White Wallachia (

Greek Greek may refer to: Greece Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group. *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family. **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...

: Ασπροβλαχία,

romanized Romanization or romanisation, in linguistics, is the conversion of text from a different writing system to the Roman (Latin) script, or a system for doing so. Methods of romanization include transliteration, for representing written text, and ...

: ''Asprovlachía)'', sometimes referred to simply as Vlachia, Wallachia or Asen's Wallachia by Western sources, was a rarely used Byzantine term for the region between the

Danube The Danube ( ; ) is a river that was once a long-standing frontier of the Roman Empire and today connects 10 European countries, running through their territories or being a border. Originating in Germany, the Danube flows southeast for , pa ...

and the

Balkan Mountains The Balkan mountain range (, , known locally also as Stara planina) is a mountain range in the eastern part of the Balkan Peninsula in Southeastern Europe. The range is conventionally taken to begin at the peak of Vrashka Chuka on the border betw ...

. The name most likely originated in the region’s notable

Vlach "Vlach" ( or ), also "Wallachian" (and many other variants), is a historical term and exonym used from the Middle Ages until the Modern Era to designate mainly Romanians but also Aromanians, Megleno-Romanians, Istro-Romanians and other Eastern ...

population, similarly to

Great Wallachia Great Vlachia or Great Wallachia ( rup, Vlãhia Mari; el, Μεγάλη Βλαχία, Megálē Vlachía), also simply known as Vlachia ( rup, Vlãhia, link=no; el, link=no, Βλαχία, Vlachía), was a province and region in southeastern Thessa ...

in Thessaly, or Little Wallachia, in Aetolia-Acarnania. Starting in 1185, the Bulgarians and Vlachs living in the region

revolted In political science, a revolution (Latin: ''revolutio'', "a turn around") is a fundamental and relatively sudden change in political power and political organization which occurs when the population revolts against the government, typically due ...

against the Byzantine Emperor

Isaac II Isaac II Angelos or Angelus ( grc-gre, Ἰσαάκιος Κομνηνός Ἄγγελος, ; September 1156 – January 1204) was Byzantine Emperor from 1185 to 1195, and again from 1203 to 1204. His father Andronikos Doukas Angelos was a ...

. After the success of the uprising, it became the core of the

Second Bulgarian Empire The Second Bulgarian Empire (; ) was a medieval Bulgarians, Bulgarian state that existed between 1185 and 1396. A successor to the First Bulgarian Empire, it reached the peak of its power under Tsars Kaloyan of Bulgaria, Kaloyan and Ivan Asen II ...

. Due to the early proeminence of the Tsardom’s Vlach element, western sources, who first came into contact with it during the

Third Third or 3rd may refer to: Numbers * 3rd, the ordinal form of the cardinal number 3 * , a fraction of one third * Second#Sexagesimal divisions of calendar time and day, 1⁄60 of a ''second'', or 1⁄3600 of a ''minute'' Places * 3rd Street (d ...

and Fourth

Crusades The Crusades were a series of religious wars initiated, supported, and sometimes directed by the Latin Church in the medieval period. The best known of these Crusades are those to the Holy Land in the period between 1095 and 1291 that were in ...

, and even Byzantine sources, like

Niketas Choniates Niketas or Nicetas Choniates ( el, Νικήτας Χωνιάτης; c. 1155 – 1217), whose actual surname was Akominatos (Ἀκομινάτος), was a Byzantine Greek government official and historian – like his brother Michael Akominatos, wh ...

, refer to the new Bulgarian state as Vlach. Thus, the French knights Guillaume de Rubrouquis and

Geoffroy de Villehardouin Geoffrey of Villehardouin (c. 1150 – c. 1213) was a French knight and historian who participated in and chronicled the Fourth Crusade. He is considered one of the most important historians of the time period,Smalley, p. 131 best known for wri ...

refer to ''Asen's Wallachia'', and the friar

William of Rubruck William of Rubruck ( nl, Willem van Rubroeck, la, Gulielmus de Rubruquis; ) was a Flemish Franciscan missionary and explorer. He is best known for his travels to various parts of the Middle East and Central Asia in the 13th century, including the ...

divides Bulgaria during the realm of

Michael II Asen Michael II Asen ( bg, Михаил II Асен; 1239 – December 1256/January 1257) was emperor (tsar) of Second Bulgarian Empire, Bulgaria from 1246 to 1256 or 1257. He was the son of Ivan Asen II and Irene Komnene Doukaina. He succeeded his h ...

into "Blakia—Assan's territory—and Little Bulgaria". In opposition to White Wallachia, Byzantine sources also refer to a " Black Wallachia", which was Moldavia (or part of it). The

Principality of Moldavia Moldavia ( ro, Moldova, or , literally "The Country of Moldavia"; in Romanian Cyrillic: or ; chu, Землѧ Молдавскаѧ; el, Ἡγεμονία τῆς Μολδαβίας) is a historical region and former principality in Central ...

itself came to be named White Wallachia (

Turkish Turkish may refer to: *a Turkic language spoken by the Turks * of or about Turkey ** Turkish language *** Turkish alphabet ** Turkish people, a Turkic ethnic group and nation *** Turkish citizen, a citizen of Turkey *** Turkish communities and mi ...

: ''Ak-Eflak)'' by the Ottomans, with the moniker of Black Wallachia (Turkish: ''Kara-Eflak)'' coming to refer to the neighbouring

Principality of Wallachia Wallachia or Walachia (; ro, Țara Românească, lit=The Romanian Land' or 'The Romanian Country, ; archaic: ', Romanian Cyrillic alphabet: ) is a historical and geographical region of Romania. It is situated north of the Lower Danube and so ...

References

Geography of the Byzantine Empire History of the Romanians History of Eastern Romance people Former countries in the Balkans {{Byzantine-geo-stub