Kotor

Who holds it

Name

Not pinned (the commune's officers in 1200 are not named in the sources checked)

Title

The commune of Kotor under King Vukan

Since

about 1185 (Nemanjic rule)

Confidence

low

English Wikipedia (Kotor); see Kotor commune.

Lord in 1200

Vukan as king of Dioclea, under the grand zupan; the commune governs itself; its Latin bishop is a suffragan of Bari.

Allies and rivals

Trade rival and partner of Ragusa; church tie to Bari.

How things stand that morning

Self-governing under Vukan.

Wealth

Shipping and transit trade.

Threats

• Ragusa's competition.
• War between the Nemanjic brothers.

Charter

Its own customs and institutions; the written statute is of 1301 and later.

Council

A council of nobles and the commune's officers (titles and names in 1200 not pinned).

Communities

Romance-speaking (Dalmatian) patricians and citizens, Slav townsfolk; Latin clergy; Orthodox churches in the district.

Fairs and markets

Not recorded for 1200; the feast of St Tryphon (3 February) is the town's festival.

Militia

Citizens and their ships.

Walls and castle

Town walls running up the mountain to the fort of St John (San Giovanni) above the town.

Trade and crafts

Shipping and the overland trade with Ras and the interior; salt, wine, oil, cloth inward; livestock, hides and wax outward.

Places of note

• Cathedral of St Tryphon: Built 1166.

Where the sources disagree

Evidence: Nemanjic rule and the town's autonomy are well established; the 1200 officers are not.

On the map: Near land only; the commune's district is drawn in Kotor commune.

Primary sources for Zeta

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 Chronicle of the Priest of Dioclea, Anonymous (the priest of Dioclea; Rudger, archbishop of Bar, by Zivkovic's attribution) (disputed: the 12th century on the older view, about 1295 to 1301 on the current one). The chronicle ends before 1200 and gives no event of that year. Read online
• History of the bishops of Salona and Split, by Thomas the Archdeacon, Thomas of Split (about 1266). Written two generations later by a Split churchman born about 1200. Read online
• The Registers of Pope Innocent III (pontifical years 1 to 3, 1198 to 1201), Innocent III (Lotario dei Conti di Segni) and the papal chancery (1198 onwards, year by year). The register for the second and third pontifical years (February 1199 to February 1201) holds the letters that set the eastern stage for 1200: the exchange with Kaloyan of Bulgaria opened in December 1199 and continued through 1200 over union with Rome and a crown, letters to Vukan of Zeta and to Stefan of Serbia, letters to Alexios III and the patriarch John Kamateros pressing for church union and help for the crusade, the preaching commissions and the legation of Peter Capuano, the Antioch succession quarrel between Bohemond and Leo of Armenia, letters to Aimery of Cyprus and Jerusalem, and the French interdict over Ingeborg. Read online
• The Registers of Pope Innocent III for 1199 to 1201, Innocent III and the papal chancery (22 February 1199 to 21 February 1201). The pope's outgoing letters for the year, in his chancery's own copy, touching nearly every realm in the atlas. Read online
• Charters of the kingdom of Croatia, Dalmatia and Slavonia, volume 2, 1101 to 1200 (documents of 1101 to 1200, edited 1904). The Croatian and Dalmatian charters to 1200: the acts of Duke Andrew as lord of Croatia and Dalmatia (1197 to 1204), the Hungarian kings' grants, the Templars and the bishops of Zagreb, Split, Zadar and Trogir, the communal statutes of the coastal towns, and the papal letters of 1200 to Emeric about Ban Kulin of Bosnia and heresy. Read online
• The Lives of St Simeon (Stefan Nemanja) by Sava and by Stefan the First-Crowned, Sava of Serbia (Rastko Nemanjic) and Stefan the First-Crowned (Sava's Life 1208, as the preface to the Studenica typikon (a short Life stands in the Hilandar typikon of 1199); Stefan's Life 1216). The two sons' lives of Stefan Nemanja are the Serbian witness to the situation of 1200: Nemanja's abdication at Ras in 1196 in favour of Stefan, his monastic years at Studenica and on Mount Athos, the founding of Hilandar (1198) and his death there on 13 February 1199, and, in Stefan's version written after the event, the war with the elder brother Vukan of Zeta, who seized the throne with Hungarian help in 1202. Read online