Great Moravia - Territory

Territory

There is a difficulty in establishing an adequate definition and identification of the inhabitants in the territory of Great Moravia. The historical record is anything but precise on this question. The structure of the state itself does not provide better answers as it is likely that it was a loose structure of federated principalities.

The Moravian state underwent considerable expansion, especially in the 870s, under Svatopluk I. In the 870s or 880s, the Moravians made a bid to extend their power northwards across the Carpathians to the broad fertile lands in Silesia and Lesser Poland. There is little clear archaeological or written evidence, however, of a permanent extension of Moravian centralization of power in Lesser Poland or to the west in Silesia, or (as has been claimed by some historians) into Pannonia. Indeed modern historiography has tended to question the former claims of huge neighboring territories permanently annexed by the Moravian state. Thus, it is under debate whether the "Balaton Principality" (administered probably by counts appointed by the King of East Francia during this period) or parts of the Carpathian Basin east of the rivers Danube and Tisza (Tisa) ("the territories of the Avars") were ever controlled by King Svatopluk. German historians Golberg and Reuter both suggests that Moravia did, in fact, control lower Pannonia (modern Hungarian Transdanubia), perhaps on two occasions: 858-863 when Carloman gave it to Ratislav for his support against Louis the German, and again in 885-892 when Svatopoluk clashed with Arnulf.

As for the history of Bohemia—annexed by Great Moravia for eleven years (from 883 to 894), the crucial year is 895, when the Bohemians broke away from the empire and became vassals of Arnulf of Carinthia. Independent Bohemia, ruled by the dynasty of Přemyslids, began to gradually emerge.