White Croats
Encyclopedia
Slavic peoples
The Slavic people are an Indo-European panethnicity living in Eastern Europe, Southeast Europe, North Asia and Central Asia. The term Slavic represents a broad ethno-linguistic group of people, who speak languages belonging to the Slavic language family and share, to varying degrees, certain...
(Croatian) tribes, of which seven tribes led by 5 brothers (Kluk, Lobel, Muhlo, Kosjenic and Hrvat) and 2 sisters (Buga and Tuga) migrated to Dalmatia
Dalmatia
Dalmatia is a historical region on the eastern coast of the Adriatic Sea. It stretches from the island of Rab in the northwest to the Bay of Kotor in the southeast. The hinterland, the Dalmatian Zagora, ranges from fifty kilometers in width in the north to just a few kilometers in the south....
(the coastal part of today's Croatia
Croatia
Croatia , officially the Republic of Croatia , is a unitary democratic parliamentary republic in Europe at the crossroads of the Mitteleuropa, the Balkans, and the Mediterranean. Its capital and largest city is Zagreb. The country is divided into 20 counties and the city of Zagreb. Croatia covers ...
) as part of the migration of the Croats
Croats
Croats are a South Slavic ethnic group mostly living in Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina and nearby countries. There are around 4 million Croats living inside Croatia and up to 4.5 million throughout the rest of the world. Responding to political, social and economic pressure, many Croats have...
in the 7th century, being invited to settle on this vastly depopulated area by Roman (Byzantine) Emperor Heraclius (610–641) in order to establish a shield against Avars for his state. Their homeland, defined by Edward Gibbon
Edward Gibbon
Edward Gibbon was an English historian and Member of Parliament...
as "the inland regions of Silesia
Silesia
Silesia is a historical region of Central Europe located mostly in Poland, with smaller parts also in the Czech Republic, and Germany.Silesia is rich in mineral and natural resources, and includes several important industrial areas. Silesia's largest city and historical capital is Wrocław...
and Lesser Poland
Lesser Poland
Lesser Poland is one of the historical regions of Poland, with its capital in the city of Kraków. It forms the southeastern corner of the country, and should not be confused with the modern Lesser Poland Voivodeship, which covers only a small, southern part of Lesser Poland...
", has occasionally been referred to as White Croatia
White Croatia
White Croatia is a vaguely defined area, said to lie somewhere in Central Europe, near Bavaria, beyond Hungary on south of Poland and west of Ukraine, and adjacent to the Frankish Empire from which the part of White Croats crossed the Carpathians and migrated in the 7th century into Dalmatia...
. The term "white" among nomadic peoples of euroasiatic steppes meant "western", the rest of directions being named: red - "south", black - "north" and green - "east".
In the late 10th century, one of the White Croats states, the duchy of Libice, was ruled by Slavnik's dynasty. In 995 Czech warriors of the Vršovci family from Bohemia
Bohemia
Bohemia is a historical region in central Europe, occupying the western two-thirds of the traditional Czech Lands. It is located in the contemporary Czech Republic with its capital in Prague...
attacked and murdered the Slavnik's (d. 981) descendants at Libice
Libice nad Cidlinou
Libice nad Cidlinou is a village in the Central Bohemian Region of the Czech Republic. It is one of the oldest settlements in Bohemia, located 5 km southeast of Poděbrady at the confluence of the Cidlina and Elbe rivers...
. Three surviving brothers: Soběslav (Sobiebor) (the eldest, at that time at war against Obotrites
Obotrites
The Obotrites , also commonly known as the Obodrites, Abotrites, or Abodrites, were a confederation of medieval West Slavic tribes within the territory of modern Mecklenburg and Holstein in northern Germany . For decades they were allies of Charlemagne in his wars against Germanic Saxons and Slavic...
as the duke of the Polans
Polans
Polans may refer to two Slavic tribes:* Polans , in the area of Dnieper river* Polans , in the area of Warta. The tribe unified most of the lands of present-day Poland under the Piast dynasty....
Boleslav's and German emperor Otto III's ally), Vojtěch
Adalbert of Prague
This article is about St Adalbert of Prague. For other uses, see Adalbert .Saint Adalbert, Czech: ; , , Czech Roman Catholic saint, a Bishop of Prague and a missionary, was martyred in his efforts to convert the Baltic Prussians. He evangelized Poles and Hungarians. St...
(later the Christian saint and the martyr) and Radim Gaudentius sought shelter in territory under the rule of Boleslav the Brave, with whom the Slavnik's family had friendly relationships, as Slavnik's duchy tried to maintain its independence from Prague Přemyslid dynasty
Premyslid dynasty
The Přemyslids , were a Czech royal dynasty which reigned in Bohemia and Moravia , and partly also in Hungary, Silesia, Austria and Poland.-Legendary rulers:...
. Soon the war between the Polish duke and Czechs' ruler, Boleslav III the Red, broke out (this time after Vršovci family extermination by Czech prince, the remnants seeking refuge in... Poland), leading the Polish Boleslav the Brave to having a temporary control of Prague. Soběslav, living in Poland after the Libice massacre of his family, was killed by Czechs defending a bridge near Prague
Prague
Prague is the capital and largest city of the Czech Republic. Situated in the north-west of the country on the Vltava river, the city is home to about 1.3 million people, while its metropolitan area is estimated to have a population of over 2.3 million...
shielding the retreat of Polish forces from the Czech capital in 1004.
The White Croats territory could have been quite vast, it is possible that it included land as far as Kiev
Kiev
Kiev or Kyiv is the capital and the largest city of Ukraine, located in the north central part of the country on the Dnieper River. The population as of the 2001 census was 2,611,300. However, higher numbers have been cited in the press....
(now Ukraine
Ukraine
Ukraine is a country in Eastern Europe. It has an area of 603,628 km², making it the second largest contiguous country on the European continent, after Russia...
). Its exact location is still the subject of discussion, as well as their genesis. Some historians present opinions, that ancient Croats were of Scytho-Sarmatian origin.
It is interesting to add that according to some American documents from the beginning of 20th century there were about 100,000 immigrants to the US born around Krakow
Kraków
Kraków also Krakow, or Cracow , is the second largest and one of the oldest cities in Poland. Situated on the Vistula River in the Lesser Poland region, the city dates back to the 7th century. Kraków has traditionally been one of the leading centres of Polish academic, cultural, and artistic life...
who declared themselves to be Bielo-Chorvats, i.e. White Croats by nationality.