File talk:Byzantine Empire Themes 1025-en.svg

My edits (close to final)

After reading Commons:Deletion requests/File:Byzantine Empire Themes 1025-en.svg and discussing the problems with the original creator of the map, I have started reviweing and modifying it in order to fix its problems. The following is a complete list of the non-cosmetic changes I made to the map so far (15/10/2012):

• LONGOBARDIA and KALABRIA: Combined into Italia (according to Kazhdan, p.1250, from 965 and on these themes were combined into Katepanate of Italy. The seat of its katepano was at Bari, see Kazhdan p.256). Fixed borders in order to include Gargano (per Toynbee and Haldon maps).
• SALERNO: Fixed position of city. Fixed borders and separated BENEVENTO (under Byzantine suzerainty until 1041, see Kazhdan, p.281)
• CAPUA: Added this autonomous territory where a semblance of Byzantine control existed until short after 1026 (Kazhdan, p.380)
• AMALFI: Removed from Empire territories since it was completely independent from 839 on (Barbara M. Kreutz, Before the Normans: Southern Italy in the Ninth and Tenth Centuries, p.81)
• NAPLES: Removed from Empire territories since it was completely independent from 838 on (Kazhdan, p.1437) or early 9th century ( McKitterick, Rosamond. The New Cambridge Medieval History, p.755)
• GAETA: Removed from Empire territories since it had gradually gained independence between end of 9th and beginning of 10th century (Kazdhan, p.813).
• CROATIA: a) Zagreb removed (the first written mention of the city dates from 1094). b) Borders in Haldon's map are located too much towards north, thus I moved them to the south (see Cambridge History of the Byzantine Empire c. 500–1492, p.534, map 24 and Kazhdan, p.354).
• SERBIA: Marked as an autonomous principality instead of a theme (the majority of scholars agree that Serbia was a theme only for a very short period in 10th century)
• ARENTANOI, ZACHLOUMIA, TERBOUNIA (borders): Haldon's maps 6.4 (the one on which this map was largely based) and 5.3 on Palgrave Atlas are remarkably inconsistent. However, map 5.3 is consistent with Cambridge History of the Byzantine Empire c. 500–1492, p.534, map 24 and Paul Stephenson, Byzantium’s Balkan Frontier , maps 4.1 and 4.2. That is, all these principalities should be located to the south of Split.
• DIOKLEIA: This theme is extremely problematic. Haldon (The Palgrave Atlas of Byzantine History, map 6.4 on p.72 shows a theme of Diokleia in the year 1050 (our map is heavily depended on that map). However, Diokleia was independent since 1030s. And we know that Raguza was a seat of strategos at some moment in the 11th century but do we have a source indicating that it was the capital of the theme of Diokleia, if it ever existed? Haldon's map 5.3, for the year 1040 (Palgrave Atlas) clearly distinguish the theme of Ragusa from Diokleia. It is also unclear whether, in 1020s, Diokleia was under direct Byzantine control (Rosser, Historical Dictionary of Byzantium, p.119, says that it "in 1018 it became a dependency of Byzantium"). Things are more clear in the Cambridge History of the Byzantine Empire c. 500–1492, p.534, map 24, where Diokleia, Serbia, Trevounia, Zachloumia are shown as autonomous under nominal Byzantine suzerainty. Therefore, I combined this info with Haldon's map 5.3 (this means I have to alter the borders too.
• TERBOUNIA: I changed it into an autonomous area under Byz. suzerainty (see Diokleia above) and undid Spalaton (split) from a theme capital (I could not find a source to support the opposite)
• NICOPOLIS: By the 11th century, Naupactos -instead of the declined Nicopolis- was the seat of its strategus (Kazhdan, p.1442)
• KRETE: Removed Gortys (was destroyed during the Arab invasion of 9th century)
• STRYMON: Renamed Kavala to Christoupolis (Kazhdan, p.443) and made Serres its capital (as it is most probable, see Nesbitt & Oikonomides, vol.1, p.104)
• BOULGARIA: Bitola renamed to Bitolis (Kazhdan, p.1619, "Pelagonia")
• PARISTRION: Renamed to Paradounavon, per Kazhdan, p.1589
• OPSIKION: Removed an unnamed city near Nicaea
• BOUKELLARION: Moved an unnamed city and renamed to Heracleia
• SAMOS: Ephesos renamed to "Theologos (Ephesos)", per Kazhdan, p.706
• KILIKIA: Moved Anazarbos to NW.
• ANATOLIKON: Changed Iconium to "Ikonion", since the rest of the map is using the hellenized forms of the city-names
• CHARSIANON: Added the Charsianon Kastron (many maps, including the basic source of this one, mention it)
• CAPPADOCIA: Added Koron as thematic capital (atttested at least until 9th c., see Kazhdan, p.378) instead of Podandus
• DOLICHE: Added Telouch as its thematic capital (Kazhdan, p.2023)
• MELITENE: Added this very important city

Help wanted

• THESSALONIKE: We may have to denote ducates (e.g. by underlining the capital of the ducate) and this was by all means one of them by 1025 (Kazhdan, p.2073). However Inkscape does not support text underlining
• HELLAS: For the capital, Nesbitt & Oikonomides, vol.2, p.22, say that Thebes and Larissa were the seats of its strategos in first/second half of 10th century, respectively. Does this mean that Thebes was no longer its capital in 1025?
• PELOPONNESOS: Note: from the end of 10th century, there was a tendency to combine its fiscal and financial authorities with those of HELLAS, see Nosbitt & Oikonomides, Catalogue of Byzantine Seals at Dumbarton Oaks and in the Fogg Museum of Art, vol.2: South of the Balkans, the Islands, South of Asia Minor, p.22 and Kazhdan, p.911
• CHARSIANON: In 1025, the seat of its strategus is not clear. The map locates it at Caesarea (the seat of Fokades family) but I could not find any secondary source for this. In older times, the seat was definitely at Charsianon Kastron (probably Mushalem Kalesi near mod. Akdagmadeni).

REFERENCES:

• Kazhdan, Alex. (1991), Oxford Dictionary of Byzantium, Oxford University Press.
• Haldon John (2005), The Palgrave Atlas of Byzantine History, Palgrave Macmillan.
• Cambridge History of the Byzantine Empire c. 500–1492, Cambridge University Press, 2008.

Be patient for the next update that will try to improve the boundaries of the Asiatic themes (plus it will correct an error in the location of Chonae and Laodicea).--Dipa1965 (talk) 22:37, 28 December 2012 (UTC)

Request

Please note a two-fold request:

1. This is very good map, however, for its use in the articles about the themata, especilally in the introduction, simplicity is paramount. I therefore suggest the following version to be developed : (note that I still like this analytical map, so I do not propose to replace it, just to make another map.) the proposal consists of:

• removal of capital cities or important cities of the themata
• removal of geographical characteristics such as islands etc
• colour coding of areas of each Thema, see as an example file:Byzantine Empire Themata-950-el.svg (seems too simple? Well it's is ideal for the introduction to the article)

2. Please add a layer in your graphics software with the Greek terms and take the trouble to save the map twice every time you amend it, once in English and once in Greek.

My best wishes for a happy new year. --FocalPoint (talk) 12:00, 31 December 2012 (UTC)

I respectfully disagree with part of the the first request, namely on the removal of capital cities. The map is by far not as cluttered so as to necessitate such a step, and it is always helpful to be able to tell at a glance which theme had which city as its centre. Ditto for the islands, since most people outside Greece couldn't tell Crete from Cyprus, let alone Chios from Euboea or Corfu...--Constantine ✍ 14:05, 31 December 2012 (UTC)

For those who are interested, I have found some time over the past few days to revisit the map, and should have a new and much improved version (in size and accuracy) up within a week or so. Best, Constantine ✍ 11:18, 31 January 2013 (UTC)

Greek toponyms

I like this map, also because it contains many original Byzantine-Greek place names (even if transliterated).

On the other hand, it is a bit confusing because there are also many English and Italian names, mostly in the West (Naples, Benevento, Ragusa) but even in the East (Constantinople, Corinth and all the islands like Rhodes etc.). Sometimes it is difficult to understand whether the name is Byzantine-Greek or not (e. g. Smyrna, Telouch). Since the map is about Byzantium, I think it would be nice and historically appropriate to use always the Byzantine names (at least for the cities and the regions that were at least one time in the empire). If any Byzantine name of important city or island is now obsolete and obscure, you could write also the modern English translation in brackets (as you did for Bari). I don't know how to find all these Byzantine names, but if someone has a book or an atlas, it would be great!

Morava river and Western Balkans borders

This map is mostly based on this map (Haldon, John: Warfare, State And Society In The Byzantine World 565-1204, Routledge, 1999), which has seriously distorted depiction of the whole Western Balkans political borders (user Dipa1956 later made a substantial editing correcting some of it, but still remained some errors).

Great Morava river is way too short as en:South Morava, which is the beginning of the Great Morava, starts almost near Skopje.

Dioclean borders should include Skadar/Scutari.

Serbian borders have strangely depicted eastern border.

It should look something like this map (Mihailo Dinić, Ilija Sindik, Historija Naroda Jugoslavije, 1953), while this map (Shepherd, 1923) is outdated and exaggerated for the time period (rather shows late 11th-mid 12th century), and this map (Cirkovic, The Serbs, 2004) is what Serbia looked like c. 1220.

Considering international references by Cambridge University Press, corrections can be done using these two sources:

Stephenson Paul: Byzantium's Balkan Frontier: A Political Study of the Northern Balkans, 900-1204 (Cambridge University Press 2004) ISBN 978-0-521-77017-0, Map in pp. 2, 20, 149, 254

Cambridge History of the Byzantine Empire c. 500–1492 (ed. Jonathan Shepard, Cambridge University Press 2008) ISBN 978-0-521-83231-1, Map in pp. 534, 635, 666, 667 Miki Filigranski (talk) 22:52, 10 January 2024 (UTC)