The Avar khaganate in 635 was much reduced compared to what it had been a decade earlier. Following the khagan’s defeat at Constatninople in 626, the Slavic clans in the West rebelled and elected Samo as their king, thus establishing an independent realm along the Morava River.

Meanwhile, a faction of Bulgars sought to dethrone the khagan, but were defeated and a part of them fled East. There, the Bulgar leader Kubrat rallied the nomadic peoples of the eastern khaganate to his banner and defeated the pursuing Avars in 635, thus asserting his authority over the steppe lands north of the Black Sea.

If we look at the previous map detailing the situation in 602 CE, we can also note some important changes that had occurred outside the Carpathian arc and in the Balkans since the start of the wars between the Avars and the Romans.

The Roman empire had lost its holdings in much of the Balkans outside of Thrace and the coast of the Aegean and Adriatic seas. Slavic communities settled on land abandoned by fleeing Roman refugees, and those former provincials who remained in place negotiated with the new arrivals to work out land and trade agreements on a village-to-village basis.

Meanwhile, as the Bulgars on the steppes of the eastern khaganate asserted their independence, the Avars could no longer project their authority beyond the Carpathian mountain passes. At the same time, the Bulgars themselves didn’t have the strength to assert their authority west of the Dniester, and so the communities between the Carpathians and the Dniester – Romanic and Slavic alike – were able to live in their village communities more or less free from the tribute demands of nomadic warlords.