Eliznik home > South East Europe > history > political history summary to 10th century > The Slavic migration
The Lombards, originally from Scandinavian, moved to Moravia, then established a kingdom in Pannonia. The Avars with the Lombards destroyed the Gepid kingdom. The Lombards invaded Italy and where they established their second kingdom. The Slavs of northern Europe start their migrations into the Balkans.
Avars 552-796
The Avars, another Asian-Turkic tribe from the east, took control of parts of southern Russia and Eastern Europe from the Huns and Slavs. They occupied most of modern Hungary with their empire stretching from the Black Sea to the Baltic, but in the C8 their empire shrank and was finally crushed by Charlemagne (805).
Slavs 6th century
By the C6 the Slavs were the largest European race. Their early origin is not known, but from 1AD they were thought to have lived in the marshes east of Russia.
Following the dissolution of the Hun Empire the Slavs made a rapid expansion populating modern Russia, Poland, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Croatia, Serbia, Macedonia, Bulgaria, and Romania. Little remains of Slavic Romania apart from some place names and possibly the voivode, administrative regions, of the Romanians inherited by the Magyars in Transylvania.
The early Slav settlement into Byzantium lands can be traced from toponyms as being along the Timok and Morava rivers and across from Niš to Sofia.
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