Later Roman Empire

The iconoclast emperors pursued a moderate foreign policy, consolidating the empire within its contracted limits ; but under the "Macedonian" dynasty, which was of Armenian descent, it again expanded and became the strongest power in Europe. The 9th century also witnessed a revival of learning and culture which had been in eclipse for 200 years. The reign of Basil I. was marked by an energetic policy in south Italy, where his forces co-operated with the western emperor Louis II. The Saracens were expelled from their strongholds, Bari was recovered, Calabria saved, and the new province (Theme) of Longibardia formed. This secured the entrance to the Adriatic, and the increase of dominion here at the expense of the Lombards was a compensa tion for the loss of Sicily. Leo VI. did much for reorganizing the navy, but his reign was not fortunate; Saracen pirates plundered freely in the Aegean and, under the able renegade Leo of Tripolis, captured Thessalonica and carried off countless captives But a great tide of success began so years later. Nicephorus Phocas won back Crete (961) as general of Romanus II., and then as emperor recovered Cilicia and North Syria (with Antioch) 968. Cyprus was also recovered. The tide flowed on under his equally able successor, John Zimisces (of Armenian race) and under Basil II. these reigns mark the decisive victory of the empire in the long struggle with the Saracens, whose empire had been broken up into separate States. The eastern frontier was strengthened by the active policy of Basil II. in Armenia, which was more fully incorporated in the empire under Constantine IX.

Basil

II.—The reign of Basil II. marks the culmination of the power of the Eastern empire, for it also witnessed the triumphant conclusion of another conflict which had lasted almost as long. In the reign of Constantine IV. the Bulgarians (see BULGARIA) had founded a kingdom in Lower Moesia, reducing the Slavonic tribes who had occupied the country, but less than two centuries sufficed to assimilate the conquerors to the conquered, and to give Bulgaria the character of a Slavonic State. The reign of Con stantine V. was marked by continuous war with this enemy, and Nicephorus I. lost his life in a Bulgarian campaign. This dis aster was followed up by Prince Krum, who besieged Constan tinople in 815. His death was followed by a long peace. Prince Boris was converted to Christianity (reign of Michael III.) ; a metropolitan see of Bulgaria was founded, dependent on the patriarch of Constantinople; and the civilization of the Bulga rians, and beginnings of their literature, were entirely under Byzantine influence. The conversion was contemporary with the work of the two missionaries Cyril and Methodius, who (while the field of their personal activity was in Great Moravia and Pan nonia) laid the south-eastern Slays under a deep debt by inventing the Glagolitic (q.v.), not the so-called "Cyrillic" alphabet (based on Greek cursive) and translating parts of the Scriptures into Slavonic (the dialect of the Slays of Macedonia). The most brilliant period of the old Bulgarian kingdom was the reign of Simeon (893-927), who extended the realm westward to the shores of the Adriatic and took the title "Tsar (ie., Caesar) of Bulgaria and autocrator of the Romans." The aggression against the empire which marked his ambitious reign ceased under his successor Peter, who married a daughter of Romanus I., and the

Bulgarian Patriarchate founded by Simeon was recognized at Byzantium. But the Byzantine rulers only waited for a favourable time to reduce this formidable Slavonic State. At length Zimisces subjugated eastern Bulgaria and recovered the Danube frontier. But while Basil II. was engaged in contending with rivals, the heroic Samuel (of the Shishmanid family) restored the Bulgarian power and reduced the Servians. After a long and arduous war of 14 years Basil (called the "Bulgar-slayer") subdued all Bul garia western and eastern (roi8). He treated the conquered people with moderation, leaving them their political institutions and their autonomous church, and to the nobility their privileges. Some Bulgarian noble families and members of the royal house were incorporated in the Greek nobility; there was Shishmanid blood in the families of. Comnenus and Ducas. Greek domination was now established in the peninsula for more than 15o years. The Slays of Greece had in the middle of the 9th century been brought under the control of the Government.

In the reign of Basil II. the Russian question also was settled. The Dnieper and Dniester gave the Russians access to the Euxine, and the empire was exposed to their maritime attacks (Constan tinople was in extreme danger in 86o and 941). In 945 a commer cial treaty was concluded, and the visit of the princess Olga to Byzantium (towards the end of the reign of the learned emperor Constantine VII., Porphyrogennetos) and her baptism seemed a pledge of peace. But Olga's conversion had no results. Sviato slay occupied Bulgaria and threatened the empire, but was deci sively defeated by Zimisces (971), and this was virtually the end of the struggle. In 988 Prince Vladimir captured Cherson, but restored it to the emperor Basil, who gave him his sister Anna in marriage, and he accepted Christianity for himself and his people. After this conversion and alliance, Byzantium had little to fear from Kiev, which came under its influence. One hostile expe dition (1043) indeed is recorded, but it was a failure. Much about the same time that the Russians had founded their State, the Magyars (see HUNGARY; the Greeks called them Turks) migrated westward and occupied the regions between the Dnieper and the Danube, while beyond them, pressing on their heels, were another new people, the Petchenegs (q.v.). The policy of Byzantium was to make use of the Magyars as a check on the Bulgarians, and so we find the Romans (under Leo. VI.) and the Magyars co-operating against the tsar Simeon. But Simeon played the same game more effectively by using the Petchenegs against the Magyars, and the result was that the Magyars before the end of the 9th century were forced to move westward into their pres ent country, and their place was taken by the Petchenegs. From their new seats the Magyars could invade the empire and threat ened the coast towns of Dalmatia. The conquest of Bulgaria made the Petchenegs immediate neighbours of the empire, and during the 11th century the depredations of these irreclaimable savages, who filtered into the Balkan peninsula, constantly preoc cupied the Government. In 1064 they were driven from the Dniester regions into Little Walachia by the Cumans, a people of the same ethnical group as themselves. They were crushingly defeated by Alexius Comnenus in 1091, and disappear from history.