Organization: Penn State University
Date: Fri, 9 Oct 1992 03:34:11 EDT
From: <PXP111@psuvm.psu.edu>  Andronikos Romanos
Newsgroups: soc.culture.greek,soc.culture.bulgaria,soc.culture.yugoslavia
Subject: Re: Two Quizzes on Macedonia (was Ioannes Scylitzes on Tsar Samuil)


Luben Boyanov (lb@cs.man.ac.uk) writes in Message-ID <6397@m1.cs.
man.ac.uk>:


> In article <92282.042216PXP111@psuvm.psu.edu> PXP111@psuvm.psu.
> edu writes:
>     [stuff deleted]
>  >> most powerful comites of Bulgaria, were spreading unrest
>  >        \                 \
>  >       "wealthier"        IN Bulgaria
>  >       equally or
>  >       more probable.          (directly from the Greek text)
>
> Well, I had the translation with the text I've typed. After all
> you can see that the translation I had  wasn't  the same as the
> one you provided. Furthermore, I've given this text because you
> provided text mentioning about  "Byzantine comites"  and  based
> your conlcusisons on that.

I  had  no translated text in my original posting.  I merely gave
the general idea of the content. The word "IN" here may have some
distinct importance... Anyway, the title "comis"  per se  suports
my original claim and G.Ostogorsky  reads  the same thing for the
magistry, the "Byzantine military command" I mentioned.
Actually, after describing the Byzantine politics in page 301  he
writes:
"After the death of John Tzimisces, a revolt broke out in the Ma-
cedonia region, led by the four Cometopuli, the sons of the comes
Nicholas, a provincial governor in Macedonia."
(Bulgaria had been under Byzantine domination. see page 269 etc.)
               < G.Ostrogorsly: " History of the Byzantine State
               trans. Joan Hussey, Rutgers University Press,1969>
and that is why I specified the other line as well:

>>> comites of the Bulgarians and for this reason named Kometopouli
>>            \              \
>>       (living/staying) AMONG/CLOSE TO the Bulgarians
>>       "para Boulgarois" in the original text

> Can't argue because don't know Greek.

OK.

> from my point of view the entire 'deep' argument it's absolute-
> ly irrelevant.
> If Samuil was called Macedonian, Armenian,  Polish  or whatever
> King, the matter would have had a completely different dimenti-
> on.   And as I mentioned historians writing on the Balkans from
> the end of 19th, start of 20th century,  never  mentioned  any-
> thing else but "The Bulgarian Tsar Samuil".

No question about it.
All data support that he was one of the  most famous Tsars of the
Bulgarians.  That is easy!  My quiz was not associated with this.
So I asked something different, something hard to "nail down"...
Why should I put a quiz on a clear cut case?

>>>>>>  Were the Patriarchic Bulgarophones of the 1890's Greeks
>>>>>>  or Bulgarians?
>>             <successive arguments deleted>
>>> Finally, it is also well known that in ethnic mixed area like
>>> Macedonia, there WERE Greeks speaking Bulgarian.
>>
>> In this case I declare the first "quiz" solved, to L.Boyanov.
>
> you clipped 2 groups - Bulgarians who spoke Greek,

I did not ask such a quiz. This was irrelevant to my question.

> and Bulgarians who even didn't speak Greek,  but were Patriar-
> chists (i.e. counted in the statistics as Greek).

You could have stated it.

> That's why I recommended you Rev. Tozer and Brailsford,

That is why I said you answered the quiz!

>>> Then read Brailsford's book:  " Macedonia its races and their
>>> future".I bet you will find exceptionally interesting events.
>>
>> No need to bet!
>> I was the one who recommended the book to you...
>
> I don't know if you've ever (and when) mentioned it,

It is not important.

> But I am 100 % certain that it wasn't you who mentioned it on
> the net,

OK,  this shows  me  that these percentages of yours are rather..
lighthearted, and the the 100% for you is of rather insignificant
value.
The posting was <92176.032316PXP111@psuvm.psu.edu>.   I posted it
using extracts from pages 100 to 105  and focused on the identity
during the very late 19th ce.-early 20th ce.
After I completed another text you responded to both.

                                               Andronikos Romanos
Xref: sparky soc.culture.greek:9700 soc.culture.bulgaria:1516 soc.culture.yugoslavia:9128