Bulgarian–Latin wars
| Bulgarian-Latin wars | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Boniface of Montferrat elected leader of the Fourth Crusade and eventual king of Thessalonica before his death by the Bulgarian King Kaloyan | |||||||||
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| Belligerents | |||||||||
| Bulgarian Empire | |||||||||
| Commanders and leaders | |||||||||
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Kaloyan Boril Ivan Asen II |
Baldwin I † Boniface I of Montferrat † Henry of Flanders | ||||||||
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The Bulgarian–Latin wars were a series of conflicts between the Second Bulgarian Empire (1185–1396) and the Latin Empire (1204–61). The wars affected the northern border of the Latin Empire throughout its existence.
The initial expansionist ambitions of the Latin Empire were crushed only one year after its foundation after the Battle of Adrianople in 1205, where its Emperor Baldwin I was captured and most of his knights perished. After that crucial defeat the Latin Empire had to defend itself against Bulgaria and the successor states of the Byzantine Empire, the Nicaean Empire in Asia Minor and the Despotate of Epirus in the Balkans.
As a result of the conflicts the Bulgarian Empire expanded its territory taking control of most of the Balkan Peninsula while the influence of the Latin Empire was reduced to Constantinople and a few towns and islands. With the elimination of the Patriarchate of Constantinople by the Roman Catholic Crusaders, Bulgaria became the centre of Orthodox Christianity.