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I've had this idea floating around in my head for literally years now. I've finally decided to try bring it to life.

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The story of the Avar Qaganate is a relatively brief, but explosive, episode in the history of Late Antiquity/Early Medieval Europe. First arriving on the scene in 567, the Avar Qaganate would, with the help of the Sassanian Empire and the Slavic tribes, be laying siege to the Constantinople in 626, only for the short lived politely to be consumed by the Bulgar Qaganate in the early 680s. The Avars are a people who made a great splash upon the scene only to vanish from history in relatively short order, leaving behind a spotty historical and archaeological record that leaves historians not even knowing the names of the Qagan that laid siege to Constantinople, or the identity of the Avar Qagan who was defeated by Isperih and his brother Kuber. This lack of documentation concerning the Avar Qaganate, unfortunately extends to the early history of the Bulgar Kingdom that supplanted them, leaving us with a less than airtight timetable on the extinction of the Avar Qaganate.

While the exact circumstances and time frame of the fall of the Avar Qaganate remain shrouded to us, it is possible to piece together several important factors in the decline and abrupt fall of the Avars. The revolt of Kuber and the Sermesianoi followed by the subsequent invasion of the Pannonian Plain by Isperih in the late 670s and early 680s saw the end of the Qaganate, the seeds to this conflict between the Avars and the Bulgars were planted with the earlier conflict between Kubrat and Magna Bulgaria and the Avar Qaganate in 631 or 632. In the area between the Sea of Azov to the river Kouphis, Kubrat unified the Onogurs, Kutrigurs, and Utigurs into what would later be known as Magna Bulgaria[1]. Qagan Kubrat’s defeat of the Avars was not on its own was not a death nail to the Qaganate, but it does show the general decline of Avar authority on the edges of their empire. Kubrat’s Magna Bulgaria would not survive him though.The fragmentation of Magna Bulgaria under Kubrat’s son’s coupled with the rise of the Cházaroi in the East would be compound the issues facing the Avar, by presenting them with an invasion that they would not recover from.

As referenced earlier, Kuber who was presumably one of the sons of Kubrat, led a group of Bulgar refugees that had come to be known as the Sermesianoi (taking the name from the city of Sirmium which they had been settled in and around by the Avars). The Sermesianoi grew increasingly discontent with Avar rule and with the land that they had been settled upon, many yearning to return to Magna Bulgaria. At some point in the late 670s, Kuber and the Sermesianoi revolted against the Avar and attempting to push south into the Balkans. The Bulgarians defeated the Avars in several, battles, but ultimately their advance was checked, and Kubrat attempted to march West towards the Lombard territories like his brother Alcek.[2]


Isperih of Bulgaria

Kuber’s rebellion was causing significant issues for the Avar, as what had started as a relatively minor threat bloodied the Avar’s again and again and saw the Bulgar host loot their way across the Qaganate. With chaos in the West, the Eastern Pannonian Plain felt less and less of the Avar’s authority. This apparent opening of the back door prompted raids into the Pannonian Plain by Kuber’s brother, Isperih, and his Bulgar horde. Isperih’s Bulgars were stretching themselves as they committed to raiding deeper and deeper into Avar territory while remaining near the Roman frontier which had resulted in them receiving sizable bribes from the Emperor Constantine IV who had desired to maintain good relations with the Bulgars while the Romans were dealing with the Arab siege[3]. With the Arabs defeated and the Emperor marshalling a force excise the Bulgars from their foothold south of the Danube, Isperih chose to accept a hefty bribe from Constantine and commit to his invasion of the Pannonian Plain[4].

The Avar Qaganate crumbled under the Bulgar invasion and by 685, Isperih’s new Bulgarian Qaganate controlled the Pannonian Plain and was poised to begin striking westward. The Bulgar Invasions of Europe was about to begin.

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[1]: Great Old Bulgaria, but because the Bulgars have settled in the Pannonian Plain ITTL and are more Latinized, it’s commonly known by the name given to it by Western European historians in the Middle Ages.
[2]: The PoD. IOTL Kuber’s rebellion managed to escape into the Balkans where they would eventually settle near Thessaloniki before eventually being absorbed into the Bulgarian Empire. There are other competing histories of the Sermesianoi that have them expelled by the Avars rather than being leaving, but either way, the situation ITTL is that they tried making it to Italy and wreaked havoc all the way.
[3]: The presence of silver Roman coins in Vartop and Priseaca minted under Constans II and Constantine IV indicate that the Romans were bribing the Bulgars to try and avoid drawing them into the conflict with the Arabs.
[4]: No Battle of Ongal ITTL, gang. Constantine IV was generally a fairly pragmatic Emperor who wasn’t keen on fighting battles when he didn’t think he had to, like with the Monothelitism Controversy or his treaties with the Lombards. Paying the Bulgars to keep fighting the Avars sounds exactly like something Constantine IV would do.
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