Sheit history of Balkans is like 1000 seasons of game of thrones

I wonder if our ancestors also wore Adidas tracksuits?

6:34 "So the Balkans were in this constant flux of uncertain political control by various groups." Huh, and they say history doesn't repeat itself.

The main reason why Bulgaria was so successful is because Asparuh convinced local Slavs to join him in the battle against the Byzantines. When they won he founded Bulgaria as a country of both Bulgars and Slavs together. Bulgar nobility ruled exclusively for a few generations initially but regarded both peoples equally and they soon merged into one culture. The early rulers practiced genuine nation building in a style reminiscent of Thracian nobility. Thracian scripts may have also been a basis for the Cyrillic script.

Correction about Boris 1 of Bulgaria - He didn't die in 889. He abdicated that year to his firstborn son - Vladimir Rasate, who, in turn, got taken down after trying to bring back paganism. In 893 Boris called a concil with which was decided that Boris's third son Simeon would take the throne. Also the map of the ninth century is incorrect on the Serbo-Bulgarian border

This was the best explanation of how the Balkans became Slavic that I have encountered. Much better than the many books I have read on the subject and superman myths. Awesome.

Small corection - Boris the First died in 907 not in 887. I see why you may have been cnofused since he abdicated the throne to his firstborn and the thirdborn son (hella of a infighting)

I had to pause several times so that the narrator could catch breath.

Greetings to Slavic brothers from Slovenia Serbia and Croatia. Pozdrowiena dla braci Słowian Słoweńców Serbów i Chorwatów !!!!

Ah that lovely balkan.... The place full of peace and fights, what to say, arguing is in our blood.

Your channel is simply amazing and very underrated

Holy crap. Never even knew the story of the Bulgars and Bulgaria was so interesting. Amazing video. Regards from Lithuania!

What a great video!

Thank you for this video! It provides the context for some of the things you mentioned in your western slavic history video while explaining southern slavic settlement in a straightforward way. I look forward to your eastern slavs video!

Wow, never heard that Bulgarian people lived originally in other side of the sea which is called "Great Bulgaria". Really interesting video!

You have great videos! Very complicated topic with a lot of missing puzzle pieces, but explained in a very simple and understandable way

your video is great! You cover a period that was totally unknown by me, but actually it helps quite a bit to explain where we stand today. Thank you!

Actually, the origins of the Bulgars are largely unknown. There are sources from Armenian writers telling us Old Bulgarians inhabited the Caucasuses for a period of time and that they had great stoneworking abilities and built stone houses when they migrated to the area. Because of all the evidence there is a newer theory regarding the origins of the Proto-Bulgarians, that states they are from Iranian descent and the Turkic elements we see in their culture were picked up later on, as many Turkic tribes migrated from Asia into the lands inhabited by the Old Bulgarians and vise versa.

One thing that I always think is important to mention about ancient settlements in the Balkans is that we have to remember that they didn't have access to the New World vegetables like potatoes which are better suited for mountainous areas. Good presentation. South Slavic history is complicated because of how many people move into and around the area and how political the history is today.

AHH FINALLY THE DAY HAS COME,I CANNOT WAIT TO WATCH THIS. EDIT : I love you,it was worth waiting more then half a year for this video,and you managed to stay perfectly unbiased.Seriously you deserve a fucking medal for this video.

Nobody: Alcek: Southern Italy it is!

It's always a blessing seeing my country Slovenia mentioned anywhere. I know it's corny, but we are always forgotten by everyone.

Thanks for a great overview! Some details I've pick up for myself over the years I can share for expanded context around what constituted the First Bulgarian state: - The tribe that gave us our Bulgarian name(or at least a tribe by that name) is mentioned in Chinese sources a heck of a long ago in BC times already; that tribe arrived in the moder-ish day lands of Bulgaria with around as little as 100 000 people, 10 000 of them as a cavalry-dominant khan’s army - They integrated with a local populace of ~2-2.5 million people, mostly Slavic tribes but also substantial numbers (maybe up to 40%) are still Thracian tribes and romanized urban populations - It is not exactly clear if that integration was by force or by synergy - Slavic tribes were a predominantly infantry-centered force, and vastly outnumbered the Bulgarians, yet the Bulgarian clans held the succession of titles - Converting to Christianity was a way to both centralize power and unite the populace. The son of Boris when he took over power reverted the change, so old Boris had to step away from the monastery, grab his sword, and have a counter-revolution ending with the blinding of his son.

I know this is unrelated, but how did you make those maps? Also, I love all the detail you put into a subject people tend to generalize!!

Honestly, that was the best video on this subject I have ever seen! Congratulations!

A great video! In the end you say that the slavic Balkans wasn't completely slavicised and that there were a lot of non-slavic speaking groups. This is very true. I know that in Croatia, the dalmatian cities were not fully slavicised until well after the middle ages, with the last speaker of the Dalmatian Romance language having died in 1898. In parallel, many speakers of eastern romance languages lived in the hills and became Vlachs and Morlachs, leading a transhumance pastoralist life. The actual Slavs initially mostly inhabited tha pannonian part of Croatia and the fertile parts of the coast, leaving the cities, the mountains and the smaller islands to the romance speakers. The romance languages later faced a double pressure to assimilate either into slavic speakers or into Venetian/Italian, which accelerated their disapparence.

7:01 that moment when 2 crazy guys crash the party

Thank you. Finding a good and unbiased video about the Balkans made by brothers usually goes south real fast.

I really like your videos because they are accurate and you talk about things we actually learn in school

I really like your videos, everything is presented very clearly and reasonably. I can see the huge ammount of work you put into this. Keep up the great work. Pozdrowienia z Polski! :)

I love your animation skills. And I love the use of very detailed map, very very detailed map with detail rivers and mountain heights showed in colours; with such map you can see different layers of history.

by accident I found ur channel, with the very first video, you won a subscriber. the way u showed the information is remarkable - very distinctly and accurate, subaltern on facts, no sci-fi, straight on the point.

Good stuff, would love a video more focused on Bulgaria

A video about the avars would be great. Really liked this video

Great video! Such detail. I really enjoyed this!

Thanks for not only painting these maps, but also mentioning what information sources we have, and which we dont have. Also, using the geographic map as underlying base is a very good idea!

Byzantium: *exists The Entire Known World: GANGBANG

Love your channel. Greeings from Sirmium!

Great video man. Really thorough! Your effort really shows.

I can't wait for your later histories of the Slavs! Молодец!

This is great content! Would you like to do some on Turkic, Iranic or Uralic(Hungarians mainly) groups next?

Dude, I have studied Bulgarian history quite extensively and I still learned new things about our own history, really impressive! Great overview of the region's history, gives great perspective and I love the animations - thank you for the great work!

Wow keep up the good work, great vid :)

Absolutely phenomenal video

Awesome video! I wish you do make a video about the bulgarian history . Keep it going !

Thank you so much for your work in putting these videos together.... I have learned a great deal and look forward to more of your videos Again thank you

Proud to be South Slavic

wow you are the first person I've ever seen mention that part about one of the brothers taking his people to modern-day macedonia. very interesting to think about. Always assumed that the Bulgarian migration occurred after this time period when Bulgaria was more established and migrants started to move south.

Very good video! Greetings from Slovenia!

United we stand, divided we fall.

Loved your video! Please make a video about East Slavic History. Thx!

Well done! Keep it up.

Great Video...and really accurately presented the Bulgarian part

Wow, great video! Very detailed and informative, thanks for your work, you earned yourself a new sub :)

Man great work!! Kudos!

Superb presentation. Thank you.

You did your homework bro, thats a hard history to follow good job.

Easily one of the best videos covering such an all-encompassing and impossibly complex topic. I want MOAR!

thanks for your work. it's amazing,

Very informative and useful thank you

Good and accurate video! Keep up the good work and greetings from Bulgaria! :)

Great video! Its was surprisingly well actually! One of the best videos on this subject, good job!

thanks for the great history video :)

13:48 The reason for the invention of Cyrillic script may not have been the fact that Glagolitic script was not suitable for Old Bulgarian / Old Church Slavonic, since both Glagolitic and Cyrillic script had had pretty much the same letters (for comparison visit en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glagolitic_script#Characteristics ), including the Slavic letters such as "Yat". Perhaps the reason was more the fact that Glagolitic script is more difficult to learn / teach / read. That's not to say that Glagolitic script is worse (but it is more difficult). It is arguably one of the most beautiful scripts, similar to the current Georgian script, and also, a lot of the letters that sound the same, e.g. "G" and "H", also have similar looking letters (Ⰳ and Ⱈ), which is not the case in, for example Latin alphabet.

Informative and highly interesting. Спасибо большое!

Really good video, my man! Great job, keep it up!

Looks great! Look forward to the last of the series. are you going to make them a play list? Suggestion - why not do the origins of the norse-germanic, ie the Goths and Vandals and Gepids ending with the Lombards - an show how they moved in the migration period? You might even intertwine the Wends with them.

Fantastic video mate! Can you please send a link for the map image you used for this video, I see it is very high quality and depicts all the topography correctly.

Amazing video!

These are the places I'm most curious about and would most like to visit - along with Anatolia and the -stan countries. They're fascinating to me since they're kind of like border areas between multiple cultures - at least historically.

fantastic video thanks!!

grear job mate, keep it up

Thank you for this informative and unbiased presentation.

Southern Slavs are so cool to me, love from an Eastern Slav!

Brilliant video man

How did I live without this channel? 🤩👍👏

Will you do a continuation on balkan history?

Great, accurate and unbiased video great job and greetings from Bulgaria!

Ive been lookinf for a vid like this

Great video

what boris the first did sounds like its strait out of one of the crusader kings games

Před pár dny jsem objevil tvůj kanál a zamiloval jsem si ho. V jednom videu máš obrovské množství informací. Anglicky umím relativně dobře, ale tak velké množství informací by se mi lépe vstřebávalo v tvém rodném jazyce. Mám rád historii a miluju mapy, takže takže tvůj kanál je přesně pro mě.

Awesome video, though i'm of the Danau Swab decent i do carry one line of serbian lineage and my family prior to the US lived in the balkans for several hundred years. Great video thoroughly enjoyed this one!

GREAT Video..Do you know if there are any vital records from Montego between 1600 and 1800?

Good representation of Slovenia. Even Slovenes rarely know of the fact that we have common roots with Czechs and Slovaks. Even though we no longer share national or cultural border, we still have more in common that with our southern neighbours.

Great video :) Thank you for mentioning the situation of us Slovenes and explaining it in a bigger detail.

super cool video, may I ask where the backgound map is from? I would love to put it in gqis for maps of my project... thx

Good job on the research. As a Bulgarian that is studying currently advanced History of the Balkans I can confirm that most of this is correct keep up the good work.

Actually this is a good video dude

Wow! nice work

Great video. With so much information, I know that it is impossible to mention everything. I do have a couple of small details that were not mentioned as it pertains to Croats settling the area. The first being that there was some kind of treaty or offer of settlement (contingent on Christianizing) from either Rome or Byzantium extended to Croats to settle the region after it was largely vacated due to raids and economic ruin. For the life of me, I can't recall the name of the document or where it can be found. A similar situation may have occurred with Serbs, given that they entered the area around the same and managed to unify the Slavs who were there before them. The other thing I would mention was that the Croatian Kingdom allied with Byzantium during one of their wars with the Bulgarian empire. As such, they were rewarded with Southern Dalmatia, which demographically, had already become largely Slavic any way. The Adriatic coast remained largely Slavic demographically until later Venetian colonization which brought back some Latin populations.

Laser, You are great! What detail! Fantastic story/history telling! вообще отлично! я поражён! великолепно!

7:05 Aww, they come to the Balkans holding hands. They are going to make such peaceful neighbours.

for an english speaking guy, you are very good at saying Bulgarian names. Normally our languange is hard.

Great video!

@m.laser I only wish you added a timeline while you were speaking of all the events

Can we just stop arguing about macedonia? Even though it’s my home country I do not want to argue any more. Why should we hate each other when we are basically the same? Glory to all Slav countries.

Pretty good video! Must've taken an eternity to research. The Balkans is a rough historical vacuum to cover, well done! Way better than most other videos about the subject. I just have one genuine question; I keep seeing this everywhere, but nobody seems to know what the actual evidence is apart from invoking a nationalist historian: What is the evidence that there were any Serbs west of the Drina river and any Croats east of the Una river before 897 CE, or that either of the two countries had borders inside of Bosnia? (I mean archaeological or written evidence, or something concrete, or at least circumstantial, deductive and identifiable) From what I know, there is archaeological evidence for an unknown culture with strange huts with an unidentified architecture in the vicinity of Sarajevo (found by Irma Cremosnik in the 1970's), dated back to around 551 CE, and is thought to be the wave of Slavs that Procopius wrote about arriving to Dalmatia in the spring of 551 CE. And during the synods of Salona in 530 & 535 CE, the region between today's Tomislavgrad up to the Sava river and east to the Drina river (judging by the borders of Dalmatia and the surrounding bishoprics' locations) was named "Bestoensis" which was under the supervision of Andreas the bishop, whose supervisor was the archbishop of Salona called Honorius. There's also mention of a small part of the Herules crossing the Danube and entering into Dalmatia before that, and an Illyrian governor from "Gratiana"(Gradiska on the Sava river) warning Amalasuntha about invading "his city" Gratiana. So there were non-Croat, non-Serb Slavs, Illyrians, some Herules and probably descendants of retired Roman soldiers there in 551 CE. Anonymus Ravennatis wrote around 700 CE that there are different countries in the middle of Dalmatia. But between then and the mention of Pribina of Nitra fleeing from the Franks to Ratimir across the Sava river in 838 CE, there's no mention of any rivers, landmarks, cities or such inside of the whole of Bosnia. And then Anastasius Bibliothecarius designated Bosnia as an independent country in 876 CE (Tibor Zivkovic, De Conversione Croatorum Et Serborum, 2012). Then Steven Runciman found some evidence that Petar Gojnikovic invaded and conquered Bosnia around 900 CE but was unable to conquer Zachumlia, John V.A. Fine thinks it was in 897 CE (Magyars destroyed Slavonia in 895 CE), and in 950 CE the De Administrando Imperio is written, Porphyrogenitus copies the terms from Anastasius when he writes about Bosnia as a "country within a country" and doesn't list its two ecumenical centers Desnik and Katera as just another 2 centers belonging to the Serbian state, and then some time after Porphyrgenitus' death, around 960 CE Caslav is drowned in the Sava or Drina by the Magyars, and Bosnia is independent again up until 968 CE when they lose the Battle of Vrbas against the Croats and that's the first time I know of Croatia having Bosnia as part of its territory. (Osman Karatay, 2003, "In Search of the Lost Tribe: The Origins and Making of the Croatian Nation") So between 551-897 CE, how do we know that Serbia and Croatia had any land at all inside of Bosnia, let alone reaching that far inside? Judging by the circumstantial evidence, it seems like the Hungarian destruction of Lower Pannonia / Slavonia made it easy for Serbia to conquer Bosnia, which implies that Bosnia might have been part of Lower Pannonia up until 897 CE rather than Serbia and/or Croatia. Especially since Braslav was the last duke of Lower Pannonia, and he disappears in 896 CE. The Slavs of Lower Pannonia have craniometrically different skulls than contemporary Croat craniums (Hrvoje Gracanin, 2008), they also seem to have been pagan from what I could gather, which coincides with the story of Theophanes Continuatus that many Slavs in the region left Christianity in reaction to Frankish oppression, and there are inscriptions of Frankish missionaries from the 9th century in a church or monastery near the spring of the Bosna river. Also, I don't know of any evidence that the Serbs and Croats were present in the Balkans before 750 CE when there is archaeological evidence near Zlatibor in Serbia and in Croatia there's the font of Viseslav and such from that time. But they're not mentioned anywhere as being in the Balkans until 822 CE (The Royal Frankish Annals / Annales Regni Francorum). There are some letters from the pope to an Aquilean or Istrian governor, worrying about the advances of Slavs into Aquilea and their possible entrance into Italy, but they're still not mentioned by name, and nothing really seems to imply that they're Serbs or Croats.

Very interesting video thanks!

What about the Second Bulgarian empire ? NIce video !