Land, Roads, Trade and Money: Balkan Banditry in Its Geographical and Economic Context

Abstract

With few exceptions, scholars agree that banditry is a predominantly rural phenomenon. Balkan bandits infested roads and rivers both in the highlands and in the lowlands, especially in peripheral and frontier regions which rarely remained under firm state control. To be sure, very few areas in the Balkans remained free of brigand depredations during the Middle Ages. Nevertheless, certain regions were more prone to such activity than others. In the western Balkans, brigandage flourished along the ʻcaravan routesʼ which connected the Adriatic Sea with the interior of the peninsula, while in the eastern Balkans, particularly in parts of Macedonia, rural lawlessness appears to have become exceptionally common from the ninth century onwards. Although very diverse in terms of their relief and geological structure (the terrain of the western and central Balkans is far more mountainous and rugged than that of Macedonia), both areas share a common feature—they are mostly covered by thick forest and woodland, whose existence constitutes an almost necessary precondition for the development of banditry. Indeed, banditry was committed in the forest or from the forest because many roads run through the forest, and it was from there that one could ambush and attack travellers; at the same time, the forest was the first place of refuge, for staying in the woods offered an excellent opportunity to evade state authorities.