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THE MEDIEVAL TOWN IN BULGARIA DURING XIII—XIV CENTURY
Summary
The medieval town had been one of the most important elements of the feudal social-economic formations. It had been itself a complex of multifunctional systems characterized by special social and! cultural environment. The book examines one of the local versions in the development of the city in the Medieval Europe — the Bulgarian town during XIII—XIV centuries.
The first chapter traces the history of the Medieval Bulgarian' town in comparasion to all the urban studies concerning the Balkan medieval towns. Special emphasis is placed on methodology of the Medieval Balkan town studies and are determined the general tendencies of its social, economic and political development. The Bulgarian town during XIII—XIV centuries had appeared as an individual version of the city settlement, whose features were determined first of all by the dynamics of the base historical processes- in the Second Bulgarian Kingdom — the struggle between the centrifugal and the centripetal tendencies and its fate had been, under the strong influence of the frequent alterations in the international situation of the Bulgarian state.
The second chapter is dedicated to the typology of the Bulgarian medieval town. The author, determing the subject of his investigations points out the danger of carring over to the past the criteria of a latter even of the contemporary material and thus- some authores are making an artifical model of the Medieval town, which divorses from the historical reality and at the same time is attractive to the idea about the town, that is fixed at a very fewr preserved medieval sources and do not give the full picture of the town. To form the tipical picture of the medieval town in the Balkans and in Bulgaria the hindrances are such factors as the great dynamics of the social, economic and political alterations in the XIII—XIV centuries, when in the life time of one or two generations several towns had fallen into decay while others had arisen, or the presence of villages of developed and sometimes dominant commercial and handcraft activity. Making an analysis of the typological picture, given in 60—80-ies of 20 c. about the life in the Medieval Balkan towns, the author is constructing his own model, edified on the materials about the Bulgarian town in XIII—XIV centuries. To the first type ol towns are reffered those centres, characterized by developed commercial and handcraft activities of the townsmen as well as political activities — Veliko Tirnovo, Bdin, Nessebar. To the second group kre noted towns of more humble developed commercial and handcraft functions, but of political importance as capitals of the little districts or episcopasy of the local ecclesiastical hierarhy — Cherven, Nikopol, Shumen, Szredetz, Yambol, Lovetch, Vratza, Ovech, Velbuzd. To the third type are noted the towns, whose political importance during XIII—XIV -centuries had been much more stronger than tneir social and economic role. They are — Pleven, Krun, Koppsis, Stob, Borui, Melnik, Strummitza, Prossek, Stanimac. The fourth group composes of the centres, whose importance had been in the economic sphere and whose political role has not been very big. These are the minor towns (Chiprovetz), and some not very large ports near the Black Sea and the Danube river — Anchialo, Sozopol and others. In the fifth group are included the fortressee whose economic importance had not been yet fixed or had decreased after war failures. The author doesn’t take this scheme as a perfect element of the investigation does see its utilitarian possibilities for researching the multifunctional role of the Medieval Bulgarian town, the tendencies of its political, social and economic development on the different stages of the history of the Second Bulgarian Kingdom.
In spite of all diversities of the functions of the medieval town in Bulgaria the growth and the progress of the handcrafts remai- nes as one of the most principal factors, which determines in the last run the principal tendency of its development. The author examines the development of the handcraft and the production of market goods, notes the growth of the specialization in the handcraft industry and the consolidation of its connections with the market. The branches of the handcraft industry are divided in two big groups: to the first one are reffered the handcrafts satisfying the necessities of the government, church and the feudal upper crust. Here great role had played the „votchina“ handcraft. To the second group, which is characterized by a higher degree of the goods are reffered the handcrafts connected with the city life and -ara directed to satisfy the needs of the citizens. Making an analyses of the data about the organization of the handcraft in Bulgaria during XIII—XIV centuries, the author draws a conclusion that the handcraft corporations in the Medieval Bulgarian town are absent.
The centre of the economic life of the town had been the market. The author, examining the trade in the Bulgarian town during XIII—XIV centuries notes that the economic life had a progressive character. But, hardly may be regarded the fact, which detained the development of this growth and it had been the activity of the foreign tradesmen. That, as a whole had influenced favourably the growth of the towns and the consolidations of the local stratum of men of enterprises. Thd commercial activity of the Bulgarian towns had been subjected to the strong influence of the complicated international situations, not only in the plan of the economic relations but in connection to the strenuous political situation, frequent wars and the Ottoman· invasions as well.
Special place in the book is given to the political role of the towns in the period of the Second Bulgarian Kingdom. The author examineS'Jthe place of the towns as centres of4the administrative system and points out several „feudal capital“ cities — as the most important centres of the feudal separatism. But the majority of the feudal klans had been side branches of the Asseniev’ ruling dynasty and had not lost their connections to the throne to the very end of the Second Bulgarian Kingdom. In this fact must be seen one of the reasons for the priority position of the town of Veliko Tirnovo until the last days of the Second Bulgarian Kingdom. The author analyses the medieval town as a knot of the administrative-fiscal system and as a ecclesiastical centre. As a whole the political role of the Bulgarian towns in the struggle between the centrifugal and centripetal forces had been entirely determined by the position of the city feudal upper crust, thus the town had became an active factor for the decentralization of the state.
The social topography and the appearance of the town are examined on the background of the complicated social processes that took place during the XIII and XIV centuries in Bulgaria. The variable social structure of the population in the town does not allow to state that there had been a special class of citizens. The town appears rather as a conglomeration of corporative com- munities-parishes and ecclesiastic communities of persons of different religions, feudal domains and monastiries. The only organization of the city population found in the sources — theeccles- siastical parish had had some social (but not professional) homoge- nity and had received some administrative and fiscal functions. The complicated social structure of the town had been expressed in its spatial mounting with some obligatory elements — citadel, quarter-parish, agrarian suburb and the getho of the persons of different religions and s. o. The disposition of homes of common citizens in the administrative centres and the attandance of feudal courts and monastiries in the „suburbs“ do not confirm the opinion which has place in the literature that there were complete compliance between the territorial and the social structure of the town.
The ideological and the cultural life in the Bulgarian town during the XIII—XIV centuries entirely corresponded to its social, economic and political supremacy in the system of the Bulgarian feudalism. The formation together with the town of Tirnovo of several other local cultural centres in the XIV century reflected the deep tendency of the feudal fragmentariness, when at the same time the revival of the cultural life in the capital city of the Tirnovo during the same epoch revealed the efforts of the centripetal forces to object the decentralization of the country. The peculiarities of the social and cultural growth of the town had been connected first of all with the growth of the feudal aristocracy, although one can speak about early traces of „city culture“. But these processes had been discontinued and crushed by the Ottoman invaders. The sensation of the rising danger brought to the growth of mysticizm and to the consolidation of the peculiar for the east- orthodox community „town-guarded“ cults.
The examination of the medieval Bulgarian town we must not consider to be completed. The scientists of medieval life are at hand to generalize continuously coming archaeological material from big and small town-centres, anu again to reread many written sources. By this not very large examination the author is inviting to discussions about the general features and peculiarities, typology and specificity of the town in the Bulgarian lands during the XIII—XIV centuries.