Tsar Ivan Sratsimir

Ivan Sratsimir (Іωаннъ Сраѯимиръ) was a Bulgarian tsar who ruled from 1356 to 1396, when Bulgaria fell under Ottoman rule.

His parentage connected him to Tsar Ivan Alexander and Theodora Basarab, daughter of the Wallachian voivode Ivanko I Basarab.

In the 1350s, his father appointed him governor of the Vidin region. He built up the fortress near Belogradchik and made it second in importance in the tsardom after the fortress of Vidin.

In 1365, the Hungarian king Louis I the Great conquered Vidin and annexed it to the Kingdom of Hungary. This period was marked by conversions to Catholicism in the region.

After a period of Wallachian rule in Vidin, Ivan Sratsimir was restored to the throne in 1369, becoming a vassal of the Hungarian king. In 1396 he participated in the crusade of the Hungarian king Sigismund, which ended in the defeat of the crusaders at Nikopol.

As a result of the defeat, Vidin was captured by Ottoman troops in 1396, and Ivan Sratsimir was taken prisoner. Information about his fate after that point is not entirely clear, but he is thought to have been sent into captivity in Asia Minor.

Despite the various hypotheses concerning the date of the fall of the Vidin Tsardom, a general majority of historians support the view that Vidin fell under Ottoman rule in 1396.