Why did Vlach states only emerge when they did in OTL?

raharris1973

Gone Fishin'
Donor
Monthly Donor
why were Moldavia and Wallachia always under the nomadic hoof before then?

Could the area have become a state dominated by another language and nationality through modern politics times? A “Cumania”, “patzinakia”, polovtsia or pechenegia? Or get Bulgarized, magyarized or ruthenianized?
 
The entire Pannonian basin was pretty depopulated overall after the Volkswanderung. It was only after the emergence of the modern Russian state and the defeat of the Golden Horde and the solidification of southern European borders that those kind of invasions completely stopped. You could have Dacia become more powerful at the expense of Hunnic and Avar khans, but that would be a completely alien world.
 
why were Moldavia and Wallachia always under the nomadic hoof before then?
Danubian Romania was basically underpopulated to begin with : @Aqua817 pointed it was the case after the Vth century, but it can be said the same even before the fall of WRE in the Vth, or the withdrawal of ERE the next century.
Pannonia and Dacia were basically military borders, with few important cities or demographics (maybe two million people in the whole of Illyricum) that heavily depended (a bit like in most part of Northern Britain) from imperial (politically and military wise) presence.

Let's remember that Danube, especially Middle Danube, was the soft underbelly of Romania, with most of raids and attacks coming or passing trough the region.

Now, I mentioned mostly Pannonia as an exemple, but most of Dacia (on both banks) had the same problem of vulnerability and geoeconomical dependency right from the beggining, and suffered as well from an early depopulation.Hence why Goths and Huns were settled in Moesia to attempt filling the gaps. It didn't work so well, even if you had remnants of these people until the VIth in the region.


So, while post-imperial Romanized/Romance cultures survived in the region (such as Kesthely Culture), they were cultural islands mostly holding out either trough direct contact with the remaining dynamic cores of Romania (in this case ERE), either by virtue of being isolated enough.

Could the area have become a state dominated by another language and nationality through modern politics times? A “Cumania”, “patzinakia”, polovtsia or pechenegia? Or get Bulgarized, magyarized or ruthenianized?
Possibly, altough the issue there is that while Pannonian Plain was fairly protected by Carpathians, which eventually allowedthe development of Slavic complex chiefdoms centered and bolstered by Avars (and later, by Franks), you didn't have such contact with ERE from the VIth onwards (such evolution rather happened with neighbouring skalevnias in Balkans). And giving the Pontic Steppe have a natural development up to the Danube, it favoured the extension of steppe khaganates as super-complex chiefdoms that existed up to Central Asia, without a need for a great territorial control to enforce their authority.
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Long story short, you need a strong enough primary state neighbouring the communities you want to devellop, in order to bolster some structuration out of it and pssibly exerce a lasting political and cultural influence : this is what Romans did in Barbaricum, what Avars, Franks and Byzzies did with Slavs, and what Hungary could have done IOTL without Mongol Invasions IMO.
 
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