City · Kaloyan's Bulgaria (the realm of the Bulgarians and Vlachs) · as at first light, 1 January 1200

Tarnovo

Tarnovo grew in the loops of the Yantra round two fortified hills, Tsarevets and Trapezitsa.

Peter and Asen proclaimed the rising of 1185 here, at their new church of St Demetrius, saying that the saint had left Thessalonica for them, and Peter declared it his capital when he failed to take Preslav. Ivanko seized it after murdering Asen in 1196 until Peter besieged him and drove him out. The sebastokrator Isaac Komnenos, captured near Serres in 1196, died a prisoner of the Bulgarians.

On 1 January 1200 Tarnovo is the seat of Kaloyan's palace on Tsarevets and of the head of the Bulgarian church, Basil, and it keeps the relics the Asens have gathered, among them St John of Rila, moved from Sredets in 1194. The papal envoy may be here or on the road (Curta has him reach Bulgaria in late December 1199).

Who holds it

Name
Kaloyan, tsar
Title
Lord
Since
1197
Born
About 1170
Family
Asen dynasty
Confidence
high

English Wikipedia (Kaloyan; Tsarevets); FMG.

Lord in 1200

The tsar Kaloyan in person; no town governor is named.

How things stand that morning

The capital, secure.

Charter

None: a royal and church city, not a chartered commune.

Council

None known; the tsar's court and the head of the church.

Communities

Bulgarians and Vlachs; the court has Cuman ties (the tsar's wife is Cuman); Byzantine captives and hostages from the wars (not counted).

Fairs and markets

Not recorded for 1200.

Militia

The tsar's household and the townsmen; no figures.

Walls and castle

Tsarevets: walls up to 3.6 m thick (by the modern account), three gates with the main gate and drawbridge at the western end, the palace with throne room and palace church, the church of the Ascension (later the patriarchal church; its building date is not pinned). Trapezitsa has its own walls and churches. The 'Baldwin tower' is named after the Latin emperor who died a prisoner here after 1205 (later).

Trade and crafts

Not recorded for 1200 beyond the needs of the court and the church. The Ragusan, Venetian and Genoese merchants known in later Tarnovo belong to the 13th and 14th centuries and are not to be back-projected.

Places of note

  • Tsarevets: Palace fortress.
  • Trapezitsa: Second fortified hill.

Where the sources disagree

Evidence: The rising, the churches and the court are well recorded; the town's economy in 1200 is not.

Primary sources for Bulgaria

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.

  • Chronicle of Alberic of Trois-Fontaines, Alberic of Trois-Fontaines (about 1227 to 1241, at the Cistercian abbey of Trois-Fontaines in Champagne). The widest net of any Latin chronicle for 1200, compiled from dozens of sources, many now lost. 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 Conquest of Constantinople (Villehardouin), Geoffrey of Villehardouin (about 1207 to 1213). Opens with the preaching of Fulk of Neuilly and the tournament at Ecry (28 November 1199) where Theobald III of Champagne and Louis of Blois took the cross, then the taking of the cross by Baldwin of Flanders, Hugh of Saint-Pol, Geoffrey of Perche and others through early 1200, the assemblies at Soissons and Compiegne in 1200, and the six envoys sent to Venice in the winter of 1200 to 1201. 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 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

Sources and studies

  1. Kaloyan of Bulgaria (English Wikipedia), citing Madgearu, The Asanids (2016), Fine, The Late Medieval Balkans (1994), Curta, Southeastern Europe in the Middle Ages (2006), Stephenson, Byzantium's Balkan Frontier (2000)
  2. Tsarevets (fortress) (English Wikipedia)
  3. FMG Medieval Lands: Bulgaria (the Asen brothers, Kaloyan, Boril, Strez)
  4. John of Rila (English Wikipedia): the relics at Sredets, in Hungary (1183-1187) and at Tarnovo (1194)

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