Stefan Vojislav

Stefan Vojislav (* beginning of the 11th century; † around 1055) was Grand Župan of Dioclitia from around 1040 until his death .

Life

According to tradition, Stefan was the son of a Dragomir, but nothing is known about him. Also Byzantine sources do not agree on its origin, and some call him a Serb from Travunija , today's Herzegovina .

Due to high tax demands from Byzantium , Stefan Vojislav, as the archon of Dioclitia, the central part of today's Montenegro , dared an uprising and also won the support of the coastal cities that had not previously belonged to Dioclitia, such as Bar , Ulcinj and Skadar in northern Albania (Alban. Shkodra ). The first uprising in 1035/36 failed and Stefan was taken prisoner.

After the flight from Constantinople , a second uprising was successful in 1037/38. Stefan Vojislav chased away the strategos Theophilos Erotikos and defeated a Byzantine expeditionary army, thereby securing the country's independence. He then placed Hum and Travunia (Herzegovina, South Dalmatia) under his direct rule. From then on Dioclitia was often called the Kingdom of Dioclitia and Dalmatia . The Serbian interior also recognized Stefan Vojislav's supremacy, where the old Serbia of the Vlastimirić was divided into Bosnia west of the Drina and Raszien east of the Drina . In 1055 he died of poisoning when he was invited to the court of the Byzantine emperor.

literature

• Sima Ćirković: Stefan Vojislav . In: Lexicon of the Middle Ages (LexMA). Volume 8, LexMA-Verlag, Munich 1997, ISBN 3-89659-908-9 , column 85.
• Paul Stephenson: Byzantium′s Balkan Frontier. A Political Study of the Northern Balkans, 900–1204. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge et al. 2000, ISBN 0-521-77017-3 , pp. 125-126, 133-135, 308.

Web links

• Vojislav Stefan in the Prosopography of the Byzantine World

predecessor	Office	successor
Časlav Klonimirović	Greater Župan of Raszien around 1040 – around 1055	Mihailo Vojisavljević