Simeon (also Symeon) I the Great (Bulgarian: Симеон I Велики, transliterated Simeon I Veliki[2] [simɛˈɔn ˈpɤ̞rvi vɛˈliki]) ruled over Bulgaria from 893 to 927,[3] during the First Bulgarian Empire. Simeon's successful campaigns against the Byzantines, Magyars and Serbs led Bulgaria to its greatest territorial expansion ever,[4] making it the most powerful state in contemporary Eastern Europe.[5] His reign was also a period of unmatched cultural prosperity and enlightenment later deemed the Golden Age of Bulgarian culture.[6]
During Simeon's rule, Bulgaria spread over a territory between the Aegean, the Adriatic and the Black Sea,[7][8] and the new Bulgarian capital Preslav was said to rival Constantinople.[8][9] The newly independent Bulgarian Orthodox Church became the first new patriarchate besides the Pentarchy, and Bulgarian Glagolitic translations of Christian texts spread all over the Slavic world of the time.[10] Halfway through his reign, Simeon assumed the title of Emperor (Tsar),[11] having prior to that been styled Prince (Knyaz).[12]

Biography

Background and early life

Simeon was born in 864 or 865, as the third son of Knyaz Boris I[12] of Krum's dynasty.[13] As Boris was the ruler who Christianized Bulgaria in 865, Simeon was a Christian all his life.[12][14] Because his eldest brother Vladimir was designated heir to the Bulgarian throne, Boris intended Simeon to become a high-ranking cleric,[15] possibly Bulgarian archbishop, and sent him to the leading University of Constantinople to receive theological education when he was thirteen or fourteen.[14] He took the Hebrew name Simeon[16] as a novice in a monastery in Constantinople.[14] During the decade (ca. 878–888) he spent in the Byzantine capital, he received excellent education and studied the rhetoric of Demosthenes and Aristotle.[17] He also learned fluent Greek, to the extent that he was referred to as "the half-Greek" in Byzantine chronicles.[18] He is speculated to have been tutored by Patriarch Photios I of Constantinople,[19] but this is not supported by any source.[14]

Around 888, Simeon returned to Bulgaria and settled at the newly established royal monastery of Preslav "at the mouth of the Tiča",[21] where, under the guidance of Naum of Preslav, he engaged in active translation of important religious works from Greek to Old Church Slavonic (Old Bulgarian), aided by other students from Constantinople.[14] Meanwhile, Vladimir had succeeded Boris, who had retreated to a monastery, as ruler of Bulgaria. Vladimir attempted to reintroduce paganism in the empire and possibly signed an anti-Byzantine pact with Arnulf of Carinthia,[22] forcing Boris to re-enter political life. Boris had Vladimir imprisoned and blinded, and then appointed Simeon as the new ruler.[23][24] This was done at an assembly in Preslav which also proclaimed Bulgarian as the only language of state and church[25] and moved the Bulgarian capital from Pliska to Preslav, to better cement the recent conversion.[26] It is not known why Boris did not place his second son, Gavril, on the throne, but instead preferred Simeon.

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