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101-653: Ottoman Bulgaria , administratively formed as Rumelia Eyalet , is the foundation on which the Ottoman Empire stepped for its establishment, consolidation and conquest in Europe until the two battles of Vienna ( Siege of Vienna and Battle of Vienna ). Previously, the two battles at Mohács marked the beginning and end of the Ottoman presence in Central Europe . The period of the 16th and 17th centuries until

202-423: A complex set of factors behind the process. These include: pre-existing high population density owing to the late inclusion of the two mountainous regions in the Ottoman system of taxation; immigration of Christian Bulgarians from lowland regions to avoid taxation throughout the 1400s; the relative poverty of the regions; early introduction of local Christian Bulgarians to Islam through contacts with nomadic Yörüks ;

303-558: A daughter of the Bulgarian Emperor, Keratsa , married Andronikos , the infant son of the new Byzantine Emperor John V Palaiologos . Unfortunately, the new relations between the houses of Tarnovo and Constantinople did not live up to the expectations of mounting a more significant response to the invading Ottomans. After the death of Stefan Dušan on 20 December 1355, the Serbian Empire lost much of its hegemony in

404-558: A form of tax farming , which created conditions for severe exploitation of taxpayers by unscrupulous land holders. According to Radishev, overtaxation became a particularly poignant issue after jizye collection in most of the country was taken over by the Six Divisions of Cavalry . Bulgarians also paid a number of other taxes, including a tithe ("yushur"), a land tax ("ispench"), a levy on commerce, and various irregularly collected taxes, products and corvees ("avariz"). Generally,

505-549: A minority of Circassians) were counted as "Established", while colonists who still benefited from a tax exemption (as a rule, Circassians arriving in 1864 or later) were regarded as "Muhacir". Contemporary European geographers, such as German-English Ravenstein , French Bianconi and German Kiepert similarly counted Crimean Tatars with Turks in Islam millet. Bulgarian%E2%80%93Ottoman Wars [REDACTED] Bulgarian Empire The Bulgarian–Ottoman wars were fought between

606-527: A numerous Christian army aiming to stop the Muslim invaders. Uglesha, whose lands bordered Ottoman territory to the east, realized the threat and unsuccessfully appealed to Serbian and Bulgarian states for help. Ruling over mixed Serbian-Greek-Bulgarian population, the two brothers set off to the east with 20 to 70,000 strong ethnically diverse army. Considerably less numerous troops led by Lala Şahin Pasha attacked

707-421: A slow, but steady process of Islamisation until the mid-1600s when the tax burden became so unbearable that most of the remaining Christians either converted en masse or left for lowland areas. These factors had an impact on the entire country. Due to them, the population of Ottoman Bulgaria is presumed to have dropped twofold from a peak of approx. 1.8 million (1.2 million Christians and 0.6 million Muslims) in

808-466: A source for constant political tensions in the region. During the civil war in Byzantium both Palaiologos and Kantakouzenos were trying to find external allies and used foreign mercenaries. The Bulgarian Emperor supported the first opponent whose stronghold was Constantinople. John Kantakouzenos on the other hand regularly hired Ottoman Turk mercenaries from Asia Minor who soon became a fixture on

909-635: Is commonly accepted to have started with the historical book, Istoriya Slavyanobolgarskaya , written in 1762 by Paisius , a Bulgarian monk of the Hilandar monastery at Mount Athos , lead to the National awakening of Bulgaria and the modern Bulgarian nationalism , and lasted until the Liberation of Bulgaria in 1878 as a result of the Russo-Turkish War of 1877-78 . The Millet system

1010-691: The Austrians as part of their long war with the Ottomans. All of the uprisings were unsuccessful and were brutally suppressed . Most of them resulted in massive waves of exiles, often numbering hundreds of thousands. In 1739 the Treaty of Belgrade between Austrian empire and the Ottoman Empire ended Austrian interest in the Balkans for a century. But by the 18th century the rising power of Russia

1111-535: The Balkan Mountains . A number of fortresses fell, through after prolonged and fierce sieges: the town of Diampol, for instance, fought against the forces of Timurtash for months but was eventually forced to surrender because of food shortage. One of Ivan Shishman's voivodes , Shishkin, was killed in battle on the southern skirts of the Balkan Mountains further easing the Ottoman conquest of

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1212-656: The Bulgarian Exarchate . The sabotage of the Conference, by either the British or the Russian Empire (depending on theory), led to the Russo-Turkish War (1877–1878) , whereby the much smaller Principality of Bulgaria , a self-governing, but functionally independent Ottoman vassal state was created. In 1885 the Ottoman autonomous province of Eastern Rumelia unified through a bloodless coup with

1313-832: The Bulgarian church in Constantinople in pursuance of the March 12 [ O.S. February 28] 1870 firman of Sultan Abdülaziz of the Ottoman Empire. The foundation of the Exarchate was the direct result of the struggle of the Bulgarian Orthodox population against the domination of the Greek Patriarchate of Constantinople in the 1850s and 1860s. In 1872, the Patriarchate accused

1414-609: The Constantinople Conference (1876-1877), and along with the strategic interests of Russia on the Balkans, was a reason for the Russo-Turkish War of 1877-1878 that ended with the reestablishment of independent Bulgarians state in 1878, albeit under the Treaty of Berlin Bulgarians were divided, and the territory of the Principality of Bulgaria was far smaller than what Bulgarians had hoped for and what

1515-583: The Dervendjis , who guarded important passes, roads, bridges, etc., ore-mining settlements such as Chiprovtsi , etc. Some of the most important Bulgarian cultural and economic centres in the 19th century owe their development to a former dervendji status, for example, Gabrovo , Dryanovo , Kalofer , Panagyurishte , Kotel , Zheravna . Similarly, Christians living on wakf holdings were subject to lower tax burden and fewer restrictions. The Ottoman Empire's greatest advantage compared to other colonial powers,

1616-658: The Despotate of Dobruja until 1411. As a result of the wars the Ottoman Empire greatly expanded its territory on the Balkan peninsula, stretching from the Danube to the Aegean Sea . From the 13th century, the two main Balkan powers Byzantium and Bulgaria fell victims to a process of decentralization, as local feudal lords grew stronger and more independent from the emperors in Constantinople and Tarnovo . This weakened

1717-665: The First Tarnovo Uprising , the Chiprovtsi uprising , the Second Tarnovo uprising and Karposh's rebellion , which led to the massive flight of Christian Bulgarians to Wallachia and the Austrian Empire , the population of present-day Bulgaria in the 1680s is assumed to have dropped to approx. 0.9 million in the 1680s, divided into 450,000 Christians and 450,000 Muslims (or a ratio of 1:1). From

1818-540: The Great Turkish War were a time of all-round prosperity without wars in the Bulgarian lands. The Franco-Ottoman alliance ensured the status quo in Europe and determined the new age and classicism , including Ancien Régime politically. The loss of Ottoman Hungary was a crushing blow to the Ottoman Empire. The Treaty of Constantinople (1700) established diplomatic relations of the Ottoman Empire with

1919-509: The Principality of Bulgaria . The Ottomans reorganised the Bulgarian territories, dividing them into several vilayets , each ruled by a Sanjakbey or Subasi accountable to the Beylerbey . Significant parts of the conquered land were parcelled out to the Sultan 's followers, who held it as benefices or fiefs (small timar , medium zeamet and large hass ) directly from him, or from

2020-753: The Tsardom of Russia , which after the period of Government reform of Peter the Great rose to the Russian Empire (1721). The Kingdom of Prussia appeared on the political map of Europe, with which the Ottoman Empire established diplomatic relations in 1761 during the Seven Years' War . After the end of the Köprülü era , the Bulgarian lands and the Bulgarians found themselves after two centuries of tranquility of Pax Ottomana again on Via Militaris , as during

2121-601: The Vidin Eyalet , Silistra Eyalet and Niš Eyalet . Christians paid disproportionately higher taxes than Muslims, including poll tax, jizye , in lieu of military service. According to İnalcık, jizye was the single most important source of income (48 per cent) to the Ottoman budget, with Rumelia accounting for the lion's share, or 81 per cent of the revenues. By the early 1600s, the timar system had virtually been abolished, and almost all land had been divided into estates ( arpalik ) granted to senior Ottoman dignitaries as

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2222-611: The following battle , although both sides suffered heavy casualties. Despite the victory and the death of young Michael Asen, the Turks were unable to reach Sofia. The defeat raised serious alert not only in Tarnovo, but also in Constantinople, forcing John Kantakouzenos to abdicate and removing one of the main facilitators of the Ottoman invasion. Faced with threat, Bulgaria and Byzantium made an attempt for rapprochement. In 1355

2323-600: The millet system and the autonomy each denomination had within legal, confessional, cultural and family matters, nevertheless, largely did not apply to Bulgarians and most other Orthodox peoples on the Balkans, as the independent Bulgarian Patriarchate was destroyed and all Bulgarian Orthodox dioceses were subjected to the rule of the Ecumenical Patriarch in Constantinople and made part of Rum millet (Greek Orthodox millet). Thus, instead of helping Christian Bulgarians maintain their customs and cultural identity,

2424-458: The northwestern areas were the dominance of the eldest son Ivan Sratsimir , despot Dobrotitsa held Dobruja , and most of Macedonia was divided into several feudal states controlled by Serbian nobles. In 1371 two feudal lords in Macedonia organised a campaign against the Turks. Serbian brothers Vukashin and Uglesha , respectively the king of Prilep and the despot of Ser , gathered

2525-532: The "Five Bulgarian Sanjaks" as per 1865 Pop. Registry According to the "Kuyûd-ı Atîk" Ottoman Population Register, the male population of the five sanjaks to eventually form the future Principality of Bulgaria was divided into the following ethnoconfessional communities in 1865: Between 1855 and 1865, the population of the Danube Vilayet underwent seismic changes, as the Ottoman authorities settled more than 300,000 Crimean Tatars and Circassians on

2626-450: The "established Muslims" column and additional 20,000 were left out or simply lost in the carry-over. The division of Muslims into "Established" and "Muhacir" in the 1873-1874 Census and the 1875 Ottoman Salname was not based on origin, as the name might suggest, but on "taxability". Thus, colonists whose tax exemption had expired and were liable to taxation (i.e., those of them who had settled prior to 1862—Crimean Tatars, Nogais, etc. and

2727-511: The 1490s. At the same time, there are records of at least two forced relocations of Bulgarians to Anatolia, one right after the fall of Veliko Tarnovo and a second one to İzmir in the mid-1400s. The goal of this "mixing of peoples" was to quell any unrest in the conquered Balkan states, while simultaneously getting rid of troublemakers in the Ottoman backyard in Anatolia. However, Ottomans never pursued or practiced forced Islamisation of

2828-673: The 1580s to approx. 0.9 million in the 1680s (450,000 Christians and 450,000 Muslims), after growing steadily from a base of approx. 600,000 (450,000 Christians and 150,000 Muslims) in the 1450s. While the Ottomans were ascendant, there was overt opposition to their rule. The first revolt began at the time Holy Roman Emperor Sigismund established the chivalric Order of the Dragon , 1408, when two Bulgarian nobles, Konstantin and Fruzhin , revolted and liberated some regions for several years. The earliest evidence of continued local resistance dates from before 1450. Radik ( alternatively Radich)

2929-661: The 19th century, as a result of the Greek Plan and the Eastern Question , the Liberation of Bulgaria was realized. Ottoman Bulgaria The history of Ottoman Bulgaria spans nearly 500 years, beginning in the late 14th century, with the Ottoman conquest of smaller kingdoms from the disintegrating Second Bulgarian Empire . In the late 19th century, Bulgaria was liberated from the Ottoman Empire , and by

3030-513: The Beylerbeys. This category of land could not be sold or inherited but reverted to the Sultan when the fiefholder died. The lands were organised as private possessions of the Sultan or Ottoman nobility, called "mülk", and also as an economic base for religious foundations, called vakιf , as well as other people. The system was meant to make the army self-sufficient and to continuously increase

3131-577: The Bulgarian Emperor joined them but was unable to send troops. In 1387 the united forces of Bosnians and Serbs defeated the Ottomans in the Battle of Pločnik . However, while the Christian states did not make any attempt to exploit the victory, the Turks' reaction was swift. In 1388 a 30,000 strong army commanded by Ali Pasha passed through the eastern Balkan Mountains and struck deep into Bulgaria's north. The Bulgarians were completely surprised and

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3232-622: The Bulgarian Emperor restored his authority over the Vidin Province with the help of the Wallachian voivode Vladislav I , but that proved to be his last success. After Ivan Alexander's death on 17 February 1371, the lands populated by Bulgarians were divided into several independent states. Much of the former territory of the Second Bulgarian Empire came under the rule of the tsar's third son Ivan Shishman ;

3333-598: The Bulgarian population, as had earlier been claimed by Communist Bulgarian historiography. According to scholarly consensus, conversion to Islam was voluntary as it offered Bulgarians religious and economic benefits. According to Thomas Walker Arnold , Islam was not spread by force in the areas under the control of the Ottoman Sultan . A 17th-century author said: Meanwhile he (the Turk) wins (converts) by craft more than by force, and snatches away Christ by fraud out of

3434-567: The Bulgarian ruler was waiting for an appropriate opportunity to renege. After bitter fighting, in 1386 the Turks seized Pirot and Naissus , killing and enslaving many Bulgarians. The advance of the Ottomans in the central parts of the Balkan peninsula caused serious anxiety not only for Ivan Shishman but also in Serbia and Bosnia . The Serbian Prince Lazar and the Bosnian King Tvrtko I organized an anti-Ottoman coalition and

3535-473: The Bulgarians refused to surrender the town. Murad besieged Nikopol for a second time and this time Ivan Shishman agreed to the Ottoman conditions and a Turkish garrison was installed in Silistra. As a result of the campaign the Turks took most of eastern Bulgaria including several key towns. Now the authority of Ivan Shishman was reduced to the lands to the west of the capital Tarnovo and several castles along

3636-481: The Danube Vilayet, Bulgarian statistician Dimitar Arkadiev has found that men aged 15–60 represented, on average, 49.5% of all males and that the coefficient that would make it possible to calculate the entire male population is therefore 2.02 . To compute total population, male figures are then usually doubled (Bulgarian authors have suggested a coefficient of 1.956, but this has not gained international acceptance). Using this method of computation, (N=2 x (Y x 2.02)) ,

3737-527: The Empire and the term was used for legally protected religious minority groups , similar to the way other countries use the word nation . New millets were created in 1860 and 1870. The Bulgarian Exarchate (a de facto autocephalous Orthodox church) was created as separate Bulgarian diocese based on voted ethnic identity . It was unilaterally (without the blessing of the Ecumenical Patriarch ) promulgated on May 23 [ O.S. May 11] 1872, in

3838-626: The Exarchate that it introduced ethno-national characteristics in the religious organization of the Orthodox Church, and the secession from the Patriarchate was officially condemned by the Council in Constantinople in September 1872 as schismatic . Nevertheless, Bulgarian religious leaders continued to extend the borders of the Exarchate in the Ottoman Empire by conducting plebiscites in areas contested by both Churches. In this way, in

3939-743: The Future Principality of Bulgaria in 1875 At the same time, a flash summary of the results of the Danube Vilayet Census published in the Danube Official Gazette on 18 October 1874 (also covering the Sanjak of Tulça ) gave twice as many male Circassian Muhacir , 64,398 vs. 30,573, and slightly fewer "established Muslims" than the final results published in 1875. According to Turkish Ottomanist Koyuncu, 13,825 male Circassians were carried over to

4040-457: The Ottoman administrative system. The boys were picked from one in forty households. They had to be unmarried and, once taken, were ordered to cut all ties with their family. While a minority of authors have argued that "some parents were often eager to have their children enrol in the Janissary service that ensured them a successful career and comfort" , scholarly consensus leans very much

4141-619: The Ottoman invasion. During the Byzantine civil wars Ivan Alexander regained control over several towns in Thrace and the Rhodopes but his frequent interference in the internal affairs of Byzantium hampered any closer relations between the two counties despite the peace established in 1332. In 1352 Turkish forces invaded Bulgaria anew, raiding Thrace, particularly the vicinities of Aitos , Yambol , and Plovdiv , and capturing rich spoils. In

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4242-468: The Ottomans (1382). The Ottomans installed a strong garrison and brought Muslim settlers from Asia Minor. On the following year fell Serres The new Ottoman success did not bring together Ivan Shishman and Ivan Sratsimir. Between 1384 and 1386 a war broke out between Bulgaria and Wallachia , and the Vlachs seized several settlements along the Danube but were later defeated and their voivoda Dan I

4343-546: The Ottomans again started hostilities. With a large army Sultan Murad moved towards the southwestern regions of the Tarnovo Tsardom with the main objective to seize its center Sofia. After a bloody clash in the Zlatitsa valley the Turks moved on to Sofia and besieged it. The city which was commanded by ban Yanuka repulsed all the attacks of the superior Ottoman forces under Lala Şahin . The later could not continue

4444-470: The Ottomans emerged as a considerable power on the Balkans. They ruled over the entire Thrace and had seized the lands of Uglesha in Eastern Macedonia and managed to subordinate Vukashin's son Marko and Ivan Shishman who became their vassals. During the same period (1371–1373) the invaders took control of the Rhodopes, a mountain studded with strong and well-guarded fortresses, approaching from

4545-455: The Ottomans had nearly 30,000 men they could not take it and Ali Pasha had to seek reinforcements from Murad himself. According to Seadeddin the Sultan marched to Nikopol with an enormous army firmly decided to seize the town at all costs. When Ivan Shishman faced the new enemy he sought a truce. Murad agreed and the Bulgarians saved Nikopol but were forced to cede another key Danubian fortress, Dorostolon . However, when Ali Pasha reached Silistra,

4646-532: The Rhodopes, Kostenets , Ihtiman , and Samokov . After a bloody siege they captured Bitola in the southwest and soon encroached on the Sofia Valley . In 1373 Ivan Shishman was forced to negotiate a humiliating peace treaty: he became an Ottoman vassal strengthening the union with a marriage between Murad and Shishman's sister Kera Tamara . To compensate, the Ottomans returned some of the conquered lands, including Ihtiman and Samokov. Between 1371 and 1373

4747-565: The Sanjak of Sofia (male Muslim population of 2,896 and male non-Muslim population of 8,038) to the Ottoman Empire and the kaza of Mankalya from the Sanjak of Varna (male Muslim population of 6,675 and male non-Muslim population of 499) to Romania and attached the kaza of Iznebol (male Muslim population of 149 and male non-Muslim population of 7,072) from the Sanjak of Niš to the Principality of Bulgaria. Ethnoconfessional Groups in

4848-520: The Turkish religion is false. If there is one among them who has some little book or can teach them in some other manner something of God's world, they hear him as diligently as if he were their preacher. When Greek scholar Janus Lascaris visited Constantinople in 1491, he met many Janissaries who not only remembered their former religion and their native land but also favoured their former coreligionists. One of them told him that he regretted having left

4949-412: The Turks to install a small garrison but then they killed the Turkish soldiers and prepared for siege. Ali Pasha immediately burned the surrounding fields and soon the starving town had to surrender. After this success they advanced to the west towards Nicopolis , one of the strongest Bulgarian fortresses along the Danube . The defence was organized by Ivan Shishman who was currently in the town. Although

5050-500: The Western Balkans and the large and ethnically diverse empire split into several successor states. The Bulgarian and Byzantine Empires of the period were once again the only remaining major political powers on the peninsula with the potential to stop the Ottoman expansion. Between 1354 and 1364 the Turks conquered Thrace as a number of important fortresses and towns, such as Plovdiv and Stara Zagora fell under attack. From

5151-469: The aggression of the Ottoman allies. In June, he defeated the Ottoman fleet near Portogalos Bay. According to sources, at night the Bulgarian ruler sent boats to burn the anchored Ottoman ships and soon after he defeated the army of Kantakouzenos at Mosynopolis . Probably the first local ruler to become aware of the impending Ottoman threat, Momchil unsuccessfully pleaded with the emperors of Bulgaria and Byzantium for help. Even though his troops continued

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5252-446: The battlefields in Thrace . The Byzantines often lost control over the Ottomans then as the latter regularly plundered villages in the Southern Balkans after the 1320s. In 1344, Momchil , the independent Bulgarian ruler of the Rhodope and Aegean regions, whose army grew to 2,000 men, took an important role in the Byzantine civil war. While at first he supported John Kantakouzenos, from the spring of 1344 Momchil reneged, provoked by

5353-416: The city was again in the Tarnovo Tsardom and it is possible that there was an armed conflict between the two Bulgarian states. Despot Dobrotitsa also did not give any support to the Emperor in Tarnovo. He was in conflict with Genova and was involved in the internal affairs of the Empire of Trebizond trying to put on its throne his son-in-law. After the temporary quiet which followed after 1373, in 1380

5454-502: The country to the status of the most powerful state in the region. In 1346, Serbian king Stefan Uroš IV Dušan received the title of Emperor with the blessing of the Bulgarian Emperor Ivan Alexander , although after his death in 1355, the large Serbian Empire disintegrated into a few independent states . In Bulgaria of the same period Ivan Sratsimir inherited Vidin from his father Ivan Alexander in 1356, while despot Dobrotitsa – nominally his subject – ruled Dobruja. Lack of stability

5555-431: The desire to stop paying jizya as a primary incentive for conversion to Islam in the Balkans, and Bulgarian researcher Anton Minkov has argued that it was one among several motivating factors. Two large-scale studies of the causes of adoption of Islam in Bulgaria, one of the Chepino Valley by Dutch Ottomanist Machiel Kiel , and another one of the region of Gotse Delchev in the Western Rhodopes by Evgeni Radushev reveal

5656-569: The early 1700s, the Christian population is assumed to have started growing again. According to the 1831 Ottoman census , the male population in the Ottoman kazas that fall within the current borders of the Republic of Bulgaria stood at 496,744 people, including 296,769 Christians, 181,455 Muslims, 17,474 Romani , 702 Jews and 344 Armenians . The census only covered healthy taxable men between 15 and 60 years of age, who were free from disability. Millets in present-day Bulgaria as per 1831 Ottoman Census By using primary population records from

5757-407: The early 20th century it was declared independent . The brutal suppression of the Bulgarian April Uprising of 1876 and the public outcry it caused across Europe led to the Constantinople Conference , where the Great Powers tabled a joint proposal for the creation of two autonomous Bulgarian vilayets, largely corresponding to the ethnic boundaries drawn a decade earlier with the establishment of

5858-415: The economic devastation and military threat from the south, Bulgaria had other problems: in 1365 the Hungarian King Louis I invaded northwestern Bulgaria , seizing the important Vidin fortress and capturing the eldest living son of the tsar, Ivan Sratsimir . In his unsuccessful initial attempts to retake Vidin, Ivan Alexander even resorted to using Ottoman mercenaries. Eventually, in the summer of 1369,

5959-468: The end of the 1350s Ottoman military units even reached the surroundings of the capital as, according to sources, the Emperor took precautions to strengthen the city walls. Ottoman chronicler Hoca Sadeddin Efendi suggests that Turkish advance between 1359 and 1364 involved destruction and depopulation of many areas: the towns Plovdiv , Stara Zagora , and Sliven were devastated, and others such as Venets and Sotirgrad were completely destroyed. Destruction

6060-405: The first three crusades during the time of Byzantine Bulgaria . This circumstance in the context of Age of Enlightenment marks the beginning of the awakening of the Bulgarians. In Ottoman historiography, this time is called the Tulip period . French diplomacy in the person of Louis Sauveur Villeneuve managed with the Treaty of Belgrade and Treaty of Niš (1739) to stabilize its key ally since

6161-501: The hearts of men. For the Turk, it is true, at the present time compels no country by violence to apostatise; but he uses other means whereby imperceptibly he roots out Christianity... Thus, in a number of cases, conversion to Islam can be said to have been the result of tax coercion, due to the much lower tax burden on Muslims. While some authors have argued that other factors, such as desire to retain social status, were of greater importance, Turkish writer Halil İnalcık has referred to

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6262-452: The heavy Muslim population losses earlier in the century, but also counteracted continued population loss and led to an increase in its Muslim population. In this connection, Karpat also refers to the material differences between Muslim and non-Muslim fertility rates, with non-Muslims growing at the rate of 2% per annum and Muslims usually averaging 0%. Koyuncu also notes a much higher natural rate of increase among Non-Muslims and attributes

6363-408: The inhabitants killed the recruiting officials. It was not rare for the boys to attempt to preserve their faith and some recollection of their homeland and their families. For example, Stephan Gerlach writes: They gather together and one tells another of his native land and of what he heard in church or learned in school there, and they agree among themselves that Muhammad is no prophet and that

6464-412: The invaders seized Ovech , Shumen , Madara and other towns. Due to the surprise campaign at first the towns and the castles were unable to organize proper defence but after the initial shock the Bulgarians took precautions. When the army of Ali Pasha besieged Varna , the defenders stiffly resisted and the Turks were forced to abandon the siege and march northwards. In Tutrakan the citizens allowed

6565-405: The kingdoms remaining from the disintegrating Second Bulgarian Empire , and the Ottoman Empire , in the second half of the 14th century. The wars resulted in the collapse and subordination of the Bulgarian Empire, and effectively came to an end with the Ottoman conquest of Tarnovo in July 1393, although other Bulgarian states held out slightly longer, such as the Tsardom of Vidin until 1396 and

6666-406: The last waves of Muslim migrants from Anatolia. As a result of the near-constant war led by the Ottoman Empire from the mid-1500s to the late 1600s, the need for additional tax revenues, the sixfold increase in jizye tax rates, which pauperised the Christian population, the Little Ice Age in the 1600s that caused crop failures and widespread famine and several important Bulgarian uprisings, e.g.,

6767-402: The mainly Orthodox countries such as Bulgaria, Byzantium and Serbia, there were a number of Catholic possessions to the west and south held by Venice , Genoa and the Kingdom of Hungary as well as Kingdom of Bosnia whose Bosnian Church (traditionally considered closely related to the Bogomils ) was considered heretic by both Orthodox and Catholics. Religious dissimilarity was thus also

6868-401: The military and economic power of the central rulers. The process deteriorated central authority to an even larger extent in the 14th century, when numerous nobles came to be only nominally subordinated to the government. In Bulgaria the powerful House of Shishman ruled over the Vidin Province in the west, while in the east Balik established a quasi-independent Despotate of Dobruja . While

6969-442: The millet system actually promoted their assimilation. Bulgarian ceased to be a literary language, the higher clergy was invariably Greek, and the Phanariotes started making persistent efforts to hellenise Bulgarians as early as the early 1700s. It was only after the struggle for church autonomy in the mid-1800s and especially after the Bulgarian Exarchate was established by a firman of Sultan Abdülaziz in 1870 that this policy

7070-403: The nearly constant Ottoman conflict with the Habsburgs from the mid-1500s to the early 1700s; the resulting massive war expenses that led to a sixfold increase in the jizya rate from 1574 to 1691 and the imposition of a war-time avariz tax; the Little Ice Age in the 1600s that caused crop failures and widespread famine; heavy corruption and overtaxation by local landholders—all of which led to

7171-475: The north. The Rakovitsa fortress (now in ruins) was besieged by Daud Pasha and fiercely defended by its voivoda Kurt; after futile attempts to capture it with force, the Turks agreed to negotiations and the Bulgarians surrendered keeping their property. Similarly, the population of Tsepina , one of the strategic fortresses of the Rhodopes, resisted Ottoman attacks for nine months before surrendering in return for their lives and property after Daud Pasha cut off

7272-523: The number of Ottoman cavalry soldiers, thus both fuelling new conquests and bringing conquered countries under direct Ottoman control. From the 14th century until the 19th century Sofia was an important administrative centre in the Ottoman Empire. It became the capital of the beylerbeylik of Rumelia ( Rumelia Eyalet ), the province that administered the Ottoman lands in Europe (the Balkans ), one of

7373-464: The other way. Christian parents are described to have resented the forced recruitment of their children, and would beg and seek to buy their children out of the levy. Many different ways of avoiding the devshirme are mentioned, including: marrying the boys at the age of 12, mutilating them or having both father and son convert to Islam. In 1565, the practice led to a revolt in Albania and Epirus, where

7474-652: The overall tax burden on the rayah (i.e., Non-Muslims), was twice as high as that on Muslims. Christians faced a number of other restrictions: they were barred from testifying against Muslims in inter-faith legal disputes. Even though they were free to perform their own religious rituals, this had to be done in a manner that was inconspicuous to Muslims, i.e., loud prayers or bell ringing were forbidden. They were barred from certain professions, from riding horses, from wearing certain colours or from carrying weapons. Nevertheless, there were specific categories of rayah who were exempt from nearly all such restrictions, such as

7575-575: The population of present-day Bulgaria in 1831 would stand at 2,006,845 people. The Principality of Bulgaria was established on 13 July 1878 and incorporated five of the sanjaks that used to be part of the Ottoman Danube Vilayet : The Sanjaks of Vidin , Tirnova , Rusçuk , Sofya and Varna , with individual border changes, cf. below. The two other sanjaks in the Danube Vilayet, those of Niš and Tulça , were ceded to Serbia and Romania, respectively. Ethnoconfessional Groups in

7676-498: The process of Bulgarian National Awakening to massification, as a result of which the so-called Kirdzhalis appeared, to which Pushkin dedicated his work of the same name ( Kirdzhali ). The most prominent leaders are Osman Pazvantoğlu and Ali Pasha of Ioannina . The Nizam-I Cedid is a kind of denial of the entire history of the Ottoman Empire and an emanation of the Bulgarian National Awakening. In

7777-489: The religion of his fathers and that he prayed at night before the cross which he kept carefully concealed. Islam in Bulgaria spread through both colonisation with Muslims from Asia Minor and conversion of native Bulgarians. The Ottomans' mass population transfers began in the late 1300s and continued well into the 1500s. Most of these, but far from all, were involuntary. The first community settled in present-day Bulgaria

7878-586: The resistance in the Eastern Rhodopes , in May 1345 the Turks led by Umur Beg marched from Asia Minor and devastated Bulgarian territories driving away people and livestock. Soon after, on 7 July 1345, Ottoman forces under Umur Beg defeated Momchil's army in the Battle of Peritor near his capital Xanthi . Sources attest that the independent ruler perished in the battle without leaving a successor, and with little political will or leadership left to counter

7979-465: The revival was marked by the enlightenment of Maxim Suvorov , and the beginning of the end of the revival was marked by the coup as a result of which Catherine the Great became Empress and which coup was followed on Ottoman territory by the liquidation of the centuries-old spiritual institutes of the Patriarchate of Peć and Archbishopric of Ohrid . The Russo-Turkish War (1768–1774) catalyzed

8080-584: The same year the Ottomans seized their first fortress on the Balkans, Tsimpe on the Gallipoli peninsula , setting firm foot in Europe. Until 1354 Ottoman forces again ravaged the lands around Yambol and Plovdiv as well as the lower valleys of the Maritsa and Tundzha rivers. In 1355 the Ottomans launched a campaign towards Sofia , but were soon engaged by the army of Ivan Alexander's eldest son and heir Michael Asen close to Ihtiman . The Turks prevailed in

8181-464: The siege and was forced to pull back to Odrin where he reported his failure to the Sultan. While he was absent the Turks managed to infiltrate Sofia and one Muslim Bulgarian captured ban Yanuke while hunting and sent him to Lala Şahin who was in Plovdiv at that time. From there the Bulgarian commander was sent back to Sofia and when the defenders saw their captured leader they surrendered the city to

8282-553: The struggle for recognition of a separate Church, the modern Bulgarian nation was created under the name Bulgar Millet . Also the Bulgarian Uniat Church was created. Armed resistance to the Ottoman rule escalated in the third quarter of the 19th century and reached its climax with the April Uprising of 1876 that covered part of the ethnically Bulgarian territories of the empire. The uprising, provoked

8383-470: The territory of the province. The settlement took place in two waves: one of 142,852 Tatars and Nogais , with a minority of Circassians, who settled in the Danube Vilayet between 1855 and 1862, and a second one of some 35,000 Circassian families (140,000–175,000 settlers), who arrived in 1864. According to Turkish scholar Kemal Karpat , the Tatar and Circassian colonisation of the vilayet not only offset

8484-462: The time of Suleiman the Magnificent , but the glory of the sword of Osman has passed with the seventeenth century. It was at this time that two key works appeared, marking the overall socio-economic and cultural-spiritual changes in the Bulgarian lands and in the life and spirit of the Bulgarians — Stemmatografia by Hristofor Žefarović and Istoriya Slavyanobolgarskaya . The beginning of

8585-418: The tremendous rate of increase in the Muslim population of the five Bulgarian sanjaks plus the Sanjak of Tulça of 84.23% (220,276 males) vs. 53.29% (229,188 males) for Non-Muslims from 1860 to 1875 to the colonisation of the vilayet with Crimean Tatars and Circassians. Ethnoconfessional Groups in the "Five Bulgarian sanjaks" as per 1873-74 Census The Congress of Berlin ceded the kaza of Cuma-i Bâlâ from

8686-562: The two Empires were facing enormous internal difficulties, the Serbs took the favorable opportunity to expand its domain. During the civil war in Byzantium in 1320s and 1330s, the Serbs conquered most of the Bulgarian and Aromanian populated Macedonia from the Byzantines. In 1330 Serbian forces defeated Bulgarian ones, led by Emperor Michail Shishman at Velbazhd effectively raising

8787-536: The two together with the beylerbeylik of Anatolia . It was the capital of the important Sanjak of Sofia as well, including the whole of Thrace with Plovdiv and Edirne , and part of Macedonia with Thessaloniki and Skopje . The Danube Vilayet was a first-level administrative division (vilayet) of the Ottoman Empire from 1864 to 1878 with a capital in Ruse . In the late 19th century it reportedly had an area of 34,120 square miles (88,400 km ) and incorporated

8888-400: The united Balkan forces at night on 26 September as the latter camped by the village of Chernomen in the lower Maritsa valley. The entire army was pushed back and Vukashin and Uglesha perished along with much of their forces. Immediately after the battle, the armies of Murad I embarked on another campaign overrunning Northern Thrace and forcing young Ivan Shishman to pull back north of

8989-469: The valley of Chepelarska river, while Ibrahim pasha set off from Plovdiv via Parvenets and then through the valley of Vacha River . Fighting occurred at Zarenitsa, Zagrad, Gradishte, Chiltepe and Karakulas (along Vacha), Imaretdere and Momina Voda (heights close to Ardino ) among others. Especially ferocious were the engagements at Momina Voda, where prominent Ottoman general Sarǎ Baba was killed, and Karakulas where Enihan Baba perished. While Ivan Shishman

9090-417: The water supplies. In the same way Stanimaka ( Asenovgrad ) was taken and soon after fell the northern Rhodopes fortress of Batkun whose commander Georgi died in the final assault. The Ottomans faced a stubborn resistance in the Rhodopes interior: central areas were invaded by the armies of Dzhedit Pasha and Ibrahim Pasha. The former advanced through the road between Stanimaka and Bachkovo Monastery along

9191-474: The wide-scale migration of Muslims from Anatolia and emigration of Christians to Wallachia, etc. Both the Christian and Muslim population then grew steadily until the 1580s, reaching approx. 1.8 million, or 1.2 million Christians and 0.6 million Muslims (or a Christian-to-Muslim ratio of 2:1 or 66 per cent to 33 per cent), where the higher growth among the Muslims is attributed to both conversion of Christians and

9292-658: Was a set of confessional communities in the Ottoman Empire . It referred to the separate legal courts pertaining to "personal law" under which religious communities were allowed to rule themselves under their own system. The Sultan regarded the Ecumenical Patriarch of the Constantinople Patriarchate as the leader of the Orthodox Christian peoples of his empire. After the Ottoman Tanzimat (1839–76) reforms, Nationalism arose in

9393-472: Was accompanied by slaughter and deportation of the local populace to Asia Minor. Not only was there a total lack of coordination between the two Empires, but they also quarreled over the Black Sea ports of Mesembria and Anchialos . Bulgaria successfully defended them in 1364, but the continuing conflict deepened the distrust and animosity between the two states despite the impending danger. Apart from

9494-424: Was desperately trying to resist against the strong Ottoman pressure, his brother Ivan Sratsimir not only withheld help but tried to make use of the difficulties which his brother faced to expand his domains over certain areas of the Tarnovo Tsardom. As Shishman's attention was pointed to the south, Ivan Sratsimir took control of the important city of Sofia which was disputed between the two brothers. However, by 1373

9595-489: Was eminent in the southern Balkans as well: in 1341–1347 the Byzantine Empire was shaken by a bloody civil war between John V Palaiologos and John VI Kantakouzenos . Circa mid 14th century the Balkans were politically disunited into a number of small states frequently in competition with each other and there was no single strong entity with a powerful enough army to withstand the Muslim invaders. In addition to

9696-475: Was killed. Ivan Sratsimir took part in the action as an ally of the Vlachs which deepened the mistrust between the two brothers. After the Ottomans secured the possession of the area around Sofia, they continued their march to the northwest. The main objective of Murad was to break the ties between Bulgaria and Serbia because despite the fact that Ivan Shishman was his vassal, Murad did not trust him and knew that

9797-478: Was made up of Tatars who willingly arrived to begin a settled life as farmers, the second one a tribe of nomads that had run afoul of the Ottoman administration. Both groups settled in the Upper Thracian Plain , in the vicinity of Plovdiv. Another large group of Tatars was moved by Mehmed I to Thrace in 1418, followed by the relocation of more than 1000 Turkoman families to Northeastern Bulgaria in

9898-484: Was making itself felt in the area. The Russians, as fellow Orthodox Slavs, could appeal to the Bulgarians in a way that the Austrians could not. The Treaty of Küçük Kaynarca of 1774 gave Russia the right to interfere in Ottoman affairs to protect the Sultan's Christian subjects. The Bulgarian National Revival was a period of socio-economic development and national integration among Bulgarians under Ottoman rule. It

9999-412: Was originally proposed in the Treaty of San Stefano . The effect of the Ottoman conquest on Bulgarian demography is uncertain and subject to much contention. However, the population of present-day Bulgaria in the 1450s is estimated to have hit a low of 600,000 people, divided into approx. 450,000 Christians and 150,000 Muslims (or a Christian-to-Muslim ratio of 3:1 or 75 per cent to 25 per cent) following

10100-667: Was recognised by the Ottomans as a voyvoda of the Sofia region in 1413, but later he turned against them and is regarded as the first hayduk in Bulgarian history. More than a century later, two Tarnovo uprisings occurred - in 1598 ( First Tarnovo Uprising ) and 1686 ( Second Tarnovo Uprising ) around the old capital Tarnovo . Those were followed by the Catholic Chiprovtsi Uprising in 1688 and insurrection in Macedonia led by Karposh in 1689, both provoked by

10201-479: Was reversed. Non-Muslims did not serve in the Sultan's army. The exception to this were some groups of the population with specific statute, usually used for auxiliary or rear services, and the infamous blood tax (кръвен данък), also known as devşirme , where young Christian Bulgarian boys were taken from their families, enslaved and converted to Islam and later employed either in the Janissary military corps or

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