Three minute history of Bulgaria

Lying at the crossroads between Europe and Asia, Bulgaria is country that has had a violet and tragic history. We explore it's dramatic past and look at how modern Bulgaria is shaped today...

By Mike Stock

The Thracians, who occupied the territory now known as Bulgaria, are among the country's earliest inhabitants (from around 3,500BC) and they have left a big mark on the region.

By 45AD, Rome, which had been at war with Thrace from the 2nd century BC, gained control, and in the 6th century, the Slavs began to move in. With them came the language and culture which helped form the Bulgaria we know today.

By the seventh century, the tribe of the Bulgars (originally from central Asia) formed a kingdom called Great Bulgaria, subjugating the Slavs and remaining Thracians, and by the 9th century, while under the rule of Boris I, the inhabitants adopted Christianity.
The Bulgars conquered most of the Balkan Peninsula during the 10th and 12th centuries, but by 1396 the Ottoman Empire invaded and Bulgaria became a province of this great empire. It was not until 1878, almost 500 years later, that Bulgaria - with the help of Russia - managed to gain independence in the Russo-Turkish War.

The thought of a strong alliance between Russia and Bulgaria, was not something that the Western powers wanted, and so at the Congress of Berlin in 1878, Bulgaria's territory was limited to a small principality ruled by Alexander of Battenburg, the nephew of the Russian czar.

The First Balkan War, which lasted from 1912 -1913, saw Bulgaria and the other members of the Balkan league, fighting against Turkey to regain lost territory. But Bulgaria was not satisfied with the small section of Macedonia that it was given, as it considered Macedonia to be an integral part of Bulgaria. And so the country instigated the second Balkan war against Turkey, as well as its former allies, which lasted from June until August 1913. Bulgaria lost this war along with all the territory that it had gained.

In the First World War, Bulgaria entered on the side of Germany, hoping to regain Macedonia. This was repeated in the Second World War, although it changed sides after Russia declared war on Bulgaria in September 1944. A few days after this, on September 9th, a Communist coalition took power. By 1947, a Soviet-style people's republic was fully established.

Bulgaria was seen as one of the most loyal satellite states to the Kremlin. Then in 1989, after 35 years in control, the general secretary of the party, Todor Zhikov, resigned and his successor, Peter Miadenov, ended the Communist monopoly on power.
Free elections were held in May 1990 and, surprisingly, the Communist party won, but this time under the new name of the Bulgarian Socialist party (BSP). Miadenov was forced to resign in 1990 and The Union of Democratic Forces (UDF) gained power in 1991, which brought in the first non-communist government since 1946. During the mid 90s, the economy deteriorated but the UDF won the elections in 1997, on the promise of overhauling the economic system and tackling organised crime and corruption.

Bulgaria became a member of NATO in 2004 and in January 2007 joined the EU.

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