page_title: Roman Catholic Diocese of Cumania
section_title: Background (before 1211)
hierarchical_section_title: Roman Catholic Diocese of Cumania / History / Background (before 1211)
caption_attribution_description: Kipchak stone baba
context_page_description: The Roman Catholic Diocese of Cumania was a Latin-rite bishopric west of the Siret River from 1228 to 1241. The lands incorporated into the diocese had been dominated by the nomadic Cumans since about 1100. Catholic missions began after Andrew II of Hungary granted Burzenland to the Teutonic Knights in 1211. After Andrew expelled the Knights from the territory in 1225, Dominican friars continued the Cuman mission. Robert, Archbishop of Esztergom baptized Boricius, an influential Cuman chieftain, two years later.
  Robert ordained a Hungarian Dominican friar, Theodoric, as the first bishop of Cumania in early 1228. Pope Gregory IX confirmed Theodoric's consecration on 21 March of that year, and the diocese was subordinate to the Holy See in 1229. The episcopal see was on the Milcov River, but its exact location is unknown. The diocese included Burzenland and lands east of the Carpathian Mountains. Vlachs who belonged to the Orthodox Church were a significant part of the diocese's population. They did not follow the Catholic bishop, and persuaded many Catholic Hungarians and Saxons to accept their Orthodox bishops.
context_section_description: The nomadic Cumans controlled the lands north of the Lower Danube and east of the Carpathian Mountains after about 1100. Archaeological research indicates that most settlements in the territory had been abandoned by that time. According to John Kinnamos, a Byzantine army which invaded the Kingdom of Hungary in 1166 "had passed through some wearisome and rugged regions and had gone through a land entirely bereft of men" before entering Hungary across the Eastern Carpathians.
  Twelfth-century Sicilian Muslim geographer Muhammad al-Idrisi wrote that the two Cuman groups (the Black Cumans and White Cumans) were separated from each other by the Dniester River. Describing the eastern borders of the Kingdom of Hungary around 1150, Otto of Freising mentioned the "open land of the Patzinaks and the Falones" (the Pechenegs and Cumans, respectively). He described the territory as a "very fine hunting ground practically untouched by plow and hoe", suggesting a lack of agriculture. However, archaeological research has indicated that local inhabitants practised agriculture in the Prut-region settlements during the 11th and 12th centuries. According to the Hypatian Codex, Ivan Rostislavich—who claimed the Principality of Halych (or Galicia)—"did harm to the Galician fishermen" on the Lower Danube (implying that portions of the lands between the Eastern Carpathians and the river were controlled by the princes of Halych). The Cumans were pagans who worshipped the sky, the earth and other natural elements.
  According to Niketas Choniates's chronicle, "the Vlachs, who had heard rumors" of the escape of Andronikos Komnenus (a rebellious cousin of the Byzantine Emperor Manuel I), captured him in 1164 at the borders of Halych. Choniates reported that Vlachs, Slavs and Cumans also inhabited the lands between the Carpathians and the Lower Danube, and the Vlachs' cooperation with the Cumans against the Byzantine Empire is well-documented. According to Anna Comnena, local Vlachs showed "the way through the passes" of the Balkan Mountains to Cumans who invaded the Byzantine lands south of the Lower Danube in 1094. Peter and Asen, leaders of the 1186 rebellion of the Bulgarians and Vlachs against Byzantine rule, crossed the lower Danube to seek assistance from the Cumans in the summer of 1186 and returned "with their Cuman auxiliaries" to continue the fight. "Cumans, with a division of Vlachs, crossed" the lower Danube and invaded Thrace in 1199.
  However, conflicts between the Cumans and the Vlachs were also recorded. According to a 1250 royal charter, King Andrew I of Hungary dispatched Joachim, Count of Hermannstadt to lead an army of Saxon, Vlach, Székely and Pecheneg warriors to assist Boril in Bulgaria after "three chieftains from Cumania" rebelled against Boril of Bulgaria in the early 1210s. The reference to the Vlachs' participation in Joachim's campaign is some of the earliest evidence of Vlach communities subjected to Hungarian rule. The Vlachs had a special status, distinct from other commoners in the Kingdom of Hungary. They paid in-kind taxes, such as a quinquagesima (one-fiftieth) on their herds; Orthodox, they were exempt from the tithes paid by Catholic peasants.
caption: Cuman stone statue
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