1. Eugene M. Alexander, "Early Slavic Invasions and Settlements in
the Area of the Lower Danube in the Sixth Through the Eighth Centuries," Ph.D. diss. (New
York University, 1994), p. 205. Cf. Perry Anderson, Passages from Antiquity to
Feudalism (London, 1977), pp. 216 and 285; Walter Pohl, Die Awaren. Ein Steppenvolk
im Mitteleuropa 567-822 n. Chr. (Munich, 1988), p. 94.
2. Robert Benedicty, "Die auf die frühslawische
Gesellschaftsbezügliche byzantinische Terminologie," in Actes du XII-e
Congrès international d'études byzantines (Ochride, 10-16 septembre 1961),
vol. 2 (Belgrade, 1963), pp. 45-55, esp. pp. 46-47; Lubomír E. Havlík, "Die
Byzantiner über die Verfassung der Slawen im 6. und 7. Jahrhundert," in From Late
Antiquity to Early Byzantium. Proceedings of the Byzantinological Symposium in the 16th
International Eirene Conference, ed. V. Vavrínek (Prague, 1985), pp. 173-78, esp. p.
174; Robert Benedicty, "Prokopios' Berichte über die slavische Vorzeit. Beiträge zur
historiographischen Methode Prokopios von Kaisareia," Jahrbuch der österreichischen
byzantinischen Gesellschaft 11 (1965), 51-78, esp. p. 53.
3. Huw M. A. Evans, The Early Medieval Archaeology of
Croatia A.D. 600-900 (Oxford, 1989), p. 63.
4. M. Iu. Braichevskii, "Ob ‘antakh’ Psevdomavrikii,"
Sovetskaia Etnografiia 2 (1953), 21-36, esp. p. 22; Genoveva Cankova-Petkova,
"Gesellschaftsordnung und Kriegskunst der slawischen Stämme der Balkanhalbinsel (6.-8.
Jh.) nach den byzantinischen Quellen," Helikon 2 (1962), 264-70, esp. p. 267; Benedicty,
"Prokopios' Berichte," pp. 61-62. See also G. G. Litavrin, "Predstavleniia ‘varvarov’ o Vizantii
i vizantiicakh v VI-X vv.," Vizantiiskii Vremennik 46 (1985), 100-8, esp. p. 101;
Havlík, "Die Byzantiner," p. 176; cf. Berthold Rubin, Prokopius von Kaisareia
(Stuttgart/Waldsee, 1954), p. 198.
page 29
5. See Günther Guhr and Friedrich Schlette, "Die
militärische Demokratie nach L. H. Morgan," Zeitschrift für
Geschichtswissenschaft 30 (1982), nos. 10-11, 909-15, esp. p. 910; Abram I. Peršic, "Das
Problem der militärischen Demokratie," in Familie, Staat und Gesellschaftsformation.
Grundprobleme vorkapitalistischer Epochen einhundert Jahren nach Friedrich Engels' Werk, "Der
Ursprung der Familie, des Privateigentums und des Staate," ed. J. Herrmann and J.
Köhn (Berlin, 1988), pp. 75-81, esp. p. 78.
6. Frederick Engels, Selected Works in One Volume (New
York, 1968), p. 581; see Günther Guhr, "Das Wesen der militärische Demokratie bei
Morgan sowie bei Marx und Engels," Ethnographisch-archäologische Zeitschrift 25
(1984), 229-56, esp. pp. 239-40. The concept of "military democracy" was further developed in
the Soviet Union in the 1930s, when it was used in reference to the final stage of primitive
society, the last step before class society. Cf. S. P. Tolstov, "Voennaia demokratiia i problema
'genetischeskoi revolucii'," in Problemy istorii dokapitalicheskikh obshchestv (Moscow,
1935), pp. 203-15; see also Anatolii M. Khazanov, "'Military democracy' and the epoch of class
formation," in Soviet Ethnology and Anthropology Today, ed. Julian V. Bromley (The
Hague/Paris, 1974), pp. 133-46, esp. p. 134. The theory of the military democracy gradually lost
its popularity after World War II and during the 1960s, when it was exposed to harsh criticism
from both Soviet and Western Marxists. Cf. Joachim Herrmann, "Militärische Demokratie
und die Übergangsperiode zur Klassengesellschaft,"
Ethnographisch-archäologische Zeitschrift 23 (1982), 11-31, esp. p. 17; Khazanov,
"'Military democracy'," p. 144; Peršic, "Das Problem." The wide variety of political forms and
structures described by anthropologists and ethnologists made the rigid scheme derived from
Morgan's and Engels's work a totally inadequate concept.
7. Benedicty, "Terminologie," pp. 49-50 and 54-55; Benedicty,
"Prokopios' Berichte," p. 66. Cf. Pohl, Die Awaren, p. 127. Contra: M. B.
Sverdlov, "Obshchestvennyi stroi slavian v VI-nachale VII veka," Sovetskoe
slavianovedenie 3 (1977), 46-59, esp. p. 57.
8. Benedicty, "Prokopios' Berichte," p. 53.
9. Herrmann, "Militärische Demokratie," p. 20; cf. Herrmann.,
"Militärische Demokratie und Allodismus in Mitteleuropa zwischen Antike und
Feudalgesellschaft," Ethnographisch-archäologische Zeitschrift 28 (1987), 257-67,
esp. pp. 263-64.
10. Kristian Kristiansen, "Chiefdoms, states, and systems of social
evolution," in Chiefdoms: Power, Economy, and Ideology, ed. Timothy Earle
(Cambridge/New York/Port Chester, 1991), pp. 16-43, esp. pp. 19-20; Christine Ward Gailey and
Thomas C. Patterson, "State formation and uneven development," in State and Society. The
Emergence and Development of Social Hierarchy and Political Centralization, ed. J. Gledhill,
B. Bender, and M. Trolle Larsen (London/Boston/Sydney, 1988), pp. 74-85, esp. p. 81.
11. Pierre Bourdieu, "Structures, habitus, power. Basis for a theory
of symbolic power," in Culture/Power/ History. A Reader in Contemporary Social
Theory, ed. N. B. Dirks, G. Eley, and S. B. Ortner (Princeton, 1994), pp. 155-99, esp. pp.
173 and 194.
page 30
12. Timothy K. Earle, "The evolution of chiefdoms," Current
Anthropology 30 (1989), no. 1, 84-88, esp. p. 86.
13. The phrase is that of Pierre Bourdieu, "Structures."
14. Ivanka Nikolajevic "L'arte bizantina: ricettività e
creatività locale," in Gli Slavi occidentali e meridionali nell'alto medioevo
(Spoleto, 1983), pp. 801-29, esp. p. 803. In the 570s, the throne of the Byzantine emperor was
often associated with the throne of Christ. Justin II's coins emphasize this quasi-religious theme of
the enthroned emperor, already glorified by Flavius Cresconius Corippus in his poem written on
the occasion of the emperor's rise to power. See Averil Cameron, "Images of authority: elites and
icons in late sixth century Byzantium," in Byzantium and the Classical Tradition. University of
Birmingham Thirteenth Spring Symposium of Byzantine Studies 1979, ed. M. Mullett and R.
Scott (Birmingham, 1981), pp. 205-34, esp. p. 221.
15 The term was first coined by the French sociologist
Émile Durkheim [De la division du travail social (Paris, 1893), p. 150]. For more
recent literature and for an interesting application of this concept to an historical case, see Giorgio
Ausenda, "The segmentary lineage in contemporary anthropology and among the Langobards," in
After Empire. Toward an Ethnology of Europe's Barbarians, ed. G. Ausenda (San
Marino, 1995), pp. 15-50. For the "segmentary society" of the Slavs, see Maria
Nystazopoulou-Pelekidou, "Les Slaves dans l'Empire byzantin," in The 17th International
Byzantine Congress. Major Papers. Dumbarton Oaks/Georgetown University, Washington D.C.,
August 1986 (New Rochelle, 1986), pp. 345-67, esp. p. 354; Pohl, Die Awaren, p.
126.
16. See also Procopius, Wars VII 22.3 and 5; VII 38.7; VII
40.7; Buildings IV 7.12-13 and 17; Theophylact Simocatta VII 4.13-VII 5.1; VII 5.8.
17. Cf. Bohumila Zasterová, Les Avares et les Slaves
dans la Tactique de Maurice (Prague, 1971), pp. 51-52; V. V. Kuchma, "Slaviane kak
veroiatnyi protivnik Vizantiiskoi imperii po dannym dvukh voennykh traktatov," in
Khoziaistvo i obshchestvo na Balkanakh v srednie veka, ed. M. M. Freidenberg (Kalinin,
1978), pp. 4-15, esp. p. 8.
18. Pohl, Die Awaren, p. 126.
19. E. Evans-Pritchard, The Nuer: a Description of the Modes
of Livelihood and Political Institutions of a Nilotic People (Oxford, 1940), p. 181; M. Fortes
and E. Evans-Pritchard, African Political Systems (London, 1940), p. 296. See also
Christian Sigrist, Regulierte Anarchie. Untersuchungen zum Fehlen und zur Entstehung
politischer Herrschaft in segmentären Gesellschaften Afrikas (Olten/Freiburg im
Breisgau, 1967).
20. Henry Munson, Jr., "On the irrelevance of the segmentary
lineage model in the Moroccan Rif," American Anthropologist 91 (1989), 386-400, esp.
p. 387; cf. E. Evans-Pritchard, "The character of the Nuer," in Primitive Heritage: an
Anthropological Anthology, ed. M. Mead and N. Calas (New York, 1953), pp. 18-34, esp. p.
26; Sigrist, Regulierte Anarchie, p. 27.
21. Charles Lindholm, "Models of segmentary political action: the
examples of
page 31
Swat and Dir, NWFP, Pakistan," in Anthropology in Pakistan: Recent
Socio-Cultural and Archaeological Perspectives, ed. S. Pastner and L. Flam (Karachi, 1985),
pp. 21-39, esp. p. 21; Ausenda, "The segmentary lineage," p. 19.
22. Marshall D. Sahlins, "The segmentary lineage: an organization
of predatory expansion," American Anthropologist 63 (1961), 322-45, esp. pp. 323 and
337. See Ladislav Holy, "The segmentary lineage structure and its existential status," The
Queen's University Papers in Social Anthropology 4 (1979), 1-22, esp. p. 2.
23. Paul Bohannan, "Extra-processual events in Tiv political
institutions," American Anthropologist 60 (1958), 1-12, esp. p. 11; Sigrist, Regulierte
Anarchie, pp. 198-200 and 217-18.
24. Pohl, Die Awaren, p. 126, based on Strategikon
XI 4.1. Cf. Pierre Clastres, Society Against the State. The Leader as Servant and the Humane
Use of Power Among the Indians of the Americas (New York, 1977).
25. Georges Balandier, Political Anthropology (New York,
1970), p. 53; Sahlins, "The segmentary lineage," p. 325; Nicholas B. Dirks, Geoff Eley, and
Sherry B. Ortner, "Introduction," in Culture/Power/ History. A Reader in Contemporary
Social Theory, ed. N. B. Dirks, G. Eley, and S. B. Ortner (Princeton, 1994), pp. 3-45, esp. p.
13. Bulgarian historians have argued that the Slavs who settled in the Balkans were divided into
numerous families, bound not so much by their common descent, as by their life together. See
Petar S. Koledarov, "Settlement structure of the Bulgarian Slavs in their transition from a clan to
a territorial community," Byzantinobulgarica 3 (1969), 125-32, esp. pp. 125 and 127-28;
Cankova-Petkova, "Gesellschaftsordnung," p. 266. Cf. Halina Evert-Kapessowa, "Quelques
remarques sur la colonisation slave," in Actes du XII-e Congrès international
d'études byzantines (Ochride, 10-16 septembre 1961), vol. 2 (Belgrade, 1963), pp.
78-81, esp. p. 81; Evans, Early Medieval Archaeology, p. 273.
26. A bandum (also known as tagma or
numerus) was the basic tactical unit of the Byzantine army, as reorganized by Emperor
Maurice. The size of this mounted unit varied from 200 to 400 men. See Charles C. Petersen,
"The Strategikon. A Forgotten Classic," Military Review 72 (1992), no. 8, 70-79,
esp. p. 71.
27. Ivana Pleinerová, "O kharaktere ranneslavianskikh
poselenii prazhskogo i korchaskogo tipov," Sovetskaia Arkheologiia 2 (1980), 51-55,
esp. p. 51; B. A. Timoshchuk, "Social'naia tipologiia selishch VI-X vv.," in Arkheologicheskie
issledovaniia srednevekovykh pamiatnikov v Dnestrovsko-Prutskom mezhdurech'e, ed. P. P.
Byrnia et al. (Kishinew, 1985), 3-24, esp. p. 12. Settlements in south Romania tend to have larger
numbers (twenty to thirty) of sunken buildings per occupation phase. See Suzana
Dolinescu-Ferche, "La culture 'Ipotesti-Cîndesti-Ciurel' (V-e-VII-e siècles). La
situation en Valachie," Dacia 28 (1984), 117-84, esp. p. 124.
28. "Emic" in anthropology refers to an "internal," subjective
categorization, to which the anthropologist may not have access by "objective" means. "Emic"
categories are often referred to by "native" names, and anthropologists, instead of describing the
group on the basis of their "objective" (also called
page 32
"etic") criteria, strive to comprehend "native"
classifications. See Marvin Harris, The Rise of Anthropological Theory (New York,
1968).
29. Pohl, Die Awaren, pp. 126-27.
30. Rena Lederman, "Big men, large and small? Towards a
comparative perspective," Ethnology 29 (1990), 3-15, esp. p. 10.
31. Holy, "The segmentary lineage," p. 19.
32. Rudolf Riedinger, Pseudo-Kaisarios.
Überlieferungsgeschichte und Verfasserfrage (Munich, 1969), p. 302; for the English
translation, see Jakov Bacic "The Emergence of Sklabenoi (Slavs), Their Arrival on the Balkan
Peninsula, and the Role of the Avars in These Events: Revised Concepts in a New Perspective,"
Ph.D. diss. (Columbia University, 1983), p. 152.
33. E.g., Procopius, Wars VII 14.22; Strategikon
XI 4.30.
34. Elman Service, Primitive Social Organization (New
York, 1971), p. 134; Richard Hodges, Dark Age Economics: the Origins of Towns and Trade
A.D. 600-1000 (New York, 1982), p. 187; John Haldon, The State and the Tributary
Mode of Production (London/New York, 1993), p. 213.
35. Jadran Ferluga, "Archon. Ein Beitrag zur Untersuchung der
südslawischen Herrschertitel im 9. u. 10. Jh. in lichte der byzantinischen Quellen," in
Tradition als historische Kraft, ed. N. Kamp and J. Wollasch (Berlin/New York, 1982),
pp. 254-66. The word for archon employed by the early tenth-century Old Church
Slavonic translation of seudo-Caesarius' Eratopokriseis is knyaz (prince). See
Benedicty, "Terminologie," p. 54; cf. Ivan Duichev, "La versione paleoslava dei Dialoghi dello
Pseudo-Cesario," Studi bizantini e neoellenici 9 (1957), pp. 89-100.
36. Taking into consideration that the term is used
independently by
more than one source, L. M. Whitby's argument that Theophylact had apparently misused a Latin
term applied to barbarian chiefs, is untenable. See L. M. Whitby, "Theophylact's knowledge of
languages," Byzantion 52 (1982), 425-28, esp. p. 428; cf. Barry Baldwin, "Theophylact's
knowledge of Latin," Byzantion 47 (1977), 357-60, esp. pp. 357-58; O. V. Ivanova,
"Slaviane i Fessalonika vo vtoroi polovine VII v. po dannym 'Chudes Sv. Dimitriia' (Postanovka
voprosa)," Slavianskie drevnosti. Etnogenez. Material'naia kul'tura drevnei Rusi. Sbornik
nauchnykh trudov, ed. V. D. Koroliuk (Kiev, 1980), pp. 81-107, esp. pp. 88 and 101.
37. Harvey Whitehouse, "Leaders and logics, persons
and polities,"
History and Anthropology 6 (1992), no. 1, 103-24, esp. p. 118.
38. Marshall Sahlins, "Poor man, rich man,
big-man, chief: political types in Melanesia and Polynesia," Comparative Studies in Society
and History 5 (1963), 283-303; cf. Michael Allen, "Elders, chiefs, and Big Men: authority
legitimation and political evolution in Melanesia," American Ethnologist 11 (1984), no. 1,
20-41, esp. p. 20.
39. Paula Brown, "Big man, past and present: model,
person, hero,
legend," Ethnology 29 (1990), 97-115, esp. p. 97; cf. Lederman, "Big men," p. 6.
40. Maurice Godelier, The Making of Great Men.
Male
Domination and Power Among the New Guinea Baruya (Cambridge/Paris, 1986), pp. 105
and 109-
page 33
10.
41. See Zasterová, Les Avares, pp. 78-79; cf.
Alexander Avenarius, "Avary i slaviane. 'Derzhava Samo'," in Rannefeodal'nye gosudarstva i
narodnosti (iuzhnye i zapadnye slaviane VI-XII vv.), ed. G. G. Litavrin (Moscow, 1991), pp.
26-37, esp. p. 29.
42. Brian Hayden and Rob Gargett, "Big man, big heart? A
Mesoamerican view of the emergence of complex society," Ancient Mesoamerica 1
(1990), 3-20, esp. pp. 14 and 16.
43. Menander the Guardsman, fr. 21; Fredegar IV 68.
Cf.
Lubomír E. Havlík, "Slovanská 'barbarská
království' 6. století na území Rumunska,"
Slovánsky prehled 3 (1974), 177-88, esp. p. 183; Wolfgang Fritze,
Untersuchungen zur frühslawischen und frühfränkischen Geschichte bis ins
7. Jahrhundert (Frankfurt am Main/Berlin/Bern, 1994), pp. 281 and 428 n. 1736.
44. Alexander Avenarius, "'Gosudarstvo Samo':
problemy
arkheologii i istorii," in Etnosocial'naia i politicheskaia struktura rannefeodal'nykh slavianskikh
gosudarstv i narodnostei, ed. G. G. Litavrin (Moscow, 1987), pp. 66-74, esp. p. 73.
45. Gordon R. Willey, Prehistoric Settlement
Patterns in the
Virú Valley, Peru (Washington, 1953); Willey, "Settlement pattern studies and
evidences for intensive agriculture in the Maya Lowlands," in Archaeological Thought in
America, ed. C. C. Lamberg-Karlovsky (Cambridge/New York, 1989), pp. 167-82. Cf. Bruce
G. Trigger, "Settlement patterns in archaeology," in Introductory Readings in
Archaeology, ed. B. M. Fagan (Boston, 1970), pp. 237-62, esp. p. 239. Since the late 1930s,
a similar concept has guided Soviet archaeologists. See B. A. Timoshchuk, "Ob issledovanii
vostochnoslavianskikh poselenii VI-IX vv.," in Problemy izucheniia drevnikh poselenii v
arkheologii (sociologicheskii aspekt) (Moscow, 1990), pp. 128-49, esp. p. 129; O. M.
Prikhodniuk, "Obshchestvenno-khoziaistvennaia struktura slavianskikh poselenii (po materialam
pen'kovskoi kul'tury)," in Trudy V Mezhdunarodnogo Kongressa arkheologov-slavistov, Kiev
18-25 sentiabria 1985, vol. 4, ed. V. D. Baran (Kiev, 1988), pp. 189-94, esp. p. 189.
46. Reid Ferring, "Intrasite spatial patterning: its
role in
settlement-subsistence systems analysis," in Intrasite Spatial Analysis in Archaeology, ed.
Harold J. Hietala (Cambridge/London, 1984), pp. 116-26, esp. p. 117.
47. For the site at Seliste, see I. A. Rafalovich,
"Raskopki
ranneslavianskogo poseleniia VI-VII vv. n.e. u sela Selishte," in Arkheologicheskie
issledovaniia v Moldavii v 1968-1969 gg., ed. I. A. Rafalovich (Kishinew, 1972), pp. 122-42;
I. A. Rafalovich and V. L. Lapushnian, "Raboty Reutskoi arkheologicheskoi ekspedicii," in
Arkheologicheskie issledovaniia v Moldavii v 1972 g. (Kishinew, 1973), pp. 110-30; I. A.
Rafalovich and V. L. Lapushnian, "Mogil'niki i ranneslavianskoe gorodishche u s. Selishte," in
Arkheologicheskie issledovaniia v Moldavii (1973 g.), ed. V. I. Markevich, (Kishinew,
1974), pp. 104-39.
48. Amphorae carried wine, oil, or garum,
while clay pans
were used for baking flat loaves of bread. See Boško Babic "Crepulja, crepna, podnica-posebno
znacajan oslonac za atribuciju srednjovekovnih arheoloških nalazišt
page 34
a balkanskog poluostrova
slovenima poreklom sa istoka," in Materijali IX. Simpozijum srednjevekovne sekcije
Arheološkog društva Jugoslavije, ed. Danica Dimitrijevic (Belgrade, 1972), pp. 101-23,
esp. pp. 114-15; cf. Joachim Herrmann, "Getreidekultur, Backteller und Brot-Indizien
frühslawischer Differenzierung," in Zbornik posveten na Boško Babic Mélange
Boško Babic 1924-1984, ed. M. Apostolski (Prilep, 1986), pp. 267-72, esp. p. 270. Cf.
Jozef Zábojník, "On the problems of settlements of the Avar Khaganate period in
Slovakia," Archeologické rozhledy 40 (1988), pp. 401-37, esp. p. 419. For
ethnographic parallels, see Milenko Filipovic, Zenska keramika kod balkanskih naroda
(Belgrade, 1951); Marcela Bratiloveanu-Popilian, "Cirimna, o vatra portativa" Revista
Muzeelor 5 (1968), no. 6, pp. 554-55.
49. For the site at Bucharest-Soldat Ghivan Street, see Suzana
Dolinescu-Ferche and Margareta Constantiniu, "Un établissement du VI-e siècle
à Bucarest," Dacia 25 (1981), 289-329.
50. For the site at Dulceanca II, see Suzana Dolinescu-Ferche,
"Contributions archéologiques sur la continuité daco-romaine. Dulceanca,
deuxième habitat du VI-e siècle d.n.è.," Dacia 30 (1986), 121-54.
51. For the site at Poian, see Zoltán Székely,
"Asezari din secolele VI-XI p. Ch. în bazinul Oltului superior," Studii si cercetari de
istorie veche si arheologie 43 (1992), no. 2, 245-306.
52. Ioan Mitrea, "Contributia cercetarilor arheologice de la Curtea
Domneasca din Bacau si Davideni-Neamt la cunoasterea epocii sec. VI-VII din Moldova,"
Studii si cercetari (Focsani) 1 (1972), 5-22; I. Mitrea, "Principalele rezultate ale
cercetarilor arheologice din asezarea de la Davideni (sec. V-VII e.n.)," Memoria
Antiquitatis 6-8 (1974-1976), 65-92; Ioan Mitrea, "Noi descoperiri arheologice în
asezarea din secolele V-VII de la Davideni-Neamt," Memoria Antiquitatis 18 (1992),
203-32; Ioan Mitrea, "Asezarea din secolele V-VII de la Davideni, jud. Neamt. Cercetarile
arheologice din anii 1988-1991," Memoria Antiquitatis 19 (1994), 279-332; Ioan Mitrea,
"Deux fibules 'digitées' trouvées sur le site de Davideni, dép. de Neamt
(VIe-VIIe siècles)," Dacia 38-39 (1994-1995), 445-47.
53. The phrase "beyond-the-households context" is that of
Margaret W. Conkey, "Contexts of action, contexts for power: material culture and gender in the
Magdalenian," in Engendering Archaeology. Women and Prehistory, ed. J. M. Gero and
M. W. Conkey (Oxford/Cambridge, 1991), pp. 57-92.
54. For a detailed discussion of ornamental patterns displayed on
"Slavic" bow fibulae, see Florin Curta, "Making an Early Medieval Ethnie: the Case of the
Early Slavs (Sixth to Seventh Century)," Ph.D. diss. (Western Michigan University, 1998), pp.
523-49.
