Peter I, emperor (tsar) of the
Bulgarian Empire, suffers a
stroke and abdicates the throne in favour of his eldest son
Boris II. He arrives (after being an honorary
hostage at Constantinople) in
Preslav and is proclaimed as the new ruler. Boris regains lost territory from the
Kievan Rus' and recaptures
Pereyaslavets, an important trade city at the mouth of the
Danube.[2]
Summer – Grand Prince
Sviatoslav I invades Bulgaria at the head of a Kievan army, which includes
Pecheneg and
Hungarian auxiliary forces. He defeats the Bulgarians in a major battle and retakes Pereyaslavets. Boris II capitulates and impales 300 Bulgarian
boyars for disloyalty. Sviatoslav assigns garrisons to the conquered fortresses in Northern Bulgaria.[3]
Pandulf Ironhead, duke of
Benevento and
Capua, leads the siege of
Bovino. He is captured by the Byzantines and taken in chains to
Bari, and jailed in Constantinople. Neapolitan forces under
Marinus II, duke of
Naples, invade Benevento-Capua, capture the city of
Avellino and then lay siege to
Capua.[4]
Otto I 'the Great', Holy Roman Emperor, assembles a large expeditionary force at
Pavia, joined by
Spoletan troops. He counter-attacks, relieves the siege of Capua and devastates the area around Naples. Otto enters Benevento, where he is received as 'liberator' by
Landulf IV and in the cities of
Apulia (Southern
Italy).
^Reuter, Timothy (1999). The New Cambridge Medieval History, Volume III, p. 584.
ISBN978-0-521-36447-8.
^Gay, Jules (1904). L'Italie méridionale et l'empire Byzantin: Livre II. New York: Burt Franklin.
^Brett, Michael (2002). "The Fatimid Revolution (861-973) and its aftermath in North Africa". The Cambridge History of Africa, Vol. 2 ed. J. D. Fage; Roland Anthony Oliver. Cambridge University Press. p. 622.