the emperor Michael III. acting as his
sponsor. It was at this time that the controversies broke out which ended
in the schism between the Churches of the East and West. Boris long wavered
between Constantinople and Rome, but the refusal of the pope to recognize
an autocephalous Bulgarian church determined him to offer his allegiance to
the Greek patriarch. The decision was fraught with momentous consequences
for the future of the race. The nation altered its religion in obedience to
its sovereign, and some of the boyars who resisted the change paid with
their lives for their fidelity to the ancient belief. The independence of
the Bulgarian church was recognized by the patriarchate, a fact much dwelt
upon in recent controversies. The Bulgarian primates subsequently received
the title of patriarch; their see was transferred from Preslav to Sofia,
Voden and Prespa successively, and finally to Ochrida.

_The First Empire._--The national power reached its zenith under Simeon
(893-927), a monarch distinguished in the arts of war and peace. In his
reign, says Gibbon, "Bulgaria assumed a rank among the civilized powers of
the earth." His dominions extended from the Black Sea to the Adriatic, and
from the borders of Thessaly to the Save and the Carpathians. Having become
the most powerful monarch in eastern Europe, Simeon assumed the style of
"Emperor and Autocrat of all the Bulgars and Greeks" (_tsar i samodrzhetz
vsem Blgarom i Grkom_), a title which was recognized by Pope Formosus.
During the latter years of his reign, which were spent in peace, his people
made great progress in civilization, literature nourished, and Preslav,
according to contemporary chroniclers, rivalled Constantinople in
magnificence. After the death of Simeon the Bulgarian power declined owing
to internal dissensions; the land was distracted by the Bogomil heresy (see
BOGOMILS), and a separate or western empire, including Albania and
Macedonia, was founded at Ochrida by Shishman, a boyar from Trnovo. A
notable event took place in 967, when the Russians, under Sviatoslav, made
their first appearance in Bulgaria. The Bulgarian tsar, Boris II., with the
aid of the emperor John Zimisces, expelled the invaders, but the Greeks
took advantage of their victory to dethrone Boris, and the first Bulgarian
empire thus came to an end after an existence of three centuries. The
empire at Ochrida, however, rose to considerable importance under Samuel,
the son of Shishma