> ******GK: Yes but Rashev's 29% + 2-3% would include
> those wouldn't it?******
Weren't Rashev's comments based on excavations in NE Bulgaria? The
presence of Protobulgarians in Macedonia before 681 is confirmed by
the old sources which led to some consensus on the subject among
Bulgarian scholars (including such as Zlatarski, e.g. what you would
call "mainstream"). Beshevliev makes a good summary on this in a book
that I have at hand. Do you want a translation?
> >
> > (VK)And apart from Slavs and Bulgars, there were
> other
> > barbarian(s) /.../ Not everything revolved around
> some
> > titanic or
> > fateful Bulgar-Slav confrontation.
>
> *****GK: "everything" never revolves around etc.. But
> that was the major one. And we shouldn't forget the
> Vlachs...Unless you don't consider them "barbarians"
> (:=)))Note also that the Slavs assimilated a lot of
> previous "locals".*****
George, I also notice that your comments on history revolve around
ethnicity, sometimes connecting ethnicity, self-determination and
language as though automatically. This is, indeed, outdated and
unproductive. I also consider your theory about the all too important
confrontation between Protobulgarians and Slavs a bit weird. I don't
think any serious Bulgarian scholar ever stressed such a
confrontation, not to mention giving it such a big name. Most of
those scholars would write about the Slavs being integrated in the
Protobulgar state from the very beginning. If you are arguing about
the opposite, you will have to offer something substantial as a proof.
As to your reference to the Vlachs, I do not remember calling them
barbarians (or Vassil, for that matter), so I guess the authorship of
this statement should be limited to its actual source. The whole
point of the debate is to look closely at some details pertaining to
our history and not to divide people into ethnoses that were
supposedly civilized or barbarian (or other).
> >
> > (GK)And after the implosion of the 2nd half of the
> > > 9th c., they were done as a significant ethnos.
> >
> >
> >(VK) pure speculation. What is the evidence for an
> > 'implosion' in the 9th
> > c?
>
> *****GK: The civil conflict at the top between "pagan"
> and "christian" Bulgar aristocrats on two occasions.
> There was a lot of blood spilled in these battles,
> with the tertium gaudens looking on. This is not
> speculative unless you deem chronicled accounts to be
> such.*****
The question is about the value and importance you attribute to those
details, calling them such big names, btw. is this your term applied
to the events? And again, you are drawing a weird parallel between
Bulgarian vs. Slavic and Christian vs. pagan, or was it the opposite?
I don't like it in both directions.
> *****GK: By then these catastrophes were experienced
> by the new, Slavic and Slavonized Bulgarian complex.
> There is no evidence that it is the remnants of the
> proto-Bulgars that especially suffered through
> them.****
Where is the evidence for your statement in the first sentence? You
met those Slavs and had a coffee with them? It was, indeed, very
important in the 20th century to connect politics with language and
ethnicity, and write our history in this spirit (look who we were, the
rest were assholes, except for the Greeks, they could write). We
were, indeed, supposed to be like our forefaters 1000 years ago, not
having mixed with anyone, not to mention barbarians. The purer our
blood, the better. And so on. I live in a country which has a lot of
experience in this direction. I prefer to learn from it and so do
young people around me.
> *****GK: I guess you don't know the Canadian
> constitution. Sovereignty is divided between the
> federal and provincial branches of Government. You
> must have heard about the "province" of Quebec.
> Manitoba is also a province possessing much power
> under the Constitution. So a provincial capital in
> Canada is not the same as a provincial capital in
> Bulgaria or Ukraine. The comparison is quite
> appropriate.****
I am not sure. We are talking about much older times, when people
could have thought otherwise in naming or not naming their capitals
with aboriginal names. And I do not think analysing the toponymy is
unusual in historical analysis. At least it it better than relying on
conjecture and so not worth such a suspicious reaction. Which brings
me to the question why the suspicious reaction? Why are the
Protobulgarians supposed to have confronted with the Slavs? Do you
really believe something that survived for more than 13 centuries
later was based on confrontation?
It is July 17, 2003. I wish we would look at the calendar and note
that 60-70 years have passed and we are supposed to have evolved.
Eva