The Battle of Kleidion in 1014 was a decisive Byzantine victory over the First Bulgarian Empire. It formed part of the long struggle between Byzantium and Bulgaria for control of the Balkans. The battle accelerated the collapse of Bulgarian independence and strengthened Byzantine political and religious influence in the region.

The Byzantine-Bulgarian frontier was a multilingual cultural zone where Greek, Slavonic, and ecclesiastical traditions met. Political conquest affected monasteries, chronicles, saints' lives, and the movement of liturgical texts that shaped South Slavic literary culture.