The Balkans | Page 9

his life in an ambush
while negotiating for peace. During preparations for a final assault on
Constantinople he died suddenly in 815. Though Krum cannot be said
to have introduced civilisation into Bulgaria, he at any rate increased its
power and gave it some of the more essential organs of government. He
framed a code of laws remarkable for their rigour, which was
undoubtedly necessary in such a community and beneficial in its effect.
He repressed civil strife, and by this means made possible the
reawakening of commerce and agriculture. His successor, of uncertain
identity, founded in 822 the city of Preslav (known to the Russians as
Pereyaslav), situated in eastern Bulgaria, between Varna and Silistria,
which was the capital until 972.
The reign of Prince Boris (852-88) is remarkable because it witnessed
the definitive conversion to Christianity of Bulgaria and her ruler. It is
within this period also that fell the activities of the two great 'Slavonic'
missionaries and apostles, the brothers Cyril and Methodius, who are
looked upon by all Slavs of the orthodox faith as the founders of their

civilisation. Christianity had of course penetrated into Bulgaria (or
Moesia, as it was then) long before the arrival of the Slavs and Bulgars,
but the influx of one horde of barbarians after another was naturally not
propitious to its growth. The conversion of Boris in 865, which was
brought about largely by the influence of his sister, who had spent
many years in Constantinople as a captive, was a triumph for Greek
influence and for Byzantium. Though the Church was at this time still
nominally one, yet the rivalry between Rome and Constantinople had
already become acute, and the struggle for spheres of spiritual influence
had begun. It was in the year 863 that the Prince of Moravia, anxious to
introduce Christianity into his country in a form intelligible to his
subjects, addressed himself to the Emperor Michael III for help. Rome
could not provide any suitable missionaries with knowledge of
Slavonic languages, and the German, or more exactly the Bavarian,
hierarchy with which Rome entrusted the spiritual welfare of the Slavs
of Moravia and Pannonia used its greater local knowledge for political
and not religious ends. The Germans exploited their ecclesiastical
influence in order completely to dominate the Slavs politically, and as a
result the latter were only allowed to see the Church through Teutonic
glasses.
In answer to this appeal the emperor sent the two brothers Cyril and
Methodius, who were Greeks of Salonika and had considerable
knowledge of Slavonic languages. They composed the Slavonic
alphabet which is to-day used throughout Russia, Bulgaria, Serbia, and
Montenegro, and in many parts of Austria-Hungary and translated the
gospels into Slavonic; it is for this reason that they are regarded with
such veneration by all members of the Eastern Church. Their mission
proved the greatest success (it must be remembered that at this time the
various Slavonic tongues were probably less dissimilar than they are
now), and the two brothers were warmly welcomed in Rome by Pope
Adrian II, who formally consented to the use, for the benefit of the
Slavs, of the Slavonic liturgy (a remarkable concession, confirmed by
Pope John VIII). This triumph, however, was short-lived; St. Cyril died
in 869 and St. Methodius in 885; subsequent Popes, notably Stephen V,
were not so benevolent to the Slavonic cause; the machinations of the
German hierarchy (which included, even in those days, the falsification

of documents) were irresistible, and finally the invasion of the Magyars,
in 893, destroyed what was left of the Slavonic Church in Moravia. The
missionary brothers had probably passed through Bulgaria on their way
north in 863, but without halting. Many of their disciples, driven from
the Moravian kingdom by the Germans, came south and took refuge in
Bulgaria in 886, and there carried on in more favourable circumstances
the teachings of their masters. Prince Boris had found it easier to adopt
Christianity himself than to induce all his subjects to do the same. Even
when he had enforced his will on them at the price of numerous
executions of recalcitrant nobles, he found himself only at the
beginning of his difficulties. The Greeks had been glad enough to
welcome Bulgaria into the fold, but they had no wish to set up an
independent Church and hierarchy to rival their own. Boris, on the
other hand, though no doubt full of genuine spiritual ardour, was above
all impressed with the authority and prestige which the basileus derived
from the Church of Constantinople; he also admired the pomp of
ecclesiastical ceremony, and wished to have a patriarch of his own to
crown him and a hierarchy of his own to serve him. Finding the Greeks
unresponsive, he turned to Rome, and Pope Nicholas I sent him two