maintained itself in the mountains and eventually forced back the immigrant
race. The Greeks, who occupied the maritime and southern regions, were
driven to the sea-coast, the islands and the fortified towns. Slavonic
place-names, still existing in every portion of the Peninsula, bear witness
to the multitude of the invaders and the permanency of their settlements.
In the 6th century the Slavs penetrated to the Morea, where a Slavonic
dialect was spoken down to the middle of the 15th century. In the 7th the
Serbo-Croats invaded the north-western regions (Croatia, Servia, Bosnia,
Herzegovina, Montenegro and northern Albania); they expelled or assimilated
the Illyrian population, now represented in Dalmatia by the slavonized
Morlachs or Mavro-Vlachs, and appropriated the old Roman colonies on the
Adriatic coast. At the end of the 7th century the Bulgars, a Turanian race,
crossed the Danube and subjected the Slavonic inhabitants of Moesia and
Thrace, but were soon assimilated by the conquered population, which had
already become partly civilized. Under their tsar Krum (802-815) the
Bulgars invaded the districts of Adrianople and central Macedonia; under
Simeon (893-927), who fixed his capital at Preslav, their empire extended
from the Adriatic to the Black Sea. In 971 "the first Bulgarian empire" was
overthrown by the emperor John Zimisces, but Bulgarian power was soon
revived under the Shishman dynasty at Ochrida. In 1014 Tsar Samuel of
Ochrida, who had conquered the greater part of the Peninsula, was defeated
at Belasitza by the Greek emperor Basil II., and the "western Bulgarian
empire" came to an end. In the 10th century the Vlachs reappear as an
independent power in Southern Macedonia and the Pindus district, which were
known as Great Walachia ([Greek: Megale Blachia]). The Serbs, who owing to
the dissensions of their zhupans or chiefs, had hitherto failed to take a
prominent part in the history of the Peninsula, attained unity under
Stephen Nemanya (1169-1195), the founder of the Nemanyich dynasty. A new
Bulgarian power, known as the "second" or "Bulgaro-Vlach empire," was
founded at Trnovo in 1186 under the brothers Ivan and Peter Asen, who led a
revolt of Vlachs and Bulgars against the Greeks. In 1204 Constantinople was
captured by the Latins of the Fourth Crusade, and Baldwin of Flanders was
crowned emperor; the Venetians acquired several maritime towns and islands,
and Frankish feudal dynasties were established in Sa