page_title: Origin hypotheses of the Serbs
section_title: Migration of White Serbs to the Balkans
hierarchical_section_title: Origin hypotheses of the Serbs / Migration of White Serbs to the Balkans
caption_attribution_description: English: Dervan's Serbia, 7th century.Српски / srpski: Dervanova Srbija, 7. vek.
context_page_description: The Serbs trace their history to the 6th and 7th-century southwards migration of Slavs. The Serbs, as the other South Slavs, absorbed Paleo-Balkan peoples and established various states throughout the Middle Ages. Serbian historiography agrees on that the beginning of Serbian history started with the forming of Serbian statehood in the Early Middle Ages.
context_section_description: According to De Administrando Imperio (DAI, written by the Byzantine emperor Constantine VII (912-959), the Serbs originated from the "White Serbs" who lived on the "other side of Turkey" (name used for Hungary), in the area that they called "Boiki" (Bohemia). White Serbia bordered to the Franks and White Croatia. DAI claims that after two brothers inherited the rule from their father, one of them took half of the people and migrated to the Byzantine Empire (i.e. to the Balkans), which was governed by Emperor Heraclius (610-641). According to German historian Ludwig Albrecht Gebhardi, the two brothers were sons of Dervan, the dux (duke) of the Surbi (Sorbs). Another part of the White Serbs did not migrate southwards, but remained in the Elbe region. Descendants of these White Serbs are the present day Lusatian Serbs (Sorbs), who still live in the Lusatia (Lužica, Lausitz) region of eastern Germany. There are also opinions that data from "De administrando imperio" that describes Serb migration to the Balkans is not correct and that Serbs came to the Balkans from Eastern Slavic lands, together with other South Slavs.
  In the Balkans, Serbs settled first an area near Thessaloniki and then area around rivers Tara, Ibar, Drina and Lim (in the present-day border region of Serbia, Montenegro and Bosnia and Herzegovina, but also Dalmatia), and joined with surrounding South Slavic tribes that came to the Balkans earlier (in the 6th century) and the Paleo-Balkan people. Over time, the South Slavic and mostly Illyrian tribes of this territory  mixed with the Serbs and also adopted Serb name as their own.
  The Emperor Constantine III (641) transferred a part of the Slavs from the Balkans (Vardar region) to Asia Minor. There these migrants founded the city of Gordoservon, the name of which gives grounds for supposing that among its founders there were Serbs, and was also known under names Gordoserbon and Servochoria.
caption: Dervan's Serbia (White Serbia), 7th century.
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