Talk:Samuil's Inscription

I doubt the image really depicts the tombstone, as the article currently suggests. One can almost read what's written on the other side, strongly implying paper and making it a photograph of a book page. Now a book page surely does not deserve its own article. The book could be mentioned in the Samuil article as a source, at most, but the photograph of its page is of no encyclopedic value. --Huon 08:55, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

Sorry, I fixed the article. I think it's now clear that the image is not a picture of an actual tombstone, but rather contains the exact wording found on the tombstone according to several credible sources. I also added the significance of this inscription which makes it a very interesting piece of information that's often overlooked. S.S.

May be it's better to keep this article separate with links to and from Samuil. P.K.

Could we have an English translation of the inscription? I could probably translate the French, but a direct translation, if it exists, would be preferable. By the way, any English sources would also be helpful (or at least transliterations of the authors' names, so one has a reasonable chance of finding them in a non-kyrillic library, say, the Library of Congress). Finally, a picture of the real tombstone would be nice. One can be found on this site, but I'm not sure about its copyright status. --Huon 09:37, 10 September 2006 (UTC)

I don't have the English translation. Feel free to translate it, and add it to the page. I added a link to to the picture of the thombstone since I'm not sure if it is copyrighted. As far as sources, I recommend you read the work by Adontz. Not only he talks about Samuil, but he also gives a good account of all the important events during that period. More importantly, Adontz exposes the false interpretations of some other historians. However, as far as I know, it hasn't been translated to English from French. I noticed that in the Serbian Wikipedia, Samuil's inscription is given separately. That's why, I think it should remain separate in the English version as well. S.S.


 * I made a translation from the French, but since my French is rather shaky, I would appreciate someone having a look (or even better, someone comparing my translation to the cyrillic original).
 * Since this article by now is rather long and informative on its own (and since the Bitola inscription has its own article as well), I doubt a merge to Samuil is necessary. --Huon 09:09, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

Why this inscription is "contradiction" of Bitola inscription?
I cannot see why this inscription is contradiction of Bitola inscription by Ivan Vladislav.

According to Comitopuli dynasty David lost his live early (as did also other brother Moses). There was also a strong conflict betwean Samuil and Aaron (Aaron was executed by Samuil).

If Samuil ordered the tombstone, there is no reason for him to mention the dead Moses if he is not buried in the same grave. There is also no reason to mention unfriendly brother Aaron.


 * According to a fringe view held by Milivoj Pavlovic, a Serbian philologist, the stone is not likely to be a memorial for the deceased parents of an important medieval ruler. ("Iljada godini od vostanieto na komitopulite i sozdavanjeto na Samoilovata drzava", Prespa, 1969). For further reading see Macedonism.

In "Macedonizm" you can see "Bulgarizm"! The Bulgarian history about "komitopulite" is a big mistake. For further reading see: Adontz, Nicolas. Etudes Armeno-Byzantines. Livraria Bertrand. Lisbonne, 1965, Pp. 347-407 (384).

Merge unnecessary
This article was greatly expanded since the merge suggestion, making the original arguments for the merge to Samuil of Bulgaria obsolete. Thus I was bold and removed the tag. --Huon 19:55, 14 September 2006 (UTC)