or Servians, with the Latin
Servi, was still more fortunate and familiar, (Constant.
Porphyr. de Administrando, Imperio, c. 32, p. 99.)
This conversion of a national into an
appellative name appears to have arisen in the viiith
century, in the Oriental France, where the princes and
bishops were rich in Sclavonian captives, not of the
Bohemian, (exclaims Jordan,) but of Sorabian race. From
thence the word was extended to the general use, to the
modern languages, and even to the style of the last
Byzantines, (see the Greek and Latin Glossaries and Ducange.) The confusion of the
or Servians, with the Latin
Servi, was still more fortunate and familiar, (Constant.
Porphyr. de Administrando, Imperio, c. 32, p. 99.)