Suchergebnisse

In Serbian historiography, the expansion of Serbia, or Raška (Rascia), in the first half of the 12th century at the expense of Byzantium, whose vassal it was, was recorded a long time ago. At the same time, it is recorded that Serbia was defeated three times by Byzantium (in 1127 – 1129, 1149 and 1150). Byzantium dealt with the problem of unruly vassals by annexing some territory at the beginning of the 11th century, relocating population (after 1129 and 1150), giving land to the Serbs settled along the Byzantine border (to Zavida, Primislav, Desa, Stefan Nemanja), and raising the number of soldiers Serbia was obliged to give for waging war (in 1150). The lands granted to Serbs between 1129 and 1143 spanned the area between Ras and Kopaonik, while those granted between 1150 and 1158/9 spanned the area between Kopaonik and the parishes (Serb. župa) of Toplica and Reka. The first expansion benefited Zavida, who received lands from Byzantium after acknowledging the Empirećs sovereignty, upon his return to Ras, which belonged to Byzantium at the time. The second expansion impacted at least a part of Zavida's territory which Stefan Nemanja later received when he became a suzerain in Serbia. We hypothesize that the territories that Byzantium gave to the Serbs as its vassals did become part of Serbia at a certain moment and under certain conditions. The answer to the question of how this was possible even though Serbia was defeated by Byzantium may be that Byzantine emperors regarded Serbian rulers as their officials and Serbian lands as Byzantine provinces.

Banishment from home is an old type of punishment, which was mainly used in regulating family relationships. It was first recorded in the Hammurabi's Code and subsequently envisaged in other legal systems. The first record of this punishment in Serbian legal history dates back to the medieval times, when King Stephen the First-Crowned banished his wife Eudokia for adultery. It was also recorded in the second Charter of Ziča, in Emperor Dušan's Code, in the abridged version of Mateus Blastares' Syntagma Canonum, and in the Code of Justinian, but not always as a form of punishment. It was more frequently envisaged in the medieval statutes of the Adriatic Sea coastal towns of Kotor, Budva and Skadar. Although it served various purposes, banishment was often used as a form of punishment. It was a common form of punishment for widows and widowers who failed to act on a pledge or failed to take proper care of the deceased spouse's property. It was also applicable in cases when parents (usually the father) wanted to punish their children for disobedience or failure to perform the duties they were expected to perform.