Croatia's borders

So, there was a differentiation between Croats and Serbs in 12th century. Does it mean that they settled in Balkans under names Serbs and Croats already?

Originally posted by Anton So, there was a differentiation between Croats and Serbs in 12th century. Does it mean that they settled in Balkans under names Serbs and Croats already?

According to the theory of the migration of Serbs & Croats in the Balkans, they settled as already formed peoples in the first half of the 7th century, with the ethnogenesis complete by the end of the 8th and 9th centuries in the Balkans. However, there was no clear border, nor is one able really to determine it in precise. For an example, the languages were even closer than they are today, and the only major characteristic of one being Serb or Croat was political stateheood, i.e. if a village gets conquered by the Croats from Serbs, its denizens would be Croats, and not Serbs; as well as vice versa.

The only thing that can be truly established are the earlies Balkan cores of the two peoples. For the Croats is already on this forum thread, - the three/four territories I named, the northern Dalmatian hinterland slightly going inside into B&H southwestern territory. For the Serbs, it's the valleys of rivers comprising of today's most southwestern Serbia (the Sanjak region), between half and a third of northeastern Montenegro, and the northeastern Herzegovina. From these lands the Serb & Croat names spread on, and eventually went into conflict as these two strong tribes managed did not prevail over the entire proto-SerboCroat people, for if one did, there would've been an early Yugoslavia as far as the Middle Ages, but a problem has erupted (unlike for example the case with the Magyars or Bulgars) that two "currents" of Slavic power and assimilation later went into conflict, and that conflict was crossed all the way to the 1990s from the beginning of time (with several attempts of Yugoslavian unification which ended in failure because of the same problems I just named).

There were countless, hundreds of smaller Slavic tribes, that quickly adopted either the Serb and Croat name. The only ones who remained were the partially semi-serbianized Docleans, Zachlumians, Canalites, Travunians and the Narentines, who were actually "hanging" between Croat and Serb identity. I must incline something here - we MUST NOT look this through modern eyes, and if a new identity is created, it DOES NOT mean that it "separated from an older one", NOR DOES IT mean that an old identity was "aggressively assimilated and destroyed by another".

In the end the only phenomenon in the Medieval Ages is the arrisal of the Bosnians in the later stages, next to, or better said inbetween, the Serbs and Croats, as the only SerboCroat tribe ('tribal name') next to the two, and the only that actually kept its name from the regional Balkan localism, rather than brought in as these two (which is already a flaw from the start if you want to make your Slavic tribe powerful, compared to the advantages of the other ones).

Originally posted by Carpathian Wolf "In the end the only phenomenon in the Medieval Ages is the arrisal of the Bosnians in the later stages, next to, or better said inbetween, the Serbs and Croats, as the only SerboCroat tribe ('tribal name') next to the two, and the only that actually kept its name from the regional Balkan localism, rather than brought in as these two (which is already a flaw from the start if you want to make your Slavic tribe powerful, compared to the advantages of the other ones). "   "Bosnians" really are sort of the same way I view Ardeleani or Moldovans or Oltenians in my country. It is a regional name but the ethnic composition is still Romanian. Like wise a "Bosnian" was either Croatian or probably Serbian. The term "Bosniak" is really a Serb or sometimes a Croatian that had converted to Islam when the Turks arrived. So in a sense some of the first "Bosniaks" were the Serbs who sided with Murat in Kosovo Poljie 1389. Now that is not to deny that "Bosniaks" are not a people, but they were a later evolution of the Croat and mostly Serb settlers in Bosnia. When the migration happened there was a Serb and a Croat tribe but there was no "Bosnian" or "Bosniak" tribe. Bosnian is a regional name any can hold where as Bosniak has a religious conotation that has evolved into a political entity and a racial identity due to the nationalism there. That is why the first Yugoslav Kingdom was the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovanes, these were racial terms where as Bosniak was a religious term. If you even look at old French, English, German etc maps the Bosniaks were regarded as "Muslim Serbs" which in the strictest sense is correct.

However, you cannot view them as Moldovans or Oltenians. That's a term that exists to today (and the most proper comparison would be the Montenegrins), these Bosnians about whom I am talking about are sort of extinct (because of the Ottomans, and at the same time not because of them), and to differentiate, I call these medieval Bosnians "Bosniens", with an 'e'. Sure, the present Bosniacs, Serbs and Croats in Bosnia and Herzegovina share their historical heritage to the Bosnians of the Middle Ages, some to lesser and yet others, to more extent, yet again also including questions regarding individual localized groups of all the three peoples, this things altogether hard to account. You seem to have mixed up the regional affiliation (every Bosniak, Serb and Croat is a Bosnian, or a Herzegovinian) with what I was talking about - the Bosniens. And you are talking about the Bosniaks now, and that's totally offtopic regarding my subject. I might as well remind you of a little thing I wrote to the up which is to be applied for the Medieval Ages, and especially so for the Early-to-High periods during the Slavic ethnogenesis:

Originally posted by Yugoslav I must incline something here - we MUST NOT look this through modern eyes, and if a new identity is created, it DOES NOT mean that it "separated from an older one", NOR DOES IT mean that an old identity was "aggressively assimilated and destroyed by another".

A normal & standard process. Now I must repeat that what you are talking about is offtopic, this has nothing do to with the Ottoman period or post-Ottoman, you're even at the wrong sub-forum for that. This is about the Bosniens, Medieval Bosnians. Namely, yes, the Serbs settled in the earliest times according to storytelling Bosnia, or better said subjected it, but the greatest possibility is in real history that the Serbs expanding from their core I mentioned to the above by the end of the 9th century ceased the Slavic territory of Bosnia. Afterwards, in the late 10th and 11th centuries the Croats want to have their share of Bosnia (currently not counting the Bulgarian and Byzantine reigns), were the first quarrels with the Bosnian autochtonous Slavic chiefs are noticed. Now, one thing is of absolute certainty, and that is that from the earliest Slavic origins, Bosnia had a certain form of individuality, as confirmed by numerous sources (e.g. the Porphyrogenitos' DAI notifies that a part of Serbia in the valley of upper Bosnia [that is, today's central-eastern B&H] is not simple Serbia like the rest of it, but a 'Bosnia'), although undoubtedly weaker as the strong identities for example of the southern Slavonic Principalities in Upper Dalmatia, which managed to for some time manage and gather even larger SerboCroat states themselves.

However, by the standard historical play of chance and circumstances, the weakenings of the Croat and Serb political centers led to, by the end of the 12th century, an establishement of a Bosnian Slavic (note: in the non-modern meaning of it!) nation in the, with no coinscidence, the same region of Old Bosnia I mentioned being its core. Paradoxically, soonly putting itself in the same position as that of the Serbs and Croats, when for an example compared to the south Slavic realms I mentioned, which left practically no trace within the SerboCroat ethnogenesis, except for the quite normal and standard certain of just localized individualities. It is thus that the assertian and "composition" of the Bosnian identity, with the crucial role of the Bogomil Bosnian (national) Church in there (my, my, while the Croats have had the Roman Catholic and the Serbs the Eastern Orthodox, is the non-emergence of other SerboCroat identities really a coincidence?), by the mid-14th century (i.e. there is nothing left that could connect them as culturally "inferior" [no bad faith indended! interpret the whole context please] to the neighboring Serbs and Croats). Its expansion onto Serb territories, as well as that 'heretic sect' to derrogatorily call it gave Bosnia an enlargening power (to the Usora & Soli regions, to the Drava rivera at the north, and then eastwards to the Drina). There should be no quarrel regarding the fact that the influential & religious struggles for northern Bosnia between Bosniens and Serbs have eventually ended with almost fully ended victorious with the first's case, however eastern Bosnia (centered around Srebrenica and those 'pocket river regions') had eventually remained through outide Bosnian influencial structures, despite inside the political, and the population in there was dominantly Serbian Orthodox, as well as the presence of the Serb ethnic name (in contrast to the very low Bosnian) was there all along until...well, to the birth of the Serbian nation and thus to this very day (except for the Moslems which were introduced by the Ottomans in the late 16th century, and who lived there by the Drina until ethnically cleansed in 1992 by the Serb forces in the Bosnian war). It is also no coincidence that precisely from that part most of the Islamic Bosnian Serbs came (Mehmed-pasa Sokolovic, perhaps some to the very those of modern day including Emir Kusturica or Lepa Brena).

There, is everything clearer now?

Originally posted by Carpathian Wolf I don't really see how you said anything different then what I had said.

Then you did not read in detail what I wrote.

Originally posted by Carpathian Wolf There was a heresy in Bosnia but that does not automatically make up a new race or ethnic composition of people. And for the most part the majority remained Orthodox. So in a sense there were more Serb Orthodox in Bosnia then "Bosniens" (Serbs and some croats that followed the bogomil heresy).

Almost surely a false assertion, including ending with a bad faithed misinterpretation, quite on the contrary of everything I wrote to the up.

Originally posted by Carpathian Wolf I say it was a regional name because it was adopted from the region. Simple as that. And in medieval history there was Moldovan, and Transilvanian (better yet Ungureni) "Of the Hungarians" etc. But yea, Bosnian is a regional name just like Montenegrin. There was neither a Bosnian tribe or a Montenegrin tribe that migrated into the area. The notion of a difference between Bosnien/Bosniak whatever you want to call it arose with other influences.

And with a really brilliant ending of oversimiplification of everything I wrote to the up on your part.

Originally posted by Sarmat12 Yugoslav, why don't you like "Moldovan" comparison?   In fact, Moldovans were in the same kind of position as "Bosniens" as you described them in the middle ages. They have their own national state until the second half of the 19th century their culture and even Moldovan dialect can be called distinctive compare to other parts of Romania.   Finally, in the modern Republic in Moldova there are people who actually advocate the existence of a separate Moldovan ethnicity and language.

I wouldn't use it, because of the many differences listed up...or better said, I would in case that the Ukranians share the Romanians' ethnicity/language (and they do not). Plus, there are no more 'Bosniens'.

A perfect and almost identical, although likewise with its own differences, is the Montenegrin-Serb historical-political issue when compared to the Moldovan-Romanian.

Originally posted by Carpathian Wolf   Moldovan doesn't have a dialect. It has an accent. A more accurate comparisant concerning dialects would be Romanian and Aromanian with the latter having an accent (to me) and several Greek words in it even though for the most part I can understand it if spoken slowly.

I spent some time in Moldova when I was a kid; my father was serving in the army there during the Soviet times. 

Edited by Sarmat12 - 26-Sep-2008 at 23:21

I'm abolsutely convinced that Romanian-Moldovan dictionary is a work of advanced "science (though this word perhaps doesn't fit here) fiction."

Originally posted by Sarmat12 Unfortunately, similar historical examples of creation of "new ethnicites" do exist.

I consider it in most cases a natural process.

For instance, I'll open an interesting all-out thread on the Montenegrins based on the content I gathered from books, other forums, websites, etc...

Originally posted by Yugoslav Originally posted by Carpathian Wolf "Yugoslav, why don't you like "Moldovan" comparison?   In fact, Moldovans were in the same kind of position as "Bosniens" as you described them in the middle ages. They have their own national state until the second half of the 19th century their culture and even Moldovan dialect can be called distinctive compare to other parts of Romania.   Finally, in the modern Republic in Moldova there are people who actually advocate the existence of a separate Moldovan ethnicity and language."   Moldovan doesn't have a dialect. It has an accent. A more accurate comparisant concerning dialects would be Romanian and Aromanian with the latter having an accent (to me) and several Greek words in it even though for the most part I can understand it if spoken slowly.   Moldovan language is a USSR invented non sense like "Macedonian" was invented by Tito. The people who advocate this Moldovan ethnicity and language are those who yearn for the "good ol golden days of the USSR."     Yugoslav:   'Bosniens' were just the Serb/Croats that settled in the area before Islam and were bogomils I guess is what your meaning is. I wish you could specify better what exactly is your problem with this assertion. Like it or not "Bosniens", "Bosniaks" whatever you want to call them share more of a root with Serbs then Serbs do with Croats...and Serbs and Croats are nearly identical.   Montenegro/Serbia is also like an example of Romania Moldova but so are the Bosniaks and the Serbs...except the latter don't get along nearly as much.     My main points concerning Bosniaks/Bosnien are: 1. "Split" out of Serbs. 2. Major difference was religion. 3. Aside from religion ethnicly they are more or less identical. 4. There was no "Bosnien, Bosniak, Bosnian" tribe. Both are based off a regional name of the region of Bosnia. 5. In simple terms they are Muslim Serbs or Bogomil Serbs.   What out of that do you disagree? Can you give a source that provides the date and time and political affects, any sign of a "Bosnian" people migrating with the Croats and Serbs? This is not fare, 2 against 1. Look, the position of the Medieval Bosnians was in the net-zone between Serbs and Croats, who themselves where the 2 closest by criteria peoples in the Balkans, and possibly beyond. The whole "national question" of Bosnia is ticked off into different periods by other factors - the crowning of Tvartko as King in 1377, the Ottoman conquest, the Austro-Hungarian annexation, the Yugoslavian unification, WWII, Tito's communists, and even actually the most recent Bosnian war (!) that moved the tides of history of the traditional 3alism of the Bosnian religious division. Of what connection, or even insinuation, to the Montenegrin & Moldovan issue is that really at all?!?  Once again, I am referring to the Montenegrins, who had their own distinct Serb identity since the fall of the state in the 15th century, for almost half a millennium up until 1918! Firstly, I shall requote this to you, as you apparently can't understand: Originally posted by Yugoslav [QUOTE=Anton]I must incline something here - we MUST NOT look this through modern eyes, and if a new identity is created, it DOES NOT mean that it "separated from an older one", NOR DOES IT mean that an old identity was "aggressively assimilated and destroyed by another". And lastly, there indeed was a Bosnien tribe.