[2][3] In De Administrando Imperio of Byzantine Emperor Constantine VII Porphyrogenitus (r. 913–959), the tribe is called Paganoi (Greek: Παγανοὶ, Παγανοἰ), and their polity Pagania (Παγανὶα, Παγανἰα), in Greek, while also noting that in Latin they are called Arentanoi (Αρεντανοἰ) and their polity Arenta (Αρεντα).

In Serbo-Croatian, the tribal name is rendered as Neretljani (Неретљани), Neretvani and Pagani (Пагани), while the polity mostly as Paganija (Паганија).

In DAI's chapters Story of the province of Dalmatia and Of the Pagani, also called Arentani, and of the country they now dwell in, the geography of Pagania is described.

[16] One of their attacks in 834–835, when they robbed and killed some Venetian merchants returning from Benevento, caused great resentment against them in Venice.

[16][21] The arrival of Basil I (r. 867–886) to the Byzantine throne led to important changes in Byzantium; energetic, he managed to enter closer ties with the Bulgarians, and even the distant Croats, and protected the Empire well.

[22] Byzantine admiral Niketas Ooryphas took up closer contacts with the Slavic tribes around Ragusa, the Zachumlians, Travunians and Kanalites, and invited them to jointly combat the Saracens, both on land and sea, in 869.

[22] Only Slavic tribes of southern Dalmatia were called to cooperate; to the north, the Croats and Dalmatians entered relations with Italian king Louis at the dismay of the Byzantines.

[22] When some "Slavs"[22] (Narentines according to Narayan[21]) in March 870 kidnapped the Bishop of Rome's emissaries returning home from the Fourth Council in Constantinople,[21] the Byzantines used this as a good pretext to attack and force them into submission (871).

[22] The DAI mentions that the Narentines were called "pagans, because they did not accept baptism in the time when all Serbs were baptized", which is placed during Basil's rule.

[22] The Narentines are not mentioned in relation to the Byzantine military expedition on Bari dispatched by Basil I (r. 867–886), in which other Dalmatian Slavs participated.

[23] The Croats, Serbs, Zachlumians, Travunians, Konavlians, Ragusans, "with all the men of the towns of Dalmatia", crossed over the sea to Langobardia and took Bari.

[27][28] Petar and the Byzantine commander of Dyrrhachion Leo Rhabdouchos met in Narentine lands regarding an alliance against the Bulgars.

[33] In the 940s, the islands of Brač and Hvar, which had earlier become part of the Croatian kingdom, seceded during Ban Pribina's rebellion and rejoined the Narentine province.

[37] On 9 May 1000, Venetian Doge Pietro II Orseolo[38] decided to conquer the allied Croats and Narentines, protecting the interests of their trading colonies and the Latin Dalmatian citizenry.

As a counterattack, the Narentines kidnapped 40 of the foremost citizens of Zara (Zadar) and stole a transport of goods from Apulia.

[citation needed] On their way home, Pietro II dispatched 10 ships that surprised them between Lastovo and Sušac and took them as prisoners to Trogir.

They guaranteed that the Narentine prince himself would show up with his men and renounce the old rights to tax the Venetians for free passage.

However, the identification is very problematic, and modern historiography argues that they were also one of the local titles of dukes who served the king of Croatia.

[45] The recorded personalities are iudex Marianorum Drosaico (Družak) in 839 by Venetian chronicler John the Deacon (1008) records a renewal of Venetian–Narentine peace treaty signed by Drosaico (Ad Narrantanas insulas cum Drosaico, Marianorum iudice, similiter fedus instituit);[39][40][46] iudex Marianorum and rex Marioanourm Berigoj from a 1050 charter by priest Ivan from Split giving himself and church of St. Sylvester on island Biševo to the Benedictine monastery of St Mary of Tremiti;[39][47][5][48] dux Marianorum and morsticus Jacobum (Jakov) from Split in the escort of Croatian king Demetrius Zvonimir and Stephen II of Croatia per three sources and Supetar Cartulary;[40][42][45] dux Marianorum and Morsticus Rusin during the reign of Demetrius Zvonimir and early 1090s per Supetar Cartulary;[39][43][44][45] rex of Croatia Slavac, brother of Rusin with ban Petar in 1090 per Supetar Cartulary.

[54] De Administrando Imperio also gives information about the Narentines and there, the Narentines are described as descendants from the "unbaptized Serbs" that settled Dalmatia from an area near Thessaloniki while earlier coming there from White Serbia under the protection of Byzantine Emperor Heraclius (r. 610–641), and that are called as Pagans because they did not accept baptism at the time when all the Serbs were baptized.

[55][56][57] In the 19th century, historian Pavel Jozef Šafárik (1795–1861) said that the first information on Serbs in history was from events regarding the Narentines.

[60] Vladimir Ćorović (1885–1941) treated the Narentines as the first of the Serb tribes to take the initiative of fighting, not for defence and tribal organization, but for the liberty of selfish desires and security raids.

[61] Czech historian Francis Dvornik in his analysis of DAI chapters concluded that they were more likely of Croatian than Serbian origin and the account is rather a political "ante-dating by three centuries the state of affairs in his own day".

[66] Serbian historian Tibor Živković also considered it a reflection of the political situation in the 10th century,[67] that there's no certainty the Narentines and others were Serbs or Croats or separate tribes which arrived with Serbs or Croats to the Balkans,[67] and that these ethnic identities are the result of political rather than ethnic development related to respective principalities.

895, during the rule of the Archon Peter, and from this political situation Constantine would have been able to write that the Pagans belonged to the Serbian tribe.

[75] In Serbian (e.g. Sima Ćirković), and partly Croatian historiography, they are often considered as Serbs or Croats and their polity as part of medieval Serbian or Croatian state, but such a consideration is not taking into account the "complexity of multi-layered identities" by which "the Slavic population differentiated into more than two ethnogenetic nuclei".

[5] While later parts of the Chronicle of the Priest of Duklja are considered of high value, events described in the early Middle Ages are largely discredited in historiography.