The Bulgars & Bulgarians; History of Bulgaria

The Bulgars are believed to be first mentioned in the fourth century as one of the five barbarian hordes in ancient China. The word Bulgar is generally considered to be of Turkic origin, meaning the mixed or the rebellious. As a nomadic horse-riding people subsisting primarily from raiding and pillaging, the Bulgars migrate west with a confederation of other Turkic tribes toward the riches of Europe. They are ruled by the Dulo clan and worship Tangra, the Turkic sky god. Their leader is Kubrat who makes an alliance with the Byzantines against another Turkic tribe, the Avars. Then in 635 AD unites the Turkic tribes establishing the first Bulgarian state called Old Great Bulgaria and within 10 years defeat the Avars and grow in power. As Kubrat lay dying in 665 AD, he told his sons to fetch a bundle of sticks and to break the bundle in two. When none of his sons could break it, Kubrat took the sticks and broke them one by one with his feeble hands. The sons understood the father's message. Their strength depended on their unity. Soon after Kubrat's death, another Turkic tribe, the Khazars, make a fierce attack on the Bulgars, destroying Old Great Bulgaria and the sons go their separate ways. One son, Kotrog, going north bounding Volga Bulgaria and another son, Asparuk, goes south to the Danube, establishing the first Bulgarian empire. Khan Asparuk, listening to the words of his father, keeps the Bulgars united and mightily rules the empire, conquering the Slavic Balkan tribes and quickly expanding his domain. He builds the capital Pliska from where Bulgaria would continue to conquer the Balkans and launch attacks on the Byzantines. After Asparuk, Tervel becomes the Khan of Bulgaria. Tervel is a close Byzantine ally after aiding Justinian II to return to the throne. For this, Tervel is given many gifts, including the title Caesar, making him the first foreign ruler to carry this title in Byzantine and Roman history. In 717, Constantinople is sieged by Arab forces and the Byzantines call on Tervel, arriving with a Bulgarian army enroutes the Arabs. This event makes Tervel a revered figure in Orthodox Christianity, even though he himself was a pagan. After many years of internal strife amongst the Khans, in 796 Khan Krum takes over. Krum makes strict order in the empire and has a policy of territorial expansion. Around 805, Krum attacks and defeats the crumbling Avar Khaganate, conquering the Pannonian Basin and the Carpathian Mountains. Krum then embarks on a military campaign against the Byzantine Empire, defeating the Byzantines in Struma and Serdica. The Byzantine Emperor Nikephoros starts a large counter-offensive, invading deep into Bulgaria, ignoring Krum's calls for negotiations and sacking the capital Pliska. Krum intercepts Nikephoros, returning to Constantinople, trapping his army in the Varvitsa Pass, wiping them out, and killing Emperor Nikephoros. It is said Krum had the emperor's skull lined with silver and used it as a drinking cup. Krum continues on his warpath and invades Thrace in 813, capturing many Byzantine cities. Krum advances on Constantinople, hoping to take the city and get his vengeance on the Byzantines. The new emperor, Leo the Armenian, calls on a meeting for peace, where Krum is ambushed and injured making his escape. Furious, Krum ravages the outskirts of Constantinople, returning home to prepare a major attack on the city. However, on April 13, 814, Krum dies, being succeeded by his son Omertag. Omertag begins his rule by making peace with the Byzantines, signing a 30-year peace treaty. During the peace, Omertag defeats rebellious Slavic tribes in the empire, integrating the Bulgar and Slavic peoples closer. Omertag is called the Builder, for reconstructing the damaged capital Pliska, including a new palace and temple to Tongra. He begins a persecution of the Christian population, viewing it as subversive to the state, and further strengthens the empire. In 836, Presyan, the grandson of Omertag, takes over and begins expansion south, conquering Slavic tribes in the region of Macedonia. In the conquest, Presyan invades Serbian territory, starting a war with the Serbs. For three years, Presyan fights the Serbian tribes, and he is defeated, being driven out by the Serb chieftain Vlastimir. This crushing defeat ends Presyan's expansion, and he dies ten years later, being succeeded by his son Boris. Boris, seeking vengeance for his father's defeat at the hands of the Serbs, in 853 sends an army commanded by his son Vladimir to the Serb lands, where they are defeated again, and Vladimir is captured, along with twelve Bulgarian noblemen. Boris negotiates the return of his son, and makes peace with the Serbs. Bordered on one side by Moravia, and on the other by the Byzantines, the Bulgars were surrounded by Christians, and under constant threat. While internal strife begins to rise after repeated losses to the Serbs, Boris decides in 864 to convert Bulgaria to Christianity. In a secret baptism, Boris, together with his family, and a select few of the Bulgar nobility, are baptized by Byzantine clergymen, making peace between both empires. After consolidating political power, Boris declares Christianity the state religion, and that summer a group of Bulgar nobles stage a revolt in defense of the Turkic-Bulgar faith. Boris ruthlessly suppresses the revolt, executing the nobles, along with their families, quieting any opposition to the Christianization of Bulgaria. Boris then seeks an independent Bulgarian church. After rejection by the patriarch to be granted independence, Boris turns to the papacy, which ignites a conflict between the papacy and the In order to prevent the creation of a papal state at Constantinople's doorstep, the Byzantine patriarch finally grants Bulgaria the status of an independent church in 870. Boris begins to build up the Bulgarian clergy, and in 886 invites two disciples of Cyril and Methodius, Clement and Naum, to come to Bulgaria and develop the Bulgarian clergy and schools. The two disciples establish educational centers throughout Bulgaria, training Bulgarian priests, and developing a new alphabet called Cyrillic, which has made the official alphabet of Bulgaria. Due to the Slavs having become the majority population, the Slavic language is declared official in 893, replacing the traditional Turkic-Bulgar language of the upper class. This declaration sparks an uprising by Boris' son, Vladimir, who with a militia of Bulgars, attacks the Christian temples in an effort to preserve the Bulgar language and pagan religion. Boris defeats Vladimir and has his eyes gouged out, relinquishing the throne and becoming a monk to live his life in peace and solitude. The establishment of an independent church, one official language, and writing system firmly unites a state of two very separate peoples into a homogenous society. Boris' third son, Simeon, begins his rule of Bulgaria in 893 and is immediately faced with attacks from the invading Hungarians in the north. Simeon makes an alliance with the Turkic Pechenegs and together launches an attack on the Hungarians, sending them into retreat. Simeon then turns his attention south, invading Byzantium, annihilating Byzantine forces in the Battle of Bulgaria-Phagon and conquering all of the Slavic-inhabited northern Greece and a bulk of the Serbian territories, vastly enlarging the empire. During Simeon's reign, Bulgaria reaches its cultural peak, becoming the literary and spiritual center of the Slavs, with the Cyrillic alphabet spreading from Bulgaria to all the other Slavic states, most notably Kievan Rus, which would later become Russia. After Simeon's death in 927, a series of rebellions occur between his sons for the secession of the throne. Taking advantage of the weak internal state, in 933 the Serbian prince Caslav starts an uprising with Byzantine support, resulting in Bulgaria losing territories in the western Balkans. Allying with Kievan Rus, the Byzantines defeat the Bulgarians in 971, resulting in the Bulgarian loss of Thrace and Lower Moesia. In 997, Tsar Samuel comes into power and as a skillful general launches many successful attacks on the Serbs and the Byzantines. Samuel annexes the Serbian principality of Duklja and imprisons the Serb leader Jovan Vladimir, making the new capital of Bulgaria, Okhrid. The Byzantine emperor Basil II, with a vow to destroy the Bulgarians, amasses a large army to completely conquer and destroy Bulgaria. In 1001 AD, Basil begins his campaign and in the next three years captures the old Bulgar capital, Pliska, expelling the Bulgarians from Thrace and Macedonia. At the same time, the Hungarians attack in the north, annexing Bulgarian lands in the north Danube. Basil continues on his rampage for the next 10 years, defeating Samuel and the Bulgarians in beating Skopje and Dyrrhachium on the Albanian coast. In 1014, after another Bulgarian defeat, 15,000 Bulgarian soldiers are captured and Basil orders them all to be blinded, with one of every 100 men to be left with one eye to lead the rest home to tell the tale. This ruthlessness earns Basil the nickname, the Bulgar Slayer. When the blinded soldiers arrived home, Tsar Samuel was so shocked that he received a heart attack, dying two weeks later. Basil finally conquers all of Bulgaria four years later in 1018, incorporating it into the Byzantine Empire and ending the First Bulgarian Empire. For nearly 200 years, Bulgaria was a province of the Byzantine Empire until Asen, a wealthy shepherd of either Vlach or Turkic origins, begins a rebellion with his brothers against the Byzantines in 1185. Gathering a vast army of Bulgarians and Vlachs, Asen also forms an alliance with the Cumans, a Turkic people living north of the Danube River. They begin attacks, defeating the Byzantines, and carve out territory along both sides of the Danube, making the capital Tarnovo and declaring restoration of the Bulgarian Empire. Asen's younger brother, Kaloyan, takes over in 1196 and in revenge for the blinding of Tsar Samuel's soldiers, takes the name Romanov Ktonos, the Byzantine Slayer. In negotiations with Rome, Kaloyan receives recognition as an emperor and the Bulgarian church is elevated to a patriarchy in spite of Byzantine opposition. Asen's son, Ivan Asen II, becomes emperor in 1218 and continues Kaloyan's anti-Byzantine policies, attacking Byzantine forts in Macedonia and Epirus, conquering the territory and expanding the Second Bulgarian Empire to its territorial peak. He's succeeded by his infant son Kaliman, which greatly weakens the empire and is forced to pay tribute to the expanding Mongol Empire in the north. The 12-year-old Kaliman is poisoned and rivalries begin to ensue amongst nobility, causing a rapid decline of the empire. The constant raids, political instability, and economic problems lead to a popular uprising in 1277, when a rebel army led by swineherder Ivailo defeat the Mongols and turn on the Bulgarian army, killing Emperor Konstantin Tikh. The Byzantines support the Asen dynasty and provide 10,000 troops to defeat Ivailo, who for three years holds them up until he's killed by the Mongols. The Bulgarian nobility elect George Tertar, a noble of Kuman descent, to be emperor, starting the Tertar dynasty. George rules for 12 years, making strong alliances with the Mongol Empire, eventually becoming a vassal of the Mongols in order to protect from Byzantine attacks. The Kingdom of Serbia begins expanding into Macedonia, and Michael Shishman, the new emperor of Bulgaria, makes an alliance with the Byzantine Empire for a joint offensive against Serbia. In 1330, Shishman invades Serbia with 15,000 troops and battles the Serbs, getting utterly defeated and Emperor Shishman getting beheaded on the battlefield as his troops retreat. This battle was a disaster for Bulgaria, and Bulgaria becomes a vassal of the elevated Serbian Empire under Tsar Dushan. In 1371, after a defeat by the invading Ottomans, the Serbs withdraw from Bulgaria. Helpless, Bulgaria becomes a vassal of the Turks and within 20 years completely conquered, putting an end to the medieval Bulgarian state. Under the Ottomans for 500 years, the Bulgarians acquire Turkish words, Turkish food, and a significant ethnic Turkish population. As the Ottoman Empire weakens in the late 19th century, the Bulgarians, inspired by the earlier Serbian and Greek uprisings, stage an uprising in 876, resulting in the establishment of an independent Bulgarian state two years later. The new Bulgarian state is much smaller than what they were promised by the great powers in the Treaty of San Stefano. In 1908, with the further collapse of the Ottoman Empire, Bulgaria is enlarged, receiving Thrace and portions of the Black Sea coast, but many Bulgarians are unhappy with Macedonia still being in the Ottoman Empire. The Slavic populace in the Macedonia region, being of mixed Serbian and Bulgarian origins, most Bulgarians consider them to be Bulgarians and the Macedonia region to belong to the Bulgarian state, as it was the location of the old capital in the first Bulgarian Empire. In 1903, a militant Bulgarian liberation movement called the Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization, or VMRO, starts the Ilinden Uprising in the Ottoman Macedonia. The uprising is ultimately a failure, and its leaders are arrested or executed within months, but it sparks a bloody Macedonian civil war amongst guerrilla factions based on ethnic lines. The Bulgarian Komiti, the Serb Chetniks, Greek insurgents, and Ottoman soldiers, all trying to carve out their own peace of the Macedonia region. The civil war continues, igniting the Balkan Wars of 1912 to 1913, where Bulgaria allies with Greece and Serbia, and they together defeat the Ottoman Empire, and Bulgaria conquers back large parts of Thrace. However, on the 29th of June 1913, Bulgaria turns on its allies and attacks Serbia and Greece with the aim of taking all of Macedonia. Bulgaria suffers many defeats, and are even invaded by Romania and the Ottomans. The Bulgarians call for peace, and in the Treaty of Bucharest, the Bulgarians settle on the current borders of Bulgaria, but with much bitterness. In 1914, the First World War erupts, and the Bulgarian Tsar Ferdinand, seeking vengeance for their defeat, allies with the Central Powers, Austro-Hungary, Germany, and the Ottomans, to fight Serbia and Greece and take Macedonia. In 1915, Bulgaria makes its attack on Serbia, occupying much of southern Serbia, including Nis, and invades Greek Macedonia and Romanian Dobruja. In 1918, however, the Serbs, British, French, Italians, and Greeks break through the front, overwhelming the Bulgarians, leading to mass desertions and surrender. Following defeat, Tsar Ferdinand steps down and goes into exile. In 1919, Bulgaria is proclaimed a republic. In 1941, World War II starts, and faced with an invasion while still longing for Macedonia, Bulgaria enters into an alliance with Hitler and the Nazis. With Yugoslavia and Greece defeated, Bulgaria occupies all of Greek Thrace and Macedonia. But when the Nazis begin losing in 1944, there is a communist uprising in Bulgaria, and the Soviets enter and arrest the regime for war crimes, executing them all. Bulgaria is communist for 45 years, allied closely to the Soviet Union, up until its fall in 1991, when Bulgaria becomes a democracy. 13 years later, joining NATO and then the European Union.