Poland, Hungary and the Adriatic

The realms

1. Commune of VeniceEnrico DandoloCommune under its doge

   Venice on the morning of 1 January 1200 is a sea republic of merchants, shipowners and salt-makers spread over the islands of the lagoon, ruled by a very old and blind doge, Enrico Dandolo, under a sworn oath and a set of councils that bind him.

2. Duchy of SilesiaBolesław I the TallDuchy

   Bolesław the Tall is the senior living Piast of the eldest line, the grandson of Bolesław III, raised in exile in Germany, a crusader of 1148 and a veteran of Barbarossa's Italian wars.

3. Duchy of OpoleJarosław of OpoleDuchy

   The first prince to sit as bishop of Wrocław.

4. Duchy of RacibórzMieszko I TanglefootDuchy

   Mieszko Tanglefoot, the club-footed younger brother of Bolesław the Tall, came back from the German exile with him in 1163 and felt cheated in the share-out.

5. Duchy of Greater PolandMieszko III the OldDuchy

   Mieszko III the Old, the last living son of Bolesław III and at about 73 the oldest prince in Poland, has held Greater Poland since 1138, lost it to a revolt of his son Odon and the Kraków lords in 1177-79, and won it back with Pomeranian help in 1181.

6. Duchy of Kraków (the senior throne)Mieszko III the OldSenior duchy

   Kraków is the seat of the senior duke of Poland, the prince who under Bolesław III's will of 1138 should stand above the other Piast dukes.

7. Duchy of SandomierzLeszek the WhiteDuchy

   Sandomierz is the heart of Casimir II's own inheritance: the castle on the Vistula below the San mouth, the old ducal town of Wiślica on the Nida, Radom, Zawichost at the Vistula crossing, and the Lublin land beyond the river towards Rus'.

8. Duchy of MasoviaKonrad, younger son of Casimir II the Just, a boy of aboutDuchy

   Masovia is the Piast land on the middle Vistula, the Narew and the Bug, ruled from the castle of Płock, which was the capital of all Poland from 1079 to 1138.

9. Principality of PomereliaSambor IPrincipality

   Pomerelia is the land west of the lower Vistula, from the Łeba in the west to the river mouth at Gdańsk, and south through the Kashubian and Tuchola forests to the edge of Kuyavia and the Greater Polish Noteć march.

10. The PrussiansNo Prussian or Sudovian leader is named in the sources forFree peoples

    East of the Vistula and the Nogat live the Prussians: pagan Balts with no king, no towns and no written law.

11. Kingdom of HungaryEmericKingdom

    On the morning of 1 January 1200 Emeric, about 25, has been king for nearly four years and has just won the first round of his quarrel with his younger brother, Duke Andrew.

12. Voivodeship of TransylvaniaLegforusVoivodeship

    On 1 January 1200 Transylvania is a province of the kingdom of Hungary, not a principality: the land beyond the forest (Ultrasilvania, Erdőelve), ringed by the Carpathians and entered from Hungary through the gates of the Meszes and the Királyhágó and up the M

13. Kingdom of Croatia and DalmatiaKing EmericKingdom under the Hungarian crown

    On the morning of 1 January 1200 the kingdom of Croatia and Dalmatia, with Slavonia between the Drava and the Sava, is back under King Emeric's direct rule.

14. Banate of BosniaKulinBanate

    On 1 January 1200 Bosnia is a mountain banate in the upper and middle valley of the Bosna, ruled for some twenty years by Ban Kulin, a nominal vassal of the Hungarian crown who answers to no one in practice.

15. Commune of RagusaCommune

    Ragusa is a small, rich self-governing port on a rocky shore south of the Neretva, outside the kingdom of Croatia and Dalmatia, under the far-off and nominal overlordship of the Byzantine emperor.

Primary sources for Poland, Hungary and the Adriatic

• Pomeranian charter book, volume 1, 786 to 1253 (documents of 786 to 1253, edited 1868). All known charters for Pomerania and Rügen to 1253.
• The Austrian and Salzburg annals (kept in the 12th and 13th centuries, with continuations to the late 13th century). A family of monastic annals from Austria, Styria and Salzburg, printed together.
• 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.
• 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.
• 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.
• Chronicle of the Poles, by Master Vincent (Wincenty Kadłubek), Wincenty Kadłubek (about 1190 to 1208). Book 4 is a contemporary's account of the fight for the senior throne of Kraków.
• Documents on the older commercial and political history of the Republic of Venice, part 1, 814 to 1205 (documents of 814 to 1205, edited 1856). Venice's treaties and privileges in full text.
• 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.
• History of the doges of Venice (about 1229, with a continuation). The earliest surviving Venetian narrative close to the events.
• Hungarian royal charters: Fejér's Codex diplomaticus and Szentpétery's critical calendar of the Árpád kings (documents of the 11th to 13th centuries; Fejér published 1829 to 1844, Szentpétery vol. 1 in 1923). The documentary base for Hungary in 1200: King Emeric's grants to Pannonhalma, the bishops, the Templars and Hospitallers, Duke Andrew's acts in Croatia and Dalmatia, and the papal letters of 1200 to Emeric about his brother's rebellion and about heresy in Bosnia.
• The annals of the Kraków chapter and the other Polish annals (kept from the 11th century; the Kraków chapter annals continued to 1266). Short dated entries that fix the chronology Kadłubek blurs: the deaths of dukes and bishops, Mieszko the Old's captures of Kraków, Prussian raids on Masovia, church consecrations.
• 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.
• The Book of Census of the Roman Church, Cencius Camerarius (Cencio Savelli, later Pope Honorius III) (1192, with later additions). The papal rent roll: every church, monastery, town and kingdom that owed a census to Rome in 1192, diocese by diocese, with the sums, followed by lists of papal lands and castles, the ceremonial Ordo and copies of charters.
• 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.
• Documents on the Early Commercial and Political History of Venice, including the Partitio Romaniae of 1204 (documents 814 to 1299, edited by G. L. F. Tafel and G. M. Thomas, 3 vols (Vienna, 1856 to 1857)). Volume 1 (814 to 1205) prints Venice's treaties with Byzantium, the chrysobull of 1198 to Venice with its list of imperial provinces, the Venetian treaty with the crusaders of April 1201, and the Partitio terrarum imperii Romaniae of late 1204, which divides the Empire by its fiscal districts and so records the provincial structure (themes, episkepseis, estates) that was in place in 1200.
• Greek Acts and Documents of the Middle Ages, Sacred and Secular (documents of the 9th to 15th centuries, edited by F. Miklosich and J. Muller, 6 vols (Vienna, 1860 to 1890)). Volume 3 (Acta et diplomata res Graecas Italasque illustrantia, 1865) prints the imperial chrysobulls to Venice, including Alexios III's of November 1198 with its list of the provinces and towns of the Empire where Venetians traded, the best single picture of the imperial provinces as they stood on 1 January 1200, together with the Pisan and Genoese privileges.
• 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.

The whole sources library

How these entries are made

Every entry describes one morning, 1 January 1200, and keeps later events in a dated "what the year holds" list with the conditions each depended on. Each entry names its sources, rates its confidence and says where the sources disagree. Published 4 November 2026. Corrections are welcome.