Dobromir, known to the Byzantines as Chrysos ( mk, Добромир Хрс, bg, Добромир Хриз, el, Δοβρομηρός Χρύσος), was a leader of the
Vlach
"Vlach" ( or ), also "Wallachian" (and many other variants), is a historical term and exonym used from the Middle Ages until the Modern Era to designate mainly Romanians but also Aromanians, Megleno-Romanians, Istro-Romanians and other Easter ...
s and
Bulgarian Slavs in eastern
Macedonia during the reign of the
Byzantine emperor
This is a list of the Byzantine emperors from the foundation of Constantinople in 330 AD, which marks the conventional start of the Eastern Roman Empire, to its fall to the Ottoman Empire in 1453 AD. Only the emperors who were recognized as ...
Alexios III Angelos
Alexios III Angelos ( gkm, Ἀλέξιος Κομνηνός Ἄγγελος, Alexios Komnēnos Angelos; 1211), Latinized as Alexius III Angelus, was Byzantine Emperor from March 1195 to 17/18 July 1203. He reigned under the name Alexios Komnen ...
. According to
Niketas Choniates
Niketas or Nicetas Choniates ( el, Νικήτας Χωνιάτης; c. 1155 – 1217), whose actual surname was Akominatos (Ἀκομινάτος), was a Byzantine Greek government official and historian – like his brother Michael Akominatos, w ...
, Dobromir Chrysos was, despite his Slavic name, a "Vlach" (an
Aromanian or
Megleno-Romanian) by birth. However, most probably he was of mixed Slavic–Vlach origins. Due to the complexity of pre-nationalist ethnic labels, references to modern ethnic groups in the Middle ages are obscure.
[John V. A. (Jr.) Fine, When Ethnicity Did Not Matter in the Balkans: A Study of Identity in Pre-Nationalist Croatia, Dalmatia, and Slavonia in the Medieval and Early-Modern Periods, University of Michigan Press, 2010; , p. 56.] He became prominent in 1197 and is last heard of in 1202.
He was already married, but in order to cement an alliance with him the Emperor offered him a daughter of the Byzantine warlord
Manuel Kamytzes. She was forced to divorce her husband and to marry Dobromir in 1198. About 1200 he took a third wife, the Emperor's granddaughter
Theodora Angelina, who had previously been married to a rival leader,
Ivanko
Ivanko is a Slavic given name and a surname, a diminutive from the given name Ivan, a Slavic variant of the name "John". It may be a transliteration from Иванко or Иванько.
Notable people with the name include:
Given name
* Ivan ...
.
In 1202 the lands of Dobromir Chrysos were conquered by Bulgarian emperor
Kaloyan.
Sources
*''O city of Byzantium: annals of
Niketas Choniates
Niketas or Nicetas Choniates ( el, Νικήτας Χωνιάτης; c. 1155 – 1217), whose actual surname was Akominatos (Ἀκομινάτος), was a Byzantine Greek government official and historian – like his brother Michael Akominatos, w ...
'' tr. Harry J. Magoulias (Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 1984) pp. 267–270, 277-280, 293-294.
Notes
Literature
Томов, Т. Добромир Хриз, който владееше Просек и Струмица - Анамнеза, Т. 6 (2008), 97-114
{{DEFAULTSORT:Chrysos, Dobromir
12th-century Bulgarian people
13th-century Bulgarian people
Bulgarian people of the Byzantine–Bulgarian Wars
Medieval Bulgarian military personnel
12th-century births
13th-century deaths
Medieval Bulgarian nobility
History of the Aromanians
Rulers in medieval Macedonia