Before the arrival in the Balkans - The Proto-Bulgares

The Bulgarian are originating from the vicinity of the Altaï. A group of Turkish tribes, they took part in the march to the West of the Huns as member of the clanic confederation which they directed.

They were thus confronted to the Occident (the Roman Empire) as of 370 and largely contributed to the constitution of the Hun Empire whose significant share of the richness rested on the tribute paid by Rome. In 432, the empire as a sovereign who reigns only 2 years and to whom succeeded Bleda and Attila, its nephews. In 441, Attila takes arms, Rome not having paid the sums agreed by treaty, he reaches the Danube. In 445, he makes assassinate his brother and 2 years after sets out again towards West. He devastates the Balkans, arrives to the Thermopiles. In 451, in Gaule, he knows his only and single defeat (at the Catalonic Fields) having required for the alliance of the Romans and the Germans, and perhaps also too stretched lines of provisioning for the troops of Attila! Let us not forget that his cavalry had only fodder for the horses, considering their number, the last adapted grazing grounds was the plain of Hungary! He avenged this bad moment on Italy the following year and dies into 453.

His succession divides and the members of the confederation, certainly vis-a-vis this absence of strong central power, take their distance. Huns disappear gradually in the shade of history and other people affirm themselves, thus the Bulgarian which create 3 great empires (Great Bulgaria, Bulgaria of the Volga and Bulgaria) and populate, before the crossing of the Danube by Asparuh, Macedonia and Thrace.

In 480, Byzance signs an agreement with the Bulgarian so that they drive the Ostrogoths out, Germanic "barbarians" which had just invaded Thrace, destabilizing seriously the Empire. The military value of Bulgarian was rented by one of the vanquished, the Ostrogoth poet Enodius! He hailed also the presence of female units in their rows! The first engagements took place into 482 at the request of Basileus Zeno and in 488, the Goths were decimated by the Bulgarian forces and were driven out definitively from the Balkans. In 493, the Bulgarian returned on their own initiative this time, demolish the Byzantine army and plunder Thrace.... With a last bloody interlude in 499 (the battle of the Zurta river which cost the life to the whole Illyrian army) in 502, the annual raids in the Byzantine provinces in spite of three rows of fortifications supposed to prevent them are institutionalized!

The Slaves invade Balkans twice and arrive up to 65 kilometers of Byzance and in 559, they still return, accompanying this time the Bulgarian conducted by Khagan Zabergan which, with the crossing of the Danube, divides his forces into three columns. One reached the Thermopiles, the other Gallipoli and the third enters the suburbs of Constantinople to directly confront the Emperor at the head of some veterans.... This military adventure however stops very quickly because of the Byzantine military activity on the Danube (risk to see the road of return closed) and then attacks, once the Danube crossed in opposite direction, of a second branch of the Bulgarian tribes bought by Byzance!

The Byzantine diplomacy tried to send the Ottomans Turks against the Bulgarian, always against money payments, it turned out badly for them since the Ottomans took Constantinople in 482 and ransacked the city!

The migration of Slaves took immense proportions and several million of them settled from the Black Sea to the Adriatic, in perfect osmosis with the local populations and always in opposition to Byzance!

Then it was the turn of Avars with the two branches of the Bulgarian tribes (Utiguri and Kutriguri) confederated like military force. In 626, they were at the doors of Constantinople! In 632, the Avar Khanat weakened, the Bulgarian tribe of the Utigurs takes its independence under the authority of its Khan, Kubrat. He quickly unified a number of Bulgarian tribes around him, which extended his kingdom from west to east (from the Dniepr to the Kuban) and from north to the south (from the Donetsk to the Sea of Azov and the Black Sea)! Kubrat had peaceful relations with Byzance. He died in 651 and his power was revealed in 1912 within the framework of a major archaeological discovery not far from Poltava in Ukraine: his tomb!

Kubrat's Bulgaria

He was buried in a wooden coffin with 250 rectangular gold dishes, and a considerable number of utensils made (20 of money and 17 of gold) of noble metals, ornaments of arms inlaid with the noble metal, hunting horn and gold spoon - the symbols of the authority, 69 gold coins, a loop of gold belt weighing close to 500 grams, etc… arranged around the body.

The identification was done in 2 times: the more "recent" gold coins dated from year 647, therefore the tomb was datable according to this date. And in 1983 Dr. W Seibt of the Byzantine institute of Vienna east managed to decipher the monograms on the two rings of bookmark of gold like Kkubratu, and Khubratu Patrichiu (the title of patrician had been bestowed to him by the Byzantine Emperor). There was no more doubt, it was the tomb of Kubrat Khan, the founder of Large Bulgaria.

Kubrat had five sons, only one could succeed to him, but the geography of the country, ideal vast plains for the nomads, were militarily indefensible whereas so many people went towards the West! The division was done with reason and two of the sons of Kubrat could recreate "Great Bulgarias"! Kotrat did it in the upper Volga, not far from the river Kama and Asparuh, followed by the main part of the Bulgarians moved towards the Balkans. In 670, as a knowledgeable Statesman, but also excellent military (duality of rule at the Bulgarian since the oldest times), Asparuh could negotiate alliances with the Slaves installed and take the top thanks to its army and in particular the excellence of its cavalry which made hear its rumbling to the doors of Byzance on several occasions!

In 681, it was over, Byzance was forced to recognize Bulgaria and to pay tribute annually.