Western Southeast Europe (1252 – 1395 CE): Serbian Zenith, Ragusan Republic, and Adriatic–Danubian Crossroads

Geographic and Environmental Context

Western Southeast Europe includes Greece (outside Thrace), Albania, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Kosovo, most of Bosnia, southwestern Serbia, most of Croatia, and Slovenia.

• Coastal lowlands and islands along the Adriatic (Dalmatia, the Ionian isles) met the Dinaric and Pindus mountains’ karst and upland pastures.

• Interior corridors—Morava–Vardar, Drina–Sava, and the Via Egnatia from Dyrrachium (Durres) to Thessaloniki—linked the Aegean and Adriatic to the central Balkans.

• River valleys and Mediterranean basins of Attica, Boeotia, Peloponnese, and Epiros anchored Byzantine agrarian themes.

Climate and Environmental Shifts

• Early Little Ice Age (~1300) brought cooler, more variable seasons; the Black Death (1348–1350) hit ports and mining towns hard, with uneven recovery afterward.

Societies and Political Developments

• Serbia: Stefan Uroš IV Dušan (r. 1331–1355) forged a vast empire over Macedonia, Epirus, Thessaly, styled “Emperor of Serbs and Greeks” (1346); promulgated Dušan’s Code (1349/1354). Post-1355, magnate fragmentation; Prince Lazar’s coalition fell at Kosovo Polje (1389); Ottomans advanced up the Vardar–Morava axis.

• Bosnia: Ban/King Tvrtko I (r. 1353–1391) expanded into Hum (Herzegovina) and coastal tracts; royal title claimed in 1377; silver mining underwrote power.

• Croatia & Dalmatia: after the Treaty of Zadar (1358), Ragusa (Dubrovnik) became effectively independent as a republic under Hungarian suzerainty; Venice retained enclaves but lost most Dalmatia for a time.

• Ragusa codified the Statute, developed consular networks to Alexandria, Constantinople, Apulia, and became a premier brokerage hub.

• Slovenia & inland Croatia: Habsburgs consolidated Carniola, Styria; towns like Ljubljana and Zagreb grew.

• Greek states (Epirus, Achaea, Athens) persisted in fragmented form, increasingly pressured by Ottomans late in the century.

Economy and Trade

• Mining & coinage: Novo Brdo, Rudnik, Srebrenica supplied silver; Serbian dinars and Ragusan issues circulated.

• Adriatic trade: Ragusan fleets exported Balkan silver, wax, leather; imported Italian cloth, salt, and spices; Dalmatian communes shipped timber and grain inland.

• Agrarian base: grain–vine–olive belts on coasts; transhumance in uplands; river valleys fed internal markets.

Subsistence and Technology

• Fortified cities (walls of Dubrovnik, Zadar, Kotor); castles protected mining roads.

• Shipyards turned out cogs and galleys; notarial and insurance instruments stabilized long-distance trade.

Movement and Interaction Corridors

• Adriatic sea-lanes (Ragusa–Kotor–Split–Zadar ⇄ Venice–Apulia–Ancona).

• Silver roads from Bosnia/Serbia to Ragusa/Dalmatia.

• Vardar–Morava route through Skopje–Niš; Sava–Drava tied inland to the sea.

Belief and Symbolism

• Orthodoxy—monasteries (Dečani, Peć) and Serbian law codes; Catholicism—communes, mendicant houses in Dalmatia; Bosnian Church in Bosnia.

• Plague-era confraternities and Marian cults expanded; saints’ days structured civic calendars.

Adaptation and Resilience

• Institutional layering (royal courts, communes, mining communities) absorbed shocks.

• Commercial redundancy—alternate ports and passes—kept trade moving despite wars and plague.

• Fiscal pivots—silver, salt, and customs—funded defenses and reconstruction.

Long-Term Significance

By 1395, Western Southeast Europe was a corridor of mines, ports, and passes: Serbia past its apex and facing Ottoman pressure; Bosnia at high tide; Ragusa a nimble republic; Dalmatia/Croatia/Slovenia balancing Hungary and Venice. These matrices would shape 15th-century Ottoman expansion and Adriatic power politics.

The East Romans, called Byzantines by historians, war with with the Ottoman Turks from 1302.

The imperial government hires the Catalan Company after a defeat in the Battle of Bapheus.

The Catalans follow a series of victories against the Turks by turning against Constantinople following the murder of their leader.

The Company proceeds to devastate the regions of Thrace and Macedonia for the next two years, including an attack on Thessalonica by land and sea, and raids against the monasteries on Mount Athos.

The Athonite monks had allowed no Catalans on the Athos peninsula until recently, but this situation has change in the past few year following the payment of reparations by the Catalan government.

The Catalans, haarassed by the imperial army under the general Chandrenos, eventually leave Macedonia and make for Thessaly.

They take control of the duchy of Athens and conquer the city of Thebes by 1311.

The Bulgarian tsar now turns to Constantinople, which had inspired the Tatar invasions and has managed to conquer many Bulgarian fortresses in Thrace.

As a consequence of his victories, Theodore Svetoslav feels secure enough to move on to the offensive by 1303 and capture the fortresses of northeastern Thrace, including Mesembria (Nesebăr), …

…Anchialos (Pomorie), and …

…Sozopolis (Sozopol).

Emperor Andronikos II Palaiologos, who has reduced the empire’s armed forces as an economy measure, has few options other than the hiring of the sixty-five hundred-man strong Catalan Company, commanded by Roger de Flor, to fight the Ottoman Turks encroaching on Constantinople.

Flor marries the niece of Andronikos, daughter of the Tsar of Bulgaria, not long after his arrival in the city, and is named grand duke (head of the fleet).

Roger de Flor, born in Brindisi in 1280, had gone to sea as a boy and become a Knight Templar.

When Acre in Palestine had fallen to the Saracens in 1291, he had made his fortune by blackmailing refugees.

Denounced by his grand master, he had fled to Genoa and become commander of a force of almogávares (Spanish frontiersmen turned mercenaries) in service to the Aragonese king of Sicily, Frederick III, who was warring with the House of Anjou.

With four thousand almogávares idled by the end of the Sicilian Wars and known as the Grand Catalan Company, he offers the services of his Company to Andronikos II Palaiologos and his son, the Basileus Michael IX Palaeologus, whose empire is under threat by the Turks invading Anatolia.

Both kings of Aragon and Sicily agree with the idea since peace has finally been reached in southern Italy and it is a viable alternative to having the Almogavar standing army unemployed in their realms.

With the help of King Frederick, Flor departs for Constantinople in 1303 with thirty-nine galleys and transports carrying around fifteen hundred knights and four thousand Almogavars.

The imperial counterattack fails at the battle of Skafida near Sozopolis, where the co-emperor Michael IX Palaiologos is turned to flight.

The imperial army has an advantage in the beginning and manages to push the Bulgarians across the river.

They are so infatuated with the chase of the retreating soldiers that they crowd on the bridge, which had been sabotaged before the battle by the Bulgarians, and breaks down.

The river is very deep at this place and many imperial soldiers panic and drown, which helps the Bulgarians snatch victory from defeat.

The Bulgarians capture many imperial soldiers and, according to custom, release the common soldiers and hold only the nobles for ransom.

Nevertheless, the war continues, with Michael IX and Theodore Svetoslav taking turns pillaging each other's lands.

The Catalan Company makes one successful counterattack against the Turks at Philadelphia in western Anatolia.

Roger de Flor is given the region without the cities as his fiefdom.

However, the Catalans, claiming insufficient payment by the emperor, turn on their patrons and attack the nearby town of Magnesia (modern Alasehir, Turkey), robbing Greeks and Turks alike.

Roger de Flor's evident intention to found a principality of his own, combined with the predatory activities of his army, lead to his recall at the end of 1304.

Roger de Flor attends a banquet offered by Emperor Andronikos' son Michael XI Palaeologus in the imperial palace at Adrianople on April 30, 1305.

Here, Michael arranges Flor’s assassination, along with three hundred cavalry and one thousand infantry, by Alan mercenaries at the service of the emperor.