sentences:  It mainly served as Byzantine propaganda praising Emperor Heraclius for repopulating the Balkans (previously devastated by the Avars) with Croats, who were seen by the Byzantines as tributary peoples living on what had always been 'Roman land'.Scholars have hypothesized the name Croat ("Hrvat") may be Iranian, thus suggesting that the Croatians were possibly a Sarmatian tribe from the Pontic region who were part of a larger movement at the same time that the Slavs were moving toward the Adriatic.The major basis for this connection was the perceived similarity between "Hrvat" and inscriptions from the Tanais dated to the 2nd and 3rd centuries CE, mentioning the name "Khoro(u)athos".