"...and to-day is peopled by Albanians."
Тие Албанци таму се доселени во доцните средни векови.
In addition, as the theme was a major base for Byzantine operations across the
Adriatic into
southern Italy, and hosted a contingent of
Mardaites marines, probably under their own
katepano.
[6][2] Warren Treadgold conjecturally estimates its military strength at some 1,000 infantry and marines in the 9th–10th centuries.
[14]
Веќе приложив објаснување од каде дошле и како стигнале
Мардаитите на Пелопонез и Епир, што претставува почеток на “албанското“ присуство на Балканот.
Μαρδαΐται
http://khazarzar.skeptik.net/pgm/PG_Migne/Constantinus Porphyrogenitus_PG 112-113/
"...strengthening it by the resettlement of over
18,500 Mardaites."
A various places at this website I have featured a quotation from the
De Administrando Imperio of the Emperor
Constantine VII Porphyrogenitus:
All terrible evils has Romania suffered from the Arabs even until now [Greek text edited by Gy. Moravcsik, Dumbarton Oaks Texts, 1967, 2008, p.94].
This was itself a quote from
The Chronicle of Theophanes Confessor [cf.
The Chronicle of Theophanes, Anno mundi 6095-6305 (A.D. 602-813), University of Pennsylvania Press, 1982, p.61 for the year 678 AD].
The statement was in the context of the disposition of the Mardaïtes. According to Warren Treadgold,
these were "Christian freebooters," i.e. something between bandits and guerrillas, who had been surrounded by the Arab conquest on Mt. Amanus
between Syria and Cilicia [
A History of the Byzantine State and Society, Stanford University Press, 1997, p.327]. Many of the Mardaïtes had then moved to Mt. Lebanon, where they, the
Maronites, other Christian refugees, and escaped slaves began plundering the adjacent territories of the Omayyad Caliph
Mu'âwiya. It sounds like Mu'âwiya was somewhat embarrassed by this activity.
In 679 Justinian II negotiated a settlement, by which the Mardaïtes would be withdrawn in exchange for an annual tribute (216,000 solidi and some slaves and horses). Theophanes did not consider this a good deal: "
The Emperor sent messengers who seized 12,000 Mardaites, mutilating the Roman state... After they were transplanted, Romania has suffered all sorts of evils at the hands of the Arabs up until the present day" [
Theophanes,
op. cit., p.61]. In other words, at a time of continued Roman reversals and Arab conquests, Justinian II voluntarily withdrew the autonomous forces of a successful counterattack against the heart of Omayyad power, in exchange for some nominal tribute that certainly the Omayyads soon ceased to pay.
A fleet of one hundred and twelve galleys, and seventy-five vessels of the Pamphylian style, was equipped
in the capital, the islands of the Aegean Sea, and the seaports of Asia, Macedonia, and Greece. It carried thirty-four thousand mariners, seven thousand three hundred and forty soldiers, seven hundred Russians, and
five thousand and eighty-seven Mardaites, whose fathers had been transplanted from the mountains of Libanus.
http://ebooks.adelaide.edu.au/g/gibbon/edward/g43d/chapter53.html
The
Theme of Hellas (θέμα Ἑλλάδος), founded in ca. 686–689 by
Justinian II, encompassing the imperial possessions of
southern Greece with capital at
Corinth.
Justinian settled 6,500 Mardaites there, who provided oarsmen and garrisons.
[169]
Treadgold, Warren T. (1997),
A History of the Byzantine State and Society, Stanford University Press,
ISBN 0804726302
32 CHANGES OF THE POPULATION.
their attention by the spectacle of desolate provinces and
§5. uninhabited cities, by forming colonies on a scale that
excites our wonder even in this age of colonisation. We
have seen that the Emperor Justinian II.
transported nearly two hundred thousand Sclavonians to Asia on one occasion.
His removal of the Mardaite population of Mount Lebanon was on the same extensive scale.
Future emperors encouraged emigration to as great an
extent.
A colony of Persians was established on the banks of the Vardar (Axios) as early as the reign of Theophilus, (a.d. 829-842,) and it long continued to
flourish and supply recruits for a cohort of the imperial
guard, which bore the name of the
Vardariots.^ Various
colonies of the different Asiatic nations who penetrated
into Europe from the north of the Black Sea in the
tenth, eleventh, and twelfth centuries,
were also established in Macedonia and Thrace. In the year 106.5
a colony of Uzes was settled in Macedonia ; and this settlement
acquired so much importance that some of its chiefs rose
to the rank of senators, and filled high oificial situations
at Constantinople. 2
Anna Comnena mentions colonies of Turks established in the neighbourhood of Achrida
before the reign of her father, (a.d. 1081.^) A colony
of
Patzinaks was settled in the western part of Macedonia
by John II. in the year 1123;^ and colonies of Romans
were also established both in Macedonia and Thrace,
after the empire had been depopulated by the Crusaders
and Bulgarians, by John III. (Vatatzes) in the year
1243.^
All these different nations were often included under the general name of Turks ; and, indeed, most of them were descended from Turkish tribes.
THE HISTOHY OF GREECE FROM ITS CONQUEST BY THE CRUSADERS TO
ITS CONQUEST BY THE TURKS AND OF THE EMPIEE OF TREBIZOND 1204-1461
GEORGE FINLAY
http://www02.us.archive.org/stream/cu31924028326878/cu31924028326878_djvu.txt
Страна 43 и 44:
Byzantine Epirus: A Topography of Transformation. Settlements of the Seventh ...
By Myrto Veikou
http://books.google.sk/books?id=dKINo5CPFy8C&pg=PA44&dq=Mardaites+Epir+Peloponnese&hl=en&sa=X&ei=bAUhUdKUDoHWtAbc8oHABQ&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=Mardaites Epir Peloponnese&f=false
In the ninth and tenth centuries
we find Mardaites also in the Peloponnesus, at Nicopolis in Epirus, and Cephalonia: Theophanes Continuatus, 304, 311; Constantine Porphyrogenitus, De ceremoniis, I (Bonn, 1829), 665. *» Gal. Ill 27, 28.
Studies on the demography of the Byzantine empire: collected studiesAuthor
Peter Charanis
http://books.google.sk/books?id=RFVoAAAAMAAJ&q=Mardaites+Epirus&dq=Mardaites+Epirus&hl=en&sa=X&ei=dwghUfTcNMGjtAbZnoCICw&redir_esc=y
http://books.google.sk/books?id=6y3RAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA8&dq=Mardaites+Epirus&hl=en&sa=X&ei=dwghUfTcNMGjtAbZnoCICw&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=Mardaites Epirus&f=false
....to be continued