THE MIRACLES OF ST.  DEMETRIUS ON KUBER AND THE SERMESIANS

The Miracles of St. Demetrius is the title of a collection of homilies offered as a hymn of thanksgiving to God for His gift to the city of Thessalonica. Each homily deals with a particular miracle performed by St. Demetrius to the benefit of the city and its inhabitants.The collection has two parts, conventionally called "books." The first book, which contains fifteen homilies, was written by Archbishop John of Thessalonica during the first decade of Emperor Heraclius' reign (610-642). By contrast, nothing is known about the author of the second book, who was nonetheless a citizen of Thessalonica. He used many more oral sources than Archbishop John, but also such written sources as the city's annals or chronicle. There are fewer miracles and miraculous deeds than in Book I , which greatly enhances the value of Book II as a historical source, especially since next to nothing is known from any other sources about the seventh-century history of the Balkans. Unlike Archbishop John, who was using history to glorify St. Demetrius and to educate his fellow citizens, the author of Book II, despite his obvious desire to imitate John's style, is visibly better informed. He wrote some 70 years after Archbishop John, i.e., in the 680s or early 690s. The episode of the Sermesians led by Kuber is one of the most intriguing of the early medieval history of the Balkans, as it highlights both migratory movements and continuity of group and, perhaps, ethnic identities. Translation adapted from Peter Charanis,  "Kouver, the chronology of his activities and their ethnic effects on the regions around Thessalonica," Balkan Studies 11 (1970), no. 1, pp. 229-235.

II 5. As you know, lovers of Christ, we have related in part, in what has proceeded, about the Slavs, the one called Chatzon, and also the Avars; that having ravaged virtually all Illyricum, I mean the two Pannonies, the two Dacias, Dardania, Mysia, Praevalis, Rhodope, and also Thrace and the regions along the walls of Byzantium, and having taken the rest of the cities and towns, they lead the people to a place near the Danube in the direction of Pannonia whose metropolis had been formerly the aforementioned Sirmium. It was there, as it is said, that the aforementioned Chagan settled all the people he had captured to be henceforth his subjects. There they intermarried with Bulgars, Avars, and other peoples, had children with them, children whom they brought up according to the traditions of the Romans, and so through orthodoxy and the holy and life-giving baptism the race of the Christians increased and became numerous as had that of the Hebrews in Egypt under the Pharaoh. And as each related to the other concerning the residence of their ancestors, they fired in each other's heart to desire to return.

After some sixty and more years had passed following the devastations which affected their ancestors, another and new people evolved, and in time the greatest number of them became free. Finally, the Chagan, considering them to constitute a people with an identity of its own put, in accordance to the custom of his race, a chieftain upon them, a man by the name of Kuber. When Kuber learned from some of his most intimate associates the desire of the exiled Romans for their ancestral homes, he gave the matter some thought, then took them together with other peoples, i.e., the foreigners who had joined them, as is said in the Book of Moses about the Jews at the time of their exodus, with all their baggage and arms. According to what is said, they rebelled and separated themselves from the Chagan. The Chagan, when he learned this, set himself in pursuit of them, met them in five or six battles and, being defeated in each one by them, took flight and retired to the regions further north. After the victory, Kuber, together with the aforementioned people, crossed the aforementioned river Danube, came to our regions and occupied the Keramesion plain. Once there, the people, in particular those who were orthodox, sought their ancestral cities, some, our city of Thessalonica, protected by the martyr, others, the most prosperous and queen of cities, and still others, the cities in Thrace which still stood.

This is what the people wanted. But counsellors of mischievious intent conceived the following ill advice: that no one among the people achieve what he desired, but that Kuber remain their chieftain and Chagan, mixed as they had come. For if they tried to go to the one who had obtained from God the scepter to rule over us and he received and dispersed them, Kuber would thereby be deprived of his authority. Accordingly, an embassy was sent to the bearer of the scepter requesting that he [Kuber] be allowed to remain together with his people where he was, and that the nation of the Drugubites, situated near us, be ordered to furnish him in sufficient quantity the necessary provisions. And this was done. Accordingly, when most of them went among the huts of the Slavs in order to provision themselves and, when upon asking, they ascertained was not very far, most of those of Roman origin, with wives and children, began to enter our city saved by God. The administrative officials immediately sent them by ship to the capital.

When Kuber learned this, as he could not reveal the perfidy which lay in his heart, he took counsel with his advisers about his own thought and loss, and came to this secret resolve: that one of his most remarkable and clever chieftains, a man, to speak briefly, replete with the machinations of the devil, who knew our language, that of the Romans, Slavs, and Bulgars, should feign to have rebelled against Kuber. He should, like the rest, approach our city guarded by God, and pretending to offer himself the servitor of the emperor, introduce among us the greatest part of his people, those who shared his evil design. And so, in this way, through a civil war, he would take the city. After its occupation, Kuber, with baggage and the rest of his chieftains, would openly establish himself there and then. Having fortified himself, he would attack the surrounding nations, and having become master of them, he would wage war against the islands and Asia, and even against the emperor himself.

Following the consultation and this decision confirmed, it appears, by oath, one of the chieftains, a man by the name of Mauros, found refuge in our city. There, using fine but deceptive words confirmed by oaths, persuaded those in power to bring to the most pious emperor a report about him which was most favorable and worthy of belief. The emperor, the benefactor of all, persuaded by what was reported to him, sent a written act designating Mauros consul as a mark of honor, and offering him a standard as gift. He ordered further that all the Sermesians who had fled from Kuber be put under his command. When this order became public and was inserted in the register of matriculation, all the people who had fled here were put under the command of Mauros, and he became their general. However, some among the Romans, knowing that Mauros never kept any faith, but that by his machinations, deceptions, and perjuries he was always evil in his ways and had thus ravaged many places and peoples, advised that one should have no faith in him. When Mauros learned this--he learned it from charges made by those who were close to him in their ways of thought and manner of acting--he cut off the heads of those who were revealing in secret his terrible design and sold their wives and children wherever and as he pleased.

Thus, the rest of the Christians, not daring to reveal the ambush being set up against the city, bemoaned their fate and that of the city. No one dared to offer resistance. Moreover, those who were in power then seemed to fear him. For this, Mauros had designated as centurions, decurions, and officers at the head of fifty men those persons who shared his evil designs. And his armed men, provided for at the public expense, watched day and night wherever there were courageous men. His plan was this, that, during the night of the great feast of Holy Saturday, when the city, with all, would be celebrating the joyous resurrection of the Savior Christ, he would with his men experienced in war incite civil war, set fire in certain official places, and thus take possession of the city.

But he who had received power from God by an invisible inspiration and sign, according to what it is written, that the heart of the king is in the hand of God, diverting it as water wherever he wishes, considered it good, without yet knowing of the evil planned against the city, to order Sisinnios, then commander of the ships, a man wise in his words and ways and in all things confiding in God, to come to this city guarded by the glorious athlete, together with the soldiers on this ships under his command. He was to watch over the aforementioned Mauros, and those who had gathered about him, to the end that with such an army as his here present, those about the aforementioned Kuber would be more eager to seek refuge in the city. This illustrious Sisinnios, wishing to execute this order, departed from the region of Hellas and reached the island of Skiathos [...] And so, sailing smoothly and happily, they reached this city delivered by God thanks to its defender Demetrius on Holy Wednesday in the Holy Week, at the seventh hour. Thus, the drama of the civil war cruelly conceived and planned by Mauros and his followers, was avoided. Mauros, frightened and discouraged, was seized by a fever which put him to bed for many days. [...]  He [Sisinnios] gave orders finally that Mauros with all the following which had come with him from Kuber, as well as the army of the ships under his command, withdraw from the city and  encamp in the regions to the west of it, in order that the Sermesians, who wished to get away from the Slavs and come here, might do so freely and without fear.

Now, after this, when an imperial order and the vessels meant to transport the Sermesians, so often mentioned, had reached the aforementioned God-loving general in charge of the ships referred to, this Mauros, together with those who had fled with him, joined the emperor crowned by God, and having been received by him, was named archon. But not even in this did the providence of the saint [Demetrius] inspired by God remain lax, but through the son of the same Mauros he made known to the pious ears the evil project which Mauros and Kuber had formulated against our city., revealing thus to him [the emperor] the treachery of the so often mentioned Mauros; and also this, that in the regions of Thrace, he had resolved in his treachery even to turn against his [the emperor's] life. That these things appeared to be truly so is shown by this: that, the often mentioned Kuber, observing what had been agreed between him and Mauros, did no harm to the men and property of Mauros. Furthermore, not only he allowed the wives of Mauros to retain their honors, but those honors increased. The aforementioned pious emperor, who puts the affairs of the Empire into the hands of God, the source of his power, did not put Mauros, whom God had now abandoned to him, to death, but stripping him of his honors, deprived him of his command and his army, and confined him in a suburb, under the watchful eyes of reliable men.