Ivats

Ivats (Bulgarian: Ивац) was a Bulgarian noble[1][2][3] and military commander in the late 10th and early 11th century. He served three Bulgarian Emperors - Samuil (997-1014); Gavril Radomir (1014–1015) and Ivan Vladislav (1015–1018).

In 1015 he defeated a Byzantine army in the battle of Bitola and stopped the disastrous campaign of Basil II in the heart of the Bulgarian Empire. After the death of Ivan Vladislav and the surrender of the Empress, the Patriarch and many nobles to the Byzantines he chose to continue the struggle along the sons of the dead Emperor and several other nobles. His stronghold was the fortress Tomornitsa in Mount Tomor, modern south-eastern Albania. The fortress was soon besieged by Basil II but the 55-day siege was unsuccessful for the Byzantines. In August 1018 he was treacherously blinded by the Byzantine strategos Eustathios Daphnomeles.

References
  1. Holmes, C. Basil II and the Governance of Empire (976-1025), Oxford University Press, 2005, ISBN 0-19-927968-3, pp. 228-229.
  2. Rhetoric in Byzantium: papers from the thirty-fifth Spring Symposium of Byzantine Studies, Exeter College, University of Oxford, March 2001, volume 11, Publications (Society for the Promotion of Byzantine Studies (Great Britain), Elizabeth Jeffreys, Ashgate, 2003, ISBN 0-7546-3453-1, p. 196.
  3. History of the Byzantine Empire from DCCXVI to MLVII, George Finlay, BiblioBazaar, LLC, 2009, ISBN 1-113-15540-X, p. 385.
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