Who are we and where did we come from?

Who are the Croats? Where did they come from? That, my friends, is a mystery. There are 3 major legends that speak of this. 

Byzantine Emperor Constantin VII. wrote about Croats in his piece called "De Administrando Imperio" in 10th century. He claimed that a 7th century Byzantine Emperor Heraclius decided he was sick of barbarian tribes called Avari. Avari were wild and horrifying and caused a great deal of damage to his Empire. That's when he decided it was time for Croatia. He called to aid a very powerful tribe of warriors known as Croats. They quickly cleaned the area getting rid of all Avari tribes and formed their own state. Other, much smaller tribes that lived in the area were forced to accept the language and governance of Croats. According to this theory Croats derived from Slavic tribes, thus the theory is known as Slavic theory. 

Another theory would make Germans our brothers. By this Gothic theory we once belonged to Ostrogoths, the most powerful German tribe. This theory is based on facts that we shared similar words with other German tribes and one of our first alphabets, Glagoljica, used gothic runes as its base. Also the name "Hrvat" or "Horvat" was a common name in German tribes and Croats call their country Hrvatska and themselves Hrvati. I do not know if the Germans would like it but it would be very cool to be brothers with them from my point of view.

The third theory I will write about here is the Iranian theory. It represents a set of beliefs that we came from Iran. Many scientists believe that a Persian tribe called "Harahvaiti" who had a land they called "Harahvatia" were in fact Croats. Also there are many artefacts found in Iran that mention Croats. This would make us a very old nation. The handwritings found there were written in 2nd and 3rd century before Christ. 

These are just the 3 major stories about the origin of Croats and there are many more. Which ever theory you wish to believe in, one thing is for sure: we were powerful, awesome and many rulers loved us.