> we can be sure both the Slavic and
> the Bulgarian population of the First Bulgarian State and surrounding
> areas rarely ventured into the mountains, where they would have
> perished miserably for lack of the skills necessary for survival.
I don't know up to which altitude was/is there possible for the
specialized populations to make a living in the high Dinaric Alps,
Albanian and Greek mountains as well as in the Rhodope mountains.
But as far as the Romanian Carpathians are of concern, I'd mention
the neglected fact that Romanians, a population deemed as a
"ur"-pastoralist population never live higher than approx. 1000 m.
Which is in stark and amazing contrast with the whole lotta of the
same living culture of the peoples (both Romance and German)
in the vast Alpine area (at whose northern slope I have been living
for almost three decades now) -- where namely rural life is alive
and kickin' at so high altitudes that whatever Romanian shepherd
would be flabbergasted to see.
So, I'd rather refrain from insisting on such vage (and romantic)
ways of seeing these pastoralist economics (which have been the
utmost hobby-horse esp. of Hungarian historians who have tried
to explain why Romanians couldn't multiply in Transylvania prior
to 1241 or, better, prior to Maria Theresia's imperial reign. ;-))
During the spectacular Mongolian invasion, the Mongolian armies
were able to master mountain ranges compared to which the
Carpathian range is made of hillocks, and those rapid fellas were
able to conquer in a couple of months regions so vast and difficult
(based on so rudimentary logistics) that modern sofisticated armies
of the US and Nato aren't able today (in such regions as Afghanistan).
So, I doubt that slavic populations couldn't adapt to mountainous
regions in periods as long as 2-3-4 centuries. :-) (Even within the
Hungarian nation, one branch (possible of Turkic extraction), the
Szeklers, are today the most specialized populace in mountain
life (living & economics) in Romania. This population was put there,
in their region, adjacent to Moldavia and Muntenia, only 8 centuries
ago, by the Hungarian kings, in order to help defend the borders
in a time when Cuman and Tatar incursions were en vogue, and
after the knights of the Teutonic Order were chased out of the
country (from the same region), as they had become too strong and
a menace to the Hung. king.)
> Put differently, starting with the eighth century there were good
> reasons for people, and particularly for people specialized in
> mountain pastoralism, to migrate into areas that had become
> attractive as a consequence of the weakening of the Avars and the
> strengthening of the First Bulgarian State.
Towards the 9th c., I'd also take into consideration the big political
clusters that made up the ephemeral so-called "Great Moravian
Empire", that covered Serbia, Banat, the entire today's Hungary
plus Croatia, 1/2 Austria, Slovacia, Moravia and Bohemia. (IMHO,
the non-Slavic elements, such as the Protoromanian-speaking
underlings must've been able to travel as easily as someone who
doesn't need special visa for the Schengen area. :-) Not to mention
the epoch when the 2nd emerging Bulgarian czardom was enabled
by a militarily strong Romanian community led by the Asen brethren
at the end of the 12th c. [Anyway, 20-40 years later, diplomas
issued by the Hungarian kings for the knights of the Teutonic Order,
as well as in 1247 for the knights of St. John, show that there were
along the Carpathian range Romanian statehoods, one of them even
possessing territories north of the range, namely in Transylvania.
Even centuries later, the ruling dynasty of Walachia i.e. Muntenia,
namely the Bessarabs, were at the same time dukes of two South
Transylvanian provinces, a title that was officially acknowledged by
the Hung. kings.)
> I would like to stress again that I regard the matter as basically
> open, although it would be disingenuous to hide my conviction that an
> Urheimat in the Ohrid area has better credentials than one in
> Transylvania.
Of course it'll stay forever open, until a... newspaper or a fragment
of some document issued by a monarch or by a... House of
Commons :-) will be unearthened saying confirming or contradicting
this hypothesis. (Actually, terrae incognitae are always more at-
tractive than places where everything is registered, archived. :))
> But if we seriously want to clinch the matter (and I for one am not
> sure it can be clinched) we should stop relying on the type of
> smokescreen reasoning that projects ninth-century condition back to
> the middle of the first millennium.
How about other places, such as Israel and the nexus of today's claims
and a history 3 millennia old, whereas the carriers are mostly of
Turkic-Slavic descent and having an (internal) ethnonym meaning
"Scythians of the Saka tribe" (Ashkenazim; in Khaldean-Assyrian almost
the same: Ashkunaz)? ;^)
> Willem
George