The study combines archaeological evidence, written sources, and genetic studies to trace the routes of peach introduction to the Balkans and explore the local cultivation practices and it revisits the discovery of peach remains at the medieval site of Ras in southwest Serbia. Peach (Prunus persica [L.] Batsch) came to the Mediterranean from the East around the 6th/4th c. BC, and over the following centuries it spread westwards. In the Roman Empire it was an already well known fruit. One possible route for its introduction to Europe was through the Balkans (“via Balcani”), from the Black Sea region along the Danube River to other areas. However, following the Migration Period and the fall of the Western Roman Empire, the peach tree orchards remained mostly abandoned for the next three centuries. In contrast, the peach trees in the Eastern (Byzantine) Empire remained present despite repeated invasions, and destructive conflicts, which occurred between the 5th–11th/12th centuries. Peaches were generally available on the market and described in written sources. Archaeological evidence of the of peaches in the region can be found at the medieval site Ras in Serbia, where peach fruit stone fragments have been radiocarbon dated to 1021–1158 cal AD. During the 12th century, Ras served as a Byzantine fortress and later became the main defensive stronghold of the newly formed Serbian state from the middle of the 12th century to the fourth decade of the 13th century. Given the peach fruit soft texture and difficulty to transport, it is likely that they were grown locally. The Romans could have introduced peaches into the area during the 4th century. However, the area was abandoned between the 6th–9th centuries and the peach trees could not have survived if unattended. In the Balkans, including present-day Serbia, there is a significant genetic diversity of peach landraces that are grown effectively wild in vineyards (“vineyard peach”) and are ancient in origins. The presence of peach stones at Ras suggests a possible continuity of practices linked to the “via Balcani” route and enduring local cultivation or trade from southern regions since ancient times. Future discoveries of peach stones in the area will enhance our understanding of this historical route. This study provides significant insights into the prolonged existence and local cultivation of peaches in the broader region, emphasizing the interplay between cultural exchange, trade, and agricultural practices over millennia.

The paper explores the linguistic and cultural patterns behind an oral incantation against snakebite that appears on the last page of a Middle Bulgarian book of psalms. The manuscript dates back to the 14th century, and was created in the Eastern regions of Medieval Bulgaria, observing the orthography of the Tarnovo Literary traditions. The Russian traveller Norov found the book of psalms during a trip to the Holy Land at the beginning of the 19th century and brought it to Russia. The incantation contains a significant number of words of unclear origin. Yatsimirskiy – the first researcher of this incantation – offers two possible explanations about the source language that allude either to its derivation from an Oriental tongue, or to local folklore practices. Modern Russian researchers maintain the hypothesis about its folklore origin and emphasise its opening words sarandara/marandara as an example of ritual nonsense speech – in their view, this could have been a popular phenomenon in the ethnic religious practices of Slavic communities. After a linguistic analysis of the text and its unclear words, I hypothesise that the words belong to one of a range at used the incantation.

This article deals with the revolts staged by the Varangians at the imperial palace in 1068 and 1078. The first part of the article focuses on the revolt at the beginning of Romanos IV Diogenes’s reign as described by the Continuator of Skylitzes. The detailed analysis of the chronicler’s account of the Varangians’ uprising in 1068 offers a new perspective on the relevant passage in his work. It reveals important details regarding the sources of the account in question, including its relationship with the works of Psellos and Bryennios. The author argues that the Varangians were not hostile to Romanos IV Diogenes at the beginning of his reign and that the Continuator of Skylitzes misplaced the relevant story in his narrative. The information he provided was indebted to Psellos and Bryennios. The second part of the article is devoted to the last revolt which the Varangians raised in April–May 1078. Analysis of the accounts of three historians: Michael Attaleiates, Continuator of Skylitzes, and Nikephoros Bryennios, supports the conclusion that the Continuator of Skylitzes and Bryennios recounted the first part of the story while Attaleiates (and partially the Continuator of Skylitzes) reported its end.

This article is the third in a series of works which aims to contribute to documenting the influence of the medical theory of individual temperaments, derived from the theory of the four humors, through the major work Iconologia by the Italian humanist Cesare Ripa (1555–1622). Here, we studied the allegory of the melancholic. Beyond the work aimed at situating it within the medical tradition, we were particularly interested in the relationship between text and image and the interplay between expression (explicite) and silence (implicite) that is so frequent in the work. We thus undertook to analyse all the symbolic attributes of Ripa’s composition according to whether they appear in the engraving, in the text, in both, and whether they are commented on or not. The importance given at the end of the text to the teachings of the School of Salerno also allowed us to better understand the synthetic thought of the Italian humanist and, consequently, the overall economy of the Iconologia. Thus, in the course of our reflection on the modes of expression of the ‘said’ and ‘unsaid’ in the definition of the melancholic temperament in Ripa, we attempted to account for the internal mechanics of his work and the nature of the rhetorical strategies (both textual and visual) of his discursive architecture.

The article discussed the time and place of the canonization of Methodius and the difference in the treatment he received in the Roman Catholic Church and in the Bulgarian Church. The study highlights the overall distinct treatment of the two brothers while tracing the changes in the attitude to Methodius as opposed to that to Cyril in the first texts written in the Slavonic alphabet, in Bulgaria. Two canons and anonymous stichera from the service on the feast day of Methodius indicate that his disciples played a significant role for establishing the cult of Methodius. In the earlier years, there was a difference – the cult of Methodius was in the process of establishment, while Cyril had already been recognized as a saint whose cult was supported by an established tradition and whose figure had been used to support the holiness of his elder brother, later born to eternal life. The study also determines the time of the beginning of the cult of Methodius in Bulgaria at the end of the 9th and the beginning of the 10th century, after the treatise On the Letters and after the translation of the Nebesa (“Heaven”) by John the Exarch in Old Bulgarian, most likely at the time of Constantine of Preslav and Clement of Ochrid.