Blood and Divine Choice: Legitimising Dynastic Continuity in Bulgaria on the Eve of the Ottoman Conquest

Кръвта и Божият избор: легитимация на приемствеността във властта в България в навечерието на османското завоевание

Исторически преглед, 82 (2026) No. 2, pp. 05-64 (ISSN 0323-9748)
DOI: https://doi.org/10.71069/IPR2.26.IB01

Ivan Biliarsky / Иван Билярски

Prof. Ivan Biliarsky, DSc - Institute for Historical Studies, Bulgarian Academy of Sciences; ORCID: 0000-0002-8084-8858, e-mail: ivan.biliarsky@gmail.com

Abstract: The article examines the modes of legitimising and ensuring continuity of supreme authority in Bulgaria from the pagan period to the end of the fourteenth century, with a particular focus on the decades preceding the Ottoman conquest. It traces specific instances in which the transfer of power proved problematic and analyses the mechanisms through which such crises were resolved and regulated. The study outlines the principal models used to legitimise a new ruler: election (especially where its outward form is understood to conceal a divine choice), inheritance in its various forms – primogeniture, porphyrogeniture, and others – corpus fratrum (collective familial rule), and related arrangements. All of these, to varying degrees, are connected to the notion of the divine character or origin of power. The author argues that Bulgarian political tradition did not operate with fixed, universal rules of succession; rather, authority was justified through a combination of dynastic charisma, divine election, membership in the ruling family, and extraordinary political decisions such as election or coup. Through case studies – from early tribal sacralisation of rulership, through collective governance and dynastic conflict, to practices of co-rulership, the “young tsar,” and porphyrogeniture under Ivan Alexander – the article shows that blood ties were never sufficient on their own. Instead, they had to be subordinated to the idea of God’s will and to the political realities of the moment. Biological descent, associated with the contingency of nature, could not be allowed to determine matters as fundamental as salvation and divine viceregency in the world.

Keywords: power, succession and continuity, legitimation of authority, dynasties, divine choice of the ruler.

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