Macedonia region: Encyclopedia II - Macedonia region - Boundaries and definitions

Macedonia region - Boundaries and definitions

The name of Macedonia has not been always used with regard to the region as defined above. In its beginnings, the ancient state of Macedon encompassed only a part of this region, approximately equal to the present-day Greek Macedonia. The Roman province of Macedonia covered a much larger area than Macedon, including almost all of present-day geographical region of Macedonia, along with large parts of central Albania and Greece.

In the Byzantine empire, there was a number of different themas (provinces) dividing the geographical region of Macedonia. A thema under the name of Macedonia was, however, carved out of the original Thema of Thrace well to the east of the Struma River during the Middle Ages. This thema variously included parts of Eastern Rumelia and western Thrace within its shifting boundaries and gave its name to the Macedonian dynasty, whose founder, Emperor Basil I, was probably of Armenian descent and born near Adrianople. Hence, Byzantine documents of this era mentioning Macedonia and Macedonians actually refer to the thema by that name. The region of Macedonia (ruled by the First Bulgarian Empire throughout the 9th and the 10th century) was, on the other hand, incorporated into the Byzantine Empire in 1018 as the thema of Bulgaria.

With the conquest of the region by the Ottomans in the late 14th century and its incorporation into the Ottoman Rumili Province, the name of Macedonia disappeared as a administrative designation for several centuries and was rarely displayed on maps. The name was again revived to mean a distinct geographical region with roughly the same borders as today by European cartographers in the 19th century.

Adapted from the Wikipedia article "Boundaries and definitions", under the G.N U Free Docmentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki