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Tsar Kaloyan reburied in Veliko Tarnovo |
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800 years after the death of tsar Kaloyan (1197-1207) the
sarcophagus with the relics of the legendary Bulgarian ruler was
buried in the yard of the St. 40 Martyrs temple in Veliko Tarnovo on
April 19, 2007. The ceremony was performed with state funeral
honours, in the presence of the Guard of Honour, with military and
church ceremonial. The ritual started with bringing out the
sarcophagus from the Regional Museum of History. It was carried by
Guards and winded by the national flag, placed over a mount and
dragged by Armored Personnel Carrier of the Military Forces,
accompanied by the sound of drums. In the beginning of the
procession a Guard carried a graphical portrait of tsar Kaloyan. The
coffin was laid down in grave No 39 in the church St. 40 Martyrs.
There the prominent Kaloyan ring was found. The idea is to rebury
the relics of the rules Samuil and Mihail Shishman, which are also
found. Thus a pantheon of the Bulgarian rulers will be established.
Tzar Kaloyan was the young brother of Assen and Petar, who
restored the Bulgarian State. Kaloyan ascended to the throne in
1197 after both his brothers died in the same year. He immediately
started active campaogn against Byzantine emperor and managed
to conquer the Thracian fortress Konstancia (Simeonovgrad). Then
he started to Varna, laid in under siege and on March 24, 1201
entered it. In the end of 1201 he began peace negotiations and the
peace treaty was signed in 1202. Tsar Kaloyan received a letter from
Pope Innocent III, who hoped to join Bulgaria to the Catholic church.
The response of Kaloyan came threee years later insisting on
receiving a king crown and independent church. On October 15
1204 Cardinal Leo, arrived in Bulgaria, he anointed the Archbishop
Vasilij of Tărnovo as Primate of Bulgaria, and crowned
Kaloyan as rex Bulgarorum et Blachorum. Immediately afterwards,
in 1204, the Fourth Crusade captured Constantinople and created
the Latin Empire, electing as emperor Baldwin I of Flanders.
Although Kaloyan had offered the crusaders an alliance against the
Byzantine Empire, his offer had been spurned, and the Latin Empire
expressed the intention of conquering all the lands of the former
Byzantine Empire, including the territories ruled by Kaloyan. The
impending conflict was precipitated by the Byzantine aristocracy in
Thrace, which rebelled against Latin rule in 1205 and called on
Kaloyan for help, offering him its submission. On April 14, 1205,
Kaloyan's Cumans managed to draw the pursuing heavy cavalry of
the Latin Empire into an ambush in the marshes north of Adrianople,
and Kaloyan inflicted a crushing defeat on the crusader army.
Emperor Baldwin I was captured, Count Louis I of Blois was killed,
and the Venetian Doge Enrico Dandolo led the surviving portions of
the crusader army into a hasty retreat back to Constantinople, during
the course of which he died of exhaustion. Baldwin was imprisoned
in the Bulgarian capital Tarnovo until he died or was executed later
in 1205. In 1207 Kaloyan advanced on the city and besieged it with
a large force, but was murdered by his own Cuman commander
Manastar at the beginning of October 1207.
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