We have thus seen that during centuries the capital had had to contend with a stream of Asiatic barbarians pouring into Europe as well as into Asia, and with uncivilized races which were already established in the Balkan peninsula.
At the end of the twelfth century the Wallachs and the Ser- Progresso vian division of the Slavs, the two races which had underemces teen placed under Boman rule at the time when prechosen Byzantium as his capital, had so far progressed as to have adopted Christianity and to have won national independence; the Huns, the first of the Asiatic races who had obtained a permanent settlement in the empire, and the Bulgarians had similarly progressed, and had likewise become independent; the more barbarian of the invaders had either been totally destroyed or, like the Patchinaks, the Uzes, and the Comans, still retained their nomadic habits and were still either Mahometans or pagans, and had not come under the civilizing influence of the New Borne. Though we read of Hungarian, Wallachian, and Bulgarian kingdoms, of Servian or other principalities, yet it must be remembered that these were all rather states in the making than countries under established rule and settled governments.
Their boundaries changed continually. One year they acknowledged the suzerainty of the New Borne and the next they claimed to be independent. New claimants for power were constantly rising in their midst. They were continually at war with their neighbors, while behind each and all of them was always, until later than the twelfth century, the constant stream of Asiatic immigrants, fresh from barbarism and hostile alike to all who had adopted Christianity or who had ceased to be nomads.
Roman law
The history, in truth, of the Byzantine empire is in great part the history of the education of barbarous races. The population of the capital and the Greeks of the south of the peninsula and of the islands still retained the traditions of art, of science, and of philosophy. The student of theology and of Roman law, as developed under Justinian and his successors, does not require to be reminded how acute was the intellect which dealt with these two great subjects, how great
was the power of generalization, how subtile the power of distinction, which was brought to bear on theological and legal questions. During long centuries the masses of people who appeared in the empire were being leavened with the Greek spirit. In time all the races of the empire would have to come within its influence. Huns and Bulgarians had been converted from cruel savages and nomadic hordes into nations which had entered upon the path of civilization.
Ottoman in Bulgaria 