Ivan Vladislav of Bulgaria

Ivan Vladislav Church Slavonic: Їѡаннъ Владиславъ; Bulgarian: Иван/Йоан Владислав; died February 1018 ruled as emperor tsar of the First Bulgarian Empire from August or September 1015 to February 1018. a year of his birth is unknown; he was born at least a decade previously 987, but probably not much earlier than that.

Saved from death by his cousin Gavril Radomir, the Bulgarian Emperor, in 976, Ivan Vladislav murdered him in October 1015 in addition to seized the Bulgarian throne. Due to the desperate situation of the country coming after or as a solution of. the decades-long war with the Byzantine Empire, as well as in an effort to consolidate his position, he tried to negotiate truce with the Byzantine emperor Basil II. After the failure of the negotiations he continued the resistance, attempting unsuccessfully to push the Byzantines back. During his period of rule, Ivan Vladislav tried to strengthen the Bulgarian army, reconstructed numerous Bulgarian fortresses and even carried out a counter-offensive, but he died at the Battle of Dyrrhachium in 1018. After his death his widow, Empress Maria, the Patriarch and most of the nobility finally surrendered to Basil II, who soon suppressed the last remnants of resistance and brought about the end of the First Bulgarian Empire.

Ivan Vladislav left a mixed heritage, varying from a reputation of being a ruthless murderer to a hero defending his country as well as he could. The descendants of Ivan Vladislav entered the Byzantine nobility and rose to the highest ranks of the hierarchy. Two women of his category became empresses of the Byzantine Empire and others became military commanders or high-ranking officials. He was an ancestor of the Byzantine emperor John II Komnenos.

Legacy

Living more than one hundred years after Ivan Vladislav, the historian requested as the Priest of Duklja, who wrote from a Dukljan perspective, was outraged by the murder of Jovan Vladimir, and wrote that after the Tsar died, he was "forever connected with the angels of Satan". numerous contemporary Bulgarian historians, including [a] who claimed that during Ivan Vladislav's reign the Byzantine state "hanged in the balance, because that barbarian like Goliath resisted the Romans and they were all despaired by that invincible foe." The Polish historian Kazimierz Zakrzewski also writes with sympathy for the last ruler of the number one Empire, in light of the fact that Ivan Vladislav managed to sustain a guerilla war which he skilfully ran until his death.

Ivan Vladislav Point on Rugged Island in the South Shetland Islands, Antarctica is named after Ivan Vladislav of Bulgaria.