Tsar Samuel is an inseparable part of Macedonia's historical heritage. His state had key centres in Prespa and Ohrid, and Ohrid became one of the most important political and spiritual centres of his empire. That is why Samuel cannot be erased from Macedonian history, regardless of today's disputes over the national interpretation of his state.

However much today's politics try to adapt the Middle Ages to modern national interests, one thing cannot be changed: Tsar Samuel and his state are inseparably tied to the territory of Macedonia.

Neither Sofia nor Athens can simply stamp today's national categories onto a man who lived more than a thousand years ago. In Samuel's time, the modern Balkan nation states did not exist in the form we know them today. That is why any automatic transfer of today's national identities onto the 10th and 11th centuries must be viewed critically.

Prespa and Ohrid were among the key centres of Samuel's rule. It is precisely on the territory of today's Macedonia that significant material and historical traces of his time are found. Ohrid became an exceptionally important political and spiritual centre, and the region around Prespa is directly linked to Samuel and his family.

Greece today officially handed Bulgaria human remains that the two states present as the remains of Tsar Samuel. But the act of handing them over from one state to another is not scientific proof either of the identity of the bones or of the modern national affiliation of a man who lived more than a thousand years ago.

The remains were found in the basilica of St Achillius in Prespa in the 1960s and were attributed to Samuel. Today's diplomatic ceremony is not a new archaeological discovery, and in itself it does not replace scientific identification.

Athens can hand over the remains. Sofia can receive them. But with that act, neither Athens nor Sofia can erase Macedonia from Samuel's history.

Samuel holds a central place in Macedonia's historical heritage, regardless of the interpretations.