THE ESTABLISHMENT OF SAMUEL'S MACEDONIAN STATE

Tsar Samuil The Macedonians formed into tribes, to oppose the enemy more easily, and some of them grouped into a union, where every tribal union had a prince. Among the tribes that were throughout Macedonia were the Sagudeti (west of Solun), the Rinhini (in the Khalkidhiki Peninsula), the Smoljani (east of the Vardar), the Dragoviti (along the upper and middle reaches of the Vardar and in the Pelagonian Plain), the Berziti (in upper or north-western Macedonia), and the Velegeziti (in southern Macedonia and Thessaly). The tribes that were to the east of the Struma River were called the Strumjani.
The Macedonians in the beginning of the VII century, came under Byzantial Slavery which lasted until the IX century, when the Bulgarian armies started entering Macedonia. The expansion of the Bulgarian state in Macedonia, ended in the middle of the IX century. Samuil's Empire Then the Bulgarian state often battled, worsened the Macedonian position. That is why in the IX century, they rebelled under the leadership at the son at the Brsjak prince-Samuel, and succeeded to free Macedonia till the end of the X century, and to organise the first state unity of the Macedonian. He proclaimed himself as a tsar, and for a capital at his Kingdom he first chose Prespa then Ohrid.
The Macedonian state during Samuel's rule was very large. It occupied all of Macedonia, where on the south it occupied a piece of Greece, on the north it reached the river Sava and Dunav, on the west to the Adriatic sea, and on the east, all the way to the Black sea. These territories were captured with wars, and although Byzantian at that time was very powerful, he was frightened from the Macedonian state which was expanding very quickly. In the year of 1014, the Byzantian tsar Basil II attacked Samuel's state. He captured and blinded 14,000 of Samuel's soldiers leaving only one eye on every 100th soldier to lead the others back to Samuel's Kingdom. When Samuel saw long rows of his blinded soldiers coming back, he was devastated and died shortly after from a heart attack.

| Back |