Constantinople and The Echo Chamber The

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Constantinople and the Echo Chamber: The Vlachs

in the French Crusade Chronicles
Florin Curta
Department of History, University of Florida, 25 Keene-Flint Hall, Gainesville,
FL 32611, USA
fcurta@ufl.edu
Abstract
The chroniclers of the Fourth Crusade (Geoffroi de Villehardouin, Henri de

Valenciennes, and Robert de Clari) have much to say about the Vlachs. Much of that
information results from direct contact with the Vlachs, particularly in the case of
Villehardouin and Henri de Valenciennes. However, several issues characterizing
the Vlachs, especially in Robert de Clari’s chronicle, are remarkably similar to stories
that may be found in Niketas Choniates. The paper analyzes the role attributed to the
Vlachs in the French chronicles, and attempts to explain the similarity to the cover-
age of things Vlach in Niketas Choniates. As such, the paper offers an examination of
all Byzantine sources mentioning the Vlachs before Choniates and of non-Byzantine
sources such as Benjamin of Tudela. The conclusion is that the image of the Vlachs in
the French chronicles derives from stories about them circulating in twelfth-century
Constantinople.
Keywords
Benjamin of Tudela – Bulgaria – Geoffroi de Villehardouin – Henri de Valenciennes –

Johannitsa Kaloyannes – Niketas Choniates – Robert de Clari – Trojan legend – Vlachs
Introduction
There is hardly any ethnic group in the medieval history of the Balkans that
has created more confusion among historians than the Vlachs. With Romanian
and Bulgarian historians arguing over the “real” identity of the medieval Vlachs,
© koninklijke brill nv, leiden, ��6 | doi �0.��63/�5700674-��34��3�

428 Curta
the accounts of the Fourth Crusade written in Old French have more often
than not been mined for historical information.1 Little, if any attention,
has so far been paid to their literary qualities. For example, many have taken at
face value the episode in Robert de Clari’s Conquest of Constantinople, in which
Peter of Bracheux meets a party of Vlachs and Cumans.2 Very few have noted
that in fact the episode is out of the chronological sequence in Clari’s narrative,
and that Peter of Bracheux’s appeal to the Trojan legend in order to justify the
crusade in terms of a patrimonial concept of state is a purely literary motif.3
The chronicles of the Fourth Crusade show that the experience of the cru-
saders in the Balkans has disrupted the mental categories that had organized
their world.4 This may explain why, in the eyes of the French chroniclers, the
Vlachs moved very rapidly from a remote and exotic position to a center-
stage role as one of the main enemies of the Latin Empire of Constantinople.
Responsible for this sudden change of attitude was the victory that Johannitsa
obtained on 14 April 1205 against the crusaders at Adrianople. The capture
1 For an excellent overview of the dispute between Bulgarian and Romanian historians concern-
ing the Vlachs, see Nicolae-Şerban Tanașoca, “O problemă controversată de istorie balcanică:
participarea românilor la restaurarea țaratului bulgar,” in Răscoala şi statul Asăneştilor, ed.
Eugen Stănescu (Bucharest: Editura Ştiinţifică şi Enciclopedică, 1989), 153–181.
2 Robert de Clari, La conquête de Constantinople 106, ed. J. Dufournet (Paris: Honoré Champion,
2004), 200 and 202. See Benjamin Hendrickx, “Recherches sur les documents diplomatiques
conservés, concernant la Quatrième croisade et l’empire latin de Constantinople pendant
les premières années de son existence (1200–1206)” Byzantina 2 (1970): 107–184 (159–160);
Francesco dall’Aglio, “L’immagine della Bulgaria in occidente al tempo della quarta crociata,”
Annuario. Istituto Romeno di cultura e ricerca umanistica 5 (2003): 99–100; Ovidiu Pecican,
Între cruciați și tătari. Creștinătate occidentală și nomazi în Europa central-sud-estică (1204–
1241) (Cluj-Napoca: Limes, 2010), 81–85 and 94–109; Ulrich Mölk, ‘Robert de Clari über den
Vierten Kreuzzug,” Romanistisches Jahrbuch 61 (2011): 213–222 (222); Alexandru Madgearu,
Asăneștii. Istoria politico-militară a statului dinastiei Asan (1185–1280) (Târgoviște: Editura
Cetatea de Scaun, 2014), 123.
3 Theresa Shawcross, “Re-Inventing the Homeland in the Historiography of Frankish Greece:
the Fourth Crusade and the legend of the Trojan War,” Byzantine and Modern Greek Studies
27 (2003): 120–152 (135–136); Alberto Varvaro, “Esperienza e racconto in Robert de Clari,” in
Miscellanea di studi in onore di Aurelio Roncaglia a cinquant’anni dalla sua laurea (Modena:
Mucchi, 1989), 1413–1427 (1425). See also Jeanette Beer, In Their Own Words. Practices of
Quotation in Early Medieval History-Writing (Toronto, ON: University of Toronto Press, 2014),
61. Nikolai Markov, Balkanite prez pogleda na edin frenski ricar na nachaloto na XIII vek.
Belezhki vărkhu khronikata na Robert de Clari (Veliko Tărnovo: Faber, 2008), 35 believes that
this episode is in fact an interpolation by a later author writing after 1216.
4 Sharon Kinoshita, Medieval Boundaries. Rethinking Difference in Old French Literature
(Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2006), 139–175 (174–175).
medieval encounters 22 (2016) 427–462

Constantinople and The Echo Chamber 429
of Emperor Baldwin (who would eventually perish as a prisoner in Bulgaria)

pushed the Vlachs to the front of the agenda of the new power.
Vlachs in the French Chronicles of the Fourth Crusade
The first mention of the Vlachs in the vernacular is in two poems of Raimbaut
de Vaqueiras: Conseil don a l’emperador written in 1204, and Nom’ agrad’
iverns ni pascors from 1205. In both, “li Blac” appear as enemies of Boniface
of Montferrat.5 They also appear twelve times as enemies in Villehardouin’s
Conquest of Constantinople, which was written at some point after 1207.6 In
the company of Bulgarians, the Vlachs are typically warriors in the armies
that Johannitsa moves against the crusaders at different moments in time.7
Together with the Cumans, they begin and finish the job in the battle at
Adrianople;8 ride all night long in order to reach Rousion; and take cattle and
people—men and women—from the environs of Constantinople, wreaking
havoc and making “si grant essil que onques nus hom n’oï parler de si grant.”9
5 Joseph Linskill, The Poems of the Troubadour Raimbaut de Vaqueiras (The Hague: Mouton,
1964), 226 and 244. See also Vladimir Agrigoroaiei, “The Vlachs and the Troubadour. Brief
Analysis of Three Poems by Raimbaut de Vaqueiras,” Revue des Etudes Sud-Est-Européennes
47 (2009): 55–74 (57–58); Sergio Vatteroni, “Blacs e Dragoiz. Valaques et Sklavènes dans un
poème de Raimbaut de Vaqueiras,” Romania 131 (2013): 467–472.
6 As the last event mentioned in his chronicle is the death of Boniface of Montferrat,
Villehardouin must have finished his work after 1207, but nothing is known about the exact
date either of his composition or of his death. Out of six manuscripts of the chronicle, the ear-
liest three are dated to the thirteenth century. See Jean Dufournet, “Présentation,” in Geoffroy
de Villehardouin, La conquête de Constantinople, ed. J. Dufournet (Paris: Flammarion, 2004),
28 and 34. For Villehardouin’s usage of “Blas” and “Blac,” see Giuseppe Stabile, Valacchi e
Valacchie nella letteratura francese medievale (Rome: Nuova cultura, 2010), 94–97.
7 Villehardouin, Conquête 352, p. 228; 459, p. 290.
8 Villehardouin, Conquête 359 and 363, pp. 232 and 234; 406, p. 260; 419, p. 268. For the analy-
sis of Villehardouin’s account of the battle at Adrianople, see Kaloian Andonov, “Voennoto
delo i voiskata na bălgarite v predstavata na Zhofroa d’o Vilarduen, Rober d’o Klari i Anri d’o
Valansien,” in Omnia vincit amor. Iubileen sbornik na NGDEK v chest na prof. Vasilka Tăpkova-
Zaimova, ed. V. Vachkova and C. Stepanov (Sofia: Universitetsko izdatelstvo “Sv. Kliment
Okhridski,” 2008), 363–384 (365–367); Boris Primov, “Crearea celui de-al doilea țarat bulgar
și participarea vlahilor,” in Relații româno-bulgare de-a lungul veacurilor, ed. M. Berza and
E. Stănescu, 2 vols. (Bucharest: Editura Academiei Republicii Socialiste România, 1971), 1:9–55
(51), believed the participants in the battle of Adrianople to have been Vlachs from the lands
north of the river Danube.
9 Villehardouin, Conquête 363, p. 234; 407, p. 260; 407, p. 261; 410, p. 263.

430 Curta
In short, Villehardouin’s Vlachs are always at war, which they always wage
successfully against the crusaders. Villehardouin has nothing else to say
about them and there is no close-up or description of physical appearance,
weapons, or character.10 This is suprising, given that Villehardouin most
certainly had the opportunity to see the Vlachs in the battle at Adrianople.11
The only character standing out of the Vlach crowd is Johannitsa, the “rois de
Blasquie et de Bougerie” (sometimes only “rois de Blasquie”).12 He is also often
depicted in a military context, but Johannitsa has his own gonfanon that he
puts on display on the walls of Adrianople.13 He also has discretionary powers
over the Cumans, and sappers at his disposal.14 His despotic behavior is appar-
ent in the execution of his captives, some of whom he has lured to his side by
means of gifts.15 That, according to Villehardouin, is “mortel traïson.”16 But not
everything about him is bad. Villehardouin describes Johannitsa as a rich and
clever king.17 He even calls Vlachia “la terre Johannis.”18
10 By contrast, the Cumans “n’estoient mie baptisé” (Villehardouin, Conquête 352, p. 228).
11 Villehardouin, Conquête 362, p. 234. For Villehardouin as a witness, see Michel Zink,
La subjectivité littéraire. Autour du siècle de saint Louis (Paris: Ecriture, 1985), 209–10; Beer,
In Their Own Words, 40–41.
12 Villehardouin, Conquête 273, p. 186; 276, p. 186; 333, p. 220; 350, p. 228; 374, p. 240; 389,
p. 248; 399, p. 254; 404, p. 258; 442, p. 280; 497, p. 311. For “rois de Blasquie,” see Villehardouin,
Conquête 311, p. 206; 335, p. 220; 345, p. 226; 352, p. 228; 359, p. 232; 371, p. 238; 392, p. 250;
412, p. 262; 413, p. 264; 424, p. 271; 443, p. 280; 444, p. 280; 451, p. 286; 456, p. 288; 459, p. 290;
461, p. 290; 472, p. 298; 475, p. 299.
13 Villehardouin, Conquête 273, p. 186; 311, p. 206; 350, p. 228; 352, p. 228; 355, p. 230; 371, p. 238;
374, p. 240; 389, p. 250; 392, p. 250; 413, p. 264; 424, p. 271; 442, p. 280; 444, p. 282, 456, p. 288;
459, p. 290; 461, p. 290. Johannitsa has siege machines, which he brings under the walls of
Serres (Conquête 394, p. 252).
14 Villehardouin, Conquête 359, p. 232; 389, p. 248; 472, p. 298.
15 Villehardouin, Conquête 345, p. 226; 394, p. 252; 401, p. 256. The prisoners from Aspros and
Rhodostos were all transported to “Blasquie” (Villehardouin, Conquête 414, p. 264; 416,
p. 266). See also Dufournet, Les écrivains, 285–289.
16 In Villehardouin’s eyes, he is similar in that respect to the Greeks who are typically “des-
loial.” Gilles A. Chosson, Chronique d’une quête inachevée: étude du significant épique et du
signifié mythique dans la Conquête de Constantinople de Geoffroi de Villehardouin, (Ph.D.
diss., University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, NC, 2004), 122–123.
17 Villehardouin, Conquête 202, p. 144; 276, p. 186; 404, p. 258. For the meaning of “sage”
as “intelligent,” but especially “clever,” see Charles Brucker, Sage et sagesse au Moyen Âge
(XIIe et XIIIe s.). Etude historique, sémantique et stylistique (Geneva: Droz, 1987), 221–223.
18 Villehardouin, Conquête 451, p. 286. Vlachia is “son païs,” where “li Blac” live (Villehardouin,
Conquête 399, p. 254; 493, p. 308).

The name of the country, “Blaquie,” also appears in Henri de Valenciennes’s

History of Emperor Henry of Constantinople, which was written a few years
after Villehardouin’s chronicle, if not at the same time.19 Like Villehardouin,
Henri de Valenciennes regards the “Blaquie” as the country of its ruler Burile
(Boril), but calls it Great Vlachia (“Blakie la Grant”) in anticipation of its
conquest by Emperor Henry I.20 Much like in Villehardouin, the Vlachs appear
eighteen times in the History always in military action. They invade Emperor
Henry’s lands, and attack the crusaders at Philippopolis, shooting at them their
arrows “huant et glatissant et faisant une noise si grant k’avis estoit que toute
la plaigne en tremblast.”21 They sound the trumpets before entering the battle,
and have green swords with long blades made in Bohemia.22 Nonetheless, they
can be easily defeated and scattered, like larks when the sparrow hawks are
approaching.23 There is even a comparison between the crusaders and the
Vlachs: while, under the leadership of Emperor Henry I, the former are like
19 Henri de Valenciennes, Histoire de l’Empereur Henri de Constantinople 505, ed. J. Longnon

(Paris: Paul Geuthner, 1948), 29. The terminus ad quem for the History is the date of Emperor
Henry’s death (June 11, 1216). Jean Longnon, “Introduction,” in Henri de Valenciennes,
Histoire, 12 believes that Henri de Valenciennes finished the History by September 1209,
when Peter of Douai, whose vassal Henri may have been, returned to Flanders. See also
François Zufferey, “Henri de Valenciennes, auteur du Lai d’Aristote et de la vie de Saint
Jean l’Evangeliste,” Revue de linguistique romane 68 (2004): 335–358 (349). Henri de
Valenciennes’s work has long been treated as a continuation of Geoffroi de Villehardouin,
primarily because it actually appears after the latter’s Conquest of Constantinople in five
manuscripts, the earliest of which are dated to the thirteenth century. See Peter M. Schon,
Studien zum Stil der frühen französischen Prosa (Robert de Clari, Geoffroy de Villehardouin,
Henri de Valenciennes) (Frankfurt a.M.: Vittorio Klostermann, 1960), 73 and 104.
20 Valenciennes, Histoire 505, p. 29; 548, p. 49. Like Johannitsa, Boril is the ultimate “trahi-
tour, qui empereur se faisait contre Dex et raison” (Valenciennes, Histoire 528, p. 40). Jean
Dufournet, “Robert de Clari, Villehardouin et Henri de Valenciennes, juges de l’empereur
Henri de Constantinople. De l’histoire à la légende,” in Mélanges de littérature du Moyen
Âge au XXe siècle offerts à Mademoiselle Jeanne Lods, ed. N. Cazauran (Paris: Ecole Normale
Supérieure de Jeunes Filles, 1978), 183–202 (201), believes that as such he is the exact oppo-
site of “boin empereour Henri” (Valenciennes, Histoire 527, p. 39).
21 Valenciennes, Histoire 504, pp. 28–29; 515, pp. 34–35; 518, p. 35; 519, p. 36. Jean Dufournet,
“Henri de Valenciennes et la Quatrième Croisade,” in Image et mémoire du Hainaut
médiéval, ed. J.-Ch. Herbin (Valenciennes: Presses Universitaires de Valenciennes, 2004),
33–50 (42), notes that the Old French verb “glatir” (which refers to the barking of a dog)
also appears in the Song of Roland.
22 Valenciennes, Histoire 536, p. 43; 532, p. 41.
23 Valenciennes, Histoire 521, p. 36; 540, p. 45.

432 Curta
well-trained falcons, the Vlachs are like birds of prey that could never be tamed
and thus cannot be used for hunting.24
Unlike Villehardouin, Henri de Valenciennes has two Vlach characters in
focus. On the one hand, Burile is the mirror image of Villehardouin’s Johannitsa:
a usurper who has made himself king against God and reason.25 On the other
hand, Esclas (Slav) is a “hault home” worthy of Emperor Henry’s military
assistance.26 He marries the daughter of the emperor, who then promises to
make him “segnour” of his own country.27 When requesting the hand of the
princess, Slav boasts of being a man sufficiently rich in land, silver, and gold,
whom people in his own country see as a genteel man.28 But before sending
his daughter off to Slav, Henry gives her a pep talk, to warn her that her future
husband was “somewhat savage” (“auques sauvages”).29 He stresses the fact
that she would not be able to understand his language, nor he hers, despite the
fact that previous scenes have depicted Emperor Henry in direct dialogue with
Slav, apparently without any translator.
Nor is any translator mentioned in the episode of Peter of Bracheux’s meet-
ing with Johannitsa and his Vlachs and Cumans. The episode appears in Robert
de Clari’s Conquest of Constantinople, written at some point after the death of
Emperor Henry in 1216.30 Johannitsa and his Cumans, while raiding Henry’s
lands, camped about two miles away from the emperor’s army. Having heard
24 Valenciennes, Histoire 520, p. 36.

26 Valenciennes, Histoire 505, p. 29. Apparently, Emperor Henry wanted to go against Boril,
“car Johanisses, ses [Boril’s] oncles, li avoit occis son [Henry’s] frère l’empereour Bauduin”
(Valenciennes, Histoire 504, p. 28). This is the only mention of Villehardouin’s bête noire,
Johannitsa.
29 Valenciennes, Histoire 558, p. 54. According to Erica Jo. Gilles, “ ‘Nova Francia?’: Kinship
and Identity Among the Frankish Aristocracy in Conquered Byzantium, 1204–1282”
(Ph.D. diss., Princeton University, Princeton, NJ, 2010), vol. 1, pp. 61 and 68, to Henri de
Valenciennes, the cultural distance between crusaders and Vlachs was far greater than
between crusaders and Greeks.
30 Beer, In Their Own Words, 57. The only extent manuscript of Clari’s chronicle is GKS 487 2
from the Royal Library in Copenhagen (available online at http://www.kb.dk/da/nb/
materialer/haandskrifter/HA/e-mss/gks-2_487.html, accessed 25 March 2015), which is
dated to the late thirteenth or early fourteenth century. See Markov, Balkanite (see above,
n. 3), 14; Ulrich Mölk, “Robert de Clari. Bemerkungen zu einer neuen Ausgabe der Conquête
de Constantinople und zur Kopenhagener Handschrift,” Zeitschrift für romanische
Philologie 124.1 (2009): 97–108; Mölk, “Robert de Clari über den Vierten Kreuzzug”
(see above, n. 2), 214.

about “monseigneur Pierron de Braiechoel et de sa boine chevalerie,” the

Vlachs and the Cumans decided to send envoys and ask for a meeting. Peter
obliged and as he was approaching the Vlachs, Johannitsa came out to meet
him together with his “haus hommes de Blakie.” They all greeted Peter and
welcomed him, even though they had a hard time looking at him, for he was
very tall. After some conversation, they asked Peter why he had come to their
country to conquer lands. In reply, Peter asked whether they knew about how
the great Troy was destroyed, and by what means. “‘Ba ouil!’ fisent li Blak et li
Commain,” who, while acknowledging that they knew about it, noted that that
was ancient history. Troy, Peter then claimed, belonged to “our ancestors,” for
some of those who had escaped from Troy had settled in the lands from which
the crusaders had now come. In other words, they had come to take what was
rightly theirs.31
Robert de Clari did not see the Vlachs in battle, for he had already
returned to France by the time of Johannitsa’s victory over Emperor Baldwin
I at Adrianople. Like Villehardouin, Robert de Clari describes Johannitsa as a
rich man with great power and consistently calls him “the Vlach” (“Jehans li
Blakis”).32 He also knows that Johannitsa was once a “sergeant of the emperor,
having charge of one of the emperor’s horse farms.”33 Every time the emperor
would demand it, Johannitsa would send to him sixty or one hundred horses.
He would also come to court once a year. One day, however, as he presented
himself to the emperor in Constantinople, an imperial official struck him
in the face.34 Upset over the offense, Johannitsa left the court in anger and
returned to his country. In Vlachia he began to gather around him the “haus
homes de Blakie” and soon the inhabitants of Vlachia recognized him as their
lord.35 Johannitsa also went to the Cumans, managed to become their friend
31 Clari, Conquête (see above, n. 2) 106, pp. 200 and 202. Troy is first mentioned in chapter 40,
where Clari claims that Abydos (“Bouke d’Ave”), at the entrance into the straight of
St. George, is the site of “great Troy.” Peter of Bracheux is also Robert de Clari’s superhero,
the man who, of all rich and poor, performed the greatest number of deeds of prowess,
thus becoming the epitome of French chivalric values.
32 Clari, Conquête 65, p. 142. “Rike hons” is not the same as “haut home.” Johannitsa, in other
words, was “a man of means, a powerful man.” See Peter F. Dembowski, La Chronique de
Robert de Clari. Etude de la langue et du style (Toronto, ON: University of Toronto Press,
1963), 71.
33 Clari, Conquête, 64, p. 142; English version from The Conquest of Constantinople, trans.
E. H. McNeal (New York, NY: Octagon Books, 1966), 87.
34 Clari, Conquête, 64, p. 142. Robert was not sure about the identity of the official: he was
either a eunuch (“uns escouillés”) or an usherer (“uissiers”) of the emperor.
35 Clari, Conquête 65, p. 142.

434 Curta
and to obtain their military assistance, and thus became their lord as well.36
He now wanted international recognition and sent envoys to the crusaders
asking to be recognized as king in his own hands, in exchange for his alliance
against Constantinople. He promised military assistance in the form of 100 000
armed men.37 After taking counsel, the barons of the crusading army decided
to reject Johannitsa’s request.38 However, he dispatched envoys to Rome and
the pope sent a cardinal to crown him.39 Johannitsa’s country thus became
“li roiaumes de Blakie.”40
At his death, power in Vlachia was assumed by Boril (Burons, Burus),
the “rois de Blakie.” In a belated attempt to recognize the power of the Vlach
ruler, Emperor Henry decided to ask for Boril’s daughter in marriage, even if
he had previously rejected the idea of taking a wife of such low origin. He had
meanwhile been advised by his barons to take her, for the Vlachs were now the
greatest power in the region, if not in the world.41
Vlachs in Non-French Sources Before and shortly After the

Forth Crusade
Where did the chroniclers of the Fourth Crusade find their information about
the Vlachs? Their coverage of things Vlach is remarkably similar to that of the
late twelfth-century chronicle attributed to Ansbertus, who deals with the par-
ticipation of Frederick Barbarossa and his army in the Third Crusade. After
crossing the Danube and leaving Braničevo on 11 July 1189, the imperial army
moved across “that most lengthy forest of Bulgaria,” where “the Greeklings,
Bulgarians, Serbs, and the semi-barbarous Vlachs (“Flachos semibarbaros”) lay
in ambush, springing forth from their secret lairs to wound those who were
last into camp and the servant who went out to collect edible plants or fod-
der for the horses with poisoned arrows.”42 By the time the crusading army
36 Clari, Conquête 65, pp. 142 and 144.

42 Historia de expeditione Friderici imperatoris, in Quellen zur Geschichte des Kreuzzuges
Kaiser Friedrichs I., ed. A. Chroust, MGH SRG Nova Series 5 (Berlin: Weidmann, 1928),
28; English version adapted from The Crusade of Frederick Barbarossa. The History of
the Expedition of Emperor Frederick and Related Texts, trans. G. A. Loud (Farnham and
Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2010), 60. The name “Ansbertus” appears in a colophon describ-

was crossing the Balkans, “Kalopeter the Vlach and his brother Asen with the
Vlachs subject to them were exercising tyrannical rule over much of Bulgaria,
and especially in the region where the Danube flows into the sea.”43 Kalopeter is
most likely Peter, Johannitsa’s older brother, who is said to have sent letters and
messengers to Frederick Barbarossa. Much like Robert de Clari’s Johannitsa,
he promises faithful (military) assistance (fidelis auxilium).44 Later in that
same year, he asked the emperor for the crown of the kingdom of Greece in
exchange for the military assistance of 40 000 Vlachs and Cumans “armed with
bows and arrows.”45 It is unlikely that “Ansbertus” inspired Robert de Clari’s
account.46 The source of his information about Johannitsa seeking recognition
must be sought elsewhere.
The same applies to the exchange of letters between Pope Innocent III and
Johannitsa. In a letter dated between late December 1199 and January 1200, the
pope claims that he has “heard that the lineage of your ancestors has its ori-
gins in the noble city of Rome, and that you have taken from them, as if by
hereditary right, both the generosity of the blood and the inclination towards
the sincere devotion that you have for the Apostolic See, I have for a long
time intended to send you letters and envoys.”47 This passage has often been
ing the individual in question as a churchman from Austria, who can hardly have been
responsible for the entire chronicle. The anonymous author of the portion of the chron-
icle in which the Vlachs appear was most likely a participant in Frederick’s crusade. See
Arnold Bühler, Der Kreuzzug Friedrich Barbarossas 1187–1190. Bericht eines Augenzeugen
(Stuttgart: Jan Thorbecke, 2002), 48.
43 Historia de expeditione, 33; English version from The Crusade of Frederick Barbarossa, 64.
Whatever political meaning the term “tyranny” may have had for the German author,
or the geographical extent of the polity over which the early Assenids ruled, it is impor-
tant to note that (Kalo-)Peter is given the epithet “the Vlach,” in the same way Robert de
Clari would later call Johannitsa “li Blaquis.” It is also obvious that to say that Kalopeter,
Asen and their Vlachs exercised tyrannical rule over Bulgaria expresses a Byzantine, not
German point of view.
44 Historia de expeditione, 33.
45 Historia de expeditione, 58; English version from The Crusade of Frederick Barbarossa, 84.
46 Parts of the History of Emperor Frederick’s Expedition survive in two manuscripts, one
written in the Abbey of St. Lamprecht in Styria, the other from the Abbey of Milevsko in
Bohemia. Both are dated to the early thirteenth century (Bühler, Der Kreuzzug (see above,
n. 42), 48; Loud, “Introduction,” 1).
47 Innocent III, ep. 255, in Die Register Innocenz’ III., vol. 2, ed. O. Hageneder, W. Maleczek,
and A. A. Strnad (Rome and Vienna: Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der
Wissenschaften, 1979), 485: “Nos autem audito, quod de nobili urbis Rome prosapia
progenitors tui originem traxerint et tu ab eis et sanguinis generositatem contraxeris et
sincere devotionis affectum, quem ad apostolicam sedem gens quasi hereditario iure,

436 Curta
used as evidence that the Vlachs were aware of their Roman origins.48 Others
have treated the story of the Roman origin of the Vlachs as concocted by the
papal chancery in an effort to convince Johannitsa to recognize the papal
primacy.49 While it is certainly not easy to separate compliment from Realpolitik,
how did Pope Innocent III learn about the Roman origin of Johannitsa’s lin-
eage? The fact that he was of Roman origin does not seem to have initially
been on Johannitsa’s mind. In a letter of mid-1202, he expresses his gratitude
to the pope for having reminded him of his blood and homeland (presumably
Rome).50 This, on the other hand, is a letter said to have been translated from
“Bulgarian” into Greek, and from Greek into Latin, the language of the surviv-
ing copy. The letter abounds in biblical citations, all in the same paragraph in
which Johannitsa acknowledges his Roman origin.51 When it comes to “ances-
tors,” Johannitsa has in mind his predecessors Peter (927–969) and Samuel
(997–1014), who had allegedly received crowns from Rome, as he was able to
iampridem te proposuimus litteris et nuntiis visitare.” That this was the first letter of the
exchange between Pope Innocent III and Johannitsa has already been recognized by
Dietmar Hintner, Die Ungarn und das byzantinische Christentum der Bulgaren im Spiegel
der Register Papst Innozenz’ III. (Leipzig: St. Benno-Verlag, 1976), 22.
48 Nicolae Bănescu, Un problème d’histoire médiévale: création et caractère du Second Empire
Bulgare (1185) (Bucharest: Cartea Românească, 1932), 77; Robert Lee Wolff, “The ‘Second
Bulgarian Empire’: Its Origin and History to 1204,” Speculum 24 (1949): 167–206 (190–191);
Petre Şt. Năsturel, “Vlacho-balcanica,” Byzantinisch-neugriechische Jahrbücher 22 (1977–
1984): 221–248 (233); Vasile Mărculeț, “Țaratul vlaho-bulgar între Bizanțul ortodox și
Occidentul catolic în timpul domniei țarului Ioniță Asan (1197–1207),” Buletinul Muzeului
Militar Naţional 6 (2008): 23–38 (23); Madgearu, Asăneștii, 110.
49 Fedor I. Uspenskii, Obrazovanie Vtorago Bolgarskago carstva (Odessa: Pechatano v
tipografii G. Ul’rikha, 1879), 210–211.
50 Innocent III, ep. 114, in Die Register Innocenz’ III., vol. 5, ed. O. Hageneder, C. Egger,
K. Rudolf, and A. Sommerlechner (Vienna: Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der
Wissenschaften, 1993), 225. By contrast, the Archbishop Basil of Tărnovo appears to have
learned much quicker what the pope wanted to hear. In his letter of mid-1202, the arch-
bishop calls Johannitsa and all his subjects descendants of Roman blood (ep. 116, in in Die
Register Innocenz’ III., vol. 5, 230).
51 “Bringing us back to the memory of our blood and homeland” is in fact a biblical allusion
(Genesis 48:21). Francesco dall’Aglio, Innocenzo III e i Balcani: fede e politica nei Regesta
pontifici (Naples: Università degli Studi, 2003), 52 n. 65 notes that another biblical quote at
the beginning of the letter (Psalms 18:11) is also used in the letter the Serbian ruler Vukan
sent to the pope in July or August 1199 (Innocent III, ep. 167, in Die Register Innocenz’ III,
vol. 2, 324). In that letter, Vukan claimed that he was not only of royal descent, but also a
relative of the pope. The parallel between the two cases is too strong to be accidental.

learn from “our books.”52 In other words, he regarded himself a descendant of

Bulgarian emperors and not Roman settlers.
Where then did Pope Innocent III find the information about the Roman
origins of Johannitsa? The formula commonly applied in papal letters to
indicate the source of information (“pervenit ad audientiam nostra,” or some
variation of the same53) is replaced in the 1199 letter with a clear reference
to hearsay. The news about Johannitsa’s Roman origins most likely did not
come from his country, but from trustworthy sources elsewhere. I shall return
later to the Byzantine origin of the idea that the Vlachs are of Roman ori-
gin, but for the moment I will suggest that the pope’s informants were from
Constantinople, quite possibly from among the Latins who lived in that city
long before its conquest in 1204.54 As a matter of fact, Innocent wrote to the
52 Innocent III, ep. 114, in Die Register Innocenz’ III., vol. 5, 226. This, of course, is pure
invention and propaganda: Peter and Samuel never received any crowns from Rome.
On the other hand, in his letter of September 8, 1203 (or later), Johannitsa claims that
Peter, Samuel, and Symeon had been emperors of both Bulgarians and Vlachs. See epp. 6,
in Die Register Innocenz’ III., vol. 7, 19; 4 (of September 1203), in Die Register Innocenz’ III.,
vol. 7, 14; Ivan Duichev, “Prepiskata na papa Inokentiia III s bălgarite,” Godishnik na
Sofiiskiia Universitet “Kliment Ohridski” 38.3 (1942): 3–109 (84).
53 E.g., epp. 89 of 21 June 1199 (Die Register Innocenz’ III, vol. 2, 187), in which Innocent men-
tions having learned about the ultrage and corporal damage done to the bishop of Vác
(Hungary); 249 of 15–17 December 1199 (Die Register Innocenz’ III, vol. 2, 475), in which
Innocent explains how he has learned about King Lewon of Armenia’s conquest of
Baghra (Gaston) from the Templars; and 254 of late December 1199 or early January 1200
(Die Register Innocenz’ III, vol. 2, 484), in which the pope announces that he had learned
about Hartmann, a cleric from Lorch, who had been robbed by a canonicus named Albert.
54 Günter Prinzing, Die Bedeutung Bulgariens und Serbiens in den Jahren 1204–1219 im
Zusammenhang mit der Erstehung und Entwicklung der byzantinischen Teilstaaten nach
der Einnahme Konstantinopels infolge des 4. Kreuzzuges (Munich: Institut für Byzantinistik
und neugriechische Philologie, 1972), 29–31, argues that the information came either
from Serbia or from Hungary, but attributes the whole issue to Johannitsa’s attempt to
imitate the presumed claims to Roman ancestry of the Byzantine aristocratic families.
Stergios Latsios, “Die Konstruktion der Vlachen von 1640 bis 1720,” in Vergangenheit und
Vergegenwärtigung. Frühes Mittelalter und europäische Erinnerungskultur, ed. H. Reimitz
and B. Zeller (Vienna: Verlag der Österreichischer Akademie der Wissenschaften, 2009),
205–227 (207) believes that while the idea that the Vlachs are of Roman origin originated
in Byzantium, it was Johannitsa (and not Pope Innocent III) who got it from there, namely
during the two years or so that he spent in Constantinople as a hostage. Needless to say,
there is no evidence either for this information originating in Serbia or Hungary, or for
Johannitsa aping the Byzantine aristocracy or boasting about his Roman origin (before
being “reminded” about that by Pope Innocent III).

438 Curta
Latins in Constantinople, as a group, and his letter suggests that he was well
informed about secular and ecclesiastical affairs in the Byzantine capital.55
But what was known in Constantinople about the Vlachs? The earliest men-
tion of the Vlachs in a Greek narrative source is the prescriptive handbook
conventionally known as the Strategikon of Kekaumenos, which was most
likely written during the reign of Michael VII Dukas (1071–1078), but after the
death of Patriarch John Xiphilinos in August 1075.56 According to Kekaumenos,
in ancient times the Vlachs were called Dacians and Bessi, and he describes
their migration from the northern parts of the Balkan Peninsula into cen-
tral Greece.57 He has otherwise only bad things to say about the “race” of the
Vlachs. They are:
entirely untrustworthy, and corrupt, and keep true faith neither with
God, nor with the Emperor, nor with a relative or a friend, but endeavor
to do down everyone, tell many lies and steal a great deal, swearing every
day the most solemn oaths to [their] friends, and violating them easily,
performing adoptions of brothers and baptismal alliances, and scheming
by these means to deceive simpler people.
They are “very cowardly, with the hearts of hares, but with bravado—and even
this comes from cowardice.”58 Much ink has been spilled on this passage and
on the significance of its testimony for the history of both Romanians and the
55 Innocent III, ep. 204 of 16 November 1199, in Die Register Innocenz’ III., vol. 2, 399–400.
56 Charlotte Roueché, “Defining the Foreign in Kekaumenos,” in Strangers to Themselves. The
Byzantine Outsider. Papers from the Thirty-Second Spring Symposium of Byzantine Studies.
University of Sussex, Brighton, March 1998, ed. D. C. Smythe (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2000),
203–14 (204). The work survives in only one manuscript copied in or near Trebizond in
the fourteenth century. It contains edifying maxims, tips on household management and
social relations, as well as counsel about serving as judge in the provinces. The author
appears to have been a senior commander in the Byzantine army, and to have been edu-
cated in grammar and rhetoric, albeit not at the highest level.
57 Kekaumenos, Strategikon IV 187, ed. M. D. Spadaro (Alessandria: Edizioni dell’Orso, 1998),
226. It is important to note that unlike Pope Innocent III, Kekaumenos does not describe
the Vlachs as being of Roman origin. By contrast, he insists that they have never been
loyal to anyone, not even to old emperors like Trajan, who defeated them. This strongly
suggests that in the late eleventh century the idea of the Vlachs being of Roman origin
was not sufficiently popular to be used in a handbook such as Kekaumenos’s.
58 Kekaumenos, Strategikon IV 187, pp. 224 and 226; English version from Roueché, “Defining
the Foreign,” 211.

Balkan Vlachs.59 However, the description of the Vlachs is modeled on a psogos

or “invective,” the seventh exercise in the progymnasmata.60 The leading fea-
ture of the “race of the Vlachs” is apistia, the lack of faith either in God or in the
Emperor. Given that the Strategikon survives in only one manuscript, it is likely
that Kekaumenos’s ideas about the Vlachs were not known in later centuries.
Any similarity between his portrait of the Vlachs and later descriptions may be
attributed not to his creation of a stereotype, but to his use of an already exist-
ing cliché for his own rhetorical purposes.
Anna Comnena, who finished her Alexiad in 1148, relates that when
the Cumans crossed the Danube in 1094, Emperor Alexius Comnenus was
informed about their movements by a certain Poudila, who was a chieftain
of the Vlachs.61 At the same time, however, the Cumans learned the route
through the mountains passes from (other) local Vlachs.62 One is vaguely
reminded here of Kekaumenos’s idea that the Vlachs are completely unreli-
able, “scheming by these means to deceive simpler people.” In another pas-
sage, Anna relates that in March 1091, Emperor Alexius ordered Nicephorus
Melissenos to raise an army against the Pechenegs, who had invaded the
Balkans. Melissenos recruited soldiers from among Bulgarians, but also those
who “live a nomadic life and are called in vernacular Vlachs.”63 A little later,
the recruits “piled their baggage on ox-wagons, together with all necessary sup-
plies” and went to Emperor Alexius in Chirenoi. As soon as they approached the
imperial army, however, the scouts mistook them for a “Scythian” (Pecheneg)
59 See, for example, Mátyás Gyóni, “L’oeuvre de Kékaumenos, source de l’histoire roumaine,”
Revue d’histoire comparée 23 (1945): 98–180; George C. Soulis, “The Thessalian Vlachia,”
Zbornik radova Vizantološkog Instituta 8.1 (1963): 271–273; Mihai Spătărelu, “Opera lui
Kekaumenos şi importanţa ei pentru istoria românilor,” Glasul Bisericii 44.7–9 (1985):
522–532; Neagu Djuvara, “Sur un passage controversé de Kekaumenos,” Revue Roumaine
d’Histoire 30.1–2 (1991): 23–66; Ilona Czamańska, “Problem pochodzenia Wołochów,” in
Wędrówka i etnogeneza w starożytności i średniowieczu, ed. M. Salamon and J. Strzelczyk
(Cracow: Towarzystwo Wydawnicze Historia Iagellonica, 2004), 327–335 (327). For the
older literature, see Adolf Armbruster, Romanitatea românilor. Istoria unei idei, 2nd ed.
(Bucharest: Editura enciclopedică, 1993), 27, n. 28.
60 Roueché, “Defining the foreign,” 212, who notes that the use of a rhetorical device is fur-
ther betrayed by reference to Dio Cassius in relation to Trajan’s wars with the Dacians.
Dio Cassius’s work was in circulation in Constantinople in the second half of the
eleventh century, which suggests that Kekaumenos may have lived and written there
(Gyóni, “L’oeuvre de Kékaumenos,” 160–167).
61 Anna Comnena, Alexiad X 2.6, ed. D. R. Reinsch and A. Kambylis (Berlin and New York,
NY: Walter de Gruyter, 2001), 286.
62 Anna Comnena, Alexiad X 3.1, p. 287.
63 Anna Comnena, Alexiad VIII 3.4, p. 242.

440 Curta
horde.64 Much has been made out of the phrase “nomadic life” used in rela-
tion to the Vlachs, presumably in reference to their transhumant form of
pastoralist economy.65 In reality, Anna’s intention may have nothing to do
either with transhumance, or with Vlach pastoralism. The Bulgarian and Vlach
recruits looked like nomads, because they moved around like the Pechenegs,
namely on wagons.
The Vlachs also appear, albeit indirectly, in the Prodromic poems written
in the 1160s or 1170s.66 The third poem makes fun of a cobbler in Constantinople,
who can afford buying expensive things for his breakfast, including Vlach
cheese.67 The Vlach cheese also appears in the fourth poem in a long recipe for
a lavish feast at a monastery, along with such exotic and expensive ingredients
as the underbelly of a Mediterranean moray, sturgeon filet, pepper, and sweet
wine.68 The Vlachs are also mentioned in the History of John Kinnamos, written
64 Anna Comnena, Alexiad VIII 4.5, p. 244; English version from Anna Comnena, The Alexiad,
trans. E. R. A. Sewter (London and New York, NY: Penguin, 1969), 255. These events took
place on the eve of the battle at Lebunion (29 April 1091), where the Pechenegs were deci-
sively defeated. For “Scythians” as Pechenegs, see Paul Meinrad Strässle, “Das Feindbild
der Petschenegen im Byzanz der Komnenen (11./12.Jh.),” Byzantinische Forschungen 28
(2004): 297–313 (302).
65 Mátyás Gyóni, “La transhumance des Vlaques balkaniques au Moyen Age,” Byzanti-
noslavica 12 (1952): 29–42 (35–36), who believed that the information about those who
live a nomadic life, otherwise called Vlachs in the vernacular, must have come from the
decree issued by Alexius I in 1091. That the Vlachs were not truly nomads, at least not
in Anna’s eyes, results from her mention of “Ezeban, a Vlach village lying quite close to
Andronia,” between Larissa and Trikala (Anna Comnena, Alexiad V 5.3, p. 154; English ver-
sion from Sewter, 168). For Ezeban, see Mátyás Gyóni, “Egy vlach falu neve Anna Komnene
Alexiasában,” Egyetemes Philologiai Közlöny 71 (1948): 22–30.
66 Margaret Alexiou, “The Poverty of Écriture and the Craft of Writing: Towards a Reappraisal
of the Prodromic Poems,” Byzantine and Modern Greek Studies 10.1 (1986): 1–40 (25);
Hans Eideneier, Ptochoprodromos. Einführung, kritische Ausgabe, deutsche Übersetzung,
Glossar (Cologne: Romiosini, 1991), 38. The mention of a Vlach mantle in the third
poem (Ptochoprodromos III 273, in Eideneier, Ptochoprodromos, 135) is attested in two
late manuscripts of the Prodromic poems dated to in or after the mid-fifteenth century.
This is therefore a later addition and cannot be used to draw any conclusions about the
image of the Vlachs in twelfth-century Constantinople. See Eideneier, Ptochoprodromos,
230; Markéta Kulhánková, “Ich bin auch eines schicken Mantels wert. Zum Manteltopos
in der griechischen Literatur,” in Epea pteroenta. Růženě Dostálové k narozeninám,
ed. M. Kulhánková and K. Loudová (Brno: Host, 2009), 191–200 (195–196); Gyóni, “La trans-
humance,” 30; Petre Şt. Năsturel, “Les Valaques de l’espace byzantin et bulgare jusqu’à la
conquête ottomane,” in Les Aroumains (Paris: Langue d’O, 1989), 45–78 (67).
67 Ptochoprodomos III 113–114 and 117–118, in Eideneier, Ptochoprodromos, 122.
68 Ptochoprodromos IV 210–211, in Eideneier, Ptochoprodromos, 149–150.

at some point after 1176.69 According to Kinnamos, they were drafted for Leo
Vatatzes’s 1166 expedition against Hungary, for they were are said to be “settlers
brought in ancient times from Italy.”70 This has often been interpreted as an
indication that Kinnamos had learned about this information from the Vlachs
themselves.71 He may have drawn instead on Dio Cassius, according to whom
“Trajan founded cities there (in Dacia).”72 That the Vlachs are specifically said
to be the old settlers from Italy (and not their descendants) suggests, however,
a different interpretation. Colonists from Italy settled in the Balkans, as well as
in Dacia. The Vlachs may have been useful to Leo Vatatzes as settlers claiming
their old lands in the province of Dacia, now occupied by Hungarians. If so,
this rationalization was, of course, Kinnamos’s construction, with little, if any
relation to Leo Vatatzes’s real reasons. In other words, what mattered at this
point for Kinnamos was to show off his knowledge of Roman (imperial) history,
as he expected his equally educated audience to know that the empire once
ruled over the lands north of the river Danube through which the Byzantine
troops were now moving against the Hungarians. This is definitely not too
far-fetched a hypothesis, given the surge of interest in Roman history in late
eleventh- and twelfth-century Byzantium.73 At any rate, Kinnamos’s comment
69 Paul Magdalino, The Empire of Manuel I Komnenos 1143–1180 (Cambridge: Cambridge

University Press, 1993), 18–20. See also Iakov N. Liubarskii, “John Kinnamos As a Writer,”
in Polypleuros nous. Miscellanea für Peter Schreiner zu seinem 60. Geburtstag, ed. C. Scholz
and G. Makris (Munich /Leipzig: K. G. Saur, 2000), 164–173.
70 John Kinnamos, Epitome rerum ab Ioanne et Alexio Comnenis gestarum, ed. A. Meineke
(Bonn: E. Weber, 1836), 259–260. This is in fact the first mention of the Roman origin
of the Vlachs, and following Dimitrie Onciul, Romanian historians have traditionally
used it to write national history under the assumption that the Vlachs in question were
those of the lands north of the Danube, in present-day Romania. See Dimitrie Onciul,
Scrieri istorice, 2 vols. (Bucharest: Editura Ştiinţifică 1968), 1:104, 146, 161, 199, 273, 326, and
597; 2:202–203 and 263; Alexandru D. Xenopol, Teoria lui Roesler. Studii asupra stăruinţei
românilor în Dacia Traiană (Iaşi: Tipografia Naţională, 1884), 117–118; Şerban Papacostea,
“Les Roumains et la conscience de leur romanité au Moyen Age,” Revue Roumaine
d’Histoire 4.1 (1965): 15–24 (19).
71 Armbruster, Romanitatea, 31.
72 Dio Cassius, Roman History LXVIII 14.3, ed. H. B. Foster, trans. E. Cary (Cambridge, MA:
Harvard University Press, 1927), 387. The implication is that the inhabitants of those cities
were settlers, some brought from Italy.
73 Attaleiates traced the origins of Byzantine law and the model for virtuous warfare to the
Roman Republic. Zonaras also expressed interest in the history of the Republic. Tzetzes’s
Letters and Histories are full of Roman stories. For all three examples, see Anthony
Kaldellis, Hellenism in Byzantium. The Transformations of Greek Identity and the Reception
of the Classical Tradition (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), 62, 300, and

442 Curta
on the Roman origin of the Vlachs strongly suggests that their exotic character,
as perceived in Constantinople, was an intellectual construction, and not the
result of a direct contact with, or even knowledge of, things Vlach.74
No mention of the Roman origin of the Vlachs appears in Niketas Choniates’s
orations or in his History, on which he was still working when he died in or
shortly after 1217.75 Like Kinnamos, Choniates wants to show off his knowl-
edge of ancient geography when claiming that Vlachs were “formerly called
Mysians”—a reference to the imperial Roman province of Moesia (inferior).76
Combining two biblical citations, he echoes Kekaumenos in describing
the Vlachs as an unfaithful nation, ready to break any oaths.77 However,
Choniates’s Vlachs are a serious enemy, the Other par excellence. They are demon-
inspired barbarians who rejoice in rising in rebellion against the emperor.78
Initially reluctant and turning away from open revolt because of the “magnitude
of the undertaking,” they had to be convinced by their leaders through unusual
methods. Peter and Asen “built a house of prayer (euktērion) in the name of the
Good Martyr Demetrios” and gathered there “many demoniacs (daimonolēptōn)
305. Kaldellis estimates that over a third of the exempla in twelfth-century texts are from
Roman history.
74 This is in sharp contrast to the administration’s view of the Vlachs. A prostaxis of
Emperor Andronicus I dated to February 1184 for the benefit of the Lavra Monastery at
Mount Athos mentions the descent of Vlach shepherds from the mountains of Moglena
into the plain—the first detailed description of Vlach transhumance. The Vlachs are
exempted from taxes in the entire theme of Moglena. See Paul Lemerle, André Guillou,
and Nicolas Svoronos, Actes de Lavra (Paris: P. Lethielleux, 1970), 341–345 (344); Năsturel,
“Les Valaques balkaniques,” 101; Tom Winnifrith, The Vlachs. The History of a Balkan People
(New York, NY: St. Martin’s Press, 1987), 119. For the prostaxis, see also Mark C. Bartusis,
Land and Privilege in Byzantium. The Institution of Pronoia (Cambridge and New York, NY:
Cambridge University Press, 2012), 55–58.
75 Alicia Simpson, Niketas Choniates. A Historiographical Study (Oxford: Oxford University
Press, 2013), 13 and 23.
76 Niketas Choniates, Historia, ed. J.-L. van Dieten (Berlin/New York: Walter de Gruyter,
1975), 131; English version from O City of Byzantium. Annals of Niketas Choniates, trans.
H. J. Magoulias (Detroit, MI: Wayne State University Press, 1984), 74. Similarly, Choniates
occasionally calls Hungarians either Paiones or Pannones, in addition to Ouggroi, Ounnoi,
or Gēpaides, for which see Lajos Berkes, “Die Ungarn bei Niketas Choniates,” Acta Antiqua
Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae 51 (2011): 353–371 (358).
77 Niketas Choniates, Orat. II, in Nicetae Choniatae Orationes et Epistulae, ed. J.-L. van Dieten
(Berlin and New York, NY: Walter de Gruyter, 1972), 9. The citations are from Luke 9:41
(“O faithless and perverse generation . . .”) and Matthew 12:39 (“an evil and adulterous
generation”).
78 Niketas Choniates, Historia, 371 and 368. For the rebellious Vlachs (apostatai Blachoi), see
also Historia, 435.

of both races [Vlach and Bulgarian]; with crossed and bloodshot eyes, hair
disheveled, and with precisely all the other symptoms demonstrated by those
possessed by demons.” The demoniacs were instructed to say that, “God had
consented to the freedom of the race of the Bulgars and Vlachs and assented
that they should shake off after so long a time the yoke from their neck.”79
At a first glimpse, Choniates appears to say that the rebels took God’s name
in vain, since they needed the demoniacs to tell the people that they were
not free. He almost casts doubt on the rebels’ faith. However, elsewhere he
acknowledges that the Vlachs were fellow Christians.80 Moreover, the scene of
the “possessed” soothsayers is meant as a preamble for the story about how the
first Byzantine victories were obtained against the Vlachs. Taking advantage of
a solar eclipse (most likely that of 21 April 1196), the Byzantines took the Vlachs
by surprise “to send them scurrying in panic.” The rebels ran violently to the
river Danube “like the herd of swine in the Gospels who ran into the sea.”81
The point of the story is, of course, that the Vlachs were essentially pigs, irra-
tional animals that acted as if possessed by demons.82 The episode of the
“possessed” soothsayers was only a way to explain how the demons got into
the pigs.
Their leaders, Peter and Asen, went to Kypsella to ask the emperor to grant
them an estate near the mountains, “which would provide them with a little
79 Niketas Choniates, Historia, 371; English version from O City of Byzantium, 205. For the
chronology of those events, see Günter Prinzing, “Demetrios-Kirche und Aseniden-
Aufstand. Zur chronologischen Präzisierung der Frühphase des Aseniden-Aufstandes,”
Zbornik radova Vizantološkog Instituta 38 (1999–2000): 257–265. Choniates’s rhetorical
skills and the precision of his supposedly ethnographic description have encouraged
scholars to interpret the scene of the “possessed” as an ancient parallel to nestinarstvo,
a fire ritual performed in many villages in southeastern Bulgaria, Strandzha, and
Macedonia, which involves demonstrations of mediumship in trance (Malingoudis, “Die
Nachrichten,” 110). That Choniates’s readers may have not interpreted the scene of the
“possessed” ethnographically results from the fact that a fourteenth-century paraphrase
of this passage refers to the soothsayers as participants in the Eleusinian mysteries. See
Alexandru Elian and Nicolae-Şerban Tanaşoca, Izvoarele istoriei României III. Scriitori
bizantini (sec. XI–XIV)(Bucharest: Editura Academiei RSR, 1975), 257 with n. 43.
80 Niketas Choniates, Historia, 504.
81 Niketas Choniates, Historia, 372–373; English version from O City of Byzantium, 206.
The reference here is to the episode of the Gergesene (or Gadarene) demoniac(s) healed
by Jesus, who transferred the unclean spirits into a herd of swine that ran off the cliff into
the Sea of Galilee, and drowned (Matthew 8:32; Mark 5:13; Luke 8:33).
82 Simpson, Niketas Choniates, 328. Choniates also calls the Cumans “legions of spirits” in
reference to the same episode of the Gadarene demoniac (Niketas Choniates, Historia,
374; English version from O City of Byzantium, 206; Luke 8:30).

444 Curta
revenue.”83 Rebuffed and insulted (Asen was “struck across the face” at the order
of John Dukas as a punishment for his barbarian insolence), the two brothers
returned to their abodes, and incited the “entire nation” to rise in rebellion.84
When the Romans obtained their first victories against the Vlach, both Peter
and Asen were among the pigs running violently to the Istros. However, after
recruiting “Scythians” as auxiliaries, Asen returned to his homeland, which
he found “emptied of Roman troops.” He thus marched in at the head of his
Cuman allies “with even greater braggadocio.”85 The third brother, Johannitsa,
is consistently called “the Mysian” (ho Mysos Iōannēs), a perfect mirror image
of Robert de Clari’s “Jehans li Blakis.”86 His political profile in the History is
defined not only in relation to the Byzantines, but also to the crusaders who
have meanwhile arrived in the neighborhood.87 He even sends envoys to the
crusaders on a mission of friendship, but is snubbed and told to address
the Latins not as an emperor would address his friends, but as a servant his
masters, “in this way being demoted to his former station. Otherwise, they
[the crusaders] would bear arms against him and ravage Mysia . . . since he had
rebelled against his Roman lords.”88
Choniates associates the Vlachs and their rulers with mountains.89 They
occupy the “rough ground and inaccessible places.”90 Their fortresses “are
83 Niketas Choniates, Historia, 369; English version from O City of Byzantium, 204. For Peter
and Asen asking for a pronoia, see Bartusis, Land, 98–101.
84 Niketas Choniates, Historia, 369; English version from O City of Byzantium, 204.
85 Niketas Choniates, Historia, 374; English version from O City of Byzantium, 206. One is
vaguely reminded here of what Kekaumenos has to say about Vlach bravado based on
cowardice.
86 Niketas Choniates, Historia, 618, 627, and 635.
87 Niketas Choniates, Historia, 619; English version from O City of Byzantium, 339: he is both
an enemy and an avenger of the Romans.
89 Niketas Choniates, Historia, 375, 394, 397, and 512. Peter lives, like the deer, in the high
mountains (Niketas Choniates, Orat. IX, in: Nicetae Choniatae Orationes et Epistulae, 91).
Dobromir Chrysos puts his faith in the rocks along which he moves. He looks like he is
being carved in the mountain or, like a statue, in rock. In short, he is a mountaineer (ho
oreibatēs: Niketas Choniates, Orat. XI, in Nicetae Choniatae Orationes et Epistulae, 109). For
the image of the (Stara Planina) mountains in the Byzantine historiography concerning
the Second Bulgarian Empire, see Kirił Marinow, “Hemus jako baza wypadowa i miejsce
schronienia w okresie walk o restytucję państwowości bułgarskiej pod koniec XII i na
początku XIII w.,” in Cesarstwo bizantyńskie dzieje, religia, kultura : studia ofiarowane pro-
fesorowi Waldemarowi Ceranowi przez uczniów na 70-lecie jego urodzin, ed. P. Krupczyński
and M. J. Leszka (Łódź: Leksem, 2006), 181–199.

situated directly above sheer cliffs” and have “newly built walls marked off
at intervals by crowned towers.”91 “Mysia” is a country “in the vicinity of the
Mount Haimos” (Stara Planina), and as such it has fields, with “crops gathered
in heaps,” which Isaac II Angelos set on fire in 1186.92 The Vlachs descend the
Mount Haimos and fall unexpectedly upon the Roman towns, killing many and
carrying away a great number of prisoners and goods.93 They leave the heights
on which they move like deer, and gather from the mountains like the sons of
Abraham.94
The comparison of the Vlachs with deer in the high mountains also appears
in the travelogue of Benjamin of Tudela, a rabbi who journeyed from his native
Navarre all the way to Baghdad and back between 1160 and 1171/2.95 However,
the text of the Sefer Masaʿot (Book of Travels) is the result not of Benjamin’s
travel or personal experiences, but of (at least) two redactions, the earliest
of which was done by an editor living in thirteenth-century Spain, who also
added a prologue.96 This text belongs to a genre of Jewish medieval literature
91 Niketas Choniates, Historia, 368 and 429; English version from O City of Byzantium, 204
and 236. The best fortified and “most excellent of all cities along the Haimos” is Tărnovo.
The city is built on a ridge of the mountain, has “mighty walls,” and is divided by a river
(Niketas Choniates, Historia, 471; English version from O City of Byzantium, 258).
92 Niketas Choniates, Historia, 368 and 373; English version from O City of Byzantium,
204 and 206. “Mysia” is the name of the country over which both Peter (Niketas Choniates,
Historia, 472) and Johannitsa (Niketas Choniates, Historia, 613 and 628) ruled. Choniates also
knows the name Vlachia, which he employs as a terminus technicus (megalē Blachia) for a
region in the highlands above Thessaly (Niketas Choniates, Historia, 638).
93 Niketas Choniates, Historia, 372.
94 Niketas Choniates, Orat. VII, in Nicetae Choniatae Orationes et Epistulae, 62. The reference
to the sons of Abraham is from Matthew 3:9.
95 Stefan Schreiner, Jüdische Reisen im Mittelalter (Leipzig: Sammlung Dieterich, 1991), 175;
David Jacoby, “Benjamin of Tudela in Byzantium,” Palaeoslavica 10.1 (2002): 180–185 (182);
François-Xavier Fauvelle-Aymar, “Desperately Seeking the Jewish kingdom of Ethiopia:
Benjamin of Tudela and the Horn of Africa (Twelfth Century),” Speculum 88.2 (2013):
383–404 (385). For the possibility that “Benjamin of Tudela” is simply the invention of
a later compilator (the author of the prologue) who may have recycled scattered travel
notes attributed to one Binyamin, see Giancarlo Lacerenza, “Appunti sulla letteratura di
viaggio nel Medioevo ebraico,” in Medioevo romanzo e orientale. Il viaggio nella lettera-
ture romanze e orientali. V Colloquio Internazionale VII Convegno della Società Italiana di
Filologia Romanza. Catania-Ragusa, 24–27 settembre 2003, ed. G. Carbonaro, M. Casarino,
E. Creazzo, and G. Lalomia (Soveria Manneli: Rubbettino, 2006), 427–452 (441).
96 David Jacoby, “Benjamin of Tudela and his ‘Book of Travels,’” in Venezia incrocio di culture.
Percezioni di viaggiatori europei e non-europei a confronto. Atti del Convegno, Venezia, 26–27
gennaio 2006, ed. K. Herbers and F. Schmieder (Rome: Edizioni di storia e letteratura,

446 Curta
known as “travel narrative,” and consists of a list of entries, each with the fol-
lowing structure: “And from there, there are x (number) of days or y (number)
of parasangs to w (place name), which is called z (Jewish name).” To this basic
structure, comments are often added concerning the size, social structure, and
specific details about the Jewish community in “w,” as well as the names of
their leaders, where there was a sufficiently large number of Jews to constitute
a minyan (a quorum necessary for worship).97
Benjamin crossed Greece from Corfu to Thebes, Halmyros, and Thessaloniki
in 1161. One of his stops, at a day’s journey from “Rabonica” (Ravennika)
was in Sinon Potamo, near present-day Lamia, in Phthiotis. There were about
fifty Jews in the town at the time, led by Rabbi Shelomoh and Rabbi Ya’aqov. A
digression on the Vlachs follows:
This [place] is at the foot of the mountains [of] Vlachia (blkyh), on which
mountains dwell the people called Vlachs (blkzyn), and they are as swift
as deer, descending from the mountains to plunder and loot the country
of Greece (Javan). And no man can climb up to them to fight, and no king
can rule over them, and they do not hold fast to the Christian religion,
and they call themselves by Jewish names. And it is said that they were
Jews and call the Jews “our brothers,” [and that] when they meet them,
2008), 135–164 (140). According to Giancarlo Lacerenza, “Struttura letteraria e dinamiche

compositive nel Sefer Massa’ot di Binyamin da Tudela,” Materia giudaica 12.1–2 (2007):
89–98 (97), the author of the prologue may have worked in Castile under King Alfonso X
el Sabio (reg. 1252–1284). The latest revision, which was probably done in France, appears
in the earliest extant manuscript, which, long believed to be of a thirteenth-century
date, is in fact from the fourteenth century (Jacoby, “Benjamin of Tudela and his ‘Book of
Travels,’ ” 140). For a brief description of all manuscripts, see Libro de viajes de Benjamín de
Tudela, transl. J. R. Magdalena Nom de Deú (Barcelona: Riopedras Ediciones, 1989), 16–17.
97 Rolf Schmitz, “Benjamin von Tudela ‘Das Buch der Reisen.’ Realität oder Fiktion,” Henoch
16.2–3 (1994): 295–314 (299); Juliette Sibon, “Benjamin de Tudèle, géographe ou voya-
geur? Pistes de relecture du Sefer massa’ot,” in Géographes et voyageurs au Moyen Âge,
ed. H. Bresc and E. Tixier du Mesnil (Nanterre: Presses universitaires de Paris ouest,
2010), 207–223 (223). See also Immaculada Pérez Martin, “Ficción y realidad en las nar-
raciones hispanas de viajes a Bizancio,” in Mare nostrum. Viajeros griegos y latinos por
el Mediterráneo, ed. J. L. Arcaz Pozo and M. Montero (Madrid: Delegación de Madrid
de la Sociedad Española de Estudios Clásicos, 2012), 175–197 (181). For “travel narrative,”
see Giuliano Tamani, La letteratura ebraica medievale (secoli X–XIII) (Brescia: Morcelliana,
2004), 147–148.

they steal from them, but do not kill them the way they kill the Greeks,
and they do not accept any religion.98
There is a remarkable parallel here to Choniates’s comparison between the

Vlachs and mountain deer. This, however, is not the only description of moun-
tain people in the Sefer Masaʿot. The Druses of Lebanon are said to be “pagans
of a lawless character. They inhabit the mountains and the clefts of the rock;
they have no king or ruler, but dwell independent in these high places.”99 The
Druses are “at war with the men of Sidon,” who are of course the Christian
Franks.100 No Jews live among the Druses, but some Jewish artisans and dyers
travel through their country occasionally for the sake of trade, for the Druses
are “favorable to the Jews. They roam over the mountains and hills, and no
man can do battle with them.”101 No fewer than five elements are common to
Vlachs and Druses: they are lawless (i.e., they have no religion); no king rules
over either group; they are friendly to the Jews; they are at war with Christians;
and “no man can go up and do battle with them.” The accounts of Vlachs and
Druses are so similar that one may well have served as model for the other.
The image of the Vlachs swooping down from the mountains is also simi-
lar to that of Jews in the country of Baden, who “are not under the yoke of
the Gentiles, but possess cities and castles on the summits of the mountains,
from which they make descents” to raid the Christian kingdom of Amatum,
or Nubia. “The Jews take spoils and booty (from the Christians) and retreat
98 Marcus N. Adler, Sefer Masaʿot shel R. Binyamin (London: Henry Frowde, 1907), 12–13;
English version adapted from Lucian-Zeev Herscovici and Eugen Pentiuc, “References to
the Carpatho-Danubian Region in Hebrew Sources of the 10th–12th Centuries,” Romanian
Jewish Studies 1.2 (1987): 5–17 (13). Herscovici’s translation of the passage is slightly dif-
ferent from that in The Itinerary of Benjamin of Tudela, trans. M. N. Adler (New York, NY:
Philipp Feldheim, 1907), 11. Most importantly, Herscovici takes blkyh to be an adjective
modifying the noun “mountains,” although the accompanying Romanian translation of
the same text implies that blkyh (Vlakiah) is the name of the mountains (the Romanian
translation is taken from Victor Eskenasy, Izvoare şi mărturii referitoare la evreii din
România (Bucharest: Hasefer, 1986), 3). The reference to Vlachs being swift as deer is a
citation from 2 Samuel 2:18.
99 Itinerary, 18.
100 For Crusader Sidon, see Rudolf Hiestand, “Die Herren von Sidon und die Thronfolgekrise
des Jahres 1163 im Königreich Jerusalem,” in Montjoie. Studies in Crusade History in Honour
of Hans Eberhard Mayer, ed. B. Z. Kedar, J. Riley-Smith, and R. Hiestand (Aldershot:
Ashgate, 1997), 77–90.
101 Itinerary, 18.

448 Curta
to the mountains, and no man can prevail against them.”102 Again, the idea
appears that “no man can go up and do battle” with the mountaineers, albeit
in a slightly different form. Both Vlachs and Ethiopian Jews descend from their
respective mountains to raid and to despoil the neighboring Christian coun-
tries. The descriptions of Vlachs and mountain Jews open with the names of
the countries in which those people live—Vlachia and Baden, respectively.
This is an unusual feature, as country names (as opposed to city names) do
not normally open anecdotes attached to entries in the Sefer Masaʿot. For the
mountain Jews, at least, this may be an indication of a much later addition
to the text, probably by its last editor. Indeed, while most authors have identi-
fied the Jews of Baden with the Falasha communities of northern Ethiopia,
there is no mention of any Ethiopian Jews prior to 1300.103
Could the description of the Vlachs be of an equally late date? In my opin-
ion, the answer must be affirmative for a number of reasons. First, when com-
pared, the position of the description of the Vlachs in the general economy of
the segment of Benjamin’s travel between Rome and Constantinople is very
different from that of the description of the Druses in the segment of his trip
between Constantinople and Jerusalem. The latter is spiced with anecdotes and
commentaries, which are abundant both before and after the description of
the Druses.104 There are no such anecdotes in the segment of the trip between
Corfu and Constantinople. In other words, the description of the Vlachs breaks
the paramount concern with the presence of Jewish communities in the most
unusual way. It is therefore likely that the description of the Vlachs is a later
addition to the text, perhaps by one of the editors, who modeled it after the
description of the Druses.105 If so, then the date for that description cannot be
1161 (the year in which Benjamin presumably traveled through Greece), but a
much later date after 1173 (the year in which Benjamin died). Assuming the first
editor of the Sefer Masaʿot, who was also the author of the prologue, worked
102 Itinerary, 67; Binyamin da Tudela, Itinerario (Sefer massa’ot), trans. G. Busi (Rimini, 1988), 74.
Baden is the ancient name of Ethiopia.
103 Fauvelle-Aymar, “Desperately seeking,” 398, notes that there is no mention of Ethiopian
Jews in the otherwise abundant information of the Cairo Geniza.
104 E.g., the description of the Assassins and Samaritans before and after the Druses, respec-
tively (Itinerary, 18).
105 Judging by the fact that the description of the Vlachs is similar to that of the Ethiopian
Jews, which was almost certainly inserted into the text after 1300, it is possible that the
former was also of a similar date. But since the greatest degree of resemblance is with the
description of the Druses, which is most likely part of the oldest version of the text, it is
equally possible that the description of the mountain Jews in Ethiopia was modeled at a
later date (after 1300) after both that of the Druses and that of the Vlachs.

in Castile, then the description of the Vlachs must be of a thirteenth-century

date, i.e., after the Fourth Crusade and the conquest of Constantinople.106
It has long been claimed that Benjamin of Tudela is the first source to men-
tion the name of the country in which Vlachs live.107 However, the earliest
use of Vlachia for a province of the Empire (“provintia Blachie”) is in the
gazetteer of provinces open for trade, which is included in the chrysobull
that Emperor Alexius III Angelos issued for the Venetians in November 1198.108
The division of the Empire between the crusaders of 1204 and the Venetians
employed the provincial names as rendered in Emperor Alexius’s chrysobull.109
It is from that division that the chroniclers of the Fourth Crusade—
Villehardouin, Henri de Valenciennes, and Robert de Clari—took the idea
of a country named Vlachia, although they applied that name to a different
“province” of the (formerly Byzantine) Empire. It is likely from that same
source that the author of the Sefer Masaʿot learned about Vlachia. Moreover,
like the chroniclers of the Fourth Crusade, he transferred to the country of the
Vlachs near Sinon Potamo the political and religious features associated with
the other Vlachia, much farther to the north. That the Vlachs were as swift as
deer when descending from the mountains to plunder and loot “the country of
Greece” applies best to the political and military conflict between the Assenids
and the emperors of the Angelos dynasty.110 It is, after all, an image that could
have just as well been lifted from Choniates’s History. If the information concern-
ing the name of the country (Vlachia) originated in Constantinople, then it is
equally possible that the image of the Vlachs as descending from the mountains
to attack Byzantium also came from the capital of the Empire. Was the informa-
tion available to the chroniclers of the Fourth Crusade from the same source?
106 Such an assumption is primarily based on the use of the Castilian plural and Castilian
equivalents to Hebrew and other names (Jacoby, “Benjamin of Tudela and his ‘Book of
Travels,’” 143). For example, the Byzantines are called “Grizianos” or “Grigos,” in addition
to “Javan,” the traditional Jewish name for Greece (or Greeks) based on the “table of
nations” in Genesis 10.
107 Năsturel, “Les Valaques de l’espace byzantin,” 53.
108 A Latin translation of the chrysobull survives in two manuscripts in the state archives
of Venice. For the mention of “provincia Valachie” in the text of the Latin translation,
see Marco Pozza and Giorgio Ravegnani, I trattati con Bisanzio 992–1198 (Venice: Il Cardo,
1993), 130. The province of “Blachie” mentioned in the chrysobull was located next to
Mount Othrys, and included the lands around Lamia, Domokos, and Halmyros.
109 For Vlachia in the text of the partitio Romaniae, see Antonio Carile, “Partitio terrarum
Imperium Romaniae,” Studi Veneziani 7 (1965): 127–305 (161, 221, and 281–282).
110 Herscovici and Pentiuc, “References,” 13.

450 Curta
The Function and Role of the Vlachs in the Chronicles of the

Fourth Crusade
To be sure, there is no description in Villehardouin of deer-like Vlach

descending from the mountains. Villehardouin uses “Blasquie et Bougerie,”
instead of just “Blasquie” in politically important contexts, perhaps because
of his participation in the negotiations leading to the partitio Romaniae of
1204, in which the name “Blachia” was reserved for a (formerly Byzantine)
province in central Greece. He also mistakes Johannitsa for the son of Isaac II
Angelos and the nephew of Alexius III Angelos, but it is impossible to tell
where this wrong information may have originated, as there is no parallel to
that in any contemporary source. To Villehardouin, the Vlach ruler was a type,
whose actions are described and condemned, but who is never given a voice.111
There is in fact no direct speech of Johannitsa, the Vlachs, or the Cumans.112
By contrast, Henri de Valenciennes uses direct speech very often. The major-
ity of the sixty instances of direct speech in his History may be found in the
middle of the work, where the Vlachs appear together with their leaders,
Boril, and Slav. If Villehardouin identifies Vlachia with its ruler, Johannitsa, to
Henri de Valenciennes Boril’s name may be used as an adjective for identifying
the Vlachs as a whole—“the Boril people” (“la gent Burile”).113 The country is
called Blaquie if the ruler is Boril and “Blakie la Grant” if, God willing, Emperor
Henry is going to defeat Boril and replace him with Slav.114 As both a “haut
hom” respected in his country and the “hom” of Emperor Henry, Slav is suf-
ficiently qualified to receive the hand of an imperial princess in marriage, and
to rule over “Blakie la Grant,” even if he remains “somewhat savage.” Henri de
111 Dufournet, “Robert de Clari,” 188–190 suggests that Villehardouin’s Johannitsa is just a
prop to highlight Emperor Henry’s qualities and merits.
112 Beer, In Their Own Words, 372, notes that the most informative and frequent examples of
Villehardouin’s use of direct speech come from the first 200 paragraphs, i.e. before the
Vlachs and Johannitsa enter the story. Direct speeches in the latter part of the Conquest of
Constantinople record pleas for help, often against Johannitsa and the Vlachs.
114 That “Blakie la Grant” is in fact the same thing as “Blaquie” results from two manu-
scripts of Henri de Valenciennes’s History, which replace the former with “le roiaume de
Blaquie.” See Kiril Zhuglev, “Kakvo razbira Valasien pod Blaquie i Blakie-le-Grant,” Izvestiia
na muzeite ot Iugoiztochna Bălgariia 22–24 (1948): 159–169; Prinzing, Die Bedeutung
Bulgariens, 122 with n. 13; Madgearu, Asăneștii, 156. Despite the great resemblance of
names, “Great Vlachia” is definitely not the region in the highlands above Thessaly men-
tioned by Niketas Choniates, Historia, 638. Nor can Henri de Valenciennes’s usage be
attributed to concerns over the terminology borrowed from the partitio Romaniae of 1204.

Valenciennes’s Vlachs are never compared with deer, but instead with birds,
either larks scattered at the approach of the sparrow hawks, or “bruhiers”
that cannot be tamed for hunting.115 Both comparisons suggest that Henri de
Valenciennes had in mind an audience familiar with falconry.116 To own fal-
cons in early thirteenth-century France was a sign of social distinction and
birds of prey were sometimes treated as prizes at tournaments.117 By 1200,
the image of a falcon swooping to catch its prey has already become a stock
comparison for the knight charging against his enemies.118 After that, one way
to point out that not every rustic is destined to become a knight is to say that
one cannot turn a “bruhier” into a falcon.119 To Henri of Valenciennes’s audi-
ence, therefore, the Vlachs appeared as no real match for the crusaders. With
only one retainer following him, Emperor Henry jumped on his horse Moriel,
spurred it into battle, and killed the first Vlach he encountered. When scolded
by Peter of Douai for his foolish behavior, the emperor recommends that “lais-
sommes les Blas a tant, et tornons vers Phinepople.”120 The Vlachs are just not
worth all that trouble. Why then is the bulk of the material in the History about
Vlachs and Cumans, especially in the first part? The answer may be found in
the long speech delivered by Emperor Henry before the battle at Philippopolis.
In that speech, Henry asks God for the victory against Vlachs and Cumans so
that revenge may be taken on them.121 One could think of Baldwin as the main
reason for Henry’s desire to take revenge on the Vlachs and the Cumans, but
the field sermon at Philippopolis depicts them as enemies of both Empire
and Church.122 This has been rightly interpreted as crusading propaganda.
115 Valenciennes, Histoire, 540 and 520, pp. 45 and 36.

116 The earliest Old French manuscripts containing treaties of falconry have been dated
to the thirteenth century. See An Smets, “La mise en recueil des traités de fauconnerie
médiévaux en latin et en langue vernaculaire (français et espagnol),” Reinardus 23 (2010–
2011): 163–185 (180–182).
117 Baudouin van den Abeele, La fauconnerie dans les lettres françaises du XIIe au XIVe siècle
(Louvain: Leuven University Press, 1990), 20–22, 78, and 95.
118 Abeele, La fauconnerie, 149. The stereotype of larks fleeing the attack of the sparrow
hawk is already present in Chanson d’Antioche, ca. 1180 (Chanson d’Antioche 273, l. 6704,
ed. S. Duparc-Quioc (Paris: P. Geuthner, 1976), 331). For hunting larks with sparrow hawks
in the thirteenth century, see Abeele, La fauconnerie, 150.
119 Abeele, La fauconnerie, 203.
120 Valenciennes, Histoire 513, p. 33. According to Dufournet, “Henri de Valenciennes,” 44, the
name of Emperor Henry’s horse is mentioned as if he were the hero of a chanson de geste.
122 Valenciennes, Histoire 523–4, pp. 37–38. As Aglio, Innocenzo III, 150 with n. 289 notes, in
a letter sent to his brother Geoffroy in September 1206, Henry actually called Johannitsa

452 Curta
Ovidiu Cristea has even suggested that the emphasis on Vlachs and Cumans
in the History is meant to justify the very existence of the Latin Empire of
Constantinople as a bastion against infidels.123 That, ultimately, is why Boril
is said to have made himself emperor “against God and reason” and why the
Vlachs sound their trumpets before battle, as if trusting their multitude more
than God.124
The crusade may have also been on the mind of Robert de Clari. There is a
greater concern with the Saracens in his Conquest of Constantinople than in
Villehardouin or Henri de Valenciennes’s works. The Saracens appear eight
times in the text, more than the Vlachs. The first references to both groups,
however, are remarkably symmetrical. Kyrsac (Isaac), one of the three Angelos
brothers persecuted by Andronicus I, flees to a country called “Blakie,” while
another brother goes to Antioch “et fu pris des Sarrasins par une chevauchie.”125
Andronicus’s biography, on the other hand, is also connected to the Saracens.
He has been sent by Emperor Manuel to bring to Constantinople “la reine
Teudore de Jherusalem, qui se seurs estoit.” But Andronicus raped the queen,
and then fled with her to Konya, among the Saracens. 126 This is, of course,
a story Robert de Clari invented most likely on the basis of the story of Lucretia
being raped by Sextus Tarquinius.127 Later in the narrative, the sultan of Konya,
having heard about the deeds of the crusaders at Constantinople on behalf of
Alexius, requests their assistance for taking back power from his (the sultan’s)
brother, who has usurped his land and seigniory of Konya.128 In addition, the
sultan promised to convert to Christianity, together with his men, and offered
“sancte cruces inimico” and “curie et sancte romane ecclesie inimicus.” In another let-
ter sent to Pope Innocent III in 1208, after the battle at Philippopolis, Henry also called
Boril “iniquissimus persecutor ecclesie dei” (Aglio, Innocenzo III, 157). For crusading as
vengeance between 1198 and 1216, see Susanna A. Throop, Crusading as an Act of
Vengeance, 1095–1216 (Farnham and Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2011), 117–143.
123 Prinzing, Die Bedeutung Bulgariens, 121 with n. 9; Ovidiu Cristea, “Epilogul Cruciadei a
IV-a. Perspectiva lui Henri de Valenciennes,” Revista de istorie 13 (2002): nos. 1–2, 243–253
(244–245).
124 That, in other words, may be a reference to Ezekiel 7:14.
127 Bertrand Rouziès-Léonardi, “Le roman d’Andronic, du bouc à l’agneau,” in Mimétisme,
violence, sacré. Approche anthropologique de la littérature narrative médiévale, ed.
H. Heckmann and Nicolas Lenoir (Orléans: Paradigme, 2012), pp. 167–186 (169).
128 Clari, Conquête, 52, p. 128. The unnamed sultan is, of course, Kaykhusraw I (1192–1196,
1205–1211), the youngest son of Kilij Arslan II, whom Robert de Clari regards as the rightful
heir (“drois oirs”) against his brother Sulaymanshah.

the crusaders plenty of his own wealth. His request was nonetheless rejected
on pragmatic grounds, namely that the crusaders “still had to get their reward
from the emperor (Alexius IV Angelos), and it would be dangerous to leave
Constantinople, as things were then, and they dared not to leave it.”129 This epi-
sode is remarkably similar to that in which Johannitsa requests recognition of
the title of king of his own lands in exchange for becoming a vassal of the cru-
saders against Constantinople, and offering military assistance in the form of
100 000 men. Like Kaykhusraw, Johannitsa was rebuffed, as the barons needed
neither his fealty nor his military assistance.130 The episode of Johannitsa
requesting recognition from the crusaders is in turn remarkably similar to
Niketas Choniates’s coverage of the same events. According to Choniates,
Johannitsa dispatched an embassy of friendship to the crusaders, who none-
theless repulsed and asked him to address them as a servant addresses his
masters.131 That the crusaders refused Johannitsa’s offers on grounds that he had
rebelled “against his Roman lords” suggests that they had chosen to treat him in
the same demeaning way in which the Byzantines had previously treated the
Vlach rulers. Choniates’s version of events is therefore to be preferred to Robert
de Clari’s. The latter simply put a spin on a story he may have learned from
Byzantine informants in Constantinople.132 Choniates’s Johannitsa does not
ask for anything, but simply looks for friends or allies. Robert de Clari has him
requesting the recognition of his title of king. This detail had to be added in
order to link the story to that about Johannitsa obtaining a crown and the title
of king from the pope.133 While the “barons of the army” treated Johannitsa
as a usurper, the pope recognized him as king. The arrogance of the crusaders
would have long-term consequences, as Johannitsa did not forget the indignity
129 The Conquest of Constantinople, transl. by McNeal, 79.

130 Clari, Conquête 65, p. 144. The parallel between the two scenes has first been noted by
Kinoshita, Medieval Boundaries, 154–155.
131 Niketas Choniates, Historia, 613. See also Genoveva Cankova-Petkova, “A propos des
rapports bulgaro-francs au commencement du XIIIe siècle,” Bulgarian Historical Review
4.4 (1976): 51–61 (52); Pecican, Între cruciați și tătari, 75–77.
132 Boris A. Todorov, “The Bulgarians Between Two Romes: The Discourse of Power in Medieval
Bulgaria” (Ph.D. diss., University of California, Los Angeles, CA, 2007), 202; Mărculeț, “A
solicitat țarul,” 32. Robert de Clari’s mention of the crusaders rejecting Johannitsa’s offer
of cooperation shows that the crusaders have inherited the Byzantine notion of Peter and
Asen having usurped the imperial power, since their lands rightly belonged to the Empire
(Madgearu, Asăneştii, 122). To be sure, Robert de Clari knows that Johannitsa’s country has
once been “une tere qui est du demaine l’empereur” (Clari, Conquête 64, p. 142).

454 Curta
he had suffered and took his revenge on the battlefield at Adrianople (“che fu
molt grand deus et molt grans damages”).134
But there is more to the parallel between Niketas Choniates and Robert
de Clari than meets the eye. Both attach an epithet to Johannitsa’s name:
“the Mysian” in Choniates, “the Vlach” in Robert de Clari. Robert de Clari’s
Johannitsa used to be a serjans of the emperor in charge with an imperial
horse farm. As such, he had to come to Constantinople every year. During one
of his visits, however, he is struck in the face by an imperial official (either
a eunuch or an usherer). Steamed up about the offense, he leaves the court
in rage and begins to plot a rebellion against the emperor, gathering on his
side both Vlachs and Cumans.135 This is clearly a variation of the story of Peter
and Asen to be found in Choniates.136 There are at least three points of over-
lap between the two stories.137 First, the hero (Asen for Choniates, Johannitsa
for Robert de Clari) is insulted and struck in the face (with a whip, according
to Robert de Clari, perhaps in reference to Johannitsa being in charge with the
emperor’s horses). He then leaves the court in a rage, and subsequently begins
to organize the rebellion. In other words, the point of the story is to explain the
rebellion of the Vlachs by means of the incident in Kypsella.
How are the remarkable paralles between Robert de Clari and Choniates to
be explained? A direct correlation is of course out of question, for it was impos-
sible for Robert de Clari to have read Choniates’s History, as he was in France
by the time Choniates died in Nicaea without finishing his work. Instead, both
authors must have learned about this incident from Constantinople. Robert de
Clari was there between July 1203 and the spring of 1205.138 Choniates’s infor-
mation, on the other hand, is based on anecdotes or rumors that circulated
in Constantinople before, but also after the crusaders’ conquest of the city on

136 Niketas Choniates, Historia, 369; Konstantin Mechev, “Osvoboditel’naia bor’ba bol-
garskogo narodo v konce XII-nachale XIII v. (K voprosu o soderzhanii termina vlakhi),”
Sovetskoe slavianovedenie (1979): no. 2, 35–47 (38–39).
137 Malingoudis, “Die Nachrichten,” 84–85 with n. 101, notes two other correspondences
between Choniates and Robert de Clari: the demise of Andronicus Comnenus at the
hands of Isaac Angelos (“Kyrsac”), and the rebellion of Branas and his subsequent defeat
by Conrad of Montferrat.
138 Peter Schreiner, “Robert de Clari und Konstantinopel,” in Novum millennium. Studies in
Byzantine History and Culture Dedicated to Paul Speck, 19 December 1999, ed. C. Sode and
S. A. Takács (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2000), 237–256 (338) notes that even the description
of the city is not based on an eyewitness account (i.e., Robert de Clari’s own experience of
Constantinople), but on written and oral accounts.

April 8, 1204. It is from such anecdotes and rumors that Robert de Clari learned
about the beginning of the Vlach rebellion, as well as the way in which the
crusaders had rejected Johannitsa’s offer of military assistance. In his Conquest
of Constantinople, the former was meant to explain how Vlachia became a
major power, and the latter—the disaster at Adrianople. Unlike Villehardouin,
Robert de Clari explains that disaster as divine retribution for the arrogance of
the barons towards “the poor people of the army” and for the horrible sins com-
mitted in Constantinople after its conquest.139 Unlike Henri de Valenciennes,
Robert de Clari regards the Vlachs not as enemies of the Church, but as God’s
instruments for punishing sinners. In and by themselves, the Vlachs have no
significance: Robert de Clari mentions them only a few times in his Conquest
of Constantinople. But after being chosen by God to inflict upon the crusad-
ers the punishment they deserved, the Vlachs cannot be ignored any more.140
That is why Clari’s Johannitsa has none of the negative traits Villehardouin
has attributed to him: there is no word either of “trahïson” or of indiscrimi-
nate massacres of prisoners. That is also why there is no crusade against the
Vlachs. On the contrary, while Henri de Valenciennes’s Slav is eager to marry
Emperor Henry I’s daughter, in Robert de Clari it is the emperor, who after
much hesitation (due to the woman’s allegedly low origin) is convinced by his
barons that it is in his own interest to ask Boril for the hand of his stepdaugh-
ter. Henri de Valenciennes’s Henry gives his daughter a forewarning about her
future husband being “somewhat savage.” Robert de Clari’s Boril lives in a sav-
age country and may have barbarian features, but sends his stepdaughter to
Constantinople with a numerous retinue and an impressive dowry.141
How is the dramatic change to be explained, from the haughty attitude of
those who rejected Johannitsa to the rather humiliating position in which
Emperor Henry found himself in relation to Boril? The barons explain it all:
the Vlachs are now the most powerful and feared people in the empire, if
not the world. In relation to Constantinople, the Vlachs have now a posi-
tion symmetrically opposed to that of the Saracens.142 Byzantine political
139 Clari, Conquête 112, p. 208; Dembowski, Chronique, 99; Kinoshita, Medieval Boundaries, 171.
140 Varvaro, “Esperienza e racconto,” 1425.
141 Clari, Conquête 116–117, pp. 210 and 212. There is comic effect in the scene of “Burus” on
the point of executing Emperor Henry’s enovys before realizing why there were there and
what they wanted.
142 In the thirteenth-century chanson de geste entitled Doon de Mayence (Les anciens poètes
de France, ed. F. Guessard, 2 vols. (Paris: F. Vieweg, 1859), 2:345), Bulgaria (Bougerie)
“marche a l’Amustant et au roi de Blasquie.” “Amustant” (in Middle French, a word derived
from Arabic al-mustaʾil) is the governor of a Muslim country, an emir.

456 Curta
refugees can go either to Vlachia or to Konya. When the crusaders close on

Constantinople, both Vlach and Saracen rulers approach them with requests
for help. Both Johannitsa and Kaykhusraw are turned down, but only Johannitsa
gets his revenge. While the Vlachs appear increasingly formidable before and
after Adrianople, Peter of Bracheux asks for a kingdom for himself, “which
was in the land of the Saracens toward Konya, if he should conquer it, and it
was given to him, and my lord Pierre went there with all his people, and he
conquered this kingdom right well and was lord of it.”143 Given the super-hero
stature of Peter of Bracheux, it is perhaps no accident that the episode of his
meeting with the Vlachs and the Cumans was inserted at a later date into the
text of the Conquest of Constantinople before the account of the allocation of
the immovable wealth of the empire. The episode in fact operates like the mir-
ror image of Robert de Clari’s own (original) account of Peter’s conquest of the
lands next to the sultanate of Konya.
It may also not be an accident that the theme of that episode is the Trojan
legend. During the last quarter of the twelfth century, some learned mem-
bers of the Byzantine elite began to invoke the Roman origin of the Vlachs,
most likely because of the cultural fads of that time, especially the fascina-
tion with the history of Republican and early imperial Rome. However, neither
Choniates nor the chroniclers of the Fourth Crusade made any reference to
the Roman origin of the Vlachs. Their silence is significant, especially when
considered against the existing evidence pointing to the spread of that idea
beyond the limited circles of the educated elites in Constantinople. Most
relevant in this respect is a legal case mentioned in a document from the
chancery of John Apokaukos, Bishop of Naupaktos (1199–1233). The docu-
ment is dated to 1222 and refers to the complaint of one Symeon Sgouropoulos,
against a man named Avrilionis Constantine. Constantine is accused of hav-
ing raped Symeon’s youngest daughter, Blasia, and then beaten and seriously
injured Symeon himself. His accomplices in the crime were “his people” (meth’
homogenous laou), for he is described as a “colonist of the Romans,” whom
people now call Vlachs (Rōmaiōn apoikos, onoma Konstantinos, Blachous touto
to genos o kairos ōnomasen anthropos).144 Despite the sarcastic tone, this is as
143 The Conquest of Constantinople, trans. by McNeal, 125.

144 Nikos A. Bees, “Unedierte Schriftstücke aus der Kanzlei des Johannes Apokaukos des
Metropoliten von Naupaktos (in Aetolien),” Byzantinisch-neugriechische Jahrbücher
21 (1971–1974): 55–160 (60–62); Năsturel, “Les Valaques balkaniques,” 94–5 and 99;
Winnifrith, Vlachs, 119; Kosmas Lampropoulos, Ioannes Apokaukos. Symbole sten ereuna
tou Biou kai tou syggraphikou ergou tou (Athens: S. D. Vasilopoulous, 1988), 271; Vasilis
Katsaros, “Eideseis gia tous Blachous apo to ergo tou metropolitou Naupaktianou

an instance of intellectual showing off in the manner of Kinnamos. Moreover,

the parallels to Kinnamos are remarkable. In both cases, there is a specific men-
tion of settlers or colonists. More importantly, the Vlachs, in both cases, are
said to be settlers brought from Italy or the colonists of the Romans, and not
their (respective) descendants. In other words, Vlachs are equated to Romans
in a direct, albeit inexplicit way. The document demonstrates that the idea of
the Roman origin of the Vlachs was still “in the air” in the early thirteenth cen-
tury. Why then is it not mentioned in the chronicles of the Fourth Crusade?
Constantinople and the Echo Chamber
Pope Innocent III may have well thought that mentioning the noble Roman
origin of his people to Johannitsa will warm him up to Roman Catholicism.
He probably learned about the Roman origin of the Vlachs from members
of the Latin colony in Constantinople who were aware of the hot topics of
intellectual and political discussions among the learned elites of the city.145
However, in the political atmosphere created after the crusaders’ conquest
Ioannou Apokaukou. Zetemata symbioses romaizonton me ellenizontes ste Mikra

Blachia,” in Sparagmata Byzantinoslabikes kleronomias.Charisterios tomos ston Omotimo
kathegete Ioanne Chr. Tarnanide, ed. K. G. Nichoritis, E. Evangelou and A. G. Athanasiadis
(Thessaloniki: Kyriakide, 2011), 279–305. According to Latsios, “Konstruktion der Vlachen”
(see above, n. 100), 208, the name Avrilionis is a sarcastic reference to Constantine’s
people, possibly alluding to Emperor Aurelianus (270–275) during whose reign the prov-
ince of Dacia was abandoned. Epirote Vlachs such as Avrilionis appear at the same time
(1220s) in documents of the chancery of the archbishop of Ohrid, Demetrios Chomatenos,
but without any mention of their Roman origins: Günter Prinzing, “Abbot or Bishop?
The Conflict about the Spiritual Obedience of the Vlach Peasants in the Region of Bothrotos
ca.1220: Case no. 80 of the Legal Works of Demetrios Chomatenos Reconsidered,” in Church
and Society in Late Byzantium, ed. D. G. Angelov (Kalamazoo, MI: Medieval Institute,
Western Michigan University, 2009), 25–42. Similarly, there is no mention of such matters
in the charters of Stephen Nemanja for the Hilandar Monastery (1198–1199) and of his son,
Stephen Prvovenčani, for the Žiča Monastery (1220), the earliest non-narrative sources in
Slavonic to mention the Vlachs. See Silviu Dragomir, Vlahii din nordul Peninsulei Balcanice
în Evul Mediu (Bucharest: Editura Academiei RPR, 1959), 17–18.
145 One of his informants may have been a certain Pretextatus, who is mentioned in three
letters as living in Constantinople together with his Hungarian wife, Sibilia (Innocent III,
epp. 114, 115, and 140, in Die Register Innocenz’ III., vol. 5, 226, 227, and 231). Prinzing, “Das
Papsttum,” 167 n. 105, points out that Pretextatus was in fact the liaison through which
Innocent III’s letters reached Johannitsa (and vice-versa) in the early years of their
correspondence.

458 Curta
of Constantinople, the idea that the Vlachs were of Roman origin had a com-
pletely different meaning. In the aftermath of Adrianople, such an idea would
have empowered the enemy, who, in the meantime, had already obtained rec-
ognition, as well as a crown from the pope. Only Robert de Clari mentions the
latter event, although both Villehardouin and Henri de Valenciennes must have
known about it, since they relate events taking place at the end of 1204. Even
Clari brings up the topic only to criticize the arrogance of the “barons of the
army,” who had rejected Johannitsa’s request and offer of military assistance.
Although Clari knew about the relations between Johannitsa and Innocent III,
he is silent about the Roman origin of the Vlachs. Nor do Villehardouin and
Henri de Valenciennes have anything to say in that respect, since their Vlachs
and portraits of Johannitsa and Boril, respectively, look more barbarian than
Robert de Clari’s.
Furthermore, there may have been an alternative ideological construct at
work, which prevented the three chroniclers of the Fourth Crusade from men-
tioning the idea that the Vlachs were descendants of noble Romans. In the
early thirteenth century, that construct, based as it was on the Trojan legend,
linked the glorious Roman past to the French, and not to the Vlachs.146 To be
sure, the emphasis in such late twelfth-century works as Eneas, long thought
to be an Old French version of Virgil’s Aeneid, and Benoît de Sainte-Maure’s
Roman de Troie, is less on Rome and more on Troy.147 But Virgil’s idea that the
146 Emmanuèle Baumgartner, “Troie et Constantinople dans quelques textes du XIIe et du

XIIIe siècles: fiction et histoire,” in La ville. Histoires et mythes, ed. M.-C. Bancquart (Paris:
Institut de Français de l’Université X-Nanterre, 1982), 6–16 (13).
147 Jessie Crossland, “Eneas and the Aeneid,” Modern Language Review 29.3 (1934): 282–290;
Rossana Petullà, “Il roman d’Eneas e l’Eneide,” Filologia medievale e umanistica 102 (1968):
409–431. However, the relation between the Aeneid and the Eneas is more complicated
than that (Francine Mora, “De l’Enéide à l’Enéas: le traducteur médiéval à la recher-
che d’une nouvelle stylistique,” Bien dire et bien aprandre 14 (1996): 21–40; Vladimir
Agrigoroaei, “Histoire des traductions en français au XIIe siècle” (Ph.D. diss., University of
Poitiers, Poitiers, 2011), 262–266. What is not at stake in this debate, however, is the fact
that the anonymous French poet knew that the Aeneid was about the origins of Rome.
Aimé Petit, L’anachronisme dans les romans antiques du XIIe siècle. Le Roma de Thèbes, le
Roman d’Énéas, le Roman de Troie, le Roman d’Alexandre (Paris: Honoré Champion, 2002),
201, notes that the French poet lists the kings of Rome in the same order that Virgil had
them, and that to its audience Eneas may sometimes have been a true De viris illustribus
Romae. Penny Eley, “The Myth of Trojan Descent and Perceptions of National Identity:
The Case of Eneas and the Roman de Troie,” Nottingham Medieval Studies 35 (1991): 27–40
(32) goes a step farther when interpreting the reference to Latin (the language in which
Lavinia wrote her declaration of love to Eneas) as “clearly designed to emphasize the fact
that Lavinia’s Italy is destined to become the cradle of Roman civilization.”

Romans were the heirs of Troy through Aeneas was sufficiently established
around 1200 in the Old French literature. At the same time, however, Troy was
linked to medieval France, and Trojans were depicted as the ancestors of the
French, as in the illuminations of one of the earliest surviving manuscripts
of the Roman de Troie.148 “Re-inventing the homeland” is precisely why the
episode of Peter of Bracheux’s meeting with the Vlachs and the Cumans was
inserted into Robert de Clari’s Conquest of Constantinople. Neither Peter nor
the Vlachs make any reference to the Romans. Moreover, while the Vlachs are
aware of the Trojan legend, they do not take the opportunity to claim that they
are the true heirs of Troy, because of being of Roman descent. Nonetheless,
as Theresa Shawcross has shown, Peter de Bracheux’s argument concerning
Trojan ancestry is “proffered by way of explanation for the second assault on
Constantinople.”149 Given that the Vlachs ask Peter about the reason for which
the crusaders came to their (the Vlachs’) country to conquer lands, I would
suggest that the reason for which this episode was inserted into the text of
Clari’s Conquest of Constantinople may have something to do with the idea that
the Vlachs were of Roman origin. To counter such claims, Peter of Bracheux
invokes the Trojan legend, thus shifting the emphasis from Rome to Troy. That
Romans are not mentioned at all in this episode is because the Trojans are
presented instead as ancestors of the (essentially, French) crusaders.150 The
episode of Peter of Bracheux’s meeting with the Vlachs is therefore an indi-
rect testimony of how widespread and politically powerful was the idea of the
Roman origin of Johannitsa and his Vlachs.
That idea originated in the cultural milieu of Byzantine lettrés in twelfth-
century Constantinople. However, it is conspicuously absent from the work
of Niketas Choniates, which is otherwise the most detailed account of the
Vlachs among the sources examined in this paper. That Choniates avoids any
mention of the Roman origin of the Vlachs may have something to do with
the changing political climate in which he was writing his History. One of the
148 Elizabeth Morrison, “Linking Ancient Troy and Medieval France: Illuminations of an
Early Copy of the Roman de Troie,” in Medieval Manuscripts, Their Makers and Users.
A Special Issue of Viator in Honor of Richard and Mary Rouse, ed. H. A. Kelly and C. Baswell
(Turnhout: Brepols, 2011), 77–102. For a historical survey of the linkage between the Trojan
legend and the French, see Claire Boudreau, “Les plus anciennes sources du mythe des
origines troyennes des Français (VIIe–XIIIe siècle),” Memini 1 (1997): 73–117.
149 Shawcross, “Re-Inventing the Homeland,” 128.
150 Robert de Clari’s interest in the Trojan legend is evident in his mention in chapter 40
of the location of the “great Troy,” which he places at “Bouke d’Ave,” at the entrance
into the straight of St. George. For the linkage between Troy and the (French) crusaders,
see Colette Beaune, Naissance de la nation France (Paris: Gallimard, 1985), 45–48.

460 Curta
most important issues defining that climate was the debate over the new defi-
nition of Roman-ness that resulted from the conquest of Constantinople by
crusaders in 1204 and the rise of the Byzantine successor states, particularly
Nicaea (where Choniates went as a refugee from Constantinople). At stake
was more Roman (political) identity than history, but there was no room in
this debate for Vlach claims to Roman ancestry. Moreover, the very fact that
such claims had meanwhile been made (on behalf of the Vlachs) by the pope
who had endorsed the conquest of Constantinople, and that Johannitsa had
recognized the papal primacy, effectively eliminated the idea of the Vlachs
being of Roman origin from the political agenda of Niketas Choniates (and,
one may assume, of many other refugees from Constantinople who shared
his political views). His contemporary, John Apokaukos, had no such qualms.
A former Constantinopolitan lettré like Choniates (although without his deep
knowledge of imperial politics), Apokaukos lived at that time in the rival suc-
cessor state of Epirus, in which there seems to have been no particular con-
cerns with the redefinition of Roman-ness in reaction to the Latin Empire of
Constantinople.
Certain key elements in Choniates’s description of the Vlachs also appear
in Robert de Clari’s Conquest of Constantinople, particularly the ideas that the
Vlach rebellion has been ignited by the (literal) slap in the face of Johannitsa
and that he had been repulsed by the crusaders when he approached them
with offers of military alliance. The latter is remarkably similar to what the
History of Emperor Frederick’s Expedition has to say about Peter’s repeated
overtures to Emperor Frederick Barbarossa. Such parallels suggest that a
number of “talking points” about the Vlachs were on the minds and presum-
ably in the daily conversations of many people in Constantinople on the eve of
the city’s conquest by the crusaders. Choniates’s audience in Nicaea may have
well recognized many of them, but such issues were still discussed in the city
after its conquest, or else Robert de Clari could not have learned about them. To
be sure, not all “talking points” about the Vlachs on which Choniates’s account
is based show up in Robert de Clari’s Conquest of Constantinople, which draws
on several other sources. For example, Clari has no knowledge of Vlachs pos-
sessed by demons, while he must have learned about Johannitsa being killed by
St. Demetrius from sources in Thessaloniki, not Constantinople.151 Moreover,
151 Robert de Clari is the earliest source to mention this miracle of St. Demetrius. The miracle
is also mentioned in the chronicle of Alberic, a Cistercian monk in the abbey of Trois
Fontaines in Champagne (Alberic of Trois Fontaines, Chronica, ed. P. Scheffer-Boichorst,
MGH SS 23:886). Alberic died ca. 1252 and must have finished writing his chronicle
shortly before that. He has St. Demetrius killing Johannitsa, but without any mention of

there is no sign of Choniates’s “talking points” either in Villehardouin’s Conquest

of Constantinople, or in Henri de Valenciennes’s History of Emperor Henry of
Constantinople, unless one is willing to accept that Johannitsa or Boril’s treach-
erous character is a variation on, or the interpretatio Latina of, the theme of
the faithless and untrustworthy Vlachs, which goes back to Kekaumenos. Nor
are there any Vlachs descending from the mountains in the chronicles of the
Fourth Crusade.
However, that “talking point” is very effectively used in the description of
the Vlachs inserted in the Sefer Masaʿot of Benjamin of Tudela. Most likely,
its origin is in the same Constantinopolitan milieu from which Choniates
drew inspiration. Choniates clearly acknowledges the fact that the Vlachs are
fellow Orthodox Christians. One wonders therefore where the author of the
description of the Vlachs in Sefer Masaʿot may have learned that the Vlachs did
not “hold fast to the Christian religion,” but the idea certainly resonates with
both the “scene of the possessed” in Niketas Choniates and Emperor Henry’s
claims in Henry de Valenciennes’s History that the Vlachs were enemies of the
Church.152 In other words, some of the issues concerning the Vlachs in various
texts examined in this paper may be simply the result of distortion of “talking
points” originating in Constantinople.
The amplification and reinforcement of those ideas about the Vlachs was
subject not only to transmission and repetition, but also to considerable altera-
tion. In Constantinople, both before and after the conquest of the city by the
crusaders, things may have looked much like the echo chamber of the mod-
ern media. One can only imagine that some Byzantines who remained in the
city may have found their opinions about the Vlachs echoed back to them in
versions much altered by the interests, worldview, and prejudices of the new
masters. To pinpoint a particular stage in the historical construction of the por-
trait of the Balkan Vlachs is therefore to chase a moving target. The evidence
the weapon by which the Vlach ruler was killed. According to Vasilka Tăpkova-Zaimova,
“Réligion et légende dans la littérature hagiographique (Saint Démétrius et le Tzar bul-
gare Kalojan),” Bollettino della Badia Greca di Grottaferrata 2 (2005): 221–237 (222–223),
the earliest and most detailed Greek source concerning this miracle first is the oration in
honor of St. Demetrius written by John Staurakios at some point during the second half
of the thirteenth century.
152 Victor Spinei, “An Oriental Perspective on the Ethnic Realities of the Balkans in the
Eleventh–Twelfth Centuries: Michael the Syrian,” Archivum Eurasiae Medii Aevi 20 (2013):
165–238 (194) believes that the information about Vlachs (Balakayê) as enemies of the
Empire, which one can find in the Chronicle of Michael the Syrian (ed. J.-B. Chabot, 4 vols.
(Paris: E. Typographeo Reipublicae, 1899–1910), 3:204), also originated in twelfth-century
Constantinople.

462 Curta
examined in this paper may, in many senses, be unsatisfactory: the “talking

points” have been rewritten over the course of more than 150 years. As indica-
tors of the broad outlines of the general perception of the Vlachs, they are,
however, sufficient. Despite considerable gaps in the record, the picture that
emerges is one of an echo chamber in which similar ideas kept recirculating
and where there was no interest in who the Vlachs really were. More often than
not, the mention of them serves some purpose other than the transmission of
information about them, such as to show the decline of the Empire under the
Angelos dynasty or to explain the disaster at Adrianople. Their leaders may at
times appear in the spotlight with genuine demands—to receive a crown like
the kings of old Bulgaria, in Johannitsa’s case, or to marry an imperial princess,
in the case of Slav. In such cases, the interest soon shifts to matters of greater
importance to others—the Roman origin of the Vlachs, in Johannitsa’s case, or
the fact that Slav was, after all, “somewhat savage.” Even Emperor Henry hesi-
tates to ask for the hand of Boril’s stepdaughter, for like Slav, she is a woman of
low origin from a savage country. But he swallows his pride, takes the advice of
his barons, and sends envoys to Boril. He does so because, after Adrianople, the
Vlachs had become “le plus fort gent et le plus doutee de l’empire ne de le tere.”
When history bursts into the echo chamber, it’s time to look reality in the eye.
Acknowledgements
In the process of writing this paper, I have incurred many debts. Vladimir
Agrigoroaei and Péter Tóth have generously offered clarifications and bib-
liographical references on several key points. Other scholars have lent their
wisdom. I am especially appreciative of Francesco dall’Aglio, Ivan Biliarski,
Anthony Kaldellis, Alexandru Madgearu, Dan Ioan Mureşan, and Victor Spinei
for their critical comments on earlier drafts.

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Constantinople and The Echo Chamber The

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Medieval

Medieval Encounters �� (�0�6) 4�7–46� Jewish, Christian and Muslim Culture

Constantinople and the Echo Chamber: The Vlachs

The chroniclers of the Fourth Crusade (Geoffroi de Villehardouin, Henri de

Benjamin of Tudela – Bulgaria – Geoffroi de Villehardouin – Henri de Valenciennes –

© koninklijke brill nv, leiden, ���6 | doi �0.��63/�5700674-��34��3�

medieval encounters 22 (2016) 427–462

of Emperor Baldwin (who would eventually perish as a prisoner in Bulgaria)

Vlachs in the French Chronicles of the Fourth Crusade

medieval encounters 22 (2016) 427–462

medieval encounters 22 (2016) 427–462

The name of the country, “Blaquie,” also appears in Henri de Valenciennes’s

19 Henri de Valenciennes, Histoire de l’Empereur Henri de Constantinople 505, ed. J. Longnon

medieval encounters 22 (2016) 427–462

24 Valenciennes, Histoire 520, p. 36.

medieval encounters 22 (2016) 427–462

about “monseigneur Pierron de Braiechoel et de sa boine chevalerie,” the

medieval encounters 22 (2016) 427–462

Vlachs in Non-French Sources Before and shortly After the

36 Clari, Conquête 65, pp. 142 and 144.

medieval encounters 22 (2016) 427–462

medieval encounters 22 (2016) 427–462

medieval encounters 22 (2016) 427–462

learn from “our books.”52 In other words, he regarded himself a descendant of

medieval encounters 22 (2016) 427–462

medieval encounters 22 (2016) 427–462

Balkan Vlachs.59 However, the description of the Vlachs is modeled on a psogos

medieval encounters 22 (2016) 427–462

medieval encounters 22 (2016) 427–462

69 Paul Magdalino, The Empire of Manuel I Komnenos 1143–1180 (Cambridge: Cambridge

medieval encounters 22 (2016) 427–462

medieval encounters 22 (2016) 427–462

medieval encounters 22 (2016) 427–462

medieval encounters 22 (2016) 427–462

medieval encounters 22 (2016) 427–462

2008), 135–164 (140). According to Giancarlo Lacerenza, “Struttura letteraria e dinamiche

medieval encounters 22 (2016) 427–462

There is a remarkable parallel here to Choniates’s comparison between the

medieval encounters 22 (2016) 427–462

medieval encounters 22 (2016) 427–462

in Castile, then the description of the Vlachs must be of a thirteenth-century

medieval encounters 22 (2016) 427–462

The Function and Role of the Vlachs in the Chronicles of the

To be sure, there is no description in Villehardouin of deer-like Vlach

medieval encounters 22 (2016) 427–462

115 Valenciennes, Histoire, 540 and 520, pp. 45 and 36.

medieval encounters 22 (2016) 427–462

medieval encounters 22 (2016) 427–462

129 The Conquest of Constantinople, transl. by McNeal, 79.

medieval encounters 22 (2016) 427–462

134 Clari, Conquête 65, p. 144.

medieval encounters 22 (2016) 427–462

medieval encounters 22 (2016) 427–462

refugees can go either to Vlachia or to Konya. When the crusaders close on

143 The Conquest of Constantinople, trans. by McNeal, 125.

medieval encounters 22 (2016) 427–462

an instance of intellectual showing off in the manner of Kinnamos. Moreover,

Constantinople and the Echo Chamber

Ioannou Apokaukou. Zetemata symbioses romaizonton me ellenizontes ste Mikra

medieval encounters 22 (2016) 427–462

146 Emmanuèle Baumgartner, “Troie et Constantinople dans quelques textes du XIIe et du

medieval encounters 22 (2016) 427–462

medieval encounters 22 (2016) 427–462

© koninklijke brill nv, leiden, ��6 | doi �0.��63/�5700674-��34��3�