The Second Bulgarian Empire

The Second Bulgarian Empire is the name modern historians use for the Bulgarian state re-established in 1185. Its territories, centred on the Danube and the Balkan Peninsula, changed over time and did not match the borders of modern Bulgaria. The state succeeded the First Bulgarian Empire, conventionally dated from 681 to 1018, and emerged after the Byzantine interval of 1018 to 1185. Its independent political centres were conquered by the Ottomans in the late fourteenth century: Tarnovo fell in 1393 and Vidin in 1396, the conventional endpoint for the empire. Dynastic claims and resistance continued later, in some accounts until 1422.

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Byzantine rule and the revolt of Peter and Asen

After Basil II conquered the First Bulgarian Empire in 1018, Byzantine government incorporated its lands while initially retaining important local arrangements, including payment of taxes in kind. The former patriarchate became the autocephalous Archbishopric of Ohrid: it governed itself under privileges defined by imperial charters, rather than being subordinated to the Patriarch of Constantinople. Later taxation and invasions helped provoke revolts in 1040–41 and 1072.

The immediate dispute behind the revolt of 1185 concerned a new tax imposed by Emperor Isaac II Angelos to finance his marriage to a daughter of the Hungarian king Béla III. Two brothers from Tarnovo, Peter and Asen, sought admission to the Byzantine army and a grant of land that could provide income. The emperor refused their request and treated them harshly. The brothers then turned opposition to the tax into a revolt among Bulgarian and Vlach communities in Moesia, the lands between the Danube and the Balkan Mountains.

The revolt began on 26 October 1185, the feast day of Saint Demetrius of Thessaloniki. Peter and Asen had built a church dedicated to the saint in Tarnovo and presented his support for their cause as a sign that their rebellion had divine backing. The rebels attacked Byzantine settlements and raided Preslav, the former Bulgarian capital. Tarnovo, with its defensible position, became their centre. Peter, the elder brother, took the name Peter IV and the title of ruler.

Isaac II’s campaign in 1186 drove the rebels north of the Danube for a time. They gained support from Cumans, mounted allies from the lands beyond the river, and returned to renew the war. Byzantine forces struggled against the rebels’ use of the mountainous terrain, while political upheaval in Constantinople repeatedly disrupted imperial military leadership. After failing to take the fortress of Lovech during a siege in 1187, Isaac agreed to a truce. It recognised the brothers’ rule in Moesia in practice, restoring an independent Bulgarian state without settling every territorial claim.

From revolt to regional power

The first rulers had to turn a successful revolt into a functioning state while continuing to fight for territory. Asen, who became known as Ivan Asen I, gained authority after a major Byzantine defeat at the Tryavna Pass in 1190. Bulgarian forces then expanded their reach into Thrace and took important towns, including Sofia and Niš. Ivan Asen was murdered in 1196, and Peter IV was killed the following year amid conflict among the nobility. These violent successions showed how much the young state depended on both military leadership and cooperation among powerful aristocratic families.

Kaloyan, the youngest brother of Peter and Ivan Asen, took power in 1197. He continued the effort to secure Bulgarian territory and international recognition. After capturing Varna in 1201, he negotiated peace with Byzantium. He also sought recognition from Pope Innocent III, whose support could strengthen his position among Christian rulers. In 1204, Kaloyan received a royal coronation and the head of the Bulgarian Church was recognised as a primate. Kaloyan continued to claim an imperial title and a patriarchate for his church. The arrangement with Rome was chiefly diplomatic: Bulgarians retained their Orthodox rites and religious practices.

The political landscape changed dramatically when crusaders captured Constantinople in 1204 and established the Latin Empire. Kaloyan’s efforts to establish friendly relations with the new rulers failed, so he joined forces with Byzantine aristocrats in Thrace who opposed Latin control. On 14 April 1205, Bulgarian and allied forces defeated the Latin army at Adrianople and captured its emperor, Baldwin I. The victory weakened the Latin Empire and expanded Bulgarian influence in Thrace. Kaloyan continued campaigning against Latin-held territories, but he was killed in 1207. His successor, Boril, faced breakaway regional rulers and lost ground to neighbouring powers.

Ivan Asen II and Bulgaria’s widest influence

Ivan Asen II, son of Ivan Asen I, took the throne in 1218 after Boril was overthrown. He used treaties and dynastic marriages, as well as military campaigns, to strengthen the state. A marriage to a daughter of the Hungarian king helped secure the return of Belgrade and Braničevo. In the south, Ivan Asen initially allied with Theodore Komnenos, ruler of the Despotate of Epirus, a regional power that had emerged after the fall of Constantinople. The alliance did not prevent war. In 1230 Theodore invaded Bulgaria, but Ivan Asen defeated and captured him at Klokotnitsa. He released many ordinary soldiers and gained the submission of towns across a wide area.

During Ivan Asen II’s reign, Bulgarian authority reached across much of the Balkans, from the Black Sea towards the Adriatic. This influence did not mean that every region was governed in the same way: some places came under direct rule, while others were ruled by local leaders who accepted the Bulgarian ruler’s supremacy. An inscription commissioned by Ivan Asen II at the Church of the Holy Forty Martyrs in Tarnovo recorded his victory over Theodore and made expansive claims about the lands under his rule. Such inscriptions expressed royal authority and ambition as well as recording events.

Ivan Asen also adjusted alliances as rival powers changed. After the Latin Empire and the Nicaean Empire, a Byzantine successor state based at Nicaea, became involved in contests over Constantinople, Bulgaria shifted between cooperation with them. In 1235, Nicaea recognised the Bulgarian patriarchate, restoring the senior church office that Kaloyan had sought. Bulgaria and Nicaea then campaigned together against the Latin Empire, but their alliance later broke down. Ivan Asen II’s ability to combine military strength, negotiation and dynastic ties helped make his reign a high point of Bulgarian power.

Government, society and the economy

The empire was a monarchy whose ruling families claimed hereditary authority. Its ruler was called a tsar, an imperial title. Leading nobles and churchmen advised the ruler and could influence war, alliances and succession. Governors appointed from the court administered provinces, but their reach depended on the territory the ruler could actually control. Powerful aristocrats could support the dynasty or challenge it.

Society included clergy, nobles and a much larger population of cultivators. Bolyars were aristocrats who held estates or military and administrative offices. Royal charters name dependent rural groups, including paritsi and otrotsi, and define rights over land, dues and jurisdiction. Households’ ability to hold or transfer a field depended on their relationship with its landholder and the privileges attached to the estate.

Agriculture and livestock raising supported most economic activity. Grain was grown across several regions, while Thrace, the Black Sea coast and river valleys in Macedonia produced wine. Towns provided markets and encouraged crafts such as weaving, leatherworking, shoemaking, carpentry and metalworking. Salt was extracted near Anchialus, and mining and metal production developed in parts of western Bulgaria and around other towns. Trade connected Bulgarian producers with neighbouring markets. Bulgarian coins circulated alongside Byzantine, Serbian, Venetian and other foreign money; the use of coins increased under some rulers, including Ivan Alexander in the fourteenth century.

The church and cultural life

The Orthodox Church helped support the ruler’s authority and gave the state institutions of its own. Its standing changed with political circumstances: Kaloyan’s negotiations with Rome did not replace Orthodox worship, and recognition by Nicaea in 1235 strengthened the Bulgarian patriarchate. Religious policy could also involve coercion. In 1211, Boril presided over a church council in Tarnovo that condemned Bogomilism, a religious movement the Orthodox authorities regarded as heretical; people who refused to return to Orthodoxy were exiled.

Tarnovo served as a political and religious centre, while monasteries and churches supported literacy and the production of books. During the fourteenth century, especially under Ivan Alexander, Bulgarian literature and visual arts flourished. Writers translated Greek works and composed religious and secular texts. The illustrated Tetraevangelia of Ivan Alexander, a book containing the four Gospels, is one surviving example of the period’s book art. Church architecture and painting also developed under Byzantine influence while retaining local styles. Builders used cruciform, domed church plans and decorated some exteriors with alternating stone and brick, sometimes adding coloured ceramic ornament. The Church of the Holy Forty Martyrs inscription, meanwhile, shows how a religious building could also serve as a setting for royal statements of power.

Fragmentation and Ottoman conquest

Ivan Asen II’s death in 1241 was followed by short reigns, disputes over succession and pressure from neighbouring powers. Mongol raids and the growing strength of Nicaea and Hungary contributed to territorial losses. In 1277, a revolt led by Ivaylo, described in the sources as a swineherd, grew amid Mongol attacks and dissatisfaction with the rule of Constantine Tikh. Ivaylo defeated Mongol forces and the royal army, killed the emperor and was proclaimed ruler. His government did not end the struggle among aristocratic factions and foreign-backed claimants. A period of instability followed before Theodore Svetoslav strengthened central authority around 1300 and reduced Mongol interference in Bulgarian affairs.

There were later recoveries, but they did not prevent the growth of powerful regional rulers or the expansion of neighbouring states. In 1330, the Serbs defeated the Bulgarians at Velbazhd and killed the Bulgarian ruler Michael Shishman. Ivan Alexander, who became ruler in 1331, recovered territory from the Byzantines at Rusokastro in 1332 and gained further lands during a Byzantine civil war in 1344. The Ottoman Turks, who had entered the region as allies in that conflict, began attacking Bulgarian territory. In the later fourteenth century, the state fragmented further. By Ivan Alexander’s death in 1371, Ivan Shishman ruled from Tarnovo, Ivan Sratsimir from Vidin, and Dobrotitsa held power in the region of Karvuna.

Ottoman advances further reduced the rulers’ ability to resist. After the defeat of a Christian army at Chernomen in 1371, Ottoman forces took territory in Thrace and the Rhodope Mountains. Ivan Shishman was compelled to accept Ottoman overlordship for a time, but the arrangement did not stop later campaigns. Sofia fell in the early 1380s, and the Ottomans captured Tarnovo in 1393. Ivan Shishman died in 1395 after losing his last stronghold at Nikopol. Ivan Sratsimir joined the Christian crusade that ended in defeat at Nicopolis in 1396; the Ottomans then took Vidin. These conquests ended the independent Bulgarian centres conventionally associated with the Second Bulgarian Empire, although resistance and claims to rule continued beyond that date.