Bulgaria

H

International Organizations

Bulgaria is a member of the United Nations (UN), the International Monetary Fund (IMF), NATO’s Partnership for Peace program, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), the Black Sea Economic Cooperation Group, the Council of Europe, and several other major international associations. Bulgaria is an associate member of the European Union (EU). In 2000 the EU opened membership negotiations with Bulgaria, and the country is expected to become a full member of the organization in 2007.

VII

History

The region that is now Bulgaria was at one time included in the Roman Empire as part of the provinces of Thrace and Moesia. Slavic and Turkic tribes settled in the area between about the 4th and 6th centuries ad. One branch of people known as Bulgars, who had established a large state near the Volga River on the east side of the Black Sea, invaded the Balkan Peninsula in the 7th century. They set up a state between the Danube River and the Balkan Mountains, an area that was then claimed by the Byzantine Empire. Byzantine armies failed repeatedly to dislodge the invaders during the 8th and early 9th centuries. By the end of the 9th century the Bulgarians had annexed considerable additional territory and laid the foundations for a strong state under Khan Krum, who reigned from 803 to 814. The Krum armies inflicted a devastating defeat on an invading Byzantine force in 811 and, assuming the offensive, nearly succeeded in 813 in taking Constantinople (present-day İstanbul, Turkey), the capital of the Byzantine Empire.

Bulgarian-Byzantine relations were thereafter relatively peaceful and continued to be so during the first half of the 9th century. The immediate successors of Krum enlarged their dominions, mainly in the region of Serbia and Macedonia. In 860, however, during the reign of Boris I, Bulgaria suffered a severe military setback at the hands of the Serbs. Four years later Boris, responding to pressure from the Byzantine emperor Michael III, made Christianity the official religion. Boris accepted the primacy of the papacy in 866, but in 870, following the refusal of Pope Adrian II to make Bulgaria an archbishopric, he shifted his allegiance to the Eastern Orthodox Church (see Orthodox Church).

A

The First Bulgarian Empire

In the late 9th and early 10th centuries, Bulgaria became the strongest nation of Eastern Europe during the reign of Boris’s son Simeon. A brilliant administrator and military leader, Simeon introduced Byzantine (Greek) culture into his realm, encouraged education, obtained new territories, defeated the Magyars (Hungarians), and conducted a series of successful wars against the Byzantine Empire. In 925 Simeon proclaimed himself tsar (emperor) of the Greeks and Bulgars. He conquered Serbia in 926 and became the most powerful monarch in contemporary Eastern Europe. Simeon’s reign was marked by great cultural advances led by the followers of the brothers Saint Cyril and Saint Methodius. During this period Old Church Slavonic, the first written Slavic language (see Slavic Languages), and the Cyrillic alphabet were adopted.

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Weakened by domestic strife and successive Magyar raids, Bulgarian power declined steadily during the following half-century. In 969 invading forces from Russia seized the capital and captured the royal family. The Byzantine Emperor John I Tzimisces, alarmed over the Russian advance into southeastern Europe, intervened in 970 in the Russo-Bulgarian conflict. The Russians were compelled to withdraw from Bulgaria in 972, and the eastern part of the country was annexed to the Byzantine Empire. Samuel, the son of a Bulgarian provincial governor, became ruler of western Bulgaria in 976. Samuel’s armies were annihilated in 1014 by the Byzantine Emperor Basil II, who incorporated the short-lived state into his empire in 1018.

B

The Second Empire and Ottoman Rule

Led by the noble brothers Asen and Peter, the Bulgarians revolted against Byzantine rule in 1185 and established a second empire. It consisted initially of the region between the Balkan Mountains and the Danube; by the early 13th century it included extensive neighboring territories, notably sections of Serbia and all of western Macedonia. Ivan Asen II, the fifth ruler of the Asen dynasty, added western Thrace, the remainder of Macedonia, and part of Albania to the empire in 1230.

Feudal strife and involvement in foreign wars caused gradual disintegration of the empire after the death of Ivan Asen II. The Bulgarian armies were decisively defeated by the Serbs in 1330, and for the next quarter century the second empire was little more than a dependency of Serbia. Shortly after 1360, armies of the Ottoman Empire began to ravage the Maritsa Valley and by 1396 they controlled all of Bulgaria. During the next five centuries the political and cultural existence of Bulgaria was almost obliterated. After a century of terrorism and persecution, Ottoman administration improved, and the economic condition of the remaining Bulgarians rose to a level higher than it had been under the kingdom, although unsuccessful revolts against Ottoman rule occurred from time to time.

With the revival of a Bulgarian literature glorifying the history of the country, in the latter half of the 18th century and the early part of the 19th century, Bulgarian nationalism became a powerful movement. In 1876 the Bulgarians revolted against the Ottomans, but were quelled; in reprisal, the Ottomans massacred an estimated 30,000 Bulgarian men, women, and children. In 1877, prompted by the desire to expand toward the Mediterranean Sea and by Pan-Slavic sentiment, Russia declared war on the Ottoman Empire and defeated it in 1878. As a result of the war, a part of Bulgaria became an autonomous principality; another part, Eastern Rumelia (see Rumelia), was made an autonomous Ottoman province.

C

Modern Bulgaria

Elected by a Bulgarian assembly in 1879, the first prince of the new Bulgaria was a German, Alexander of Battenberg, also a prince and a nephew of Emperor Alexander II of Russia. Eastern Rumelia revolted against the Ottoman Empire in 1885 and was united with Bulgaria. Russia, whose relationship with Prince Alexander had deteriorated, refused to recognize the union. The Russian emperor demanded the abdication of the prince and withdrew all officers who had been detailed to train the Bulgarian army. Serbia then declared war on Bulgaria but was quickly defeated. In 1886 a group of Russian and Bulgarian conspirators abducted Prince Alexander and established a Russian-dominated government. Within a few days the government was overthrown by the Bulgarian statesman Stepan Stambolov, but the Russians compelled Prince Alexander to abdicate. The new ruler, chosen in 1887, was Prince Ferdinand of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha. Taking advantage of a revolution in the Ottoman Empire, in 1908 Ferdinand declared Bulgaria independent and assumed the title of King, or Tsar, Ferdinand I; he reigned from 1908 to 1918.

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