Simeon I of Bulgaria

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Simeon I
Tsar of Bulgaria

Reign	893 – 27 May 927
Born	866
Died	27 May 927
Predecessor	Vladimir of Bulgaria
Successor	Peter I of Bulgaria
Consort	unknown
Issue	Mihail of Bulgaria Peter I of Bulgaria Ivan of Bulgaria Veniamin of Bulgaria unknown daughter
Royal House	Khan Krum's dinasty
Father	Boris I of Bulgaria
Mother	Maria

Tsar Simeon the Great (Bulgarian: Цар Симеон Велики) (c. 866 – May 27, 927) was the ruler of Bulgaria, who reigned 893 – May 27, 927.

He was 27 when he took the throne from his brother Vladimir, the son of Prince Boris, who was deposed and possibly blinded by his own father after his attempt to return Bulgaria to paganism. One of the first decisions which he took after taking over the throne was to move the capital of Bulgaria from Pliska to Preslav.

Bulgaria during the reign of Tsar Simeon

After he received his education in Constantinople, Simeon took the monastic vows and possibly prepared to become the head of the Bulgarian Church, but the fall of his elder brother prompted him to the throne. To break away from Byzantine religious influence, he replaced the Greek liturgy with Slavonic. The Glagolitic alphabet enabled the use of the Slavonic language (or Old Bulgarian) in administration, literature and liturgy. Under the supervision of Simeon and thanks to his lavish sponsorship Old Church Slavonic flourished — to the extent that the enormous bulk of texts circulating during later centuries in the Russian lands go back to Simeon's time. The literary life, concentrated around the cities of Preslav and Ohrid, in Macedonia, included both large-scale translation of Greek works in exegesis, hagiography, rhetoric, chronography and in original works written in Old Bulgarian. This was the Golden Age of the medieval Bulgarian culture whose most enduring consequence was the establishment of the Cyrillic alphabet — based on the Greek alphabet, but supplemented with Glagolitic or newly created letters. Slavonic literature became the third major literature in the Christian world while Slavonic liturgy spread throughout most of Eastern Europe.

In 893 the Byzantines decided to move the market for Bulgarian goods out of Constantinople to Thessaloniki. The war that followed ended in 896 with a great Bulgarian victory in the battle of Bulgarophygon in Eastern Thrace. The market was returned to Constantinople and the Byzantine Emperor had to pay annual tribute to Bulgaria. More importantly, with the help from the Pechenegs Simeon successfully fended off a Magyar invasion which was coordinated with the Byzantines.

Later, Simeon claimed the imperial title and tried to replace Byzantium as the biggest power in the region, probably even building a new Bulgarian-Byzantine empire. In 913 he invaded Thrace and unimpeded stationed his army at the gates of Constantinople. After a successful military campaign Simeon was crowned by the Byzantine patriarch as "Emperor of the Bulgars and the Romans", a title that was quickly recognized by pope Formosus too. Simeon led aggressive policy regarding the Serbian principalities and continuously invaded the country and imposed his choice of prince. On August 20, 917 an extraordinarily large Byzantine force invaded Bulgaria, but suffered a heavy defeat at the Battle of Anchialus. As a result Simeon drew into his orbit the Pecheneg leaders and started a major offensive against the European dominions of Byzantium. He allegedly even tried to negotiate an anti-Byzantine coalition with the Fatimid ruler in Egypt. Simeon maintained extensive diplomatic correspondence with the Byzantine Emperor Romanus I and the Patriarch Nicholas Mysticus, but his ambition to be recognized as Emperor by the Byzantines remained unfulfilled. By 926 he fought with Croatia under King Tomislav, but suffered a defeat in the Battle of the Bosnian Highlands. Simeon died of a heart attack on May 27, 927, after 14 years of war against the Byzantine Empire.