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the “village of Slavs” (
villa Sclavorum). The predominant Roman
majority had assimilated
these colonists by the end of the Middle Ages, but traces of them remain in Friuli in place
names such as Sclavons or Belgrado.
A NEW ORDER AND NEW STRUCTURES
The years of peace after the Battle of Augsburg in 955 enact a new developmental
policy in the southeast of the restored Roman-German empire, which was expressed in new
organisational structures in the 970s. As early as 952, Otto I placed the March of Verona and
Friuli and the March of Istria under the jurisdiction of the duke of Bavaria, expanding his
sphere of control beyond Bavaria and Carinthia. This created a massive political entity that
controlled the Alpine passes, and hence the routes between Italy and Germany. It was the
summit of medieval Bavarian rule. But the uprising by the duke of Bavaria, Henry II the
Quarrelsome, led Otto II to separate, in 976, the Duchy of Carinthia from the over-large and
over-powerful Duchy of Bavaria, which was combined with the border marches from Verona
in the west, via Istria and modern-day Slovenia to Semmering in the east. This brought to an
end the political union that had linked Carantania to Bavaria since the second half of the
eighth century (though Carinthia would twice be brought back into personal union with
Bavaria before 1002). The newly created Duchy of Carinthia – the first in the eastern Alps –
formalised something that had been intrinsic to the development of Carinthiaan area until that
time: the acknowledgement of a certain amount of independence and autonomy, despite the
connection to Bavaria, based on the political tradition of the old Slavic principality of
Carantania. The fact that Carinthian dukes ruled over the March of Verona until the middle of
the twelfth century underlines the strategic importance of the new duchy, at the heart of a vast
network of communication routes. The Duchy of Carinthia was larger than the former
principality of Carinthia, and was also much larger than the later Land of Carinthia. It is a
paradox of historical development, then, that the territory in the eastern Alpine area with the
oldest tradition of independent statehood, and the first in the region to become a duchy in the
medieval German state, only became a political whole (as a Land) at the end of the Middle
Ages.
For defence against the Magyars, the territory to the east and south of Bavaria and
Carantania were organised into smaller border regions or margravates, which were related to
the tradition of Carolingian border marches. To the north, along the Danube between the Enns
and the Viennese forests, the Eastern March connected to Bavaria was given the name
Ostarrîchi (i.e. Österreich, Austria) for the first time in 996. A special march along the middle
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course of the Mura, between Bruck to the north and Radgona to the south, received its first
mention in 970. The name Carantanian March (marchia Karentana), attested somewhat later,
clearly expresses its connection with the Duchy of Carinthia. To the south was the March of
Drava, first mentioned in 980. The sources refer to it as the “march beyond the forests”
(marchia Transsiluana), that is the march beyond the Drava forest between Pohorje and
Kozjak, in relation to Carinthia. Another name, the March of Ptuj (marchia Pitouiensi) is also
attested, though it did not last long. In 980, we first read of the March of Savinja (Sovuina),
which included the Savinja river basin, and extended south of the Sava to the Krka river. This
lower part of what was to become Carniola later gained the name of the Slovene March
(Marchia Sclavonica, que vulgo Windismarch dicitur). Carniola included the upper Sava
valley (Gorenjska or upper Carniola) and Notranjska (inner Carniola). It was first mentioned
in 973, as “Carniola, known locally as the march of Creina.” It was centred on the “castle in
the march” (Chreina, Chrainburch) i.e. Kranj. Although of different etymological origin – the
name Kranj derives from the Celto-Roman Carnium, while Creina is of Slavic origin – the
similar-sounding names of the region and its centre overlapped and influenced each other so
that locally it was the Slovene name Kranjska, rather than Carniola, that was applied to the
region. The Germans also used the Slovene term, in the form Krain. Carniola was bordered to
the west by Friuli –
which reached east as far as the upper Soča river valley and the lower
Vipava valley – and Istria, which incorporated the upper Karst to the Nanos massif and
Javorniki. Surrounded and extended by these march regions, the Duchy of Carinthia gained
the misleading name of Great Carantania in Slovene historiography. However, at the
beginning of the eleventh century, probably in 1002 – after the final dissolution of the
personal union between the duchies of Bavaria and Carinthia – this large political formation
fell apart, and the marches from the Mura to the Sava became directly subordinate to the
crown. In 1012, when Adalbero, the margrave of the March on the Mura, became the duke of
Carinthia, the Carantanian March was brought back into the duchy, though for a long time this
union did not seem to have any prospects. After the eleventh century, when the Otakar, or
Traungauer, dynasty assumed control as margraves, the Carantanian March became the centre
and starting point of developments that led to the creation of the new Duchy (and Land) of
Styria (Steiermark, Štajerska). The same Duke Adalbero had to renounce any public
jurisdiction over the Aquileian church in Friuli in 1027.
The establishment of a stable, well-organised margravate placed Slovene territory
within the medieval Roman-German empire, enabled the formation of the economic and
social system typical of western Europe: feudalism. A clear expression of the new system’s