Antes the ancestors of the Slavs in the South Balkans

Most of the Balkans was settled by Slavs of one of two types (excluding the smaller groups of Slavic Slovenes and Turkic Avars in the Western Blalkans). Each of these two main Slavic groups was to be named for a second conquering group who appeared leter in the 7th century.

The first of these two groups was the Bulgars, whose Slavic component the Bulgarian historian Zlatarski derives from the Antes. They were conquered in the late 7th century by the Turkic Bulgars, The Slavs eventually assimilated them, but the Bulgars name survived.It denoted this Slavic group from the 9th century thriough the rest of the medieval period into modern days. Until the late 19th century both outside observers and those Bulgaro-macedonians who had ethnic consiousness believed that their group, which is now two separate nationalities, comprised a single people, the Bulgarians. Thus the reader should ignore references to ethnic Skopjians in the Middle Ages which appear in some modern works. In the Middle Ages and into the 19th century the Macedonian Term was used entirely in refernce to a geographical region (as also the Thracian,Moesian e.t.c.)

For the story the second Slavic group was the Serbo-Croatian that according Zlatarski derives from the Slaveni.

Is known that Avars suffered two majot defeats from the Slavs.

First was from the Slaveni who when set up an independent state in Illyricum. This Slavs are the Croats. Secodnly from the Bulgars near the Azov sea, under Kovrat leadership libirated themeshelvs arouns 635 A.D.

Avars were masters of Slavs, and they used Slavs for units in battle usually infantry. However the Avars would be creators of their own destruction as eventually Slavs learned how to fight against the Avars and eventually rose against the avars and defeated them with the help of Samo. Bulgars as far as I know were a turko-tatar peoples, the proto-bulgars form the volga. As far as I know the Bulgars were closer to being affiliated with Avars then Antes.
"The latter were tribes of Turco-Tatar origin (Bulgars), whose original home had been the region along the Volga, north of the Caspian Sea and the Sea of Azov. Some of these moved form there in the sixth century together with the Avars advancing across the Ukraine to the lower reaches of the Danube. In the last third of the seventh century thye split off from the Avars and, under the leadership of Asparuch, penetrated to ancient Moesia where they formed an alliance with the local Slav tribes in the struggle against their common enemy- the Byzantines."
-The World of the Ancient Slavs.
pozdrawiam!

Originally posted by Sarmata Also...arent the ancestors of the southern Slavs the Sklaveni? Antes were Eastern, and Venedi were western.

You are correct as about the Antes and the Eastern  region. Vendes were those the ansectors of Slovenians and Chechs.

Sarmata, can you reduce that map?

The key element as about the sourses and the origin of the first Slav settlemts is  the work of Jordanes, Getica. Jordanes had equated the Sclavenes and the Antes to the Venethi (or Venedi) also known from much earlier sources, such as Pliny the Elder, Tacitus, and Ptolemy.

Pedorov  and Curta  mention tha the �gPrague zone�h was an archaeological equivalent of Jordanes' Sclavenes, while the �gPen��kovka zone�h was ascribed to the Antes, fall-out curves neatly coinciding with the borders of the Soviet republics. Also Curta mention that the Sclavenes do not belong to this group (Lombards, the Gepids, the Goths, the Cutrigurs, and the Antes ) most probably because Procopius viewed them as �gnew.

Edited by akritas

Originally posted by akritas The first of these two groups was the Bulgars, whose Slavic component the Bulgarian historian Zlatarski derives from the Antes.

The Antes? Hmm, could you give me an exact quote? Unfortunately, I haven't read anything of Zlatarski yet, but it's interesting from where does he derive the Antes line. IIRC, tribes of the Antes have participated in the Balkan plundering during the Slavic raidings period until the basileos caused an internal conflict between the Antes and the other Slavic raiders - the Slavinii, which stopped the raids for a little. But I don't know anything of Antes settling from that period. Or maybe he suggests that the Bulgars, while coming from "Old Great Bulgaria" (Ukraine), have joined or taken some of the Eastern Slavs? That's interesting... And funny how it corresponds to something else I read recently for the etimology of the word "Sklav/Sakaliba"...

Originally posted by NikeBG Originally posted by akritas The first of these two groups was the Bulgars, whose Slavic component the Bulgarian historian Zlatarski derives from the Antes. The Antes? Hmm, could you give me an exact quote? Unfortunately, I haven't read anything of Zlatarski yet, but it's interesting from where does he derive the Antes line. IIRC, tribes of the Antes have participated in the Balkan plundering during the Slavic raidings period until the basileos caused an internal conflict between the Antes and the other Slavic raiders - the Slavinii, which stopped the raids for a little. But I don't know anything of Antes settling from that period. Or maybe he suggests that the Bulgars, while coming from "Old Great Bulgaria" (Ukraine), have joined or taken some of the Eastern Slavs? That's interesting... And funny how it corresponds to something else I read recently for the etimology of the word "Sklav/Sakaliba"...

page 35-36, The Early Medievals Balkans, John Fine, University of Michigan

I quoted Porfirogenet only on the fact that Croats ruled Slavs, for everything else there are archeological evidence.