This essay analyses one of Miho Barada’s best known texts, his doctoral thesis
titled The topography of Porphyrogenitus’ Pagania, published in 1928. The starting
point of Barada’s analysis is the ...36th chapter of the volume On the governance of
the empire (‘De administrando imperio’, DAI) by the Byzantine emperor Constantine
Porphyrogenitus. The volume was dedicated, as the title indicates, ‘to the
inhabitants of Pagania who are also known as the Narentines and to the land they
inhabit’. In the text Barada first determines the boundaries of Pagania (region of
the river Neretva). This was not a particularly difficult feat as DAI, as well as some
other sources, provided detailed information on this question. A bigger historiographical
problem and the question to which Barada devoted most space in the
volume was the geographical positioning of the districts Rastoka and Dalena.
Towards the end of the book Barada focused on the Narentines and cited ninth
and tenth century sources. I was especially interested in the location of one of the
fortifications mentioned in DAI: Verulje/Vrulje/Brela. Some scholars identified
Constantine’s τό Вερούλλια or ‘Berulia’ as Vrulja and others as (Gornja) Brela.
Miho Barada concluded that Brela and Vrulja were two names that had arisen
from the same basis. He finally proposed that ‘Berulia’ was located on the site of
the Church of St. Nicholas in Gornja Brela because ‘there are plenty of springs
in the field near S. Nicholas’. The conclusion of this essay is that it does not make
much sense to look for ‘Berulia’ up in the hills. The purpose of ‘Berulia’ and of
the other three fortifications in Pagania was to oversee coastal sailing. Thus it is
impossible for the location of ‘Berulia’ to be in the hinterland, from where the sea
cannot be seen or the view of the bay is restricted. Also, and in contrast to Barada’s
view that ‘these settlements (that is, the four ‘settled towns’ in Constantine’s Pagania)
were far away from the sea’, I argue that both ‘Berulia’ and other settlements had to be fairly close to the sea because the fort crews had to be able to reach the shore fast after spotting a ship and intervene quickly if necessary.
