Cumans of the Wallachian plain (people or self-governing land) in 1200, The Cumans

The open steppe of the Wallachian plain, from the Jiu and the Olt to the lower Siret, is Cuman country.

The Baragan, the Burnaz and the Danube meadows and marsh islands are the winter grounds of Cuman clans, who move north toward the forest edge and the hills in summer. No khan is named for these years and no single ruler is known: the clans join for war and raid when they choose. These are the 'Scythians' of Niketas Choniates, the neighbours across the Danube to whom Peter and Asen fled in 1186 and who have fought beside the Vlach-Bulgarian tsars ever since.

In 1199 'the Cumans with a division of Vlachs crossed the Istros' (Choniates): on St George's day (23 April 1199, the translator's date) they plundered the towns round Mesene and Tzouroulos, swept down to Rhaidestos and fell on the feast at Kouperion; the Roman troops of Vizye caught them on the way home and freed most of the captives, but the raiders turned and drove them off. A greater raid in four armies overran the Thracian theme of Macedonia and plundered the monasteries of Mount Ganos; Magoulias dates it late 1197-1198 with a query for 1199, Madgearu to the autumn of 1199. Choniates does not say that Kaloyan led or licensed these raids, and Madgearu thinks they crossed Bulgaria without his leave.

Not all of the Danube Cumans lived here: the Rus' (Hypatian) chronicle says that in 1187 and 1190 the bulk of the Dnieper Cumans were away 'on the Danube' (Spinei 2009, p. 158). On 1 January 1200 the clans are in their winter camps on the north bank with the herds and captives of 1199; no raid is recorded for the winter itself. There are no towns: settled life is in the Vlach and Slav villages of the hills and forest edges (record Vlachs of the Wallachian hills), and the later Wallachian towns (Campulung, Curtea de Arges, Targoviste, Bucharest, Braila, Giurgiu) do not yet exist.

Who holds it

Name: No khan or chief west of the Dniester is named in any source for 1199-1200
Title: Cuman khans and clan chiefs, with no single khan known over them
Since: Cumans have held the steppe north of the lower Danube since the late 11th century, after the defeat of the Pechenegs in 1091
Family: Cuman (Kipchak) clans. Kaloyan's wife came from a Cuman ruling family (Dimnik 2004, via en.wikipedia); her father's name is not recorded.
Confidence: low

Choniates names no Cuman leader in the raids of 1199-1201. The nearest named Cuman chiefs are Kotian (Koten) and his brother Somogur, who came with Rurik of Kiev against Roman of Galicia in an entry dated 1202 that belongs to about 1205 (Spinei 2009, p. 160; Rus' sheet record The Cumans); where their camps lay in 1200 is not known. Bortz, the Cuman prince baptised at Milcov in 1227, is later still. Any name put on these hordes for 1200 would be invented.

Overlord

None. The clans are allies and in-laws of the Bulgarian tsar Kaloyan (Ioannitsa), whose wife is a Cuman princess, not his subjects.

What it holds

Winter pastures on the Danube meadows, the marsh islands between the Danube arms (the later Balta Ialomitei and Balta Brailei) and the Baragan steppe
Summer pastures toward the forest edge (the Vlasia and Teleorman forests) and the hills
The crossing places of the north bank opposite Vidin, Nikopol, Svishtov and Dristra (point records Vidin crossing, Nikopol crossing, Svishtov crossing, Dristra crossing)
Tribute or services from the settled Vlach and Slav villages: presumed from the later relation of Cumans and Vlachs, not attested for 1200

How it was acquired

The Cumans took the lands north of the lower Danube from the Pechenegs and Uzes in the late 11th century; Choniates already has them crossing the Danube to raid in the 1140s and 1150s.

Allies and rivals

Allies of the Asen tsars since 1186, paid in booty; in 1199 they raided Thrace apparently on their own account (Madgearu 2016), and they ride with Kaloyan in March 1201. Enemies of the emperor Alexios III, whose Thracian towns they plunder and whose subjects they sell. Roman Mstislavich, prince of Volhynia and since 1199 of Galich, is the coming enemy. No fighting with Hungary is recorded that winter (Transylvania map). Ivanko of Philippopolis, in revolt against Alexios III and Kaloyan's ally since 1198 (Madgearu; Bulgaria record), sent Kaloyan herds and captives as his share of the spoils (Choniates).

How things stand that morning

The clans of the plain are in their winter camps along the Danube, back from the spring and autumn raids of 1199 with booty and captives. They obey no lord. Their alliance with Kaloyan stands by marriage and habit, but the raids of 1199 were not, so far as Choniates tells, made at his order. Across their borders: south of the Danube, Kaloyan's Bulgarian towns from Vidin to Dristra (Bulgaria record); north, the Vlach communities of the hills (Vlachs of the Wallachian hills) and beyond the Carpathian crest Hungary's Transylvania (outside); north-east, the Brodnik land and the Cumans of Moldavia across the Siret (Brodniki, Cumans of Moldavia and the Bugeac).

Wealth

Horses, cattle and sheep; captives sold to the south and east (Choniates, for the year 1200-1201, speaks of Romans repeatedly carried off and sold to unbelieving peoples); booty from Thrace.

Military

Mounted archers who use feigned flight and ambush (Choniates on the campaigns of 1186-1187); they cross the Danube unhindered with their booty (Choniates, for the 1150s). No numbers are given in the sources.

Threats

Roman Mstislavich of Galicia, who invades the Cuman lands at the urging of the Rus' metropolitan (Choniates) and, says Spinei, at the request of Alexios III, in 1201-1202 and again in 1203-1204; his Byzantine marriage is dated between 1197 and about 1200 (Rus' sheet, hal)
A peace between Kaloyan and Alexios III that closes the crossings through Bulgaria (made in spring 1202, Choniates)
Feuds between the clans

Customs and assemblies

Cuman society is built of clans under their own chiefs, who meet and agree for a war or a raid; there is no capital, no court and no single law-giver. A clan moves with its tents and wagons between winter camps by the river and summer grazing to the north. They are pagan. Peace is sworn by oath and sealed with marriages, hostages and gifts; captives are ransomed or sold. Not pinned in detail for these hordes.

Overlord claims

No ruler takes tribute from them. Kaloyan's style 'emperor of the Bulgarians and Vlachs' in his letters to Innocent III names peoples, not this ground. The Hungarian king's title of king of Cumania is of 1228-1233 (later).

Belts note

No raiding belt is drawn on the Danube. The Cumans and Kaloyan are allies, so the river is not a hostile frontier, and the raids of 1199 (spring and autumn) struck Thrace far to the south (Byzantium and Bulgaria records); no raid is recorded for the winter of 1199-1200, and none on Transylvania or Galicia.

What the year holds

What happened next, if nothing in play changes it. Each event carries what it depends on and what would stop it.

In 1200

Spring and autumn 1200 (raiding seasons; no raid dated to 1200 itself)A new raid across the Danube into Byzantine Thrace is likely when the grass is up, as in April and autumn 1199. Choniates's next recorded raid falls in the Byzantine year 1 September 1200 to 31 August 1201 (translator's date, with a question mark): Vlachs and Cumans plundered the best lands of Thrace, came close to Constantinople and went home safe.Depends on: The chiefs agreeing to ride; a road through Kaloyan's Bulgaria or across the delta Stopped by: A peace between Kaloyan and Alexios III that closes the crossings, a Rus' attack on the camps, or a murrain or hard spring

Later, on the likely course

March 1201 (later; Choniates, translator's date 23 March 1201)Cuman allies march with Kaloyan when he destroys Konstantia and takes Varna in three days (Madgearu 2016: 'Kaloyan and his Cuman allies').Depends on: Kaloyan at war with Alexios III and the clans willing Stopped by: A peace made before the spring of 1201
1201-1202 (later: Fine gives 1201, Spinei the winter of 1201-1202 and again 1203-1204)Roman of Galicia invades the Cuman lands and devastates them; the raiders go home and the raids on Thrace stop for a time (Choniates, year 1200-1201).Depends on: Roman secure in Galich and free of war with Rurik of Kiev; the warriors away raiding Stopped by: War between Roman and Rurik, or a peace between Roman and the hordes
Spring 1202 (later)Alexios III makes peace with Kaloyan (Choniates), closing Thrace to raids through Bulgaria for a while.Depends on: The Cumans withdrawn and Kaloyan willing to treat Stopped by: Kaloyan pressing the war

Places of note

Comana: A village whose name some historians derive from the Cumans; a toponym, not a 1200 settlement record

Where the sources disagree

Choniates dates by events, not years: the dates 23 April 1199 (the St George's day raid), late 1197-1198 with a query for 1199 (the raid of the four armies and Mount Ganos) and 1 September 1200 to 31 August 1201 (the raid ended by Roman's attack, with a question mark) are Magoulias's; Madgearu (2016) puts the raids of 1199 in spring and autumn. Fine (1994) puts the Cumans' withdrawal under Roman's pressure in 1201; Spinei (2009) puts Roman's campaigns in 1201/1202 and 1203/1204.
Madgearu (2016, via en.wikipedia, Kaloyan) reads the 1199 raids as made without Kaloyan's authorization, because Choniates does not mention him; this is an argument from silence.

Evidence: Choniates gives the raids (fair) but no leaders, numbers or camps (thin). The range is drawn from the lie of the land and the later Latin use of the name Cumania (1227-1247).

On the map: No bounds are recorded and the pastures moved with the seasons. The outline is the open plain below the hills from the Jiu to the lower Siret. The Oltenian plain west of the Olt was not called Cumania in the charter of 1247, so the western part is the least certain.

Primary sources for The Cumans

Chronicles, registers, sagas and inscriptions written in or near 1200 that cover this entry. Each has its own page with editions, translations and where to read it.

The Hypatian Chronicle (the Kievan Chronicle compiled about 1200 at the Vydubichi monastery; the Galician-Volhynian Chronicle in the 13th century). The southern record. Read online
The Laurentian Chronicle (the Suzdal continuation kept in the late 12th and 13th centuries; manuscript 1377). The court record of Vsevolod III of Vladimir. Read online
History of Niketas Choniates, Niketas Choniates (about 1185 to 1217, in stages, with a final revision in exile at Nicaea after 1204). The central narrative for the Byzantine Empire under Alexios III Angelos: the Bulgarian and Vlach war under Kaloyan, the breakaway of Ivanko in the Rhodopes and his capture by treachery in 1200, Dobromir Chrysos at Prosek and Strumica and the emperor's campaign and settlement with him, the Cuman raids into Thrace, John Komnenos the Fat's one-day revolt at Constantinople on 31 July 1200, the loosening of imperial control in the provinces and the rise of Leo Sgouros, and the court's fiscal abuses. Read online
The Deeds of the Hungarians, by the Anonymous Notary of King Béla, Anonymus (P. magister) (about 1200 to 1210, the date disputed). Not a record of events but a picture of the kingdom's nobility and geography as a courtier of about 1200 wished to see it: the clans and their lands, the castles and counties, the Vlachs, Cumans and other peoples of the Carpathian basin, all projected back onto the conquest. Read online
The Georgian Chronicles: the Histories and Eulogies of the Sovereigns, and the Life of Queen Tamar, Anonymous, attributed to the chancellor Theodore of Chqondidi and to Basili, master of the court (about 1210 to 1225). Two court histories of Queen Tamar written within a generation. Read online
The Tale of Igor's Campaign (about 1187 to 1200 (disputed)). A poem on Igor Sviatoslavich's defeat by the Polovtsians in 1185 that addresses the princes of the day by name: Vsevolod of Vladimir, Rurik and David Rostislavich, Yaroslav of Galich, Roman of Volhynia and the Olgovichi of Chernigov, of whom Igor himself was prince from 1198. Read online

Sources and studies

Last revised 4 November 2026. Published 4 November 2026. Suggest a correction on the OMNIA Discord.