguation) .

Tomislav ( Latin Tamisclaus or Tamislaus ; † around 928 ) is considered the first king of the Croats . He was the first Croatian ruler to use the title rex .

Tomislav came from the Trpimirović dynasty and ruled from 910 as Knes over the duchy of Croatia , the so-called coastal Dalmatian Croatia. After the union with inland Pannonian Croatia , Tomislav became the ruler of medieval Croatia around 925 , which reached the height of its power under him.

Equestrian statue for Tomislav in Zagreb (created by Robert Frangeš Mihanović 1928–1938, erected in 1947).

Live and act

Tomislav was probably the son of Muncimir , whom he succeeded as Knes of Dalmatian Croatia around the year 910.

The Slavs had Tomislav reign by the collapse of Hungary in Pannonia experienced a highly significant for European history division: Was formerly the entire space between the Baltic Sea and the Aegean Sea from Slavic tribes inhabited, as were the fixing of Hungary , the South Slavs of the West and East Slavs separated.

Tomislav's dominion around 925.

Tomislav was able to successfully defend his country, which included (today's) Slavonia , large parts of Bosnia , core Croatia and parts of the Dalmatian coast, against Magyar attacks. But his political plans had other goals. He built up a force that, according to De Administrando Imperio of the Byzantine Emperor Constantine VII, supposedly numbered 100,000 infantry, 60,000 horsemen and 180 warships.

The Byzantines welcomed Tomislav as an ally because it enabled them to pinch Bulgaria . The Bulgarians, for their part, had subjugated the Serbs, which were not yet unified in one state, which led to the first Serbian mass exodus (as later before the Turks) to Croatia. The Serbian prince Zaharija Pribislav fled to Croatia in 924 because of this fact.

The alliance with Byzantium placed the entire Dalmatian coast under Tomislav, including the previously formally Byzantine port cities of Split , Trogir and Zadar as well as the Adriatic islands. With the exception of Istria , which was divided between the Franconian Empire and Venice , all Croats were now united in the Kingdom of Tomislav.

Excerpt from the letter of Pope Pope John X to his "dear son Tomislav, King of the Croats" from the year 925 ( Joannes episcopus seruus seruorum dei dilecto filio Tamisclao regi Croatorum ).

In 925 John X sent a letter to Tomislav, in which he called him the "King of the Croats" ("Tamisclao regi Croatorum"). It can be assumed that Tomislav had acquired the title rex himself and that the Pope only recognized existing conditions. At the same time, with this message, John X suggested that the Croatian kingdom owes its foundation to the papacy. One can also assume that it was of certain importance for Tomislav to see his new dignity strengthened by Rome. Byzantium did not recognize this title.

At a council called in 925 by papal legates in Split , questions of church discipline and the ecclesiastical organization of Croatia were discussed in detail. In a note that preceded the wording of the Council decisions in 925, it says “Tomislav is king in the Croatian province and in the Dalmatian regions” (“in prouintia Croatorum et Dalmatiarum finibus Tamisclao rege”). In the 12th canon of the council resolutions of 925, the ruler of the Croats is referred to as a king ("rex et proceres Chroatorum").

In 927, the Bulgarian Tsar Simeon I sent a powerful force at the time to subdue the Croats. However, this attack was successfully repulsed and the Bulgarians were defeated.

In 928 - around the time when the new Pope Leo VI. put an end to these efforts - Tomislav mysteriously disappeared and after some time was pronounced dead.

As the successor to King Tomislav, his younger brother Trpimir II ascended the Croatian throne in 928 .

Others

The Republic of Croatia awards foreign heads of state the highest expression of recognition for their services to the creation of a sovereign Croatia and for outstanding contributions to its international reputation and position as well as for the great contribution to the development of bilateral relations with the King Tomislav Order ( Croatian Velered kralja Tomislava s lentom i Velikom Danicom ).

Tomislav is represented on the 1000 Croatian Kuna banknote, the highest banknote in the Republic of Croatia.

Representations

• 

  Oton Iveković : The Coronation of King Tomislav (1904/05)

• 

  Josip Horvat Međimurec : The Coronation of King Tomislav (1938)

• 

  Yugoslav postage stamp (1940)

• 

  Josip Horvat Međimurec: Tomislav on the Throne (1941)

• 

  Monument in Tomislavgrad

See also

• List of rulers of Croatia
• History of Croatia

swell

• Ernest Bauer : Tomislav [Croatia] . In: Mathias Bernath, Karl Nehring (Hrsg.): Biographisches Lexikon zur Geschichte Südosteuropas . tape 4 . Munich 1981, p. 339 ( ios-regensburg.de ).
• Tomislav. In: Hrvatska enciklopedija. Leksikografski zavod Miroslav Krleža, accessed on August 17, 2017 (Croatian). 

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Tomislav. In: Hrvatska enciklopedija. Leksikografski zavod Miroslav Krleža, accessed on August 17, 2017 (Croatian). 
2. ↑ Bauer 1981 (see literature)
3. ↑ Codex Diplomaticus Regni Croatiæ, Dalamatiæ et Slavoniæ, Vol. I, p. 32.
4. ↑ Law on Croatian Orders and Awards. Retrieved December 27, 2013 (Croatian). 

predecessor	Office	successor
as Prince Muncimir	Prince of Dalmatian Croatia and King of Croatia 910–928	as King Trpimir II.