THE A M E R IC A N IN S T IT U T E FOR B A L K A N A FFA IR S

This book is dedicated to the m em ory o i a ll those who died that K osovo m ight be avenged and the Serbian lands tree and united.

W ritter

THE A M E R IC A N IN S T ITU TE FOR B A LK A N A FFA IR S

THE MACEDONIAN QUESTIONThe Straggle for Southern Serbia

by

Dr. D j o k o S L I J E P C E V I C

Translated by James L a r k i n

The American Institute for Balkan Affairs

Published by The Am erican Institute for Balkan A ffa irs

1525 W . D iversey Parkway, C h i c a g o 14, Illinois

Printed in Germany by Buchdruckerei Dr. Peter Belej, Mundien 13, Schleissheimer Str. 71

PREFACE

Many books, brochures and articles have already been written on the Macedonian question. Most of them are of the nature of propaganda, and make no serious attempt to sub­stantiate their views. Consequently, one more exposition of this problem, provided that it be based on historical facts, is hardly supererogatory—particularly as the Macedonian ques­tion has for decades been the cause of numerous political disturbances in the Balkans. While little that is new can be said of the entire period up to 1918, no full and properly documented account as yet exists of the development of this question since that date. The present book incorporates an attempt to throw further light on this latest period and to examine the factors that have been at work.

Originating in the efforts of the Bulgars to impose their own national character upon the population of Southern Serbia and those parts of the geographical area known as Macedonia which passed to Greece after the wars of 1912— 13, the Macedonian question began to assume a new aspect after the creation of the Kingdom of the Serbs, Croats and Slo­venes: it became the instrument of the Comintern in the latter’s efforts to disintegrate this kingdom, which from 1918 to 1941 was the chief obstacle in the way of a Communist revolution in the Balkans. The brunt of the Comintern’s attack was directed against the Serbs as the backbone of Yugoslavia, which had come into being as a result of their military exer­tions between 1914 and 1918. In the years following World War I, the Macedonian question became the critical factor uniting all those separatists, whether of left- or right-wing orientation, whose activity was for years directed at integrat­ing, both within and without Yugoslavia, all anti-Serbian elements. It is in the propaganda of this movement that the myth of “Greater Serbian imperialism” found its most com­plete and aggressive expression. The ultimate aim of this movement, the dismemberment of the Serbian national lands, has been fully realized in the Federative People’s Republic of Yugoslavia.

By examining the various phases through which the Mace­donian question has passed, the author has attempted to trace

5

Its historical development. The fairly detailed account which he has given of the efforts of the Bulgars to impose their national physiognomy upon the Serbian population of Southern Serbia is by no means the reflection of any hostility on his part toward the Bulgarian people. The writer of these lines considers himself a friend of the Bulgars and is fully aware of their value and importance for the Balkan Peninsula. He believes that the dispute between the Serbs and Bulgars over Southern Serbia was finally settled by the outcome of World War I. This is also probably realized by the most responsibly- minded Bulgars, who have succeeded in freeing themselves from the shackles of a myth that has brought the Bulgarian people so much misery. Originally a dispute between the Serbs and Bulgars over the question of the national orientation of the population of Southern Serbia, the Macedonian problem subsequently became a weapon in the revolutionary activity of the Comintern, and later, during World War II, took the form of a quarrel between the Bulgarian and Yugoslav Com­munist parties as to which party was entitled to control the operations of Communist organizations in this area.

In every phase of its development, the Macedonian ques­tion has affected the vital interests of the Serbs. These interests are now threatened in a new form by the thesis of the existence of a distinct Macedonian nationality in a region which was the scene of the most brilliant events in their medieval history and for the liberation of which they made many sacrifices in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. This thesis was first propounded under the influence of so­cialist ideas as they took root in a primitive environment. Long maintained and cherished by the Comintern, it was ac­cepted by the Communist Party of Yugoslavia, which today is its sole champion. With the creation of the People’s Republic of Macedonia, the Yugoslav Communist Party has applied this thesis in practice over that part of the territory which is under its control. On its own territory, the Macedonian question is virtually non-existent for the Bulgarian Communist Party. It has even less significance in Greece, where the Communists were never generous toward the demands of the Slavs of Aegean Macedonia for national recognition.

Thus, from being a problem of significance for the Balkans as a whole, the Macedonian question has become a matter of Yugoslav internal policy, or, to be more precise, an important

II

part of the Serbian question in Yugoslavia. As such, it has entered a new phase, marked by a diminution in the im­portance which it enjoyed for decades, not merely on the Balkans but also on the international plane. The frontiers of the states now almost exclusively concerned with this question have been confirmed by international treaties, which cannot be altered without another war. The fact that no one today would venture upon a war in the Balkans in order to change these frontiers enhances their immutability and limits the international significance of the Macedonian question.

The present work is the result of prolonged research and a serious effort to set forth this question in its organic deve­lopment. Amid the uncertainties of §migr6 life, it has been a strenuous task. The procurement of the necessary literature, especially that published in Yugoslavia, has been linked with great difficulties. Many relevant works published in Yugo­slavia have proved to be unavailable in libraries abroad, with the exception of those at Vienna and Rome, where they have been indirectly accessible; while from Yugoslavia itself some works have been obtained with difficulty and others not at all. Moreover, the material problems involved have frequently proved insuperable for an 6migr§ thrown upon his own re­sources. Mr. Stanislav Krakov, the writer and journalist, has been kind enough to place his library at the disposal of the author, who takes this opportunity of expressing his sincere gratitude for his assistance.

Special acknowledgment is due to Professor John C. Adams, Professor of History at Dartmouth College, Hanover, New Hampshire, for reading the work in manuscript and making suggestions for its improvement. Professor Adams is not responsible for any of the views expressed in this book.

Finally, the author wishes to express his indebtedness to the American Institute for Balkan Affairs, and particularly to Dr. U. L. Seffer, for undertaking the publication of this work and thus rendering it accessible to the English-speaking public.

Ascension Day 1958 Djoko M. SlijepCevifi.

Munich (Germany)

7

MACEDONIA AS A GEOGRAPHICAL CONCEPT

It has never been precisely stated what one is to under­stand by the expressions “Macedonia” and “ the Macedonian people.” A ll we know is that ancient Macedonia was not a state with an ethnically and culturally homogeneous popul­ation. According to Strabo, the Thracians and Illyrians made up the Macedonian people,* while Leopold von Ranke states, “ the mutual influence of the Macedonian and Greek ways of life constitutes the main theme of Macedonian history.” 2 Dr. Otto Hoffmann is of the opinion that the ancient Mace­donians were ethnically Greeks, “but,” he adds, “ the Mace­donian empire, which they founded, was in existence before the time of King Archelaus as a union of various peoples under the leadership and rule of the Greek Macedonians and their tribe.” 3 The same view is put forward by the writer of the article on Macedonia in the Paulys-Wissowa Real- Encyclopadie: the Macedonians were of Greek provenance and inhabited Northern Thessaly.4 Dr. Karl Oestreich asserts that the ancient Macedonians were nearer to the Greeks than to the Thraco-Illyrian people. “They [the Macedonians] should be regarded as a nation closely related to the Hellenes which, later on in the ancient period, became completely Hellenized. From Roman times on, there are no more Macedonians.” 5 Referring to this problem, Joachim H. Schultze asks in some perplexity, .. the Macedonians. They gave the land their name, but who were they? What do they signify nowadays? Do they exist at all? And what about the ‘Macedonian Slavs’?” 8 He goes on to say that the meaning of the term “Macedonian” as a territorial concept was frequently modified,

1 Leopold von Ranke, W eltgeschichte, Vol. I, 1928, p. 326.* Ibid.* O tto Hoffmann, Die M akedonien, ihre Sprache und ihr Volks-

turn, Gottingen, 1906, pp. 260— 61.4 Paulys-W issowa Real-Encyclopadie, V o l. X X V II, p. 690.• Karl Oestreich, „D ie Bevolkerung von M akedonien", G eogia -

phische Zeitschrilt, 1905, V o l. I, pp. 273— 74.• Joachim H. Schultze, Neugriecheniand, Gotha, 1927, p. 128.

9

and points out that the Arabian geographer Idrisi spoke of Rhodope and the Balkans as “Macedonian mountains” (gebel al-Maqedoni).1 James Barker remarks that with the fall of Perseus Macedonia lost its national character. The land was divided into four regions, the people enslaved and trade hampered.8 The British Universities Encyclopaedia states: “The ancient kingdom of Macedonia extended in a north­westerly direction from the Aegean Sea. Originally occupying a small area, it stretched, at the time of its greatest extent, from Haemus [i. e., the Balkans] in the north to Thessaly, and to the Aegean in the south, and from Epirus and Illyria in the west to Thrace in the east.” 9 In 168 B. C., the Romans turned it into a province which included Thessaly and Illyria. A t the division of the Empire in 395 A. D., this province fell to the Eastern part.

The fame of Macedonia was created by Philip and Alexander. Indeed, it is their achievements that impressed the name of Macedonia so deeply in the consciousness of its later inhabitants. According to Alexander Randa, Macedonian patronage of arts and letters lies at the foundation of the pro­gressive activity of Hellenism.10

Dr. Gustav Weigand is of the opinion that in ancient times Macedonia was understood as signifying a somewhat smaller region than we associate today with the term: “Originally it was only the district on the lower reaches of the Haliakmon [Bistrica] and the Aksios [Vardar] under the rule of local kings who came from Orestis, i. e., the land around the Kastoria Lake.” 11 “The ancient Macedonians,” says Theodor Capidan, “who originally extended from the valley o f the Aksios to the Haliakmon, were gradually denationalized by the Thracians, Illyrians and Greeks.” 18 According to JireCek, “medieval Macedonia consisted of two regions with somewhat differing histories: one, which embraced the Byzantine coast in the neighborhood of Salonica and Serrai, and another,

7 Ibid., p. 126.8 James Barker, Turkey, N ew York, 1877, p. 248.* British U niversities Encyclopaedia, V o l. V I, p. 804.10 A lexander Randa, D er Balkan: Sdiliisselraum der W e li-

geschichte, Graz-Salzburg-Vienna, 1949, p. 116.11 Gustav W eigand, Ethnographie von Makedonien, Leipzig, 1924,

p. 2.11 Th. Capidan, D ie MazedorumSnen, Bukarest, 1941, p. 52.

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without access to the sea, which, from the seventh century on, was occupied by Slavs and which, from the eleventh to the fourteenth centuries, was for the most part under the in­fluence and domination of the Greeks.” 13 Mentioning Basil the Macedonian, who was born in a village near Jedren and as a boy was taken prisoner by the Bulgarians, JireCek says that the name “Macedonian” should not cause surprise, for “ in the Middle Ages the whole of present-day Rumelia was often called Macedonia.” 14

Theodor von Sosnosky pointed out that “after the fall of the Byzantine Empire, the name [of Macedonia] disappeared completely from the map, and when it was mentioned at all it always referred to the empire of Philip and Alexander. With the collapse of Alexander’s world empire it ceased to play an independent role in history. Then, however, it sudden­ly appeared on the lips of the whole world. . . . Only the name, admittedly, for it signifies only the same land, not the same people.” 15 “ The name ‘Macedonia,’ ” says Horand Horsa Schacht, “disappeared with the collapse of the Byzantine Empire. Otherwise applied only as an historical designation, it reappeared in the national struggles of the Balkan people. . . . Under the Turks, there was no Macedonia. For this reason, the Turkish government spoke only of the ‘Ru- melian question.’ ” 16 For Dr. Oestreich, too, Macedonia is no more than an “historical designation which originally covered an area further to the south, including the plain of Salonica, . . . and, as a term whose meaning had not been clearly de­fined and could be stretched at will, was arbitrarily applied to the hinterland.” 17

13 Constantin Jos. Jirefiek, Das diristliche Element in der topo- graphischen Nomertklatur der Balkanlander, Sltzungsberichte der Kaiseriichen Akadem ie der Wissenschaften in W ien : Ph ilo logisch - historische Classe, V o l. C X X X V I, p. 42.

u Constantin Jos. J ire iek , Geschichte der Bulgaren, Prague, 1876, p. 157.

15 Th. von Sosnosky, D ie Balkanpolitik Osterreich-Ungarns seit 1886, V o l. II, pp. 118— 19.

’ • Horand Horsa Schacht, D ie Entwicklung der mazedonischen Frage um die Jahrhundertwende zum M urzsteger Programm, Halle, 1929, p. 14.

17 Karl Oestreidi, Reiseeindriicke aus dem V ila je t Kosovo, Vienna, 1899, p. 331.

11

Since the beginning of the nineteenth century, the extent of Macedonia has been variously defined. Von Gruber states that it lies between the Balkans and Athos, on both sides of the Vardar and the Struma, and that it covers an area of1,720 square miles inhabited by a population of 500,000. “Geographically,” he says, “ it is normally divided into two sanjaks—those of Salonica and Custendil. In accordance, however, with recent information, we shall abandon this practice and mention the best-known places: Salonica, the chief meeting-place of commercial routes connecting European Turkey with the rest of Europe (from here Vienna and Smyrna trade in money exchange); then Seres [Serrai], Kara- ferija fVerija], Vodiin [Edessa], Jenisa, St. Orfano, Emboli, Filibi [Philippopolis, Plovdiv] and Custendil.” 18 Of Bulgaria, he says that it lies on the Black Sea between the Balkans and the Danube, and that it embraces an area of 1,740 square miles with a population of 1,800,000. According to him, Bul­garia was at that time divided into four sanjaks—those of Sofia, Nicopolis, Silistria and Vidin. To Serbia, von Gruber assigns the sanjaks of Kratovo, Skoplje and Novi Pazar.1* R. Walsh, who traveled round Bulgaria in the late 1820’s, states: “Modern Bulgaria stretches from the mouth of the Danube, along this river, to the point above Vidin where it is joined by the Timok. The Danube constitutes its entire northern boundary, as the Balkan chain does its southern. The whole of the area within these limits is over a hundred hours’ distance long and about sixteen hours across. The Bul­garians have, however, spread far beyond these artificial limits.” 20 A. F. Heksch also considered that “Bulgaria pro­per” extended “ from the lower Danube to the main ridges of the Balkans and the Black Sea,” and that, ethnically, it “still embraces the district of Sofia also.” 21 Hugo Grothe was extremely cautious in defining the geographical concept “Macedonia” : considering the question what was considered as constituting Macedonia under the Turks, he says, “From

18 Carl Anton von Gruber, Das osmanisdie Reich, p. 24.'• Ibid., pp. 16— 17 and 18— 19.20 R. Walsh, Reise von Konstantinopel dureh R u m e lien ,. . . Dres-

den-Leipzig, 1828, pp. 203— 04.!1 A lexander F. Heksch, Donau, von ihrem Ursprung bis an die

Miindung, Leipzig, 1884, p. 51.

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the point of view of state law, only three vilayets— those of Salonica, Bitolj and Skoplje [Kosovo]— may today be regard­ed as constituting Turkish Macedonia. . . . It is doubtful whe­ther so-called Old Serbia— the sanjaks of Prizren, PriStina and Srem [?]— belongs to Macedonia.” 22 Gerhard Schacher gives the following boundaries of Macedonia: “ In the south­west of the Balkan Peninsula is situated a territory with an area of 65,000 square kilometers— therefore not quite twice the size of Holland—which is enclosed in the south by the Aegean Sea, in the west by the Pindus Mountains, Gramus, Mokra und Stogovo, and in the north and east by the Sar- Planina and Crna Gora and the spurs of the Osogovo, Rila and Rhodope Mountains respectively.” 23 Wladimir Sis, who was definitely biased in favor of Bulgaria, defines the frontiers of Macedonia thus: “ It [Macedonia] borders in the north on Old Serbia and the pre-1913 Serbian kingdom, in the northeast and east on Old Bulgaria, to which in 1878 was added its northern part— i. e., the districts of Custendil and Dupnica— in the southeast on Thrace, in the south on the Aegean Sea, Thessaly and Epirus, and in the west on A l­bania.” 24 “ In the Turkish empire,” says Schultze, “ the name ‘Macedonia’ disappeared. According to the political division carried out in the twentieth century, our country belongs to the vilayet of Salonica, and, within the limits of the latter, to the sanjaks of Serrai and Drama. The eastern frontier was the lower Nestos; the northern frontier included Nevrokop, and the western frontier Melnik and Diumaja.” 25

Jovan Cviji6 traced the frontiers of Macedonia in the south across a turn in the Bistrica River, in the north along the northern boundary of the sanjak of Novi Pazar, in the west along the Crni Drin, and in the east along the Mesta. According to this frontier, both countries lie between 39°56’50” and 43°38’25” North, and between 54°14’31” and 60°7’26” East of Greenwich. The average meridian is 55°21’, while the average degree of latitude is approximately 41°50’. The total area of Macedonia and Old Serbia is 74,709 square kilometers,

11 Hugo Grothe, A u l tiirkischer Erde, Berlin, 1903, p. 358.Gerhard Sdiacher, D er Balkan und seine wirtschaftlichen Krdlte,

Stuttgart, 1930, p. 240.“ W ladim ir Sis, Mazedonien, Zurich, 1918, p. 7.“ Sdiultze, o p .c it., p. 126.

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which is 26,000 square kilometers greater than that of Serbia and 24,000 square kilometers less than that of Bulgaria.2®

An expert in Balkan cartography, Cvijid established, after extensive researches what one should understand by the term “ancient Macedonia.” According to a map drawn by the Italian general Giac. Gastaldia in 1566, Serbia, in addition to Kosovo, included the area around Skoplje. According to maps by V. Coronellia, official geographer of Venice, dating from 1692, Skoplje is described as “metropoli della Servia.” On seventeenth-century French maps, Serbia includes, apart from Novi Pazar and Prizren, the area around Skoplje. In the atlas of 1696 by von Saunson, Serbia includes Skoplje and OvCe Polje. According to the maps of Joh. Bapt. Homann, which date from the first half of the eighteenth century, Serbia in­cludes the districts of Skoplje, Kratovo and Custendil, while the map of 1805 by Sava Tekelija shows Serbia as including Prizren, Pristina, VuCitm, Skoplje, Kratovo, Custendil and Pirot.27

The districts south of the border of liberated Serbia were for long known as “Turkish Serbia.” The appellation “Mace­donia” was confined to the area of Salonica. On von Stieler’s map and in his pocket atlas of 1832, the frontiers of liberated Serbia are indicated, while a large area south of them, in­cluding even Sofia and Ihtiman, is designated as “Turkish Serbia.” On H. Kiepert’s map, dated 1853, the name of Mace­donia is given to the district around Salonica. The same applies to the Map of European Turkey revised by H. Berg- haus and F. Stiilpnagel in 1856. Cviji6 says, “ In all the edi­tions of von Stieler’s atlas from 1850 on, the name ‘Mace­donia’ is given to the region approximately corresponding to the modern vilayet of Salonica. The name ‘Turkish Serbia’ disappeared from the later editions of von Stieler’s atlas, and the region between Macedonia proper and the borders of Serbia [i. e., of Serbia before the Battle of Kumanovo in 1912] remains even today without a definite name. Occasionally this region appeared under the old Turkish administrative de-

“ Jovan C v ijii, Grundlinien der Geographie und G eo log ie von M azedonien und A ltserb ien, Gotha, 1908, p. 38.

27 Ibid., pp. 39— 40.

14

signation ‘Rumeli’ before this fell out of use and the entire area was left without a name.” 28

As a result of his researches, Cviji6 came to the following conclusion: “On the majority of older maps [i. e., from the sixteenth century], and on a few of later date in which the classical nomenclature was used or which were influenced by this nomenclature, the name ‘Macedonia’ was confined to the coastal region around Salonica and the surrounding plain— that is, to Campania and the district west and northwest of it near to what is now the Meglen basin. The chief towns of this region of Macedonia proper are Vodena [Edessa] and Pella [now the village of Podol]. A t the end of the fifteenth and during the sixteenth centuries, many lands of the Balkan Peninsula, because of erroneous recollections of the classical world, were, mostly by local writers, called Macedonia— even Old Serbia, Zeta, Albania, Bosnia and Hercegovina.” 29

The geographically ill-informed author of the folk poem about Prince Kaica places the Danubian town of Smederevo in Macedonia. Two versions of DuSan’s legal code, those of Ravanica and Sofia—both from the seventeenth century— call DuSan emperor of Macedonia. The Sofia version reads: “The pious and Christian Stefan, Emperor of Macedonia, Serbia, Bulgaria, Greece and Dalmatia,' while that of Ravanica says simply: “The pious, faithful and Christian Emperor of Mace­donia, Stefan.” *0 In a record of 1564, written at the monastery of Zavala, in Hercegovina, it is stated that this monastery lies “ in the shelter of Mount Vele2, which is in the Macedonian lands.” *1 BoSidar Vukovic-PodgoriCanin says of himself that he comes from “ the Diocletian lands, in Macedonia, from the town of Podgorica.” *2 Certain pilgrims to the Holy Sepulcher, Vukovoj, Gavrilo, Sava, Jovan and Sekule, state on two oc­casions that they are from “ the Macedonian lands, from the land of Zahumlje, known as Hercegovina.” 33 In 1569, a certain Jakov says that he is from “ the Macedonian lands, from the

*« Ibid." Ibid.30 Spiridon G o p fe v ii, Makedonien und A ltserb ien , Vienna, 1889,.

p. 299.S1 Ljubomir Stojanovid, Stari srpski zapisi i natpisi (O ld Serbian

Records and Inscriptions), V o l. IV , p. 65, No. 6328.3t Ibid., V ol. I, p. 160, No. 494.53 Ibid., p. 195, N o. 621, and p. 389, No. 1573.

15

place called Sofia.” 34 In 1615, it was stated that the monastery of Moraia is situated “ in the region of Hercegovina, in the western lands, in the Macedonian lands.” 35 It was on account of such statements that Vuk Stefanovic Karadzic observed that “all our people’s lands are called Macedonia.” 3®

Heinrich Muller’s Turkish Chronicle, published at Frank- furt-on-Main in 1577, contains an interesting passage on Mace­donia which reads: “However valiantly the Serbian people fought in Macedonia, the Sultan nevertheless occupied the Serbian towns of Serrai, Strumica, Philippopolis and Veles. . . . Bajazit also collected a great army against the powerful ruler Marko of Macedonia, which land is the most fertile of all Serbia.” 87 The unknown writer who continued the work of Archbishop Danilo, in the section entitled “On the En­thronement of the Second Patriarch, the Serbian K ir Sava,” has the following to say: “Of his [Urol’s] empire, Prince Lazar took one part, and the other VukaSin, who, in claiming the kingdom, cared nothing for the curse of Saint Sava. And UgljeSa took the Greek lands and towns. A fter this, having gathered together, they went out into Macedonia, were killed by the Turks and thus met their end.” 38

As may be seen, the term “Macedonia” signifies merely a geographical concept which has been insufficiently defined and which has no ethnographical significance.

34 Ibid., p. 211, No. 683, and p. 212, No. 685.38 Ibid., p. 286, No. 1030.M Vuk Stefanovic Karadzid, Beispiele der serbisch-slavisdien

Spradie, Vienna, 1857.37 As quoted in Gopdevid, op. cit., p. 305.38 Lazar M irk o v ii (tr.), Z iv o ti k ra ljeva i arhijepiskopa srpskih

od arhijepiskopa Danila (The L ives o f the Serbian Kings and Arch­bishops from Archbishop Danilo), Belgrade, 1935, p. 290.

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THE A R R IV A L OF THE SLAVS IN THE BALKANS

On their arrival in the Balkans the Slavic tribes began to settle, among other places, in the area of what is now Mace­donia. Opinions are divided on the questions when and in what numerical relationship these tribes first began to cross the Danube and where and how they originally settled. In many cases, these views are completely irreconcilable. The Polish historian Surowiecky asserted that the Slavic tribes did not cross the Danube until after the collapse of the Hunnic state— that is, not before the last two or three decades of the fifth century.1 Paul Joseph Schafarik, for long an authority on this question, shared the same view: “There is no doubt,” he wrote, “ that the Slavs penetrated beyond the Danube into Moesia and Pannonia before the middle of the sixth century, although we have no direct evidence of this. Byzantine sources speak of Slavic inroads into Moesia and Thrace in the years 527, 533 and 546; similarly, there is frequent mention of mercenary troops (in the years 537, 540, 547, 555 and 556) in the service of Byzantium. On the other hand, history makes no mention of the peaceful occupation of the lands south of the Danube, although this must in any case have begun in the late fifth or early sixth century.” * Later, Marin Drinov maintained that the settlement of the Slavs in the Balkans took place over a prolonged period— at least three centuries— and that it began before the transmigration of peoples, being completed in the seventh century.8 JireCek regarded this view of Drinov’s as the more accurate one, and emphasized that "in the fifth century the Slavs were far from being unknown in the [Balkan] Peninsula: they were a fairly numerous and influential people, although their colonies appear to have been

1 Constantin Jos. J ireiek , Geschichte der Bulgaren, Prague, 1876, p. 72.

* Paul Joseph Schafarik, Slavische A lte r thumer, V o l. II, Leipzig, 1884, pp. 13— 14.

s Marin Drinov, ZaselenJe Balkanskago po luostrova Slovenam i (The Settlement o f the Slavs in the Balkan Peninsula), M oscow, 1873,' as quoted in J ire iek , o p .c it., p. 73.

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pretty widely scattered.” 4 He goes on to say that Slavic colonization began in the third century and was carried out gradually: “A t the end of the fifth century,” he says, “armed migration began on a massive scale.” 8 This would be the second and final phase in this movement, which likewise took place over a prolonged period.

We also know that the Emperor Justin I (518—27) and his nephew Justinian I (527— 65) were of Slavic origin. A t a later date, there were even Slavs among the patriarchs of By­zantium. Their numbers were considerable in Justinian’s army. Among Justinian’s commanders, we find mention of Dobrogost, Svegrd and Svarun, who in 555 distinguished themselves in the war against the Persians. Similar cases could be quoted in plenty, all of which show that the first Slavs to arrive in the Peninsula had begun to merge on a large scale with the indigenous population and had become civilized and converted to Christianity before fresh waves of Slavic tribes crossed the Danube.*

On their arrival in the Balkans, these Slavs preserved their tribal organization and old way of life as far as circum­stances permitted—for it was inevitable that they should mix to some extent with the indigenous population. As regards the distribution of the various tribes in the Peninsula, there is much that is still obscure: we only know for certain the names of some of them and the areas that they occupied. The Sever- jani, or Severci, settled in what is now Dobruja, the Timo- iani in the region of the Timok, and the Moravljani on the Morava River; the Brsjaci, a people which still exists under the same name, occupied the area around Prilep, Veles, Bitolj and TikveS;7 nothing more than their names is known about the Smoljani and the Rinhini: JireCek remarks that their habitation and the origin of their names are obscure; the Sagudati inhabited the plain of Salonica; one part of the very important tribe known as the Dragoviti or Dragovici settled in the western valley of the Vardar River, and the other in the western Rhodope Mountains; the VelesiCi, or VelegostiCi, occupied Thessaly, the VojniCi Epirus and the Milinci the

4 Jirefek , op. cit., p. 80.• Ibid., p. 94.• Ibid., p. 79.7 Ibid., p. 120.

18

Taygetus plateau, while the Jezerani descended as far as the Gulf of Laconia.8 The name of the seven Slavic tribes that Asparuch was the first to subdue are still unknown. “History,” says Dr. Ischirkov, “speaks of the Severci and of seven other Slavic tribes in what is now eastern Bulgaria whose names are unknown to us.” * Schafarik was of the opinion that the members of these tribes were peaceful tillers of the soil: on the arrival of the Bulgars, some of these tribes, or at least part of them, migrated to regions which remained under By­zantine rule.10

It is generally recognized that these Slavic migrations, on account of thier scale, completely changed the ethnic character of this region. “From Cape Matapan to the Dal­matian ports and the Danube estuary, there was not a single district without its Slavic colonies.” 11 Jakob Philipp Fall- merayer made an especial study of the question how far south these colonies penetrated, and discovered that they stretched as far as the southern Pelopennese. “These primitive Slavs of the sixth century,” he says, “are the authentic ancestors and kinsmen of the modern Greek peasants in Macedonia, Thes­saly, Hellas and the Pelopennese. For over nine hundred years, the population of these districts spoke both Greek and Slav. . . . It is only during the last four centuries that the Slav language died out as a spoken language on the territory of ancient Greece, with the exception of the northern tip of Acamania.” ** Even Carl Hopf, who on many points strongly disagreed with Fallmerayer, did not dispute this view in essence; while accepting the “ irrefutable fact that the Pelo- ponncse was for long inhabited by Slavs, he queried the iiHHcrtion that Athens was sacked, that the ancient Greeks completely disappeared and that the modem Greeks were connected with the Hellenes by nothing more than the lan- KiniKe which they had inherited.” 18

• Ibid.* A. Ischirkov, .D ie Bevolkerung in Bulgarien und ihre Siedlungs-

verhaitnlsse', Petermann'a M itte ilungen , 1911, Halbband II, p. 117.10 Sdiofarlk, op. clt., p. 14.u J lreiek , op. clt., p. 126."* Jakob Philipp Fallmerayer, Fragmente aus dem O rient, 2nd

ed., Stuttgart, 1877, p. 344.18 See J ireiek , op. clt., pp. 122— 23.

19

This widespread diffusion of the Slavs in the Balkans, particularly in the region of ancient Macedonia, explains why this region was called “Slovinia” in Byzantine sources. Before the arrival of the Bulgars, Moesia was known by the same name. Referring to this name, Schafarik says: “ It was used in two senses: in the one sense, it was applied to all the Slav lands under Bulgarian domination, i. e., to ancient Upper and Lower Moesia, together with Dardania, and in the other it referred to a smaller area which, in my opinion, should be sought in Macedonia and on the forntiers of Albania and Thessaly.” 14

The Emperor Justinian II Rhinotmetus (686— 87) conduct­ed a military campaign against the Bulgars and the “land of the Slavs.” In 758, the Emperor Constantine Copronymus attacked the “Slavic land that was situated in Macedonia” and carried o ff many slaves. When Niciphorus (802— 10) dis­banded his army, he indicated the “ land of the Slavs” to his soldiers as their future abode. It was reported of the Bul­garian khan Krum that in 813 he strengthened his army with recruits “ from all the Slavic lands.” Thus it is with justifica­tion that JireCek states that the “ local name of ‘Slovjenin,’ in the plural ‘Slovjene,’ was known from the sixth centuryon in neighboring areas to the west and south___ This nameis to be found, not only in the area of Salonica and in Dal­matia, but also in the eastern Alps and western Carpathians, among the Polabian Slavs and in the area of Novgorod.” 16 Vatroslav Jagic also pointed out that foreigners gave the name “Slavs” to all those tribes which, after crossing the Danube, pressed toward the south and west. He added that this common name did not “designate a single tribe or homo­geneous people, but a whole mass, which, from the sixth century on, moved across the Danube from what is now the plain of Bessarabia and Rumania.” 16 Although, in opposition to Kopitar and MikloSi6, he maintained that the Macedonian Slavs were neither of the same tribe as the Pannonian nor spoke the same dialect, he took due account of the fact that

14 Schafarik, op. cit., p. 197.15 K. Jirefiek and J. Radoni<5, Is torija Srba (H istory o f the Serbs),

V o l. I (to 1537), Belgrade, 1952, p. 37.16 V. Jagi<5, „Ein Kapitel aus der Geschichte der siidslawischen

Sprache", A rch lv fur Slawische Ph ilo log ie , Vol. X V II, 1895, p. 54.

20

the language of the Dalmatian Croats, like that of the Neret- vljani, was for long called Slav, and that, after the Serbs and Croats had finally settled down, there were areas between them which were termed “Slavic lands,” as, for example, Slavonia.17 According to Corovic, many Western writers applied the name “Slavonia” or “Sclavinia” to the entire area from Istria to the Bojana and from the Dalmatian coast to the Danube. Even in Dubrovnik and Kotor, during the thir­teenth and fourteenth centuries, Slavonia was often identified with Serbia. In the fourteenth-century chronicle of Koporin, it is stated that King Milutin’s good name had spread “over all the Greek and Slav land.” The chronicle of Pec later cor­rected “Slav” to “Serbian.” 18

The Slavs inhabiting the Balkan Peninsula referred to themselves as “Sloveni” (Slavs). Corovic states that it is un­likely that at that time there were any definite frontiers dividing them. Their individual tribal names tended more and more to give way to this common appellation, which was applied to them, as to a single entity, by outsiders. It was thought at one time that the Balkan Slavs received this name from a tribe which came to the Peninsula and settled near Salonica. “ In these lands, called Slovinia,” says Schafarik, “ there settled that well-known Slavic tribe which by its deeds became known in history before all others, and whose lan­guage was adopted by Constantine and Methodius, who had learnt it in their childhood in Salonica, for their translation of the Bible, by means of which a noble culture was made uecessible to one half of the Slavic nation. It was after these Slavs ISloveni] that Constantine named his alphabet, and the language which he used, ‘Slav’ [slovenski].” 19

Whether this be so or not, it is known that Constantine (I. <•., Cyril) and Methodius adopted the language of the Mace­donian Slavs as their written language. In the L ife of Metho- (11 u n , 11 Is stated that the Emperor Michael III, having sum­moned St. Cyril to entrust him with the task of working among the Slavs, commanded him to take Methodius and go with him to Moravia. “You are from Salonica,” he said, “and

17 Ibid., pp. 58— 59 and 63.18 Vladim ir Corovi6, la torija Jugosl-avije (H istory o f Yugoslavia),

Belgrade, 1933, p. 5.19 Schafarik, op. clt., p. 199.

21

all the people of Salonica speak pure Slav.” 20 In the Lives of Cyril and Methodius— the first original South Slav literary compositions— it is stated that the former was “ the first teacher of the Slavic nation” and that he taught “Slavic pupils,” while Methodius is described as having had a “Slavic principality” under his direction. This refers to the time when Methodius, whose secular name has not come down to us, was a highly placed official in the Imperial service and was in charge of a theme (i. e., province) in the Balkans.

It was perfectly reasonable that the Slavs’ first literary language should be called “Slav.” A fter much research, Matija Murko came to the conclusion that it is incorrect to call this language Bulgarian. “It is unhistorical and even more dan­gerous,” he says, “ to use the term ‘Old Bulgarian,’ since this latter was the Turkish language.” 21 P. A. Lavrow drew atten­tion to the fact that in the “Pannonian legends”— as the Lives of Cyril and Methodius were called— the expressions Bulgarin and bulgarsk are not to be found— a circumstance which distinguishes the Legends significantly from the Greek Vita Clementi. From this one might infer that Clement was of Macedonian origin, since at that time these expressions were not used in Macedonia. In the early redactions of his writings, therefore, Clement is more accurately described as being “slo- vensk,” i. e., Slav. It cannot, moreover, have been fortuitous that the Emperor Simeon, in 893, appointed him as the first Slav bishop.28 Ferdo SiSi6 states that, at the beginning of the tenth century, Slav figured as a literary language side by side with Greek and Latin. “It is known,” he says, “ that this language flourished in the tenth century in Macedonia and Bulgaria and that from there it began to spread toward the West, where a separate literary center came into being in Croatia and maintained its existence despite all difficulties.” 24

20 Fran Grivec, 2 itja Konstantlna in M etod ija (The L ife o f Con­stantine and Methodius), Ljubljana, 1951, p. 117.

11 M. Murko, Geschichte der alteren siidslawischen Literatur, Leip­zig, 1908, p. 58.

28 P. A . Lavrow, „D ie neuesten Forschungen iiber den slawisdienClemens,* A rch iv fur Siawische Ph ilo log ie , V o l. X X V II, 1905, p. 365.

** Murko, op. cil., p. 58.14 Ferdo SiSii, Jie top is popa Dukljanina (The Chronicle o f the

Priest Dukljanin), Belgrade-Zagreb, 1928, p. 3.

22

During the following centuries, we find a living Slavic tradition among writers in this region, even though they lived and worked within the Bulgarian state. In the manus­cript by the Exarch Jovan, which dates from the late eleventh or early twelfth century, there occur the expressions “slo- vensk” (Slav) and “slovensk jazik” (Slavic language), while the priest Grigorije has “slovenski jazik” ; “Russkaya pravda” (1020) contains the word “Slovenin” (Slav), while in the writ- tings of the monk Hrabar (of the tenth or eleventh century) we find the expressions “slovenska red” (Slavic speech), “ rod slovensk” (Slavic people) and “pismena slovenska” (Slavic characters). In the Prologue to some Lives of the Saints dating from the thirteenth century, there occur the forms “slovensku jeziku,” “slovenskih knjig,” “slovenski uSeniki,” etc.*5 It is also of interest that in an inscription of 1295 in the KrmCija it is stated that “ the rules emerged into the light of the Slavic language.” 26 The translator of Dionysius the Areo- pagite, in a manuscript of Bulgarian recension, calls the Slav language “our” language, and, comparing it with Greeks, says that it was also created by God and found good, but that it lacks the wealth of expression and nuances that Greek has.*7 With reference to a collection of sermons dealing with the Gospels, it is stated that they were translated from Greek into Slav.*8

In view of all these facts, Dr. Leonard Schultze-Jena was mistaken in his assertion that we have “no information on the nationality of those Slavs who had inhabited Macedonia for three centuries before it was conquered by the Bulgars and later by the Serbs.” *9 Apart from everything that oc- •■urri'd subsequently, we know that these Slavs constituted ii lnrK<' ethnic mass which, in spite of attested tribal differ- i m i c c m , hi'cnme more and more compact: blood relationship and i-xrtimi'oim circumstances accelerated this tendency. Although, iin .Iiik^‘ hits pointed out, there were certain dialectal dif- fcrrnct'M, th<> written Slav language became a unifying force.

'* Srtiafnrik, o p .c lt., pp. 27— 28 and 29.*• LJub. Stojnnovli, Stari srpski zapisi i natpisi (O ld Serbian Re­

cords and Inscriptions), Belgrade, 1905, V o l. I l l ,p. 139, No. 5543.*’ Ibid., pp. 41— 42, No. 4944." Ibid., p. 46, No. 4948.*• Leonard Schultze-Jena, Makedonien: Landschafts- und Kultur-

bilder, Jena, 1927, p. 153.

23

The acceptance of Christianity also made its contribution: through the Church tribal differences were attenuated, and a keener sense of the community was developed than had hitherto existed. In general, Christianity made the Slavs more domesticated, bound them more closely to the land they had occupied and reduced their aggressiveness toward Byzantium. Matej Sokolov pointed out that Christianity had had a curb­ing influence upon other barbarians in the Roman Empire. St. Jerome, a fourth-century writer, observed that as soon as the barbarians became Christianized, they ceased waging war against “the Romans.” The tenth-century writer Kamenijat expressly states the same thing of the Slavs: since they had accepted Christianity, they had ceased threatening Salonica.80

The Christianization of the Balkan Slavs took place gra­dually. When Cyril and Methodius first began their work, they had been, in the formal sense, more or less converted. It has been established that they were Christianized long before the Bulgars, whose official conversion dates from 861 or 862.31 It may be said that the Balkan Slavs did not begin to play a part in history until they had acquired a literary language and a clergy of their own. Tired of a life of constant raids and warfare, they were inspired by Christianity in the form in which it was brought to them by Cyril and Methodius and their disciples, by their pastoral and cultural work and by the powerful religious and literary stimulus that this work supplied. Through the Christian religion, which only now they began to comprehend more deeply, they began to grasp the essence of power and to menace the non-Christian way of life of the agents of this power. Nowhere did the concept of the Church, inculcated into the minds of the people by the disciples of Cyril and Methodius and their successors, come into more direct conflict with that of the State, which (in this case) was nationally alien to them and predatory in its practices. In general, they seem to have displayed a definite antipathy toward the state: their frequent revolts against the Bulgarian state spring, as we shall see, from this cause. “Unit­ed,” says Corovi6, “ in a powerful ethnic community, they exerted a certain opposition toward Bulgaria, where ethnic

90 SiSid, op .c it., pp. 112— 13.31 Schafarik, op. cit., p. 181.

24

heterogeneity was evident and where the Bulgars held the most important positions.” 82

The Slavic tribes settled in the territory of Macedonia were united by the Orthodox religion. In it they, so to speak, discovered their true selves. People of humble origins became priests, preachers and anchorites. It was not fortuitous that during these troubled times there were increasing numbers of hermits, who became the spiritual torchbearers of the districts in which they lived. Through the Church, by the efforts and achievements of the clergy, a newly-formed people was entering the world of literature and working out a cul­tural and spiritual individuality of its own; through the Church it began to catch up with Byzantium, with which the ideal of the Church bound it ever more closely. “The very appearance of a Slavic liturgy,” says Corovi6, “was every­where received with joy and immediately felt as a mark of ethnic individuality. This was the first exchange of influences among the Slavs in the cultural sphere. Slavs from Mace­donia, together with their teachers, went to work among the Pannonians and Moravians, and the Moravians, in their turn, after they had been driven out, came southward to continue their work. There were no frontiers between them: they passed from Macedonia to Moravia and from Moravia to Pnnnonia as though that sort of thing could be taken for granted. They were united and felt themselves to be united, both in the north against the Germans when they pursued them, and in the south vis-a-vis the Greeks, from whom they separated their fellow Slavs. Each made his contribution to this process of consciously creating an independent Slavic culture.” ss

In npite of all that we know of the origins and first f l o w e r i n g of South Slav culture in the region of ancient Macedonia, decades of laborious and united effort on the part o f ( I n f i r s t inhabitants remain for us a closed book. Who first, b e f o r e Hie arrival of the disciples of Cyril and Methodius, aroused lln* Slavs’ cultural and political consciousness; who first preached the Gospel in the language of the people; where, and under what conditions, the Slavic liturgy was first performed in the south; who were the first Slav hermits: all

** Corovid, op. clt., p. 63.33 Ibid., p. 49.

25.

these questions, and many more beside, remain unanswered, or, at least, without a satisfactory answer. Our curiosity is particularly understandable in view of the fact that many of these things must undoubtedly have taken place before the appearance of Cyril and Methodius and their disciples: when they began their work of translating, the Slav language had already attained a degree of richness and development which, despite all the errors to be found in the earliest translations, fills us with astonishment. To translate from the Greek used by the early Church is a difficult and laborious task even today: at that time the performance of this feat must indeed have demanded a great knowledge of languages and spiritual aptitude for such a task. The wealth of ideas and expressions employed in these Slav translations is considerable. They must have been taken from somewhere— and where but from the people, from the accumulated fruits of its mature spiritual experience?

The labors of the disciples of Cyril and Methodius— not only those we know, after the death of Methodius in 855, to have turned their attention to the lands then belonging to Bulgaria (i. e., Clement, Naum and Andjelar), but also those whose names have not come down to us— lent a new impetus to the work that had been begun. Ascetics and workres of no ordinary caliber, Clement and Naum were missionaries in the best tradition of Byzantine Orthodoxy. Presecution in Mo­ravia, conflicts with anti-Slav and anti-Orthodox circles in the lands where they had worked and the numerous humilia­tions to which they had been exposed had raised them above the common run of men.

A fter all that they had gone through, the country to which their work now brought them was at the same time fruitful and rewarding and also undermined by considerable heresy and underground movements. V. N. Zlatarski truly says that for many centuries Macedonia was the chief center and spring­board for all the heresies in the Balkan Peninsula.84 More­over, according to the results of modern research, the Mace­donian land and people had become the cradle of the Bogomil movement. “Macedonia,” says Dmitri Obolensky, “ in the

*4 V. N. Zlatarski, Is to rija na Bulgarskata durzava prez srednite vekove (H istory o f the Bulgarian State in the M iddle A ges), V o l. I, Part II, Sofia, 1927, p. 65.

26

tenth century was the centre of opposition to the Bulgarian state and the refuge of all who were malcontents against the government, and thus a particularly fertile ground for anti- ecclesiastical movements.” 35

In this atmosphere, both the religious work of Clement and Constantine and their ecclesiastico-administrative orien­tation (Zlatarski assumes that Constantine was the first Slav bishop for northeastern Bulgaria) showed a steady and pro­nounced bias in favor of Byzantium. For both of them the patriarchate of Byzantium was nearer than Simeon’s empire: with their entire being they were bound up with Byzantium, which they regarded as the source of pure Orthodoxy. Their connection with the Bulgarian state was a far more tenuous one. Clement considered himself as an apostle of the Slavs, not as a champion of the Bulgarian state. Undoubtedly, he had much in common with the Emperor Simeon as a member of the Orthodox Church, as a devoted supporter of the faith and of the cause of promoting a Slav literature; but Simeon’s desire to become Emperor and to establish a partriarchate failed to arouse his sympathies. We know that Clement op­posed this desire right up to his death in 916, and that it was his determined opposition in 915 which prevented Simeon temporarily from proclaiming the Bulgarian Church an in­dependent patriarchate. Two years after Clement’s death, Simeon nevertheless issued a proclamation to this effect, and Obolensky rightly declares that by this deed Simeon “be­trayed the work of St. Clement.” 98

The assertion, persistently made by Bulgarian historians, I hid Cyril and Methodius and their disciples were Bulgars is devoid of historical foundation. Jagi6 stated firm ly that not only they, but even the Slavic population of Macedonia among whom Clement and Naum worked was not Bulgarian. “A t the beginning of the tenth century, not to mention earlier times,” ho anyN, "the ethnic composition of the Bulgarian state was heterogeneous even within the frontiers of Bulgaria proper, let alone Mncedonia, where Clement’s activities were mostly concentrated. Here there lived a Slavic people free from non- Slav Bulgarian elements, whose speech corresponded in the

“ Dmitri O bolen iky, The Bogom ils: A Study in Balkan N eo - Manlchaelsm, Cambridge, England, 1949, p. 147.

*• Ibid., p. 91.

27

main to the Church Slavonic of Cyril and Methodius, which, in my opinion, Clement also regarded from childhood on as his native tongue. The language which he employed in his writings was therefore pure Old Slavonic, which neither he nor his contemporaries called Bulgarian.” 37

The cause to which Clement devoted his energies was that of Orthodoxy among the South Slavs. Even before this, the Bulgarian state had made great efforts to identify this cause with its own interests. Drawn toward the Church, the Slavic population within its frontiers tended more and more to shun the state. The ascetic zeal which at that time was especially lively in the West had also permeated the Slavic population in the Balkans, which regarded the secularization of the Church with indignation. What inspired both Church and people was not the brilliance and splendor, the power and wealth, or the cruelty and despotism, which the state had to offer, but the urge toward perfection, toward that which shines in the Christian religion like an inextinguishable torch. If, among leading circles in the Church, Byzantinized elements, in the pejorative sense of the word, could occasionally be found, both the hermits, whose numbers continued to in­crease, and the people in general displayed a zealous spirit reminiscent of that of the earliest generations of monks. This orientation toward the Church, together with the consiousness that the Bulgarian state was an alien force, led to an evident antipathy toward the state and complete indifference to its fate.

This state of affairs was advantageous for the Bogomil movement. In it, says Zlatarski, the people expressed their protest, not only against Church and state, which, by virtue of their structure, were alien to popular conceptions, but in general against moral decay and the adherence to everything non-Bulgarian provoked by the alien and, for the state, dis­astrous influence of Byzantium.*8

Tired as they were of war, the masses of the population were nevertheless restless. Beneath the cloak of resignation

37 Vatroslav Jagic, ,„Izgnanici iz M oravske posle smrti M etodije- ve: Sirenje slovenske crkve i kn jige medju juznim Slovenim a" (Ex­pulsions from M oravia A fte r the Death o f Methodius: The Spread of the Slavic Church and Literature Am ong the South Slavs), Izabrani kradi spisi, Zagreb, 1948, p. 420.

38 Zlatarski, o p .c il., p. 561.

28

there lurked the specter of revolt: throughout the length and breadth of the Slav lands, which were just awakening to consciousness, fanatical sects and heretics were at work, sum­moning the people to rebel against the state and against the Church, which was becoming a tool of the state. The people’s religious fervor and their longing for an ideal world enabled the Bogomils to make great progress among the Slavic po­pulation of Macedonia. Exacting in their demands upon them­selves and strict observers of the hermitic way of life, they were severe in their judgment of those who ruled in Church and state and complaisant in their attitude toward the little man, who was, as ever, thirsting for justice. Thus the preachers of Bogomilism vigorously prepared the people for rebellion; they succeeded in creating a serious threat to the Bulgarian state from within and in accelerating its fall. In the Nemanja state, just the opposite occurred: here Bogomil­ism was uprooted and rendered incapable of further threaten­ing the development of the state. Referring to the Bogomils in Bulgaria, the priest Kozma says: “They preach disobedience to authority, anathematize the rich, pour scorn on the military, abuse the boyars, declare the servants of the Emperor and his officials to be scorned before God and forbid slaves to work for their masters.” 39

Murko interpreted all this as a protest against the feudal state of Bulgaria, which was becoming increasingly Byzantin- ized. It is an inescapable fact that this protest was much more pronounced in the regions between Ohrid and the Vardar, whore the Bogomil faction of the Dragovi6i was particularly •lining, than in the eastern regions, where the authority of I tu' Mtilgnrian state was more firm ly established.40 Ivan Sa- lui/.ov pointed out that social persecution was rife in Bulgaria light up to the end of the Emperor Peter’s reign (927—69). In coniii'fllon with the Bogomils, it is noteworthy that, ac­cording lo Obolensky, Reinerius Sacchoni, at one time himselfii Hupportrr of this heresy, in the chapter on the Cathar churclicn contained in his work Summa de Catharis et Leonintis (written in 1250), “gives a list of sixteen heretical 'churches’ or communities of the Cathars, at least five of which werc> situated in the Balkans. The last two ‘churches’

’• Quoted tn Murko, op. cit., p. 85.40 Ibid.

29

in Reinerius’s list, the ‘Ecclesia Bulgariae’ and the ‘Ecclesia Dugunthiae,’ were considered in his time to be the original source of all others.” Reinerius mentions a “Slavic church” near the “church of the Drugovi6i” : Franjo RaCki was of the opinion that this “Slavic church” was in Bosnia.41

Thus the Balkan Slavs were passing through an extremely complex stage in their political, spiritual and cultural deve­lopment. They were not to be easily fused with the Greeks— although this did occasionally occur—nor did they willingly reconcile themselves to Bulgarian rule. From the ethnographic point of view, their Bulgarian conquerors did, indeed, become engulfed in the Slav masses of the population, since they formed but a small percentage of the whole, but they never­theless remained for a long time the ruling caste and did not easily lend themselves to Slavonicization. Within the Bul­garian state, the conflict between Slav and Bulgarian elements was to last for many centuries.

41 Obolensky, op .c it., p. 157.

30

THE MACEDONIAN SLAVS UNDER BULGARIAN RULE

The history of the Bulgarian state in the Balkans begins with the arrival of a group of Bulgars, under the leadership of Khan Asparuch, in the region around Varna. According to Mikov, they numbered approximately fifty thousand.1 “A t Pliska, or Pliskova,” says Corovifi, “ near the modern village of Abobe, their first capital came into being, covering a large fortified area of twenty-three square kilometers.” 2 Here there was a “wall stretching from the Danube to the sea,” as one ancient source tells us.3 From here, Asparuch began to subdue the Slavic tribes which had long been settled in this area nnd which, ethnically speaking, had nothing in common with their conquerors. Advancing the official Bulgarian view, Dr. A. Ischirkov says: “The Bulgars imposed their rule upon the Slavs, who, since they possessed a more advanced culture [than the Bulgars], gave the Bulgars their language, which became the official language of both Church and state. The new Bulgaro-Slav empire became the rallying point of the ethnically related tribes on the other side of the Balkans and in Macedonia: through frequent political and religious unions, the common tribal consciousness has been strengthened right up to the present time.” 4 Schafarik asserts that these tribes were peaceful tillers of the soil who were incapable of offer­ing resistance to a militarily powerful and well-organized group.5 In 817, Theophanes noted that the Bulgars had crossed the Danube and reached Varna, where they subdued seven Slavic tribes, whose names, as has already been pointed out, have not come down to us.6 We have seen that the Slavic tribe

1 D. M ikov, Les ila p es d'une unit6 nationale, Sofia, 1915 ,p. 7.1 V ladim ir Corovid, Is torija Jugoslavije (H istory o f Yugoslavia),

Belgrade, 1933, p. 33.3 See Spomenik Srpske K ra ljevske Akadem ije Nauka, V o l. Ill,

Belgrade, 1890, p. 191.4 A . Ischirkov, „D ie Bevdlkerung in Bulgarien und ihre Siedlungs-

verhaltnisse,* Petermann's M itteilungen , 1911, Halbband II, p. 117.* Paul Joseph Schafarik, Slavisdie A lterlhum er, V o l. II, Leipzig,

1844, p. 14.• Ibid.

31

known as the Severjani had settled in what is now Dobruja: they too were subjugated by the Bulgars.

Constituting, as they did, a very small minority, the Bul­gars, in the nature of things, soon began to merge with the Slavic population. “Under the new regime,” says Jireiek, “ the Slavic regions became gradually welded into a single nation and took over the name of their masters, the Bulgars, underwhom they are still living today___ After the passage of afew centuries, there were no longer two nations— Slavs and Bulgars—speaking different languages, but only Bulgars who spoke Slav.” 7 Zlatarski says that the relationship between Bulgars and Slavs was not that of victors and vanquished, but of two peoples with equal rights. “When we bear in mind,” he writes, “ the central position that the Bulgars now occupy among the Slavic peoples, and the leading role which they played in the events of that period, we are obliged to admit that the Slavs entered upon a federative relationship with the Bulgars whose primary objective was to preserve their in­dependence. It may be assumed that the internal administra­tions of these two peoples were from the outset completely independent and that they lived separately one from the other.” 8

Nevertheless, the Bulgars, as we shall see later from nume­rous examples, for long remained a self-sufficient community and adopted toward the subjugated Slavs the attitude of a leading caste, which looked down upon the Slavic population and maintained a jealous watch to ensure that the Slavs should not attain to high places in the state administration. Their ethnic dissimilarity persisted for a long time and, especially at first, was intensified by their differing religions: when the Bulgars first came to the region around Varna, the Slavs were already, for the most part, Christian, while the Bulgars were pagans. The official conversion of the Bulgars took place in 865: on September 14, 865 (according to Zlatar- ski’s conjecture), a certain Greek bishop, at the head of a group of missionaries sent to convert the Bulgars, baptized

7 Constantin Jos. J irefek , Geschichte der Bulgaren, p. 130.8 V . N. Zlatarski, Is torija na Biilgarskata duriava prez srednite

vek ove (H istory o f the Bulgarian State in the M iddle A ges), Vol. I, Part I, Sofia, 1918, p. 143.

32

Moris, who received the name of Mihailo.’ “Of the manner in which the people were converted,” says Zlatarski, “we know nothing. By all appearances, it would seem that the new faith spread gradually, for in some places heathenism persisted for a long time afterward.” 10 He goes on to point out that at that time Christianity was the faith of the Slavic population.11

It is noteworthy that Zlatarski emphasizes that the intro­duction of Christianity into Bulgaria dealt a serious blow at the country’s ethnic dualism in favor of the Slavic element: "through Christianity, Boris became master of the Bulgarian Slavs, who during his reign were the ruling nation and con- Kcquently constituted the power and might of the Bulgarian Htivte. From khan of the Huns and Bulgars, he became emperor of the Slavs and Bulgars.” 12 Zlatarski would have been much nearer the truth if he had not mistaken the true nature of the relationship between the Bulgarian ruling element and the Slavs: Boris supported the Slavs, but could not give them the role of state leader which Zlatarski assigns to them.

From the arrival of the Bulgars in the Balkans to the con­version of Boris there had passed an interval of 186 years. What had occured in the meantime in the relations between Slavs and Bulgars? The process of ethnic unification, especial­ly in view of the small number of Bulgars, took place ex­tremely slowly. During the whole of this period, the stubborn impatience displayed by the Bulgarian ruling caste toward the Slavs, whom they were reluctant to recognize as their own equals, is particularly noticeable. The Arabic writer Mas’udi, who died in 956, has recorded how the Bulgars, con­cluding a peace treaty with Byzantium, sold young Slavs of both sexes as slaves.13 Schafarik says that Slavic tribes sub­jugated by the Bulgars paid them tribute—particularly in Upper Macedonia— and that their princes gave sole recognition to the supreme authority of the Bulgars.14 The relationship was much the same as that with Byzantium at the time when

• Ibid., Part II, p. 30.10 Ibid., p. 29.11 Ibid., p. 35.18 Ibid., pp. 41 and 42.,s See JireCek, op. cit., p. 133.14 Schafarik, op. cit., p. 181.

33

the Slavs had first settled in the Balkans. Pointing out that, long after it had been conquered by the Bulgars, Moesia was also called “Slovinia,” Schafarik says: “The name ‘Bulgaria’ was, indeed, the more usual from the eighth century on; but the old name recurred from time to time.” 15 Evidently, the state was Bulgarian, but the people subject to that state did not as yet consider themselves as Bulgarians. This is borne out by the fact that in 761, eighty-two years after the arrival of the Bulgars, a revolution occurred in Bulgaria which was directed against the Slavs, and 208,000 Slavs left Bulgaria. “They left the country,” says Zlatarski, “and voluntarily gave themselves up to the [Byzantine] Emperor, whom they asked to assign them a place of habitation.” 18 They were settled in Asia Minor on the Arton River, in the region of Bithynia.

Zlatarski goes on to say that this struggle had to decide “ which of the two constituent ethnic elements in the state—■ the Bulgarian or the Slav— should have the ascendancy in determining the Bulgarian national character.” 17 Especial efforts were made in this sense by the khan Krum (802— 14), who succeeded by means of a trick in taking Sofia from the Byzantines. He sacked both Macedonia and Thrace with the intention of annexing them to his state. We have evidence which shows that Krum favored the Slavic element: a dele­gation which he sent in 812 to Byzantium to negotiate with the Emperor Michael Rhangabes (811— 13) was headed by a high-placed official named Dragomir, who was obviously a Slav. As to the character of the ruling caste of Krum’s ad­ministration, however, this is of no significance, for both at an earlier and at a later date there were Slavs in high posi­tions in Byzantium.

Summing up Krum’s policy as a whole, Zlatarski emphasizes his efforts to strengthen the Slavic influence in the state. His reasons for doing so were, of course, political, dynastic and personal. “ In his desire to create an extensive and powerful Bulgaria, Krum was aware of the need to renounce the national fanaticism and ethnic separatism of his fellow-countrymen if he was to follow the natural and cor­rect course of developing and strengthening the state, which

15 Ibid., p. 198.u Zlatarski, op. tit., p. 209.17 Ibid., p. 212.

34

was obliged to fall back on the numerical strength of the Slavs, without, however, realizing that by doing so he was accelerating the unification of the two ethnic elements and preparing a solid foundation for the absorption of the Bul­g a r ia n element in the Slav.” 19

Krum’s policy, for all its prudence and political farsighted­ness, was frustrated by his son and successor Omortag (814—31), whose internal policy was marked by bloody and ruthless persecution of the Christian religion and of the Slavs. The ruling Bulgarian stratum strove to protect itself and to destroy whatever might reduce its prospects of remaining in power. The revolt of the Slavic tribes against this must have been vigorous and on a large scale, since Omortag “was under the powerful influence of the anti-Slav policy of the Bul­garian aristocracy.” ,9 In this connection, Omortag devoted much greater attention to the areas north of the Danube than to the territory of the Macedonian Slavs, which he does not appear particularly to have coveted. Other Slavic tribes, too, gave signs of their hostility toward Omortag’s government: the TimoCani and Braniievci rebelled and seceded from Bul­garia. In their search for support, they appealed for help to Louis the Pious. Referring to this incident, Zlatarski ludicrous­ly remarks that the TimoCani seceded from Bulgaria “for un­known reasons—probably because of the death of Krum” ;20 while Corovi6 says: “In their flight from the Bulgars, they could certainly count on better protection from the Frankish Btute than from an alliance with Ljudevit [Posavski]. Their first decision was to offer themselves to the Franks; even so, they Joined Ljudevit, obviously under the influence of their tribal links with him. In all our history, this is the first attempt on the part of [Slavic] tribes at conscious collabora­tion over a wide area, although, as on previous occasions in the NtruKglo with the Obri, it was of a purely defensive character." *'

The reign of Omortag’s successor, Mallomir (831— 36), pro­duced no changes in the policy toward the Slavs. Mallomir’s successor, Presijam (836—52), took advantage of the war

19 Ibid., p. 291.>• Ibid., p. 318.*• Ibid., p. 312.!1 Corovii, op. clt., p. 38.

35

between Byzantium and the Arabs to annex numerous areas belonging to the Macedonian Slavs. “His success,” says Coro- vid, “appears to have been considerable: the Bulgars quickly emerged as the masters of Ohrid and the entire region around Devol, thus uniting under their rule the greater part of the Macedonian Slavs.” 22 Zlatarski states that Presijam annexed central and western Macedonia, the lands between the upper and lower Vardar and the Cmi Drin, together with Kosovo Polje, and as far south as Ohrid and Prilep.23 JireCek shares the same view: “From the area of Serdica [Sofia], they [the Bulgars] subdued the Slavic tribes of Macedonia as far as the Byzantine littoral near Salonica, and, since they had occupied Ohrid and the region of the Devol River, they became neigh­bors of the province of Durazzo.” 24

Presijam’s son Boris (852— 88) and Boris’s younger son and second successor Simeon (893— 927) supplemented Presijam’s conquests and continued the war against the Serbian state, which was just coming into being. Presijam was the first to wage war against the Serbs: he was defeated and compelled to withdraw. Boris was later also defeated and his son Vladi­mir taken prisoner. A relaxation of effort on both sides led to the conclusion of peace terms, as a result of which Vladimir and twelve Bulgarian boyars were returned, accompanied by a guard of honor as far as Ras, at that time the frontier between Bulgaria and Serbia. “The Serbs,” says Corovi6, “were probably diffident of the issue of a continued struggle, and therefore agreed to favorable terms.” 25

Simeon, the greatest leader that Bulgaria has ever had, “a man determined and brave in war,” as Lav the Deacon describes him, decided to bring the remaining Slavic tribes under his rule. “According to the treaty concluded with By­zantium in 864, the southwestern frontier of Bulgaria ran from the central Rhodope westward to the Rupelo defile, along the Bjelasnica mountains, across the Vardar near Demir Kapija and then toward the southwest, embracing the lakes

! ! Ibid., p. 40.18 Zlatarski, op. cit., V o l. I, Part I, p. 342.M C. J. J ire iek and J. Radonid, Is torija Srba (H istory o f the Serbs),

Vol. I (to 1537), Belgrade, 1952, p. 111.f* Corovid, op. cit., p. 41.

36

of Ohrid and Prespa.” 28 The tribes which were still outside the Bulgarian borders included the Smoljani (on the lower reaches of the Mesta River), the Rinhini (between the lower Struma and the Vardar), the Sagudati and the Dragovi6i (northwest and west of Salonica).

Powerful as he was, and obsessed by the ambition to sur- plant Byzantium in name as well as in fact, Simeon was urged on by an insatiable desire to proclaim a Bulgarian empire and patriarchate: the patriarchate he did, in fact, proclaim in 918, without the permission or approval of Byzantium and sub­sequently he proclaimed himself emperor. Soon after this, he devoted the greater part of his energies to the war against the Serbs, on whom he wanted to take his revenge for their defeats of his father and grandfather. Although it was only just coming into being, the Serbian state showed considerable powers of resistance and its leaders considerable skill in maneuvring between Bulgaria and Byzantium, in which they divined the lesser threat to their future development. Re­ferring to the period when Simeon was attempting to destroy Serbia, JireCek states that the territory of Serbia stretched from the Adriatic to the Ibar, from the mouth of the Boj ana along the coast to Cetina, and in the north as far as the Sava River. The center of gravity of the ancient Serbian state was on the Lake of Skadar (Scutari). Not until the time of the Nemanjidi did its frontiers begin to move eastward and south­ward.*7

Simeon succeeded in destroying the Serbian state. “Si­meon,” says Schafarik, “exacted a dreadful revenge upon the Serbs, who had entered upon an alliance with the Greeks against the Bulgars. Serbia was terribly devastated.” 28 Large numbers of slaves were taken off. Porphyrogenitus recorded that only a few groups of hunters were left in Serbia, without wives or children.

A fter the death of Simeon, which occurred in 927, the might of Bulgaria waned rapidly. His son and successor, Peter (927— 68), an unusually close prototype of the Serbian UroS “ the Wavever,” was a devout but weak person entirely under Byzantine influence and unequal to the times in which he

*• Zlatarski, op. cit., V o l. II, p. 328.17 C. J. Jiredek, Geschichte der Bulgaren, p. 162.18 Schafarik, op. cit., p. 187.

37

lived. Under his rule, the state began to totter to its founda­tions: in 930, his brother Mihailo rose in revolt, but was soon killed and his revolt crushed. Caslav Klonimirovic fled from Bulgaria and set up a powerful state of his own. Five times the Magyars attacked Bulgaria, mostly in collaboration with the Cumani. In 963, there broke out the rebellion led by the nobleman 3i§man and his sons: meeting with failure in the east, he withdrew to the western regions, where he founded a new administrative center.

The First Bulgarian Empire came to an end with the death of Peter in 968. (Bulgarian historians, and with them many others, include the reigns of Samuil and his successors, and consider the First Empire as lasting until 1018). There is no doubt that the Slavs of Macedonia were also for a long period subjects of this empire. Zlatarski emphasized that throughout this extensive empire there was no inner unity. “One may confidently assert,” he says, “ that in the earliest period of the First Bulgarian Empire there existed a Bulgarian state, but there was as yet no Bulgarian people with strongly defined cultural principles, with its own way of life, which would set it apart as an entity, as a separate nation.” 29 Zlatarski claims, however, that this situation changed in the middle of the ninth century, but no evidence can be found for this assertion. The western part of the empire, chiefly the territory of the Macedonian Slavs, displayed a persistent tendency toward separatism and a lack of interest in the idea of a Bulgarian state. Hugo Grothe states that as late as the ninth century Bulgarian inroads into unconquered Slav territories “were undoubtedly raids carried out by marauders, which could hardly have left any ethnic traces on these territories.” 30 Referring to the replies given by Pope Nicholas I to the questions put to him by the Emperor Boris, JireCek says that they offer valuable and irrefutable evidence that the Bul­garian ruling stratum had not yet become fused with the subjugated Slavs.31 Murko also remarks that in the tenth century the Bulgars were still a separate people,32 while Dr.

28 Zlatarski, op. cit., V o l. I, Part I, pp. 351— 52.30 Hugo Grothe, A u t tiirkischer Erde, Berlin, 1903, p. 361.81 C. J .J ire iek , Geschichfe der Bulgaren, p. 156.32 M. Murko, Geschichte der alteren siidslawischen Literatur, Leip­

zig, 1908, p. 25.

38

Kurt Floericke, despite the assertion that the Bulgars, as an ethnic group, rapidly disappeared in the Slavic masses, emphasizes that the administration of the Bulgarian state of that time was definitely aristocratic in character: “ thus,” he says, “ in customs and ideas, there was everywhere the greatest possible opposition to the democratic Slav nation.” 88

There can be no question of a single people in the enormous Bulgarian state of the Middle Ages. Some blending of races did occur, since this was inevitable; but the idea of a Bulgarian state, represented as it was by a non-Slav ruling stratum, left hardly any permanent traces in the minds of the Macedonian Slavs. Even when it was resurrected in the form of the Second Bulgarian Empire (1186— 1393), it was not defended with such determination and self-sacrifice as was the Serbian state. Moreover, it is noteworthy that the Second Bulgarian Empire took its origins from Tumovo, which, after the battle on the Klokotnitsa in 1230, regained its former power. “From the time of Samuil,” says JireSek, “ the Bul­garian Slavs were once more united under a single scepter. In addition to Danubian Bulgaria, it embraced BraniCevo and Belgrade, Nig and Velbuzd, Thrace together with Didimotika and Adrianople, the whole of Macedonia—that is, the regions around Ser, Skoplje, Prilep, the Devol, and Ohrid—and A l­bania together with Elbasan as far as the approaches to Durazzo.” 34

The history of the Second Bulgarian Empire is also full of drama. There were constant quarrels, rebellions and con­spiracies between various local rulers and pretenders to the throne, of whom there were many. Except during the reign uf Ivan Asen II (1218—41), the Second Bulgarian Empire was ili'void of any central idea. In contrast to the First, it was at l Iw hi'lKht of its power amicably disposed toward the Serbs. Tin' Serbian state, which had come into being as a result of the work of Stevan Nemanja and St. Sava, had overcome its initial obstacles and was evincing an increasingly definite li'iulmry lo spread southward. The Emperor Ivan Asen II, fathrr-lii-law of King Vladislav, was himself a great admirer of St. Sava, and, when St. Sava died at Tumovo, he made an nttempl to keep his remains in Bulgaria. In his L ife of

*' Kurl Flonrlcko, Geschichte der Bulgaien, Stuttgart, 1913, p. 12.M C. J. J lretek, Geschichte der Bulgaren, p. 251.

39

St. Sava, Teodosije says that, on receiving Vladislav’s first re­quest that he be allowed to remove St. Sava’s remains to Ser­bia, Asen “summoned the patriarch and his counsellors and asked them whether he should surrender the Saint, and they replied that he should under no circumstances do this, since the state leaders and the entire city were indignant on ac­count of this.” 85 In the spirit, work and achievement of St. Sava may be seen a revival of the period of St. Clement and of that movement toward the unification of the Slavic tribes to which we have already drawn attention. Moreover, there is ample evidence to show that he did much to secure recognition of the independence of the Bulgarian Church, thus putting both the Bulgarian Church and the Bulgarian state in his debt.

During the period when the Second Bulgarian Empire was still in its infancy, the Macedonian Slavs were once more under Greek rule. When the Latins captured Byzantium in 1204, they fell into the hands of the despots of Epirus. A kinsman of Kaloyan (1197— 1207), Dobromir Strez, who is also prominent in Serbian history, remained loyal to the Greeks and under their patronage formed an independent principality. Later he accepted the protection of Stevan Prvo- venCani, then betrayed him, and finally paid for this with his life. In his account of this period, the monk Teodosije says that “ the Goths [so he calls the Bulgars] became very power­ful and, finding many Greek cities deserted and helpless, they seized and held them; they also occupied the cities around Salonica and controlled Ohrid.” 85 From the death of Ivan Asen II to the battle on the VelbuSd in 1330, the Bulgarian throne was occupied by a series of rulers who are of little interest. As a result of the battle on the Velbuzd, the Bulgars were driven out of Slavic Macedonia, and for several centuries after this, until the emergence of the Exarchate, they were to play no further role in this region. “On that day,” says Floericke in reference to this battle, “ the leader­ship of the South Slavs passed from the Bulgars to the Serbs.” *7 The collapse of the Bulgarian Empire with the fall

“ Teodosije, Z iv o t svetoga Save (The Life o f St. Sava), in Basii, Stare srpske b iog ra lije (O ld Serbian Biographies), p. 240.

3» Ibid., pp. 162— 163.37 Floericke, op. cit., p. 33.

40

to Turnovo in 1393, took place without noise and without heroic feats: it was the Serbs who defended Macedonia against the Turks.

Conscientious and well-informed historian as he was, Zla- tnrski committed a serious error in supposing that he Slavic tribes which settled in Macedonia and the whole of the Bal­kans bore no resemblance to the Serbs and Croats who, at the time of Heraclius (610— 41), settled in those areas with which their later history was to be associated. Referring to the Slavs of the so-called Slavo-Antic group, Zlatarski says: “Neither In their origin, nor in their language, nor in their political interests did they have anything in common with the Serbo- Croats.” 88 “ Consequently,” he goes on to say, “ during the first period of their history, the Serbs were unable to unite and form a single state, and, from the time when they first !x}gan to settle in the Peninsula, failed to take an independent part in the political affairs of southeastern Europe. On the contrary, they kept aloof from the other Slavs in the Pen­insula, since they belonged to another Slavic group and con­sequently differed from them in their origin, language and political interests.” 39

Evidently, Zlatarski overlooked a number of important facts. Until the time of Samuil, the other Balkan Slavs also failed to create a state of their own; the efforts of Prince Samo and later of Ljudevit Posavski to form a Slavic state proved unsuccessful; as soon as the Serbs began to form a state of their own, the Bulgars intervened with the object of preventing them from doing so and were repeatedly defeated by the Serbs; like the BraniSevci and TimoCani, the Mace­donian Slavs felt no enthusiasm for the Bulgarian regime, and lit*’ Malkan Slavs in general were for long incapable of re- KanlliiK I he* Bulgarian state as their own since it was, indeed, (iIImi to them. By misinterpreting the concept of the state, at a time when states were formed by individuals or their dynasties, Zlatarski erroneously regards as Bulgars all those Slavs who at any time had found themselves under Bulgarian domination. If Bulgaria had indeed been their national state, it would have been impossible, in spite of everything that

*• Zlatarski, op. cIt., V ol. I, Part I, p. 16.M Ibid., p. 345.

41

subsequently occurred, for all trace of it to disappear. In 1814, Dobrovsky considered Bulgarian to be a dialect of Serbian, while until 1826 Schafarik had not seen a single book written in Bulgarian.40 Identifying the Bulgarian state, from the national point of view, with its subjects, Schafarik de­signated all those Slavs who had at any time been incorporat­ed in the Bulgarian state as “Bulgarian Slavs.” “ In its widest sense,” he says, “we understand the term ‘Bulgarian Slavs’ as including all those Slavs who were at one time to be found in Moldavia, Wallachia, Sibiu and southern Hungary from the Prut River in the north to the confluence of the Drava and Danube rivers, in ancient Moesia and modern Eastern Serbia from the mouth of the Danube to the Morava, in Thrace, Macedonia and Albania, in Thessaly and other parts of Greece and even in the Pelopennese and on the neighboring is­lands.” 41

Following Schafariks’ example, other writers have em­ployed an equally uncritical approach in defining the ethnic boundaries of Bulgaria. Paul Dehn states that they encompass a wide area. “With the exception of some isolated com­munities in Epirus, west of the Vardar and in Upper Moravia, the Bulgars inhabit a wide area which is bounded by the right bank of the Danube from the Serbian frontier to the Black Sea, from where the frontier follows the shores of the Black Sea, Sea of Marmor and Aegean Sea as far as the mouth of the Vardar, then follows the course of the Vardar up to Kosovo Polje, from where it passes through Giljane, Vranje, Leskovac, NiS and Pirot to Vidin on the Danube. Only in the large ports such as Byzantium and Salonica do we find a re­duced number of Bulgars.” 42 A similar definition of the Bul­garian frontiers is to be found in Stefan Mladenov’s Geschichte der bulgarischen Sprache, published in 1929. Such definitions are, of course, to be regarded as arbitrary and unrealistic.

40 C. J. Jirefcek, Geschichte der Bulgaren, p. 506.41 Schafarik, op. cit., p. 152.42 Paul Dehn, Die V o lk e r Siidosteuropas und ihre politischen Pro-

bleme, Halle, 1909, pp. 20— 21.41 Stefan M ladenov, Geschichte der bulgarischen Sprache, Berlin-

Leipzig, 1929, p. 1.

42

THE EMPEROR SAMUIL

In the history of the Macedonian Slavs, the attempt of Samuil to create and maintain a Slavic state in the Balkans furnishes a chapter apart. The son of comes Nikola, Samuil (976— 1014) is an extremely interesting figure, but, like the times in which he lived, there is much about him that is obscure. Bulgarian historians, together with many others, re­gard him as a Bulgar and his state as a continuation of the Bulgarian state. The most recent research, however, suggests that he was of Armenian origin: Nicolas Adontz has put for­ward the view that his family was Armenian. That his mother Ripsimija was Armenian is no longer open to doubt.44 His state, which came into being as the result of a rising against Byzantium, did not include all, if any, of the eastern regions of the Bulgarian Empire, but did embrace all the Serbian lands. Between Samuil and the Serbian princes there appears to have been mutual confidence and dependence: Samuil made Jovan Vladimir, Prince of Zeta, his son-in-law.

On the other hand, he regarded his domain, not as a con­tinuation or revival of the old Bulgarian state, but as his own, new and original creation. He had his own conception and his own aims. From Ohrid, where he had his capital, Samuil began to extend his territory in all directions. “From here,” says Bo2idar Prokic, “he gradually extended his authority over all the Serbian tribes as far as the Croatian frontier, over all the Slavic tribes in Macedonia and Thessaly and all the Bulgars except those south of the Balkan Mountains in Thrace. Thus, Samuil was the first among the Slavic rulers to attempt the liberation of all the Slavic tribes in the Balkan Peninsula—Macedonians, Serbs and Bulgars—from an alien regime. This he soon suceeded in doing, uniting them in a single Slavic state and giving it that name which the hitherto strongest Slavic state in the Balkans had borne.” 45

Summing up this period, Corovi6 says: "Samuil, therefore, did not recognize the authority of the former Bulgarian

44 N icolas Adontz, “Samuel l'Armenien, roi des Bulgares,” M im o i- res de I'Acad6m ie royale de Belgique, 1938, pp. 41— 42.

4* Boiidar A . Prokid, “V o jvoda Iva c” (Duke Ivac), Bratstvo dru itva svetoga Save, V o l. IX and X, 1902, p. 5.

43

dynasty over his lands: he created a new state administration and a new dynasty. Even though he later conquered Bulgaria and its imperial capital, Preslav, he did not transfer his own capital thither, but remained true to his Macedonian environ­ment, to Prespa and Ohrid___ Thus the land of the Mace­donian Slavs, for the first and the last time in our history, became the center of a great liberation campaign and of agreat state___ Samuil’s state of Macedonian Slavs was a newcreation, which exploited the imperial inheritance of Bul­garia. For this reason, his state is regarded in certain foreign circles as a continuation of the old state of Simeon, i. e., of Bulgaria.” 48

The only feature that Samuil’s state and that of Bulgaria had in common was that they both came into being in the course of the struggle with Byzantium, in which Byzantium was in the end victorious. A new feature in Samuil’s policy, particularly in comparison with Bulgaria, was that he gave the Slavic element a wider and freer scope. There is one more striking difference between the two: while Bulgaria, despite her power and greatness, left no profound traces in the con­sciousness of the Macedonian Slavs, the same cannot be said of Samuil’s state. The subsequent desire of the people that it should be revided found expression in a series of rebellions, of which not one was oriented toward the old Bulgaria: of these uprisings, the most interesting are those led by Petar Deljan, the soldier Tihomir (in the region of Durazzo), Manuel Ivac (near Prilep) and Djordje Vojteh.

Vojteh’s uprising was pro-Serbian in orientation. Since 1035, a new Serbian state had begun to form at Zeta, and a rebel delegation requested Mihailo, King of Zeta, to help them and give them his son Bodin to lead the revolt. “Aware of the links,” says Corovic, “between the Zeta dynasty and Samuil, and probably also prompted by the fact that Zeta, with which RaSka, the Trebinje district and Hum were at that time in alliance, was the only Slavic state in their vicinity, the rebels appealed for assistance to King Mihailo of Zeta. Perhaps they hoped that considerations of tribal solidarity would prompt the King to join them. This Mihailo did.” 47

4* C orov ii, op. tit . , p. 64.47 Ibid., p. 73.

44

Samuil’s religious policy also showed that he was following a different course from the Bulgarian rulers: there was no enmity on either side between him and the Bogomils. While the names of Boris, Simeon and Peter are prominent in Bul­garian ecclesiastical literature, “Samuil’s name is almost com­pletely absent. . . and always wrapped in a veil of restraint.” 48 Jireiek also remarks that Samuil gave neither the Orthodox nor the Catholic Church any support in their struggle against the Bogomils.49

As the example of Ivac shows— for he was certainly not the only one— there were members of the Orthodox faith among Samuil’s military commanders. (On the Feast of the Assumption, August 28, 1018, Ivic was captured by Evstatije Dafnomil, administrator of Ohrid, by trickery and blinded.) The celebration in Macedonia of the slava, which is attested by the Byzantine chronicler Skilica, is one more proof that the Macedonian Slavs in Samuil’s state differed from the Bul­gars. “ In the east, in Bulgaria, this custom was never ob­served—nor is it today— and when, in the eleventh century, the Bulgars began to subdue the Christianized Slavic tribes in Macedonia and the Serbian lands, they found the slava already established there. When the Bulgars were converted in the second half of the eleventh century, they neither then nor at any later date took over this custom from the Mace­donian Slavs.” 50

A ll this indicates the individual character of Samuil’s state, which was neither Bulgarian nor Serbian. In 1884, Alexander Heksch, on inadequate grounds, called this state "Serbian,” chiefly in order to emphasize that it was not Bul- grnian. "A t the end of the tenth and the beginning of the eleventh century,” he says, “ a kingdom under Samuil emerged in Macedonia is erroneously called Bulgarian, for the Bulgars hnd no part in it. On the contrary, the chief cities of Bul­garia—Sllistria and Plovdiv— remained outside the frontiers of Samuil’s state and under Byzantine rule. Samuil’s state was Slavic, with its center in Macedonia.” 51 Somewhat more

48 Dmitri Obolensky, The Bogom ils: A Study in Balkan N eo - Manichaelsm, Cambridge, England, 1949, p. 151.

4* C. J. J irefek , Geschichte der Bulgaren, p. 191.M Prokid, op. cit., p. 12.

A lexander F. Heksch, Donau, Leipzig, 1884, p. 635 (footnote).

45

circumspectly, Hugo Grothe wrote in 1905: “Whether this state was Bulgarian or Serbian— usually it is referred to as the ‘Western Bulgarian Kingdom’— is still an open question. In any case, as soon as the SiSmani attempted to conquer this land from the north, a movement of immigration began from Old Serbia.” 52

Samuil’s state was the first and last state of the Mace­donian Slavs. It was called into being by the circumstances of the period, which likewise soon removed it from the historical arena. Its disappearance in 1018 creates for us a new problem: that of the old archiepiscopacy of Ohrid, which, like Samuil’s state, has been erroneously called Bulgarian, for, while it controlled the Slavic areas in its immediate vicinity, it did not extend, after the collapse of the Second Bulgarian Empire, to the central areas of the Bulgarian Patriarchate. While, with the gradual decline of the Serbian state and, concurrently, of the Patriarchate of Ped, the authority of the archiepiscopacy of Ohrid spread to the dioceses of the Patriarchate of Pec, the Patriarch of Byzantium, after the fall of Turnovo, placed the Bulgarian Church under the control of the Metropolitan of Moldavia. In 1402, nine years after the collapse of Bulgaria, we find at Turnovo a Greek bishop, who was subordinate to the Patriarch of Byzantium.5®

51 Grothe, op. cit., pp. 361— 62.5a C. J. Jirecek, Geschichte der Bulgaren, p. 350.

46

THE MACEDONIAN SLAVS UNDER SERBIAN RULE

I.

The Macedonian Slavs came gradually under the sway of the medieval Serbian state as a consequence of the struggle of the Serbs against Byzantium, not Bulgaria. There must have been contact even earlier between the tribes of central Serbia and those of Macedonia. During the first stage of their life in the Balkans, they had been, at least formally, under the aegis of Byzantium, from which they were gradually taken over by the Bulgars. Right up to the time of Presijam, mutual relations between all the Slavic tribes were good. In the middle of the tenth century, Constantine Porphyrogenitus recorded that until the time of Prince Vlastimir Serbs and Bulgars were on peaceful terms, since they were under By­zantine rule. Then Presijam, anxious to prevent the formation of a Serbian state, opened war against the Serbs.

The most natural explanation of these good relations is that, despite all their tribal differences, they were bound together by ties of kinship and by the fact that they had much in common. In contradiction of the view of Jemej Kopitar a ml Franc Miklogic (both of them Slovenes), which was taken o v e r nnd developed by Zlatarski, more recent research has n I i o w i i thut the Serbs and Croats, whose migration to the UnlkmiH on a large scale is assigned to the reign of the Em­peror lienicllus (610— 41), neither linguistically nor ethnically d i f f e re d bo much from the other Slavic tribes which settled in the Hulkuns before them as to justify their being con­sidered as an entirely separate Slavic group.1

1 See Ernst DOmmler, .Uber die alteste Geschichte der Slawen in Dalmatien (549— 928),* SUzungsberidite der Kaiserlichen Akadem ie der Wissenscha/lcn In W ien : Philologisch-historische Classe, V o l. XX , 1856j and Ludwig Gumplowicz, .D ie politische Geschidite der Serben und Kroaten,* Pollllsch-anthropologische Revue, 1902/03, p. 783.

4?

Moreover, Schafarik asserts that the Slavic tribes in the region of the confluence of the Southern and Western Morava were mingled with Serbs.* The same thing must have oc­curred to the southeast and south of the central Serbian tribes, where the population was more or less similarly con­stituted. “Linguistic archeology,” says Corovid, “gives fairly positive results in respect of the dialectal unity of the old South Slav tribes, and excludes the possibility that the Serbs and Croats came to the Balkans as an element dialectically distinct from the other Slav masses. Our linguists have found that Serbo-Croat and Slovenian are the product of a common language and that they were spoken even before the grouping [of the Slavic tribes] in the regions they occupy today took place.” 3 Referring to the speakers of proto-Slavic, Max Vasmer says that “before the more important dialectal dif­ferences began to emerge, they inhabited a region whose in­dividual areas were subject to mutual linguistic modifica­tion.” 4 “Where we find Slavs,” says J. J. Mikkola, “who call themselves Slavs, we must derive them from a single proto­tribe.” 5

It is interesting to note that, despite all the vicissitudes of fortune to which the Slavic tribes were, during the centuries, exposed, linguistic oases have survived in the south which testify to the kinship of the southern tribes with those which inhabit present-day Slovenia and KoruSka. During World War I, Ljubomir Pavlovid discovered, in the Slav villages around Ostrovo, a language group which resembles Slovenian. “The language of these Slavs,” he reports, “ is nearest to that of the Slovenes. I have seen many Slovenes from our front who have no difficulty in conversing with these Slavs. Mos­lems from Meglen stated repeatedly that linguistically they are nearest to the Slovenian volunteers in the Serbian army. An acquaintance of mine, a respected householder from Voden, told me, after a conversation with a lieutenant colonel in our

2 Paul Joseph Schafarik, Slavische A lterlhum er. V ol. II, Leipziq, 1844, p. 259.

3 V ladim ir C orov ii, Is torija Jugoslavije (H istory o f Yugoslavia), Belgrade, 1933, p. 22.

4 M ax Vasmer, Untersuchungen iiber die altesten W ohnsitze der Slavert. Part I: D ie Iran ier in Siidrussiand, Leipzig, 1923, p. 1.

8 J. J. M ikkola, „Samo und sein Reich,* A rch iv fur S iavisd ie Ph iio - log ie , V ol. XLII, 1929, p. 86.

48

army who came from Slovenia, that he understands the Slo­venes better than he does Serbs and Bulgarians, Slavic cus­toms associated with weddings, "slava,” funerals, domestic and agricultural life are almost identical with those in the mountain villages of Old Serbia and Montenegro.” ®

Much that would be of interest for us today in the pre- historical life of these Slavic tribes remains obscure. Schafarik himself felt this, and was right when he said that “ the pre­history of the Serbs of Illyria is covered in impenetrable dark­ness.” 7 This is especially true of the period preceding the formation of a Serbian state under Vlastimir: apart from the evidence of Constantine Porphyrogenitus, which is accepted by many historians and rejected, at least partially, by many others, we are unable to learn anything further of the arrival of the Serbs in the Balkans and of the manner of their settling there. We only know that there were Slavs who called themselves Serbs outside the Balkans: in 631, Prince Samo was joined by Drvan, “ a prince of the Serbian tribe, which was of the Slavic nation.” 8 This appears to be the earliest mention of the name “Serb.” The second occurs in the year 822: the chronicle of Einhard mentions that in this year Ljudevit Posavski fled to the Serbs in Bosnia, “which people holds a large part of Dalmatia.”

It is not open to question that there were also Serbs in other parts of the Balkans than those in which the first Serbian state came into being. Of primary importance are those who, before the mass migration began, settled in the area of Salonica. Vatroslav Jagi6, following Porphyrogenitus, states that Serbs, without meeting any opposition, came to Salonica “and settled near Salonica in a district which was called ‘ta Serblia.’ ” 9 Jagic is of the opinion that the name “Oi Serbloi” was confined to a very small area.10 J. Mikotcy affirmed that in 640 the Serbs spread first over Macedonia,

• Ljub. P a v lo v ii, “O stanovnistvu i selima Ostrovske okoline” (The Population and V illages o f the O strovo District), Glasnik Geo- gra iskog druitva, V ol. V , 1921, p. 239.

7 Schafarik, op. cit., p. 249.8 See Diimmler, op. cit., p. 389.* V . Jagif, „Ein Kapitel aus der Geschichte der siidslawischen

Sprachen," A rch iv filr alavische Ph ilo log ie , Vol. X V II, 1895, p. 60.10 Ibid.

49

then Illyria.11 Schafarik supposed that one part of the Serbs, unwilling to return with the majority to the north, remained in Macedonia.12 Kaspar Zeuss rejected this view: “ [The argu­ment] that a people which stretched from the Timok to the Adriatic originally inhabited a small theme [i. v., province] near Salonica, that it took it into its head to return to its former home and then decided to stay where it was, needs no further proof of its absurdity.” 13

However that may be, there is evidence that among the Slavs who were transferred to Asia Minor there were some who called themselves Serbs. In 649 (i. e., at a time when, even according to Porphyrogenitus, the resettlement of Serbs in areas outside Macedonia had been completed), the Emperor Constantine III transferred a part of the Slavs from the Var­dar to Asia Minor. There these migrants founded the city of Gordoservon, the name of which gives grounds for supposing that among its founders there were Serbs. From the seventh to the tenth century, there were five such transfers of popu­lation.14 Between 1118 and 1143, the Emperor John Comnenus resettled some of the Serbs in the region of Nicomedia.15 Corovii points out that place names of Serbian origin are to be found over the entire southern part of the Balkan Pen­insula, far from the regions where the principal groups of Serbian tribes had settled.18 JireCek conjectures that the an­cestors of the Serbs and Croats may have been “ those Slavs who, near Syrmium on the Sava River, built boats for the Avars, and who, together with the ancestors of the Slovenes, fought, side by side with the Avar hordes, in the eastern Alps against the Bavarians, and, as auxiliaries, went over to the Longobards in Italy.” 17

11 J. M ikotcy, O tiorum Chroatiae, V o l. I, Budapest, 1806, pp. 89 to 112.

12 Schafarik, op. cit., p. 239, footnote.1S Kaspar Zeuss, D ie Deutschen und die Nachbarstamme, Munich,

1837, pp. 612— 13, footnote.14 J. Erdeljanovid, “O naseljavanju Slovena u M aloj A z i j i i Si-

r iji od V II do X veka ” (The Settlement o f Slavs in Asia M inor and Syria from the Seventh to the Tenth Century), Glasnik Geogratskog druitva , V o l. V I, 1921, p. 189.

>' Ibid.14 Corovic, op. cit., p. 6; cf. K. Jire^ek and J. Radonii, Is torija Srba

(H istory o f the Serbs), Vol. I (to 1537), Belgrade, 1952, p. 59.17 J ire iek and Radonifi, op. cit., V o l. I, p. 59.

50

Further evidence of strengthened mutual contacts and, particularly, of the intermingling of Slavic tribes is the rapid spread among all these tribes of the Slav (Cyrillic) alphabet. Among Serbian scholars it is generally assumed that these mixed tribes brought the Slav alphabet from Slavic Mace­donia into the hilly regions of Serbia. This would be all the more likely if, as Corovic says, “ there can scarcely have ever bi>en any definite frontiers between them [the Slavic tribes In the Balkans]; here as in the areas through which they had passed, they were distributed among fraternities and tribes and mingled and maintained contact [with one another].” 18 Aleksa I vie remarked that the Balkan Slavs were regarded by foreign writers as “one great ethnic entity, possessing chiefly one language and one general culture.” *• Although we know that the Slav alphabet and liturgy spread among the Serbs in Bosnia and MaCva from Pannonia, it is true that “ the Serbs in Zeta and RaSka acquired the Slavic alphabet, the Christian faith and the first foundations of Slav writing from the south. Certain Serbian documents of the twelfth and early thirteenth centuries, such as the Miroslav Gospel and the Hilandar typic, bear pronounced traces of the influence of Slavic Macedonia.” 20

Schafarik made an attempt at defining the eastern and southern frontiers of the Serbian lands as they were at the time of Porphyrogentus. Quite arbitrarily, he traced them along the valley of the Ibar River and the “Serbian” Morava, even though, as he himself admits, Porphyrogenitus says nothing on this point.81 “ It is open to doubt,” says Schafarik, "whether the eastern bank of the Ibar and the confluence of the Toplica and TempeSka, i. e., the whole of former Dardania, was originally inhabited by Serbs. It is more probable that this strip of land was first settled by Bulgarian Slavs and that it was only later annexed to the Serbian state by Stevan Nemanja and his successors, with the result that the Serbian speech subsequently predominated.” 22 He further states that

18 Corovid, op. cit., p. 15.19 In Narodna encik loped ija SHS (National Encyclopedia o f the

Serbs, Croats and Slovenes), V ol. IV , p. 306.20 Ibid., p. 307.21 Schafarik, op. cit., pp. 258— 59.22 Ibid.

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the western banks of these rivers were permanently settled by Serbian tribes. According to them, the eastern banks of both rivers were inhabited by Slavs of “ the other tribe.” 28 “ In the east, the Morava and Ibar up to ZveCan separated the Serbs from the Bulgarian Slavs.” 24

Kaspar Zeuss, whom Robert Roesler described as a “ researcher of whom it may be said that the more we read him, the more he fills us with wonder,” 25 accepts the in­formation given by Porphyrogenitus on the settlement of the Serbs in his De administrando imperio as correct, but points out that Porphyrogenitus fails to define all the frontiers of the Serbian tribes. Only those tribes are mentioned which settled in the immediate hinterland of the Adriatic Sea, “but not the main masses in the east.” To these, from among the most important tribes, he assigns the TimoCani and BraniCev- ci.i6 Ernst Dummler, also a serious critic of Porphyrogenitus, says that the Serbian tribes settled on both sides of the Danube, beginning from the confluence of the Drava with the Danube and reaching as far as the Timok.27 He surmises that the Serbian tribes, together with the state of Prince Mutimir, came under the ecclesiastical authority of Methodius’ diocese of Moravia and Pannonia, which was founded in 870 by Pope Adrian II. He confirms this with a passage from a letter from Pope John V III to Prince Mutimir, which runs: “Follow the practice of your predecessors and try, insofar as it is pos­sible, to return to the Pannonian diocese. Since, thank God, a bishop has been appointed there by the See of St. Peter, entrust yourself to his paternal care.” 28

Schafarik’s mistake was that the ethnic boundaries, which were obscure to him, he confused with political boundaries. Byzantine writers did the same thing: all those tribes which the Bulgars gradually brought under their domination they began to call Bulgarian, being perhaps under the impression

“ Ibid.24 Ibid.85 Robert Roesler, „Uber den Zeitpunkt der slavischen Ansiedlung

an der unteren Donau,” Sitzungsberichte der Kaiserlichen Akadem ie der Wissenschalten in W ien : Phiiologisch-historische Classe, V ol. LX X III, 1873, p. 96.

*• Zeuss, op. cit., pp. 614— 15.17 Dummler, op. cit., p. 396.28 Ibid., p. 407.

52

that membership of a state and ethnic character are one and the same. Thus, Zlatarski called the Macedonian Slavs “Bul­garian Slavs” even before some of them had come under Bul­garian rule.*® At this time, and for long afterward, the Balkan states were the creations of rulers and dynasties rather than national states in the modem sense of the word. Even the state of the Nemanjici, in which the national element was prominent, was regarded by Stojan Novakovid as the creation of a dynasty rather than of a people. “Everything here,” hesays, “was personal and bound up with personalities___ Thevery idea of a great empire and a great state did not exist in the minds of the people or even among the aristocracy of that period: it sprang from DuSan himself and the dynasty of the Nemanjici.” 30

If these remarks are true of the medieval Serbian state, they are, mutatis mutandis, even more applicable to the Bul­garian state under both empires, whose dynasties were alien to the masses of the Slavic population: in proportion as the state became more powerful, the concept of the state grew more cosmopolitan in character. Recently, Mihailo Dinid point­ed out that the idea o f a universal empire still haunted the Bulgars in the time of Jovan Aleksandar: “The autocrat of the Bulgars and Greeks was presented as the rival of Constan­tine the Great.” 31

II.

The land of the Macedonian Slavs was conquered by the Serbs, not from the Bulgars, but from the Greeks. When the Second Bulgarian Empire was still in its ascendancy, and Asen I was struggling with Isaac Comnenus, Stevan Nemanja had already extended his territory beyond the frontiers of the old state of Ra§ka. Referring to this period, JireCek says:

“ V . N . Zlatarski, Istorija na Bulgarskata duriava prez srednite vek ove (H istory of the Bulgarian State in the M iddle A ges ), V o l. I, Part I, Sofia, 1918, p. 343.

so Stojan Novakovid , “Les probl&mes serbes,” Archiv liir slavische Philologie, V o l. X X X IV , 1912, p. 232.

31 M ihailo Dinid, “DuSanova carska titula u odima savrem enika” (Dusan's Imperial Title in the Eyes of Contemporaries), Zborrtik u (ast ies le stogodiin jice Zakonika cata DuSana, V o l. I, Belgrade, 1951, p. 106.

53

“While the Serbs were laying waste the towns of Macedonia and Albania, the Bulgars were fighting, side by side with the Wallachians and the Cumani, along the whole of the line from Plovdiv to the Black Sea.” 32 When the Serbian state began to emerge in the ninth century, during the period when Bul­garia was at the height of its power, the Serbs were assisted by the Byzantines, who saw in them their natural allies against Bulgaria. “As a result of their successful halting of the Bulgarian advance during the ninth and tenth centuries, the Serbs became the most powerful of all these mountain peoples, and the Byzantines wished to have them as allies, since every enhancement of Serbia’s power at that time was extremely welcome to them.” 33

Furthermore, the growth of the Serbian state constituted a threat to Bulgaria on account of the fact that, by virtue of its origins, its line of development and its entire internal structure, the Serbian state was Slavic and therefore attracted the other Slavic tribes to itself more powerfully than did either Bulgaria or the Greek state. We have already seen how, immediately after the collapse of Samuil’s state, these peoples began to orient themselves toward Serbia.

Another characteristic feature of this period is the absence, despite their common desire for expansion toward Macedonia, of the hatred which, as we have seen, existed from the time of Presijam to the death of Simeon. Nemanja was cooperating with the Bulgars when he offered Frederick Barbarossa his alliance against Byzantium: it was in conjunction with them that he began his attacks on the Byzantine lands. Stevan PrvovenCani assisted Dobromir Strez. During the reign of Asen II, one of the most likable and powerful of the Bul­garian rulers during the Second Empire, King Vladislav married the Emperor’s daughter. We have already mentioned the Emperor’s regard for St. Sava and the deep respect which the saint enjoyed in Bulgaria. Milutin himself, one of the most outstanding Serbian rulers, married Ann, daughter of the Bul­garian Emperor Djordje Tarterije. Milutin’s son Stevan, who later became king, married the daughter of the Bulgarian Emperor Smilats: Emperor DuSan was the issue of this mar-

** Constantin Jos. JireCek, Geschichte der Bulgaren, Prague, 1876, p. 227.

33 Jireiek and Radonid, op. cit., V o l. I, p. 68.

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riuge. Milutin’s daughter Ann was married to Mihailo SiSman, while DuSan married the sister of the Bulgarian Emperor .fovan Aleksandar, who called himself “Emperor of the Bul­gu rs and Greeks.” A fter the battle on the Velbuzd (1330), the Bulgarian nobles, completely broken and, through the death of Mihailo SiSman, deprived of a leader, came before Stevan Dcdanski and said to him: “Behold, the Bulgarian Empire and the entire Bulgarian state— its cities, its lands, its glory and its wealth— today are in your hands and you shall give them to whom you wish, for it is given you by the Lord’s ownhand___ For, from henceforth, the Serbian kingdom and theBulgarian Empire shall be constituted as one and there shall be peace. We who sign this are at the disposal of your king­dom.” 34 Stevan refused to annex the Bulgarian state, and gave the Bulgarian throne to his sister Ann and her son. "Arise,” he said to his sister, “and go in glory with your son to the Imperial throne, to the Imperial city of glorious Tur- novo, where you were before.” 35

Nowhere do Serbian sources mention that the Neman] ici conquered the lands in the south from the Bulgars: they al­ways state explicitly that they took them from the Greeks. In the cities of the south, which were captured in stages, the population was Greek: nothing is said about its being Bul­garian or showing any leaning toward the Bulgarian state. St. Sava, who certainly was acquainted with the true state of affairs and who was not ill disposed toward the Bulgarian state, says that Nemanja annexed Zeta and DraSkovina, “both Pilots” and the region between Prizren and Skadar, and goes on: “ . . . and, of the Greek lands, Patkovo [the district around the modern Djakovica], Hvosno and Podrimlje, Kostrac, Sit- nica, Lab, Lipljan, DuboCica, Reke [the district around Aleksi- nac], U5ka [east of the DuboCica near Ni§ava and Vlasina], Zagrlata [the district around Djunis], LevCe and Belica [on the left bank of the Velika Morava].” 38 That St. Sava re­

34 Lazar M irkovid (tr.), 2 ivo/i kraljeva i arhiepiskopa srpskih odarhiepiskopa Danila (Archbishop Danilo 's Lives of the Serbian Kingsand Archbishops), Belgrade, p. 147.

M Ibid.34 St. Sava, “Zivot Stevana N em anje” (Life of Stevan Nem anja),

in M. Basid, Stare srpske biografije (O ld Serbian Biographies),pp. 3— 4.

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garded all these regions as ethnically Serbian may be seen from his remark that Nemanja, “by his wisdom and labors, acquired everything that had been wrested by force from his patrimony, and that had belonged to him from the Serbian lands.” 37

Stevan Prvovenfcani, Nemanja’s son and successor, says that Nemanja “gathered together the lost lands of his mother­land.” 38 In the Hilandar charter of 1198— 99, it is stated that “of the Greek lands” he conquered the regions mentioned by St. Sava.36 In another Hilandar charter, written in 1200—02, Stevan PrvovenCani states that Nemanja “ recovered his lost patrimony, and took, from the coastal lands, Zeta with its cities; from the Albanians, Pilot; from the Greek lands, Lab together with Lipljan, DuboSica, Reke, Zagrlata, LevCe, Lepe- nica and Belica. With God’s help and by his own labors did he acquire all this.” 40

Stevan Nemanja, who, even before he rose above his brothel's, ruled the areas on the Toplica, Ibar and Resava rivers and the district of Duboiica, had to know who in­habited the regions bordering on his own territories. A ll these regions were under Byzantium: this is why they are described as “ the Greek lands.” A ll Nemanja’s efforts were directed toward the object of annexing as much as possible of these lands. A t one time, the Emperor Manuel Comnenus’ favorite, later his prisoner and enemy, Nemanja, a gifted and prudent ruler, always saw in Byzantium his chief enemy and the main obstacle in the way of extending the frontiers of his state. In order to frustrate Byzantine policy to the maxi­mum extent, he concluded as many alliances as he was able. A fter the death of Manuel Comnenus, Nemanja, in alliance with the Magyars, penetrated as far as Sofia. When the Magyars abandoned the war, Nemanja continued his ag­grandizement alone. “When,” says Stevan PrvovenCani, “ the Hungarian king returned to his own state, the Saint, leaving him, departed with his forces to the fortress of Pem ik and

47 Ibid., p. 4.38 Stevan Prvovendani, “Zivot Stevana N em an je” (Life of Stevan

Nem anja), in Ba§ic, op. cit., p. 31.*• Lazar M irkovit, Spisi svetoga Save i Stevana Prvovenianoga

(W ritings of St. Sava and Stevan Prvovencani), p. 25.40 Ibid., pp. 161— 62.

56

I

destroyed and sacked it with his forces; also the fortress of Stob, the fortress of Zemun and the fortress of Velbuzd [all of which are now districts in western Bulgaria], the city of Skoplje, the fortress of Le§ki, the fortress of Gradac, the town of Prizren, the glorious town of NiS, the fortress of Svrljig, the fortress of Ravni and the fortress of Kozli. These fortresses were destroyed and razed to their foundations, for not one stone was left on another that was not destroyed. And even today they have still not been rebuilt. Their land, their wealth and their glory he added to the wealth and glory of his motherland and the glory of the nobles and his people... . To the territory of his motherland, he added the entire region of Ni§, Lipljan, the Morava, so-called Vranje, the region of Prizren and both Pilots in their entirety, together with their boundaries.” 41

These conquests were completed by Nemanja in the period from 1183 to 1189: on July 27, 1189, together with his brother Stracimir, he gave Frederick Barbarossa a ceremonious wel­come in Nis and entertained him lavishly. Together with Bar­barossa and the Bulgars, he pressed with his troops as far as Trajan’s Gate (Trajanova Kapija). Frederick’s refusal to con­clude an alliance with Nemanja and the Bulgars against By­zantium did not prevent Nemanja from continuing his con­quests alone. When Barbarossa decided, a little later, to agree to such an alliance, his envoy, Duke Berthold, failed to find Nemanja at Trajan’s Gate, and their negotiations were con­ducted through the agency of messengers. “A t that moment,” says Jirecek, Nemanja “was very busy with large-scale military operations on the territory of the old Bulgarian state.” 42

The defeat on the Morava in 1190 put an end to Nemanja’s conquests. By the ensuing peace terms, he lost the greater part of the lands he had taken. He even failed to retain Prizren, and was obliged to surrender the “ Serbian conquests south of the Toplica and Morava, while in the Morava valley the Serbs abandoned the important town of NiS; however, they consolidated their positions at certain other points, as,

41 In Basit, op. cit., p. 41; cf. JireCek and Radonid, op. cit., V o l. I„ p. 157, and C orov ii, op. cit., p. 99.

4* Jiredek and Radonii, op. cit., V ol. I, pp. 156— 57.4* Corovit, op. cit., p. 102.

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for example, in the immediate vicinity of Ravni, while the Serbian frontier was advanced in the northeast and in Zagr- lata near Djunis.” 48 “The Serbs,” says JireCek, “ retained a considerable part of Byzantine territory. In the east, there remained in Serbian hands the region between the Rudnik Mountains and the junction of the Morava with the valleys of the Lepenica [the district around Kragujevac], Belica and LevaC; the region of Zagrlata between the two Moravas where they join; finally, the region of DuboCica south of Nis. In the south, there fe ll to the Serbs the whole of Kosovo Polje, together with the confluence of the Sitnica and Lab and the village of Lipljan. In the basin of the Beli Drin, they retained the district of Hvosno around Pec and Djakovica, which be­longed to the diocese of Prizren, and, in northern Albania, the districts of Upper and Lower Pilot, on the road from Prizren to Skadar. One permanent acquisition was the littoral of Duklja, that is, Zeta together with the towns of Skadar, Bar and Kotor. A fter these concessions, Belgrade, Ravno, NiS, Skoplje, Prizren, Kroja and LjeS became the frontier towns of the Byzantine state.” 44

Neither Stevan PrvovenCani (1196— 1227/28), nor kings Radoslav (1228— 34) and Vladislav (1234— 43) extended the frontiers of Nemanja’s state. Only around Ni§, the great im­portance of which was well understood by Nemanja, did con­flicts take place with the Bulgars and the Magyars. Nemanja’s ambition “to drive the Greeks out of the northern part of the Balkan Pennisula as he had driven them out of the southern littoral of Dalmatia and Zeta” 45 did not prove entirely practicable, but his achievement, such as it was, proved to be well-founded: from the areas which he annexed, further con­quests could easily be carried out. “Apart from the natural routes,” says Jovan Cvijic, “which lead from the crossroads at Raska, it was vitally necessary for Ra§ka and Zeta, which were united in the twelfth century, to occupy the Morava valley in the neighborhood of Nig, Kosovo and Metohija. Another territorial ambition of the strengthened Serbian state was to descend from the mountainous regions of the Peninsula and occupy the valley of the Vardar, above all Skoplje and

44 JireCek and Radonid, op. cit., Vol. I, p. 157; cf. V . Corovid in Narodna enciklopedija SHS, Vol. Ill, p. 42.

44 Corovid, Istorija Jugoslavije, p. 100.

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both Pologs [Tetovo]. This she succeeded in doing during the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. Then she conquered A l­bania south of the Ma6a. A t the time of her greatest ex­pansion, in the fourteenth century, she even took Epirus, Thessaly and the western part of Thrace.” 4# As the result of all these successes, the name of the Serbs as a people spread over an ever increasing area. “With Nemanja and the state of the Nemanjici,” says Corovic, “ the Serbian name crossed the Morava and the Vardar.” 47 “The name ‘Serb,’ ” says JireCek, “gradually became the general appellation for the neighboring tribes, in the same way as, in the northern Slavic lands, the name of the Czechs proper spread to the Czech tribes enumerated in the charter of the Prague bishopric, or the name of the Poljani near Gdansk to all the Polish tribes.” 48

During the reign of Stevan PrvovenCani, the Bulgars once more entered Macedonia and took it from the Byzantines. The Emperor Kaloyan, who was killed at the siege of Salonica, "took possession of the Byzantine west from the mountains near Sofia to the frontiers of Thessaly, together with the towns of Prizren, Skoplje, Ohrid and Ber.” 48 Here too, the Bulgars became the neighbors of the Serbs: as a result of the ensuing situation, the Serbs were obliged to abandon N il in 1203, only to recover it in the reign of the Emperor Borilo. In 1204, when the Latins took Byzantium, parts of Macedonia fell into the hands of Latin principalities. For Serbia, these were grievous times. Referring to this period, Prvovenfani writes: “And they [the enemies of PrvovenCani] conceived the high ambition of destroying the Saint’s [Nemanja’s] patrimony and making me extremely angry, and, i f possible, of driving me out of my state.” 50

It was during this period that Dobromir Strez, with the assistance, first of the Greeks of Epirus, later of Stevan Prvo- veniani, formed his principality around the town of Prosek. Although he was related by ties of kinship, the Bulgarian

46 Jovan Cvijid, Balkansko poluostrvo I ju inoslovenske zemlje (The Balkan Peninsula and the South S lav Lands), p. 134.

47 Corovid, lstorija Jugoslavije, p. 102.48 Jiredek and Radonid, op. cit., V ol. I, p. 68.4,1 Ibid., p. 164.*® In BaSid, op. cit., p. 162.

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court considered him as an apostate, and requested Prvoven- dani to extradite him. Teodosije remarks that this request was complied with “since they feared that he would make him­self Emperor and kill them.” 51 Teodor Andjel, despot of Epirus, drove the Bulgars out of Macedonia. In 1232, the frontier between Epirus and Serbia ran, in the north, from Arban, Debar and Skoplje.52 Seven years later, in a battle near the Klokotnica, the Bulgarian Emperor Asen II defeated Teodor Andjel and became master of Macedonia. The in­fluence of Epirus in Serbia, to which King Radoslav had been particularly exposed, was replaced by that of Bulgaria, where the crown now passed to Asen I I ’s son-in-law, who, as we have seen, was amicably disposed toward the Serbs.

In the second part of his reign, King Uro§ (1243— 76), after he had checked the attacks of the Bulgars, who in 1253 reached Bijelo Polje and in 1254 occupied the Rhodope Moun­tains and eastern Macedonia up to the Vardar, advanced, together with the Epirans and Latins, penetrated as far as Skoplje, Prilep and KiCevo: in the following year, however, he was obliged to abandon all these towns, and the Niceans once more occupied Skoplje. During the reign of K ing Dragu- tin (1276— 82 for this part of the state), the Serbo-Byzantine frontier ran along the Sar-planina above Prizren and Lip- ljan.5* With the accession of King Milutin (1282— 1321), there began an irresistible advance of the Serbs toward the south. “ In those days,” says the well-informed Archbishop Danilo, “ the Serbian land found itself greatly hemmed in and re­duced, for the Greek empire reached to the place known as Lipljan, and its power was growing, so that it wanted to take the entireregion of this Christian state, and even to have it as an obedient servant.” 54

Milutin’s entire energies were directed toward rectifying this situation. His conquests were mainly achieved at the expense of Byzantium, which had captured the whole of Macedonia from the successors of Asen II and thus once more become the master of this region. Summing up Milutin’s suc­

51 Teodosije, “2ivot svetoga Save” (Life of Saint Sava), in Basit, op. cit., p. 62.

M Jire&ek and Radonit, op. cit., V o l . ] , p. 171.“ Ibid., p. 188.54 M irk ov ii (tr.), op. cit., p. 81.

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cesses, Danilo, who enjoyed the king’s confidence, describes how, “ rising with his forces,” Milutin “entered the neighbor­ing territories of the Greek empire; namely, first he took both Pologs, together with their cities and lands, the glorious city of Skoplje, then Ovie Polje, Zletovo and Pijanac. A ll these lands he took soon after his accession, and added them to the territory of his motherland.” 55 This was in 1282, and the following year, immediately after Christmas, he penetrated into eastern Macedonia and captured the whole of the terri­tory as far as Ser and Kavala. Danilo states that Milutin “went with his forces into the interior of the Greek lands, to Mount Athos, and, having conquered all these lands of that empire, the regions of Struma and Ser, Krstopolj and other neighboring districts, and having seized their property and wealth, returned by God’s w ill to his motherland, full of every good intention.” 66

Milutin escaped the fate of his predecessors, for he suc­ceeded in retaining his conquests. “Without peace terms’ being concluded,” says JireCek, “ the frontier line ran north of the Byzantine fortresses of Strumica, Prosek, Prilep, Ohrid and Kroja.” 57 Corovid also states that Milutin retained hold of all his newly-won territories, and says: “By means of these conquests, he oriented Serbia, for many years to come, to the south, down the valley of the Vardar, toward the Aegean. Until his reign, Serbia had gravitated mainly toward the Adriatic; it was in this direction that all the main commercial routes and all other communications had led to Dubrovnik, Kotor, Bar and Skadar. Serbian interests were now con­siderably extended.” 58 Milutin made Skoplje his capital.

A fter the capture of Durazzo, peace terms were concluded in 1299 between Milutin and Byzantium: Milutin retained all his conquests, and, in order to enhance his personal prestige, married the young Simonida.

With the Bulgars, who did not appear on the scene while he was conquering Macedonia, Milutin was on good terms. During the reign of his successor, Stevan DeSanski (1321— 31), the Bulgars, this time in alliance with Byzantium, attempted

55 Ibid., p. 82.«* Ibid., p. 85.•’ Jiredek and Radonic, op. cit., Vol. I, p. 191.“ Corovid, Istorija Jugosiavije, p. 128.

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once more to put themselves on the map of Macedonia. In1329, DeCanski besieged Ohrid, but a Greek attack obliged him to withdraw. From Danilo we learn that, even before the battle on the VelbuSd, Dedanski was pestered by the Bul­gars: “He was,” says Danilo, “given some cause for anxiety by the Bulgarian Emperor Mihailo.” 59 We also learn that De- Canski attempted to avoid war with the Bulgars. When these attempts met with failure— although he sincerely desired peace— he began seriously to prepare for war: on July 28,1330, one hundred years after the battle on the Klokotnica, there took place the battle on the Velbuid, where “ the Bul­gars met with a great collapse, and so the Serbian forces were victorious.” 90

There was no need to fight the Greeks: when the Emperor Andronicus learned of the defeat of the Bulgars, he attacked Bulgaria himself in order to gain something from a rival in the throes of chaos. “Hearing of this fall [i. e., defeat] of their sovereign,” says Danilo, “ they [i. e., the Bulgarian nobles], since in that land there was disturbance and great discontent, rose up in civil strige and seized one another’s wealth; more­over, they not only did this to one another, but also seized the wealth and lands of their Emperor.” 61 From Byzantium, DeCanski took the cities of Veles, Prosek, Stip and Dobrun. Danilo, who was closely connected with the ruling dynasty, exaggerates somewhat when he says that “ even in the first years of his reign” DeCanski “captured from the Greek lands many cities, together with their entire territories, whose many names it is impossible for us to set out in detail in this ac­count.” ,2

The victory of the Serbs on the Velbuzd was complete. Its consequences were of the greatest historical importance for both Serbs and Bulgars: the question who should control the valley of the Vardar and Macedonia was finally decided in favor of Serbia. Repercussions on the orientation of the Slavic population of Macedonia were inevitable. Stanoje Sta- nojevic rightly pointed out that “when, after the death of DuSan, discord broke out in his state and the state was con-

5* M irkovid (tr.), op. cit., p. 131.«° Ibid., p. 139.

Ibid., p. 146.“ Ibid., p. 149j cf. Corovid, Istorija Jugosiavije, p. 146.

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sequently weakened and disintegrated,” Macedonia “was re­garded as a part of the Serbian state.” This victory,” says Corovic, “secured Macedonia for Serbia, gave her the leading position in the Balkans and strengthened Serbian influence in Bulgaria.” *4

Dusan, who reigned as king from 1331 to 1346 and then as emperor to his death on December 20, 1355, extended ear­lier Serbian conquests in the south. When he ascended the throne, the frontier between Serbia and Byzantium passed through the cities of Ser, Melnik, Strumica, Prilep, Ohrid, Kroja, Berat and Valona. During his reign, these frontiers were suddenly advanced: by 1334, he had taken Ohrid, Struga and several more towns in the south. In the summer of this year, he was in the vicinity of Salonica, an it was here that, on August 26, he concluded peace terms with Byzantium. According to these terms, he retained Strumica, Prilep (where he built himself a palace), Ohrid, Kostur, Hlerin, Zeljezanac, Voden and Cermen. “A ll this,” says Danilo, “he took in three years of his reign, for God had made him so glorious.” 65 In 1342, Dusan besieged Voden, but was thrown back. Finally, however, he took both Voden and Melnik, which was sur­rendered to him by Duke Hrelja. In the following year, DuSan laid siege to Ser. On Hrelja’s death, DuSan also took posses­sion of his territories. In the fall of 1345, the Serbs occupied Kostur, Drama and Orfano, together with its marine salt mines. In 1348, DuSan conquered Epirus, Acarnania, Etolia and Thessaly. “ Consequently,” says Jovan Radonic, “DuSan’s territories stretched from the Danube to the Gulf of Corinth and from the Adriatic to the Aegean. Apart from Thrace, Byzantium retained only the city of Byzantium and Salonica, which served as a gateway to the Aegean.” 6®

The attempt made by Byzantium in 1350, when DuSan was in Bosnia, to recover these lost territories met with failure despite the initial successes scored by Kantakuzen: on his

•3 A s quoted in Corovid, lstorija Jugoslavije, p. 145.M V . Corovid, “Stevan Decanski,” Narodna enciklopedija SHS,

V ol. I, p. 585.“ M irkovid (tr.), op. cit., p. 170.M Jovan Radonid, “M edjunarodni polozaj Srbije u X IV veku”

(Serbia’s International Position in the Fourteenth Century), Z bornik u dost Seste stogodiin jice Zakonika cara DuSana, Vol. I, Belgrade, 1951, p. 20.

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return in the following year, Dugan won back all the areas he had temporarily lost, and retained hold of them up to his death.

III.

Both Bulgars and Serbs, in their desire for control of the Morava-Vardar valley, gradually wrested from Byzantium the area of the Macedonian Slavs. It is not known today whether this desire was the principal motive of Presijam’s attack upon Vlastimir: from this time on until the battle on the Bregalnica 1885 it was always the Bulgars who began these attacks, only to be defeated. In 1885, however, it was the Serbs who opened the war and were subsequently defeat­ed. In all the other wars with the Bulgars, with the exception of the attack made by the Emperor Simeon, the Serbs emerg­ed victorious. Under the Nemanjici, the Serbs, consistently pursuing the goal set them by Stevan Nemanja, regarded By­zantium, not Bulgaria, as their main enemy. “In the foreign policy of the Nemanjici,” says Georgije Ostrogorski, “ there is no more important problem than the relations with, and the struggle against, Byzantium. The struggle for independ­ence which was concluded under Nemanja, the struggle for Macedonia, the heart of the Balkans under Milutin, and the struggle for hegemony in the Balkans under DuSan— these are the chief stages in the conflict between Serbia and Byzantium and also in the growth of the Serbian state.” 67

In the Serbian efforts to obtain control of Macedonia, the Bulgars were a factor of secondary importance: Serbian sources without exception show that the Serbs regarded the Bulgarian domination of Macedonia as something that could not last or have any particular importance for them. We have already mentioned, as a circumstance of great significance, that Asen II was not ill disposed toward the Serbs, even though he must have known of Nemanja’s pledge that he entrusted to his successors. It is possible that the Serbs con­sidered the Bulgarian efforts of obtain mastery over Mace­donia as being simply attacks upon an alien territory, rather

•7 Georgije Ostrogorski, “DuSan i n jegova vlastela u borbi sa Vizantijora” (Dusan and his Nobles in the Struggle with Byzantium), ibid., p. 79.

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than as attempt to complete their national state. Teodosije says that the Bulgarian Emperor Kaloyan “arose and destroy­ed many Greek cities over the whole of Thrace and Mace­donia, for at that time the city of Byzantium was held by the Fruzi [the Latins], who did not scruple to destroy the other cities since they were not their own, while he, finding them empty and helpless, destroyed them, and everything was from God.” 68

One important question is: how did the Slavic population look upon all these numerous changes among their political masters, and, in particular, what was their attitude toward the Bulgarian and Serbian states? We have no sources at our disposal on which to base a clear answer to this question, but one thing is certain: during the entire period in which the Serbian state exercised control over this region, there were no rebellions or expressions of discontant against the Serbian regime on the part of the Slavic population. Instead, the ties between the local population on the one hand and the new regimes and its successors on the other began to be streg- thened: a new life and pride was awakening in the conscious­ness of the Macedonian Slavs, who felt that they were enter­ing upon a prolonged period of peaceful and ordered exist­ence.

While scarcely anything has persisted in the consciousness of the Slavic masses of Macedonia of the conquests of the Bulgars and their state, which for centuries enjoyed great power, their memories of the Serbian regime have remained permanently alive: in the minds of the people, the idea of the Serbian state was a living thing, and the people, becom­ing inseparably bound up with Serbian history, accepted and retained this idea as its own despite all the sufferings to which it was exposed. As in the central regions of Serbia, so here, the establishment of a national way of life and of a settled state was associated with the Nemanjici. The Slav Orthodox tradition, which had grown out of the efforts and achievements of SS. Clement and Naum, and the devotion to the work of the first generations of South Slav anchorites, came once more to life in the labors of SS. Simeon and Sava. The victories of Nemanja and of the idea of the Serbian state

•* In BaSil, op. cit., p. 161.

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which he created acquired a peculiar character and warmth which was missing from the Bulgarian regime so far as the Macedonian Slavs were concerned. Compared with the dynasty of the Nemanji6i, the Bulgarian rulers were rather knights and warriors than the representatives of a state which, from the very beginning, the elements of Church and state were interwoven in a harmonious and mutually fruitful relation­ship: throughout the whole of this period, the Church in Bul­garia failed to acquire the moral and spiritual authority over the secular rulers which she acquired in Serbia. Similarly, in Bulgaria the Church failed to imbue the conception of the state with that living consciousness of the historical mission of Christianity which she inculcated in Serbia.

From the very beginning, the movement inspired by St. Sava accepted the spiritual heritage of SS. Clement and Naum and supplemented it with the achievements of numer­ous Serbian saints, who, side by side with kings, princes and bishops, included gardeners and goldsmiths. A t this stage in its development, Bulgarian Orthodoxy lacked this broadly popular character and this spiritual elan and purity. Despite all its strength and tenacity, Bulgarian Orthodoxy never suc­ceeded in becoming a national faith in the same way as Serbian Orthodoxy. “Our Orthodoxy, the ‘Serbian faith,’ ” says Corovid, “became the embodiment of our state tradition, while our national psyche endowed the mythologized Christian faith with certain elements of genuine belief.” 69 It was this that bound the Macedonian Slavs to the fate of the Serbian state. Neither the First Bulgarian Empire nor Samuil’s state nor the Second Bulgarian Empire resembled the medieval Serbian state on this plane, for they all failed to reconcile the ideologically Christian element with the secular in their state organization. The very fact that the founder of the medieval Serbian state became a monk and a saint and that his son was, not only the creator of an independent Serbian Church, but also, in the fullest sense of the word, the founder of the Serbian conception of the state and a teacher and educator of the Serbian lands, obliged Nemanja’s successors to display a degree of self-sacrifice and devotion to their task that was exceptional for their time: the cult of saintliness that so com-

" C orovii, Istorija Jugoslavije, p. 313.

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pletely permeated the life and career of the physical and spiritual father of the medieval Serbian state attracted the later Nemanjidi also. In the second Hilandar charter, Stevan Prvovencani states that Nemanja commanded him to care for the churches and monasteries: “He commanded me,” he says, “ to care for the churches and the monks serving in them, and not to incur the wrath of the Lord in any good work.” 70

Of the ten rulers of this dynasty, five took monastic orders toward the end of their lives. Danilo II attests that King Dragutin led a monastic life before he took a monk’s orders. “And when, after his death, they wanted to wash him, they found him girded with a narrow belt of straw about his naked body and clad in a frock of hard flax; the belt of straw had penetrated deep into his body, and when they tried to remove it, they were unable to do so.” 71 In addition to Queen Jelena, seven members of this dynasty were proclaimed saints. On the evidence of Patriarch Pajsije, it is known that the bones of the Emperor DuSan, who was not canonized by the Church, were removed by the people from his grave as a relic. The Bulgars had nothing like this: they satisfied their thirst for saintly relics by gathering in Turnovo the remains of various saints of whom the greater number had never lived in Bul­garia. In this connection, their attempt to retain the relics of Saint Sava at Turnovo is typical. Another interesting circumstance is the fact that the remains of King Milutin, who brought Macedonia under the sway of Serbia, are even today to be found in Sofia.

It is this aspect of the matter, difficult to express in a few words, that displays the lively feeling and vivid consciousness of that high calling, that orientation toward the eternal values, which was so prominent in the rulers of the Neman- jid dynasty: in the minds of the ordinary people of the time, for whom religious considerations were of greater importance than national, the spiritual and secular leaders of Serbia, for all their human weaknesses, left an ineradicable impression of themselves and their work. In the churches and monas­teries which they and their nobles either built or restored, was set forth, as in a modern film, the whole of biblical and ecclesiastical history in a luxurious wealth of frescoes. The

70 Mirkovid, Splsi svetoga Save i Stevana PrvovenCanoga, p. 165.71 M irkovid (tr.), op. cit., p. 41.

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people learned from them, and by studying them, were trans­ported to the realm of the spiritual. When, alongside frescoes of the saints, others made their appearance depicting the Serbian rulers, their status in the eyes of the people grew even higher: to be the subjects of such rulers and the state created by them inspired a pride which today it is difficult to conceive in its entirety. Even at that early date, a national pride was growing, a feeling of warm contentment at being a Serb, a child of St. Sava. When later the wheel of fortune was reversed and the Serbs fell victims to the fickleness of fate, noble and serf (sebar) defended, side by side, not only their country’s frontiers, but also its spiritual and moral values. It was these very ties that inspired the heroic and self-sacrificing defense of the last remnants of the Serbian state: generation after generation of Serbs was mown down in the battle for its possession, soaking every inch of Serbian soil with its blood.

It was the national or popular character of the work of St. Sava and the rapid rise of the state of the Nemanji6i that drew the Macedonian Slavs close to the Serbian state and Church: they became Serbian, since this was their best path into the future. “The significance of the Church of St. Sava,” says Cviji6, “ and its influence upon the people can hardly be described as Byzantine.” 72 It was, indeed, specifically Serbian: stimulated by a powerful creative impulse, Serbian Orthodoxy bound the Serbian tribes together and assimilated them to the Slavic tribes of Macedonia. The Slavic lands in the Balkans were once again permeated with a new creative spirit and a consciousness of mutual kinship.—Not that there had, even previously, been any rivalry or spirit of litigation between the various Churches and tribes: what wars there were had been waged by dynasties, and even while they were in pro­gress the people do not appear to have been hostile among themselves. It was as though the Slavs of this region were more concerned about being under the Greeks than whether they were under Serbs or Bulgars. Within the limits of the Serbian state, the mingling of Slavic tribes proceeded more easily and more rapidly: more easily, as a result of the spiri­tual and moral atmosphere that reigned there, and more-

58 Cviji6, op. cit., p. 160.

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rapidly, because of the conviction of the masses that the Serbian state would prove more durable. Of importance for the orientation of the Slavic masses was also the fact that the Serbian rulers were their kinsmen, that they had sprung from the people: the state conception that they represented was not an alien one, as was the case with the Bulgars.

The brilliant career achieved by the Serbian state and the awe-inspiring power and rapid rise of its rulers also played their part. To bring Byzantium to her knees, as Milutin had done, or to toy with her, as DuSan did, must have impressed all the Slavic tribes in the Balkans, for they had been the victims of that very power which was disappearing once and for all before their eyes. This is all the more true in view of the fact that the Serbian conquests were quite different in character from the Bulgarian: the Nemanji6i took pains to establish their conquests on a basis of national cultures and thus to make them lasting, so to speak, from within, to leave their own impress on everything they did and to crown their reigns with great deeds. The conquests of the Bulgars, which were numerous, powerful and, for Byzantium, extremely dan­gerous, were more like the invasions of the Goths, Huns and Avars: after the armed blow had descended, the administra­tion settled itself in and ruled the conquered territories without taking a thought for the future. This is partly to be explained by the fact that the Bulgarian dynasties were alien and that the ruling stratum and the masses of the population had not yet been completely assimilated. With the Bulgars, there was not that universal inner compactness and fateful link between state and people as there was with the Serbs.

As a result of a combination of circumstances and also of its faith in its Christian mission, the Serbian state, before it began to disintegrate, felt itself called to resist the onslaught of Islam. As early as Milutin’s reign, the Serbs were engaged in tho struggle with the Turks, and the Emperor DuSan realized, with great clarity and foresight, that his chief his­torical task was to drive the Turks out of Europe: hence his efforts to organize a crusade under his leadership. It is also noteworthy that it was the Serbs, and not the Bulgars, who went out to the Maritsa to wait for the Turks and prevent them from penetrating farther west. A fter the heavy defeat suffered by the Serbs on the Maritsa, it is recorded that the people were seized by a feeling “as heavy as lead” of helpless­

69

ness and isolation: “The land was left empty and bereft of all goods—people, cattle and other fruits. And there was no prince, nor leader, nor teacher to save and rescue the poeple: all were filled with dread [of the Islamites], and the brave hearts of the knights were transformed into hearts weaker than women’s. A t that time, I think, the seventh generation of the Serbian rulers was completed.” 73 “The chief re­sistance,” says Cvijid, “offered the Turks as they followed the routes into the interior was that given by the Serbian people and state, which held the greater part of these routes. They opposed the Turks’ advance in three battles on sites whose natural and strategic positions are even today of great im­portance— in the valley of the Maritsa, west of Jedren (the battle of the Maritsa— Cernomen), in the valley of the Toplica (the battle od the Plofinik, west of Ni§), and on Kosovo Polje— in order to defend the Morava valley and the Dinaric is­lands.” 74

The Bulgarian state, which JireCek describes as “ the shadow of a state,” 75 fell without any heroic resistance. It did not even feel called upon to join the Serbs in the struggle against the Turks, by whom it too was threatened. In 1393, it passed out of existence almost unnoticed, leaving behind scar­cely any historical traces in the mind of the people.

IV.

Under the Nemanjici, the Serbianization of the Slavs in Macedonia was carried out, both on the spiritual and cultural and on the national and ethnic plane. The most characteristic feature of this process is that it was desired by both sides— by the local Slavic population, and by the new Serbian re­gime. Circumstances that we have already examined drew them toward one another: for this reason this movement may be described as a natural, organic process which sprang out of the very situation that had arisen at that time in that

73 Ljub. Stojanovic, Stari srpski zapisi i natpisi (O ld Serbian Re­cords and Inscriptions), Vol. Ill, p. 43, No. 4944.

74 Cviji<5, op. cit., p. 137.75 JireCek and Radonii, op. cit., Vol. I, p. 314.

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region. The population of Macedonia took over the Serbian spirit, the Serbian conception of the state, a considerable part of the Serbian ecclesiastical organization, and the whole of Serbian history. Apart from this, indeed, it has no other history: the cult of St. Sava and Kosovo and all the historical characters of the Serbian epos became, and remained, the common property of all the Serbian tribes. “Although,” says Dr. Alois Schmaus, “ the Serbian national epic found its fullest realization in the regions of the northwest, nevertheless a considerable part of its material was taken from Southern Serbia. And vice versa: many poems which originated elsewhere found their way to Southern Serbia, were sung here and orally inherited.” 78

Throughout Slavic Macedonia, widespread Serbian cultural and religious monuments bear witness that the country was a part of the Serbian lands: right up to the appearance of Bulgarian propaganda and the confusion brought by foreign travelers who journeyed round parts of the country, it was indeed called “the Serbian land.” A wealth of material from Southern Serbia has been collected and published by V. Dje- ric, in which, over the centuries, in varying circumstances and for various reasons, the Serbian name is mentioned or in which prominent individuals born in these parts are called Serbs: from 1350 to the beginning of the seventeenth century, there are data to the effect that Ohrid, Bitolj and Kratovo—not to mention Skoplje—were on Serbian terri­tory.77 Hadji Kalfa, the Turkish geographer, records that Kostur was also in the Serbian lands and that Serbs, as well as Wallachians, lived there. In 1704, Jerotej RaCanin, on his way to Jerusalem, noted that the Serbian tradition was very lively among the peasants of OvCe Polje. Dr. Joseph Muller, who for a long time was a medical officer in the Turkish army, found, in the middle of the nineteenth century, Serbs around Bitolj, in Debar and Struga, on the eastern shore of Lake Ohrid, and in the valleys of the Resan and Prespa.78

76 A lois Sdimaus, „Dichtung," Mazedonien: Leben und Gestalt einer Landschalt, Berlin, 1940, p. 106.

77 V . Djerid, Ethnographie des Slaves de Macedoine, Paris, 1918, pp. 18— 21.

78 Joseph Muller, Albanien, Rumelien und die osterreichisch- montenegrinische Grenze . . . , Prague, 1844, p. 21.

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Dr. Karl Oestreich found fifteen Serbian families in Ohrid.7® Although he had accepted the then widely held thesis that the Slavic population of Macedonian was Bulgarian, Franz Bra- daSka nevertheless stated: “Serbs are living in isolated colonies among Bulgars and Shiptars around Prespa and Ohrid, in Albania west of the city of Berat, then in Novo Selo, Rosko- vica and Drenovica, finally in Naji6evo on the Rian river and on the mouth of this river.” 80 Anton Tuma von Wald- kampf, an Austro-Hungarian field marshal, found Serbian Hottlemens in the region of Bitolj. “ In Macedonia,” he says, "Serbs are living, partly in the great plain of Bitolj, partly in the Vardar plain and are particularly compact in the valley of Tetovo.” 81 They sporadically appear in the district of Salo­nica, where they live side by side with other nationalities.82

In opposition to all this evidence, Jordan Ivanov, the chief Bulgarian authority on the Bulgarian character of Macedonia, was able to quote only a few cases in which the name “Bul­garian” was mentioned in Southern Serbia before the ex­arch is ts began their work. The earliest of these dates from 1474: the Consilium Rogatorum of Dubrovnik decided to grant alms to the extent of twenty perpers to the Bulgarian monastery of St. Joachim Osogovski, whose abbot, Gervasije, Hinted at an audience in Moscow in 1586 that he came “from the Bulgarian lands.” In 1686, the Patriarch Arsenije III Crnojevifi visited this monastery: at the end of a Gospel at Pc6, he wrote a note stating that he had been at the monastery of Osogovo, where there was “some disorganization in Church matters.” On two occasions in the year 1704, Veljko Popovic of Kratovo says that he was bom “in the Bulgarian lands, in the place known as Kratovo,” while in 1753 the nun Ana says that she “was born in Kratovo, in Bulgaria.” In 1818, a certain NeSo Markovic, a merchant from Kratovo, printed in Buda­pest a calendar “ for the convenience of the Bulgarian people.” In 1619, we find mention, in an inscription in a church at Vodensk, of “Angelaki, grand secretary of Justiniana I and all

’* Karl Oestreicfa, .M akedonien," Geographische Zeilschri/f, 1904, Vol. I, p. 252.

*® Franz BradaSka, .D ie Slaven in der Tiirkei,* Mitteilungen aus Junius Peters' geographischer Anstalt, V o l. X V , 1869, p. 458.

*' Anton Tuma von W aldkam pf, Griechenland, Makedonien und Sildn/banlen, Leipzig, 1897, pp. 214— 15.

" Ibid., pp. 214— 15.

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Bulgaria.” In the legend entitled “Slovo Kirila Filosofa kako uvjeri Bugare” (The Tale of how Cyril the Philosopher Con­verted the Bulgars), it is stated that the city of Ravanj is in Bregalnica and that Cyril was brought there by Bulgars. In a manuscript at the monastery of Zograf, it is stated that Pirot is situated in “ the Bulgarian lands.” The same is said of the whole of Pelagonia.83

Kratovo, as we shall see, was a Serbian center; as for the other cases quoted, no refutation of them is called for in view of their paucity in comparison with those quoted on the other side. Of the Serbian character of cultural monuments, there can be no question. “Even now,” wrote Tomaschek, “ in Macedonia, memories of Dugan’s and Marko’s time are fresher than those of the old Bulgarian period.” 84 Dr. Leonard Schultze-Jena made another mistake in asserting that in Macedonia the Bulgars “ left behind them monuments in stone and the spirit.” 83 They left no such monuments: if they had, it would be difficult to explain their efforts, which were not inconsiderable, to Bulgarize King VukaSin, his son Marko and the brothers Dejanovic.86 N. P. Kondakov, who in the main accepted the Bulgarian thesis on the national character of the Macedonian population, did not fail to notice the importance of Serbian historical monuments in Macedonia: he points out that most of the churches and monasteries in Southern Serbia date from the time of Dugan.87 He notes that the fresco of King Marko in Markov Monastery, near Skoplje, showing him as the founder of this monastery, was destroyed “by Bul­garian patriotism.. . as a monument of Serbian rule in these places.” 88

Not only in this masser was the local population assimilat­ed to the newcomers from RaSka: under the Nemanji6i, there

88 Jordan Ivanov, BCilgarski starini iz Makedonija (Bulgarian Antiquities from M acedonia), 2nd ed., Sofia, 1932, pp. 147— 79, 283, 488 and 502.

84 A s quoted in H. W endel, Makedonien und der Frieden, M unidi, 1919, p . 101.

85 Leonard Schultze-Jena, Makedonien: Landschaits- und Kullur- bilder, Jena, 1927, p. 37.

88 D. Rizoff, Die Bulgaren in ihren historischen, ethnographischen und poiitischen Grenzen, Berlin, 1917, p. 21.

87 N . P. Kondakov, Makedoniya: Arkheologicheskoe puteshestvie, (M acedonia: A n Archeological Journey), St. Petersburg, 1909, p. 62.

88 Ibid., p. 184.

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were transfers of population from the northern regions to the south. Unfortunately, we know little of the scale of this move­ment, but it is certain that it took place. “In the fourteenth century, the Serbian army was followed by a part of the Serbian population, not only into southern Macedonia, but even into Epirus and Thessaly, just as later, during the with­drawal northward, there took place a considerable movement toward the Danube and across it.” 89 Cvijic discovered that under the Nemanjici colonization was carried out by Serbs at the confluence of the P6inja and Kriva Reka. For this reason he asserts that all the historical monuments of the population of this region date exclusively from the time of the Nemanjici.90 Elsewhere, Cvijic states that there were Serbian settlemens in Ber, around Salonica and in the region of Skoplje, “and perhaps there were others in other parts of Macedonia.” 91

As a result of the conquest of these lands by the Turks, the upper strata of the population withdrew northward, doubtless accompanied by some of the ordinary people. Thus began the first thinning out of the Serbian population of Macedonia: thereafter, the process went on for some centuries. Those who stayed behind tended to go over to Islam. A cha­racteristic feature of these migrations, which occurred at frequent intervals, is that they took place northward, rather than eastward. There is no evidence of any movement toward Bulgaria: on the contrary, ecclesiastics and writers came from Bulgaria into Serbia. According to Cvijic, people came from Ohrid, Bitolj, Prilep and Debar. In Lower Sumadija, there were stettlers from Veles, Bitolj and from Katranica and Gramatik near Olympus.92 On the other hand, Serbian tribes from Albania, retreating before the Albanians, increased the proportion of Serbs in Macedonia. “Those from Skadar,” says Cvijic, “ spread throughout Macedonia, Old Serbia and Sred- ska, in the basin of Tetovo, Pored and Bitolj, on the upper reaches of the P£inja, etc. Serbs from Albania, from the valley

Hi Corovii, Istorija Jugoslavije, p. 304.90 Jovan Cvijic, G rundlinien der Geographie und Geologie von

Mazedonien und Altserbien nebst Beobachtungen in Thrazien, Thes- saiien, Epirus und Nordalbanien, Part I, Gotha, 1908, p. 133.

91 Jovan Cvijic, Remarques sur Vethnographie de la Macedoine, Paris, 1907, p. 18.

92 C v ijii, Balkansko poluostrvo i ju inoslovenske zemlje, p. 218.

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of the Maca and the districts of Mokra, Cermenika, etc., settled mainly in western Macedonia (in the neighborhood of Debar, the MijaC region, Mavrovo, etc.). There are also some of them in Upper PSinja who come from Elbasan.” 83 During the migration under Patriarch Arsenije III Crnojevic, many Serbs left Kratovo. “This movement of people from Kratovo to Budapest and Vienna,” says Petar Djordjevid, “explains the links that they maintained in the first half of the nine­teenth century with these two towns.” 84

The pressure exerted by the Albanians, especially after the Serbs began to rise against the Turks, was very great. Apart from those Orthodox Serbs who withdrew eastward, many went over to Islam as a result. During this period, the Serbian name began to be used as a synonym for rebellion and sedition. Referring to the region of Gornja Reka, R. T. Ni- kolic says that a part of its population was converted to Mohammedanism. “Previously,” he says, “ the Orthodox reli­gion and the Serbian element had determined the ethnic character of this region. Ethnographically speaking, the situation was doubtless similar to that at present obtaining in the Mavrovo basin, which falls within the district of Gornja Reka and, together with the Serbian population of this latter, constitutes in every respect a single ethnic entity, except that in Gornja Reka Albanian is spoken and in the Mavrovo basin Serbian; there are Mohammedans, but they are negligible in comparison with the Serbian element, and they speak Serbian. That this was so may be seen from the migrations, which also occurred from purely Serbian districts. In Gornja Reka, there are settlers from Gora [Brodec], Kumanovo and BilaC, in the Vranje district, and most probably also from other Serbian districts. Even today, these settlers are still Orthodox, but they have taken over the Albanian language and use it both at home and outside (they know no Serbian, except for a few words).” 93

M Ibid., p. 169.M Todor D jordjevid, “Kratovo,” Prilozi za poznavanje giadova

u na&oj zemlji (Materials on the Cities of Our Country), Belgrade, 1931, p. 29.

95 R. T. Nikolid, “Sirenje A rnauta u srpske zem lje” (A lbanian Ex­pansion O ver the Serbian Lands), Glasnik srpskog geograiskog druStva, 3rd year, Vols. I l l— IV , p. 115.

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With reference to the district of KaCanik, Nikoli6 says that it formerly possessed many village churches which were deserted. On Kosovo Polje, Kuripegic in 1530 found a church in every village. “ In these districts,” says Nikolid, “where the Albanians began to settle, the Serbian element instantly left its home and removed, either to neighboring Serbian v il­lages or farther eastward, although there were cases of their going over to Islam. It is characteristic, however, that there were relatively few Mohammedan Serbs in these districts. In this respect, these districts differ from Gornja Reka and the districts west of Sara and Korab, where the Serbian element seems to have immediately become converted to Mohammedanism and turned Albanian or Turkish.” 96 This occurred particularly after the migrations under patriarchs Arsenije III and Arsenije IV to the lands north of the Sava and the Danube.

In connection with the features marking the religious and national unity of the Slavs inhabiting Southern Serbia, mention should also be made of the celebration of the slava, a custom peculiar to the Serbs and unknown to the Bulgars. There is abundant evidence that this custom was observed by the entire Orthodox population of these regions; we also know that it was regarded by the Bulgars as something completely alien to them. Both Ivan Jastrebov and Jovan CvijiC, two of the closest students of these regions, asserted that the Ortho­dox Slavs celebrated the slava. Furthermore, those Slavs in Macedonia who had turned Mohammedan and adopted the Albanian tongue long preserved their former religious cus­toms. When the Bulgars began to spread their propaganda over Southern Serbia, apart from destroying frescoes and books of Serbian recension, they forbade the celebration of the slava. (In passing, it should be noted that the Bulgars treated Greek inscriptions on frescoes in the same way as Serbian: Heinrich Gelzer has recorded that the Bulgarian ex- archist bishop of Ohrid ordered the Greek inscriptions on the frescoes in the church of St. Clement to be erased, while the bishop of Bitolj destroyed a “ trapazarion” and erected a school on its site.)97 Until a few decades ago, the Bulgars, in that

•• Ibid., p. 120.•7 Heinrich Gelzer, Vom heiligen Beige und aus Makedonien,

Leipzig, 1904, p. 159.

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part of Southern Serbia which they conquered, regarded all those who celebrated the slava as Serbs. Gilbert in der Maur quotes the following case: during World War I, the Bulgarian troops under the command of first lieutenant Protogerov were ordered to inflict reprisals upon the population east of Kuma- novo for an attack made on some Bulgarian troops. Before the reprisal measures were begun, the entire population declared that it was Bulgarian, purely in order to avoid being punish­ed. Protogerov was greatly perplexed. “Then Protogerov’s aides had an idea: they asked who celebrated the slava. Those who did so were shot, since the celebration of the slava is a sign that one is a Serb: it is a custom which the Bulgars do not have.” 98

In any examination of the question whether the Slavic population of Macedonia was Serbian or Bulgarian, certain factors connected with ecclesiastical history must be taken into account. These may be summarized as follows. With the southward advance of the Serbian state under Milutin, various districts began to enter the Serbian Church. This pro­cess continued for some time afterward, although we do not know the precise frontier separating the Patriarchate of Pec from the archiepiscopacy of Ohrid, which the Emperor Du§an left in peace. As the southern areas of the medieval Serbian state fell under Turkish domination, the authority of the Ohrid archiepiscopacy spread northward. In contrast to events in Bulgaria after the fall of Turnovo, the new ecclesiastical regime was not hostile toward the Serbs: in 1466, Archbishop Dorotej of Ohrid ordered a Nomocanon to be translated from Greek into Serbian for use in the church at Ohrid.99 Further, at the end of the 1520’s, Pavle, Bishop of Smederevo, an energetic and warlike personality, rebelled against Prohor, Archbishop of Ohrid, and quickly succeeded in overthrowing him, but was himself soon afterward overthrown and de­prived of his rank. Nevertheless, the bishops of Kratovo and Lesnovo remained loyal to him. When the Patriarchate of Pe6 was restored in 1557, it included, in the south, the dioceses

98 Gilbert in der M aur, Jugoslawien einst und jetzt, Leipzig- Vienna, 1936, p. 330.

99 Todor D jordjevid, op. cit., p. 11.

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of Skoplje, Kratovo, Custendil, Stip, Samokov and Tetovo.100 “On this occasion,” says Dr. Radoslav Grujic, “all the dioceses north of Strumica, Veles, KiCevo and Debar were taken from the Ohrid archiepiscopacy and returned to the restored Patriarchate of Pec.” 101 Further, according to Grujic, “ the Ohrid archiepiscopacy was left with only the regions south of Tetovo, Skoplje, Veles and Stip (i. e., Ohrid, Bitolj, Kava- dar and Strumica).” 102 This, as we shall see, is the region where Cviji6 discovered a nationally reconstituted Slavic population.

The territory of the Custendil (also known as the Vel- buzd) diocese embraced the area from Velbuzd and Radomir southward. This area now belongs to Bulgaria. Samokov, now a county seat in Bulgaria, had at that time a numerous Serbian population: near the town were situated Srpsko Selo (literally, “Serbian Village”) and Srpski Samokov. It was the dense Serbian population in this area that caused it to be assigned to the resuscitated Patriarchate of Pe6. Sofija, mean­while, remained within the Patriarchate of Byzantium. It is also noteworthy that it was only within the borders of the Patriarchate of Pec that the spirit of rebellion and the readiness to fight the Turks were constantly alive. Here, on one of its extreme frontiers, Bishop Simeon of Samokov took part in one revolt, while the bishops of Skoplje and Stip were parties to an agreement with Patriarch Arsenije IV to raise a rebellion. When Simeon was caught, he was taken to Sofia and hanged there in 1737. The writer who records his death says that this was followed by a great persecution of the Christians, and adds: “Ah, how the Christians suffered in those times: it seems to me that there had been nothing like it since the time of Diocletian.” 103

100 A leksa Ivic, “G rad ja za istorisku geografiju srpske crkve” (Materials for an Historical Geography of the Serbian Church), Glas- nik geograiskog dru&tva, Vols. V II— V III, 1922, p. 209.

101 Rad. Grujic, “Ohridska arh iepiskopija” (The Archiepsicopacy of Ohrid), Narodna encikiopedija SHS, Vol. Ill, p. 251.

,oi G ru jii, “Pecka patrijarSija” (The Patriarchate of Pec), ibid., p. 376.

103 Stojanovic, op. cit.. V o l. II, p. I l l , N o . 2709.

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THE BULGARIAN NATIO NAL REVIVAL AND THE MACEDONIAN QUESTION

The Macedonian question arose in the second half of the nineteenth century. During the long enslavement of the Bal­kan Christians by the Turks, there is no evidence that such a question existed. The Turkish rule, which was strong and well organized, especially at first, leveled out all national and tribal differences among its Christian subjects: whoever was not one of the faithful was a “giaour,” an infidel, a subject of a lower order without guaranteed rights. The giaours, moreover, were divided into “urum-mileti,” which for long signified the Orthodox in the Turkish empire, or “Latin- mileti,” i. e., members of the Roman Catholic faith, who, on account of the Western attitude toward Turkey, were for many years in a worse situation than the Orthodox.

Territorially nearer Constantinople, and, since the fall of Turnovo in 1393, deprived of a national state and a national Church, the Bulgars, unlike the Serbs, lapsed more and more into a state of lethargy and lost themselves in the masses of the Balkan Orthodox population. For these, the Greeks acted as spokesmen, for they had succeeded in making Phanar their ecclesiastical and national center and in render­ing themselves, with he passage of time, indispensable to the Porte. Vested as they were with ecclesiastical authority which they received in return for payment of a special tax to the Sultan, the Greek bishops, apart from their firm loyalty to the Orthodox religion and their great efforts toward its pre­servation, were frequently a burden to their flock as willing tax-gatherers and men with a taste for money. The very fact that they derived their office from the Sultan accounts for their decisive influence on the Porte, which they exercised in order to seize as much money as possible, and their frequent overthrowals of Orthodox bishops in the Patriarchate of Con­stantinople and also of the Patriarch himself. Their practice of extorting money from their flock was necessitated by the fact that they had to bribe the Turkish authorities in order to acquire their sees and to retain them once they had got

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them: once having ascended the episcopal throne, they were obliged to repay the debts incurred in rising to that position.

In Bulgaria and those districts of Southern Serbia that had remained within the province of the Archbishop of Ohrid, village priests were also frequently Greeks. Thus, in the course of time, the Greek Church became one of the elements in the spiritual enslavement of the Bulgars, which exerted a profound influence on the minds of the people and eventual­ly produced a feeling of unbridled hatred toward the Greeks. Nevertheless, the Bulgars held on to their own Orthodox faith, which during the Turkish occupation brought them yet closer to the Serbs. “The old Balkan culture,” says Cvijid, “often in conjunction with the [Orthodox] faith, influenced the po­pulation, especially the Christian element, bringing it together and consolidating it and producing many common psycho­logical traits— almost a single Balkan soul; this process was enhanced by the Turkish oppression, which forced the people into a single community and provoked them to exert a com­mon resistance___ This formation of a single Balkan soulwas brought to a halt partly by the national and religious conflicts of the last few decades.” 1

During this period, relations between Serbs and Bulgars were peaceful: over the wide area known as Sopluk, all dif­ferences between them seemed to disappear. Both peoples were Slav and Orthodox; both lived under more or less the same conditions; both of them felt the longing to recover their lost freedom. The Serbian uprisings, which occurred repeated­ly over a period of several centuries exerted a rousing effect upon the Bulgars, who took over the Serbian epos of Kosovo. Vladimir Kachanovsky noted down from Nikola Minchev, a Bulgar from Dupnitsa, four folk poems about the Battle of Kosovo that were sung by the Bulgars.2 When the Serbs suc­ceeded in forming their little state, their reputation among the Bulgars rose even higher. When Prince MiloS was on his way to pay homage to the Sultan, he arranged his route to pass through Bulgaria, where the people greeted him with enthusiasm. It is a well-known fact that he assisted the build­

1 Jovan Cvijid, “Geografski i kulturni polozaj S rb ije” (Serbia's Geographical and Cultural Position), Glasnik Srpskog geogralskog druilva, V o l. Ill, Nos. 3— 4, p. 21.

* See A rd iiv liir slavische Philologie, V o l. V II, 1884, pp. 112— 13.

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ing of schools in Bulgaria and authorized the printing of Bul­garian textbooks at his own press. For the enslaved Bulgarian people, Serbia was a stimilus encouraging them to exert an effort on their own behalf, and a hope of assistance if and when they began to do so.

A fter long hesitation, the Bulgars finally began to rouse themselves. Their national and cultural awakening has its peculiar features. In order to understand the tremendous sacrifices and efforts that were made to create a great and powerful state and, at all costs, to outstrip all their neighbors in the Balkans, one must study the Bulgars’ dark and troubled history during the long period in which they were under the Turkish yoke. As soon as a suitable opportunity arose, a mighty force that had been stifled for centuries was released from the national wellsprings. A deep need was felt for com­plete historical self-affirmation, and a desire to make good, as soon as possible, all that they had lacked for centuries past. In an age of romanticism, the Bulgarian intelligentsia, carried away by a nebulous vision of its country’s past, succumbed to the temptation to abandon all moderation and lost all sense of historical reality. Moreover, it was exposed to flattery pro­voked by its country’s geopolitical importance in the rivalry of the great powers in the Balkans. In its passion and longing to resurrect its country’s greatness, to transform its romantic visions into political reality, the Bulgarian intelligentsia leapt from one extreme to the other: it was prepared to hire itself out to the Porte, the Vatican and the Russians, provided only that it could realize its dream. When Russia helped it in large measure to do this, it turned its back on her and appealed to Austro-Hungary and later, through the latter, to Germany, which under Bismarck would have nothing to do with it. To what extent the Bulgarian intelligentsia was inimically dis­posed toward Serbia and Russia may be seen from a me- mordanum printed on October 9, 1915, in the Frankfurter Zeitung: “A powerful Serbia would be very advantageous for Russia, but very harmful for Austro-Hungary and Germany. A powerful Bulgaria would thwart the interests and ambitions of Russia, but might be of great advantage for Germany and Austro-Hungary.” *

s Warum Buigaiien mil uns geht? Eine bulgaiisdie Denksdiritt. Reprint from the Franklurter Zeitung for Oct. 8 and 9, 1915, p. 15.

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It was Bulgarian ambitions to realize the dream of a powerful Bulgaria, which, as the memorandum just mentioned says, should embrace “the whole of present-day Serbian Mace­donia, part of Old Serbia and all the Turkish territory on the right bank of the Maritsa,” 4 that gave birth to the Mace­donian question. Its emergence was preceded by the national and cultural revival of the Bulgars, the establishment of the Exarchate and the formation of San Stefano Buglaria. When the Congress of Berlin forced Russia to renounce the peace terms of San Stefano, the Bulgarian Exarchate once more assumed the function of pioneer of Bulgarism in Macedonia. Later, the idea of an autonomous Macedonia was used to mask the annexationist ambitions of King Ferdinand. While Bul­garia was in the embrace of Russia, this idea attracted many people in the West: it was accepted, as we shall see, with especial fervor by European socialists, who did much to po­pularize it in the West.

In the following sections, the development of the Mace­donian question w ill be set forth in all its component parts, which are extremely complex and frequently mutually inter­twined.

THE SPIR ITU AL AND N ATIO N AL FATE OF THE BULGARS UNDER THE TURKS

The fate of the Bulgars under the Turkish regime was harder than that of the Serbs. In a state of constant rebellion and oriented, as they were, toward the West, which supported them and encouraged them to resist, the Serbs, even after they had lost the last traces of political independence, con­tinued to rebel against the Turks and force them to recognize their national identity: in these insurrections and the de­struction by which they were accompanied, the Serbs acquired new strength and steeled their resistance. With the restoration of the Patriarchate of Pe6 (1557), they achieved a complete national renaissance and entered upon a period of powerful national unification and spiritual renewal.

This the Bulgars never had: they became hopelessly over­whelmed in a twofold slavery— to the Turkish state and to

4 Ibid.

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the Greek Church. A ll that was left to them were the “vojnik kuraleri,” or military settlements, which existed for over three hundred years. “Right up to 1840 and even now to some ex­tent,” says Jirefcek, “every year in the spring ‘soldiers’ would go off, under the leadership of their daribaSije to Istanbul to graze the Sultan’s horses and mow the hay. One of them, who wore a fox ’s tail in his cap, would carry before them a red kerchief bearing a crescent as a banner.” 8

As we have seen, there was no intimate bond between the Bulgarian masses and their medieval state. They did not think of it as being a part of their destiny, nor did it represent for them a system of values dearer than life itself. “Bulgarian tradition and folk song,” says P. A. Sirku, “attribute the country’s collapse before the Turks to the population’s very low morale. According to tradition, the Bulgars had become very wicked, so that they neither submitted to God nor respected him. If they came to church at all, they stood at a distance and took the wafer on the tips of their spears. No one recognized any one else as senior or more important, and no one submitted to anyone else.” 8

The Bulgarian mentality had become permeated with the spirit of rayah to an extent which has astonished every student of this period of Bulgarian history. Referring to this period, Marin Drinov wrote: “Our people were dead; the Bulgars were no longer a nation, but a mob, subjugated, oppressed and ruined. Even the word ‘narod’ [“people,” “nation”] had been replaced by the Greek term ‘hora,’ which means peasants burdened with various duties and taxes. I f anyone suceeded in rising to a respectable position as a citizen, he ceased to be a Bulgar and became a Greek, for it was not fitting for the former to lead the life of a citizen: such a thing was per­missible only for a Greek. A Bulgar must remain a peasant born for heavy labor.” 7 “A t that time,” says Georg Eugen Kunze, “ it was as though the name of Bulgar was an insult and a stigma, as one lament puts it. In time, the Bulgars

5 Constantin Jos. Jireiek , Geschichte der Bulgaien, Prague, 1876, pp. 452— 53.

• P. A . Sirku, Vrem ya i zhizn patriarkha Jeftimiya Ternovskogo (The Life and Times of Patriarch Jeftimije of Turnovo), pp. 598— 99.

7 A s quoted in Kurt Floericke, Geschidite der Bulgaien, Stuttgart, 1913, p. 39.

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ceased to feel that they were a national entity, a nation. Thenational consciousness had been extinguished___ The body ofthe Bulgarian people was not only broken into fragments, but bleeding from a thousand wounds; the people’s soul had left its body, the Bulgarian nation was dead; the only thing that lived on was the anger of poverty-stricken slaves.” 8 “Soon after the loss of its independence,” says Hugo Grothe, “ the political aims of the Bulgarian people, which was left without a nobility to lead it, were extinguished.” 9 Ivan Minchev states that the Bulgars lost their national conscious­ness and attended only Greek schools.10 Bogdan Filov adds that the period of the Turkish yoke “ interrupted the free development of the Bulgarian nation and fettered its spiritual forces; at one time, it even threatened its existence as a national entity.” 11 Jirefcek remarks that the Bulgarian nation at that time “was nothing but a horde of persecuted Chris­tians, whose spiritual decay was not to be compensated forby any number of souls___ Only among the uneducatedpeasants did the Slavic tongue and the old national con­sciousness persist.” ls

At the end of the third decade of the nineteenth century, at a time when a new Serbian state was being founded at the cost of very great effort, R. Walsh traveled through Bulgaria. In spite of all that was going on in Greece and Serbia, he could see no sign of a national awakening or of revolution among the masses of the Bulgarian people. “The people,” he says, have completely lost that warlike sense which distin­guished their ancestors. The majority of Bulgars lead a pas­toral life and live in little villages made up of groups of houses which neither possess the orderliness of towns nordeserve the name of town___ Even in those few schools thatare to be found in the towns, books are exclusively Greek, although the Greek language has made no progress with the people. The result of this is that the Bulgars are completely

8 G eorg Eugen Kunze, Bulgarien, Gotha, 1919, pp. 30— 31.* H ugo Grothe, Bulgarien, Natur, Volkstum, Staat, Geistesleben,

Wirtschatt, W ien , 1921, p. 60.10 Ivan Mintschev, Serbien und die bulgarische nationale B ew e-

gung, p. 8.11 Bogdan Filov, Geschichte der bulgarischen Kunst unter der ttir-

kischen Herrschait und in der neueren Zeit, Berlin-Leipzig, 1933, p. 2.11 Jirefek, op. cit., pp. 506— 07.

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illiterate. Their language is only a spoken one without gram­matical rules. Recently, however, an effort has been made to print a few textbooks in this language for elementary educa­tion, but I have not seen them. Those that I have seen were Greek for the schools and Slav for the churches. Usually, there is one priest for every two or three villages who visits them from time to time and performs religious rites. One seldom finds a village with a church, a school or any books; except the teachers, who are usually Greeks, probably no one in the villages through which my route lay knew how to read or write.” '*

At the beginning of the second half of the nineteenth cen­tury, the situation in Bulgaria was, in this respect, much the same. Panayot Khitrov, the well-known Bulgarian brigand leader and champion of Bulgarian liberation from the Turkish yoke, describes the life of the Bulgarian peasants as follows: “Whoever wishes to have an idea of what a slave is needs only to see how a Bulgarian peasant lives in the villages. He is not a man whose heart does not cry out in anguish at the sight and who does not call down the punishment of Heaven upon those who so humiliate human nature that they reduce God’s image to the level of the animals and murder all human thought and feeling in him ... . The Bulgarian people has been so humiliated by the Phanariots and the Turks that it has lost all semblance of humanity; it is like a machine that plows and reaps in order that others may sate them­selves.” 14

Summing up such evidence on the dormant state of the Bulgar’s national awareness during their long enslavement to the Turks, Cvijid wrote: “Under the Turkish rule, the Bulgars completely lost their morale and their self-respect, and were reduced to the level of the meanest of Turkish sub­jects. Apart from other reasons for this degree of subjugation, much was due to their proximity to Istanbul and to the geo­graphical character of their country, which, with its lack of forest, was particularly suitable for the inculcation of a ditluk regime. Here this regime was at its severest; almost all the

13 R. Walsch, Reise von Konstantinopel durch Rumelien, das Balkangebirge, Bulgarien, die Walachei, Siebenbiirgen und Ungarn, Dresden-Leipzig, 1828, pp. 210— 11.

14 Georg Rosen, Die Balkan-Haiduken, Leipzig, 1888, p. 89.

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Bulgars were no more than hired laborers, raya. Under these conditions, the Bulgarian name lost its national significance, and over a wide area was used as a class or economic de­signation signifying raya, tiller of the soil, or peasant. It is a well-known fact that until the middle of the nineteenth century educated Bulgars and almost all city-dwellers were ashamed of the name Bulgar. Only after the establishment of the Exarchate (in 1870) and the liberation of Bulgaria (in 1878) did this name begin to acquire the national significance that it now possesses in Bulgaria and to take root in Mace­donia. — Thus, under the Turks, the name Bulgar lost its former ethnographical meaning and in a large part of the Peninsula signified a rural population living under an extremely severe iitluk regime. Owing to the widespread use of the name in this sense, certain foreign researchers and travelers, ignorant of the special circumstances of the po­pulation, fell into the error of regarding the Bulgarian name as a national one. Ethnographical maps of this period, pre­pared in accordance with these erroneous views, did much to complicate the chief question between Serbs and Bulgars—the Macedonian question.” 16

SIGNIFICANCE OF THE TERM “BULGAR”

It is in the light of these historical facts that one should examine the significance of the term “Bulgar,” which, both by the Greeks and, later, by numerous travelers through Mace­donia during the nineteenth century, was used to designate the Orthodox Slav population, which did not know Greek and therefore could not be called Greek. For the most part, it was not called Serbian on account of the then fairly firm ly estab­lished error that the Serbian state of the time embraced all Serbs except those in Bosnia. “When a part of the Serbian people,” says Jovan DragaSevic, “albeit very small, acquired its political freedom and gathered itself into a little state separate from Turkey, under the name of ‘Serbian state,’ the Turks identified the name of Serb, which was hateful to them, with the subjects of Serbia; thus, they did not tolerate that anyone in their state should call himself a Serb,. . . and the

15 Jovan C vijit, Balkansko poluostrvo i Juinoslovenske zem lje(The Balkan Peninsula and the South Slav Lands), pp. 263— 64 and 265.

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unliberated population did not dare to call itself by a name enjoying such an evil reputation in Turkey.” 16 Milojko Vese- linovic states: “That the people in Macedonia and Old Serbia now call themselves Bulgars is entirely due to the enforced desire of the Turks, who more readily hear the name of the peaceful and submissive Bulgar than that of the ever rebel­lious Serb.” 17

The Macedonian population, constantly in a state of un­certainty and fear for its very life, was reluctant to give any definite answer to foreigners’ questions on their national feelings. “I asked,” says James Baker, “some Bulgarian pea­sants in Macedonia about their nationality, and they im­mediately replied ‘rum,’ which, indeed, is the name peculiar to the Greek population of Asia Minor. They insisted that they were Greeks. ‘I f that is so,’ I told them, ‘why do you speak Bulgarian at home?’ ‘Because our forefathers did so,’ was their reply. ‘We have had to suffer a great deal for being called Bulgars, although we are Greeks.’ ” 18 A t about the same period, Karl Braun-Wiesbaden was passing through these districts. He also noticed this submissive outlook among the Slavic population of southern Macedonia and southern Bosnia. “Here in Macedonia and southern Bosnia,” he says, “ the Bulgar makes no claim to speak his mother tongue, let alone understand any other. When he meets some ‘effendi’ (whether a Turk or an unknown foreigner, for the Frank is always an ‘effendi’ here), he greets him in Greek with ‘kal hora’ or ‘kal himera.’ ” 19 “Fifteen years ago,” wrote Milojko Veselinovi6, “ I was in Turkey [i. e., in the southern areas of Serbia, then under Turkish rule] and had the opportunity to converse at some length with many people, especially with peasants from the districts of Vranje, Leskovac, Ni8, Turnovo, Kriva Palanka, Kumanovo, Skoplje and elsewhere, and I noticed that they mostly refer to themselves as ‘risjani,’ ‘ka- vuri’ or ‘raya.’ When a Turk asks them, ‘Say, what are you,

’• Jovan Dragafievid, Makedonski Sloveni (The Macedonian Slavs), Belgrade, 1890, p. 26.

17 M ilo jko V . Veselinovid, Srbi u Madedoniji i u Juinoj Staioj Srbiji, ili odgovor g. S. S. BopCevu (The Serbs in M acedonia and Sou­thern O ld Serbia: A Reply to Mr. S. S. BopCev), Belgrade, 1888, p. 15.

18 James Baker, Die TQrken in Europa, Stuttgart, 1878, pp. 19— 20.“ Karl Braun-W iesbaden, Reiseeindrucke aus dem Sudosten,

V o l. Ill, Stuttgart, 1888, p. 247.

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rayaV they reply, ‘I am a kavurin, aga.’ But when a Christian asks them, they say, ‘I am a risjanin.’ ” 20

Milojko Veselinovic (in 1888), Jovan Draga§evi6 (in 1890) and Stojan ProtiC attempted to fix more or less precisely the meaning of the term “Bulgar” (in Serbian “bugarin” and in Bulgarian “ bulgarin”). “Under no circumstances,” wrote Vese­linovic, “w ill an inhabitant of Macedonia or southern Old Serbia call himself a ‘bolgarin’ or ‘bulgarin,’ but only (and then out of necessity) ‘bugarin,’ which is a sign that a Serb is speaking, since lu becomes u in the pronunciation of a Serb alone and of no one else.” 21 As distinct from Protid, who, writing on “Macedonia and the Macedonians” in Odjek, as­serted that the Macedonian Slavs took the name “Bulgar” from the Latin “vulgaris,” 22 Veselinovic claimed that it was derived from the Greek “vulgaros.” 23 Draga§evi6, who, as an ethnographer, was a member of the Serbian delegation to the Berlin Congress, held more or less the same view on the origin of the term “Bulgar” as Veselinovi6. His derivation is from the Greek Boulgaroi, which means the common people.14 He goes on to say that the word Bolgaroi, which was applied to the Bulgars proper, “signifies a definite nation,” 25 while Boulgaroi indicates only the cultural level of the people. Later, the Greeks confused the two expressions, “particularly as the Byzantines could not regard even those in the east as being civilized, and also both these peoples [in the eastern and western halves of the empire], although differing from one another, were related. Subsequently, the uninitiated took these expressions as meaning the same thing, i. e., as being the name of a nation.” 26 “Bolgar and B o u lg a r he continues, “ are two quite different expressions: the former, in Latin Bulgar and in Slav bolgar and bugar, is the name of a nation that never crossed the Rhodope Mountains and Despotova Gora, which separated it quite naturally and inevitably from the peoples to the west of these mountains___ Boulgar de­signates the people, or plebs; it is the equivalent of the Latin

20 Veselinovi6, op. cit., p. 15.11 Ibid., p. 3.88 Ibid., p. 11.23 Ibid., pp. 3— 4.u Dragasevic, op. cit., p. 19.25 Ibid., pp. 22— 23.“ Ibid.

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Vulgar, and means the ‘lower class’ of the people in a coun­try.” 17 DragaSevic also agrees that fear of the Turks was the reason why the Serbs in Macedonia called themselves Bul­gars: they followed the whim of their masters, while “many used this alien name instead of their own in their dealings with citizens on whom they were economically dependent.” 19 “During the Turkish regime,” says Cvijid, “ the name ‘Bulgar’ as applied to the raya spread beyond Bulgarian districts [and came to be applied] to serfs and peasants farming land on a tenant basis. The area controlled by this extremely oppres­sive regime extended to Skoplje and beyond---- Applied, asit was, in this sense in the Vardar districts, the name ‘Bulgar’ began to penetrate as far as Kosovo and Metohija, while one Russian traveler in the seventeenth century applies the name even to Serbian peasant farmers in the area of Sarajevo, in Bosnia. In the extreme west of the Balkan Peninsula, in Dalmatia and Croatia, the name ‘Bulgar’ signified ill breeding, and probably for this reason the inhabitants of these areas called their simple folk poems ‘bugarStice.’ ” 49 Vatroslav Oblak confirms the view of Veselinovi6 that in the Mace­donian and west Bulgarian dialects vocalic I is replaced by u, particularly in those areas where Bulgarian comes into con­tact with Serbian, while the same phenomenon cannot be found in the east and south of the areas over which Bul­garian is spoken. “Both by its greographic extent and by its sporadic appearances, this u shows that we are here concern­ed with Serbianisms. Indeed, in almost all dialects characteriz­ed by u instead of I, we find other traces of Serbian influence, as, for example, u for a. Particular mention should be made of the name bulgarin with all its variations, which one finds throughout almost the whole of Macedonia (except, perhaps, some southern and southeastern districts) in the form bu- garin.” 80

Veselinovic, against whom loud protests were raised at one time, was right when he pointed out that the name “Bulgar” began especially to be used by the local population when the

17 Ibid., pp. 30— 31.« Ibid., p. 24.29 C v ijii, Balkansko poluostrvo i Juznoslovenske zemlje, p. 269.,0 V . Oblak, “Einige Capitel aus der bulgarisdien Grammatik,”

Archiv Stir slavische Philologie, V o l. X V II, 1895, p. 442.

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agitation for a Bulgarian exarchate first assumed a large ucale. “Since,” he says, “ the people had lost its Serbian bishops in the previous century, it did not care for any alien ones, but mechanically supported the Bulgarian bishops, thinking that they would at least read the church services in Slav, which would be better, in its opinion, than Greek. This was taken advantage of by the Bulgarophiles, who collected signatures from the people by virtue of which the people renounced the Patriarchate and joined the Bulgarian Ex­archate. As soon as anyone signed, he had from that moment on to call himself a Bulgar, since otherwise that ‘majority’ would not be obtained that was essential if they were to have a Bulgarian bishop and Slavic services in church. Finally, the people agreed, but, being unable to say ‘bulgarin,’ used the Serbian pronunciation ‘bugarin.’ ” 81

Quite apart from the proverbial ignorance of the state of affairs in the Balkans which frequently obtained, this helps to explain why foreign travelers in the nineteenth century called all Orthodox Slavs in Macedonia “Bulgars,” frequently without having the least idea of where to draw the borderline between Serbs and Bulgars. Referring to the district between Salonica and Voden, August Griesebach wrote in 1839: “The Bulgarian language covers the southern and eastern, and Serbian the northern and western parts of the area, although the borderline between these two daughters of the Slavic tribe has proved impossible to define precisely; it is said that this line, by a gradual confusion of words, merges, so to speak, into a transitional zone.” 32 Despite this assertion, Griesebach calls the districts around Skoplje, Tetovo and Sar- planina Bulgarian since, he says, they are inhabited by Bul­gars, and says that the inscriptions on the walls of the monastery of St. Atanasije are written in Bulgarian (i. e., in Old Slavonic) and Greek.33 “There are,” he says, “several Bul­garian monasteries in Upper Albania— that is, one large monastery is apparently, according to the map, situated near Debar.” 34 As we have seen, Braun-Wiesbaden found Bulgars

*' Veselinovid, op. cit., pp. 16— 17." August Griesebadi, Reise durdi Rumeiien und nach Brussa im

Jahre 1839, Gottingen, 1841, V ol. II, p. 66.•» Ibid., pp. 233, 252 and 278— 79.>4 Ibid., pp. 278— 79.

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(he himself puts this word in quotation marks) in 1878 in Macedonia and Bosnia.35 His skepticism with regard to this term is evident: referring to the Slavophile propaganda of the time which made all Orthodox Slavs on Turkish territory out to be Bulgars, he says: “Anyone who has been on the spot and lived there can only find rediculous current Russian asser­tions that these people are all ‘Bulgars’ and that the land from the Vardar to the Aegean— including Ser, where a well- known Greek teachers’ college in flourishing— must be given to Bulgaria. One would have to be as ignorant as a diplomat to believe such a lie.” 38

A t the beginning of the twentieth century, Southern and Old Serbia were studied, among others, by Dr. Karl Oestreich. His observations are of particular interest since by that time relations in Southern Serbia had become crystallized. A l­though he commits a number of errors in respect of the ethnic character of this region, nevertheless his judgment is more sober and objective than that of other writers. Referring to the population around Skoplje, which Griesebach out of sheer ignorance described as Bulgarian, he says: “ The city’s po­pulation consists of all possible elements. The great majority are Serbs— some of whom have come out in favor of the Bul­garian Exarchate and call themselves ‘Bulgars’— and A l­banians, or Mohammedanized Serbs. Although it is situated south of Sar-planina, Skoplje is the chief city of Old Ser­bia. . . . The rural population, although it is Serbian in origin, has for the most part given its support to the Exarchate, since a Bulgarian bishop is for them more acceptable than a Greek bishop of the Ecumenical Church to which they formerly be­longed. This is how the rural population around Skoplje has today come to be mostly Bulgarian; the same is true of the purely Serbian Tetovo.” 37

How the Serbian population of Southern Serbia came to decide in favor of the Exarchate and what precisely this de­cision meant, Dr. Oestreich sets forth in his extensive study entitled “Die Bevolkerung von Makedonien.” Here he points out that the establishment of the Bulgarian Exarchate

55 Braun-W iesbaden, op. cit.. Vol. Ill, p. 233.M Ibid., pp. 241— 42.K Karl Oestreich, “M akedonien,” Geographische Zeitschrilt, V ol. X,

N o. 1, 1904, pp. 198— 99.

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provoked a serious schism among the Slavic masses in the Balkans, who were appealed to by both the Patriarchate and the Exarchate, since the rest of the population was al­ready oriented by virtue of its very national identity and, moreover, in comparison with the Slavs, constituted a negli­gible minority. On the question who these “Bulgars” were in Southern Serbia, Oestreich says: "The ‘Bulgars’ were Slavs, and the so-called ‘Greeks’ were also Slavs. The ‘Bulgars’ were simply Macedonian Slavs who had joined the Bulgarian Church, which had been brought to them by the inhabitants of the [Bulgarian] Principality and which had been anathema­tized by the Patriarchate. They might be Bulgars or Serbs. The ‘Greeks’ were also Slavs who, on account of opposition toward the Bulgars and their Turkophile policy, had remained in the Greek Ecumenical Orthodox Patriarchal Church, which, as far as its membership is concerned, was also Slav.”A considerable part of the rural population, although it then felt itself to be Serbian, seized the first opportunity of ob­taining Slavic priests and so declared itself to be Bul­garian. . . . Whoever joined the Bulgarian Exarchate was re­gistered in the Turkish population records as “bulgari-milet” and to the world at large was a Bulgar.39

To what extent the inhabitants of Southern Serbia were disturbed by the conflict between Patriarchate and Exarchate may be seen from an episode described by Veselinovid. The older peasants from a village near PCinja said: “Heaven alone knows what w ill become of our people. We were all brothers and on friendly terms, but since the quarrel over the bishop began, some have been crying, ‘We are Bulgars, for we are on the Bulgarian side,’ while others on the Patriarch’s side said, ‘We know who we are, even if they do call us Graeco- philes.’ Cursed be he who started this quarrel!” 40

Although, for the most part, agreeing with what V. Grego- rovic wrote on the ethnic affinities of the Slavic population of Macedonia (Gregorovi6 assigned them to the Bulgars), N. P. Kondakov was nevertheless unable to exclude entirely the possibility that there were Serbs in this region. Generally

88 Karl Oestreidi, “D ie Bevdlkerung von M akedonien,” Geogra- phische Zeitschrift, Vol. XI, N o . 1, 1905, p. 273.

39 Ibid., p. 291.40 Veselinovid, op. cit., pp. 15— 16, footnote 1.

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speaking, he saw in the Macedonian Slavs “an indefinite national group which clearly approximates to the population of Bulgaria proper.” 41 However, he adds that in Ohrid, “ ‘Serbophiles’ or ‘Patriarchists,’ as the Bulgars call them, are living in very small numbers, and in the city at that.’ 42 Further, Kondakov states that in the vicinity of Skoplje there were a number of Serbian settlements and large villages, while in the city itself there were fifty Serbian houses without a church. In general, he is of the opinion that there were never any Serbs in Skoplje, but that they were nevertheless at that time the leading cultural element. “But,” he goes on, “ if there were no [Serbian] cities, villages of tremendous size had survived by whose means extremely beautiful churches had been erected, and, although this district is purely Bul­garian with a few Serbian villages thrown in, it may never­theless be described, from the cultural standpoint, as a corner of Old Serbia.” 43 In Mladi NagoriCani, Kondakov found Serbian villages in which the Bulgars had begun to found settlements of their own.44 In his Memoirs, DjorCe Petrov recalls that there were “Serbophile” villages in the area of Bitolj, near Smilevo, and that, when they began to organize the Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization, they were undecided whether to include the “Serbophiles” in their organization or not. “We decided,” he says, “ to accept them with freat caution and reserve, for fear they might betray the cause to the Greek bishop.” 45

Not without interest, in this connection, are the observa­tions made on the spot by Professor Franz Doflein, who was engaged in geological research. Like many others before him, he was biased in favor of the Bulgars, but nevertheless ob­served that the people he came across did not speak Bul­garian. “So far,” he says, “ the linguistic frontiers between Serbian and Bulgarian have been constantly shifting in the Balkans, especially in Macedonia. The result is that it is difficult to say whether, in the north, on the Danube frontier,

41 N . P. Kondakov, Makedoniya: Arkheologidisekoe puteshestvie (M acedonia: A n Archeological Journey), St. Petersburg, 1909, p. 249.

41 Ibid., p. 223.4S Ibid., p. 173.44 Ibid., p. 194.45 Spomeni na G 'o r ie Petrov (G ’o rie Petrov's Mem oirs), Skoplje,

1950, pp. 20 and 26.

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the dialect spoken in a village, let us say, near Pirot, is Serbian tinged with Bulgarian or Bulgarian tinged with Serbian. The borderline is similarly indistinct and confused in northern Macedonia.” 48 Doflein noticed that the urban population of Skoplje spoke a dialect which seemed to him to be nearest to Bulgarian. “When,” he says, “one is farther away, in the villages north of Skoplje, it becomes increasingly difficult to make oneself understood with those few words of Bulgarian that Germans normally have at their disposal. The probability of meeting Serbs becomes progressively greater. In Skoplje also, many inhabitants are Serbs, which is not sur­prising in a communications center that is so near Serbia.” 47

One of the more prominent foreigners who traveled through the Serbian lands was J. G. von Hahn. In 1868, he found “Bulgarian Christians” in many places, and “Serbian Christians” only in Prokuplje and KursSumlija. A ll the rest of the Slavic population south of the Serbo-Turkish frontier, which at that time was two hours’ walk from Aleksinac, he described as “Bulgarian peasants.” 48 In Leskovac he found two thousand four hundred, in Vranje one thousand and in Kumanovo three hundred and fifty houses belonging to “Bul­garian Christians,” in the vicinity of Kumanovo ninety Bul­garian villages and in Giljane one thousand five hundred homes of “Bulgarian Christians.” 49 Long before Hahn, Ami Bou6, in 1847, designated the Cmi Dr in as the western fron­tier of Bulgaria.50 According to him, Bulgars are to be found in Bulgaria, Upper and Lower Moesia and Macedonia. Of the Bulgars of Upper Moesia and Macedonia, he says that they have many folk poems in common with the Serbs. As far as he could ascertain, the Bulgars at that time did not sing any poems about Marko Kraljevic. He further noted folk poems were not sung in Bulgaria in the same manner as in Serbia,

41 Franz Doflein, Mazedonien: Erlebnisse und Beobachtungen einesNaturforschers im Geiolge des deutschen Heeres, Jena, 1921, p. 274.

47 Ibid., p. 246.49 J. G. von Hahn, Reise von Belgrad nach Saloniki nebst vier

Abhandlungen zur alten Geschichte des Morawagebietes, Vienna,186(1, pp. 31— 32.

« Ibid., pp. 48, 58, 71, 82, 111, 127, 139 and 172.,0 Am i Bou6, La Tuiquie d'Europe, Vol. I, Paris, 1840, pp. 6— 9.

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especially in Bosnia and Hercegovina, and observed that the Bulgars did not have the gusle.51

Four years later, Cyprian Robert offered almost identical information on the population of Macedonia. According to him, the Bulgars made up the “ essence of the Macedonian population.” Speaking in greater detail of the country, he says that the chief town of Bulgarian Macedonia is Serez.52 He adds that this part of the country should be distinguished from the northwestern districts inhabited by Serbs. “For the rest, the Serbian pastoral tribes are separated from the Bulgarian agrarian population of Macedonia by the Greeks, who inhabit the central and coastal regions of this great land.” 58

From the foregoing, the true meaning of the expression “Bulgar“ should be clear, both as applied by the people to itself and as comprehended by foreign travelers. It designated, not an ethnic group, but the common people, the working masses ,who spoke Slav. The most menial tasks, which neither Greeks nor Turks were willing to undertake, were known as “Bulgarian work.” 54 The fact that foreign travelers referred to the Slavic population as Bulgars was due to ignorance and to wrong information obtained from the Greeks and from other sources. Of all such travelers, with very few exceptions, Tihomir Georgevitch is merely stating the truth when he says that they knew neither the history, nor the language, nor the customs, nor the mutual relationships of the peoples they were describing. “Only a small number of books on Mace­donia,” he says, “has been written with a real knowledge of the subject, truthfully, independently and without bias.” es

How foreigners gathered their information on the in­habitants of the areas through which they passed may be seen from two examples. The French consul Pouqueville, who journeyed through Greece and parts of Turkey and Mace­donia at the beginning of the nineteenth century, was accom­panied by a young Greek who simply called all Slavs Bul-

« Ibid., V o l. II, p. 107.62 Cyprian Robert, Les Slaves de Turquie, Paris, 1844, V o l. II,

p. 234.“ Ibid., p. 279.84 Jovan C v ijii, Remarques sur Vethnogiaphie de la Macedoine,

Paris, 1807, p. 21.K Tihomir R. Georgevitch, Macedonia, London, 1918, pp. 7 and 11.

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gars. Franz BradaSka says of Hahn that he was insufficiently acquainted with the ethnic relationships of the areas through which he traveled, and did not even know Serbian. “ I am not at all surprised,” says BradaSka, “ that he was unable to obtain detailed information about everything: in the first place, his journey was too hasty; in the second place, his servants and escorts were Albanians; and in the third place, he knew no Slav language. In particular, this ignorance of Slav explains his inability to distinguish between Bulgars and Serbs and the fact hat, relying on his Albanian guides, he copied down inaccurately several Slav names which had been written quite correctly on the attached sketch of the terrain by Major Zah.” *•

THE NATIO NAL AW AKENING OF THE BULGARS IN THE NINETEENTH CENTURY

Despite their condition during the early decades of the nineteenth century, it was impossible for the Bulgars not to be affected by the new ideas of national awakening that were stirring the other Balkan nations at that time. The inspirer and initiator of the Bulgarian national revival was Pajsije, n monk from the diocese of Samokov and at one time vice abbot of the monastery of Hilandar, where in 1758 he met Jovan Raji6 while the latter was collecting material for his history. Raji6 encouraged Pajsije to attempt a similar work on the Bulgars, with the result that in 1762 there appeared Pajsije’s Slaveno-bugarska istorija (History of the Slavs and Bulgars), the chief source of which was Mavro Orbini’s Regno degli Slavi, published in 1601. “Of Bulgarian sources,” says JireCek, “he knew only a few legal documents and lives of the saints.” 57 According to F. Kanitz, Pajsije’s work is com­pletely uncritical, but marks the turning point in the Bul­garian national revival, since it aroused the Bulgars’ love for and interest in their own past.58

“ Franz BradaSka, “Die Slaven in der Tiirkei,” M Itteilungen aus Justus Peters' geographischer Anstalt, Vol. X V , 1869, p. 445.

*’ Jirefek, op. cit., p. 519.M F. Kanitz, Donau — Bulgarien und Balkan, Vol. Ill (1860— 80),

Leipzig, 1880, pp. 87— 88.

06

Another leader of this movement was George Ivanovi6 Venelin, a Ukrainian from the Carpathians who was born in 1802 and whose real name was Georg Huca. The son of a priest, he was also intended for the Church, but later became a doctor, and finally, on the encouragement of the Russian historian Pogodin, took up history. In 1829, he published the first volume of his work Stari i novi bugari u njihovom poli- tiikom, etnografskom, istoriskom i verskom odnosu prema Rusima (The Ancient and Modern Bulgars and Their Political, Ethnic, Historical and Religious Relation to the Russians). This work, too, is a collection of fantastic tales without any connection with historical facts.

Before these two men began to publish their work, very little had been known about the Bulgars among the historians of Europe. In 1771 Schlozer pointed out the need for a Bul­garian grammar and dictionary. In the dictionary prepared in 1787 on the command of Catharine the Great, among a total of twelve Slav languages Bulgarian is not even mentioned and Serbian occupies fifth place. As late as 1814, Dobrovski re­garded Bulgarian as a dialect of Serbian. Twelve years ear­lier, the Englishman Leake published his Tetraglosson, in which the Bulgarian text is written in Greek characters. This work was reprinted in 1804 in Researches in Greece.59 Not until 1822 was the existence of a Bulgarian language made generally known by Vuk Stefanovic Karadzic in his book Prilog Petrogradskom uporednom re6niku svih jezika so naro- Citom osvrtom na bugarski jezik (An Appendix to the St. Petersburg Comparative Dictionary of A ll Language, With Particular Reference to Bulgarian). “With this book,” wrote the well-known Bulgarophile Derzhavin, “ the Serb Vuk Ka- radiid brought into the light of day the Bulgarian language, which everyone had forgotten. As his linguistic criterion, he took the dialects of Macedonia, i. e., the dialect of Razlog, and illustrated the Bulgarian laguage with some poems com­municated to him by Bulgars from Razlog.” 60 Until 1826, Schafarik had not seen a single book in Bulgarian; he “ thought that the Bulgars were only to be found between the

M Jirecek, op. cit., p. 506.60 N . S. Derschawin, Uber Makedonien, wissenchaftliche und

krilische Untersuchung, Leipzig, 1918, p. 67.

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Danube and the Balkan Mountains, and estimated their num­ber at no more thin six hundred thousand.” 61

In 1824, there appeared the first Bulgarian spelling primer, compiled by Petar Hadji Berovi6; in the following year, a col­lection of Biblical stories in Bulgarian came out in Budapest, and the year after that, another spelling primer. In 1828, a Bulgarian version of the New Testament, translated by Sapu- nov and the monk Serafim, was published, and in 1844 Hristaki Pavlovi6, from Dupnica, printed Pajsije’s Slaveno- Mdgarska istorija in a much abridged form. The appearance on the scene of Neofit Rilski, a gifted, industrious and ex­tremely patriotic scholar, accelerated and further strengthen­ed the Bulgars’ national and spiritual awakening. Connected on his mother’s side with Mihailo German and Marko Georgi- jevic, who were important figures in Serbia, Neofit was on friendly terms with Prince MiloS and received much help from him. He was himself aware of his calling as a teacher and educational worker, and made great efforts to give of his best. In 1835, the “Printing Press of the Serbian Princes” printed his Bulgarian grammar and Katihiziz (Catechism), and in 1836 his Sluzba i Zitije svetoga Jovana Rilskog (Service and L ife of Saint John of Rilo). In 1840, he published his translation of the New Testament.82 For the rest, Bulgarian books were printed in Istanbul, which was becoming more and more the spiritual and cultural center of the Bulgars, in Vienna, Belgrade, Bucharest and RuschCuk (now Ruse). In Salonica, a Bulgarian printing press was opened in 1839: here was printed the paper Solun, which “contained only an­nouncements and advertisements.” 83 Early 1859 saw the ap­pearance in Salonica of the paper Bulgariya, organ of the movement advocating union of Bulgaria with Rome. The papal legate, Brunonio, was also working toward the same end, and on December 18, 1860, an agreement was signed for a union: As first archbishop of the Bulgarian united Church, the Pope appointed Josif Sobelski, who was consecrated in Rome on April 8, 1861. On June 18, however, Sobelski dis­

61 Jirecek, op. cit., p. 506.92 Neofit Rilski, Izabiani suchineniya (Selected W ritings), Sofia,

1937, pp. 4 and 13— 14.*3 Karl Braun-W iesbaden, Eine tiirkische Reise, Vol. II, Stuttgart,

1876, p. 179.

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appeared in Istanbul;64 it is believed that he was bound by the Russians and taken o ff by ship to Russia.

At this time, Istanbul was the Bulgars’ spiritual, cultural and ecclesiastical center: in 1849, Neofit Rilski opened here the first Bulgarian church, which, according to R. Grujid, “soon became the rallying point of the movement of all Slavs under Turkish rule for the liberation of their Church from the Greeks.” 85 From here, support was given for the opening of Bulgarian schools. Until 1845, these were few in Bulgaria itself, while in Macedonia they numbered no more than four.#a Serbian schools, on the other hand, were opened in Macedonia from the beginning of the nineteenth century on (in 1813, for example, at Prilep and KiCevo); in the middle of the century their number was about forty, which increased by the Serbo-Turkish war of 1878 to a hundred.

Until 1845, the total number of schools in Bulgaria was thirtyone, and in Thrace eighteen. The number that had been newly opened increased with the passage of time. “The rebel­lious population felt a need for education,” says M. Grigorov. “That offered it by the monastic schools was no longer ade­quate. . . . Workers in the revival movement were engaged in this direction also.” 97

The consequences of this campaign were inevitable. “From these schools,” says Karl Braun-Wiesbaden, “and also with the aid of leaflets and books, a Slavic consciousness was spread abroad. Whereas before, people did not know them­selves whether they were Serbs or Illyrians [Albanians], Rumanians or Greeks, now they began to consider themselves Slavs and prot6g6s of Orthodox Holy Russia, whose duty it was to free them from the rule of the Phanariot Greek hier­archy.” ,8

It was in the schools, especially those attended by Bul­garian youths abroad, that the first generations of the Bul­garian intelligentsia were fired by the spirit of national revo­lution. Their chief desire was to win their national freedom,

** Ibid., p. 184.•5 Rad. G ru jii, “Egzarhiska crkva u Juinoj S rb iji” (The Exarchist

Church in Southern Serbia), Narodna enciklopedija SHS, V o l. I, p. 704. •• Hermann W endel, Siidslawische Frage, Berlin, 1918, pp. 216— 17. •7 Neofit Rilski, op. cit., p. 3.M Braun-W iesbaden, Fine tiirkische Reise, V o l. II, pp. 181— 82.

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but they were undecided as to the lines along which their efforts should be directed. As a result of Venelin’s influence, many of them conceived the ambition of resurrecting the great Bulgarian empire that had existed under Simeon. Re­presenting somewhat later the ideas of this generation, Ivan Vazov dreamed of a Bulgaria that should embrace the entire area from the Black Sea to Lake Ohrid and from the Danube to the mouths of the Struma and Marica.69 In practice, how­ever, the Bulgars failed to raise a single rebellion in any way resembling those of the Greeks or the Serbs: under the in­fluence of the revolutionary ideas current at the time, they did plan an insurrection in early 1849, but the total result was a rising confined to the area around Vidin. On April 10, 1849, Ilija GaraSanin wrote to Stevan Knicanin: “Some expression of discontent has broken out in Bulgaria, but in my opinion it won’t come to anything in the end.” 70

A sober observer well acquainted with the true state of affairs, GaraSanin even recommended the Bulgars not to rebel. In a circular addressed to district commanders and dated March 19, 1849, he instructed them, i f they were in contact with people from Bulgaria, to persuade them that it was inexpedient to raise a rebellion, since “Serbia would welcome their liberation as much as they would themselves, but she sees that the time is not yet opportune, and for this reason wishes to save them from this ill-advised under­taking.” 71

In his Nadertanije (Memoirs), published a few years before this circular, GaraSanin showed that he understood the Bul­gars’ situation and did not resent their unwarlike attitude. “Of all the Slavic lands,” he wrote, “Bulgaria is nearest to the imperial capital [Istanbul], and the greater part of her territory is easily accessible; the Turks’ most important military positions and more than half of their army are to be found there. In no other European country does the Turk feel so secure, so much the master, as in Bulgaria. Moreover, al­most all the Bulgars are without arms and have learnt to work and obey: industry and submissiveness have become

68 Cf. Grothe, op. cit., p. 71.70 Prepiska Ilije GaraSanina, 1839— 49 (Correspondance of Ilija

Gara§anin, 1839— 49), V o l. I, Belgrade, 1950, p. 383.71 Ibid., p. 374.

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for them the rule. These observations, however, should not lead us into the error of failing to acknowledge the Bulgars’ true worth, or, what is worse, holding them in contempt.” 72

From the time of Prince M iloi on, Serbia took a very favorable attitude toward the spiritual and national awaken­ing of the Bulgars, and gave whatever help she could. From furnishing material assistance and offering facilities for the printing of textbooks and other literature for Bulgarian schools, this ever-increasing cooperation ranged, through the acceptance and maintenance of Bulgarian students, to the con­clusion, under Prince Mihailo, of an alliance with the Bul­garian revolutionary committee formed at the beginning of 1867. When Panayot Khitrov appealed to them for help in raising a rebellion in Bulgaria, a group of prominent Bulgars in Bucharest refused, justifying their action by the pretext that “ they intended to work together with Serbia for the formation, with the latter, of a South Slav state, i. e., to unite the Serbian and Bulgarian popular forces in order to create a strong Balkan confederation.” 73 With this in view, the Serbian government enabled S. Rakovski in 1860 to publish his weekly paper Dunavski lebed in Belgrade and in 1865 per- mited the publication of the paper Vostok. Moreover, a “Bul­garian Legion” was founded in Belgrade to enable Bulgarian revolutionaries, at the expense of the Serbian state, to receive military training and prepare themselves for participation in the liberation of their country. A t first, their number was a mere fifteen, but later it rose to two hundred, and by 1868 there were at least three hundred. The Bulgars were joined by Serbs from Bosnia and Hercegovina, from Montenegro, Dalmatia and Hungary; there were also a few Croats.74

In spite of all the enthusiasm and longing to create a single South Slav empire, the Legion disintegrated. The Bul­gars rose in protest because Professor DragaSevic insisted in his lecturos that Salonica was in Old Serbia; other grievances were that they had begun to be issued with the same rations

7’ A s quoted In Ferdo 5i§i6, Jugoslovenska misao (Yugoslav Thought), Belgrade, 1937, p. 94.

78 Rosen, op. cit., p. 66.74 Ibid., p. 189.

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as members of the Serbian forces and that their pay had been reduced from one ducat to one ruble per month.75

Before the emergence of the Exarchate, Serbia assisted the Bulgarian cause in other ways. In 1860, the Serbian Academic Society financed the publication of the first volume of Stevan Verkovic’s collection of folk poems of the Macedonian Bul­gars, although it refused to back the publication of materials on Southern Serbia assembled by MiloS Milojevic.78 Verkovi6, who, from being a Catholic theologian, became a supporter of Ljudevit Gaj and later a close collaborator of GaraSanin in promoting the Serbian cause in Macedonia, is an extremely problematical figure. There is no evidence whatsoever that he refused GaraSanin’s proposal to work on Serbia’s behalf or that he only in 1862 became “head and leader of a secret Serbian mission in Macedonia, a position which he held until 1875.” 77 On August 8, 1848, Garaianin wrote to Timotej Kne- zevic, head of the Prince’s chancellery: “The bearer of this letter is named Verkovic, and comes from Bosnia [he was born in the village of Uljar, in Posavina, in 1827], For the most part, especially recently, he has lived in Croatia. He has been in Serbia once before, and was employed to give in­formation about Turkish Albania.. . . It is best that you send him away immediately. He needs money to cover his traveling expenses, and from the little that I have with me I have been unable to give him anything. Would you therefore give him fifty ducats from the police fund and make a note that they have been given him.” 78 Verkovi6’s mystification over the epos “Veda Slovenska” for long engaged the interest of aca­demic circles.79

In 1868, Verkovid published in Moscow his work Opis na- £ina zivota makedonskih bugara (Description of the Mace­donian Bulgars’ Way of Life), which was dedicated to Princess Julija, w ife of Prince Mihail.80 An adriot and versatile schemer, Verkovic succeeded at one time in creating a name for himself. In fact, he belonged to the type that knows how to serve several masters simultaneously: while working for

75 Ibid.76 Derschawin, op. cit., p. 66.77 Archiv fur slavische Philoiogie, Vol. X X V , 1903, p. 581.78 Prepiska Ilije GaraSanina, 1839— 49, Vol. I, p. 257.78 Cf. A rd iiv liir slavische Philoiogie, V ol. X X V , 1903, p. 581.80 Dersdiawin, op. cit., p. 76.

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Gara§anin, he was collecting material for Count Ignatiev, using the Russian consul at Salonica as an intermediary. It was on the basis of this— incidentally inaccurate—ethno­graphical and statistical material that the frontiers of San Stefano Bulgaria were subsequently carved out.81

In 1861, Josif Juraj Strosmajer enabled the publication in Zagreb of an anthology of Bulgarian folk poems collected by the Miladinov brothers, from Struga. On November 15, 1926, KreSimir Iva6i6 wrote: “Strosmajer sent the brothers Dimi- trije and Kosta Miladinov to do educational work in Mace­donia. With his material assistance, they published in 1861 the first collection of Macedonian folk poems.” 82

The notion that the whole of Macedonia was inhabited only by Bulgars— that is, that all the Slavs in Turkey were Bulgars, with the exception of those in Bosnia and Hercego­vina, which had not been incorporated in the Serbian state— was reinforced by the mistake made in 1817 by Schafarik, who, in his Slovensky zemljovid (Geography of the Slavs), published in Prague in that year, designated all the Serbian lands south of the frontiers of the Serbian state of that time as Bulgarian. Schafarik’s example was followed by Dimitrije Davidovi6, who published, as an appendix to his lstorija srp- skog naroda (History of the Serbian People), a map entitled “The Lands Inhabited by the Serbs.” The first edition of this work came out in Vienna in 1821, and the second was issued at the expense of the Serbian government. Justifying Bul­garian territorial ambitions on the basis of Serbian sources, D. Rizov quoted Davidovic: “On the map and in the book to which it is appended, not only Macedonia, but also the towns of NiS, Leskovac, Vranje, Pirot and even Prigtina and Novi Pnzar, lie outside the frontiers of the Serbian tribe.” 88

THE BULGARIAN EXARCHATE AND THE MACEDONIAN QUESTION

In the development of the Macedonian question, the Bul­garian Kxarchntc played an extremely important part, for it was the first propagator of Bulgarian territorial ambitions

"* Ibid.** Balkannka M rra c lfa (Balkan Federation), N ov . 15, 1926, p. 1016."* D, Rlzolt, Ola Hulgnren In Ihren historisdhen, ethnographisdien

und polltlsclien Qrenten, Berlin, 1917, p. 27.

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among the Slavic population of Macedonia. Despite the policy of national repression to which the people was exposed, Bul­garian discontent was directed much more against the Greek bishops than against the Turks. “ It is characteristic,” says Kurt Floericke, “ that the first steps were directed, not against the political oppression exercised by the Turks, but against the religious and linguistic persecution conducted by the Greeks. Thus, they did not leave the path of the law for an instant, but rather appealed to the pashas and the Sultan for their impartial and well-disposed mediation.” 84 Bogdan Filov remarks that Pajsije’s Slaveno-bulgarska istorija was the original stimulus of the Bulgarian national movement ,“which took place simultaneously in Macedonia and Bulgaria and which was primarily directed against the use of Greek in the church service.” 85 “The Greek schools in Bulgaria,” wrote Ivan MinCev, “were a greater danger than the tyrannical regime of the Turks, for they were on the way to denationaliz­ing the Bulgars.” 88

In order to avert this danger that was threatening them from the Patriarchate at Constantinople, the Bulgars threw themselves into the arms of the Turks. The efforts made by Bulgarian leaders before the proclamation of the Exarchate did not, however, bear fruit. Rich Bulgarian merchants who had awakened to the call of nationalism organized in 1840— 45 an opposition to ecclesiastical oppression. In 1867, the Bulgars appealed to the Porte for permission to set up a special body for public instruction in Bulgaria.87 In a memorandum which the Bulgarian revolutionary committee handed to the Sultan in 1870, it was stated that the Bulgars were fully prepared to remain under the Sultan’s authority. “ I f our independence,” says the memorandum, “could find recognition and con­firmation under the glorious scepter of the sultans, and if the sultans were at the same time willing to be also emperors of the Bulgars, then why should we not offer our help and our strength to the Ottoman monarchy, as the Magyars did to Austria and the Algerians to France?... Diplomacy would then stand in astonishment when it saw a miracle where it

84 Floericke, op. cit., pp. 41— 42.85 Filov, op. cit., p. 5.84 Mintschev, op. cit., pp. 18— 19.87 Baker, op. cit., pp. 31 and 44.

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had been accustomed to seeing a weak body. In this way, all pretext for intervention and threats from whatever power would be precluded for all time. Not one foreign country would look askance at Istanbul under the pretext of liberat­ing the Christians, since the latter would be free and would want to remain so.” 88

The idea behind this memorandum, with its obvious digs at Russia, is attributed by Braun-Wiesbaden to the Porte. “ It was,” he says, “neither a French, nor a Roman, nor a Greek, but a Turkish idea, although, indeed, completely beyond the grasp of a man like Abdul Aziz.” 88 Joseph Maria von Rado- witz, whose position at that time would enable him to be well informed on such matters, ascribed the idea of proclaiming an exarchate and the execution of this idea to Russia: “This movement [the Bulgarian movement for ecclesiastical separa­tion from the Patriarchate of Constantinople] was secretly fostered by Russia, i. e., by Ignatiew, whose personal idea it was, without, however, its suddenly coming out into the open. It represented a complete turnabout in Russian oriental po­licy: while, until the Crimean War, the Russian slogan had been the defense of Orthodoxy as a whole, now the Slavic national idea emerged for the first time as a leading principle to which the ancient Patriarchate of Constantinople sacrificed, together with the sympathies of the disappointed Greeks. From now on, Russia was no longer merely the chief power behind Holy Russian Orthodoxy, but a mighty champion of the Slav national movement.. . . Only in the summer of 1872 did this gradually become clear. Foreign diplomats on the Bosphorus did not, apparently, appreciate this as they should have done— least of all the British representative, Elliot, who spoke of it to me disparagingly. In the meanwhile, I reported it to Berlin as the biggest change for centuries in Russian oriental policy, and expressed the conviction that it marked the beginning of a future conflict between Russian and Turkey.” “°

98 Cf. Mintschev, op. cit., p. 29, and Baker, op. cit., pp. 44— 46 and 363— 66, w here the text of the firman proclaiming the Exarchate may be found.

8* Braun-W iesbaden, Eine tiirkische Reise, V ol. II, p. 187.*° H a jo Halborn, Aufzeichnungen und Erinnerungen aus dem

Leben des Botschalters Joseph Maria von Radowitz, Vol. I, Berlin- Leipzig, 1925, p. 242.

105

This was the setting in which the Bulgarian Exarchate was born. Without doubt, the Russians exerted great efforts toward its creation, since they believed that in this way they would secure a powerful means of realizing their policy in the Balkans. The Porte, on the other hand, which understood better than the Russians what was going on, thereby acquired a new weapon with which to smash the unity of the Balkan Christians. Serbia, who was ill informed and prompted, as ever, by sentiment for the Slavic cause, interpreted the pro­clamation of the Exarchate as a gain for the Slavic world and for Orthodoxy. The Serbian government, through its envoy in Istanbul, and Metropolitan Mihailo personally—who was very favorably disposed toward the Bulgars—welcomed the creation of the Exarchate in the belief that its influence would be confined to ecclesiastical matters and that a much happier time was thus ahead for the Slavic population in the south of the Peninsula. A true pan-Slav, completely devoted to the Russians and to Orthodoxy, and one of the main leaders of Slavophilism in the Balkans, Metropolitan Mihailo made great efforts to secure recognition of the Exarchate, for he was anxious to preserve the unity of the Orthodox Church in the Balkans, which was being subjected to heavy attack, both by propaganda of various kinds and by materialistic ideas.

The Bulgars, on the other hand, understood the matter quite differently. Still without a state, they tried to exploit the Exarchate for the realization of all their national ambi­tions, which sprang from the influence of Venelin and that nebulous romanticism which had seized their leaders of the time. Some of these leaders were, in any case, little concerned about the Church; what did concern them above all was the realization of their national ambitions and the formation of a Bulgarian state at the first opportunity. Richard von Mach was not far from the truth when he wrote that the firman of March 11, 1870, by which the Exarchate was esatblished, marked “ the beginning of a new national development of the Bulgarian people.” 91 Mintschev commented that this firman “belongs to the greatest moral victories attained by the Bul­garian people during the nineteenth century.” 92 Dr. Vasil

81 Richard von Mach, Der Machtbereich des bulgarischen Exarchats in der Tiirkei, Leipzig-Neuchatel, 1906, p. 11.

82 Mintschev, op. cit., p. 26.

106

Radoslavoff wrote: “The Constitution of the Bulgarian Prin­cipality contains a special provision whereby the new Bul­garian state constitutes an essential part of the Church and is subordinate to the Holy Synod, regardless of where the latter shall have its seat.” 93 In the light of all these circumstances, it is not surprising that the first five Bulgarian bishops, in a letter to the Bulgarian nation, urged the people, not only to remain loyal to the Sultan, but to redouble their loyalty and submission.” 04

For the Bulgars, the most valuable gain was the official recognition, throughout the territory of the Exarchate, of “bugar-mileti” as well as “urum-mileti.” The former term was intended as designating all those members of the Ortho­dox Church who remained loyal to the Patriarchate but who did not feel themselves to be Greeks. From the practical or political point of view, this was the first official recognition of Bulgarian nationality. On the other hand, the Serbs in Old and Southern Serbia suffered a twofold setback: since they had no national Church of their own, it was impossible for them to be entered in the population register as a separate nation,95 and, divided as they were between Exarchate and Patriarchate, they were thrown into conflict among them­selves. “With the creation of the Exarchate,” says Carl Ritter von Sax, “the Bulgarian name once more acquired official significance.” 96

The edict establishing the Exarchate opened up consider­able opportunities for spreading Bulgarian influence in all the Serbian lands under Turkish rule. The opportunities were amply exploited. Under the pretext of introducing Church services read in Slav and liberating the people from the authority of the Greek bishops, there began a bitter struggle for the Bulgarization of areas that had never been Bulgarian. “Those who declared themselves for the Exarchate were Bul­gars, those who acknowledged the Patriarchate were Serbs. It was scarcely possible at that time to trace any linguistic

•* Vasil Radoslawoff, Bulgar ten und die Weitkrise, Berlin, 1923,p. 1.

94 Baker, op. cit., pp. 44— 46.05 Cvijii, Remarques sur l'ethnographie de la Macedoine, p. 50.

Carl Ritter von Sax, Geschichte des Maditverlalles der Tiirkel bis Ende des XIX. Jahrhunderts und die Phasen der norientalischen Frage« bis aut die Gegenwart, Wien, 1913, p. 19.

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borderline.” 97 Bulgarian agents, many of whom were from Macedonia and had been converted to the Bulgarian cause, inundated the whole of Macedonia and, under the aegis of the Exarchate, engaged in the work of bringing the people over to their side. On January 14, 1899—i. e., at a time when relations had become well defined, Freiherr von Marschall reported to German Chancellor von Hohenlohe that all the Bulgarian commercial representatives in Macedonia were merely revolutionary agents: “This is especially true,” he said, “of the agent Rizov in Skoplje, where he has organized a central depot for the Macedonian-Bulgarian movement. The same is essentially true of Bulgarian diplomatic re­presentatives, who consider their chief task to be the con­ducting of propaganda for a Greater Bulgaria.” 88

Article 10 of the above-mentioned firman required that at least two thirds of the total Orthodox population in any area should decided in favor of the Exarchate, that it be included in the area of the Exarchate and that it be given the right to ask for Exarchate bishops and priests. Taken all in all, this edict subordinated to the Exarchate the dioceses of Pirot, Nil, Custendil and Samokov, all of which had previously come under the Patriarchate of Pec. The omission of all reference to Skoplje, Veles and Stip in the edict is conspicuous.99 “In Macedonia and eastern Thrace,” says Richard von Mach, “i. e., in those areas that are today under direct Turkish administra­tion, not one diocese was originally subordinated to the Bul­garian Exarchate.” 100 Later, however, they too were included in the Exarchate and received bishops appointed by the Exarch.

In their efforts to obtain this two-thirds majority, Bul­garian propagandists did not scruple in their choice of me­thods. Referring to their work in Southern Serbia, Theodor von Sosnosky wrote: “What these methods were the Greeks, Serbs and Turks of this unhappy land felt on their own backs. By plunder and arson, rape and murder, armed bands tried

97 Gilbert in der Maur, Die Jugoslawen einst und jetzt, Leipzig- Vienna, 1936, p. 237.

Die grosse Poiitik der europaischen Kabinette, 1871— 1914, Vol. XII, Part II, Berlin, 1923, p. 525.

99 Von Madi, op. cit., pp. 14—15.100 Ibid., p. 16.

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to make them come over to the Bulgarian side. The obvious consequence of this terrorism was that other nations re­taliated according to their strength. In this manner, one band raged against another.” 101 “Their terrorism,” says Hugo Grothe of the Bulgars, “brought them more enemies than friends. If power were to come into their hands today, there would be a danger that everything non-Bulgarian would be persecuted ten times as bitterly as it was when Bulgaria was in Turkish hands.” 102 “The fear in Macedonia,” wrote H. N. Brailsford, “is more than an emotion. It is a physical diseace, the malady of the country, the ailment that comes of tyran­n y » 102a

For a long time, the Turks tolerated this conduct on the part of the Bulgarian missionaries, for their old hatred of the Serbs had been exacerbated by the Serbo-Turkish war of 1878. “It is understandable,” says Heksch, “that the Turks preferred the patient and submissive Bulgar to the rebellious Serb or Greek. Since the Serbian principality had gained its freedom, the Turks regarded every Serb who declared himself to be such as a rebellious conspirator against the Turkish regime. This circumstance was exploited by the Bulgars in order to spread their propaganda among the Serbs outside the principality. Whoever was reluctant to become a Bulgar and persisted in calling himself a Serb was denounced to the Turks as conspiring with Serbia, and could only expect severe punishment. Serbian priests were maltreated; permission was refusde to open Serbian schools, and those that were already in existence were closed; Serbian monasteries were destroyed. In order to avoid persecution, the population renounced itsnntinnnlity and called itself Bulgarian___ During the lastthirty or forty years, propaganda has been rife in which the HuIkum have encouraged the Turks to act against Serbs and Greeks. Ilonce, throughout Macedonia, Thrace and Dardania, Slavs are considered to be Bulgars, which is quite incorrect. On the contrary, the Slavs in Macedonia are incapable of understanding a Bulgar from Jantra. If it is desired to de­

101 Th. von Sosnosky, Die Balkanpoiitik Osterreich-Ungarns seit 1886, Stuttgart-Berlin, 1914, Vol. II, p. 129.

101 Hugo Grothe, Aul liirkischer Erde, Berlin, 1903, p. 366.ioxa h . N. Brailsford, Macedonia: Its Races and Their Future, Lon­

don, 1906, p. 36.

109

signate these Slavs correctly, then they must be considered as Serbs, for the Serbian name is so popular with them that, for example, male children are sometimes christened ‘Srbin’ [Serb]. The Serbian hero of the folk poems, Marko Kraljevic, is obviously the Serbian ruler in Macedonia.” 103

Scarcely any serious scholars have considered that a vote for the Slavic church service was a declaration that one was a Bulgar. “If,” says Hugo Grothe, “during the church plebis­cite of 1872, two thirds of the Christian Slavs voted for the Exarchate, this was by no means a confession of their Bul­garian descent.” 104 Brailsford remarks that the inhabitants of Southern Serbia of that time were Bulgars, “because free and progressive Bulgaria has known how to attract them.” 105 The Fxarchate was a laboratory in which they were national­ly transformed: on these grounds, Brailsford says that the Fxarchate clergy were “missionaries of the Bulgarian idea.” 106

It is not, therefore, too much to say that the Bulgarian Exarchate was the precursor of San Stefano Bulgaria, which, as D. Rizov says, “remained the national and political ideal of the entire Bulgarian people.”107 “Present-day Bulgaria,” wrote Paul Dehn, “is considered by Bulgarian politicians as a torso, and they will not rest until they resurrect their country within the frontiers, more or less, of the San Stefano treaty, including, in partilucar, the Aegean ports, since Varna, on account of the expensive and time-wasting passage through the Bosphorus and Dardanelles, is insufficient.” 108 In order to consolidate the territory for this dreamed-of state, the Bulgars, as Hermann Wendel pointed out, set about the Mace­donian Slavs with deliberate and well-organized propaganda and a program for spreading Bulgarian education. “Teachers,” says Wendel, “not only taught the children to read and write, but instilled into them the Bulgarian national outlook. Thus, the Bulgars emerged, not as the initiators, but as the ex­ploiters, of a movement which, in the form of the awakening

103 Alexander von Heksch, Die Donau von ihrem Ursprung bis an die Miindung, Leipzig, 1885, p. 636.

104 Grothe, Aut tiirkischer Erde, p. 364.105 H. N. Brailsford, op. cit., sf. 103.10« Ibid., p. 105.107 Dimitar Rizoff, Bulgarien udn Russland, Berlin, p. 8.108 Paul Dehn, Die Volker Siidosteuropas und ihre politischen

Probleme, Halle,, 1909, p. 22.

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of the ‘unhistorical nationas,’ was bound inevitably to appear one day.” 109 “The new state,” says JireCek in reference to the Bulgaria it was hoped to create, “was supposed to embrace the area from the BaSiSko Lake and the port of Kavalla, and in the west to include Pirot, Vranje, Debar and Kastoria. These frontiers were never realized, but for the Bulgars they remained as a formulated political ideal.” 110

Thus the Exarchate, as it was envisaged by Bulgarian ecclesiastical and popular leaders, was the precursor of San Stefano Bulgaria—a hastily formed conception that was to become the tragedy of the Bulgarian people. Bulgaria, in the form in which it was carved out by the Russians at San Stefano, was intended to serve the Russians as a fulcrum in the Balkans, as a springboard toward domination of the Mediterranean. “Such a Bulgaria,” says Dr. Alexander Redlich, “was conceived, not as an independent country, but as a Rus­sian province, which would, formally speaking, remain under the sovereign power of Turkey. It was intended to become a Russian Egypt and to keep the route open for Russia to Istan­bul. In this way, Russia became the territorial neighbor of Turkey, which her next blow would destroy.” 111 In the view of H. W. V. Temperley, San Stefano Bulgaria fulfilled all Bul­garian ambitions: it was presented as an ideal for succeeding generations, and maps of it were in every school. “The realiza­tion of these frontiers," he says, “was the aim of the whole of subsequent Bulgarian policy.” 112 Wolfgang Windelband states that it was an attempt to achieve undisputed Russian control in the Balkans, “and St. Petersburg reckoned on Ku rope's bowing before a fait accompli, the force of which Iiiim always been attested in the history of diplomacy.” 118

In I ho calculations of those who hankered after a Greater lUilKuriu, Macedonia played an essential role. “Bulgaria,”

I li'nnaim Wendel, Makedonien und der Friede, Munich, 1919, pp. 211 2!).

110 (!. .llroNik, Dan FOrstentum Bulgarien, Prag-Wien-Leipzig, 1891, p. 316.

1,1 Alexander Rndlich, Der Gegensatz zwischen Osterreich-Ungarn und Russland, Stuttgnrt-Berlin, 1915, pp. 13— 14.

1,1 H. W. V. Tomporley, History oi Serbia, London 1917, p. 268. lla Wolfgang Windelband, Bismarck und die europaischen Gross-

m&chte, 1879—85, aul Grand unveroifentiichter Akten, Essen, 1940, p. 53.

Ill

wrote D. KrapCev on March 24, 1915, “will never renounce her claim to Macedonia. Sooner or later, in one way or another, it will become an inseparable part of our state. Enormous sacrifices have been paid for it, and, if necessary, yet more will be made when a suitable opportunity offers itself. The proper moment and the means. . . will be determined by the Bulgarian government.” ,u

The Congress of Berlin made it impossible for San Stefano Bulgaria to remain as it had been carved out: instead of bowing to Russia, Europe threw her plans into confusion. The regions of Pirot, Vranje, Leskovac, Prokuplje and NiS were annexed to Serbia, but Southern Serbia continued to be sub- jucted to Bulgarian propaganda, which, after this setback, merely redoubled its efforts. “That the Congress of Berlin left Macedonia under Turkish rule,” says Gilbert in der Maur, “was the result of complete ignorance and indifference to human dignity, a disgrace for the century in which the Italian and German nations, on the basis of the national principle, emerged as states.” 1,5 Von Radowitz did not believe that the Russian negotiators were convinced of the permanency of their achievement. “If they had been, then they would have been under an illusion as regards the world situation.” 1,6 Bismarck appears to have foreseen the possibility of such a development in Balkan relations. In his Memoirs, he wrote. “It is not impossible that in the distant future all these tribes [the Orthodox peoples in the Balkdns] will be forcibly annex­ed to the Russian system; that their mere liberation will not make them supporters of Russian authority has been provedprimarily by the Greek people___The liberation movementcontinued, and the same thing happened with the Rumanians, Serbs and Bulgars as with the Greeks: all these peoples readily accepted Russian assistance in their liberation from the Turks, but, when they had won their freedom, they did not show the slightest disposition to accept the tsar as the sultan’s successor.” 117

114 D. V. Krapchev, Izminal put, Sofia, p. 72.115 Gilbert in der Maur, op. cit., p. 327.” • Holborn, op. cit., Vol. II, p. 3.117 Bismarck, Gesammeite Werke, Vol. XV: Gedanken und Er-

innerungen, Berlin, 1932, p. 423.

112

From fear of the Russian danger—a fear that at that time was justified—the great powers continued to enslave a section of the Balkan Christians, on whom Bulgarian propaganda descended with renewed fervor, persisting in its attitude that what had now proved impossible of attainment would never­theless one day be achieved.

THE EMERGENCE OF THE MACEDONIAN QUESTION

Opinions are divided on the date of the emergence of the Macedonian question. According to Ivan Mintschev, this ques­tion was posed by the very division of the population into sup­porters of the Exarchate and the Patriarchate of Constan­tinople. Examining the point in greater detail, he associates it directely with the appointment by the Turks of Exarchist bishops in Ohrid and Skoplje. “Ohrid and Skoplje,” he says,“are the heart of Macedonia___On that day, the Macedonianquestion was born.” 118 According to Richard von Mach, how­ever, these appointments were not issued until December 1884: “After endless efforts, official permission was given for the nomination of Exarchist bishops for two approved dio­ceses, Ohrid and Skoplje.” 119 These bishops, Sinesije of Ohrid and Teodosije of Skoplje, did not assume their duties until 1890. In 1894, the Bulgars obtained Exarchist appointments to the dioceses of Veles and Nevrokop, and in 1897 for Bitolj, Debar and Strumica.120 Carl Ritter von Sax links the emerg­ence of the Macedonian question with the attempt by a group of Macedonians, gathered in Sofia, to persuade the great powers to intervene with the Porte in support of the Bul­garian cause in Macedonia. “It was this that brought the al­ready fourteen- or fifteen-year-old Macedonian question out into the open, after which, for the next eight or nine years, it aroused the greatest interest by its distortion.” 121

Others again assign the origin of the Macedonian question to the decision of the Berlin Congress to leave the entire area under Turkish rule, with the obligation that reforms be intro­

118 Mintschev, op. cit., p. 37.119 Von Mach, op. cit., p. 26.120 Ibid., pp. 28—30.

Von Sax, op. cit., p. 510.

113

duced. Thus, Noel Buxton, a great friend of the Bulgars, says that the decisions of the Berlin Congress created the Balkan question, which for him is the same as the Macedonian ques­tion.12* Ivan-VanCa Mihailov says that “until 1878, the Mace­donian question did not exist: there was only the question of Bulgaria as a whole.”125 Gilbert in der Maur regards the Ber­lin Congress as “the birthday of the Macedonian move­ment.” 124 In his article “Three Theses,” N. Terzijev makes a similar assertion.125

However this may be, from this time on, the discord between the views of the Exarchists on the one hand and of those who desired complete freedom on the other became more and more marked. The former might be called Bul­garian centralists, and the latter autonomists, although among the latter there were many differet nuances: the two factions differed in their formulation of the question and in the man­ner in which they considered it should be solved. For the Bulgars and those numerous Macedonians who had become Bulgarized, it was simply a question of continuing the struggle for the liberation of their fellow-countrymen: when circum­stances became more propitious, the authority of the Bul­garian principality would simply be extended over the whole of Macedonia—i. e., over those areas that after the Berlin Congress had remained under Turkish rule. For those who held this view, the Macedonian Slavs were “Macedonian Bul­gars.” For the Bulgars, as Lazar Mojsov says, “before the liberation of Bulgaria, there had been no ‘Macedonian ques­tion,’ no Macedonian national movement-- Only after theliberation of Bulgaria, when the ‘Macedonian Bulgars’ re­mained under Turkey, did the Macedonian question appear on the agenda, and then not as the Macedonian national ques­tion, but as the problem of liberating the ‘Macedonian Bul­gars’ and reuniting them with their ‘motherland.’ ” 128

181 Noel Buxton und C. Leonard Leese, Balkan Problems and European Peace, London, 1919, p. 27.

128 Ivan Mihailoff, Macedonia: A Switzerland oi the Balkans, St. Louis, 1950, p. 64.

m Gilbert in der Maur, op. cit., p. 327.115 Lazar Mojsov, Bugarska radniika partija (komunista) i Make-

donsko pitanje (The Bulgarian Workers' [Communist] Party and the Macedonian Question), Belgrade, 1948, p. 10.

Ibid., pp. 34—35.

114

•Slum Ihnt time, the official Bulgarian thesis on Macedonia lutw remained virtually the same. It is remarkable that the llulKiiriim socialists, unlike their Serbian counterparts, accep- ril Oil* thesis. In its eighth number for 1899, Novo Vreme, llu'oiftlcul organ of the Central Committee of the Bulgarian Hoclal Democrat Party, in a leading article entitled “The Macedonian Question,” stated that for the socialists this was mil it national, but merely a political, question. In its forty- flflh, forty-sixth and forty-seventh issues for 1901, Rabot- uwhasky vestnik, organ of the Bulgarian socialists, published mi article entitled “The Macedonian Movement and the Wor­ld th’ Party.” “Our attitude toward the Macedonian move­ment," says the article, “should be the same as our attitude toward any other movement with reactionary and anticultural li-ndoncies. Our main task is to draw the working people awuy from it and to turn their attention in the direction of I heir true needs.” 128

Dimitar Blagoyev-“Deda,” founder of the Bulgarian Social Democrat Workers’ Party, himself accepted and defended the (5renter Bulgarian thesis on Macedonia. In his book Prilog na intorijata na sotsijalizm v Bulgarija (Contribution to the History of Socialism in Bulgaria), published in 1907, Blagoyev writes: “From 1880 to 1885, the patriotic and revolutionary- minded intelligentsia, which represented existing classes in- Hofar as they had developed in both free part of Bulgaria [the Bulgarian principality and Eastern Rumelia, which, from being an autonomous province within the Turksih Empire, became Southern Bulgaria in 1885], organized a number of patriotic Macedonian societies. The object of these societies was to arm bands and send them into Macedonia in order to raise a rebellion and thus secure the country’s liberation, which constituted the most urgent national task at that time. The question of uniting both free parts of the country re­mained in the background, or, to be more precise, mergedwith the liberation of Macedonia___Revolution in Macedoniahad to bring with it the unification of Macedonia and Sou­thern Bulgaria with Northern Bulgaria, so that the liberation of this region represented a continuation of the great work of the glorious revolutionaries Khristo Botev, Levsky, Kab- leshkov, Volov and others.” 127

>*•« Ibid.1,7 Ibid., pp. 12—13.

115

Resistance to the pressure of Bulgarian propaganda and the campaign for national assimilation seems to have begun to crystallize even before the proclamation of the Exarchate, as soon as it became clear where the Bulgarian movement was heading. In the light of existing knowledge, it might be reasonable to say that the first group of “Macedonians” began to form in Instanbul, where, being at the very source of events, it could follow their development. This group had its own paper in Istanbul, entitled Makedonija, organ of the National Party, which first came out before the proclamation of the Exarchate and ceased publication in 1872. Its editor was Petko Slavejkov, who, in the issue for January 18, 1871, published an article entitled “The Macedonian Question.” This asserted that those “Makedonisti”—as people from this region were then called—who had refused to declare themselves in favor of Bulgaria were indeed not Bulgars but Macedonians, and that their language differed from Bulagrian. “We have scarcely won our freedom from the Greeks,” they said. “Surely we are not going to submit to others now?” In its issue of November 30, 1870, the paper Pravo, which also came out in Istanbul, attacked Kuzman Sapkarov for distributing in Ohrid textbooks written in Macedonian. He was reported as saying: “We have freed ourselves from the Greeks: are we now to become Sopovi [inhabitants of the region known as ‘Sopluk’]?” In the last decade of the nineteenth century, Petar Pop-Arsov published in Vienna his StambolovStina u Make- doniji (The Stambolov Regime in Macedonia), in which he sharply criticized the work of the Exarchate in Southern Ser­bia and demanded Macedonia’s secession from the Exarchate and the provision of her own teachers. In general, as we shall see later in greater detail, resistance to the Greater Bulgarian aspect of the Exarchate’s work was becoming increasingly powerful.

This attitude provoked a sharp response from the official Bulgarian side: those who asserted the nationally distinctive character of the population of these areas were dubbed “se­paratists.” In his article “Claimants to Macedonia,” published in 1899 in the Russian periodical Zhizn, D. Grigorijev points out that this movement was young, “but, judging by all ap- f'

116

Iii n ranees, it would appear to have the future on its side. It is ImllNputable that it exists only in Macedonia.... Above all,I In- wparatists deny the justice of Bulgarian claims to Mace­donia." At the Congress of Rilo, the Macedonian revolutionary in Kiinization defined its attitude as follows: “Everything in I lie deeds and actions of the Exarchate and its organs tending toward Bulgarian [the organization] regards as harmful to its demands and takes a stand against it.”

Later, when the Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Or­ganization (also known as IMRO) had developed the scale of U,n activities, the Exarchate was its first and bitterest enemy. The younger generation, for the most part educated in Ex- archist schools, began to turn against the tyranny exercised by Exarchist clergy and officials. “In 1890,” wrote G’orCe Petrov in his Memoirs, “there appeared almost imperceptibly, among young people in all the Bulgarian centers, a movement against the bishops, local authorities, Exarchist priests and officials; there was also opposition to the claims of the Ex­archate to exercise unlimited control over the Church and schools throughout the land. In this struggle, the esnafi, who constituted a powerful class in the towns of Macedonia, took the side of the young people.. . . There was not a bishop or prominent Exarchist teacher but was subjected to insults and persecutions on the part of the population. This movement developed concurrently with that of Macedonian ‘separatism,’ as it was termed in the periodical Loza, which came out in Sofia under the editorship of Arsov, BalasCev, Hadji Nikolov and others. Even today, Loza claims that this movement appeared in Macedonia as a result of their propaganda. This same ‘separatist’ movement also made headway among teachers in the gymnasium in Salonica. In my opinion, this movement, which went on for several years, may be explain­ed as a reaction to the old desire of the Exarchate to con­centrate in its hands the control of public life, and moreover, may be described as the country’s first attempt at independent action.” 188

When IMRO had completed its organization, the Exarchate began to look upon its work with even greater disfavor, al­though their mutual relations were not publicly broken off.

*** Spomenl na G'orie Petrov, p. 19.

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Each continued its activities, hindering the work of the other wherever possible. The Exarchate was at an advantage, since it was legally recognized, while teachers who supported IMRO were obliged to pass themselves off as Exarchists. Petrov, who was well informed on these matters, says that the Exarchate furnished the Bulgarian government with an opportunity for setting up “commercial agencies” throughout Macedonia, for it regarded IMRO as a dangerous adversary which might ruin the entire Exarchist cause. On the other hand, the Exarchate and its supporters constantly appealed to the government and excepted it to save them.” m IMRO, for its part, stub­bornly persisted in its efforts to remove all possible rivals from Macedonian territory and to establish itself as sole leader. It was anxious, particularly with regard to the coun­try’s teachers, among whom it counted its best people, to force the Exarchate to submit to its will and to appoint as primary and high school teachers only those persons whom it recom­mended. In 1898, Petrov went illegally to Istanbul on behalf of the organization in order to secure an arrangement, and took with him a list of such persons drawn up by the or­ganization’s Central Committee.<so “When the Exarch received me,” says Petrov, “we talked at length about many things. I had the imperssion that he seriously considered the Ex­archate to be the sole leader of spiritual and social life in Macedonia. Consequently, he showed no inclination to make any concessions whatsoever.” 131

On this occasion, the substance of the quarrel was a dis­agreement on the best way of achieving the country’s libera­tion—by revolution, advocated by IMRO, or by evolution, defended by the Exarch. Concluding his account of this meet­ing, Petrov says: “I was carried away and spoke with some asperity. Deeply convinced of the justice of our cause, I beg­ged the Exarch above all to be reasonable and not to perse­cute our movement. I repeated that we were ready a power in the country, and appealed to his discretion, that a conflict might be avoided. He lowered his voice, and fell silent. I took my leave of him, convinced that I should suceed in my mis-

Ibid., p. 54.4S0 Ibid., pp. 73—79.151 Ibid., p. 75.

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ulim," '•* Petrov was mistaken: the Exarch’s policy toward IMHO remained as before.

W<> find a similar demand for separation from the Bulgars mill for self-affirmation as an independent nation in Krsta I'. Misirkov, who wrote: “However, if during the national it wakening of the Makedonians, we had taken a different view of the political map of the Balkan Peninsula, the Macedonians would have acted quite differently. If Bulgaria and Thrace had been free and if Serbia had lived in the same conditions ax Macedonia for fifty years, the Macedonians would have m-led in accord with the Serbs and not with the Bulgars. .Similarly, the Macedonians could have collaborated with the (! reeks, if the latter could have acted more sensibly and if only Greece and Macedonia had been for fifty years under the Turks and all the other Balkan lands had been free.” 155

In his book Makedonija i Stara Srbija (Macedonia and Old Serbia), Spiridon Gopievic quotes a report of 1888 on Bul­garian propaganda in Southern Serbia, which contains the observation that in this region there were increasing numbers of people who supported neither side in the quarrel but simp­ly wanted their own independence. “I must further point out,” the report says, “that there are people here who feel no enthusiasm for Serbia, Bulgaria or Greece, and who dream of an independent state. Being Slavs, they will have nothing to do with the Greeks, nor with the Serbs since the latter show no interest in them, nor with the Bulgars since the language of the latter is alien to them and the constant im­position of the idea of a Greater Bulgaria is unacceptable to them. The number of these independents, however, is still very small.” 134 Misirkov also championed the fight against propaganda, since the consequences for the population were extremely severe. Moreover, the view that the population of these areas had a distinctive character was gaining more and more supporters. “The fight against various kinds of propa­ganda in Macedonia,” he says,, “is not a retrogressive but a progressive step, since we are fighting for our freedom against the forces of darkness, which will not allow our country to

’>» Ibid., p. 76.,M As quoted in Mojsov, op. cit., p. 20.,M Spiridon Gopfevid, Makedonien und Altserbien, Vienna, 1889,

p. 311.

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see its interests with its own eyes, but instead.. . obscure the truth by giving it a Bulgarian, Serbian or Greek bias. It is time we cast off the meshes in which national and religious propaganda in Macedonia has entangled us.” 135

With the passage of time, this trend became more and more pronounced. Dimo Kazasov points out that in 1894 or­ganizations such as the “Young Macedonian Society,” the “Fraternal Union” and the “Macedonian Committee” had al­ready begun to appear. In 1894, Glavinov, in his paper Make- donski glasnik, stated: “In the Macedonian national revo­lutionary movement, there are three trends: the nationalistic, i.e., Bulgarophile, the socialist and the purely Macedonian.”138

It will have been noticed that all this was taking place during the period when the Internal Macedonian Revolu­tionary Organization was coming into being. Organized in 1893 in Salonica, it counted among its founders Goce DelCev, Damjan Grujev, Pere To§ev, G’orfce Petrov, Dr. Hriste Tatar- fiev, Petar Pop-Arsov, Ivan Hadji-Nikolov and Hriste Batan- d2ijev. According to Article 1 of the constitution, the aim of the Organization was “to gather into one entity all discontent­ed elements in Macedonia and the area of the Aegean, regard­less of nationality, in order to achieve, by means of revo­lution, complete political autonomy for these areas.”

The emergence of such an organization was favored by the ideological and political atmosphere of the time: disillusion­ment in the Bulgarian state, reaction against the Exarchate and the longing for independence were becoming more and more pronounced. Delfiev, who, according to some, was prompted by socialist ideas while others maintained that he was simply a national revolutionary (Slavejko Arsov, com­mander of a guerrilla detachment at Resan during the rising of August 2, 1903, remarked that “DelCev did not entertain any extremist—socialist or anarchist—ideas: he did not serve such ideas”),137 oriented the entire movement toward the masses, and from them sought support for the execution of

135 As quoted in Mojsov, op. cit., p. 29.<M As quoted in Mojsov, op. cit., p. 18.137 Vostaniiko dvixenije vo Jugozapadna Makedonija po spomeni

na Slavejko Arsov (The Rising in Southwest Macedonia: Memoirs of Slavejko Arsov), Skoplje, p. 7.

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the Organization’s avowed aim—liberation of Macedonia from Turkish rule. “The key to the liberation of Macedonia,” he wrote on October 17, 1895, to Jefrem Karanov, “is to be found In an internal rising. Whoever thinks of liberating Macedonia In uny other way is lying, both to himself and to others.” 138

The entire efforts of this revolutionary group were con- funtrated on organizing and stirring up the masses, in order to prepare them as quickly and as thoroughly as possible for n rising. Dimitar Vlahov states that they dreamed of an auto­nomous Macedonia under the protection of the great European powers.139 “In Macedonia,” wrote DelCev in the letter men­tioned above, “a systematic campaign is being waged for a general internal rising, which shall assume large pro­portions, and there is not a single comer of the country that is not covered by this campaign.” 140 In comparison with what Petrov has to say about the early work of the Organization, DelCev was exaggerating considerably: like every inspired revolutionary, he was more of a visionary than a realist. “As far as I recall,” says Petrov, “our first plan was extremely modest: every member had to give half a lira annually, and on his ‘christening’ [initiation into the Organization] to give according to his inclination and means. I remember the desire expressed by Pereto [ToSev]: that a man should be sent to Europe at his expense to learn how to make bombs, so that we might use them to overthrow Turkey. Altogether, we had some childish ideas. Our first main desire was to appoint in the cities and villages the maximum number of circles, con­spiratorial in character and selected from close friends who trusted one another, and to start something against the Turks with the aid of bombs.” 141

In order to attain the maximum effect for their propa­ganda, they began publishing their own papers: in Bitolj, Petrov issued his Na oruzje, which came out altogether in no more than nine numbers, each number benig printed in thirty to forty copies on a hectograph; in Salonica, Damjan Grujev

m Ljuben Lape, Pismata na Goce Deliev (The Letters of Goce Delie v), Skoplje, 1951, p. 11.

,n Dimitar Vlahov, !z istorije makedonskog naroda (From the History of the Macedonian People), Belgrade, 1950, p. 33.

140 Ljuben Lape, op. cit., p. 13.141 Spoment na G'orie Petrov, p. 21.

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published his Vostanifc. Their chief object, however, was to collect arms. First of all, they acquired bombs and revolvers, then rifles of various calibers, for which they frequently had no ammunition. At every opportunity, it was emphasized that their chief aim was to raise an armed reblelion. “At first,” says D. Vlahov, “the Organization operated only among the Slavic population in the area controlled by the Bulgarian Ex­archate, since it had no confidence in those other Macedonian Slavs who acknowledged the spiritual authority of the Greek Patriarch or the Pope of Rome. Similarly, the founders of the Organization did not attempt to stir v evolution among the other nationalities of Macedonia—T Albanians, Greeks and Wallachians. They feared that by \ King among various nationalities who were suspicious of one another—an attitude that was encouraged by the Turkish authorities—the Or­ganization might soon disintegrate, thus compromising the idea of a revolutionary struggle at the outset. Later, when it became clear that the idea of liberation was receiving the support of the remaining Slavic population and the other nationalities in Macedonia, the Organization, under the in­fluence of its more progressive members, altered its statute so that any inhabitant of Macedonia might join, irrespective of his nationality, religion or political convictions, provided only that he accepted the Organization’s principles and was prepared to fight for the liberation of Macedonia.” m

Only for a short period, as M. Vardarski points out, did IMRO “organize the revolutionary movement in peace.” 145 Soon after its foundation, it acquired powerful and determin­ed enemies. As we have seen, the first of these was the Ex­archate, whose leaders looked to the Bulgars to liberate Mace­donia and hence were unwilling to assist any other move­ment. In order to hinder the work of IMRO in Macedonia, the Exarchate began to set up, through the agency of people devoted to its cause, “fraternities,” the first of which was founded in 1898. These fraternities expected Macedonia to be liberated by Bulgaria, and concentrated their revolutionary ardor on moral preparation for this event. Petrov describes

148 Dimitar Vlahov, Iz istorije makedonskog naioda (From th« History of the Macedonian People), Belgrade, 1950, p. 34.

148 M. Vardarsky, “L’organisation r6volutionnaire int6rieure,” Vindependence macidonlenne, Nov. 15, 1919, p. 60.

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how the Exarchists had decided to destroy all IMRO’s or­ganizations. “Kuniev, as inspector,” he says, “systematically persecuted teachers who supported us and replaced then by others who were ‘neutral.’ Naumov, as former director of the Pedagogical School in Salonica, energetically pursued this ob­jective among the teachers. The entire Exarchist machine was switched onto this counter-propaganda. At the same time, intrigues were initiated with the Supreme Committee in the Principality and with the government for the creation of a group to oppose the Organization. In the end, this trend re­sulted in another ‘fraternity’—the ‘revolutionary frater­nity.' " 144

This Supreme Committee, founded in Sofia in 1894, was an instrument of the Bulgarian government and court, which looked askance at anything that was done without its parti­cipation: it wanted to have the entire control of Macedonian affairs in its own hands. Between this body and the Central Committee of IMRO, a struggle was to develop that was to drag on almost without respite and degenerate into a bloody conflict. There were, it is true, attempts at collaboration between them, but, apart from brief intervals of success, the situation would return to its former footing. The “Centralists,” as the supporters of the Central Committee of IMRO were called, were joined by a group of officers in Bulgaria, who, in order to render assistance, founded “auxiliary officers’ fraternities,” which collected money for the Centralists. “The fraternities,” says Petrov, “were organized on a basis of se­crecy in the majority of garrisons in Bulgaria. At first, they could not do much, but they nevertheless gave a certain amount of help in money and materials.” 145

When the Supreme Committee was joined by Simeon Iladev and StaniSev, relations between the two rival organiza­tions were somewhat improved. Both sides sought a rap­prochement, but there was difficulty in reaching agreement on the point which should have the principal voice in pre­paring and carrying out a rebellion in Macedonia. DelCev and Petrov, at that time official representatives of the Central Committee in Sofia, demanded that the Supreme Committee

144 Spomenl na G'orte Petrov, pp. 38—39.•«' Ibid., p. 65.

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Mlioulrl be no more than ist auxiliary organ.149 Not until Boris Mu r/il'ov became head of the Supreme Committee did relations appreciably improve, but even then it was not for long, since frt’Nh disagreements arose between the Centralists and Sara- fnv’s group. Furthermore, a group of officers headed by (ioneral ConCev decided to take over the Supreme Committee. 'I’llIs group had a plan already worked out for raising a rebel­lion in Macedonia: the entire region had been divided into fourteen districts which were to be controlled by officers mibordinate to General ConCev.

Finally, in opposition to the wishes of the Centralists’ official representatives of the time, Confiev succeeded in at­taining the leadership of the Supreme Committee, although Sarafov refused to recognize him and surrender his position. Harafov was eventually arrested, but realeased again soon afterward.

From the political standpoint, the problem posed by this region appeared to be most easily soluble by the creation of an autonomous government which, instead of constituting an apple of discord among the Balkan states, would be a bridge for bringing them together and smoothing the path into the future. Ever since Cyprian Robert had suggested a Balkan federation, this idea had appealed to the most enthusiastic Idealists, not only among circles close to IMRO, but also among the ranks of Bulgarian revolutionaries. As early as 1870, Ljuben Karavelov had written, in Sloboda, No. 16, that not only Serbs and Bulgars, but also Rumanians and Greeks Khared the same objective and the same destiny, and that all Mhould “create a free Danube federation and defend their national and personal freedom.” Vasil Levski dreamed of the emergence of free Balkan republics, while Hristo Botev wrote: "The right of Serbia, Rumania and Greece to existence and future development depends (1) on the collapse of Turkey, (’2) on the liberation of the Slavic peoples enslaved by her, and (3) on [the establishment of] a sacred and loyal South Slav union which could unite them in a single political entity, capable of resisting all violence and attack" (Zname,

■“ Ibid., p. 69.

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J874, No. 6). Makedonski glas, headed by the carpenter Vasil Glavinov, also championed this idea.147

As far as is known, the idea of setting up an autonomous Macedonian was first expressed on July 8, 1876, in conversa­tions between Tsar Alexander II and Franz Josef held at Reichstadt, in northern Bohemia. It came from Franz Josef, who proposed setting up an independent province of Mace­donia.148 Somewhat later, in a conversation with Bismarck which took place in early October 1887, Francesco Crispi pro­posed autonomy for Macedonia, Old Serbia and Albania, and emphasized that Vienna had already accepted the idea.149 Eight years later, after the slogan “Macedonia for the Mace­donians” had been launched in 1894, the idea of establishing an autonomous Macedonia appeared once more. It was one of the chief points in the first program of IMRO, and the sub­ject of discussion at its first congress, held in Salonica in the summer of 1896. “The principle of autonomy,” says Petrov, “had already been put forward by Sofia, and we discussed the question along general lines.” 150 Count Henckel von Donners- marck, German charge d’affaires in Istanbul, informed Prince Hohenlohe on May 25, 1895, that the Porte was opposed to Macedonia’s desire for autonomy, and went on: “As is well- known, the Macedonians based their demands vis-a-vis the Porte on Article 23 of the Treaty of Berlin, according to which the Porte was obliged to introduce autonomous administra­tions in its European province with the assistance of a com­mission composed of members of the local population-- ThisMacedonian agitation is supported in Bulgaria, and even Prince Ferdinand’s word of warning could not change any­thing. Hundreds of thousands of Bulgars are in Macedonia, while about six hundred thousand Macedonians are living in Bulgaria. Still closer unity between Bulgars and Macedonians, who are linked by a common faith, is being promoted by committees, which are supplied with considerable material

147 Dimo Kazasov, Burni godini (The Stormy Years), Sofia, 1949, pp. 249—50.

148 Von Sosnosky, op. cit.. Vol. I, p. 169.

149 Bismarck, Gesammelte Werke, Vol. VIII: Erinnerungen und Gedanken, Berlin, 1932, p. 573.

1M Spomeni na G'orie Petrov, p. 48.

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resources. These are well organized, and their center is in Bulgaria.” 151

The idea of an autonomous M vedcnia was supported by the Bulgarian government: it hau already, as we have seen, been accepted by IMRO. Ivan-ManCa Mihailov says: “The leaders of the Macedonian liberation movement have taken autonomy, and no more, as their final objective.” 152 Under February 16, 1895, von Holstein noted that Ferdinand wanted to become king of Macedonia. “As far as Macedonia is con­cerned,” he says, “it is in the highest degree probable that Russia will energetically oppose Bulgarian expansion in this direction, since this would seriously threaten the interests of the Greek royal family, which is closely linked by ties of kinship and friendship with St. Petersburg. To any Bulgarian move in the direction of Macedonia, Hellenism would reply with recourse to arms.” 153 The Russians were already bitter­ly disappointed in Bulgaria, and Ferdinand’s conduct in­creased their distrust. Fearing the establishment of a Slavic bloc in the Balkans, Freiherr von Marschall, German ambas­sador in Istanbul, on May 2, 1890, recommended that Greece and Bulgaria unite in order to frustrate such a possibility. Events turned out quite differently: not only did the Russians prevent this eventuality, but they stopped helping Bulgaria in Macedonia. On August 25, 1896, von Voigts-Rhetz, German consul general in Sofia, informed Hohenlohe that the Russian envoy in Istanbul had refused to support the Bulgarian de­mand addressed to the Porte that the establishment of two more episcopal sees in Macedonia be approved by the Bul­gars.154

Two years later, Austro-Hungary and Russia reached an agreement on the Balkans: the provisions of the Treaty of Berlin were, in principle, adhered to, but it was emphasized that if the territory of European Turkey were divided up, this could, with the exception of the sanjak of Novi Pazar, which Austro-Hungary reserved for herself, be the subject of

151 Die grosse Politik der europdischen Kabinette, 1871—1914, Vol. XII, Part I, Berlin, p. 121.

152 Mihailoff, op. cit., p. 65.154 Die grosse Politik der europaischen Kabinette, 1871—1914,

Vol. XII, Part I, p. 108, Cf. p. 134.154 Ibid., pp. 137—38.

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ii friendly agreement between these two powers. Even then It was made clear that none of the Balkan states should be ii I lowed, by such a division of Turkish territory, to expand to such an extent that the balance of power in the Balkans was upset, and that, if new frontiers were defined, this would have to be borne in mind.155

Neither the Bulgarian court nor its supporters were in the least attracted by the idea of a Balkan federation, which was gaining more and more sympathizers among the left wing of IMRO. Jane Sandanski formed a federalist movement in the vicinity of Ser, but he was killed in 1914 on the orders of King Ferdinand. The seed sown by Sandanski bore fruit in the work of the National Federative Party, the kernel of which, according to Dimitar Vlahov, was the revolutionary district of Ser.156 This party represented the “working strata of the Macedonian population___[It] sought points of con­tact with other nationalities in Macedonia and in Turkey, strove to form a federation of free natioal units on an extreme democratic basis, and opposed interference by foreign states in the internal life of Turkey. One of its great tasks was the struggle against Greater Bulgarian, Greater Serbian and Greater Greek chauvinism, against their ambition to win the masses of the Macedonian population over to their side and expllit them for their imperialistic aims. This party included in its ranks workers, peasants, esnafi, the people’s intel­ligentsia and in general all elements of the people. It emerged as a champion of the interests of these strata; it sought a solution of the national question in the interests of the nationalities concerned and of the agrarian question in the interests of the peasant masses, and demanded that each people be given complete cultural and educational rights and freedom. It fought for the complete equality of rights of all nationalities, for a democratic union of all nations [in Mace­donian] and for the formation of an eastern federation.” 157

185 Ibid., pp. 296—97.1M Dimitar Vlahov, “Makedonija i Mladoturska” (Macedonia and

the Young Turks), Istoriski glasnik, Belgrade, 1949, No. 3, p. 36.157 Ibid., p. 37.

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After its congress of August 1909 and the election of its central leadership under Vlahov, the National Federative Party championed the idea of an independent Macedonia. It took quite a different attitude on the national question from that of the right wing of IMRO: for the former, the social- democrat element took precedence, while for the latter the nationalistic element was to the fore. “For the National Federative Party,” says Vlahov, “the national question con­sists, not in a modification of inequality, bu t. . . in the guaran­teeing of maximum opportunities for free development and expression to even the smallest national minorities. While parties struggling for the supremacy of one particular nation adopt the banner of national separatism and strive to group all elements of their nation against other nations, the National Federative Party has put its organization on an international basis. Its extreme demands on the national question are none other than the ultimate demands of all democracy: a guarantee of complete freedom for every nation in the local community, sanjak, vilayet and region.” 158

During the regime of the Young Turks, the right wing of IMRO organized itself as a “Union of Bulgarian Constitutional Clubs in Turkey,” which was established at the congress of September 7, 1908. In 1910, this group renewed its illegal activities, one of the leaders of which was Todor Aleksandrov. The organ of the Union was Otad&bina, which came out twice weekly with a circulation of 2,700 copies, one third of which was distributed in Bulgaria. In 1910, the Union was disbanded in compliance with a law on the disbanding of political parties in Turkey.

###

With the passage of time, the split in the ranks of IMRO became wider: the Central Committee’s following continued to attach greater importance to Macedonian autonomy than to dependence on Bulgaria, while those that had infiltrated from the Supreme Committee sought annexation of Mace­donia by Bulgaria. For the rest, there was some confusion in the ideas of certain leaders of IMRO. Simon Jeftimov, for many years editor of Makedonija, asserted that right from the first the general view had been that an independent Mace-

158 Ibid., p. 42.

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(Ionia should be set up. “It [IMRO] was committed to the liberation of Macedonia and the establishment of a buffer f.lnte to prevent a quarrel in the Balkans and to serve as n link between the Balkan states.” 159 The very fact that .leftimov was assassinated by a group of his adversaries shows Unit this view of his can scarcely be taken as the view of the i itfht wing of IMRO. Dimo Kazasov points out that from 1895 Id 1903 a vigorous guerrilla campaign was carried on in Southern Serbia. It is known that most of these guerrilla Imnds were organized in Bulgaria and sent from there into Macedonia, although there were other bands formed in the urea itself and commanded, not by regular officers, but by local leaders. In most cases, however, they were led by Bul­garian officers backed by General ConCev, Colonel Jankov, Captains Nikolov, Stojanov and Protogerov, Lieutenants Boris Sarnfov, Sugarov and others. “These officers, under the direct leadership of the court, had seized power in the Sofia or­ganization and succeeded in placing at its head their friend Boris Sarafov, behind whom were the officers’ fraternities led by General ConCev.” 160 In 1902, as we have seen, this group disintegrated, and one wing, led by ConCev, began direct participation in affairs in Macedonia.1,1

The commencement of armed operations in Southern Ser­bia was preceded by a purge in the leadership of the Sofia organization and, in connection with this, by dissension in the field. On April 5, 1901, Sarafov, Davidov, who was chairman nf the Macedonian committee, KovaCev, who was secretary of I his committee, and several of its members were arrested.162 Professor Stefan Mihailovski became chairman of this com­mittee, while General ConCev acted as vice-chairman. By this means, the group that stood for union with Bulgaria gained the ascendancy in this committee, and impatiently began preparations for an armed campaign. On August 6, 1901, the eommittee issued a declaration asserting that Macedonia could only be saved by a revolution. Elliot, at that time the British

IM Simon Jeftimoff, Die mazedonische Frage (Sonderdruck aus der "Zi'itsdirift fiir Politik,” 20. Jahrgang, Heft 5), pp. 6—7.

1.0 Kazasov, op. cit., p. 245.1.1 Correspondence Respecting the Allairs ol South-Eastern Eu­

rope<: Turkey, Presented to both Houses of Parliament by Command of His Majesty, London, 1903.

"* Ibid., p. 39.

129

representative in Bulgaria, stated that this idea came from General Condev, who, as we have seen, was supported by the court.

During the summer of 1902, arms were poured into Mace­donia from Bulgaria in increasing quantities, especially into those areas where it was planned to launch the rebellion. In order outwardly to dissociate itself from these preparations for a rising, the Bulgarian government, under the pressure of circumstances abroad, on September 1, 1902, arrested General Confcev, who soon suceeded in escaping from Drenovo, where he had been interned.183 Nevertheless, the rising broke out at the beginning of November. On November 5, Elloit report­ed that the insurgents planned to occupy the Struma valley and the vicinity of Nevrokop.194

An essential requirement for the realization of this plan was the cooperation of the population of Razlog. Bound as it was by ties of loyalty to Sarafov, and at the same time un­favorably disposed toward Bulgarian annexationist ambitions, the population of Razlog, despite the fact that it was well armed, refused to join the rebellion. “This,” says Elliot, “was a serious blow to the rising, particularly since Razlog was known to possess plentiful stores of arms. They refused to have anything to do with Coniev’s group, declaring that they would not rebel until a suitable moment had come, and that they could not agree that the moment was already ripe.” 198 From another report of Elliot’s, it is clear that the people were unenthusiastic about the whole enterprise. After the suppression of the rising, Colonel Jankov, taking leave of the inhabitants of the village of Zagoridani, where he was born, promised them that further efforts would be made and the struggle continued. The villagers were quite unimpressed.19* From the evidence of Slavejko Arsov, we learn that Jankov had been operating quite independently of members of IMRO: the latter did not even know that it had been decided to raise a rebellion. “I did not meet Jankov at all,” says Arsov. “I was unaware of the situation, and did not know why Jankov had come. I thought it would be good if we got him on our side,

>“ Ibid., p. 196.164 Ibid., p. 244.185 Ibid.1,4 Ibid., p. 249.

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iiiiiHidering that, as a soldier, a colonel, he might be use­ful." 197 He wrote to him and asked for a meeting, but Jankov did not reply.

The total number of insurgents was no more than five hundred, of whom three hundred had come from Bulgaria. Hence, Hugo Grothe is entirely correct in describing the cam­paign as an “artificial revolution aimed at provocation.” 1,8 According to official British reports from the scene, Lieute­nant Colonel Nikolov, together with D. Rizov, commanded a Kroup of 250—270 men in the area of DSumaja; DonCo, to­gether with Captain Stojanov, operated with 170 men in Mel­nik and Petrid, and Aleksije, a local commander, with 70—100 men in the region of Poroj. Coniev acted as a kind of chief inspector.189 A curious point is that, in the proclamation addressed to the people, they described Alexander of Mace­donia as the ancestor of the present population of the country, who were called upon to regard him and his military virtues as an example.

The cause of the failure of the rebellion was that it was alien to the people. The idea of a rising did not spring from them, but was introduced from outside. “Supporters of the rebellion were those who had little to lose, the intellectual proletariat of the big towns such as Salonica and Bitolj,. . . and those who saw in the unconstrained life of a guerrilla lighter a good opportunity for personal gain. Not even the extravagant promises of Coniev or Sarafov could inspire the masses, dulled as they were by decades of underground activity.” 170

Much later, on January 25, 1928, Makedonsko delo stated that Coniev’s aim had been to use the rising to destroy IMRO, and to incite the people to revolt by means of provocation. “The inhabitants of Upper Diumaja and Petrifi,” says this article, “had begun to realize that these men were committing a blunder and that they would withdraw and flee to Bulgaria, leaving them to stew in their own juice. Accordingly, those

Vostanliko dviienije vo Jugozapadna Makedonija po spomeni na Slavejko Arsov, p. 33.

,M Grothe, Auf tQrkisdier Erde, p. 347.,m Correspondence Respecting the Ailairs ol South-Eastern Eu­

rope: Turkey, p. 280.170 Grothe, Aul tiirkischer Erde, pp. 346—47.

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villages that had come under the control of the Supreme Committee sent, one after the other, couriers to Sandanski, Cernopejev, Arsenov and other commanders in neighboring districts, seeking their help in their efforts to free themselvesthe Supreme Committee’s troops___What form did the risingactually take? The peasants had ceased to trust the Supreme Committee’s followers, and were unwilling to rebel, notwith­standing all propaganda, assurances and terrorization. In order to compel them to rebel—i. e., to abandon the villages and, whether with or without arms, to flee into the mountains and so create the impression that a revolt had broken out— the Supreme Committee’s bands used provocateur methods: in several villages, they attacked Turkish landowners, thus pro­voking reprisals by Turkish troops and compelling the po­pulation to ‘rebel.’. .. This was a great blow for the Organiza­tion, occurring as it did at a moment when the latter was carrying out its armament plans.. . . It was a dreadful and irreparable blow to the honor and prestige of the Mace­donian liberation movement, which was represented to the outside world as being dependent on, and led by, the Bul­garian government and court, which were exploiting it as the instrument of their aggressive policy” (pages 13—14).

In general, it may be said that the population was torment­ed by the arbitrary conduct of the guerrillas: the entire life and work of the peasants was controlled by IMRO. This merely aggravated their already difficult situation, and brought no solution to the problem. There were signs that this was beginning to be realized in Bulgaria. During a private audience, King Ferdinand asked Baron Wladimir Giesl for his opinion why the influence of Bulgarian propaganda in Southern Serbia was waning, while that of Serbia was growing. Baron Giesl, who was well acquainted with the mood of the inhabitants of Southern Serbia, gave as the main reason for the decline of Bulgarian influence the terror in­flicted on the people by the “revolutionary committees.” “Yes,” replied Ferdinand, “that is the real reason. The com­mittees have done much harm to the Bulgarian cause, and it will be worse if Russia succeeds in getting Joachim III ap­pointed ecumenical patriarch.” 171 During another audience,

1,1 Wladimir Giesl, ZweJ Jahrzehnte im Nahen Orient, Berlin, 1927, p. 161.

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when the subject of discussion was the possibility of estab- llwhing an autonomous Macedonia dependent on Bulgaria, the lmron said to Ferdinand: “I have already demonstrated that I he plan for an autonomous Macedonia under Bulgarian leadership, which the Bulgars are advocating, is a Utopia. Rus- nla, Turkey, Serbia and Greece would resist it with all their force.” 172

###

In the revolutionary campaign conducted, not only by Bul­garian propaganda but also by IMRO, the rising of August 2,11103, occupies a central place. Both sides, although their aims were becoming increasingly divergent, claimed it for them- Hclves, seeing in it the most forceful expression of the revo­lutionary 61an and of the devotion of the masses to their cause. In the various references to it, it is extolled as the highlight of the campaign for the liberation of Macedonia and as an event marking the beginning of a new epoch. Ac­cording to one of the leaders of IMRO, it was a revolutionary watershed in Macedonian history dividing two currents—that of IMRO and that of the Supreme Committee.17* In his brochure on the rising, Dimo Hadji Dimov wrote: “This epoch- making event was decided on by the congress of the Revo­lutionary Organization in early January 1903, and on July 20 (Old Style) it was launched. It was begun with an enthusiasm and degree of self-sacrifice that can only be manifested by a people that has been taught to die for its freedom. This | the Macedonian] people had been educated in this spirit by its Revolutionary Organization, which could not be otherwise than worthy of its people.” 174 Elsewhere, the rising is de- Hcribed as “the most important revolutionary act in the his­tory of the Macedonian revolutionary movement,. . . an epoch- making event of tremendous importance, a turning point which determined, not only the immediate future of the Mace­donian liberation movement, but also Bulgarian, and to a certain extent, international, policy toward Macedonia and Turkey in general.” The rising “exposed all the complexity

«" /bid., p. 163.Makedonsko delo, Aug. 10, 1928, p. 12.

1,4 Ibid., Sept. 25, 1925, p. 55.

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of the Macedonian problem on the Balkan, and, if you will, on the international plane.” 175

What, in effect, was this rising? There are researchers who consider that it was a purely Bulgarian affair. Edith Durham, a great enemy of the Serbs, comments that “the Macedonian rising of 1903 was a purely Bulgarian movement.”178 D. Krap- dev described it as “the most powerful manifestation of the unity of the Bulgarian population within the frontiers of the Turkish empire of that time. In it participated all those who were devoted to the Bulgarian nation and who felt themselves to be Bulgars—Exarchists, Patriarchists,Catholics and Pro- testanst.” 177 Brailsford, who gathered his data on the actual scene of the rising, visited all the villages that had suffered in it and spoke to the peasants who had taken part, emphasizes that the cause of the rising lay “as much in the economic grievances of the peasantry as in the political aspirations of the educated class.” 178

A resolution in favor of a rebellion was adopted by the Salonica section of the Central Committee of IMRO in early January 1903. G’orCe Petrov states that among leading per­sonalities of the Central Committee who were in Sofia at the time opinions were sharply divided on whether the rebellion should be undertaken or not. On receipt of a letter in January 1903 from the Salonica section of the Central Committee, the Sofia group met several times to discuss what attitude it should take: whether to accept or reject the proposal of the group in Salonica. SlavCo KovaCev declared that the proposal should be adopted since “the Supreme Committee had already raised a rebellion, and we should not fall behind, lest the people say that we are incapable of raising a rebellion and that we are not revolutionaries.” 179 DelSev and Petrov were definitely opposed to the proposal. “One cannot help notic­ing,” says Petrov, “that the proposal for a rebellion was most strongly supported by those who did not intend to take any part in it. At the Smilevo congress, too, rebellion was most

•7* Ibid., Feb. 10, 1928, p. 5.178 Edith Durham, Die slawische Gelahr: Zwanzig Jahre Balkan-

Erinnerungen, Stuttgart, p. 114.177 Krapchev, op. cit., p. 77.1,8 Brailsford, op. cit., p. 42.I7’ Spomeni na G'orie Petrov, p. 125.

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kt^nly advocated by those districts that took no part in it, as, for example, the Salonica district, even though Salonica play­ed a most important role in raising a rebellion.” 180 “Well- known revolutionaries,” says Vlahov, “DelSev, Petrov, Jane Sundanski, Hadji Dimov and others, energetically opposed the raising of a rebellion, since they foresaw its defeat. When, however, it was lounched, they did their duty, assisting the struggle of the Bitolj insurgents.” 181 DelSev was killed in an ambush, while Petrov took part in the fighting, albeit without success.

At the congress held on April 20—28, 1903, in the village of Smilevo, the decision was finally taken to raise a rebellion. The Central Committee of IMRO was represented by Damjan Grujev, while delegates from local committees included Lo- zanCev, Pop Hristov and PeSkov. Boris Saratov, from the Sofia group, attended as an “inspector of troops.” Others pre­sent included various commanders and district leaders. Al­together, there were thirty-two delegates: Grujev presided, while Pop Hristov and Cvetkov acted as secretaries. The meeting was guarded by a hundred guerrillas, assisted by armed peasants from Smilevo.

Slavejko Arsov, who represented the Resan district, says that the decision to raise a rebellion met with some opposi­tion. Those against it included the delegates from Prilep, KruSevac and Mariovo. “Many delegates,” says Arsov, “re­garded the idea of a rebellion with distrust: it was impossible to foresee what would come of it, and so they hesitated to make such a decision.” 182 In the end, a rebellion was decided on, but not until the end of June, in order to allow the harvest to be gathered and food supplies to be assured. A head­quarters staff was appointed, consisting of Damjan Grujev, a teacher from Salonica, Anastas Lozaniev and Boris Saratov. “The staff,” says Arsov, “consisted of three persons who had equal status and whose decisions were final. The congress also drew up a disciplinary code based on a draft prepared by DelCev and Saratov. It was further decided that the staff should include Pere Tosev, G’orSe Petrov and Matov—if they

>»» Ibid., p. 127.181 Vlahov, op. cit., p. 40.181 Vostanitko dviienije vo Jugozapadna Makedonija, p. 57.

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put in an appearance. Deputies were appointed for the three members of the headquarters staff: Petar Acev for Sarafov, Lazar Trajkov for LozanSev and Georgi Pop Hristov for Gru- jev.” 185 It is noteworthy that the leaders of the rebellion in­cluded no one from the Mihailovski-ConCev group, from which Sarafov had separated. In his article “August 2—the National Holiday of Macedonia,” marking the anniversary of the rising, Dimitar Mitrev wrote: “The blame for proclaiming this premature rising lies with the agents of the Bulgarian court—Ivan Garvanov, Boris Sarafov, Atanas LozanSev and others, who had succeeded in entering the leadership of the Revolutionary Organization.” 184

Recently, it has been increasingly emphasized that the primary motive of the rising was the social question. It is pointed out that the proclamation of the insurgents stated that they were fighting for the liberty of all the inhabitants of Macedonia, for “a free Macedonia, with broad rights for all poor people, of whatever nation, religion or language, in­habiting its territory.” 185 We also know that an extremely important part in preparations for the rising was played by the teacher Nikola Karov, one of the chief pioneers in the pro­pagation of socialist ideas in Southern Serbia. This is stated by his biographer, Klisurov. As a “mountain commander,” Karov was the moving force behind the KruSevo republic. It has been said of him that in the most fateful moments of the struggle he carried a rifle in one hand and a copy of the Communist Manifesto in the other.188

If all this is true, then it may be assumed that the KruSevo republic, which lasted in all only thirteen days, and which was presided over by Karov, was a socialist republic. Accord­ing to the evidence of one of the survivors of this rising, “there floated over the town the red flag of revolution bear­ing the words ‘Freedom or Death.” This was the flag of the republic, the flag of a people that had elected its leaders: Nikola Karov had been chosen as president of the republic, Dimo Vangel had been assigned the administration of justice,

18S ibid., pp. 57—58.

184 Politika, Belgrade, Aug. 2, 1946.

185 Borba, Belgrade-Zagreb, Aug. 2, 1950.

18* Mojsov, op. cit., p. 45.

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Dimitar Sekulov that of food and production and Teodor NeSkov that of finance.” 187

However this may be, the rebellion was a complete failure. It left behind nothing but destruction and grief. According to Kazasov, the results of the rising were 66 villages destroy­ed, 2,610 houses burnt to the ground, 2,565 persons killed and 12,880 peasants deprived of their land.188 Borba states that 135 villages were destroyed, about 10,000 houses burnt, 2,000 persons killed and about 2,500 women and girls raped and abducted.189 Similar information is given by Dimitar Vlahov, who says that most damage was inflicted in the district of Bitolj. “Here,” he says, “the distress was so great that inter­national charitable organizations had to send help and in­stitute special campaigns to collect assistance. Survivors who were fit for work were obliged to leave the country and seek a livelihood abroad. Large numbers emigrated to the USA. From that time on, Macedonian peasants, workers and crafts­men emigrated on a massed scale to America.” 190

This how the rising of August 2, 103, appears when con­sidered in the light of the facts. Circumstances suggest that it was largely inspired by Sofia, through a group belonging to the Central Commitee of IMRO, which had allowed itself to be prevailed upon. Sofia was unable to exploit ConCev’s unsuccessful rising for its own ends, and it was necessary to undertake something more ambitious. To a considerable degree, however, the rising may be regarded as the inevitable eruption of that movement that IMRO had for years been preparing among the masses in anticipation of the day when complete freedom would dawn. It was impossible for IMRO to postpone a rising indefinitely, especially after ConCev had launched his attempt: the struggle for positions in the field and the race to see who could capture the masses most suc­cessfully were growing progressively more acute. The masses, meanwhile, were emotionally in favor of a rising that would bring them freedom, but rationally opposed to a rising that it was not difficult to foresee would end in failure. After the first sharp conflicts and the reprisals inflicted by the Turks,

1,7 Borba, Aug. 2, 1950.188 Kazasov, op. cit., p. 247.189 Borba, Aug. 2, 1950.1,9 Vlahov, op. cit., p. 41.

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that little enthusiasm that the people had felt vanished: the instinct of self-preservation stifled their patriotic feelings and killed the desire to continue a resistance that was completely hopeless. Slavejko Arsov, who commanded a company of in­surgents, describes the mood of his men after the first defeats thus: “Their courage had left them, and they grew thoughtful: their wives and children were far away, they no longer had either house, or furniture, or cattle: they had nothing. These unfortunates had lost their last hope: it was impossible to encourage them any longer.” 191

The Macedonian rising of 1903 was a failure for which the people paid dearly. The myth that later grew up round it is woven out of fantasy, and has no connection with reality. It was neither a historical turning point nor an epoch-making achievement. It failed to free Macedonia from Turkish rule, and merely further weakened the strength and powers of re­sistance of the masses, which had been persecuted and tor­mented for centuries. Its only too obvious failure could not but destroy the people’s faith in revolution and shake its conviction that the material sacrifices that it had had to bear were worth while: in addition to the tribute exacted by the Turks, it had had to pay tribute to the Organization, which had imposed its rule on them. In the eyes of the people, the Turkish regime had demonstrated its strength, while the European powers had shown an astonishing lack of interest. DelCev’s thesis that the Macedonian people could free itself by its own resources had been drastically refuted by practical experience. The people’s strength had proved far from suf­ficient to effect their liberation without outside help and de­feat their still powerful adversary. There was no assistance from outside—not even from Bulgaria: even those who had championed the cause of rebellion had almost all escaped to Bulgaria. Left to themselves, the people remained alone in their wrecked homes, to which their destiny bound them. When Brailsford asked the inhabitants of a village that had been burnt and pillaged why they did not remove to Serbia or Bulgaria, they replied: “Who would care for the monastery, if we abandoned it? The Turks would seize it.” 192

1.1 Vostaniiko dvizenije vo Jugozapadna Makedonija, p. 90.1.1 Brailsford, op. cit., p. 59.

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This remarkable people, so deeply rooted in its native soil, was, unlike its leaders, incapable of deserting its sanctuaries. For it, the future had lost all brightness: disillusioned and crushed, it was once more left to itself and its wretched fate.

###

The failure of the rebellion widened the already existing Hap in the ranks of IMRO, and quarrels became more acute. Local elements now began to make themselves felt. According to Petrov, “old campaigners, trained by rough guerrilla com­manders, . . . became masters of the situation, while the legal organizations in the towns became dormant.” 185 Centraliza­tion, which had prevailed in the Organization, gave way to wide-scale decentralization. By 1906, many organizations had broken up. Later they revived, only to find themselves faced by the same question as before: was Macedonia to be Bul­garian or independent? The latter choice was now officially supported by the Mihailovski-Coniev group: in 1899, D. Rizov had written to Ferdinand that external difficulties made it necessary to regard a free Macedonia as their chief aim.194 On the arrest of Sarafov and his closest collaborators, Mihai- lovski also declared himself in favor of autonomy for this region, since it seemed to him that this was the only way of winning over European public opinion. Elliot reported from Sofia that on June 22, 1901, Mihailovski delivered a lecture there, in which he said: “There is no intention of uniting Macedonia with Bulgaria: we want complete equality of rights for the country’s inhabitants and political autonomy, coupled with the possibility of eventually forming a federation of all the Balkan states.” 195

In diplomatic circles, it had begun to be realized that, in respect of Macedonia, European public opinion was based on nothing but a tissue of falsehoods systematically and per­sistently supported and multiplied by Bulgarian propaganda. On April 20, 1904, German Ambassador in Istanbul von Mar-

181 Spomenl na G'orCe Petrov, p. 164.184 Correspondence Respecting the Allairs ol South-Eastern Eu­

rope: Turkey, p. 189.185 Ibid., p. 51.

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schall reported to Prince Billow on the state of affairs in Macedonia, and said: “It is important to realize that the greater part of what is written in the European press about Macedonia is false, since there are no ‘Macedonians’ there, but only Turks, Albanians, Serbs, Greeks, Pomaci, Wallachians and Exarchist and Patriarchist Bulgars. Moreover, the hatred dividing Christians of various nationalities there is a much greater cause of disorder than the opposition between Chris­tianity and Islam.” 199 At the end of January 1905, von Mar- schall expressed the opinion that all reforms envisaged for Macedonia were doomed to fail since the people, so far from being united, was made up of various nationalities which hated one another and each of which wanted to substitute its own rule for that of the Turks.187

Clear evidence of the discord and chaos reigning among the leaders of the Macedonian uprising is provided by the inconsistent attitude of Boris Sarafov. Disillusioned in official circles in Sofia, he turned up one day in Belgrade, where he attempted to found a Macedonian committee. According to an official report submitted by G. Bonham, British representative in Belgrade, he pleaded the cause of Macedonian autonomy. His slogan was “Macedonia for the Macedonians.” Bonham says: “Macedonia, he [Sarafov] unequivocally emphasized, needs neither Bulgarian nor Serbian teachers and priests, but only arms and troops. He pointed out with regret that the Bulgars were displaying greater energy in Macedonia than the Serbs, and advised the latter to make their influence more prominent. He would like a Macedonian committee to be formed in Belgrade which would cooperate with the Bul­garian committee in the liberation of Macedonia.” 198 At the Rilo Congress, Sandanski made several accusations against Sarafov—among others, that he had taken money from the Serbian government. Sarafov’s reply was: “You accuse me, but I did this without incurring any obligations, thinking that the Serbs would emerge on the correct path and permit the movement of our men; now, however, they are sending their

,9* Die grosse Politik der europtiischen Kabinelte, 1871— 1914, Vol. XXII, p. 140.

197 Ibid., p. 213.198 Ibid., p. 203.

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own men. Consequently, I am now opposed to them and have declared war on them.” 1,9

Soon after, Saratov was assassinated in Sofia on the night of December 11, 1907, by Todor Panica, who was subsequent­ly shot on the orders of Minister of War Petrov.200 The same fate later befell Sandanski, around whom had gathered so- dnlist-anarchist elements in favor of Macedonian indepen­dence.*01 Jacob Rutchi states that Panica was killed by MenCa Karniiiju in a Vienna theater during a performance of Peer Gynt, at the very moment when Death utters the words: “One does not die in the middle of the fifth act.” 202 This would indicate that the information quoted above from an official report by the British consul in Sofia is incorrect.

It is nevertheless true that many grievances between various groups among the leaders of IMRO on the one hand und the Supreme Committee on the other were settled by violence. The pro-Macedonian trend, which was assuming in- creasinlgy definite form, and the Greater Bulgarian move­ment were unable either to amalgamate finally or to separate from one another. This situation was unchanged even after World War I: one group continued to advocate autonomy and the other federation. At this stage, the movement for auto­nomy provided an even more convenient facade for screening Greater Bulgarian pretensions. The autonomists, headed by Todor Aleksandrov, General Protogerov and Ivan-VanCa Mi­hailov, carried on their work chiefly in the area of PetriC, Nevrokop, Razlog, Upper Dzumaja, Dupnitsa and Custendil. "Here,” says Dimo Kazasov, “they exacted tribute, ruled, punished and murdered in utter defiance of law and order. They used the idea of autonomy to conceal the annexationist ambitions of Greater Bulgarian chauvinism.”203 The federalists included Dr. Filip Atanasov, N. Jurkov, Pavle Hristov, Panica and others.

,,, Spomeni na G'or6e Petrov, p. 128. Cf. Makedonsko delo, Nov. 25, 1929, p. 7.

*** Correspondence Respecting the Allairs ol South-Eastern Eu­rope: Turkey, p. 155.

*01 Kazasov, op. cit., p. 249,,0* Jakov Rutchi, Die Reformation Osterreich-Ungarns und Russ-

Jands in Macedonien 1903— 1908, Bern 1918, p. 38.*#s Kazasov, op. cit., p. 18.

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Gilbert in der Maur is right in pointing out that these groups were pursuing different aims. “The aims of IMRO,” he says, “and those of the official Bulgarian party [Staats- bulgaren] are by no means identical, as a superficial examina­tion would appear to show. For the latter, Macedonia is part of Greater Bulgaria. The Macedonians must, therefore, adjust themselves to Bulgarian interests and defer to them. IMRO, on the other hand, demands that Bulgarian policy [Staats- leben] accommodate itself to the wishes and aims of the Mace­donians, that it put itself at their disposal and defer to them. In this way did the various shades of opinion on Macedonia emerge: but as Macedonian state-builders, as Macedonian- Bulgarian patriots, and particularly as Macedonians oriented toward a federation with Greater Bulgaria, they are waging a single fraternal war.” 204 In time, there emerged from this confusion a group under Dimitar Vlahov, which called itself IMRO and was, as we shall see, completely Communist in its orientation. There was also a “Serbian group,” in reference to which Gilbert in der Maur says: “If Macedonia had become Bulgarian, we should probably have heard nothing of a Bul­garian, but rather of a Serbian Macedonia, just as now we hear talk of the work of IMRO.” 295

104 Gilbert in der Maur, op. cit., pp. 262—63.105 Ibid., p. 332.

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SERBIAN AND THE MACEDONIAN QUESTION

Throughout the nineteenth century, the attitude of Serbia toward the situation in what was coming more and more fre­quently to be called Macedonia differed from that taken by Bulgaria. From the very first, the interest taken by the re­suscitated Serbian state in the Slavic population of this region was that of a country concerned in the liberation and union with itself of a kindred people. From the moment it came into existence, the Serbian state was not content until it had united under its wing all the Serbs inhabiting the occupied Serbian lands.

The first Serbian uprising of 1804 was a signal for the entire nation to rebel, and furnished one more proof that the Serbian people had not abandoned its ambition to revive its vanished state. It acted as a powerful and heartening stimulus upon the Serbian population still enslaved by the Turks at a time when they did not know which way to turn. The second Serbian uprising of 1815 and the gradual emergence of the Serbian principality under Milos’s wisdom and skill constitut­ed a further step toward the realization of this sacred goal, at the same time, however, showing clearly that the road to its complete attainment was a long and difficult one.

For the whole of the Christian Balkans, these uprisings marked the beginning of a new era in which the dawn of freedom could be discerned. The enslaved Christian peoples, were encouraged by the very fact that in a part of the Serbian lands a free state had been created in which the difficult pro­blem of the tenant farmers had been solved and freedom of person and property achieved. This state was coming to be regarded as a torch of freedom and as a meeting point for all those who were anxious to fight the Turk. In time, it was to become a refuge for all those obliged to flee from their native soil for taking part in the campaign for liberation.

These uprisings also had a powerful effect upon the Bul­gars—particularly in the western districts of Bulgaria, where the Bulgarian and Serbian elements were so closely inter­mingled that it was sometimes impossible to say which was

143.

predominant. The Serbs felt sincere sympathy for the Bul­gars, oppressed as the latter were by the Turks and the Greek Orthodox Church. By a strange trick of fate, it was a Serbian monk from Dalmatia, Gerasim Zelid by name, who first gave the Bulgars the idea of demanding from the Patriarchate of Constantinople a hierarchy of their own. A man of a restless temperament and a curious turn of mind, Zeli6 arrived at the end of 1784 in Mount Athos: here he met some Bulgarian pil­grims, whom he judiciously advised to choose from their number a deputation which should present the Patriarch in Constantinople with the request that he consecrate for them bishops from among their own people. “If,” Zeli6 told them, “the Patriarch will not do this, let them say that they will go to the Grand Vizir and tell the Sultan himself that they are his faithful subjects and pay him tribute honestly, but that they have no spiritual pastors of their own tongue and race who can be understood, but instead the Patriarch sends them Greek bishops and monks who speak a foreign tongue. The Patriarch will not, I think, dare to let them take their complaint to the Sultan, but will hear their request.” 1

When Zelid gave this advice, no one could have foreseen that a few decades later the Bulgars would take it almost literally in their efforts to secure their own ecclesiastical hierarchy. It is a little-known fact that the first Slavic bishop to be consecrated by the Patriarch for the Bulgars (on Au­gust 15, 1851) was a Serb—Stevan Kova6evi6.8 When these events were taking place, it was even more impossible to foresee that Serbo-Bulgarian relations, after their auspicious start, would be seriously upset by the Bulgars’ struggle for their own national Church and that this struggle would be a factor in the emergence of the Macedonian question.

The first and second Serbian uprisings were regarded by the Serbs of Southern and Old Serbia as events in which they were intimately concerned. One of them, Petar Cardaklija,

1 Zitije Gerasima Zelida (Life of Gerasim Zeli£), Belgrade, 1897,Vol. I, pp. 123—24.

1 Stevan M. Dimitrijevic, “Bogoslovsko-uiiteljska skola u Prizre-nu” (The Theological and Teachers' Training College at Prizren),Bratstvo DruStva svetoga Save, Belgrade, Vol. XVII, p. 202.

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from Ohrid, was a member of the first Serbian delegation to go to St. Petersburg. Deligrad was founded by Vu6a 2iki6, from Mavrovo. Petar, brother of Sima Andrejevic Igumanov, remained loyal to Karadjordje even after the collapse of the first uprising. Petar Icko was a well-known and respected figure under both Karadjordje and Milos. Mihailo German and Marko Georgijevi6 were also persons of consequence who had important roles to play under Prince MiloS. “In the Serbian risings led by Karadjordje and Milos, many people from Old Serbia and Macedonia also took part, occupying important posts in Serbia’s army and government. When Serbo-Turkish relations began to return to a more peaceful footing, Serbia, through the agency of merchants, teachers and special envoys, maintained contact with Old Serbia and Mace­donia over the entire area of what had been Dugan’s empire.”*

Feeling themselves to be ethnically united with the po­pulation of these districts, where risings did not break out, the Serbian leaders declared “that they would not lay down their arms until the Serbian state, including Sokol, Skoplje and other cities, was liberated.” 4 In the plans for the area’s liberation drawn up by Tsar Alexander I in 1808, the Serbs were assigned a leading role. “This Tsar was anxious that the Serbs, as a warlike people, be given a frontier running, in the west, along the Drina, in the south, along Sar-planina (including Skoplje), and from there to the southeast to Sofia, finally following the Timok River.” 5

As soon as the Serbian principality had an opportunity of drawing up its own state policy, it included Macedonia in its plans. In the revived Serbian state as conceived by Ilija Gara- Sanin, Macedonia and Old Serbia occupied a central place. Garasanin regarded the existing Serbian principality as no more than the kernel of the Serbian state that was to be. In his Nadertanije, he wrote: “Serbia must not confine herself within her present frontiers, but aim at annexing all the Serbian peoples that surround her. If she does not pursue this policy with determination, or, what would be worse, if

* Jovan M. Jovanovid, Juzna Srbija od kraja XVIII veka do osiobodjenja (Southern Serbia from the End of the Eighteenth Cen­tury to the Liberation), Belgrade, p. 72.

4 Ibid., p. 53.5 Ibid.

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she rejects it and fails to draw up a well-thought-out plan for achieving this goal, she will be tossed hither and thither like a little boat in the storms brewing abroad until she finally fouls against such a tremendous rock that everything will be smashed.” 6

An adherent of the principle of legitimacy then current in Europe, Gara§anin wanted to achieve this revival of the Serbian state in such a maner that it could not be said that the Serbs wanted to attain something they had never had: for him, the medieval Serbian state was the foundation on which its modern counterpart was to be built. “This founda­tion for the erection of a new Serbian empire,” he said, “must now be completely cleared of ruins and raised above ground; then, on this firm and stable historical basis, we must begin upon and extend the new building. In this way, in the eyes of all nations and of the very cabinets of Europe, this enter­prise will acquire indescribable importance and great value, for we Serbs shall then appear before the world as the true heirs of our great forefathers, who are engaged, not in some new task, but in the resurrection of our motherland. Thus, our present actions will not be without a link with the past, but will constitute a complete and harmonious whole. For this reason,. . . the political life of the Serbs is protected by sacred historical right. No one will be able to condemn our ambition as being something new and unfounded, or even as being [based on] revolution; everyone will be compelled to acknowledge that it is politically inevitable, that it is founded on ancient hitory, that it has its roots in the former state and national life of the Serbs, and that these roots are now merely putting forth new shoots and beginning once more to blossom.. . for there is probably not a single country in Europe where the people’s memories of the historical past are so lively as among the Turkish Slavs, who still recall, vividly and accurately, almost all the glorious figures and events of their history.”7

Jovan Cvijic, who was a scholar, not a politician, emphasiz­ed this bond linking the Serbs with their ancient political tradition, which persists even in the most remote areas where

9 Ferdo Sisic, Jugoslovenska misao (Yuqoslav Thouqht), Belqrade, 1937, pp. 89—90.

7 Ibid., pp. 91—92.

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the population can neither read nor write. “Every place of any importance from Kosovo to Skadar, from Skoplje to Salonica, is known to the peasants from their folk poems,. . . is regarded by them as their old acquaintance and as their own property. In the popular consciousness, there is a clear continuity of events and aspirations from the time of the Nemanjici to the most recent wars... . The people are filled with enthusiasm for their traditions and for the land that in the historical past was theirs, and they are scarcely concerned about the population living there. These regions they regard os their patrimony, which, through their misfortune, has been settled by some foreign people. This does not trouble them at all: they consider themselves entitled to occupy these lands. When it is a question of territory that, in the nation’s history, has had great significance, significance of the first order, then the historical principle takes precedence in the popular consciousness over the ethnographical.” 8 In Macedonia, not even the ethnographical principle, as we shall see, is pre­judicial to the Serbian cause.

Slobodan Jovanovic points out that Serbian propaganda in Macedonia began in 1868 under the Regency.9 In this year, the Regency established a special educational committee for the purpose of seeing to the setting up of schools in Southern Serbia and the supply of teachers and school books. At the beginning of the nineteenth century, there were more schools in this area than in the territory subsequently covered by the Principality, since “there were more famous monasteries and populous towns with a well-developed trade.” 10 “Engaged in constant competition with the Greeks, the Serbian merchants felt that their prosperity depended on the quality of the education that was being given to their children. For this reason, they took steps to improve their educational system and brought teachers from Serbia, Austria, Dalmatia and

8 Jovan Cvijid, “Geografski i kulturni polozaj Srbije” (Serbia's Geographical and Cultural Situation), Glasnik srpskog geograiskog druStva, Belgrade, Vol. Ill, Nos. 3— 4, pp. 12 and 13.

* Slobodan Jovanovic, Vlada Aleksandra Obrenovica, 1889—97 (The Reign of Alexander Obrenovid, 1889—97), Belgrade, Vol. I, p. 89.

10 Al. Jovanovii, Srpske Skole i ietnliki pokrel u Juinoj Srbiji pod Turcima (Serbian Schools and the Chetnik's Movement in Sou­thern Serbia Under the Turks), Skoplje, 1937, pp. 243—44.

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Croatia.” u Jovan M. Jovanovic also states that teachers for Serbian schools in Southern Serbia were brought from other Serbian districts. “Serbian teachers,” he says, “came to these parts from Serbia, Vienna and Budapest. As the seat of the old Orthodox bishops, Ohird, together with its environs, was poorly supplied with Slavic schools, but the language and the textbooks there were Serbian, for in Serbia more attention was devoted to whether the population was Slavic and Christian than to whether it was Serbian or Bulgarian. At that time, the district of Debar was one of the most pro­gressive. . . . Throughout the nineteenth century, the inhabi­tants of KiCevo continued to use the Serbian language, which had been preserved there for centuries. All attempts to sup­press the Serbian written word here had met with failure. The district of Prilep, with its traditions about Kraljevid Marko, possessed a center of Serbian culture in the monastery of Treskavac. What the Sveta PreCista Monastery was for Porefc, Treskavac was for the people of Prilep—the main center of instruction for the Slavic population. Until the eighteen sixties, Serbian was the language of instruction there for those who were able and willing to attend school.” 14

These teachers were to be found, not only in all the larger centers of population, but also in the villages: it was they who began to modernize the old monastic and semi-monastic schools in Southern Serbia. The Serbian principality did what it could to promote the establishment and improvement of these schools, “but her policy was aimed at effecting a rap­prochement and an alliance of the Balkan nations for the purpose of freeing all the Christians from the Turks. The struggle between Serbian and Bulgarian influence for hege­mony in the countryside seemed a trifle, a matter of local importance more than anything else.” 18 Dealing with this period, Stanoje Stanojevic points out that Prince Mihailo launched a campaign for the conclusion of an alliance “in which Serbia was to be the center and chief factor. In 1866, he had concluded an alliance with Montenegro; in January 1867, he agreed with the Bulgarian emigre committee in Bucharest to launch a campaign for the resuscitation of Bul-

11 Ibid.11 Jovan M. Jovanovic, op. cit., p. 123.18 Ibid., p. 122.

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Karia and her union with Serbia; after the cities [i. e., those Serbian cities, including Belgrade, that had been captured by the Turks] had been handed over, he concluded an alliance with Greece (in September 1867), and entered upon an agree­ment with Rumania, while his agents were constantly engag­ed in active work in Bosnia, Hercegovina, Albania and Mace­donia.” 14

While laying a broad foundation for the campaign to liberate the Balkan Christians, Serbia did much to promote the education of the younger generation of Bulgars, in order that they might later educate their people and prepare them for the struggle for liberation. Immediately before the Serbo- Turkish wars (1876—78), a movement had emerged in Bul­garia which had as its original object the acquisition of a Bul­garian ecclesiastical hierarchy but which degenerated into a struggle against Serbian schools in Southern Serbia and against the Serbs generally. That the Exarchists launched their campaign for the Bulgarization of the Serbs at the very moment when the Turks were venting their wrath upon the Serbs had tragic consequences for the Serbian cause in Southern Serbia. “Out of spite, and also for political reasons, the Turks killed, arrested and exiled our teachers and priests. The Serbian nationality and the Serbian name were banned under pain of the severest persecution. They could not be mentioned in a single official document or spoken in public.”15 “From 1867 on, the name ‘Serb’ came in the Turkish empire to mean ‘rebel.’ The Turkish authorities expelled Ser­bian teachers. Serbian schools survived only in the area north of Sar-planina: to the south, they disappeared completely. At that time, the land north of Sar-planina was named Old Serbia and that to the south Macedonia: it could accordingly be said that after the Turkish wars our schools disappeared in Macedonia.” 18

Until the emergence of Exarchist propaganda, which was assisted in every way by the Turks, the entire Slavic popu­lation of this region was described as Serbian. This was the situation found by a group of French staff officers who, with

14 Stanoje Stanojevid, Istorija srpskog naroda (History of the Serbian People), Belgrade, 1926, p. 371.

15 Al. Jovanovid, op. clt., p. 257.14 Slobodan Jovanovid, op. cit., p. 89.

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the permission of the Turks, traveled round Macedonia in 1807 compiling a statistical survey of the population. Apart from Greeks, Turks, Albanians and Wallachians, they found only Serbs. “The only spoken Slavic language to be mentioned is Serbian [‘servienne’], and that not only in the region of Skoplje, but also in those of Bitolj and Salonica. As for Bul­garian, no mention of it is made in the survey. Consequently, the language of the Macedonian Slavs over a century ago was called Serbian, and that is a very important point.” 17

The Bulgarian language and Bulgarian influence were, in fact, not mentioned until Exarchist propaganda began on a large scale. According to Vasilj Popovic, “until the nineteenth century, no instances occur of the Macedonians’ calling them­selves Bulgars or their language Bulgarian. In the Middle Ages, documents in Macedonia were written in Serbian. All records and inscriptions originating in Macedonia are in Serbian.” 18 Under these circumstances, it is not in the least surprising that throughout this region schools for the Slavic population were Serbian until the appearance of the Exarch- ists. This applies particularly to the rural population, which remained true to the faith and the traditions of its ancestors.

Even during the nineteenth century, the ethnic character of this area could not be altered. Bulgarian propaganda suc­ceeded in creating its oases in the towns, but not in converting the villages, which subsequently, as soon as Bulgarian pres­sure ceased and the Serbian campaign got under way, began to secede from the Exarchate. There is abundant evidence that the greater part of the Slavic population of Macedonia, even in the second half of the nineteenth century, felt itself to be Serbian. During his journey through Debar and the sur­rounding district, Mihailo Velji6 noted that this entire area, including Debar itself, celebrated the slava. “Of all their customs,” he says, “the slava is the most popular. Despite powerful influences from outside,. . . all without exception

17 Grgur Jaksic, “StanovniStvo Madedonije u pofetku XIX veka” (The Population of Macedonia at the Beginning of the Nineteenth Century), Bratstvo druitva svetoga Save, Belgrade, Vol. XVII, p. 199.

18 Vasilj Popovii, "Makedonsko pitanje” (The Macedonian Ques­tion), in Narodna enclklopedlja SHS (National Encyclopedia of the Serbs, Croats and Slovenes), Belgrade, 1928, Vol. II, p. 648.

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continue to look forward with pleasure to this holiday and faithfully observe the customs associated with it.” 19

Milojko Veselinovi6 recorded that the population of western Macedonia spoke Serbian and observed Serbian cus­toms. “They speak Serbian, observe the slava, celebrate Serbian heroes, kings and emperors and are proud of them; they dance the oro like the Serbs, and their entire life resembles that of the other Serbs.” 20 Jovan Hadji Vasiljevi6 says that a Slav school was opened in Ohrid in 1848. “The way for Serbian literature and education,” he says, “was opened by those people of Ohrid who had been in Serbia during the wars, to receive their schooling or for other reasons, and by the Slavic monks of Mount Athos.” 21 Jordan Hadji Konstantinov, after he had left Serbia and gone over to the Exarchists, was the first to attempt (in 1859) to open a Bulgarian school in Bitolj, but as a result he was obliged to leave this school and resign his position. Aleksa Jova- novi£ says that “in all its villages [i. e., in the villages of Drimkol], all the schools secretly remained Serbian until the revival of our [i. e., the Serbian] cultural movement. The names of all their teachers have been preserved from ob­livion.” 22 Ilija LiguS, who was a teacher at Prilep at the be­ginning of the nineteenth century, formed contacts with Serbia, from where he brought school textbooks. The school at Tetovo celebrated St. Sava’s day (the traditional slava of Serbian schools) for the first time in 1862. The Mijaci and the Brsjaci, like the whole of PoreC, remained consistently Serbian.

To what extent the population of Southern Serbia felt itself to be Serbian may be seen from the following two instances. Every year, inhabitants of the village of Lukovo, in the district of Kratovo, went away for the summer to earn their living. In the year in which the Exarchate was founded, Djordje

19 Mihailo Veljid, “Srpske narodne umotvorine, obidaji i veto- vanja iz Debra i okoline” (Serbian Folk Poems, Customs and Beliefs from Debar and its Environs), Bratstvo druStva svetoga Save, Bel­grade, Vol. IX—X, pp. 431—32.

*® Milojko M. Veselinovid, “Geografsko-etnografski pregled Ma- dedonije i Stare Srbije” (Geographical and Ethnographical Survey of Macedonia and Old Serbia), ibid.. Vol. I, p. 189.

*' Jovan Hadii Vasiljevid, ’’Ohrid,“ ibid., Vol. XVII, p. 101.!* Al. Jovanovid, op. clt., p. 254.

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Krstic, headman of the village, went to the kaimakam (the Turkish official in charge of the district) and asked him to issue passports for this purpose to five hundred people from the village. When the kaimakam ordered that it be stated in the passports that the persons concerned were Bulgars and not Serbs, Krstic refused to agree before he had consulted his own people. Returning to Lukovo, he summoned a village meeting at which the inhabitants decided that they were Serbs and that they would not present themselves to the world as Bulgars. Since the kaimakam refused to issue them passports as Serbs, they did not go to work, and that year remained in the people’s memory as the “black year.”

The second instance is as follows. One day, the kaimakam came himself to Zletovo to persuade the people to declare for the Exarchate. Having addressed a general assembly of the population, the kaimakam turned to Jovan SamardSiski, the most respected man in Zletovo, who declared that he was a Serb and could not be anything else. His example was fol­lowed by all the rest. One of his sons, who had gone to Bul­garia in search of work and was employed as a messenger in the Bulgarian National Assembly, got up and told the as­sembled people that he could not be a Bulgar since all the Bulgars called him a “Srpcheto” (i. e., a “little Serb”) and not a “Bugarcheto” (“young Bulgar”). This displeased the kaima­kam, who called him a “young greenhorn.” The lad’s brother reacted violently to this, and was killed by a Turkish soldier, who went unpunished.

An illustration is given by the vojvoda Mina Stankovi6, now resident in Chicago, of the way in which Serbian children were subjected to anti-Serbian pressure. When he was a child, he attended the school at the monastery of Saint Gavrilo Les- novski, which had been restored by the despot Jovan Oliver. The teacher there was an Exarchist priest who, every day, both before and after school, made the children recite a poem stating that neither Serbs nor Greeks were Christians—only Bulgars.

How Serbs, nevertheless, came to be Bulgarized may be seen from the following instance. On one occasion when he was a boy, Jakov Ljoti6, whose father was Serbian consul in Salonica, asked Hadji Mi2ev, a prominent merchant who was a good friend and a frequent guest of his father’s, to tell him frankly whether he was a Serb or a Bulgar. MiSev, whose

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son was a highly placed official in the Blugarian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, turned to Ljotic’s mother and said: “What shall I say to this youngster? It’s ridiculous and absurd that I was once a Serb and am now a Bulgar, but that is the truth. In 1879, together with two other people from Veles, I went to Belgrade to ask Jovan Risti6 on behalf of the town of Veles to send us a Serbian teacher, whom we would pay, and to give us Serbian books, for which we also offered to pay. Risti6 replied: ‘We have waged two exhausting wars against the Turks, and we can give you nothing. Go to Sofia, for Russia is pouring supplies into Bulgaria and giving her everything. They will let you have all that you want. We too went to Sofia and got what we needed, and all at their expense.” 23

Somtehing similar happened to Spiridon Gop£evi6 and Dimitrije Petrov, who toured Macedonia with the object of acquainting themselves on the spot with the true ethnic situation. When they asked a peasant from Crna Reka whether he was a Serb or Bulgar, he replied: “It is true that the Serbs share with us the same language and the slava, but it is also true that the Bulgars have accepted us, opened schools for us, publicly supported our grievances against the Turkish govern­ment and assisted us with money. The Serbs are our blood brothers and the Bulgars our half brothers, but the latter treat us like real brothers and the former like half bro­thers.” 24

The peasant from Crna Reka was unaware of the great difficulties besetting the Serbain principality, and saw only that which was taking place before his own eyes. He could, moreover, scarcely be acquainted with Serbia’s attitude toward the Bulgarian revival. Even people like Jovan Ristid did not immediately appreciate the significance of the Bul­garian campaign in Southern Serbia. In his Politifika istorija Srbije u drugoj polovini X IX veka (Political History of Serbia in the Second Half of the Nineteenth Century), Zivan Ziva- novi6, an intimate friend of Ristic’s, states that during the first few years of Exarchist propaganda in Southern Serbia, Ristic adopted a mild and conciliatory attitude toward the

25 From a private communication from Mr. Jakov Ljotid.24 Spiridon Gopievid, Makedonien und Ailserbien, Vienna, 1889,

p. 107.

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Bulgars. When his attenion was drawn to this, he replied on December 16, 1878, in the National Assembly: “If among the Bulgars there are to be found people who are harmful to us, too much importance should not be attached to this. Young states are like young people. Our state is older than Bulgaria: we have more experience, and should therefore set them an example of moderation and work for mutual confidence. There is no nation that is closer or more akin to us than the Bulgars.”15

Ristic was not the only Serbian leader of the time that was anxious to help strengthen the new Bulgarian state. The fact that the Bulgars were backed by Russia influenced the attitude of Metropolitan Mihailo, who nurtured a particular affection for them. “Our politicians,” says Aleksa Jovanovi6, “were inaccurately informed on events concerning the Bul­garian Church, which by then had made great headway in Istanbul; nor were they properly acquainted with the morale of the Bulgarian people. Their assessment of the latter was derived from the districts bordering on Serbia, and they sup­posed that a similar situation was to be found within the country.” 26 Later, it transpired that the propaganda for a national Church was being exploited by the Bulgars as a means of propagating the idea of a Greater Bulgaria.

###

Although Russia had been on her side, Serbia’s interests in Southern Serbia suffered greatly as a result of the Serbo- Turkish wars. On the one hand, the Turks were now even more embittered against the Serbs; on the other, the aims pursued by Russia constituted a grave threat to Serbia’s vital interests. Russian victories over the Turks, which were wel­comed by the Serbs, gave rise to the peace of San Stefano, which created a Bulgaria that went beyond the hopes of even the most ardent of Bulgarian chauvinists. “At San Stefano,” says Aleksa Jovanovid, “Russia extended the Bulgarian fron­

15 Zivan 2ivanovi6, PoIitiCka lstorija Srbije u drugoj polovini XIX veka (A Political History of Serbia in the Second Half of the Nineteenth Century), Belgrade, 1924, Vol. II, p. 98.

*• Al. Jovanovii, Postanak Egzarhije i Turska, Rusija i Srbija (The Establishment of the Exarchate and Turkey, Russia and Serbia), Skoplje, 1937,p. 55.

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tiers westward across the southern borders of Serbia, assign­ing Ni§, Kosovo, Prizren, Kursumlija and KolaSin to the Bulgars. This was the result, not of ignorance of ethnography and the historical past of our people, but of the own political interests and the interests of the Slavic world; for, according to Russian views of the time (and her views, like her actions, were imperialistic), the Slavs in Austria had been absorbed by the masses of the Germanic population.”S7

The Serbian government was powerless to alter the Rus­sian decision. No arguments it advanced could change the course that had already been decided upon: Bulgaria now occupied first place in Russia’s Balkan policy, and neither reasons based on common sense nor the Serbs’ historical rights could have any effect upon the Russian attitude. Filled with despair, Milisav Protic, Serbian envoy to the Russian court, reported to his government: “In Russia, the aim is being deliberately followed of promoting Bulgarian supremacy and holding Serbia down as far as possible. During conversations with Giers I learnt that everything we have taken is regarded as being Bulgarian, and that, in their opinion, it would be unjust to hand over a Bulgarian people to Serbia. I also learn that Russian and Bulgarian interests are the same and occupy first place in any negotiations, and that, if concessions are necessary, they will be made, in the first place, at the expense of Serbian interests, and if need be of Russian interests also,but under no circumstances of Bulgarian interests.__I havecome to the conclusion that Russia, to our misfortune, is aim­ing, not at protecting Bulgaria from Turkey, but simply at security from Serbia and the Serbian people, and that Serbianinterests are in danger___ The Slavophiles maintain thatthere is no Old Serbia [as such], but that it is all Bulgarian.”*8

The reaction of the Serbian population of Southern and Old Serbia was quite different. When it became known that a congress was to be held in Berlin to alter the decisions of San Stefano, the Serbian population of these areas conceived the hope that it would not have to accept Bulgarian domina­tion after all. Prominent people and parish committees began to collect signatures and make representations to the great powers, to Prince Milan Obrenovic and to the Serbian

« Ibid., p. 53.» Ibid., p. 58.

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government. Working just before the war on a monograph on Mihailo, Metropolitan of Belgrade, the present writer dis­covered, in Mihailo’s private archives, some of these missives that had been sent to him. In some of them, he too was asked to urge the Russians not to permit these areas to pass to the Bulgars. Mihailo, who enjoyed the high esteem of the Slavophiles, was himself astonished at this turnabout in Rus­sia’s policy toward Serbia.

Some of these appeals were published by Spiridon Gopfie- vic in his Makedonija i Stara Srbija (Macedonia and Old Serbia). One of them, written on May 10, 1878, bearing 170 signatures of parish representatives, priests and archi­mandrites from the districts of KiSevo, Prilep and Veles, states: “Some time ago, we were told by our city corbadzije, who, together with the Turks, have been exploiting us ever since Kosovo, that we were to come under the rule of the Bulgarian Empire, as though we were Bulgars and not true Serbs. All of us in the administrative districts of Skoplje, Tetovo, Debar, Kiievo, Veles, Prilep, Bitolj, Kostur, Gorica, Salonica, Tikve§, Stip, RadoviSte, Nevrokop, Melnik, Koiani, Kumanovo, Banjska, Radomir, Sofia, Palanka, Samokov and Dupnica are true, authentic Serbs. This is attested by the numberless monuments of a purely Serbian character that are to be found in the districts mentioned.” 29 The document goes on to name all the Serbian endowments, and states that the poeple are reluctant to give up their present state of enslave­ment to the Turks merely in order to become slaves of the Bulgars. This, the document says, “would be more.. . intoler­able than our present enslavement to the Turks, and would force us, either to kill off all our livestock as revenge for this injustice, or to abandon our sacred soil, our churches, our graves and everything that is dear to us, and this would profit neither Europe nor our people.” ,0

An appeal of June 12, 1878, addressed to Milan Obrenovid, signed by 520 parish representatives and bearing 220 seals, states: “In the districts of Kumanovo, Skoplje, Banjska, Kra- tovo, Radomir, Melnik, Nevrokop, Stip, Kodan, Strumica, Veles and elsewhere, we are pure Serbs and the best repre­sentatives of Old Serbia. Our country is purely Serbian and

29 Gopcevic:, op. cit., p. 372.30 Ibid., p. 328.

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the true heart of Serbia: from it there sprang, not only our sacred Nemanji6i, but our state, our literature, our glory, our greatness and everything that was and still is Serbian.” 31 “Since we are not and never have been Bulgars, and since not a single Bulgar is living among us,” says another appeal to Prince Milan dated June 15, 1878, and presented to him in the name of the population of the districts of Kidevo, Ohrid, Debar and Elbasan, “we come as Serbs to you, our only lord and ruler, and beg you to save us from this and unite us, as being the purest and best Serbs, with your principality of Serbia, our only mother and consolation.”32 On June 20, 1878, the Serbs of Skoplje addressed a similar appeal to Prince Milan, and on October 10 of the same year those of Prizren, PriStina, Vucitrn, Pec and Djakovica, this latter document bearing 126 seals. In every case, the fear was expressed that they might fall under Austro-Hungarian or Bulgarian rule. “A few months ago,” they say, “we heard the dreadful news that we are to be transferred to either Austria-Hungary or to Bulgaria. At the same time, Russian agents came with much money and asked us to append our signatures and seals to a statement that we are ‘Macedonians’ and wish to be united with Russia by way of Bulgaria.” 33

One such appeal, written on July 1, 1878, and bearing eight hundred signatures and seals, was submitted by Archi­mandrite Sava Defcanac to the Congress of Berlin on behalf of Southern and Old Serbia. This document emphasized the desire of its authors to be united with Serbia, since, they say, “our fathers did not live together with the Bulgars, and we do not wish to do so now. The Bulgars and ourselves can never constitute a single people, since we are pure Serbs and nothing else.” 34

On this occasion, the desire of the Serbs in Southern and Old Serbia to be united with the Serbian Principality was not realized. The Berlin Congress ignored their wishes, even though it frustrated Russia’s schemes in the Balkans. Serbia’s gain was that she won complete independence and acquired an independent Church. “Serbia,” says Zivanovic, “left the

“ Ibid.“ Ibid., p. 332.M Ibid., p. 336.M Ibid., p. 334.

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Ottoman Empire, and by virtue of a great international agree­ment, entered the ranks of independent states. Side by side with the Serbian state, the Serbian Church also recovered her independence.” 35

Serbia achieved her territorial expansion southward against the wishes of Russia. She paid for the support she received from Austria-Hungary by abandoning her claim to Bosnia and Hercegovina, which Austria-Hungary occupied by virtue of a mandate from the great powers. By persisting in her support of Bulgaria, Russia threw King Milan into the arms of Vienna. Giers told the Serbian envoy in St. Petersburg that as far as his government was concerned Russia’s interests came first, then those of Bulgaria and then only those of Serbia, although there were cases where Bulgaria’s interests enjoyed equal priority with those of Russia.30 At that time, the Russian Slavophiles also wholeheartedly championed the cause of a Greater Bulgaria. Aksakov demanded that the Morava River be made the frontier between Serbia and Bul­garia, and in a rage tore up the map prepared by Kisyakov, who was alleged to have assigned much disputed territory of Serbia.37

Though territorially insignificant, Serbia’s southward ex­pansion was of great advantage to her. While, before the Berlin Congress, the total area of her territory was no more than 37,740 square kilometers, it now amounted to 48,300 square kilometers. This increase was described by Jovan Cvijid as a “turning point in the expansion of Serbia, for her territory was thereby considerably extended to the south, and, having acquired almost the entire basin of the Southern Morava, together with Vranje, Nig and Pirot, she assumed a wedge-like form.. . . She became a Morava state, with the addition of the Drina and Valjevo districts and the Timok basin.” 88 Carried away by his enthusiasm for a Greater Bul­garia, D. Rizov wrote that Serbia acquired the “Bulgarian district of Nis” as a reward for her part in the Russo-Turkish

ss 2ivanovi<5, op. cit., p. 40.M Wladan Georgewitsch, Die serbische Frage, Stuttgart-Leipzig,

1909, p. 56.87 Gopfevic, op. cit., p. 247.38 Cvijic, op. cit., p. 6.

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w ar of 1876—78, and that this provoked a strong desire on her p art to “continue her expansion in B ulgarian Macedonia.” 39

Rizov was, naturally , w riting nonsense. By a secret con­vention signed on June 28, 1881, between A ustria-H ungary and Serbia, the form er channeled the la ter’s expansion in a direction tha t for the moment presented no danger for her, with the possibility in view of checking this movement too at a la ter date. By this convention, A ustria-H ungary bound her­self to assist the expansion of Serbia, “if she [Serbia] honestly fulfilled the provisions of the convention, toward the valley of the Vardar, w herever circumstances made this possible.” 40

During the interval between the Berlin Congress and the F irst Balkan War, Serbia tried in various ways to oppose Bulgarian influence in Southern Serbia—an influence which she had at first sought to promote. The annexation by Bul­garia of Eastern Rumelia on Septem ber 6, 1885, which destroyed the balance of power in the Balkans established by the Berlin Congress, was regarded by King Milan as a suitable moment for settling accounts with the Bulgars. Only four days later, the journal Nova Ustavnost p rin ted an article by Jovan Ristic which set forth the whole problem in a reasonable and m oderate light. The article declared: “As soon as Bulgaria annexes a large and rich province w ith a popu­lation of eight hundred thousand, the balance of power in the Balkans is im m ediately destroyed. If the Balkan states will not rise in protest again Bulgarian aggrandizement, they m ust think of means of restoring equilibrium in their favor. Serbia will seek compensation in Odl Serbia and northern Mace­donia. . . . We need not do anything rash, but we must keep this danger [of increased Bulgarian activity in Macedonia] before our eyes and be prepared to remove it. We m ust not allow anything that we—still more, anything that our fore­fathers—have acquired to be lost.” 41

Feeling that he had been affronted and confident of re ­ceiving support from Vienna, King Milan was disposed to take

’• D. Rizoff, Die Bulgaren, p. 8.49 Jovan M. Jovanovid, op. cit., p. 93.41 As quoted in 2 ivanovii, op. cit., p. 277.

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decisive measures. In a speech from the throne, delivered be- bore the National Assembly summoned for Septem ber 20, 1885, the king declared himself ready to do everything ne­cessary to “preserve the status obtaining before these events took place, or to establish an equilibrium tha t would genuine­ly guarantee that the interests of the various Balkan nations [were] in harm ony w ith each other.” 48 Everything indicated that King Milan had decided upon war, which, it should be emphasized, he conceived as a w ar for Macedonia. Of this, the Bulgars appear to have had no doubts: the prince of Bul­garia sent his m inister Grekov, accompanied by a special mission, to Nil, where King Milan was at that moment, for the purpose of negotiating with him; but Milan refused to receive him. “By this act,” says Zivan 2ivanovi6, “the last thread was broken on which the fate of m any questions hung. These were soon, w ith catastrophic speed, to m eet their fate­ful solution.” 43

In the proclam ation in which, on November 2, 1885, he declared w ar on Bulgaria, King Milan pointed out that Bul­garia had violated the provisions of the Berlin T reaty and tha t “Serbia cannot be indifferent tow ard an alteration in the balance of power in the Balkan Peninsula, particularly when it exclusively favors a state tha t has used every moment of its freedom to dem onstrate to Serbia that it is a bad neighbor and will not recognize her rights.” 44

Badly organized and unskilfully led, the war, which was supposed to be a w ar for the V ardar valley, lasted only th ir­teen days and ended in a Serbian defeat on the Slivnica. On March 6, 1886, the king, in a special proclamation, announced to the nation that peace w ith Bulgaria had been signed. The armistice concluded on December 21 of the preceding year had been prolonged on March 1. Serbia’s common frontiers w ith Bulgaria and Souther Serbia, the la tter of which con­tinued to rem ain under Turkish rule, were unchanged. The whole w ar was no more than an episode—the result of a fit of tem per on the part of a sovereign who could not contain himself a t a moment which m ight have been exploited quite differently.

41 Ibid., p. 278.43 Ibid., p. 281.44 Ibid., p. 283.

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There is no doubt that King Milan clearly saw the danger threatening the interests of the Serbian nation as a result of increasing Bulgarian influence in a region that had been the backbone of the medieval Serbian state. “Even today,” says Stanoje Stanojevid, “when any Serb thinks of the history of his country, he first and foremost thinks of that state, whose history makes up the m ajor p art of the history of the Serbian people in the Middle Ages. It is the state of Dugan’s empire and of the B attle of Kosovo, the source of almost all the nation’s traditions, and the scene of activity of all the per­sonalities mentioned in Serbia’s medieval traditions and his­tory. Everything tha t is a source of pride in the past of the Serbian people is connected w ith it, and its restoration has been the object of their desires and ambitions throughout the centuries.” 45

The realization of these ambitions was threatened by Bul­garian propaganda in Southern Serbia: Serbia could not per­m it Bulgaria to become her neighbor on the southern side as well. Stojan Novakovid, a historian and statesm an who at one tim e was working in close cooperation w ith King Milan, con­sidered tha t in the Macedonian question Serbia could not go along with Bulgaria, since “we dare not perm it the Bulgars to occupy our southern frontier. Closed in on the west by A ustria, who retains Bosnia, we should suffocate if the Bul­gars, by taking Macedonia, cut off our egress to the south.” 48

A fter the failure of the w ar of 1885, it was clear that Serbia would not succeed w ithin the foreseeable fu ture in taking this disputed region by force. The only alternative was to resume the cultural campaign in terrupted by the outbreak of the Serbo-Turkish wars of 1876. As a result of their un­pleasant experience w ith Bulgaria, both Turkey and Russia were now more favorably disposed tow ard Serbia than before. B ulgaria’s growing independence warned Russia to exercise g reater restrain t in her efforts to help her.

Thus, Russia began once more to lend more and more sup­port to the Serbian cause in Macedonia. Zinovev, the Russian

4® Stanoje Stanojevid, “O srpskoj kulturi u srednjem veku” (Ser­bian Culture in the Middle Ages), in lz naSe proilosti (From OurPast), Belgrade, 1934, Vol. I, p. 23.

4* Slobodan Jovanovid, op. cit., p. 330. Cf. Stojan Novakovid,Baikansko pitanje (The Balkan Question), p. 121.

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envoy in Istanbul, told the Serbian envoy on one occasion that Macedonia would never become Bulgarian.47 “As the im­m ediate neighbor of B ulgaria,” says Slobodan Jovanovid, “Serbia was a good observation point and springboard for attack. Under King Milan, the radicals fled to Bulgaria, where they were immediately received by the Russian consul: now, the enemies of Coburg and Stambolov fled to Serbia, wherethey could count on protection from the Russian embassy___Finally, Russian diplomacy took under its wing Serbian pro­paganda in Macedonia: Macedonia was the Achilles’ heel of Bulgarian policy, and for this reason Russia attem pted to exert pressure on Bulgaria from th a t side.” 48

In February 1885, the A ustro-H ungarian government, through the Serbian envoy in Vienna, recommended King Milan to intensify activity in Macedonia, “since this is also in her [A ustria-Hungary’s] interest. As for Bulgaria, A ustria- Hungary will on no account allow h er to expand in that direction.” 49 All this showed tha t the loss of the w ar was not to be regarded too tragically: it had opened up new per­spectives and indicated fresh possibilities for removing Bul­garian influence from Southern Serbia. It exerted a sobering effect upon both the governm ent and the masses of the popu­lation in Serbia. The need became evident to combine official efforts w ith private initiative in the struggle for this region. In 1886, there was founded the Society of St. Sava, whose m ain purpose was “to spread education and foster the nationalconsciousness and good qualities of the Serbian people___Asthe chief organ of Serbian propaganda, it was to a certain extent controlled by the M inistry of Education (in 1887) and la ter by the M inistry of Foreign A ffairs (in 1889—91). In 1891, its links w ith the governm ent were broken, and its cultural and educational work among the Serbs in Turkey began to weaken until finally it confined itself to the publication of books and rendering of assistance w ithin the limits of its own resources.” 60

47 Hermann W endel, Der Kampl der Siidsiawen um Freiheit und Einheil, Frankfurt on Main, 1925, p. 511.

48 Slobodan Jovanovid, op. cit., Vol. I, p. 85.49 Jovan M. Jovanovid, op. cit., p. 127.40 Ibid., p. 139.

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In addition to the Society of St. Sava, there were numerous o ther cultural-political societies engaged in assisting churches and schools in Southern and Old Serbia. Of these, the most im portant were the Society for M utual Aid to the Inhabitants of Old Serbia and Macedonia and the Serbian Brotherhood, the la tte r being an association of refugees from these two regions. Numerous newspapers, both w ithin Serbia and out­side, pursued sim ilar aims. In 1871, the paper Prizren began publication in the town of that name; in 1885, Kosovo, and in 1895, Carigradski glasnik, first came out in PriStina and Istanbul respectively. Sim ilarly, Vardar issued its first num ­ber in Skoplje on Septem ber 1, 1908. All these papers, in their various ways, supported the Serbian cause in Southern and Old Serbia.

It is impossible w ithin the scope of this chapter to set forth all that was done by the Serbian government after the unsuccessful w ar of 1885 to spread education in these areas. At the end of the Serbo-Turkish war, Serbian schools here were almost non-existent. In 1891, there w ere 110 of them, w ith about 130 teachers; by 1904, their num ber had risen to 300, w ith 400 teachres. In additions to a theological sem inary in Prizren, gymnasia w ere opened in Skoplje and Salonica in 1893, and four years la ter also in Bitolj. Som ewhat later, two- year secular schools were opened in Skoplje, Salonica and Bitolj; while a teachers’ train ing establishm ent for men and women was opened in Skoplje.41

The increasing num ber of Serbian schools in these areas was unable to solve the chief problem: the Porte continued to ban the use of the Serbian name in Southern and Old Serbia. “When the requests, subm itted to a commission of the Porte in 1896, th a t the Serbian nationality be recognized in Turkey, w ent unheeded,” says Jovan Jovanovic, “the Serbs began to demand the restoration of the Patriarchate of Pe6.” 52 In a memoir subm itted to King A lexander in 1897, Jovan Risti6 proposed that a Serbian ecclesiastical district be set up under the Turks with the name of “Serbian exarchate.” “The establishm ent of an exarchate already has a precedent in the

** J. T. M arkovii and Svetozar Tomii, O Makedortiji i Makedon- cima (Macedonia and the Macedonians), Corfu, 1918, p. 89.

" Jovan M. Jovanovid, op. cit., p. 108.83 Zivanovid, op. cit., Vol. Ill, p. 379.

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B ulgarian Exarchate, while the restoration of the Patriarchate of Pec should be left for the fu tu re .” 53 Slobodan Jovanovid rightly comments th a t the idea of restoring the Patriarchate of Ped on the territo ry of the vilayets of Salonica, Bitolj and Kosovo was unrealistic. “Of the area th a t was once under its [the Patriarchate’s] spiritual authority, the greater part has been wrested in the course of time from the Ottoman Empire and transferred, politically speaking, either to Bulgaria or to Serbia, or else to Austria as the power occupying Bosnia and Hercegovina. That p art of the Patriarchate of Pec which has remained w ithin the Ottom an Em pire coincides in the main w ith the vilayet of Kosovo. If the P atriarchate were restored, it would exclude those very parts of Macedonia—the vilayets of Bitolj and Salonica—for which the main struggle has been waged between us, the Greeks and the Bulgars.” 54

The idea of restoring the Patriarchate was soon abandoned. Much more realistic was the proposal to seek Serbian bishops for those dioceses of the Patriarchate of Constantinople in whidi Serbs constituted the m ajority. A fter prolonged and laborious efforts and patient diplomatic negotiations, the Patriarchate of Constantinople appointed Dionisije Popovid, a Serb from Bosnia, in 1895 as M etropolitan of RaSka and Prizren. On October 19, 1899, A rchim andrite F irm ilijan was elected Serbian m etropolitan of Skoplje, but, on account of double dealing by the Patriarchate and other difficulties, he was not consecrated until June 28, 1902. During King P eter I ’s stay in Istanbul in 1910, V am ava Rosid was elected bishop of Veles and Debar. “By giving him the title of episkop glavin- ski, the Patriarchate acknowledged the righ t to the episcopal throne of Ohrid, [since] the episkopija glavinska formed part of the medieval bishopric of Ohrid. The Serbs lacked only this bishopric to restore both in name and in fact their ancient autonomous Church, which, w ith the aid of the Patriarchate of Constantinople, had been dismembered in the seventeenth century.” ss

These successes, modest though they were, had a positive effect in the increased num ber of Serbian schools and the heightened disposition of the Serbian population to offer re­sistance to the Bulgars. “Under the influence of this activity ,”

M Slobodan Jovanovid, op. cit., Vol. I, p. 370.“ Jovan M. Jovanovid, op. cit., p. 119.

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says Radoslav Gruji6, “whole districts began to secede from the B ulgarian Exarchate and join the Serbian bishops.” 68 Having acquired their own bishops and services read in the Slavic tongue, the Serbian population had no fu rth e r need to rem ain w ithin the Exarchate, which had become an institu ­tion for the Bulgarization of the Serbs.

Of particu lar im portance in the struggle against Bulgarian influence and Turkish oppression in Southern and Old Serbia was the chetnics movement. “In the districts of Kumanovo and K riva Palanka,” says Jovan Jovanovid, “a genuine rebel­lion was raised, while Slavic chetas were active in the districts of KiCevo, Prilep, Veles and elsewhere.” 67 In 1878, the priest D im itar raised a rebellion in the region of Kuma­novo. “W ithout any provocation, but simply in agreem ent with his friends—mostly priests—he persuaded the entire region to take up arms. The rising embraced the entire area from Kumanovo to the present Bulgarian frontier, to Kratovo and OvCe Polje, while its main centers were the m onasteries of Zabel and K arpina.” s8 Five years before the Serbo-Bulgarian w ar of 1885, there broke out the rising of the Brsjaci. “Four strong men, Ilija Delija, Rista Kostadinovid, Micko Krstid and Andjelko Tanasovid, raised the district [Demir-Hisar, PoreC and Kifievo] in revolt in the middle of October 1880, and the people supported the rising, which lasted for a year.” *•

The renewal of Serbian chetnics activity was provoked by the increased pressure of B ulgarian bands, which were m ulti­plying in Southern Serbia and attem pting to prevent the re­tu rn of those Serbs who had joined the Exarchate. Seeing th a t they were losing control of the situation in the cultural, edu­cational and ecclesiastical spheres, the Bulgars in 1897 found­ed in Salonica the Association for K illing the Serbs w ith the

M Radoslav Grujid, “Egzarhiska uprava u Ju ino j Srbiji” (The Ex­archist Administration in Soutern Serbia), in Narodna enciklopedija SHS, Belgrade, 1928, Vol. I, p. 705.

M Jovan M. Jovanovid, op. cit., p. 142.u Jovan Hadzi-Vasiljevid, “Po kumanovskoj i skopskoj okolini”

(Round the Districts of Kumanovo and Skoplje), Bratstvo dru&tva svetoga Save, Belgrade, Vol. VII, p. 179.

M Jovan M. Jovanovid, op. cit., p. 142.

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object of destroying the leading Serbian stratum in that area. According to Jovanovi6, these B ulgarian bands “began to attack villages, impose taxes on villages and on individuals, and commit arson and m urder, taking two or th ree victims at a time. Terrorization was also carried out on a large scale,but this began to m eet resistance in the villages___Between1904 and 1906, terrorization of the Serbs by arm ed bands reached unprecedented proportions. During these th ree years, there were 93 m urders and 82 robberies in the Skoplje district, 48 m urders and 61 robberies in the Bitolj district and 2 m ur­ders and 8 robberies in the vicinity of Salonica.” 84

The emergence of Serbian chetas may be said to have been spontaneous. Two of the earliest leaders of these chetas were Micko Krstic in Porefi and Andjelko Aleksi6 in PCinja. When the form er succeeded in capturing Damjan Grujev, the re­putation of the chetas was fu rth e r enhanced, both locally and in Serbia. The treatm ent of the wounded G rujev was typical: he was spared his life, and afte r he had been success­fully treated, he was given his freedom. “The chetnics move­m ent which came into being in these unhappy Serbian dis­tricts under the Turks,” says Aleksa Jovanovi6, “aimed prim arily at defending the Serbs from Bulgarian propaganda, then a t protecting them from Turkish oppression, and finally at preparing them for their liberation and reunion with Serbia. The Serbian kingdom, with its freedom, law and order and democratic regime, was for all the ideal.” 81

The failure of the Macedonian rising of August 2, 1903, and the progressive disintegration of IMRO finally prompted those Serbs that had gone over to the Exarchate to re turn to the Patriarchate. “The Bulgars,” says M. Milenovic, “lost village after village, often w ithout a fight.” 88 The failure of the revolution and Turkish acts of violence provoked among the Exarchists a movement for their re tu rn to the Patriarchate and to Serbian ways of life, as occurred in the diocese of Veles and Debar. The largest Exarchist village in the Ki6evo district, Karbunica, set an example that was followed by

•“ Ibid., p. 147.“ AI. Jovanovid, Srpske Skoie i ie tn iik i pokret u Juznoj Srbiji

pod Turcima, p. 292.•* M. M ilenovii, “C etnifka akcija” (Chetnic's W arfare), in Narod-

na enciklopedija SHS, Vol. IV, p. 947.

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others. This unexpected movement spread to Ohrid and De­bar.” w

As the counterpart of the B uglarian Association for Killing the Serbs, a secret society known as the Serbian Defense was founded in 1905. A rticle 1 of the society’s constitution states that it was founded by “Serbs from Old Serbia and Mace­donia, especially by those from the sanjaks of Skoplje and Debar and the districts of Kifievo, Prilep and Ohrid as well as from other parts of the vilayets of Bitolj and Salonica.” ®4 This society was a successful attem pt to arouse and unite Serbian national forces on the actual scene of the struggle. Its chetnics-groups were of two kinds: in addition to those th a t moved freely about the countryside, there were others, organized in secret, th a t were tied to their own localities. These provided a reserve for filling gaps in the former. The aim was that each individual take an interest in the national conflict and m ake his own contribution. No distinction was made between Exarchist and Patriarchist Serbs: the intention was tha t they be brought together and united.

The ethical character of this movement may best be seen from the society’s constitution, Article 17 of which states: “Both perm anent and secret chetas may kill, from among the Muslims, only those Albanians or Mohammedanized Serbs who have deserted from the Turks in order to harm our cause. Soldiers, gendarmes and Turkish officials m ay not be attacked, but if our chetnics are attacked by them, they m ust not sur­render, for this is not perm itted by the honor of the Serbian name and Serbian arm s.” 65 Nowhere in the constitution is it stated tha t the aim of Serbian chetnics is to kill the Bulgars. Article 18 m erely states: “Those Bulgarian guerrilla bands will be pursued which plunder the people or force them to renounce th e ir nam e and Church.”

Organized, as they were, on the very scene of the struggle, and springing from the very bosom of the people, these Serbian chetas soon began to made headway against the Bul­gars. Their successes not only encouraged the local population, but also excited public opinion in Serbia. Soon, volunteers

•* Jovan M. Jovanovii, op. cit., p. 151.44 Ibid., p. 160.45 Cf. ibid., p. 162.44 ibid.

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w ere arriv ing from all parts of Serbia, including Serbian Catholics and Mohammedans. “Checked and frustrated by their failurse,” says Aleksa Jovanovid, “the ardor of our people burst forth like a volcano. The guerrilla campaign spread like an uncontrollable fire. Young pupils from the gymnasia w ere sent back by the police across the frontier. People in the prim e of life abandoned their regular occupa­tions and all the conveniences of a peaceful life in order to toil in the worst w eather through the gorges of Old Serbiaand Macedonia___It was literally a struggle for life or death.When there was no hope of escape, the chetnics killed either themselves or one another so as not to fall into the enemy’s hands.” 67

In time, the Serbian governm ent began to give assistance to this chetnics movement, partly in the form of m aterial aid and partly by turning a blind eye to the departure of com­missioned and non-commissioned officers for the scene of the struggle, w here they took over command of chetnics and led them w ith g reat heroism and self-sacrifice. In Bel­grade, a central committee for M acedonian affairs was set up under Ljubom ir Davidovic. Its mem bership was made up of prom inent personalities from the political, academic and cultural life of the city.

The revolution of the Young Turks in 1908 imposed a tem ­porary check upon the guerrilla campaign, but enabled the Serbian population of the Turkish lands to organize them ­selves politically. Representatives of the “Ottoman Serbs” entered upon negotiations w ith the Young Turks, and a t a conference of Serbian leaders held in Skoplje on August 23—26, 1908, the Provisional Central Committee of the Ser­bian People was set up. The organization was called the Serbian Democratic League, and promised the Young Turks that it would abandon revolutionary methods and transfer the struggle for its rights to the constitutional plane. The first national assembly of the “Ottom an Serbs,” held in February 1909, demanded complete national freedom and acknowledg­m ent of the Serbian nationality.

The disbandm ent of the chetas, carried out afte r the accession to power of the Young Turks, soon proved to be a

•7 AI. Jovanovid, Srpske Skole i ietnidki pokiet u Juinoj Srbiji pod Turcima, p. 292.

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mistake. The Young Turks behaved quite differently from w hat they had promised: their aim was not only to save their em pire from disaster, but to prom ote the conversion of all the non-Turkish nationalities on their territory , which inevitably also affected the Serbs. In the fall of 1910, the Bulgars began once more to send guerrillas into Southern Serbia, bu t w ithout achieving any great success. In the following spring, Serbian chetas also began to reappear, and the Young Turks made an attem pt to disarm the people, who were tired of constant w arfare and insecurity.

On the eve of the Balkan W ar of 1912, a rapprochement between Belgrade and Sofia was in the offing: w ar with T ur­key could easily be foreseen, and thus the guerrillas were beginning to acquire especial significance. According to Jovan Jovanovic, Serbian chetnics, before the w ar broke out, “crossed the frontier before the regular troops, cleared the way for them, repaired the roads, prepared positions for the Serbian artillery and fortified the most im portant points.” 68 Aleksa Jovanovi6 says that, “by their audacious attacks or n ight raids, they threatened the enemy’s flanks and frequently his rear, thus causing confusion and disorder in his ranks.” 99

The Serbian chetnics contributed much to the speedy and complete victory of Serbia in the F irst Balkan War, thus achieving one of the conditions necessary for the Serbian governm ent to demand a revision of the agreem ent concluded w ith Bulgaria on the partition of Southern Serbia. It should also be mentioned that im mediately afte r the w ar of 1885 certain circles in Bulgaria had begun to realize the inevita­bility of one day negotiating w ith Serbia for a partition of Macedonia. Responsible circles in Serbia had also, on several occasions, attem pted to reach an agreem ent w ith the Bulgars on activity in the unliberated areas. In 1889, Nikola PaSi6 tried to negotiate w ith Stambolov on this question, but the la tte r passed the Serbian message on to the Turks. Of more serious im port was the agreem ent signed on March 1, 1897, which bound both countries to take no action in the Balkans w ithout previous consultation; to negotiate jointly on ques­tions concerning their respective co-nationals in Turkey; to

*® Jovan M. Jovanovid, op. cit., p. 183.•• Al. Jovanovid, Srpske ik o le i (e tn iik i pokie t u Ju ino j Srbiji

pod Turcima, p. 306.

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render m utual assistance in m atters concerning the Church and education in Turkey; to invite the Prince of Montenegro to join the agreem ent; and to inform no other country but Russia of the term s of the agreem ent.70 In Slobodan Jovano- vifi’s assessment, the im portance of this document was that “we [the Serbs] have secured B ulgarian recognition of a sphere of interest—adm ittedly not as yet defined—in Mace­donia, and have made any m ilitary action by the Bulgars in the Balkans conditional upon our previous consent.” 71

In 1901, D im itrije Vujid’s governm ent attem pted to reach an agreem ent w ith the Bulgars based on a principle that was la ter adopted in the trea ty of 1912. The Bulgars refused the proposal on the grounds that it was impossible for them to “make w ritten agreem ents on the partition of territo ry be­longing to their sovereign Sultan.” The Serbs then proposed that the rivalry between Serbian and Bulgarian propaganda in Macedonia be stopped. The Bulgars replied th a t this did not depend on them, since the struggle was being waged on their own initiative by the Bulgarian population of Mace­donia.72

A fu rth e r attem pt at negotiations on the drawing up of spheres of influence in Macedonia was made in February 1904. The initiative once more came from Pa£i6, who was willing to negotiate “on condition tha t Bulgaria agree that Old Serbia,i. e., the vilayet of Kosovo, be recognized, as a purely auto­nomous Serbian region. As fa r the o ther two vilayets, those of Salonica and Bitolj, he was willing tha t they be organized as an autonomous district, provided that Patriarchists and Exarch- ists among the Slavic population enjoy equal rights.” 73 The idea of an autonomous Macedonia had been accepted by Boris Sarafov as long ago as 1900, but was firm ly rejected by King Alexander Obrenovic, who summed up the situation thus: “An autonomous Macedonia is a Macedonia ruled by the Bulgarian Exarchate and therefore lost as far as we are concerned." 74 When the paper Autonomna Makedonija, dealing with this

70 Jovan M. Jovanovid, Borba za narodno ujedinjenje (The Struggle for National Unification), p. 43.

71 Slodoban Jovanovid, op. cit., Vol. I, p. 367.72 Ibid., Vol. II, p. 249.73 Jovan M. Jovanovid, Borba za narodno ujedinjenje, p. 43.74 Slobodan Jovanovid, op. cit., Vol. II, p. 253.

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question, was firs t issued in Belgrade, the Bulgarian auto­nomists came into the open: they made it clear “tha t they re­garded autonomy as a stage in the area’s union w ith Bul­garia .” 75

A rapprochement between Serbia and Bulgaria was effect­ed in 1911. According to Vladim ir Corovic, this occurred as p art of Bulgarian efforts to secure a rapprochement between the rest of the Slavic world and Russia. “A part from this,” he says, “Bulgaria was guided by the following purely prac­tical considerations: everything tha t she could possibly ac­quire for the aggrandizem ent of her national territo ry was situated in Turkey—in Thrace and Macedonia. If Serbia en ter­ed an alliance w ith Turkey or rem ained neutral in a conflict between Bulgaria and Turkey, then the entire success of Bul­g aria’s plans would be jeopardized. Bulgaria could scarcely have withstood a Turkish onslaught alone.” 74

The Serbo-Bulgarian alliance, signed on February 29, 1912, was the result of a realistic grasp by both sides of their own interests. On June 19 of the same year, a m ilitary convention was also signed. The agreem ent on a territo ria l partition pro­vided for a “disputed zone” between the two countries on the final partition of which they were to agree afte r the w ar (i. e., the Balkan W ar of 1912). In the event of their being unable to reach agreement, it was laid down th a t a final decision be brought by the Russian tsar.

This “disputed zone” extended from Sara to the Rhodope Mountains, and from the Archipelago to Lake Ohrid. Accord­ing to Stojan Protid, who w rote under the pseudonym “B al- kanicus,” “the region east of the Strum a River and the Rho­dope M ountains was recognized by Serbia as indisputably Bulgarian, while the regions north and west of Sar-planina was acknowledged by Bulgaria as indisputably Serbian. Everything tha t lay between these two lines was then still a subject of dispute between the two countries. The entire disputed area was divided in the agreem ent by a transverse line from Egri Palanka to Struga, on Lake Ohrid, so that Struga, Skoplje and Kumanovo were allotted to the Serbs.” 77

78 Jovan M. Jovanovid, Borba za narodno ujedinjenje, p. 57.7* Vladimir Corovid, Istorija Jugoslavije (History of Yugoslavia),

Belgrade, p. 552.77 Balkanicus, Serbien und Bulgarien, Leipzig, 1913, p. 76.

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As the result of a combination of circumstances, Serbia, afte r her victory over Turkey, sought a revision of this agreement. The Serbian contribution to Turkey’s defeat had been much greater than the Bulgarian. Serbia had been obliged to send powerful m ilitary aid to Bulgaria, who was unable to cope w ith the Turks in Thrace. In the siege and capture of Edrena, it was Serbian troops tha t played the decisive role. When she emerged on the Adriatic, Serbia was driven back by a concerted action of the great powres. Losing patience and desirous of confronting Serbia and Greece w ith a fait accompli, Bulgaria attacked them w ithout declaring war. The Bulgarian defeat on the Bregalnitza, described by Corovi6 as a “second V elbuid,” decided the fate of Macedonia during the tw entieth century. All B ulgaria’s efforts of the last few decades had proved vain. The population of Southern Serbia greeted the Serbian victories with enthusiasm. The turnabout in the attitude of the people was such as to cause grave anxiety to the Bulgarian propagandists. On Jaunary 11, 1913, P etar Kocov w rote to his friends: “Try and come as soon as possible, since otherwise everything will have been Serbian- ized. Whoever before was an out-and-out Bulgar has now be­come a Serb.” 78

World W ar I once more put the question of the ownership of this territo ry onto the agenda. I t was pu t there, not by the people, but by the diplomacy of the great powers on both sides. Both blocs were anxious to have Bulgaria on their side. The Bulgarian governm ent grasped the significance of the moment and for a while m aneuvered between the two blocs. As a rew ard for joining one or the o ther side, she demanded the immediate cession of the whole of Macedonia. The pro- Bulgarian Balkan Committee in England insisted that Bul­garia be m et half-way.

Vasil Radoslavov, who received first-hand inform ation on the development of this situation, says tha t the British envoy in Sofia, H. O. Ironside, delivered a Note to the Bulgarian foreign m inistry on November 3, 1914, which stated, in ter alia: “If Bulgaria agrees to join the Triple Entente [Italy had not yet determ ined her position] against Turkey, she will be guaranteed the Enos—M idija line, th a t part of Macedonia

78 Ibid., p. 106.

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east of the V ardar and south of the line defined in the Serbo- Bulgarian agreement, and, further, financial assistance.” 7* The Bulgarian governm ent emphasized that it wished to re ­main neutral, but w ith certain concessions. “She claimed,” says Radoslavov, “Macedonia, including both the disputed and the undisputed zones of the 1912 trea ty and the cities of Ser, Dram a and Kavala, and the restoration of Dobruja and Thrace up to the Enos—Midija line.” 80

The members of the Quadruple Entente were largely dis­posed to m eet the Bulgarian demands: on May 29, 1915, their representatives handed over to the B ulgarian government identical statem ents indicating their willingness to satisfy these demands provided th a t Bulgaria decide to attack Turkey immediately. The second point of this statem ent declared: “On the conclusion of hostilities, the allied powers guarantee Bul­garia possession of Bulgarian Macedonia: (a) north and west of the line Egri Palanka—Veles—Ohrid—Bitolj; (b) south and east of the present Serbo-Greek and Serbo-Bulgarian fron­tiers___The fulfilm ent of this promise is contingent uponthe securing to Serbia of suitable compensation in Bosnia and Hercegovina and on the Adriatic, and upon the undertaking that until the conclusion of peace Bulgaria shall not under­take measures to occupy any part whatsoever of the above- mentioned territo ries.” 81

While she was negotiating with the representatives of the Q uadruple Entente, Bulgaria was already in possession of the Note from Germ any and A ustria-Hungary, delivered on May 23, 1915, stating that, if she rem ained neutral, she would re ­ceive Macedonia, which was held by the Serbs, and areas held by the Greeks and the Rumanians.82 In order to clarify the situation finally w ith the members of the Entente, the Bul­garian governm ent informed them on June 14, 1915, tha t she wished to know w hether the p art of Macedonia referred to “entirely corresponded to the territo ry constituting the dis­puted zone according to the map appended to the Serbo-Bul-

’* Vasil Radoslavoff, Bulgarien und die W eitkrise, Berlin, 1923, p. 144.

«# ibid., p. 153.81 Ibid., p. 154.81 Ibid., pp. 156—57.

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garian agreem ent of 1912.” 83 In their reply of August 3, 1915, the Allies guaranteed her once m ore that p a rt of Mace­donia tha t fell w ithin the frontiers “indicated on the geo­graphical map appended to the Serbo-Bulgarian agreem ent of 1912, and they undertake to do their best to ensure that any aggrandizem ent of Serbia as a result of the present w ar shall be entirely dependent on the Bulgarian disputed zone.”84

This did not satisfy the B ulgarian government. Forty days later, the representatives of the four great powers delivered to the B ulgarian government a fresh Note in which they de­clared the readiness of their governments to guarantee Bul­garia the desired part of Macedonia provided tha t Bulgaria conclude a m ilitary alliance w ith them and im mediately de­clare w ar on Turkey.85 The Bulgars, for their part, stipulated tha t they occupy the desired area of Macedonia immediately a fte r they entered the war. “There is not the slightest doubt,” says Radoslavov, “th a t the Bulgarian government was p re­pared to negotiate with the Quadruple Entente, provided that the la tte r perm it Bulgarian troops to occupy the Macedonian territo ry [in question].” 86

While Serbia was offering heroic resistance to the Austro- H ungarian and German troops and shedding blood over every inch of her territory , Bulgaria was bargaining w ith both sides. It could be taken as certain tha t she would decide in favor of the Cenrtal Powers: her foreign policy had long been anti- Russian and anti-Serbian. Vienna feared the creation of a G reater Serbian state em bracing all the Serbs outside the te r­rito ry of the Dual Monarchy, which was nearing its end. Her encouragement of Bulgaria was aimed at strengthening the la tte r’s demands upon Serbia, who was still effectively resist­ing the attacks made upon her. Tschirschky, Germ an ambas­sador in Vienna, reported to Prince von Biilow a conversation he had had w ith von A ehrenthal on December 3,1908, in which von A ehrenthal had told him that “the rivalry between Serbia and Bulgaria should at all costs be maintained, and tha t in this sense he regarded the cession to Bulgaria of a p art of Serbia

83 Ibid., p. 159.84 Ibid., pp. 162—63.85 Ibid., p. 168.88 Ibid., p. 169.

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as a suitable means.” 87 Von Biilow insisted that A ustria- Hungary establish the firm est links possible w ith the Bulgars, “not only on account of her own Slav, bu t in order to impede any action by Russia against A ustria-H ungary.” 88

Serbia’s inability to defend herself, arising from the fact that all her forces had been throw n into the battlefield, gave Bulgaria a suitable opportunity to attack her. Moreover, the governments of the Q uadruple Entente w ere exerting strong pressure upon the Serbian government to agree to their pro­posals on Macedonia. N either this pressure, however, nor the difficulties of her position at the time could shake the attitude of the Serbian government, which firm ly refused to accept the proposals of its allies. Albin Kutschbach, who at th a t tim e was in Ni§, has described the bearing of Nikola PaSsid a t th a t juncture. PaSic, who had previously tried so hard to achieve an agreem ent w ith the Bulgars, was now inexorable. Anxious and preoccupied more than was his wont, he avoided contact w ith the outside world. “In the spring of 1915, as, indeed, in the preceding fall,” says Kutschbach, “Russia, France and Bri­tain intervened w ith the Serbian government to persuade it to cede to Bulgaria the indisputably Bulgarian areas of Mace­donia, in order that Bulgaria m ight join the Entente. The Allies threatened to stop all aid to Serbia in the form of money and supplies if she ignored these demands. The Serbian government, supported by the National Assembly, neverthe­less rejected all these dem ands.” 88

R eferring to the attitude of the Serbian governm ent a t this juncture, Winston Churchill points out tha t the Allies’ demands upon Serbia “were in themselves just, and necessary for the general cause, but of vital significance for the security of Serbia. In face of all these protestations, the Serbian governm ent and parliam ent remained adamant. Allied di­plomacy, which was difficult to budge,. . . had even reached the point of stopping all fu rther assistance to Serbia in w ar m aterials and money if the la tte r did not subm it to their insistent demands. In face of everything, Serbia, conscious as

87 Die grosse Politik, Vol. XXVI, Part II, p. 515.88 Ibid., pp. 517—18.M Albin Kutschbach, Der Brandherd Europas: 50 Jahre Balkan-

Erinnerungen, Leipzig, 1929, p. 192.

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she was of all the dangers involved, remained obstinate in her rejection of all appeals to m ake effective promises.” 84

Both Serbia’s allies and her opponents offered her the unacceptable, and the Serbian governm ent stuck to its guns. W ith rem arkable foresight, it perm itted the Serbian National Assembly on August 10, 1915, to proclaim at NiS th a t Serbia would continue the w ar until the liberation of all the Serbs, Croats and Slovenes. W ith the break-through on the Salonica front, the Serbian arm y once more decided the question of the possession of Macedonia, which was now included in the state of the Serbs, Croats and Slovenes.

M W inston Churchill, Die W eilkrise, 1911—18, Zurich, Vol. II, pp. 151—52.

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THE MACEDONIAN QUESTION BETWEEN THE TWO WORLD WARS

During the period separating the two world wars, i. e., from the end of 1918 to April 1941, the M acedonian question rem ained very much alive, continuing to be a subject of dis­pute between Bulgaria on the one hand and Yugoslavia and Greece on the other. The num erous attem pts at a solution came to grief chiefly as a result of the obstinacy of Bulgaria, whose attitude on this question was greatly influenced by IMRO. From the assassination of A lexander Stambolisky, who was a determ ined opponent of IMRO, to the accession to power of the Velchev-Georgiev group, the righ t wing of IMRO w ar v irtually a determ ining factor in the attitude of Bulgaria to­ward Yugoslavia and Greece, which w ere re luctant to abandon their positions. With the rise to power of ZVENO, IMRO’s in­fluence ceased: Vancha Mihailov fled to Turkey, and several prom inent leaders of his group w ere arrested.

Elisabeth B arker was only partly justified when she claim­ed that the Macedonian question had disappeared from in ter­national politics during the last four years:1 even before the emergence of ZVENO, the Comintern had m ade the Mace­donian question an instrum ent of its destructive activity in the Balkans. The left wing of the “United IMRO” had already consolidated its positions, and gathered round itself all the leftist elements in the Balkans. In their attitude toward Yugo­slavia, which was the chief object of attack from both sides, and, a t the same time, the chief factor in deciding the Mace­donian question, both the righ t and the left wing of this organization were equally hostile. This organization was also inimically disposed toward Greece and Bulgaria, and was em erging ever more clearly as the advocate of a Communist revolution in the Balkans, the object of which was to produce an independent and free Macedonia. Since, as Hugh Seton- Watson correctly points out, “the real Macedonian problem

1 Elisabeth Barker, Macedonia: Its Place in Balkan Power Politics, London, 1950, p. 29.

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was the problem of a Yugoslav Macedonia,” the attitude of the Communist P arty of Yugoslavia toward the Macedonian question was of great importance.2

It was in the interplay of these three factors, ra ther than in the official relations of the three Balkan states concerned, th a t the Macedonian question developed between the two world wars.

It was Dimo Kazasov who pointed out th a t hatred of the Serbs was the principal m otive of all shades of opinion among those championing the Macedonian cause who, after the Se­cond Balkan W ar and World W ar I, refused to reconcile them ­selves w ith a fait accompli. These groups persisted in spread­ing distrust of the Serbian regime among the population of Southern Serbia. Toward the end of 1912, the non-Slav national minorities in Southern Serbia began to unite in re ­sisting the new situation. A delegation of Macedonian Turks subm itted to the peace conference in Lausanne a memorandum, signed by Halim-bey Sami, who acted as their chairman, Nesim Ruso and Mehmed Galib, containing demands which Turkey had consistently opposed while she had been in con­trol of these regions—i. e., (1) the formation of an autonomous region with Salonica as its capital; (2) a guarantee from the g reat powers that this autonomy would be respected; and (3) European control over this territo ry .3 A sim ilar request, sup­ported by Italy, was subm itted by the Macedonian Rumanians in the area of the Pindus Mountains.4

An appeal had also been addressed to the peace conference by a group of Slavs, who, on instructions from the Bulgarian government, demanded the formation of an autonomous Mace­donia. In his article “Macedonia and the Peace Conference,” Constantin Stefanove wrote: “Autonomy and independence for Macedonia is no new demand on the part of the Mace­donians. It is as old as their struggle for freedom. An in­dependent Macedonia, guaranteed by one of the least interest­ed powers—America, B ritain or the League of Nations—could

1 Hugh Seton-W atson, Osteuropa zwischen den Kriegen, Pader- born, 1948, p. 366.

' M im oires p r e se n ts a la Conference de la Paix d Lausanne parle d£16gu6 de 1 Association m acidonienne musulmane, p. 17.

4 Th. Capidan, Die Mazedorumanen, Bukarest, 1941, p. 142.

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certainly both ‘save the country and satisfy the wolves.’ ” 6 Toward the end of 1919, members of IMRO active in the Seres district issued a declartion in which, in ter alia, they demanded the restoration of Macedonia w ithin her natural geographical frontiers, “based chiefly on Salonica, the V ardar valley, Skoplje and Bitolj, with its natu ra l geographical and economic h in terland.” *

The Macedonian emigre movement had considerably in­tensified its activity against Yugoslavia. Its center at the time was in Switzerland; its leader was Constantin Stefanove and its secretary Blagoje Bojadzijev, then a student of law. This group had enlisted the support of all the national minorities from the area, who, on Ju ly 31, 1919, subm itted a memo­randum to the peace conference signed by N. Talit, on behalf of the Rumunians of Macedonia, Ipedi Zade-bey, a m erchant from Salonica, Sam Levy, form er editor of the Journal de Salonique and L ’Epoque, PanCo Dorev, a publicist and “Bul­garian deputy for Bitolj in the Turkish parliam ent,” and Aziz Klany-bey, a retired colonel from Bitolj.7

Somewhat earlier, in June of the same year, the Central Council of the M acedonian Society had addressed an appeal "to the civilized w orld” which contained four points demand­ing the form ation of an independent Macedonian state. The new state was to be divided into cantons on the Swiss model, and it was emphasized tha t the rights of all national minorities would be guaranteed. In the middle of October of the same year, representations were made to the British P ar­liam ent pointing out tha t Macedonian Bulgars, Turks, Jews, Wallachians and Albanians made up “approxim ately ninety percent of the total population.” It goes w ithout saying that the authors of this document aslo demanded an independent Macedonia. “All our churches,” they declared, “schools and national institutions have been either closed down or taken over by the Serbian and Greek authorities. All our priests, teachers and leading countrymen have been obliged to emi­grate, or else have been arrested and liquidated. Use of our

* Constantine Stephanove, “M acedonia and the Peace Con­ference,” Vindipendance macidortienne, Nov. 1, 1919, p. 27.

• Ibid., Oct. 16, 1919.7

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language has been forbidden under pain of severe punishment, and our books either banned or destroyed.” 8 Justifying their demand for an independent state, they declared tha t this was the only reasonable solution to the Macedonian problem. “Under these circumstances,” they said, “Macedonia would cease to be an apple of discord between the Balkan states. On the contrary, it would provide a link between them for the establishm ent of a genuine, lasting and progressive Balkan federation.” •

Behind all these moves there stood the In ternal Mace­donian Revolutionary Organization. Leading circles in this organization had been discouraged by the failures besetting them on all sides, particularly as there was no hope of assist­ance from outside and the government of A lexander Stam - bolisky was their sworn enemy. In November 1922, during his visit to Belgrade, Stambolisky told press representatives that the Macedonians were “a rebellious race” and “a thorn in the side of both Bulgaria and Serbia.” He fu rther declared that he was ready to “pack them all into railroad cars and send them off to Yugoslavia.” 10 It was at this very juncture that Todor Aleksandrov attem pted to establish contact w ith S tjepan Radi6 and persuade him to cooperate in the struggle against Yugoslavia. In his article “Todor Aleksandrov and the Croatian Peasant Movement,” Radi6 himself explained the nature of these contacs. According to him, Aleksandrov “suc­ceeded from time to time in sending his trusted supporters to Zagreb to enqire w hether the HRSS [Croatian Republican Peasant Party] would be willing to join his, Aleksandrov’s, revolutionary campaign.” 11 Radi6 replied tha t “the HRSS pursues its objective by way of firm political organization and such political activity as goes by the name of peasant demo­cracy. The HRSS earnestly recommends this policy of peasant democracy to the Macedonian Revolutionary Organization, since it is supported by ninety-nine precent of the peasants, who are by nature pacifists, but who, given proper organiza­tion, are capable of becoming the unrem itting and indomitable

8 L'indSpendance mac^donienne, Nov .15, 1919, p. 71.• Ibid.10 Dimo Kazasov, Buini godini (The Stormy Years), Sofia, 1949,

p. 114.11 Balkanska lederacija, Aug. 15, 1924, p. 37.

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champions of political power for the entire working people, including peasants and industrial workers.” 12

The right wing of IMRO did not take Radi6’s advice. W ith no prospect, e ither of help from outside or of obtaining a revision of the peace terms, it continued to concentrate its energies upon terrorism in Southern Serbia, thus inevitably provoking counterm easures and reprisals on the part of the state. The state refused to be alarm ed by the sallies of the terrorists, even more to perm it them to set up an irresponsible em pire of th e ir own w ithin Yugoslavia. Ivan Mihailov, whom Elisabeth B arker describes as a “k iller and a gangster on a large scale, not a revolutionary,” 18 was torn between his loyalty to Bulgaria and the propaganda of his organization advocating an independent Macedonia. By his conduct, he caused casualties tha t were la te r exploited for propaganda purposes. The whole world resounded w ith reports of Serbian atrocities against Bulgars and Macedonians in Yugoslavia.

With the consolidation of reactionary and expressly anti- Serbian circles in positions of authority in Bulgaria, IMRO was able to intensify its activity, both in Macedonia and abroad. In the middle of June 1927, when the left wing of IMRO had already greatly extended the scale of its activities, the paper La Macedoine began to come out in Geneva. In its first issue, dated June 13, its editor, Simeon Jeftimov, printed a leading article under the heading “Our Program .” The paper was officially the organ of IMRO, but was backed by the Bul­garian government, which used it as a means of propagating its views on the B ulgarian character of Macedonia.

By dint of system atic and persistent effort, the leadres of IMRO succeeded in uniting and m ultiplying their organiza­tions abroad, which w ere particularly num erous in America and Canada. In Septem ber 1927, the Central Committee of the Union of Macedonian Political Organizations sent an open le tte r to Dr. Nikolaj Velimirovid, a t tha t time Bishop of Ohrid, demanding tha t he vacate his see.14 On November 17 of the same year, the tria l opened in Skoplje of a group of students belonging to “a secret revolutionary organization of Mace­donian youth.” Counsel for the defense w ere Dr. A nte Pavelid,

11 Ibid.» Elisabeth Barker, op. cit., p. 38.14 La Macedoine, Sept. 1, 1927.

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la te r a leader of the Ustase, Dr. Ante Trumbic and Dr. Sekula Drljevic, a leader of the M ontenegran federalists.

The fu tu re m ilitant alliance between the UstaSe and the champions of the Macedonian cause could already be discern­ed. A year later, on November 16, 1928, Ivan Mihailov de­clared in a statem ent on the w arlike aims of IMRO: “IMRO is following events in Yugoslavia closely. It is convinced that the Croats regard the Macedonians’ claims for autonomy favorab ly .. . . If Yugoslavia becomes involved in a w ar with a foreign power, IMRO will know tha t its moment has come.” 1S

Stephen G raham states that the connection between Pave- li£ and IMRO was established in Vienna afte r the form er had left Yugoslavia, and tha t this was done at the request of Italy, who was then actively helping the Organization. For this pur­pose, IMRO dispatched to Vienna Naum Tomalevski, who was subsequently, when disputes arose w ithin the ranks of IMRO, m urdered by King A lexander’s assassin.18 At first, the “United IMRO” also had its eye upon Pavelic, for it had been dis­illusioned by his visit to Sofia. In respect of this visit, R. Ra- dev, in his article “Change Your Allies, Pavelid!” wrote: “If the entire Croatian people w ere to accept the orientation of Dr. Pavelic, it would have to en ter the struggle side by side w ith the Italian Fascists, who are keeping the whole of Istria and part of Dalm atia under their yoke and who at any moment th reaten to occupy the whole of Croatian Dal­m atia___It is no longer open to doubt who is the potencialally of the Croats in their struggle for liberation from the tyranny of Belgrade. Their allies can only be the national- revolutionary organizations of the Balkan peoples, who for decades have been fighting for Macedonia’s freedom from her Balkan oppressors and resisting the great im perialist powers, who are aiming at the complete subjugation of the B alkans.. . . We are convinced th a t the HSS [Croatian Peasant Party], the M ontenegran federalists and all the other oppressed peoples of Yugoslavia will join in a single front w ith the true Mace­donian revolutionaries of the United IMRO, which is vigorous­ly championing the freedom of all the Balkan peoples and a federation of Balkan republics against the world im perial­

15 Ibid., Nov. 16, 1928.19 Stephen Graham, Alexander ot Yugoslavia, London, 1938,

pp. 132—33.

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is ts .. . . The movement led by Dr. Pavelid, w hether conscious­ly or not, can only prove prejudicial to the freedom of the Croats and the o ther Balkan peoples. Let us, we emphasize, en ter the struggle against the dictatorship of Belgrade with all the means in our power—side by side, not w ith the m ur­derers of Bulgarian workers and peasants, but w ith the true representatives of the liberation struggle of the Bulgarian and Macedonian peoples.” 17

It was at this stage that the work of IMRO was ham pered by the outbreak of violent discord among the leaders of its right wing. The parties concerned w ere A leksandar Proto­gerov on the one hand and Ivan Mihailov and Georgi Pop- Hristov on the other, who, according to G ilbert in der Maur, advocated the inclusion of Macedonia in B ulgaria.18 Proto­gerov was accused of m urdering Todor Aleksandrov, bu t was himself assassinated on Ju ly 28, 1928. This was followed by the violent rule of Mihailov, who declared in a statem ent tha t Protogerov “owed his popularity, not to his mem bership of IMRO, but to his work as an officer in the Bulgarian army. He always felt himself to be such prim arily, and in this respect w ent to such lengths, tha t he encouraged the claims, in the Macedonian areas of Bulgaria, of Bulgarian nationalist organizations tha t demanded the re tu rn to Bulgaria of the regions tha t had been taken from her, thus placing himself in direct opposition to the Macedonian autonomists, who w ant a single state independent of B ulgaria.” 18

The visit of Pavelid and Perfec to Sofia m erely served to confirm the cooperation already agreed upon between these two movements advocating separation from Yugoslavia. Filled with enthusiasm by this visit, the editor of La Macedoine wrote: “The politicians of Belgrade themselves spurred the various peoples of Yugoslavia to help one another in the struggle against th e ir common enemy—Belgrade. The Croatian-M acedonian front has been openly established and publicly announced. It has been joined by the Montenegrans and eight hundred thousand Yugoslav A lbanians.” 20 During

17 Balkanska iedeiacija, May 1, 1929, p. 2562.18 Gilbert in der Maur, Die Jugoslawen einst und jetzt, Leipzig-

Vienna, 1936.19 La Macedoine, Nov. 16, 1928.*• Simeon Jeftimoff, Die mazedonische Frage, p. 25.

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their visit, Pavelic and PerCec signed a declaration affirm ing their intention to collaborate w ith the official Macedonian Committee, which at th a t time was headed by Dr. StaniSev. On January 10, 1930, Dr. StaniSev wrote: “We Macedonians claim to be better Bulgars than those in the [Bulgarian] King­dom p ro p e r.. . . Agreem ent already exists between the Croats and Bulgars, and soon they will be joined by others in the common cause of liberation.” 21 The declaration stated that both sides had come to the conclusion that the Croats and Macedonians were obliged to win their own political freedom, their rights as hum an beings and as citizens and the complete independence of Croatia and Macedonia.22 Just before the de­claration was signed, La Macedoine published an appeal from Croats, Macedonians and M ontenegrans in America and Canada demanding complete independence for all three groups.2®

This policy of collaboration was pursued obstinately and system atically: allies were sought on all sides in the struggle against Yugoslavia. Congresses and meetings, an organized press campaign and frequent direct appeals to representatives of the g reat powers and to international forums—everything was directed toward a definite goal— tha t of showing the world at large tha t the Serbs, as a nation, were persecuting the national m inorities. Typical of these m easures was the jo in t conference of Macedonian and Croatian representatives held in New York on August 17—19, 1929, a t which it was announced tha t a common Croatian-M acedonian front in

Europe and America had been established “to fight for the freedom of the Croatian and Macedonian peoples.” 24 A little later, in November 1929, an appeal, signed by C. Criscuola d’A ntivari as chairman of the “M ontenegrans in em igration,” was sent to Ramsay MacDonald, Prim e M inister of Great B ritain.28

According to Pavelid, the total num ber of victims of the alleged Serbian te rro r in Yugoslavia during the period from

21 La Macedoine, Jan . 10, 1930.22 Ante Pavelid, A us dem Kample urn den selbstandigen Staat

Kroatien, Vienna, 1931, p. 93.83 La Macedoine, March 22, 1929.24 Ibid., Sept. 27, 1929.“ Ibid., Nov. 29, 1929.

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January 6, 1929, to June 1930 amounted to 76 killed in political prisons, 3 condemned to death, 1 condemned to hard labor for life, and 319 sentenced to various term s of imprison- ment.*' According to Bruno Mlinarid, 230 persons were hanged or otherw ise killed in Yugoslavia between December 1, 1918, and April 10, 1941, when the Independent Croatian State was proclaimed under Pavelid.27

On December 15—17, 1929, the F ifth Congress of Mace­donian Youth was held in Sofia. In the message of greeting sent by this congress to the youth of Croatia, it was stated: “The youth of Macedonia today enthusiastically welcomes the creation of a common Croatian-M acedonian front. It is happy a t the thought tha t the other non-Serbian peoples, who are suffering no less than we under the present blood-thirsty re­gime of Belgrade, will soon join this front. In the belief and hope tha t the struggle of the Croats and Macedonians will grow daily stronger, the Congress w arm ly greets the youth of m ilitant Croatia and sends them its wishes for success in the struggle.” 28 On January 9, 1929, Konstantin Stefanove, in an article entitled “The Macedonian Parliam ent,” declared that a Croatian-M acedonian w ar fron t had been set up.29

The Eighth Congress of IMRO, held in Bulgaria tow ard the beginning of A pril 1932, sent a message of greeting to 6migr6 Croats which stated: “The Congress sends a fraternal greeting to the revolutionary Croatian organization, to the Croatian people and to all the oppressed minorities in the Balkan Pen­insula, who have united in order to remove the injustices sanctioned by treaty and to win for themselves political free­dom and independence.” s#

The climax of the concerted action by UstaSe and Mace­donian independents was the conspiracy against King Alexander, who, especially since January 6, 1929, had been the chief protagonist of the state they were fighting. For all of them, the removal of A lexander from the historical arena m eant the destruction of the central p illar of that state which

*• Pavelid, op. cit., p. 122.17 Bruno Mlinarid, Tito, der rote Rebell, und seine “vollkom m ene

Demokratie," Zurich, 1948, p. 10.“ La Macedoine, Jan. 10, 1930.*» Ibid.50 Ibid., May 17, 1932.

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they regarded as an essential obstacle to the realization of their plans. They did not even conceal their m urderous in­tentions: on May 6, 1934, La Macedoine printed the full text of the death sentence pronounced upon A lexander by the “Central Croatian Union” at Seraing, in Belgium. This sentence had originally been published in Nezavisna hrvatska drzava on April 16, 1934. The text reads:

The Central Croatian Union, in the presence of all its members on Belgian territory, adopted the following resolution on April 1, 1934:

1. The black date of December 1918 is the cause of the betrayal and deception of the Croatian people, which, on the orders of A lexander Karadjordjevid, is subordinated to Serbia.

2. This betrayal and deception consists in the fact that no one can deprive any nation of its sovereignty w ithout a previous vote and w ithout a free act of self- determ ination.

3. The responsibility for everything lies with A lexander Karadjordjevid, who has occupied Croatia by force and is torm enting and crucifying her.

4. A lexander is answ erable w ith his life for the death of Stjepan Radic, Pavle Radi6, D jura B asariiek, Milan Suflaj, Rosie, Hranilovid, Soldins and m any other Croatian m artyrs.

5. A lexander is reponsible for all the lies being spread abroad, according to which everything is in the best possible order in Croatia, whereas in fact rivers of Croatian blood have been and are still being shed.

6. A lexander is responsible for the death of Oreb, Begovi6, and others insofar as he perm itted them to be condemned to death.

7. A lexander is also responsible for allowing the “A vala” agency to continue spreading lies to the effect that the Croatian people is content w ith the sentence imposed on Oreb and his followers and th a t Croats in Zagreb have protested against the Croatian UstaSe and their leaders.

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On the basis of all these facts, we condemn A lexander K aradjordjevii and the entire Belgrade governm ent to death. The Croatian UstaSe m ust execute this sentence at the first possible opportunity. W ith this end in view, we address the following appeal to Dr. Ante Paveli6, chief of the UstaSe:

“We urgently beg you, our leader, to order that, over and above other commands, this sentence be exe­cuted by a detachment of the Ustase.

“We w ant revenge, we w ant a struggle to the death, we w ant revolution. If it does not succeed at the first attem pt, then we shall renew it a hundred times, but Croatia and the entire Croatian people are determ ined to set up a free and independent state.

“Revolution will come, even though the wohle of Europe be shaken to her very foundations. We are pre­pared to die to the last man, but we will not w ait any longer.” 31

In the organization and execution of A lexander’s m urder, the ties linking the two m ain separatist movements in Yugo­slavia and their centers abroad were once more demonstrated. Nevile Henderson rightly emphasizes the fatal nature of this union when he says: “The m urderer was a Bulgar, who had become practiced in shooting and bom b-throwing at the notorious Janka Pusta, an estate in Hungary. The plot had been staged by Pavelid (the present Croatian Quisling) and his group in Italy, which provided the money.” 32 Hugh Seton- Watson comments: “No one doubts tha t the m urder had been prepared long beforehand and tha t the H ungarian and Italian governments had had a hand in the whole affair.” 33

One of the chief obstacles in the way of a right- or left- wing revolution in Yugoslavia had become removed: for­eigners who assessed the significance of the m urder from the European viewpoint unequivocally emphasized its European and world importance. Hugh Seton-W atson says: “U ndoubted­ly, the m urder of King A lexander was a catastrophe of in ter­

31 Ibid., May 6, 1934.u N evile Henderson, W erner unter den Briicken, Zurich, 1949,

p. 288.33 Seton-W atson, op. cit., p. 433.

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national im oprtance.” 34 Henderson, who was a m an of broad vision and had a good grasp of the significance of events, says: “I was certain, and events bore me out, tha t the king’s death was a m isfortune not only for Yugoslavia, but for the whole of the Balkans and for Europe.” 85

* * *

The righ t wing of IMRO, together w ith all the elements supporting it, was opposed by the left wing of this same organization, which, from the moment of its formation, had been growing more and more definitely Communist inclined. Its establishm ent had been proceded by secret conversations between Moscow and the leaders of IMRO, who were seeking a way out of the impasse in which the organization then found itself. The federalist wing was most in favor of following this path, while others were re luctant to reject it straight away and preferred to w ait and see w hat course events would take. E lisabeth B arker states tha t in 1923 Todor Aleksandrov sent D im itar Vlahov to Moscow together w ith Atanasov, from whom Vlahov later separated.

The form ation of the United IMRO as such was preceded by several years of lively activity on the part of the Balkan Communist parties, united since January 1920 in the Balkan Communist Federation under the direct leadership of the Comintern. W hat took place was briefly as follows. From the foundation of this federation, the Com intern insisted on the preparation and execution of a Communist revolution in the Balkans. In a message addressed to the Balkan Communist parties, Zinovev pointed out that they were then in the phase of preparing a social revolution in the Balkans, and that, in order to be sure of success, each of them ought to take active m easures for a Communist revolution in its own country.*' For Zinovev, the prim ary aspect of the Macedonian problem was the possibility of revolution, though even he agreed that there was also the question of the “Macedonian Bulgars” under Yugoslavia. He made no mention, however, of those under Greece. The Fourth Congress of the Comintern, held in

« Ibid., p. 434.3S Henderson, op. cit., p. 290.3* Elisabeth Barker, op. cit., pp. 48—49.

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1922, came out against the settling of Greek refugees from Asia Minor in Aegean Macedonia, and demanded tha t the Greek Communist P arty follow the same line. This was later also the attitude taken by the Balkan Communist Federation.

At a conference of this federation held in 1922, Vasil Kola- rov, on orders from the Comintern, raised the question of an autonomous Macedonia. A fter the overthrow of Aleksandar Stambolisky and the considerable assistance offered by right- wing elements of IMRO to A leksandar Tsankov, the Comintern once more turned its attention to the Macedonian question. In a special proclamation, it w arned the Macedonians of the danger threatening them from the new regime in Bulgaria, which they had helped on its way to power. This proclamation is described by Elisabeth B arker as “the first, still some­w hat imprecise, form ulation of its [the Com intern’s] views on the Macedonian problem .” 37 In March 1924, the Balkan Communist Federation, at its Sixth Congress, announced its detailed program for Macedonia: it demanded the creation of a Macedonian republic which should en ter a union of in­dependent Balkan republics.

Three statem ents in this resolution are im protant: (a) tha t none of the neighboring states had a m ajority of its co­nationals in Macedonia and that therefore none of them was entitled to rule Macedonia; (b) th a t the slogan of unification and autonomy for Macedonia had penetrated to every corner of the country; and (c) tha t the Communist parties of the various Balkan countries were not applying pressure to national M acedonian and Thracian organizations, bu t desired the closest cooperation w ith them. The aim was to create a united revolutionary front.

The Fifth Congress of the Comintern, held between March and June 1924, also passed a resolution on the Macedonian and Thracian question which in fact am ounted to a repetition of the resolution adopted by the Sixth Congress of the Balkan Communist Federation on the creation of a united Macedonia and a united Thrace. The Congress completely rejected the idea of autonomy for separate parts of Macedonia under any of the existing Balkan states, and instructed the Balkan Com­m unist parties and the Balkan Communist Federation to assist the national-revolutionary movements among the oppressed

»7 Ibid., p. 51.

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peoples of Macedonia and Thrace. Control of the work of all the Communist parties was entrusted to the Balkan Com­m unist Federation “in respect of the nationality questions and, especially, of the question of Macedonia and Thrace.” 88

The establishm ent of the United IMRO was preceded by the appearance of the journal Balkanska federacija, which first came out on July 15, 1924, under the editorship of Dimi­ta r Vlahov and continued publication until 1932, at firs t in Vienna and la ter in F rankfu rt on Main. In its statem ent of policy, published in its first issue, the paper declared that its main task was “to work for the liberation and self-determ ina­tion of the Balkan peoples and their federation. We shall fight for the grouping of all national-liberation movements in the Balkans in a single Balkan front, against all Balkan reaction and against any European political moves to promote reaction in the Balkans.” 39

This first issue also contained a proclamtion signed by Todor Aleksandrov, A leksandar Protogerov and P etar Caulev and entitled “A New O rientation of the Macedonian Revo- loutionary Movement.” According to Vlahov, this proclamation was prepared during the course of conversations between A pril 1 and May 6, 1924. It was w ritten by Vlahov and signed personally by Caulev and Protogerov, while Aleksandrov, who left im mediately before, authorized the other two to sign in his name.40 Vlahov la ter wrote th a t Caulev and Protogerov, “under pressure from the masses, were obliged to accept new principles governing the organization.” 41

This is the famous proclam aiton of May 6, 1924, expressing IMRO’s complete ideological reorientation. “On examining this fundam ental historical experience,” the proclam ation states, “IMRO has come to the final and firm conclusion that, in its revolutionary struggle for the freedom of Macedonia, it can only rely on the most progressive revolutionary m ovem ents in Europe, which are fighting against the im perialist policies of their government and against the existing peace treaties for genuine self-determ ination for their own and other

88 Ibid., p. 58.89 Balkanska lederacija, July 15, 1924, p. 2.40 Ibid., Aug. 15, 1924, p. 38.41 D. Vlahov, Iz istorije makedonskog naroda (From the History

of the M acedonian People), Belgrade, 1950, p. 47.

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peoples.” 42 At its Third Congress, held in June 1926, the Communist Party of Yugoslavia, in a resolution on the political situation and the tasks of the Party, greeted the foundation of a united IMRO. “In view of the fact,” the re­solution declares, “tha t the leadership of IMRO is serving the annexationist policy of the B ulgarian bourgeoisie, although it has recently been attem pting to effect a rapprochement w ith the Serbian bourgeoisie, the Communist P arty of Yugoslavia is obliged to take active measures to promote the renewal of national-revolutionary organizations in Macedonia on the basis of the May m anifesto.” 43

In this context, the “most progressive revolutionary move­m ents in Europe” should be taken to mean prim arily the Soviet Union, which was already active in the Balkans. A part from the Communists, the influence of the Comintern had extended to certain socialist groups: on January 15, 1925, a conference of the Balkan Socialist Federation was held which was attended by all those Balkan socialists who had declared themselves in favor of joining the Third International. At the congress held at Vukovar on June 20—25, 1920, the Com­m unist P arty of Yugoslavia advocated the form ation of “a single front made up by the revolutionary p ro letariat of the Balkan and Danube lands.” 44

Here, too, the way had been prepared for the work of the United IMRO. In Septem ber 1924, the Balkan Communist Federation addressed a m anifesto to the population of Mace­donia and all Balkan workers in which, in ter alia, it was stated: “The Balkan Communist Federation, together with the Communist parties of Bulgaria, Yugoslavia and Greece and the working population of the Balkans, will spare no assist­ance to the Macedonian people, nor will it ever harm the true solidarity of its [the Macedonian people’s] organizations.” 45 Soon after this, Rakovsky, the Soviet envoy in London, in an interview w ith Dr. Stefan Steiner, defined the official Soviet a ttitude toward the Macedonian movement: “The attitude of

41 Ibid., pp. 48—49.48 Istoriski arhiv KPJ. Tom II: Kongresi i zem aljske konleiencije

KPJ od 1919— 1937 (Historical Archives of the Communist Party of Yugoslavia. Vol. II: Congresses and National Conferences of the Party, 1919— 1937), Belgrade, 1950, p. 109.

44 Ibid., p. 41.48 Balkanska lederaci/a, Dec. 15, 1924, pp. 130—31.

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the Soviet governm ent tow ard the Macedonian movement has already been defined several times by the representatives of tha t government. A short while ago, a t the London conference,I suggested to the B ritish government, in the name of the Soviet government, tha t the nationality problem in Yugo­slavia and Macedonia be solved by promoting the idea of a Yugoslav federation. We have no reasons for concealing the fact that Macedonian leaders have several times requested our assistance in the struggle for the independence of their coun­try .” 46 Stating tha t Todor Aleksandrov had himself appealed to him, Rakovsky said: “With the greatest willingness we are, by diplomatic means, assisting the Macedonians, whose cause we regard as ju st.” 47

In all its subsequent manifestoes, appeals and articles, the group centered on the journals Balkanska federacija and Makedonsko delo placed its chief hopes on help from Moscow. Moreover, they saw in the USSR an ideal state which, as the resolution adopted by the Central Committee of the United IMRO in October 1926 says, had “raised the principle of the self-determ ination of peoples and realized it on its own te rri­tory, since it had guaranteed to all its peoples the right to make their own decisions freely and to decide their destinies for themselves.” 48 “We oppressed Balkan peoples,” wrote N. Matijevic, “see, and m ust see, in the Soviet Union the only true friend of national freedom, for the Soviet Union has given complete national freedom to all the peoples of the form er tsarist empire, both great and small. The collapse of the Soviet Union would mean the victory of the im perialist powers, and for our Balkan nations, eternal slavery.” 49

Summing up these hopes in the USSR, Sider wrote, in his article “Balkan Federation and the Balkan Peoples”: “The Soviet Union is interested in constructing a Balkan federation, not only because it is the center of world revolution, but above all because the Balkan region, w ith its existing regimes, constitutes an im portant sector on the anti-Soviet front. A federation of free Balkan people’s republics, having secured its im munity from the attacks of international imperialism,

« Ibid., Oct. 15, 1924, p. 70.47 Ibid.48 M akedonsko delo, Oct. 25, 1926, p. 9.48 Balkanska federacija, Ju ly 15, 1929, p. 2677.

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will become the natura l ally of the Soviet Union___When.speaking of revolution in the Balkans, we m ust not assume that it will break out sim ultaneously in all the states con­cerned. The liberation of the enslaved and oppressed Balkan peoples will be the result of a series of revolutions.” 50

The entire work of the United IMRO was conducted under the wing of Moscow. Its immediate goal was to provoke, w ith full-scale assistance from the USSR, a Communist revolution in the Balkans which should lead to the emergence of a free Macedonia. The appeal addressed by the Central Committee of this organization of the Macedonian people at the beginning of October 1927 declared: “There is today only one sure way of securing freedom for the Macedonian people, and tha t is revolution on a massive, national scale.” 51 In the leading article of its first issue, Makedonsko delo declared its program to be “the liberation and unification of the Macedonian people and its entry into a federation w ith the other Balkan nations. Its slogan is ‘an independent Macedonia and Balkan federation.’ ” 52

Makedonsko delo energetically set about settling accounts with the Suprem e Committee in Bulgaria and w ith the federalists in emigration: conspicuous are the efforts of the «roup centered on this paper to rid itself of all possible rivals and secure recognition for itself alone as the true champion of Macedonian revolution. Pointing out tha t six papers were published by the Macedonians in Sofia, two of them in French, and tha t Makedonsko saznanije, apart from others in America, had come out in Vienna since December 1923, the paper states: “All these papers, like those of the so-called Macedonian Political Organization in America, are w ritten in one and the same spirit—that of B ulgarian nationalism, of the Bulgarian Supreme Committee. They do not express the discontent and suffering of the Macedonian people.” The a r­ticle “Which W ay?” criticizes Macedonian emigres in Bulgaria: "These people were agents of the policy of the Bulgarian state with regard to Macedonia, and that policy was the annexation of Macedonia by Bulgaria. These Macedonian workers have appeared in the Macedonian liberation movement as in-

"* M akedonsko delo, Ju ly 10, 1930, pp. 3—4.»' Ibid., Nov. 10, 1927, p. 4.** Ibid., Sept. 10, 1925, p. 1.

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strum ents of the aggressive policy of the B ulgarian govern­m ent.” 68

The United IMRO, which came into existence as a result of the manifesto of May 6, 1924, consisted of the left wing of IMRO and members of the form er Seres group, the emigr6 Communist Union, the Union of M acedonian Emigres and the Ilindan Emigre Organization.54 “We representatives of all the Macedonian groups,” this manifesto declares, “hereby an­nounce to the Macedonian people that the unification of the scattered forces of the Macedonian movement in a single Macedonian revolutionary fron t is an accomplished fact. The conference for setting up a united revolutionary movement, which was held in October, was attended by representatives of all the organizations and groups in Macedonia tha t accept the principles set forth in the M anifesto.” 55

In the constitution that was draw n up for the new orga­nization, Article 1 stated th a t the organization’s aim was “to fight for the establishm ent of a free and independent Mace­donia w ithin the limits of her geographical and economic frontiers and to equip her as an independent political entity fit to become a fully-flegded m em ber of a fu ture Balkan federation.” 56 Article 3 stated that the organization “should establish close contact with all national-revolutionary and social-revolutionary organizations and parties in the Balkans which support the principle of the self-determ ination of peoples and which are prepared to collaborate in the task of turning Macedonia into an independent political en tity .” Ac­cording to Article 4, the new Macedonian state was to be founded upon “complete national, political and cultural equal­ity for all nationalities living in Macedonia.” 57

In his book Izdajnici makedonske stvari (Betrayers of the M acedonian Cause), published by the organization’s Central Committee, D. Vlahov states tha t the organization counted on the assistance of all revolutionary bodies in the Balkans, “and especially on the moral, m aterial and political support of the

83 Ibid., pp. 2—3.M Ibid., April 10, 1926, p. 3. Cf. Balkanska federacija, Dec. 1, 1926,

p. 1046.** Balkanska federacija, Dec. 1, 1926, p. 1046.*• Ibid.11 Ibid.

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IIS.SU."511 “The struggle of the oppressed Balkan peoples,” ilri larrd the manifesto issued by the Central Committee of Hit' organization at the time of its foundation, “is common to nil of them. These peoples are prepared to aid w ith all the i i m ' j u i h in their power the struggle of the Macedonian people for froo national self-determ ination, ju st as the Macedonian people, for its part, is prepared to lend its w hole-hearted m ip p o r t to their struggle for national liberation.” 59

It was this idea of collaboration betw een all the revo­lutionary groups in the Balkans tha t gave birth to the Balkan Committee of National-Revolutionary Organizations, em brac­ing the Committee for the L iberation of Kosovo, the Com­mittee of the A lbanian Organization for National Liberation and the Central Committee of the Dobruja Revolutionary Organization.*0 These were la ter joined by the Revolutionary Committee of W estern Thrace.81 The leading article of Bal­kanska federacija for August 20, 1930, entitled “The Path of th r Kosovo Revolutionary Committee,” stated tha t this com­m ittee had established “close contact w ith certain Balkan national-revolutionary organizations” which were “fighting the same oppressors.” In A pril 1927, the Kosovo and Albanian committees issued a jo in t declaration in which the form er defined its a ttitude toward the opponents of freedom for the Albanians of A lbania and Kosovo. This declaration was sign­ed, on behalf of the A lbanian committee, by Fan S. Noli, Lano Borshi, Dr. Omer Nishani, K onstantin Boshnjak, Dr. Nush Nushati and Captain Azis Cami, and, on behalf of the Kosovo committee, by Bedri Pejani, Kiamil Balia and M ajor Ibrahim Jakova. Bedri Pejani subsequently joined King Zogu.82 Later, the Kosovo committee associated itself w ith the other Balkan revolutionary organizations to form the Balkan Committee.8S

M emoranda were subm itted by the Balkan Committee to various in ternational bodies, seeking the liberation of Mace­donia and of the other national groups represented on it. One such mem orandum was subm itted to the Third Congress of

“ M akedonsko delo, Sept. 10, 1927, p. 1.*• Balkanska federacija, Dec. 1, 1926, p. 1046.•° Ibid., Nov. 1, 1929, p. 2721.•* Ibid.“ Ibid., Aug. 20, 1930, pp. 2993—94.“ Ibid., June 1, 1927, and Aug. 20, 1930, p. 2994.

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National M inorities held at Geneva in 1927. Like the rest, this document sought the creation of a federation of Balkan re­publics, emphasizing that this offered the only possible solu­tion of national disputes in the Peninsula: “This federation,” the mem orandum stated, “will contribute to peace, progress and the advancem ent of the peoples of the Peninsula, and will represent a powerful force capable of resisting the aspirations of the W estern European im perialist powers, which, by their Balkan policy, are now preparing for a fu ture w ar.” 84

In October 1928, after the unfortunate incident in the Belgrade National Assembly, the Balkan Committee appealed to the Croatian people and the population north of the Danube and Sava rivers to cut off all relations with Belgrade. “The Belgrade parliam ent,” said the appeal, “should no longer legislate for you. Your and our representatives can only en ter a central body that shall represent a union of nationally free states.” **

On October 3, 1929, the Balkan Committee signed an appeal addressed to the chairman of the International Peace Con­gress that was being held in Athens. In ter alia, this appeal declared: “The oppressed Balkan peoples and national minorities are taking their cause of liberation into their own hands, and, side by side with the oppressed masses of workers of the ruling nations, are waging a common struggle by re­volutionary means—the only means in the Balkans of fighting for their complete liberation from fascist dictatorship and national oppression.” •'

In the same year, the “national-revolutionary organizations of the Balkans” issued an appeal against w hat they described as “terrorism ” in Yugoslavia: the people were openly called upon to revolt against the authority of the state. “For this purpose,” the appeal stated, “we call upon the oppressed masses to elect from among their own ranks committees for carrying on the struggle. In every town and village, however small, such committees m ust be set up, consisting of peasants and workers bent on revolution and of honest and progressive m em ber of the intelligentsia.” 67

64 M akedonsko delo, Sept. 10, 1927, p. 14.45 Ibid., Nov. 10, 1928, p. 2.•• Balkanska iederacija, Nov. 1, 1929, p. 2721." Ibid., Dec. 1, 1929, p. 2740.

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To m ark the second anniversary of the regime set up by A lexander on January 6, 1929, the Balkan Committee issued IIn "Manifesto to the Enslaved Peoples of Yugoslavia.” “The dictatorship,” says this manifesto, “has deprived all the non- Si’rbian peoples of their national name and character. It has illNNolved all political organizations, all national associations mid nil cultural, economic and sports societies.. . . If the (•renter Serbian imperialists involve you in a w ar w ith the Soviet Union, the one state tha t has given complete freedom10 all peoples, resist this w ar and turn your arm s against the (iren ter Serbian im perialists.” 68

At the end of 1931, the Balkan Committee issued a protest n^iilnst terrorism and persecution of Macedonian revolution-11 ry groups in Bulgaria. This protest was directed exclusively against Ivan-Vanca Mihailov and his group, w ith reference to whom it was stated: “This gang has nothing in common with (he movement to liberate the Macedonian population. On the cotnrary, as hirelings of the Bulgars who are bent on revenge, It is terrorizing and killing all progressive and m ilitant rlom ants in the Macedonian liberation movement, whose ideal In an independent Macedonia and a Balkan federation.” 69 In May 1932, the Balkan Committee once more issued a declara­tion attacking Mihailov, alleging tha t he had gathered about himself “a gang of m urderers and violators of their own people,” and that he was the “hireling of reactionary and fascist elem ents in Bulgaria and an agent of im perialism and counterrevolution.” 70

When the great Sokol rally was due to be held in P rague In 1932, the “Macedonian youth” of Yugoslavia issued an appeal for a boycott of the rally. This appeal, which a t the Name time was a call for revolution and the destruction of Yugoslavia, stated: "Only by fighting Balkan and international Imperialism, in concert w ith the revolutionary workers and peasants of the world and w ith the support of the Soviet Union—the only country in which there is neither national nor social persecution—can we achieve the liberation of Mace-

“ Ibid., Jan. 5, 1931, p. 3086.•• M akedonsko delo, Dec. 10, 1931, p. 3. ’• Ibid., May 10, 1932, p. 5.

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donia and the creation of a federation of free Balkan peoples.” 71 A manifesto addressed by the Central Committee of the United IMRO to the Macedonians under Greek rule declared: “The Communist P arty has been fighting, and con­tinues to fight, for the defense of the enslaved Macedonian population. I t has inscribed on its banner the motto ‘The righ t of the Macedonian people to self-determ ination, and a single and independent Macedonia.’ ” 72

In May of the same year, D. Vlahov, in his article “Revo­lutionary Ferm entation in Macedonia,” conjured up a picture of imminent revolution in Yugoslavia, in which the “oppressed masses of Yugoslavia, in alliance with the o ther Balkan coun­tries and w ith the powerful support of all revolutionary ele­ments outside the Balkans,” would “cast off the bonds of slavery and set up their own regime—the regime of the work­ing masses of the Balkan Peninsula.” 73

From the moment of its foundation, the Communist P arty of Yugoslavia had worked for a Communist revolution in Yugoslavia, in which the Macedonian question was to play a significant part. Hampered by internal disorganization and the fact tha t its standing in Moscow was not particularly high, it failed, during the firs t years of its existence, to work out a definite policy of its own, particularly w ith regard to the Macedonian question, its attitude tow ard which was dictated by the Comintern and the Balkan Communist Federation. Its Serbian section, however, which had sprung from the Serbian Social-Democratic Party , had adopted a de­finite attitude on this question which coincided, in fact, with tha t of European socialism, which was less concerned with reality than with its own fixed theories: for the socialists of Europe, as for those of Serbia, the liberation of the Balkan peoples was of in terest only insofar as it improved the position of the proletariat and the prospects of the class war. “N ational independence,” wrote Radniike novine in 1912, “is an essential principle of the class struggle. A nation m ust be

71 Ibid., Ju ly 25, 1932, p. 2.7i Ibid., Sept. 25, 1932, pp. 1—2.75 Ibid., May 10, 1932, pp. 1—2.

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fire In every respect if the proletariat intends to offer de- li'i mlmsl resistance to its social or class enemy.” 74

The Serbian socialists were opposed to the idea that Mace- 11<inlii Nhould be assigned either to Serbia or to Bulgaria—still m or e , that it should pass to Greece: they w ere equally de- tirm lned that it should not be divided among these three AtHl<>N.,s “As for us prim itive Balkan socialists,” they said, "mine of us, w ith the exception of the broadminded Bulgars, U In favor either of so-called balance of power or of any kind of hegemony in the Balkans: all we w ant is Balkan unity,I lie economic, cultural and political unification of all parts of the Balkans in a wonderful federation of democratic re ­publics, with Macedonia as an equal and autonomous member, f o r this alone can guarantee its members free development of t h e i r national characteristics and complete political and eco­nomic independence for the whole.” 78

In a discussion w ith G. K. Rakovsky, Popovic visualized thin “autonomous M acedonia,” not as an entirely independent Mato, but m erely as a m em ber enjoying equal rights in a Bal­kan federation. For him, it was absurd th a t Macedonia should become a new and independent state. “The Balkan people Itavo suffered and still are suffering from their lack of unity. The creation of a Macedonian state would m erely mean one .•itep fu rther into medieval particularism , which is in com­plete opposition to the aspirations and needs of the new era.” 77

Sima Markovi6, one of the best M arxist theoreticians among the firs t generation of Serbian Communists, also failed to arrive at a solution of the problem. At the end of his book Nacionalno pitanje u svetlosti marksizma (The National Ques­tion in the Light of Marxism), he pointed out that the peace treaty signed in Bucharest in 1913 had divided the region into

74 As quoted in Istoriski arhiv KPJ. Tom I: Socija listiik i pokret ii Srbljl, 1900—1919 (Historical Archives of the Communist Party of Yugoslavia. Vol. I: The Socialist Movement in Serbia, 1900—1919), Belgrade, 1950, p. 238.

’» Ibid., p. 240.™ DuSan Popovid, “Oko M akedonije” (Around Macedonia), Iza-

branl splsi (Selected Writings), Belgrade, 1951, p. 454.77 DuSan Popovid, “M akedonsko p itanje” (The Macedonian Ques­

tion), Izabrani splsl, p. 458.

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three parts—Serbian, B ulgarian and Greek. Markovic also saw a solution of the question in the formation of a union of Balkan peoples, “of which an autonomous Macedonia would be a full m em ber w ihtin the frontiers determ ined by a ple­biscite.” 78

It is significant tha t Markovic nowhere speaks of a separate Macedonian people. Instead, he emphasizes that the “ethnic hotch-potch of Macedonia greatly complicates the Macedonian question. This question will never be solved if we approach it solely w ith the interests of one or another Balkan people in mind. It can only be solved when we consider the interests of all the Balkan peoples, united in a single economic and political union founded upon the absolute equality of rights of all the nations and national groups living in the Balkans.” 7»

A t the elections for the Constituent Assembly of the King­dom of the Serbs, Croats and Slovenes—the first elections to be held afte r the country’s unification—thirty -th ree percent of the votes cast in Yugoslav Macedonia were for the Com­m unist P arty of Yugoslavia. It is emphasized by researchers that these votes were cast, not by people who were genuinely Communistically inclined, bu t by people who had been misled.80 Moreover, the traces of form er socialist activity still survived, particularly among the urban population, which was now understandably oriented toward the Yugoslav Com­munists. The latter, however, so fa r as m ay be judged from m aterials already published, seem for some time to have been unable to m ake up their minds on the Macedonian question. Right up to 1923, there is no evidence w hatever concerning their attitude: then, a t its third national conference, held in December of that year in Belgrade, the Communist P arty of Yugoslavia, under the influence of the Com intern ra th e r than of its own accord, advanced a more or less definite policy. In Paragraph 8 of its resolution on the nationality question, it emphasizes that none of the neighboring states has a m ajor­ity in Macedonia and tha t the struggle for its independence

79 Sima Markovic, Nacionafno pitanje u svetlosti marksizma (The N ational Question in the Light of Marxism), Belgrade, 1923, p. 123.

7» Ibid., p. 124.e* Adam B. Ulam, Titoism and the Cominiorm, Harvard Universi­

ty Press, Cambridge, Mass., 1952, p. 8.

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rilinulri be waged, in the first place, by the Macedonian lii'iiNiints, who m ust unite with the workers to form a govern­ment of workers and peasants for an independent Macedonia, which would voluntarily en ter a federation of independent Mnlknn republics.8’

The importance of this conference lies in its adoption of n special resolution on the Macedonian and Thracian question, liy which the party “acknowledged for the first tim e the existence of a Macedonian national question.” 82 This re- Hiilution advocated the formation of a “single and autonomous Macedonia,” 83 which should unite with the o ther Balkan lands to form a federative republic, since only this could "secure peace, independence and freedom of development for all the Balkan lands." Such a federation was to be a “vo­luntary union of independent Balkan republics, num bering among its members the republics of Macedonia and Thrace.” 84

The Independent W orkers’ P arty of Yugoslavia, a legally recognized wing of the banned Yugoslav Communist Party , nhowed somewhat greater reserve in its resolutions adopted on April 13—14, 1924, in defining its attitude tow ard the Macedonian question. The gist of these resolutions was tha t the party would “develop the greatest activity among the working masses of Macedonia, entering into the closest pos­sible contact w ith them by means of propaganda and the press, and assist their struggle for liberation.” 85 In its re­solution on the nationality question in Yugoslavia, the national conference of this party was much franker in defining its uttitude. “In view of the preceding,” this resolution states, "it is the duty of the P arty to organize the working masses of the oppressed peoples and openly lead a common struggle for their right of secession, i. e., to assist the movement of the oppressed peoples w ith the object of forming independent states of Croatia, Slovenia, Macedonia and Montenegro, and of liberating the A lbanians.” 86 In Point 5 of the “P latform of the W orkers’ and Peasants’ Bloc,” the party demanded

®‘ Istoriski arhiv KPJ. Tom II: Kongresi i zem aljske konlerencije od 1919— 1937, p. 77.

** Ibid., p. 474, footnote 13.M Ibid., p. 74.

Ibid., pp. 75 and 77.•• Ibid., p. 294.M Ibid., p. 339.

201

“complete recognition of the right of all the oppressed peoples of Yugoslavia to political independence and freedom ,” and named as its objective “independent republics of Croatia, Slo­venia, Macedonia and M ontenegro and freedom for the Al­banian people.” 87 During the same year, Kosta Novakovic, a prom inent Serbian Communist, published his brochure “Mace­donia for the Macedonians, and Land for the Peasants,” which was confiscated, he himself being sentenced to six m onths’ imprisonment.88

In June 1924, the Comintern, in Point 7 of its resolution on the nationality question in Yugoslavia, unequivocally demand­ed the destruction of Yugoslavia as a state. According to the Comintern, which was apparently dissatisfied w ith the attitude hitherto of the Communist P arty of Yugoslavia on the Macedonian question, “the general slogan of the right of peoples to self-determ ination, advanced by the Communist P arty of Yugoslavia, m ust be presented as the secession of Croatia, Slovenia and Macedonia from Yugoslavia and their establishm ent as independent republics.” 88

The Third Congress of the Communist P arty of Yugo­slavia, held in June 1926 in Vienna, sharply criticized the work of the party on the nationality and agrarian questions in Macedonia, and demanded that more energetic measures be taken. In a resolution on the political situation, it was stated tha t the party “m ust lend active assistance to all national- revolutionary movements w ith the object of hastening the collapse of capitalism and the victory of proletarian revo­lution. . . . The P arty m ust actively promote the revival of national-revolutionary organizations in Macedonia on the basis of the May Manifesto [of 1924].” 90

This congress made no new contribution to the party ’s policy on the Macedonian question. One gets the impression that the party was obliged to subordinate its policy on this question to the will and aims of the Comintern: more and more, it was becoming the instrum ent of the Comintern and

87 Balkanska federacija, Dec. 15, 1924, p. 134.88 M akedonsko delo, Jan. 25, 1927.89 Istoriski arhiv PKJ. Tom 11: Kongresi i zem aljske konterencije

PKJ od 1919— 1937, p. 421.90 Ibid., p. 109.

202

• fusing to be an independent factor capable of influencing llu* course of events. In a resolution adopted by the congress (in the nationality question, the party demanded a “federation til workers’ and peasnts’ republics in the Balkans, since only th f voluntary union of organized peoples as workers’ and |)i'n,simts’ sta tes” could “bring about a genuine solution of the nationality question. The P arty will m eanwhile constantly emphasize that the road to a solution of the nationality ques­tion lies in a revolutionary struggle of the masses of workers mid peasants directed at destroying capitalism and establish­ing w orkers’ and peasants’ republics.” 91

The year 1927 saw no new developments in the policy of l In* Yugoslav Communists on the subject of Macedonia. In Miiy of th a t year, Kosta Novakovic published an article on Macedonia and the Balkans in which he pu t the problem as follows: “This is how we Communists look a t the Balkan pro- liU m: the Macedonian question is the most im portant elem ent In the Balkan problem, so tha t the solution of the form er isn prerequisite for the solution of the la tte r___ We YugoslavCommunists extend a brotherly hand to all Balkan revo­lutionaries who aspire to the liberation of their peoples and iiro fighting to this end.” 92 When the attem pt was made on the life of General KovaSevic, regional committees of the Communist P arty of Yugoslavia and the Union of Communist Youth of Yugoslavia issued a manifesto stating: “The Com­m unist P arty of Yugoslavia would welcome and assist any struggle for the liberation of the enslaved peoples of Yugo­slavia, particularly the liberation of the Macedonian people,which is living in the greatest hardship___ Armed rebellionund civil w ar—these are the means by which Macedonia will acquire her national freedom. Until tha t moment comes, she must work on organizing the masses and preparing them forii bloody conflict. In this way, she will become united, instead of being divided among Yugoslavia, Bulgaria and Greece. Only the creation of a Balkan federation em bracing Mace­donia as a free state enjoying full membership will solve the Macedonian national question.” 93

•' Ibid., p. 112.•* M akedonsko delo, May 10, 1927, p. 10. •• Ibid., Nov. 25, 1927, p. 4.

203

In August 1928, Serbian Communist students issued an appeal against terrorism in Macedonia. “Bloody experience has taught the peoples of Macedonia,” they said, “tha t they cannot achieve full national freedom so long as the present B alkan states ru le over them. Hence the form ation among the masses of a Macedonian ideology tending toward the establish­m ent of a single and entirely independent Macedonia in which all nationalities will enjoy complete equality of rights.” 84

Such was the atm osphere when the Fourth Congress of the Yugoslav Communist P arty was held at Dresden in October1928. At this congress, a g reat deal was said about the so- called “Serbianization” of Macedonia, which was to serve as a “strategic base for the hegemony of the G reater Serbian bourgeoisie” and to “extend the national springboard” of this bourgeoisie for the im plementation of its “hegemonistic policy against the other nations of Yugoslavia.” 95

A t this congress, the Yugoslav Communist P arty defined its attitude toward the question of Macedonia’s secession from Yugoslavia much more clearly than it had done hitherto. A resolution on the economic and political situation in Yugo­slavia and the tasks of the party stated: “The P arty affirm s the solidarity of the revolutionary w orkers and peasants of the other nations of Yugoslavia, particularly of Serbia, with the Macedonian national-revolutionary movement which has been revived in the form of the United IMRO, and calls upon the working class to lend w holehearted assistance to the struggle for an independent and united Macedonia.” 88

This may be said to have remained the party ’s attitude toward the Macedonian question. The events of January 6,1929, in Yugoslavia threw the party out of its rut, and its leaders were thereafter too preoccupied to think of Mace­donia. Even eight years later, a t the Fourth National Con­ference, held a t L jubljana in December 1936, nothing new was said. In connection w ith the Macedonian question, it was m erely stated that the revolutionary struggle should be con-

94 Balkanska lederacija, Aug. 1, 1928, p. 2090.•5 Istoriski arhiv PKJ. Tom 11: Kongresi i zem aljske konterencije

PKJ od 1919— 1937, p. 153.98 Ibid., p. 163.

204

limn'd, since it should be a struggle “for the form ation of a workers’ and peasants’ Soviet regim e,” 97

According to Elisabeth Barker, this silence of the Yugo- filnv Communist P arty on the subject of Macedonia m ay haveI...... duo to a tacit abandonm ent of the anti-Versailles standmi Macedonia in particu lar or Yugoslavia in general. National M< ti 11st Germ any had become the chief spokesman of the movement for revising the Versailles Treaty, and since she vvie. lit that time expressly hostile tow ard the Soviets, the ( ’iimlnlcrn no longer considered it expedient to force a terri- I < 11 in I dismemberment of Yugoslavia.98 Talk of the need for u Communist revolution in the Balkans also ceased. At a meeting held in Moscow in the sum m er of 1936, the Central Committee of the Yugoslav Communist P arty adopted a re­solution explaining its change of tactics in the nationality i|iieMtion by the increased aggressiveness of the fascist and Imperialist powers, which were anxious to “exploit the national movements in the interests of w ar and their own lilan.s for aggrandizem ent.” 99 It was fu rther stated that these (< m oderations “prom pted the Communist P arty of Yugoslavia ht change its tactics in the nationality question w ithout abandoning the principle of the righ t of all peoples to self- ilrlerm ination, including secession. The P arty opposes the breaking up of the territo ry at present occupied by the state ill Yugoslavia, since it aims at achieving a reorganization of Hint state by peaceful means, on a basis of national equality of rights. In the present circumstances, any movement aimed a I the secession of the oppressed peoples would only assist the Niscist im perialists and their w arlike aims.” 100

That this was indeed m erely a change of tactics and not an abandonment of u ltim ate aims w ith regard to Macedonia was dem onstrated by the course of events during and after World War II. The Communist P arty of Yugoslavia consistent­ly m aintained its anti-Serbian positions in the Macedonian question. On October 12, 1945, Milovan Djilas stated at Skoplje: “O ur party and its Central Committee, not only

•’ Ibid., p. 262.•" Elisabeth Barker, op. cit., p. 74.M laloriski arhiv PKJ. Tom 11; Kongresi i zem aljske konierencije

PKJ od 1910— 1037, p. 399."• Ibid.

205

during the early days of the struggle, but also in the arduous fight against G reater Serbian reactionary hegemonistic re­gimes, emblazoned on its banners the freedom and rights of the Macedonian people: i t has remained, and will remain, true to this slogan___In the struggle for the rights of the Mace­donian people, the P arty has given num berless victims.”

206

THE MACEDONIAN QUESTION DURING AND AFTER WORLD WAR II

The collapse of Yugoslavia in A pril 1941 enabled B ulgaria In realize h er old am bition—that of once more annexing Macedonia. W hat she had failed to attain in 1915 had now I won achieved: she had united all three parts of the region under her control. We do not know w hether ruling circles in Bulgaria believed that this annexation would prove per­manent: we only know tha t the Central Committee of the Bul­garian W orkers’ (Communist) Party , true to its traditional attitude on the Macedonian question, accepted the occupation of Yugoslav and Greek Macedonia as signifying their libera­tion. People spoke of the unification of the “B ulgarian lands.” In conformity w ith the mood of the masses, the B ulgarian W orkers’ P arty launched the slogan “one territo ry—one party ,” signifying th a t the Communist P arty of Macedonia, which at the time was weak in respect of both organization and personnel, was to subm it to the Bulgarian W orkers’ P arty ( ' • M i t r a l Committee. Metodi (“Charles”) Satorov, then secretary of the Central Committee of the Macedonian Communist I‘arty, had been pro-Bulgarian inclined even before the war. In un agreem ent w ith the Central Committee of the Bulgarian W orkers’ Party , he expressed the view that the region had been liberated and tha t the Macedonian Communist P a rty nhould be incorporated in the Bulgarian.1

A part from his own personal inclinations, Satorov may liavo been prom pted to take this standpoint by a letter, pub­lished in the spring of 1941, from Todor Pavlov, in which the latter argued th a t the Macedonians had no separate ethnic Identity and had felt themselves to be Bulgars throughout Ihelr history. In spite of th ree summonses issued by the Central Committee of the Yugoslav Communist P arty during

1 Pregled narodno-oslobodila6kog rata u M akedoniji, 1941—44' (Hnvlow of the W ar of National Liberation in Macedonia, 1941—44), |iiil)(l. by the Historical Institute of the Yugoslav Army, Belgrade,. I DM), p. 8.

207

the course of May 1941, Satorov refused to go to Belgrade for conversations, and placed himself a t the orders of P e ta r Bog­danov, who had been sent to Skoplje as a delegate of the B ulgarian p arty ’s Central Committee to the Central Com­m ittee of the Macedonian Communist Party.

The quarrel over Macedonia had begun to assume the aspect of a quarrel between the Central Committees of the Yugoslav and B ulgarian Communist Parties over the question w hether the annexation of Macedonia by Bulgaria could be regarded as a solution of the Macedonian question. The ques­tion to whom the Macedonian Communist P arty owed al­legiance had receded into the background. The Yugoslavs were reluctant to recognize the claims of the Bulgars and resisted them. When Satorov ignored the summons to go to Belgrade, the Yugoslav party sent Lazar KoliSevski and Dragan Pavlo- vic to Macedonia to restore order in the party organization. It is significant th a t most of the Macedonian Communist P a rty ’s leaders rem ained faithful to the Yugoslavs, and were reluctant to join Satorov.

Koli§evski did not find it easy to get rid of Satorov, who was backed by the Bulgarian p arty ’s Central Committee and, to a certain extent, by the occupying forces, to whom a t any moment he m ight be betrayed. At the beginning of November 1941, this is, in fact, w hat happened: he was arrested and deported to Bulgaria, but not before he had gathered round himself the pro-Yugoslav elements in the Macedonian party and formed a new leadership from among their ranks. On June 25, 1941, the Yugoslav party expelled Satorov and at the same time sent a le tter containing instructions to members of the Macedonian Communist Party . The Bulgarian party ’s Central Committee was obliged to w ithdraw Satorov from Macedonia and appoint him secretary of the Sofia district committee.2

With this, the firs t phase in the quarrel over the allegiance of the M acedonian Communist P arty came to an end, to be im mediately followed by the second phase. A fter the arrest of Kolisevski, the post of secretary to the Central Committee of the Macedonian party was given, w ith the consent of Dra-

* Ibid., p. 12.

208

Mill) Pnvlovi6, to Bane Andrejev, who was even a t tha t stage liHlcved to be in sym pathy w ith the B ulgarian cause. He was In touch with Bojan Bulgarjanov, successor to P etar Bog- ilunov. However that may be, it is a fact tha t the Macedonian party was still in a state of chaos. M entioning this, Boris ("Crni”) Vukm irovit, in a report dated May 23, 1932, stated: " Macedonia was disunited, and they sought to establish con­tact through Sdipnija [Albania]. We got in touch w ith the Skoplje organization, which had become disrupted bu t is now restored to order.” 3 In his report of August 21, 1942, to the Yugoslav p arty ’s Central Committee, Vukmirovi6 stated w ith tegard to Macedonia: “The situation there is unbelievably difficult. There have been constant and uninterrupted dis­turbances. People have behaved in cowardly fashion, and the officer in command of headquarters (Vasilije Lekovii) has confessed everything. Ceda Milanovi6, who is one of the head­quarters staff, blew the gaff w ithout any pressure being applied at a l l . . . . The Regional Committee [i. e., the Mace­donian Central Committee], formed afte r the departure of the I Yugoslav] Central Committee delegate, has proved to be weak and unequal to events. I t d idn’t know how to organize people. Four or five have been simply removed from their Jobs. The slogan “A Soviet Macedonia” rem ained the order of the day. All the P arty men were throw n into partisan units, and so, w ith the destruction of these units, the P arty organiza­tions (especially those of Bitolj and Prilep) were also broken up. The best men have perished. About th irty have been killed or wounded, including two members of the Regional Com­mittee, which has been superseded by a tem porary one. P arty organizations are now being stabilized: people in them are young and have some esprit de corps. They have sent one m an to Serbia. They are also trying to get in touch w ith you through the B ulgarian Central Committee, and through this ehnnnel have dispatched a detailed report. Five partisan units have been formed at Veles, Prilep, Bitolj, PreSevo and Resan. You can get in touch w ith them through PreSevo and also through us.” 4

* From the secret archives of the Central Committee of the Com­munist Party of Yugoslavia.

4 Ibid.

209

In order to settle as soon as possible the quarrel as to who should control the Macedonian Central Committee, Tito ap­pealed directly to the Comintern. “In August, the Comintern approved the views and proposals of comrade Tito and the Central Committee of the Communist P arty of Yugoslavia, and, on this basis, adopted a resolution condemning the ir­responsible attem pt of the Central Committee of the Bul­garian W orkers’ P arty to annex the Macedonian P arty or­ganization and returning this organization to the Communist P arty of Yugoslavia.” 6

The Bulgarian W orkers’ P arty subm itted to this decision of the Comintern. W hether it did so unreservedly and without some arri£re-pens6e, it is difficult to say: it is certainly significant that no mention is made of Macedonia in the p lat­form of the Bulgarian Patriotic Front issued on Ju ly 17, 1942. In the program approved in December 1943, we find merely: “The only satisfactory solution is a united and independent M acedonia.. . . There should be no question of annexation by any Balkan state w hatever.” 6

This program was preceded by an agreem ent between the Communist parties of Bulgaria and Greece, signed on Ju ly 12, 1943, at P e tri5, by which both bound themselves to work for the establishm ent of a union of Balkan soviet republics. This agreem ent was signed by J. Joanides for the Greek party and by Dushan Draganoff for the Bulgarian.7 F. A. Voigt correctly states tha t the purpose of this agreem ent was to set up a Balkan federal soviet state stretching to the Bosphorus and Dardanelles and directly subordinate to the Soviet Union. The separation of Macedonia from Greece and establishm ent of a M acedonian republic embracing parts of B ulgaria and Yugo­slavia would have m eant the realization in large part of the Communist plans of the time and was, indeed, the chief aim of Russian policy in southeastern Europe.8

* * *

5 Pregled narodno-oslobodilaikog rata u M akedonijl, 1941—44, p. 11.

* Polllika, Belgrade, Ju ly 24, 1948.1 F. A. Voigt, Pax Brilannlca, London, 1949, p. 395.8 F. A. Voigt, “The Battle of Konits,” The Nineteenth Century and

Alter, Feb. 1948.

210

A . far as is a t present known, the Central Committee of lln* Utilitarian W orkers’ Party , afte r the intervention of the i 'iiiitlntcrn, raised no more obstacles in the path of the Yugo- «Imv party Central Committee in Macedonia. The very fact Hull (ieorgi Dimitrov then occupied a high position in the « ninlritern may have exerted a sobering influence on the Bui­lt" i Inn Commuinsts. How the la tte r were affected by the ( ‘iiinintern’s decision is revealed in a letter, unfortunately undated, from the Bulgarian to the Yugoslav Central Com- uilI(<■<•, w ritten in reply to a le tte r of October 6, 1942. General­ly 'ipcnking, this le tter is an attem pt to justify the treatm ent nt I hi' Macedonian Communist Party . A fter pointing out thatI In- Bulgarian party, im mediately after the war, established 1'niilnct with certain members of the M acedonian party, the letter goes on: “At tha t time, a representative of the Mace- ilmilmi Central Committee came to us w ith a report th a t the Y u k i i s I u v Central Committee had decided to allow the Mace­donian organization to establish organizational and political u-liillons with the Bulgarian party and to pu t itself under thehitler's leadership___ Until the question was definitelym Itlod, we decided to give the Macedonian committee a con- m drnible degree of autonomy and to collaborate w ith it on tin' broadest possible basis, retaining only a certain degree of political control. I t was agreed tha t the Macedonian organiza- lum propose the publication of its own organ as the auto­nomous W orkers’ P arty of Macedonia. We w ere greatly sur­prised when we learn t subsequently tha t the Yugoslav Central Committee had not decided to allow the union of the Mace­donian organization and our party, tha t the Committee was opposed to such a union, that this had led to a strained and completely abnorm al situation w ithin the M acedonian or- Kimlzution, that a conflict had arisen between the Macedonian committee and your representative and tha t this had led to a schism in the organization, to m utual expulsions and the emergence of parallel committees.” 9

Proceeding to the situation in Macedonia, the le tter says: "The early illusions entertained in large m easure by the Mace­donian population are disappearing, the revolt against the Bulgarian adm inistration is growing daily, and favorable con­

• From the secret archives of the Central Committee of the Com- muiiiit Party of Yugoslavia.

211

ditions are being created for a rebellion against the Bulgarianauthorities___ N aturally, there are places in Macedonia(Kumanovo, and in part also Skoplje) w here the population is ready to wage an active struggle against all aggressors, in­cluding Bulgarian. Elsewhere, it is not prepared for such a decisive struggle, for which it m ust be prepared by large-scale political propaganda and by a campaign for the protection of its immediate political and economic interests from the B ulgarian authorities: only by gradually involving the Mace­donian people in a decisive struggle by way of sabotage and diversionary acts against the occupying forces can favorable conditions for a large-scale armed conflict be created.” 10

The le tte r devotes no more than a few words to the funda­m ental problem—the subject of the quarrel between the two Central Committees: the Bulgarian committee considers the quarrel to be already solved and approves the Yugoslav party ’s policy of armed rebellion, since it has the support of the Com intern.11

From the secret archives of the Yugoslav Communist P ar­ty ’s Central Committee, we learn that relations in 1942 between it and the B ulgarian Communists were good, al­though it was impossible for them to become cordial. The Bulgarian Communists’ request that a representative be sent by the Yugoslav Central Committee proved to be still im­practicable. A letter from the Yugoslav to the Bulgarian Central Committee dated March 10, 1942, sets forth the situa­tion as it was in the early p art of this year. “A meeting between your and our representative will be possible through the Macedonian and Serbian regional committees, which have received detailed instructions on this subject. In view of its urgency and importance, we think that this m eeting will soon take place.” 12

It is not clear who was the Yugoslav party Central Com­m ittee’s representative before the Macedonian Regional Com­mittee. When Dragan Pavlovic was w ithdraw n from Mace­donia, his place was taken by Dobrivoje (“Bobi”) Radosavlje- vi6. According to Lazar Mojsov, Radosavljevi6 did not arrive

10 Ibid.11 Ibid.12 Ibid.

212

lii Muccdonia until August 1942.18 “We have here a delegate lnun Albania,” wrote Tito to Dr. Blagoje (“Mihajlo”) Ne§kovi6 im October 23, 1942. “Through him we have sent plenty of iimli’i'ial, not only to the Albanian Communist Party, but also hi M/icedonia. It is good that Bobi has been sent there. As *ii>iiii as you receive a report from him, sent it on to us.” 14

We do not know precisely when Dragan Pavlovid left Miicidonia. In any case, it must have been about the end of Din-mber 1941, since on January 21, 1942, he met his death in Mo.snia. In October 1941, Tito sent Orce Nikolov, a tailorl Kim Macedonia and a candidate member of the Yugoslav pm ly Central Committee, from Uzice with the task of organiz­ing an armed rising in Macedonia. Nikolov never reached his ili :itination: meeting a Bulgarian patrol, he was discovered mid killed in the ensuing struggle.1*

During this period, despite everything subsequently writ- f( ii on the subject, Tito enjoyed the complete confidence of Moscow. Mo§a Pijade testifies that he was in daily contact with the Comintern by radio from 1941 on throughout the ••ntlre course of the war.19 Through Tito, the Comintern nought contact with the Bulgarian Central Committee. On .Inly 27, 1942, the Yugoslav Central Committee sent the fol­lowing message to its Bulgarian counterpart: “Deda [the Comintern] urges us to get in touch with you as soon as pos­sible and to let him know whether this has been done, since hr has certain things to send you through us. Let us have your n ply immediately in order that we may report to Deda that w<‘ have established contact with you.” 17 On August 17, the Serbian Regional Committee wrote to a certain “Ljuba,” whose identity we have been unable to discover: “Enclosed is n letter for the Bulgarian Caca [the Central Committee of the Unitarian Workers’ Party]. Immediately after your arrival,

" Lazar M ojsov, Bugarska radniika partija (komunista) i M ake- ihtnnko nacionalno pitanje (The Bulgarian W orkers ' [Communist] fu rly and the Macedonian. National Question), Belgrade, 1948, p. 150.

14 From the secret archives o f the Central Committee of the Com­munist Party of Yugoslavia.

,s PaSko Romac, Begstvo aa robije (Flight from Bondage), Bel- (I i iido, 1951, p. 59.

" Polltlka, Belgrade, Dec. 28, 1949.17 Prom the secret archives of the Central Committee of the Com­

munist Party of Yugoslavia.

213

among other things, get in touch straight away with their representative and give him this letter so that he may for­ward it----As you see, it is very important that you main­tain constant contact with us through the comrades from N. [Ni§] and that we receive as soon as possible Ca<5a’s reply, as also your own reports.” 18

Two days later, “FiSer” (Ivo-Lola Ribar) wrote to Dr. Bla- goje NeSkovi6: “Deda has urged us to establish contact with the Bulgarian Communist Party, not only in our own, but also in his, interests. Are you in a position to do something about this straight away and establish a channel of communication? If so, tell Mihajlo to approach them as our representative and inform them that contact is being sought at Deda’s orders. Tell me what happens.” 18

From a letter sent by Dr. Blagoje NeSkovic to the Bul­garian Central Committee on October 27, 1942, on behalf of the Yugoslav Central Committee, we learn that this task was not without its difficulties. “So far, it has been impossible to let you have a reply from our Central Committee,” wrote NeSkovic, “or to send a representative from our Central Com­mittee for the purpose of composing a joint manifesto. This is why we suggested that method of negotiating on the draw­ing up of a joint manifesto. However, in spite of all the dif­ficulties involved, we shall do everything in our power to ensure that your receive a reply at the earliest possiblemoment---- In our opinion, direct communication betweenus would be best served by giving you an address in Serbia, since, as far as we know, you are in a position to send your people there legally. If you have some other proposal, we shall accept it. We shall send you the address as soon as we find a reliable one: in the meantime, we shall have to communicate with you through our instructor attached to the Macedonian Regional Committee.... We have already informed you that Deda is enquiring about you. We have told him that we are in touch with you through some partisan units, and he has sent us the following message: ‘You report to us that you have established contact with the partisans in Bulgaria. If your means of communication are constant and reliable, we ask you to help our Bulgarian comrades to establish radio com­

18 Ibid.18 Ibid.

214

munication with us___We ask you, comrades, to assist ourInstructor in arranging his stay and work in Macedonia, as in everything else.” 20

During October, NeSkovii finally succeeded in establishing communications with Bulgaria. On November 6, 1942, he re­ported to a certain “Valdes” : “On Deda’s orders, I have done I ln> following: I have sent Deda’s entire message to the Bul­garian Cada and asked him what he needs in order to estab- I Ish radio communication.. .. For the rest, our contact with I lie Bulgarian Cada is good. Many of their people have been arrested and shot, including Stari. The comrades in Bulgaria linve set up a Patriotic Front. Latterly, they have been pressing on with the formation of partisan units, and asking us for advice. The comrades in Macedonia are in touch with the comrades in Greece and Albania.” 81

* * *

In subsequent conversations between the Communist Party of Yugoslavia and the Bulgarian Workers’ Party, the Mace­donian question occupied a central place. The Bulgarian party look great care not to make its attitude definitely negative or positive. True, it occasionally appeared to contemplate a Yugoslav federation, but never clearly expressed any desire for a unification of all three parts of the region. Similarly, it iii'ver definitely rejected this possibility. This may explain why the Bulgarian Farmers Party declared themselves in favor of a unification of Bulgaria and Yugoslavia.22

Ostensibly, the Bulgarian Workers’ Party advocated the closest collaboration with the Yugoslav Communist Party in this matter. In its letter of greeting to the second session of the AFCNLY (Anti-Fascist Council for the National Libera­tion of Yugoslavia), dispatched toward the end of November 1943, the Bulgarian party’s Central Committee declared its readiness to do everything in its power to ensure the “com­plete removal of all obstacles in the way of a union of all the Slavic peoples in the Balkans in a free federation, in which

“ Ibid.11 Ibid.** Branko Cubrilovid, Zapisi iz tudjine (Notes from A broad ), Sara­

jevo, 1946, pp. 54— 56.

215

there shall be neither oppressors nor oppressed.” 23 Only a few weeks later, however, in December of the same year, the Bulgarian Patriotic Front, headed by the Communists, took up a stand on the solution of the Macedonian question that was in complete opposition to the decision of the AFCNLY. Elisabeth Barker is not exaggerating when she says, of this attitude taken by the Bulgarian party: “ It was, in fact, a return to the old line of Vlahov—Comintern line of the mid—nineteen-twenties.” 24 Even in 1926, it seemed to the people around Vlahov that behind Yugoslav federation there was lurking the threat of “Serbian imperialism.” In the lead­ing article “Yugoslav Federation, or Greater Serbian Im­perialism,” published on February 10, 1926, in Makedonsko delo, it was stated: “Naturally, no one is so naive as not to realize that the mask of ‘Yugoslav federation conceals a crude annexationist desire on the part of the Greater Serbian im­perialists to enslave other nations and seize their lands.” 25

The situation acquired additional picquancy with the elec­tion of Dimitar Vlahov, at that time still in Moscow, as vice- chairman of the AFCNLY. This council and already been join­ed by Vladimir Pop-Tomov, also from Macedonia, and Meto- dije Antonov-Cinto, who belonged to the Serbian Farmers’ Party and was later, in November 1946, sentenced to eleven years’ hard labor.26 Pov-Tomov, who, after the conflict between Tito and the Cominform, became Bulgarian Foreign Minister, was one of the most determined opponents of the present solution of the Macedonian question.

Discussions on this question were continued in 1944. In the latter half of this year, they were to have reached the con­clusion desired by Moscow and the Yugoslav Communist Party, but, once more, they came to nothing. At the First Congress of the Macedonian Communist Party, held at the end of December 1948, Svetozar Vukmanovi6-Tempo revealed that during the summer of 1944 he and Lazar KoliSevski were in­vited by the Bulgarian Workers’ Party Central Committee to

43 Drugo zasedanje A V N O J -a (The Second Session of the A F C N L Y ), 1943, p. 44.

24 Elisabeth Barker, Macedonia: Its Place in Balkan Pow er Po - litics, London, 1950, p. 97.

25 Makedonsko delo, Feb. 10, 1926.28 Elisabeth Barker, op. cit., p. 101.

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come to Sofia and attend a session of the Central Committee in order to help smooth out remaining causes of dissension. This session was attended, on the Bulgarian side, by Traicho Kustov, Anton Yugov, Dobri Terpeshev and Georgi Tsankov. "We advanced and substantiated all our accusations,” said Tempo, “and demanded that the leadership of the Bulgarian Workers’ Party rectify its policy on the Macedonian national (luostion. It was then mutually decided (1) that the leadership of the Bulgarian Workers’ Party issue publicly and in written form a statement of self-criticism on all points raised by us hi connection with the Bulgarian party’s attitude toward the Macedonian national question; (2) that the leadership of the Unitarian Workers’ Party undertake to give the Pirin area of Macedonia, not merely cultural, but also administrative, milonomy within the Bulgarian state, to encourage the deve­lopment of a national consciousness among the Macedonian people, and in this way to prepare for a final unification of the Pirin and Vardar areas of Macedonia when conditions were favorable, that is, when the question of a Yugoslav federation came up for decision.” 27

The Bulgars did nothing to apply this resolution in practice. Nevertheless, superficial relations between the two parties gave no sign of deteriorating. The question of estab­lishing a Yugoslav federation was once more raised by leading Yugoslav Communists. Mosa Pijade was right when, in 1944, lie wrote: “Apart from the Communist Party of Yugoslavia, there was not one party or political group that was prepared I o raise its voice against the denationalization of the Mace­donian people or that had the courage and determination to recognize the Macedonians as a separate Yugoslav people and fight for the principle ‘Macedonia for the Macedonians.’ ” 28

It is noteworthy that, apart from this, certain prominent Yugoslav Communists were campaigning about this time for a union of Yugoslavia and Bulgaria. In a speech delivered at

*’ Polltlka, Belgrade, Dec. 22, 1948.*" Mo$a Pijade, “Slobodna M akedonija u bratskoj demokratskoj

•/.n|t‘(liilcl ju inoslovenskih naroda” (A Free M acedonia in a Fraternal Dnntocratic Community of South Slav Peoples), Put nove Jugoslavije: /.hlrka tlanaka o narodno-oslobodiladkom pokretu (The Road of the N ow Yugoslavia: Symposium of Articles on the National Liberation Movement), 1944, p. 95.

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the beginning of November 1943 to mark the twenty-sixth anniversary of the October Revolution, Milovan Djilas de- calred: “The peoples of Yugoslavia have always striven for a union with their brothers the Bulgars. Thanks to her rulers, Bulgaria has become Hitler’s vassal, a German war camp. The peoples of our country regard it as their sacred duty to assist the liberation of another Slavic nation, while the latter, for its part, must make every effort to free itself from its German conquerors. Only in this way can the Bulgarian people avoid being dismembered, humiliated and enslaved; only in this way can a broatherhood of South Slavs be formed which, relying on the world’s democratic forces—in particular, on the Soviet Union—will resist all attempts at subjugation or the playing off of one nation against another for the benefit of the imperialists. The history of these peoples shows that this is the only means of securing for them a happier future, the only way of ensuring that their sacrifices shall not be in vain. Such a brotherhood would also attract other Balkan peoples who are the victims of imperialism—the A l­banians and the Greeks.... History has assigned to our com­mon homeland of Yugoslavia and the national liberation movement the imposing task of acting as pioneers of a future federation of South Slavs, of laying a foundation for the broterhood, unity and equality of the Balkan peoples.” 28

Just over a year later, Djilas linked the solution of the Macedonian question with the formation of a South Slav federation. “A solution of the Macedonian question which not only is not prejudicial to either Serbs or Bulgars but in fact strengthens the brotherly ties between these two peoples and the Macedonians constitutes one of the greatest historical events in the Balkans and one of the vital requisites for a general consolidation of the Balkan situation and for the ensuring of peace and independence for the Balkan peoples. ” *#

On November 10,1944, Aleksandar Rankovi6 also expressed his views on this important question. “As for Macedonia,” he said, “the Macedonian people has also decided that its country be brought into a Yugoslav federation. This removes from the

*8 V ladim ir Dedijer, Dnevnik (D iary), Belgrade, Part II, pp. 584 — 585.

80 M ilovan Djilas, Clanci, 1941— 46 (Articles, 1941— 46), Belgrade,1947, pp. 34— 35.

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agenda one of the biggest questions of our internal policy und one of the extremely important problems of our foreignpolicy___ Today, no one in Bulgaria or Greece can advancetiny claims to Macedonia, since Macedonia is no longer liable lo be plundered and partitioned by sundry Balkan hegemon­ies and imperialists. It is a free federal unit in the free federation of Yugoslavia. The Macedonian people is a separate people in the Yugoslav federation.” ”

* 0 *

What was the reason for the anxiety shown by the leaders of the Yugoslav Communist Party to retain their hold on key positions in the Balkans? Albert Mousset attempts to explain this by the fact that they were under the inlfuence of Moscow. "If,” he says “Bulgaria and Yugoslavia are side with each other, this is obviously the result of similar submission to Russian domination, and we have seen above that their agreement on the Macedonian question was less genuine than was believ­ed.” 52 “During these twenty-five years,” said Dr. Blagoje Ne§- kovit at the First Congress of the Macedonian Communist Par­ty, held in 1948, “ the Communist Party of Yugoslavia has been fighting for a consistent policy, for a strict application of the teaching of Marx, Lenin and Stalin on the national ques­tion." **

That this subordination to the aims of Moscow was de­liberate and systematic is borne out by Svetozar Vukmanovic- Tompo, who must have been well acquainted with Soviet policy in the Balkans during the last war. He says: “What was behind the demand for a united Macedonian people within the framework of a Balkan federation? It was, in fact, an attempt by the Soviet government and other members of the Informburo to separate the People’s Republic of Macedonia from the Federative People’s Republic of Yugoslavia with the object of destroying socialist Yugoslavia and subordinating her to the control of the Soviet government.” 34

*' A leksandar Rankovid, Izabrani govori 1 ilanci (Selected Speeches and Articles), Belgrade, 1951, pp. 34— 35.

** A lbert Mousset The W orld ol the Slavs, London, 1950, p. 172.** Polltlka, Belgrade, Dec. 20, 1948.14 Svetozar Vukm anovii-Tem po, O narodnoj revoluciji u Grikoj

(The National Revolution in Greece), Belgrade, p. 77.

219

When Tito sent Tempo armed with special powers to Mace­donia, none of his colleagues took this view: their relations with Moscow were of the friendliest, and Tito was ready to do anything Moscow demanded of him. He had not yet master­ed his aversion, typical of the Bolsheviks, toward the Ameri­cans and the British, and was prepared to throw them into the sea if they attempted to land in Yugoslavia. A confidential letter sent on April 8, 1942, to leading members of the Party makes clear his attitude toward the British military missions. “For your information,” the letter says, “but not for general publication, we must communicate to you some very interest­ing things that we have established beyond all doubt. We know for certain that Britain, through her agents in Yugo­slavia, so far from supporting us, is stirring up trouble between us and certain other groups, such as the Chetniks. Like the Germans, she is supporting various Chetnik bands in order that they may attack us. We have evidence showing that it has become a part of Britain’s policy to create as much confusion in Yugoslavia as possible, to compromise the struggle for national liberation, and, when the moment is ripe—i. e., when Italy plays into her hands by leaving Hitler, to disembark her troops in Dalmatia and elsewhere. She thus hopes to appear here as a deliverer come to rescue the country from chaos. With this object in view, ten of her so-called military missions have already arrived in this country, and are carrying on their dirty work in various places. One of them has joined our headquarters; another has disembarked in Dalmatia, and yet others are at the moment situated else­where, so that we have no information concerning them. From what has happened in certain areas such as KolaSin, where powerful Chetnik bands, well armed and mainly led by men appointed in London, have suddenly appeared, it is clear, however, that they have a hand in this affair, together with the Italian occupying forces, who in their own interests are lending their assistance.. . . At all costs, see that you isolate them from the masses and keep a check on them. Each of these mission has a radio transmitter and is in immediate contactwith its headquarters—the [British] Intelligence Service___We must continue to stress the alliance between the Soviet Union, Britain and America and to represent the latter as our allies, but within the country we must fight their agents and hangers-on as servants of the occupying forces and enemies

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iif the people who are hindering the struggle for national liberation.” 35

In December 1942, the Yugoslav Communists still believed In the possibility of a British landing on the Dalmatian coast. On December 13, Vladimir Dedijer noted in his diary: “Our attitude toward an Allied operation is perfectly clear. If the object of such a landing is to weaken the occupying forces, wo shall support it with all our military strength. If, on the (ither hand, its object is to frustrate our efforts, or if the Mritish land after we have ejected both the Germans and l heir collaborators from Yugoslav territory, this will amount In intervention, an infringement of the principles of the At­lantic Charter and of our national rights, an attack upon our Independence, and we shall resist it.” 36 Yugoslav partisans were urged by propaganda to resist any such landing. “ If the fat English come, our machine guns will mow them down,” ran one of the Communist marching songs.

It is significant that only three days after Dedijer made this entry in his diary, Milovan Djilas published an article In B o rb a for December 16, 1942, under the title “The Import­ance of Propaganda in the Postwar Organization of Europe.” Pointing out that in Britain and America “reactionary cliques” Ntill existed which had not renounced their desire to “sub­jugate and enslave other nations,” Djilas declared that in those countries a popular movement of an anti-imperialist character was gaining strength. “The war of liberation waged by the USSR,” said Djilas, “has created the best possible con­ditions for a strengthening of the workers’ democratic move­ment in Britain and America and for the forging of strong tios of friendship between the people of these countries and the USSR and the enslaved nations. The steady growth of progressive forces and the ever stronger ties between the USSR and the freedom-loving nations constitute a feature particularly characteristic of this phase of the war—a feature which will be more and more in evidence as time goes on.” 37 In general, this article of Djilas’s was inspired by a vision of

“ From the secret archives of the Centra] Committee of the Com­munist Party of Yugoslavia.

** Dedijer, op. cit., Part II, p. 26.*7 Djilas, op. cit., pp. 39 and 40— 41.

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the moment when the Communist revolution would extend to Britain and America.

* * *

It is known that Stalin did not want a second front in the Balkans. In order to avoid being surprised himself, he was anxious to set up a Balkan headquarters controlling all the Communist forces in the area and so present his partners at Teheran with a fait accompli. Tito was entrusted with the execution of this task. We find a hint of this plan in the letter sent by “Filip" (Nikola Grulovi6) on June 5, 1943, to Dr. Bla- goje NeSkovic, in which he says: “The Allies are counting on the opening of a second front in the Balkans, and for this reason have decided to get in touch with our Supreme Head­quarters. General Alexander has sent three couriers to Su­preme Headquarters, of whom two are members of the Com­munist Party. One of them has already left for his destination, while the other two are with our brigades.” 88 Leigh White points out that James Klugmann, at that time chief of the British Middle East Information Service, was an active Com­munist. After the war, he was given charge of the training of cadres for the Communist Party of Great Britain.39 Later, he attested his faithfulness to Moscow with a book directed against Tito.40

Vasilije Buha, at that time a member of the Communist Regional Committee for Serbia and a man well informed on what was going on, emphasized the need for concentrating Communist forces in the area of Macedonia. “Here [in Mace­donia],” he said, “ it was necessary to free a fairly large area, bring in a large number of partisan units and establish a firm military center for coordinating the Communist campaigns in the surrounding countries—Serbia, Bulgaria, Greece, A l­bania, Montenegro, Kosovo and Metohija and Sandiak. Here, too, a firm base was required for the setting up of a head­quarters for all units in the Balkans. Naturally, all the Balkan countries would be represented at this headquarters, but the

38 From the secret archives of the Central Committee of the Com­munist Party of Yugoslavia.

39 Leigh W hite, Balkan Caesar: Tito Versus Stalin, N e w York, 1951, p. 51.

40 The book is From Trotsky to Tito, London, 1951 (2nd ed., 1952).

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leadership would go to the representatives of that country whose partisan movement was strongest. In this particular case, this would certainly be Tito.” 41 At a partisan conference of the Slovenian Communist Party, held on July 5—8, 1942, Eduard Kardelj declared that the Balkans must become the "starting point for a new Communist regime for the whole of Kurope.” 42

Svetozar Vukmanovi6-Tempo was entrusted with the task of carrying out all the local preparations necessary for the ('stablishment of a Balkan headquarters. An energetic and Indomitable man, he succeeded in dealing with many local obstacles. On August 8, 1943, he reported to the Yugoslav party Central Committee that he had established contact with the Bulgarian party Central Committee and that he had pro­posed to them a plan for joint action. “I explained to them,” he said, “ the plan for concerted action and for the establish­ment of a Balkan headquarters. With the former end in view, I sugested that they make use of our territory covered by the Vranje unit, in order to form their own partisan units thereund operate in the direction of Turn and Sofia----They haveagreed to be represented at the headquarters and have sent their delegate, who is still in Skoplje waiting for instruc­tions.” 48 In October of the same year, the headquarters of the Macedonian partisans issued a proclamation to the po­pulation which declared: “Everyone must gather round our national liberation movement, regardless of whether he once felt himself to be a Bulgarophile, Grecophile or Serbophile. To this end, we must create a common front of all the Balkan peoples against the fascist occupying forces and against all Imperialism in the Balkans.” 44

In view of what has been said, Hugh Seton-Watson’s as­sertion that Tito at that time wanted an independent Mace­donia cannot be regarded as correct. All that can be said is that he wanted to play the leading role in the Balkans without falling foul of Moscow. According to Seton-Watson, “Tito’s decision was that in future Macedonia should not be a Serbian

41 From the secret archives of the Central Committee of the Com­munist Party of Yugoslavia.

« Ibid.41 Pregled narodno-oslobodilaikog rata u Makedoniji, p. 51.44 Ibid., p. 58.

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or a Bulgarian colony, but an autonomous republic, and that the Macedonians should be acknowledged as a nation distinct from both Serbs and Bulgars.” 45 This was, in the main, the view, not only of Tito, but of the Balkan Communist parties.

Since the Teheran conference had put a stop to the threat of a second front in the Balkans, maneuvers in connection with the setting up of a Yugoslav federation could be resum­ed. The course taken by these moves becomes clear from what MoSa Pijade tells us about the conversations between the Yugoslav and Bulgarian Central Committees on the question of a union of Bulgaria with Yugoslavia. At the end of 1944, these conversations were particularly lively. “The process of a federative union with Bulgaria should be speeded up,” said Stalin to Subasi6 and Stanoje Simic when they were in Moscow, “since, if the people want it, there is no preventing it.” 46

Toward the end of December 1944, Eduard Kardelj was sent to Sofia to negotiate an agreement on such a union, which it was expected would be signed on December 31 and publish­ed on January 1. Negotiations, however, were broken off as a result of the Bulgars’ intransigence on the question of the unification of the three parts of Macedonia. After conversa­tions with leading personalities in Sofia, Kardelj reported to Belgrade: “I do not know whether we can on principle accept the formula contained in their proposal for Macedonia—i. e., that the Bulgarian part be united with the Yugoslav only in the event of the entire region’s unification with Bulgaria. I maintain that the Macedonians are entitled to this [their country’s unification] regardless of whether federation with Bulgaria is decided upon or not.” 47

The Bulgars also wanted to impose another condition upon Kardelj: they demanded that, in the event of a union between the two countries, each of them should be regarded as a single unit. Somewhat chagrined, Kardelj advised Belgrade to appeal immediately for Stalin’s mediation. “He told me,” said Kar­delj, “that we should unite, and not conclude any pacts for

45 Hugh Seton-Watson, “Differences in the South-East,” The Listener, London, July 1948, p. 79.

40 Politika, Belgrade, Dec. 29, 1949.47 Ibid.

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mutual aid. Now is the time: I doubt whether we shall ever have so good an opportunity again.” 48

This time it was Britain who threw all plans into con­fusion. On the day after Kardelj’s departure from Sofia, the British government informed the Bulgarian that it could not accept a federation or confederation comprising only Bulgaria and Yugoslavia. Only such a federation which included A l­bania, Greece and Turkey would meet with its approval. The British government further stated that it had information that the Macedonians and Bulgars were working for a union with the Macedonians in Greece, to which it was most definitely opposed. It was also opposed to a unification of Macedonia within the frontiers of Yugoslavia.4*

In order, perhaps, to avoid possible complications with Britain, Moscow washed its hands of the matter and withdrew all support in the affair from both Yugoslavia and Bulgaria. The Yugoslav Communists, however, did not easily abandon hope that something might come of it. In the middle of July 1945, a Congress of Balkan Anti-Fascist Youth was held in Belgrade. A resolution adopted by this congress stated: “The youth of all our countries undertakes to fight above all against chauvinism and national intolerance, on which antinational governments have always built their plans.” 50

The attitude of Bulgaria under the Patriotic Front toward the Macedonian question was never clearly defined. Ostensib­ly, both the Bulgarian Communist Party and the Patriotic Front advocated the formation of a single Macedonian unit: inwardly, they hesitated to apply this policy in practice. For its part, the Bulgarian government took no steps whatever to facilitate the unification of all three parts of the country. In his reply to the speech from the throne, Georgi Dimitrov de­clared on December 26, 1945: “The Patriotic Front considers that every effort should be made to ensure that Macedonia cease once and for all to be a cause of dissension in the Bal­kans and become a bond between the Bulgars and Serbs, between the new Bulgaria and the new Yugoslavia. There should be no partitioning of Macedonia, no rivalry for the control of this territory, but rather respect for the will of its

48 Ibid.« Ibid.M Ibid., July 16, 1945.

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inhabitants, the greater part of whom have already acquired their national freedom and equality of rights within the People’s Republic of Yugoslavia. Between Bulgaria under the Patriotic Front and the Federative People’s Republic of Yugo­slavia, between these two neighboring South Slav countries, relations are so fraternal that there is every possibility that they themselves, without any interference from outside, will decide all questions affecting their national interests.” 51

However, when drawing up the constitution for the People’s Republic of Bulgaria—known as “Dimitrov’s Consti­tution”—Dimitrov himself and the Bulgarian Communist Party were much less generous with regard to the unification of Macedonia. Paragraph 5 of Article 12 merely says that the Bulgarian National Assembly “decides questions relating to the cession, alteration or extension of the territory of the People’s Republic of Bulgaria.” 52 This indefinite attitude toward the Macedonian question came in for criticism from the Yugoslavs. In his article “Some Features of the Patriotic Front’s Draft Constitution for the People’s Republic of Bul­garia,” Dr. Leon GerSkovic pointed out that nothing whatever was said in the draft about national minorities, and, as far as Macedonia was concerned, “the draft, supposing that the Macedonian people raises the question of its union with the People’s Republic of Macedonia, refers to the matter in an indirect and disguised manner, as though it were something abstract and not a concrete problem, and as though it were a matter of ceding Bulgarian territory and not of realizing the national rights of the Macedonian people on Bulgarian terri­tory and uniting them with their national homeland, the People’s Republic of Macedonia.” 58

In his book Pirinska Makedonija u borbi za nacionalno oslobodjenje (Pirin Macedonia in the Struggle for National Liberation), Dimitar Mitrev gives an account of the Bulgarian Communist Party’s policy on the Macedonian ques­tion during and after World War II. Mitrev shows the inde­finiteness of this policy during the war and the complete

51 Borba, Belgrade-Zagreb, Dec. 27, 1945.52 Konstitutsiya i osnovnye zakonodatelnye akty Narodnoi respu-

bliki Bolgarii (The Constitution and Fundamental Legislative Acts of the People’s Republic of Bulgaria), M oscow, 1952, p. 28.

53 Borba, Belgrade-Zagreb, N ov . 4, 1946.

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absence of any desire to unite Bulgarian with Yugoslav Mace­donia. In its number for August 1946, Makedonsko zname, organ of the Pirin Macedonians, published an article entitled "We Must Escape From the Magic Circle.” Here it was stated: "We stand for a Macedonian state, language and culture, but oven the greatest fanatics among us continue to speak and write Bulgarian, instead of following the new current and uniting ourselves with the culture, language and life of our people.” 54 On January 27, 1947, the same journal, in an article entitled “Pirin Macedonia,” stressed the need for the unification of Macedonia “under the banner of the Mace­donian state as it is today.” 85

This was a clear expression of the desire that Pirin Mace­donia be united with the People’s Republic of Macedonia, which Communist Bulgaria would not and could not permit. A year later, the First Congress of the National Macedonian Front, attended by representatives from Aegean and Pirin Macedonia, was held at Skoplje. This congress sent a re­solution to the Preace Conference, which was then in session in Paris, demanding that Aegean Macedonia be annexed to Yugoslavia. Pirin Macedonia was not mentioned. “The Mace­donian people,” stated the resolution, “draws the attention of the Peace Conference to the fact that the denationalization of our people in Aegean Macedonia is neither a fortuitous nor a merely recent phenomenon. This attitude toward the Mace­donians under Greek rule has been systematically observed since the moment when a part of the living body of the Mace­donian people was forcibly included in the Greek state.” 58

The proclamation addressed by this congress to the Mace­donian people lay particular stress upon the fact that dele­gates from all three parts of the country had taken part, and goes on: “This made the congress a demnostration of the un- shakeable desire of the Macedonian people in all parts of Macedonia for freedom and unity within our republic of Macedonia and the Federative People’s Republic of Yugo­slavia___By way of a concerted struggle, waged side by side

84 Dimitar M itrev, Pirinska Makedonija vo borba za nacionaJno ottloboduvanje (Pirin M acedonia in the Struggle for National Libera­tion), Skoplje, 1950, p. 300.

M A s quoted in M itrev, op. cit., p. 324.** Polilika, Belgrade, A ug . 7, 1946.

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with the progressive forces of the Greek nation, our people in Aegean Macedonia will be able to realize their dream and win their national and democratic rights.” 67

For a whole year, these ambitions were encouraged by the Yugoslav Communist Party, which finally demanded that PetriC, Upper Dzumaja and Nevrokop be transferred to the People’s Republic of Macedonia. “ In other words,” says Albert Mousset, “ in Yugoslavia the Macedonian population of Bul­garia was still considered as non-Bulgarian in character. La­tent, but still discernible, it was the old quarrel which had, for half a century, set the two peoples in opposition to each other.” 58 Finally, Tito referred to this question while praising the solution of the national problem in Yugoslavia. In a speech delivered in Zagreb on October 31, 1946, he said: “ In the old Yugoslavia, the national question remained unsolved. Instead, there was national persecution and inequality. The various peoples were unable to develop and foster their national cul­tures, since there was no equality of national rights. In our new Yugoslavia, each national group, including the Croats, the Slo­venes, the Macedonians, the Montenegrans and the national minorities, has its rights and enjoys the conditions that are ne­cessary for its national, cultural and economic development.” *'

***

During the course of this year, numerous difficulties with regard to the Macedonian question cropped up in Bulgaria, partly as a result of the fact that certain members of the Communist Party could not bring themselves to accept that Macedonia should no longer be regarded as Bulgarian terri­tory. There was also dissatisfaction among members of the Patriotic Front, who issued several memoranda on the subject between the end of 1945 and the end of 1946. One of these was issued in December 1945 by Krsto Pastukhov; during the course of 1946 others came from Lozanchev, K. Lulchev and N. Petkov.

According to Pastukhov, “ it would be quite another matter if it were proposed to set up a completely independent state

87 Ibid.58 Mousset, op. cit., p. 131.” Politika, Belgrade, N o r . 1, 1946.

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outside the frontiers of both Yugoslavia and Bulgaria. In that case, people could live together on a friendlier footing, on a basis of mutual understanding and the defense of common interests.” 80 Lozanchev had visions of a “federative Mace­donian state governed by a mandate of allied democratic powers.” Lulchev adcovated a “genuinely autonomous Mace­donia,” while Petkov declared that the problem would be cor­rectly solved “only when the Macedonian people is given autonomy [and the opportunity] to decide its own fate.” 61

The attempt of the right wing of the Patriotic Front to bring the Macedonian question before the great powers was severely criticized by the Bulgarian Communist Party and by the Yugoslav Communists. An article entitled “The Black­mailers,” published in Ote£estvene front on December 6, 1945, criticized the memorandum submitted by Krsto Pastukhov, in which he asserted that the Macedonian question was not yet solved. The article demanded: “Is Krsto Pastukhov represent­ing the national interests of the Bulgarian people when he once more sows the seeds of hatred between the peoples of Bulgaria and Yugoslavia?” From this it would appear that, in the opinion of the Bulgarian government of the time, the Macedonian question had been settled by the establishment of the People’s Republic of Macedonia within the framework of Yugoslavia. The same impression is created by a statement made by Dimitrov to a correspondent of a Swedish paper on July 16, 1947. “As for Macedonia,” said Dimitrov, “the pro­blem has for the present been settled by the coupling of the People’s Republic of Macedonia with the other Yugoslav re­publics. But there is also a part of Macedonia in Bulgaria, and another in Greece. These three parts will one day be united, although some time will perhaps be necessary before this comes about.” 62

For his part, Tito also expressed his displeasure with the Bulgarian opposition for composing memoranda and sub­mitting them to representatives of the Western powers. “There are people in Bulgaria,” he remarked in a speedi delivered in Skoplje on October 11, 1945, “who are composing memoranda and sending them to the Allies with the demand that the

10 M ojsov, op. cit., p. 233.•' Ibid., pp. 232— 33.•* Borba, Belgrade-Zagreb, July 17, 1947.

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Pirin, Aegean and Vardar regions of Macedonia be united. But under whose protection? Under that of foreign po­wers. ... All these memoranda ... are no more than a facade. It is a lie that they want that kind of Macedonia.” 93

In view of the existing state of affairs, it is in no way remarkable that the Bulgarian Workers’ Party should have felt itself obliged to define its attitude on the whole question. This it did in the first half of August 1946 with a resolution passed at a plenary session of its Central Committee. In Para­graph 1 of this resolution, it was stated: “The Bulgarian Workers’ (Communist) Party considers that the greater part of the Macedonian people has been given a form of state and national organization within the Federative People’s Republic of Yugoslavia as the People’s Republic of Macedonia. The unification of the other parts of the Macedonian people has yet to be effected on the basis of the Macedonian People’s Republic within the Federative People’s Republic of Yugo­slavia.” Paragraph 2 declared: “The Bulgarian Workers’ (Com­munist) Party considers that the realization of the conditions prerequisite for this unification, i. e., the transfer of the Pirin region to the People’s Republic of Macedonia, is above all a matter for the Macedonians themselves and the common task of Bulgaria under the Patriotic Front and the Federative People’s Republic of Yugoslavia.” 64

Paragraph 5 of this resolution demands that there be no state frontiers between Bulgaria and a united People’s Re­public of Macedonia just as there are none between the People’s Republic of Macedonia and the rest of Yugoslavia. “The transfer of the Pirin region to the People’s Republic of Macedonia.” says this section of the resolution, “so far from hampering economic and cultural exchanges between Bul­garia and the transferred territory, should on the contrary, serve to strengthen the ties between Yugoslav Macedonia and Bulgaria.” 65 Finally, Paragraph 6 states that all members of the Party are required to support these demands and that the "Macedonian emigration in Bulgaria is urged to give its full cooperation in consolidating the fraternal Macedonian republic and also in preparing for the transfer of the Mace­

83 Ibid., Oct. 12, 1945.91 M ojsov, op. cit., pp. 263— 64.68 Ibid., p. 265.

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donian population of the Pirin region to the People’s Republic of Macedonia on the basis of an alliance between Bulgaria under the Patriotic Front and the Federative People’s Re­public of Yugoslavia.” 96

According to Lazar Mojsov, who is not always impartial toward his Bulgarian opponents, the importance of this re­solution lies in the fact that in it “the Central Committee of the Bulgarian Workers’ Party for the first time acknowledged, clearly and unambiguously, that the People’s Republic of Macedonia is indeed an expression, on the national and political plane, of the aspirations of the entire Macedonian people and that the unification of the Macedonian people should be effected on the basis of the People’s Republic of Macedonia within the framework of the Federative People’s Republic of Yugoslavia.” 67

This resolution was never, incidentally, made public. Ob­viously, the Bulgarian Workers’ Party itself did not adhere to it.

It was in such an atmosphere that the Bled agreement was born. Notwithstanding all the difficulties involved, the pur­pose of this agreement was to offer a definitive solution of the Macedonian question. From what has been published about this agreement, no conclusions appear to have been reached either on Macedonia or on the formation of a South Slav federation.

The idea of a Balkan federation embodying a final solution of the Macedonian question was not crystallized even after World War II. While advancing this idea as a popular pro­paganda slogan, responsible state leaders in both Bulgaria and Yugoslavia hesitated to make any real effort for its realization. In an interview on November 19, 1944, with H. D. Harrison, Reuter’s correspondent in Belgrade, Tito refused to reply to the question whether a South Slav federation would include Bulgaria, and confined himself to the remark: “Our peoples desire the friendliest relations with the other Balkan lands, particularly with Bulgaria, Albania and Greece. This is also in the interests of the peoples of these countries.”

Thus those who had been advocating the speedy formation, if not of a Balkan, then at least of a South Slav federation,

•• Ibid., p. 267." Ibid., p. 263.

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were once more disappointed by the results of the Bled agree­ment. In connection with the conversations at Bled, Georgi Dimitrov declared on several occasions that the establishment of a South Slav federation was not of topical importance. On August 2, 1947, he told a correspondent of Radio Prague: “I must emphasize that neither the question of setting up a federation of South Slavs nor that of some Balkan or Balkan- Danube federation or confederation is of immediate im­portance."68 Elsewhere, Dimitrov declared that this question had “in no wise been the subject of conversations during our conference.” 98

At the beginning of December of the same year, Tito was somewhat more frank. He told newspapermen in the train from Sofia to Dragoman: “Hitherto, the Balkans have been an imperialist arena, and even now attempts are being made to form a base there for certain imperialist aims. For this reason, the securing of peace in the Balkans means the securing of peace in Europe. If the Balkans can be prevented from be- comming a theater of war, this will to a certain extent forestall a violation of the peace in Europe.. . . The Slavic states are determined to go hand in hand, not only in matters concerning their internal affairs, but also in questions of foreign policy.” 70

There is little doubt that Tito was here thinking, not of the Soviet Union, but of the West, which had frustrated the attempt to effect a union of Bulgaria and Yugoslavia. During his visit to Hungary, which took place soon after this, Tito attempted to free himself of the suspicion that he was work­ing for the formation of a Slavic bloc. “We have been repeatedly accused,” he said in reply to a toast proposed by Lajos Dynnies, “of striving to form a Slavic bloc. People said that a ‘Slavic era’ was imminent, and that we rejected co­operation, at least sincere cooperation, with other nations.... When we finished the war, we had no thoughts of establish­ing any Slavic blocs. That was one of the old ideas of pan- Slavism, invented under the Russian tsars. The Lenin-Stalin conception, meanwhile, is quite different: it makes no dif­ference who it is—Slavs, Hungarians, Frenchmen, Germans,

48 Borba, Belgrade-Zagreb, Aug. 3, 1947.* Ibid., A ug . 4, 1947.70 Politika, Belgrade, Dec. 1, 1947.

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Englishmen or Americans. Whatever nation a man belongs to, if he isn’t a democrat, if he aims at the persecution of other nations, he is no friend of ours. But everyone who takes the stand of people’s democracy, who adopts Stalin’s correct solu­tion of the national question and the correct interpretation of international relations, he is our brother and friend, regard­less of whether he is a Hungarian, a Pole or anyone else.” 71

In the various attempts to solve the Macedonian question, particularly after the Balkan Wars, Aegean Macedonia played a distinctly subordinate role. Theoretically speaking, the at­titude of the Greek Communist Party on this question coincid­ed with that of the Comintern and the Balkan Communist Federation. On the plane of practical politics, however, it took care, for national reasons, not to ask for trouble: for the Greeks, any suggestion of solidarity among the Balkan Slavs was anathema. In Greece also, during World War II, there was a Communist partisan movement, in which the Slavic element had begun to make itself felt. When Svetozar Vuk- manovid-Tempo appeared in Greece, he was given a friendly reception by the Greek Communists. “Military and political collaboration between our army and units of the Greek libera­tion army,” says Tempo, “was highly developed throughout the war for national liberation. Macedonian units were always met with great courtesy and hospitality when they were ob­liged by the enemy’s offensives to withdraw into Greek terri­tory. Mutual aid in weapons and military equipment, joint operations against the occupying forces, etc.—all this was one form or another of mutual cooperation and military comrade­ship between our own and the Greek national liberation armies.” 78

According to Elisabeth Barker, Tempo had been given the task by Tito of persuading the Greek Communist Party to help found a Slavic front for national liberation in Aegean Macedonia.73 Indeed, in the middle of 1943 there emerged the Slavo-Macedonian National Liberation Front (known as SNOF), the establishment of which became generally known

71 Omladina, Belgrade, Dec. 10, 1947.72 Politika, Belgrade, July 24, 1948.73 Elisabeth Barker, op. cit., p. 110.

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only after several months had passed. Theoretically, its military units were under the command of ELAS, but some time later those under Gotsi (Gochev) rebelled.74 “The function of SNOF,” says C. M. Woodhouse, “was to justify the existence of an autonomous Macedonia in Southern Slav federation.” 75

The question of establishing this federation was the cause of a deterioration in relations between the Communist parties of Yugoslavia and Greece. When the quarrel came out into the open and began to grow more acute, Tempo advanced the thesis that the Greek Communist Party had given its consent for the establishment of SNOF “only under pressure from the masses.” “That is to say,” said Tempo, “the Macedonians could freely speak their mother tongue, they were permitted to organize their own mass organizations within the framework of the Greek National Liberation Front, the Macedonian national liberation front was permitted to print newspapers in Macedonian, etc.; but there was no suggestion that, by virtue of its part in the national liberation struggle, the Mace­donian people might be entitled—even nominally—to self- determination after the country’s liberation.” 87 When the con­flict between Tito and the Cominform was followed by the quarrel between the Yugoslav and Greek Communist parties, Zakhariades, in an article dated August 1, 1949, wrote that the aspirations of the Slavs of Aegean Macedonia, who had re­ceived assistance from the Yugoslav Communist Party, were merely “ the Greater Serbian chauvinism of Tito’s clique.” 77 In fact, the Greek Communist Party itself had adopted a Greater Greek attitude, which found expression in the re­solution passed at the second plenum of the party’s Central Committee, held in 1946. “The Communist Party of Greece,” says the resolution, “which played a leading part in the struggle for national independence and integrity, once more declares the present frontiers of Greece to be sacred and un­touchable. The Greek Communist Party affirms that it will not abandon the fight for recognition of the rights and equal­ity of the Slavs living in Greek Macedonia within the frontiers of the Greek state.” 78

74 C. M . W oodhouse, A pple of Discord, London, 1948, p. 64.75 Ibid., p. 93.7* Vukm anovic-Tem po, op. cit., p. 73.77 Ibid.78 Ibid., p. 72.

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This meant that the situation was the same as before the war. Through a combination of circumstances, the Yugoslav Communist Party, after a conflict with the USSR and the satellite bloc that had become progressively more acute, was obliged to recognize this stand taken by the Greek Com­munists and to abandon all interest in the fate of the Aegean Slavs, even though the latter had proved themselves the most aggressive element in the Communist revolt in Greece, since they believed that under a Greek Communist regime they would achieve their national rights. The Communist revolt in Greece was broken, and the Slavs of Aegean Macedonia were still what they had been before the war—a national minority condemned to lose all trace of their national character.

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TH E M AC E D O N IAN QUESTION TO D A Y

From the account that has been given of all the phases through which the Macedonian question has passed, it is evident that this question still awaits a final solution. In its present phase, it presents quite a different picture from that of the past, even though there have been no territorial changes in the region since 1918. A characteristic feature of the situation as it stands today is that the question has become almost entirely a matter of Yugoslav internal policy. As far as Greece and Bulgaria are concerned, it appears to have been finally decided. True, in Bulgaria it is still raised from time to time, but in Greece it has lost all political significance. The defeat in the civil war of the Greek Communist Party, which had been backed by the Slav population of Aegean Macedonia, meant not only that a unification of all three parts of the country was now impossible, but that the whole question had been removed from the agenda.

The Bulgarian Communist government has, in effect, oc­cupied the same position as its non-Communist predecessors on the Macedonian question. Deprived of an opportunity of uniting the entire area under its own control, it has been unable to bring itself to recognize the Macedonians on its territory as constituting a separate nationality, as the Yugo­slav Communists have done in Southern Serbia. During their occupation of Southern Serbia and Aegean Macedonia, from April 1941 to the late summer of 1944, the Bulgars were distinctly ill at ease in these two areas. Between them and the local population, there was a mutual lack of confidence. In Southern Serbia, they even appointed their fellow-countrymen as chairmen of village communes. On the other hand, although the occupying forces expelled Serbian bishops—Josif Cvijovi6, Metropolitan of Skoplje, and Vikentije Prodanov, Bishop of Zletovo and Strumica—from Southern Serbia, the Bulgarian Orthodox Church did nothing about sending its own bishops to take their place. It seems to have been reluctant to identify itself with the Bulgarian administration in Macedonia, which

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may be taken as a sign that it regarded the Yugoslav-Bul- garian border as permanent.

By a combination of circumstances, the Yugoslav Com­munists, part from Ivan-VanCa Mihailov, are the only ones to have maintained an interest in the Macedonian question and striven for the establishment of a separate Macedonian nationality, distinct from the Bulgarian and from the Serbian. They alone have remained true to the theses of the Comintern on ttie existence of this nationality. For the Comintern, how­ever, the Macedonian question was only of interest as a weapon for securing a Communist revolution in the Balkans. When the greater part of the Balkans had been brought under Communist rule, Moscow’s attitude on this question changed. “Under the influence of the great October Revolution, the Macedonian revolutionaries altered their way of thinking and consequently their methods of work. Previously, they had re­garded the Macedonian question as a distinct problem on its own, isolated from the general struggle against imperialism; but after World War II and the October Socialist Revolution, they began to think of it as one of the links in the universal struggle of the proletariat and the oppressed nations of the Balkans and throughout the world against imperialism.” 1

By the establishment of the People’s Republic of Mace­donia, the Yugoslav Communists consider that they have solved the Macedonian question, even though they have not succeeded in uniting all three parts of the country. Under the pressure of circumstances arising after the expulsion of Yugo­slavia from the Cominform in June 1948, they abandoned one of the most important points in their program with regard to the Macedonian question. “There are some of our brother Macedonians in Aegean Macedonia,” said Tito at Skoplje on October 11, 1945, “and we are not indifferent to their fate. Our thoughts are with them, we are taking care of them. We shall persist in our demand that all Macedonians be united in their own land.” * The rapprochement between Yugoslavia and Greece, however, and the formation of the Balkan Pact were conditional upon the Yugoslav Communists’ abandon­ment of their attitude toward the transfer of Aegean Mace­

1 Dimitar V lahov, Iz istorije makedonskog naroda (From the H is­tory of the M acedonian People), Belgrade, 1950, p. 45.

1 Borba, Belgrade-Zagreb, Oct. 12, 1945.

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donia to Yugoslavia. With little hesitation, Tito, prompted by the necessity of maintaining his own position, renounced all the promises that he had made to the Slavs of Greek Mace­donia.

The creation of the People’s Republic of Macedonia (con­ceived, perhaps, as a first step toward the union of all three parts of the country), so far from solving the Macedonian question, has presented it in a new and acute form: whether this republic does not represent an attempt to denationalize the Serbian inhabitants of Southern Serbia. Apart from Serbs, this region is inhabited by a number of Bulgars and consider­able numbers of Albanians and Turks, while before World War II there was also a fair proportion of Jews. According to the StatistiCki godisnjak FNRJ (Statistical Annual of the Federative People’s Republic of Yugoslavia) for 1956, on March 31, 1953, the People’s Republic of Macedonia possessed1,304,514 inhabitants, including 399,000 non-Slavs, a mere 35,000 Serbs and 861,000 “Macedonians.” The remainder were described as “various nationalities.” 3 This clearly shows that the population of the People’s Republic of Macedonia, like that of Aegean Macedonia but unlike that of the Pirin region, is not ethnically compact. This fact was well understood be­fore World War II by the leaders of the United IMRO. In an article entitled “The Macedonian Sphinx,” Sumorov wrote: “The truth is as follows: Macedonia is a geographical unit, with distinct economic and political interests. The Mace­donian people is not an ethnic unit, but is also not a formless mass. There is no Macedonian race, just as there is no Swiss race. The population is not purely Bulgarian: there are Bul­gars, Turks, Greeks, Albanians, Jews, Wallachians, and Serbs—insofar as the latter exist. A ll of them together make up the Macedonian people.” 4 As the reader will notice, the sting of this latter remark is directed exclusively against the Serbs.

The question whether the Macedonian people of Yugoslavia exists as a separate ethnic entity is of fundamental im­portance. The Yugoslav Communists are more or less alone

s Stalistiiki godi&njak FNRJ za 1956 (Statistical Annual of the Federative People's Republic of Yugoslavia for 1956), Belgrade, 1956, p. 54.

4 Balkanska lederacija, M ay 1, 1930.

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in their claim it does exist as such. According to Jovan Cvijic, the Slavic population of the area between Skoplje and Salonica is of indefinite national composition. “This, from the national point of view, fluctuating mass,” he says, “I have called simply ‘Macedonian Slavs.’ It is quite certain that those of them who come under Serbian rule soon themselves be­come Serbs, while those who come under Bulgarian rule equally rapidly become Bulgars.” 5 H. N. Brailsford took a similar view: for him, the Macedonian Slavs are “probably very much what they were before either a Bulgarian or a Serbian Empire existed—a Slav people derived from rather various stocks, who invaded the peninsula at different periods. But they had originally no clear consciousness of race, and any strong Slavonic Power was ably to impose itself upon them.” 8 According to H. W. V. Temperley, Macedonia, racially speaking, represented a “medley of tongues, a kaleidoscope of nationalities.” 7 Reinhard Trautmann saw the key to order in this region in the “exclusion of the terroristic influence of both peoples [Serbs and Bulgars] and in the cul­tivation of a distinct tribal ‘Macedonian’ consciousness among the greatest possible number of Macedonians.” 8 Walter Jakob pointed out that there were 350,000 “Macedonian Slavs,” as opposed to 90.000 Bulgars and 100.000 Serbs, and expressed the view that the kernel of the ethnographic problem was to which nationality these “Macedonian Slavs” should be as­signed.’

The view put forward by Jovan Cvijid was decisively re­jected by Joachim H. Schultze, who said: “These Macedonian Slavs are probably no more than an idea thought up by the Serbs in order to conceal their own aggressive tendencies.” 10 Richard von Mach, who was well acquainted with the local conditions, likewise refused to recognize the existence of these “Macedonian Slavs.” He points out that the Bulgars and Serbs

6 Jovan Cvijic, “Die ethnographische Abgrenzung der V o lker auf der Balkanhalbinsel,” Dr. A . Petermanns Mitteilungen aus Justus Peter's geographischer Anstalt, V ol. I, 1913, p. 186.

* H. N . Brailsford, Macedonia: Its Races and Their Future, London,1906, p. 101.

7 H. W . V . Temperley, History oi Serbia, London, 1947, p. 309.8 Reinhard Trautmann, Die siavischen Volker und Sprachen, p. 33..• W a lte r Jakob, Die mazedonische Frage, pp. 29 and 30.10 Joachim H. Sdiultze, Neugriedxenland, Gotha, 1927, p. 129.

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came into conflict over the question of the ownership of this territory, and remarks that “ if the Serbs, like the Bulgars, had broken off ecclesiastical relations with the Greeks, they could have achieved considerable success in those areas in which the Macedonian Slavs had not yet taken one side or the other. But their awakening came too late, and their efforts south of Skoplje serve scarcely any purpose other than to lull their national consciousness___ Everything changes, and noth­ing can change the national character of a people so effectiv­ely as prolonged and systematic treatment through the medium of the schools and the Church. One day the question will be what is now and not what was once upon a time.” u

When von Mach expressed this view in 1899, he had no idea that the people itself would, in the clearest possible way, give the lie to his assertion that it was possible for the Bul­gars to impose their own national character upon the Serbian population of Southern Serbia. Like von Mach, Jovan Cvijifc also overlooked a number of facts demonstrating, not only that there were Serbs south of his line of demarcation, but that the Serbian population was indeed nationally conscious and constantly prepared to promote the Serbian cause. He did, however, observe that this national consciousness was keener among the population of that part of Southern Serbia which after 1557 came under the Patriarchate of Pec than in the area subject to the Archbishopric of Ohrid. This influence exerted by the Patriarchate is also noted by Krum ToSev, one of the modern pioneers of the Macedonian cause. “The whole of northern Macedonia,” he says, “ including the cities of Skoplje, Tetovo, Kumanovo, Stip and Kratovo, together with a part of western Bulgaria, belonged to this patriarchate. There was virtually nothing to prevent even churches and monasteries of the Archbishopric of Ohrid from using printed books, which, printed as they were in the language used at that time in the Serbian Church, spread to an ever increasing extent through Macedonia, thus doing much to spread the language of the Resava school of orthography.” 18 Vasilije

11 Richard von Mach, “Beitrage zur Ethnographic der Balkanhalb-insel,” Dr. A . Pelermanna Mitteilungen aus Justus Peters' geographi-sciier Anstalt, V o l. X LV , 1899, pp. 100 and 101— 02.

,s Krum ToSev, “D ie mazedonische Schriftsprache,” Sudost-For-schungen, Vol. X V , M unidi, 1956, p. 494.

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Markovic asserted that the influence of the Eesava school was of long duration in Macedonia and western Bulgaria. “From the fifteenth to the seventeenth century,” he says, “ its in­fluence was widespread and predominant, not merely in the Serbian lands, but throughout the Slavic South. During this period, it has been established that the Serbian language, specifically that of the Resava school, was universal in Mace­donia.” 13

Attempting to bolster up their thesis on the existence of a distinct Macedonian nationality, enthusiasts of the Mace­donian cause point out that seventeenth-century documents are extant which show that there was a distinct Macedonian literary language even at that date. In his Grammar of literary Macedonian, BlaSo Koneski quotes a private letter dating from 1637, which he describes as “the earliest text so far known in New Macedonian.” 14 This letter is written in a local dialect under the pronounced influence of Church Slavonic, which is to be observed in the written language used in all the Serbian lands at that time. When quoting this letter as proof of the distinctive national character of the Mace­donian Slavic population, Koneski, whether deliberately or otherwise, overlooks the fact that it was the government of the Serbian kingdom that first decided that textbooks for Serbian schools in Southern Serbia, which at that time was under Turkish rule, should be printed at Constantinople in the local dialect. In the year 1890, eight such books were is­sued in Constantinople, including a calendar entitled Golub and a Macedonian reader. Dispatching these books to Bel­grade, Stojan Novakovi6, on whose initiative they had been printed, wrote in reference to the calendar: “This is the first little book produced here that is intended, not for the chil­dren, but for the people themselves. It is enough for a start that people see that we have not forgotten them, that we are attending to their spiritual needs and that we are not ignoring their popular dialect as the Bulgars are doing in their pro-

** V asilije M arkov ii, Pravoslavno monaStvo i manastiri u sre- dn jevekovno j Srbiji (Orthodox Monasteries and Monastic Lif^ in M edieval Serbia), Belgrade, 1920, p. 139.

14 B laio Koneski, Gramatika na makedonsktot literaturen jazlk (Grammar of the M acedonian Literary Language}, Skoplje, 1952, pp. 13— 14.

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paganda, suppressing both the dialect and fine popular tradi­tions with their so-called literary language.” 15

For want of historical data to prove the existence of a separate Yugoslav Macedonian nationality, Koneski has re­course to a resolution adopted by the Comintern in April 1934: “ In this resolution,” he says, “ it is established that a Macedonian nation exists, in spite of the fact that this is denied by the bourgeoisie of those countries that divide Mace­donia among themselves.” 18

Having come to power after World War II, the Yugoslav Cmmunists were in a position to attempt a realization of this decision of the Comintern’s, even though the Comintern had by then ceased to exist. Orthodox Marxists as they were, they believed that, by issuing decrees and falsifying the will of the people, they could create new nations and literary languages for them. On August 2, 1944, the Anti-Fascist Association for the National Liberation of Macedonia decided that the Mace­donian literary language be introduced throughout the terri­tory of the future People’s Republic of Macedonia. The dif­ficulty was that this language had yet to be created. A special commission was given the task of finding some way in which this might be done, and in October 1944 a meeting was held on the subject in the village of Gorno Vranovci. From November 27 to December 3 of the same year, another com­mission sat on the question but was unable to reach a decision, since on May 3, 1945, yet another was established for the same purpose. This last body prepared a draft orthography which was adopted on June 2 and approved by the government of the Macedonian People’s Republic on June 7 of the same year. Except for a few modifications and additions, this orthography is still in force.17 As literary language of the republic was chosen the “central Macedonian dialect, which is spoken in Skoplje, Veles, Bitolj and Prilep. This is the written language of today in federal Macedonia.” 18 The alphabet adopted was

15 A s quoted in A l. Jovanovid, Srpske skoie i (e tn iik i pokret u Juznoj Srbiji pod Turcima (Serbian Schools and the Chetnic's M o ve ­ment in Southern Serbia Under the Turks), Skoplje, 1937, p. 262.

J® Koneski, op. cit., p. 38.17 Ibid., pp. 45— 49.18 Radovan Lalic, “Nacionalni preporod makedonskog naroda”

(The National Aw aken ing of the Macedonian People), Borba, Bel- grade-Zagreb, N ov . 23, 1944.

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that of Vuk StefanoviS Karadzic, except that the symbols k’ and g’ and S (dz) as the thirty-first letter were introduced to represent certain characteristically Macedonian sounds.19

According to Krum Tosev, the central Macedonian dialect was chosen because this was the form used by the writer Krste Misirkov in his Za makedonskite raboti (On Macedonian Problems), published in 1903. In this work, says To§ev, “ the question of a Macedonian literary language was first seriously dealt with in a scientific manner.” 20 Dimitar Vlahov quotes the report of the Orthographical Commission, according to which “the Macedonian language, like many others, has crystallized as a real need, as a result of objective factors and the laws of linguistic evolution. One of the dialects of the contemporary popular speech has been taken as the basis of the literary language: this is the central dialect. One im­portant point is that between this dialect and the other, out­lying, ones, there is no substantial difference either in vocabulary or in grammatical forms. Similarly, many elements from other dialects have been incorporated in the literary language, so that it is very close to the popular speech.” 21

Alongside the efforts to create a separate Macedonian literary language, distinct from the Serbian, attempts were also made to form a separate Macedonian Orthodox Church, in order to separate the Serbian population of Southern Ser­bia from Serbia proper, not merely on the political and ad­ministrative level but on the spiritual plane as well. On orders from the government, a group of Orthodox priests in Mace­donia asked for permission to secede from the Serbian Ortho­dox Curch and set up a separate Macedonian Orthodox Church, which had never existed as such throughout the region’s his­tory. They backed up their request with the argument that since the Macedonians were recognized as a nation in their own right, they were entitled to their own Church.

There were three main reasons which prompted the regime to initiate this movement. Firstly, the Party took the view that the Serbian Orthodox Church was the chief advocate of the “Greater Serbian idea,” and therefore considered that the

'* Dugan Popovii, ’’Povodom makedonske azbuke" (The M ace­donian A lphabet), ibid., M ay 6, 1947.

20 ToSev, op. cit., pp. 497— 98.21 V lahov, op. cit., p. 71.

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removal of its influence over the Serbs of Southern Serbia would accelerate their national reorientation. Secondly, leaders of the Party were aware of the part played by the Bulgarian Exarchate in spreading Bulgarian influence in the region, and wanted to establish a similar institution for their own ends. By provoking dissension among the Serbian Ortho­dox clergy in Southern Serbia on the question of establishing an independent Macedonian Orthodox Church, the regime would introduce disunity into the Church and so weaken its resistance to Communism. Thirdly, the Communists realized that the Serbs of Southern Serbia are an extremely devout community deeply attached to ecclesiastical and popular tradi­tions. An open attack upon the Church was not in the interests of the regime: a more expedient policy was to promote dis­order, as a result of which the sees of Southern Serbia re­mained vacant after 1941. Disorganized and deprived of their leaders, these dioceses could not exert the influence that they might have done otherwise.

In this way, the Communists aimed at dealing a severe blow to the Serbian Orthodox Church, the only surviving institution in which the Serbian people was united. Terri­torially, the Serbs had been divided under the new regime into five federal republics and two autonomous regions; and to leave the dioceses of Southern Serbia (i.e., those of Skoplje, Ohrid and Bitolj, and Zletovo and Strumica) under the control of the Serbian Patriarchate, under whose authority they had been for the most part during the Turkish regime, would have meant that the Serbian religious influence, which was im­placably opposed to the designs of the Communists, continued to flourish. The thesis that the Slavic population of Southern Serbia constitutes a distinct national group can only be vindicated if the Serbian element can be persuaded that it is not Serbian but Macedonian.

In presenting their demand for a separate Church, the spokesmen of the regime among the Serbian Orthodox clergy of Southern Serbia showed a distinct lack of discretion. They appealed for a revival of the old Archbishopric of Ohrid in complete ignorance of the historical role it had played. That it had never been “Macedonian” in their sense of the term is clear. When they saw that an autocephalous Church was out of the question, they modified their demands and agreed to autonomy within the Serbian Patriarchate, on condition

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that local bishops be appointed and that the “Macedonian language” be used in ecclesiastical administration.

To what extent the demand for an independent Mace­donian Church was prompted by the regime may be seen from the fact that the side of the regime was taken by the Association of Orthodox Clergy of the Federative People’s Republic of Yugoslavia. Openly anti-Serbian, the regime re­fused to permit this organization to be called the Association of Serbian Orthodox Clergy, which in fact is what it is. The purpose of its actual title is to allow clergy from the Mace­donian republic to join, despite the fact that Article 14 of the Constitution of the Serbian Orthodox Church states that the dioceses of Southern Serbia are an essential part of the Serbian Church, which cannot be divided into any federal units.

Taking his stand on the Constitution of the Serbian Church, Gavrilo DoSic, when he returned to Yugoslavia after the war, refused even to discuss the regime’s demands for the establishment of a separate Macedonian Church. Educated as he was in Greek seminaries and having fought in the struggle for the Serbian national cause in Southern Serbia before the Balkan Wars (1912—13), Patriarch Dozi6 could not understand that some one should ask him to renounce that for which he had been ready to give his life. It was the Patriarch’s de­termined attitude that frustrated, albeit temporarily, the efforts of the regime and its supporters in the Church.

With the election, in the summer of 1950, of Vikentije Pro- danov as Patriarch, the hopes of the ecclesiastical separatists of Southern Serbia were increased. In the electoral college that appointed him, the majority, supported by the regime, accepted a representative of the separatists as one of their number without any legal basis whatever. From the moment of his election, Prodanov undertook before the regime to find a solution to the problem. Immediately after the election, he told the Tanjug agency that he hoped that the question of the “Macedonian Church” would solved in an acceptable manner. A year later, on November 27, 1951, he was reminded of his unfulfilled promise. In reply to a question, he declared: “The Serbian Orthodox Church has always desired a solution of the ecclesiastical question in Macedonia. When the Church Con­stitution was changed in 1947, the Holy Episcopal Synod pro­

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posed and introduced certain provisions into the Constitutionin order to meet the wishes of the Macedonian clergy---- Inview of the clergy’s acceptance of the jurisdiction of the Serbian Orthodox Church, I think a satisfactory solution to the ecclesiastical question in Macedonia will be found.” 82

Patriarch Vikentije did not say what form this solution was to take. Under constant pressure from the government and from the pro-Communist clergy, he is in an extremely difficult position: if he does nothing to settle this question, he exposes himself to the danger of reprisals from the regime, and if he attempts to work out a solution he cannot be certain that it will not involve him in a conflict with the vital interests of the Church he heads. On the eve of the May 1951 session of the Holy Synod, Vesnik, organ of the Union of Associations of Orthodox clergy of the Federative People’s Republic of Yugoslavia, in its issue for May 15, wrote that it was high time that the question of recognizing a Mace­donian Orthodox Church was settled. “The participation of the Macedonian clergy and laity in the election of the Patriarch,” said the paper, “ is the best possible proof of their canonical unity and filial devotion to their Mother Church. Their right to their own language and their national in­dependence is guaranteed by the state Constitution, and one cannot, and indeed must not, take it in bad part if, on that basis and by virtue of their specific social development, they demand exceptional privileges that are beneficial, inter alia, for the Church as a whole. In this particular case, fear of precedents is completely irrelevant. A refusal to take due account of these facts means continued deference to Greater Serbian chauvinism, which cannot and must not be permitted in the fraternal community of Yugoslav peoples.” Ratko Jelic, secretary of the Association of Orthodox Clergy of Yugo­slavia, summed up the situation as follows: “The Constitution of the Federative People’s Republic of Yugoslavia has acknow­ledged the nationality, language and culture of the People’s Republic of Mecdonia. Whoever denies this is violating the state Constitution, and cannot claim to be a true citizen of this land.” 23

12 Vesnik, Belgrade, Dec. 1, 1951. !S ibid., Jan. 1, 1952.

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As a result of the uncompromising attitude of the Holy Episcopal Synod and, undoubtedly, of the mood of the local population, the separatist group in Southern Serbia has con­siderably modified its demands. No longer insisting even upon autonomy within the Serbian Patriarchate, it is content with the appointment of local bishops and the right to use the “Macedonian language” in ecclesiastical administration. In November 1952, Djordje Andjelkovski, one of the leaders of this group, denied that they sought a secession from the Serbian Church. “Just as there is not a single person," he said, “who does not wish to live within the borders of Yugo­slavia, so there is no one who would wish for an ecclesiastical schism.... We want no schism, we want ecclesiastical unity, but we continue to demand our own bishops, our own clergy and the use of our own language.” 24 Commenting upon this passage from Andjelkovski’s speech, Vesnik wrote: “He emphasized that this does not mean that the Church in Mace­donia is seeking secession from the Serbian Orthodox Church or autocephalous status, as certain persons are maliciously trying to make out.” 25 In Paragraph 3 of the resolution adopted at their second ordinary conference, the clergy of Southern Serbia stressed that they wanted ecclesiastical unity, while in Paragraph 4 they expressed determined opposition toward any renewal or strengthening of Bulgarian propa­ganda.28

The problem of a Macedonian Orthodox Church still awaits a definitive solution. The agreement of April 10, 1957, between Patriarch Vikentije and representatives of the committee for initiating the organization of a Macedonian Orthodox Church is an affair of the Patriarch personally rather than of the Serbian Church as a whole. Nothing has yet been published to the effect that this agreement has been approved by the Holy Episcopal Synod, without which the Patriarch cannot bind the Church to any decisions. It should therefore be regarded as a provisional measure still awaiting official confirmation.

According to this agreement, the Serbian Patriarch be­comes administrator of all three dioceses in Southern Serbia until the election of new bishops, and appoints episcopal sur-

!4 Ibid., N ov. 15, 1952.25 Ibid., Oct. 15, 1951.20 Ibid.

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rogates, members of ecclesiastical courts and officials of other ecclesiastical bodies in these dioceses. Ecclesiastical institu­tions are permitted to use the local dialect in the administra­tion of affairs and in sermons, provided that the liturgy is performed, as hitherto, in Church Slavonic. Local Church authorities in the Macedonian republic may use a seal bearing the Church’s coat of arms and a motto in Macedonian.

There is evidence that Patriarch Vikentije takes the view that this agreement provides the basis for a settlement of Church affairs in Southern Serbia. In a pastoral letter ad­dressed, on the occasion of this agreement, to the clergy and laity of the dioceses concerned, he declared his conviction that “a way [had] been found of establishing the long-awaited unity of our Church. Ecclesiastical administration has been reorganized in the dioceses situated in the Macedonian People’s Republic, and so the unity of our Church has been established by legal means.” 27

The Patriarch’ official visit to the dioceses of Southern Serbia, made at the end of March 1958, followed as a con­sequence of the agreement of April 10, 1957. Its purpose was to readjust relations between the separatists and the official Church. Whether, however—and when—this difficult question, so important for the interests of the Serbian nation, will be finally settled it is hard to say. It is possible that the con- ciliatoriness in this matter displayed by the regime and its spokesmen within the Church is no more than a tactical maneuver designed to secure the rapid appointment of local bishops dependent for their position upon the consent of the Party leaders, who continue to regard the Serbs in Southern Serbia as nationally distinct from those in Serbia proper. When they succeed in appointing their own men to the sees of Southern Serbia, the Communists will change their tactics and attempt to establish a separate Macedonian Orthodox Church.28

In their attempts to create a distinct Macedonian national­ity, the Yugoslav Communists, particularly those occupying

17 Politika, Belgrade, A p ril 19, 1957. Cf. Borba, Belgrade-Zagreb, A pril 19, 1957.

88 Borba, Belgrade-Zagreb, March 28, 1958.

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leading positions in the Macedonian People’s Republic, do not hesitate to adopt any form of falsification. They claim to speak in the name of the people, even though the popula­tion of Southern Serbia has never had an opportunity of stat­ing freely whether it feels itself to be a separate nation or not. The views of the population on this point, however, are of decisive importance for the whole problem.

The Communist regime, by virtue of the power it holds in its hands, is trying to force an alien concept upon the popula­tion of this region. The arguments it advances in justification of this concept are neither new nor original, and are incapable of withstanding any serious criticism. To declare, as Lazar Mojsov does, that the Macedonian nation “was unable to take its final form or to find forceful expression in any sphere of social life before the rise of capitalism and the complete liquidation of feudalism in Macedonia” 89 is mere wordplay—■ the forcible application of Marxist cliches to historical reality. The same is true of Dimitar Vlahov’s assertion that formerly the “majority of Macedonians were unaware of their Mace­donian nationality, although individual Macedonian public workers did possess a national consciousness.” 30 Vlahov con­siders that a Macedonian nation is now being created together with the Macedonian literary language, since “this will da much to ensure that the roots of Greater Bulgarian and Greater Serbian aspirations are torn up once and for all.” 31 Ivan Karaivanov states that the Macedonians are a separate nation because they won their freedom side by side with the other peoples of Yugoslavia. It is known, however, that the partisan movement was relatively feeble in Southern Serbia— much more so than the Chetnic national movement, which is not allowed to be mentioned in Communist Yugoslavia. “The population of the Macedonian People’s Republic,” says Ka­raivanov, “ is a powerful factor which will force, not only other nations, but history itself to acknowledge the Mace­donian masses as a separate and free nation.” 32

18 Lazar M ojsov , Bugarska radnidka partija (komunista) i make­donsko nacionalno pJtanje (The Bulgarian W orkers ' [Communist) Party and the M acedonian National Question), Belgrade, 1498, p. 6.

30 V lahov, op. cit., p. 58.31 Ibid., p. 72.n Ivan Karaivanov, Narodna republika Makedonija (The People's.

Republic of M acedonia), Skoplje, 1949, p. 48.

249

It is a conspicuous fact that in Southern Serbia it is only the Serbs who are expected to declare themselves Mace­donians: no such demand is made of the Greeks, the Jews, the Wallachians, the Albanians or the Turks. Mathias Murko points out that at one stage certain Russian circles attempted to “create a separate nationality and a new literary language among the Macedonian Slavs," 33 but this attempt came to nothing. In his dispute with BopSev, Milojko Veselinovic stated that the Serbs of Southern Serbia are “bound to their land and their homes, and have no idea of Macedonia, neither do they call themselves Macedonians. This ancient name only survives in literature as a historical term, and has begun to be heard in recent times only in the cities and from various propagandists, who hope by its means to fish in troubled waters.” 34

The thesis of the Yugoslav Communists on the existence of a separate Macedonian nationality is the most complete expression of the anti-Serbian trend in their nationality po­licy. Their efforts in this direction find a complement in their attempts to create a separate nationality for the Monte- negrans, notwithstanding the fact that it is in Montenegro that Serbian national feeling is most jealously guarded. The present solution of the Macedonian question has been de­liberately and systematically arrived at without consulting the Serbs and in opposition to their vital interests. This is a noteworthy feature of the situation as it stands today.

The establishment of a “people’s republic of Macedonia” without consulting the nation most intimately concerned con­stitutes one of the most farreaching moves in the process of disintegrating the Serbian lands: whereas the Slovenes in their entirety have been welded together in one federal unit, and almost all the Croats are embraced by the People’s Re­public of Croatia, the Serbs are divided between five “people’s republics” and two autonomous regions. The entire govern­mental and parliamentary system of the Federative People’s

33 M. Murko, Geschichte der dlterert sudslawischen Lileratur, Leip­zig, 1908, p. 18.

34 M ilo jko V . Veselinovic, Srbi u M acedoniji i u Ju ino j Staroj Srbiji, Hi odgovor g. S. S. B opievu (The Serbs in Macedonia and Southern O ld Serbia: A Reply to Mr. S. S. Bopfev), Belgrade, 1888, pp. 30— 31.

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Republic of Yugoslavia is so adjusted that, for example, in the Chamber of the Nations, the same number of delegates is assigned to the republics of Macedonia, which has about one and a half million inhabitants, Slovenia, which has even fewer, and Serbia, which, within its present frontiers, has over five million. When it is borne in mind that the Yugoslav parliament of today contains only well-tried Communists, it becomes clear that under the present regime the Serbian people, like the other peoples of Yugoslavia, has no means of self-expression.

The regime proclaims its views and decisions as though they have the approval of the people. At the second session of the AFCNLY, the Party proclaimed a distinct Macedonian nationality, thus “introducing the Macedonians into the family of South Slav and European nations.” 35 When it decided to create a separate language out of a Serbian dialect and pro­claim as a separate nation that section of the Serbian people that spoke that dialect, the Yugoslav Communist Party failed to notice the impossibility and absurdity of the position it was taking up. Logically speaking, having turned a south Serbian dialect into a separate language, the Party could just as easily divide the Croats into three distinct peoples accord­ing as they use the 6ak, kaj and Sto dialects.

###

From the foregoing exposition, it is clear that the Mace­donian question has been reduced to a matter of Yugoslav internal politics, where it represents one of the present Com­munist regime’s most powerful weapons in its campaign against the Serbs. In the future relations of Yugoslavia, Bul­garia and Greece, it will play a progressively diminishing role. The frontiers dividing these three countries may be taken es being definitive: only another war can change them. In the political plans of Moscow, this question may once more acquire a certain importance as an instrument of pressure upon either Bulgaria or Yugoslavia. The Soviet Union has already changed its attitude several times on the Macedonian

“ MoSa Pijade, Izabrani govori i ilanci, 1941— 47 (Selected Speeches and Articles, 1941— 47), Belgrade, 1948, p. 258.

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question, and it is not improbable that its future policy in this regard will be determined by considerations of its in­fluence in the Balkans. As it stands today, the Macedonian question has lost much of its former importance in Moscow’s plans for world revolution. If the Soviet Union nevertheless decides to revive this problem, it will have to present it in a purely nationalistic light. However that may be, “Yugoslav Macedonia” is now a permanent loss as far as the Bulgars are concerned. A ll the attempts of certain sections of the Bul­garian emigration and the right wing of Macedonian emigra­tion to secure the transfer of Southern Serbia to Bulgaria are no more than the last few spasms before the parties con­cerned become completely reconciled with immutable reality.

Bulgarian claims to Southern Serbia no longer constitute a threat to Serbian interests in this area. The danger lies in the attempts of the Yugoslav Communists to deprive these classically Serbian lands of their national physiognomy and present them as the home of a nation that has so far never existed—a nation without a history and without those es­sential characteristics that any true nation must have.

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260

INDEX

Ariontz, N icolas, 43 Adrian II., Pope, 52 Alexander, Macedonian, 11 Aloksandrov, Todor, 128, 141,

180, 183, 188, 190, 192 Ann, empress, 55 Andjelar, 26Andjelkovski, D jordje, 247 A ndrejev, Bane, 209 Andrejevid-Igum anov, Petar,

145Andrejevid-Igum anov, Sima,

145Andronicus, Emperor, 62 Antonov, Metodije-Cinto, 210 Arctielaus, King, 9 Arsen ije III., Patriarch, 72 Arsov, Slavejko, 120, 131, 135,

138Asparuch, Khan, 31 Assen II., Emperor, 54, 60, 64,

75

Baker, James, 10, 87, 104, 107 Balia, Kiamil, 195 Bnrbarossa, Frederick, 54, 57 Barker, Elisabeth, 177, 181, 188,

189, 205, 216, 233 Bedri, Pejani, 195 Berghaus, H., 14 Bodin, K ing of Zeta, 44 Hoham, G., 140 Borilo, Emperor, 59 Boris (M ihailo ), Emperor, 33,

36, 38, 45 Borshi, Lano, 195 Boshnjak, Konstantin, 195 Bou6, Am i, 94 BradaSka, Franc, 72, 96 Braislford, H. N „ 110, 134, 239 Braun-W iesbaden, Karl, 87, 90,

91, 98, 99, 105 Broz, Josip-Tito, 185, 210, 213,

220, 222-3, 228-9, 231, 232

Buha, Vasilije, 222 Bulgarjanov, Bojan, 209 Buxton N oe l and Leese Leo­

nard, 114

Capidan, Theodor, 10, 178 Churchill, W inston, 175, 176 Clement, Bishop, 22, 26, 27, 28,

40, 65Comnenus, John, Emperor, 50 Comnenus, Manuel, Emperor,

56Con iev , Genaral, 124, 129-130,

131, 137, 139 Constantin (Cyril), 21, 22, 24,

25, 26, 27, 28, 73 Constantin, Bishop, 27 Constantin III., Emperor, 50 Copronymus, Constantin, Em­

peror, 20 Coronellia, K., 14 Crispi, Francesco, 125 Cvijid, Jovan, 13-4, 15, 58-9,

68, 70, 74, 76, 80, 85, 86, 89, 95, 107, 146, 147, 239

Cvijovid, Josip, Bishop, 236 Corovid, Vladim ir, 21, 24-5, 31,

35-6, 43-4, 48, 50, 51, 57, 59,61, 63, 66, 74, 171

Cardaklija, Petar, 144 Caulov, Petar, 190 Cubrilovid, Branko, 215

Dafnomil, Evstatije, 45 Danilo II., Archbishop, 16, 61,

62, 67Davidovid, Dimitrije, 103 Davidovid, Ljubomir, 168 Dedijer, V ladim ir, 218, 221 Dehn, Paul, 42, 110 Delcev, Goce, 120, 123, 134,

135, 138 Delija, Ilija, 165 Deljan, Petar, 44

261

Derschawin, N . S., 97, 102 Dedanac, Sava, Archimandrit,

157Dimitrijevid, Stevan, 144 Dinid, M ihailo, 53 Dimitrov, Georgi, 211, 225, 229 Dionysius, Areopagite, 23 Djeric, Vaso, 71 Djilas, M ilovan, 218, 221 Djordjevid, Todor, 75, 77 Dobrovski, 42 Doflein, Franz, 93-4 Dozid, Gavrilo, Patriarch, 245 Dragonov, Dushan, 210 Dragutin, King, 60, 67 DragaSevid, Jovan, 86-7, 88-9,

101Drinov, Marin, 17, 83 Drvan, 49Dummler, Ernst, 49, 52 Durham, Edith, 134 Dushan, Emperor, 15, 54, 62, 63,

64, 67, 73, 77

Einhard, 49Erdeljanovid, Jovan, 50

Fallm erayer, Philipp Jakob, 19 Fan, S. No li, 195 Ferdinand, King, 82, 125, 132,

133Filov, Bogdan, 84, 104 Firmilijan, Archimandrit, 164 Floericke, Kurt, 39-40, 83, 104

GaraSanin, Ilija, 100, 145, 146 Gastalidia, Giac., 14 Gavranov, Ivan, 136 Gelzer, Heinrich, 76 Georgijevid, Marko, 98, 145 Georgevitch, Tihomir, 95 German, M ihailo, 98, 145 Gervasije, Abbot, 72 Giesl, W ladim ir, 132, 134 Gilbert in der Maur, 77, 108,

112, 114, 142, 183 Gopfevid , Spiridon, 15, 119,

153, 156 Graham, Stephen, 182 Greskovid, Leon, 226 Griesebach, August, 90

Grivec, Fran, 22 Gruber, v. Anton, 12 Grigorije, Priest, 23 Grothe, Hugo, 12-3, 38, 46, 84,

100, 109, 110, 131 Gru jev, Damjan, 120 Grujic, Radoslav, 99, 165 Grulovic, N ikola, 222

H adji Dimov, Dimo, 133 H adji Kalfa, geographer, 71 H adji Konstantinov, Jordan,

157H adji MiiSev, 152 H adji-Vasiljevid , Jovan, 165 Hahn, J. G., 94, 96 Halborn, Hajo, 105 Harrison, H. D., 231 Heksch, F. A lexander, 12, 45,

110Henderson, Nevile , 187, 188 Heraclius, Emperor, 47 Hoffmann, Otto, 9 Homann, Joh., Bapt., 14 Hopf, Carl, 19 Hlabar, monk, 23 Hrelja , Duce, 63

Irondise, H. O., 172 Ischirkov, A l., 19, 31 Ivadid, KreSimir, 103 Ivanov, Jordan, 73 Ivan Assen II., Emperor, 39-40 Ivid, A leksa, 51

Jagid, Vatroslav, 20, 23, 27-8,49

Jakova, Ibrahim, 195 JakSic, Grgur, 150 Jankov, colonel, 130 Jastrebov, Ivan, 76 Jelena, Queen, 67 Jeftimov, Simeon, 128-9, 181,

183Jelic, Ratko, 246 Jiredek, Jos. Constantin, 10-11,

17, 19, 20, 32-3, 36-7, 38-9, 42, 45, 46, 50, 57-8, 60, 70, 83, 84, 96-7, 98, 111

Joanides, J., 210 John VIII., Pope, 52

262

Jovan A lexander, Emperor, 53, 55

Jovan, Exarch, 23 Jovanovid, A leksa, 147, 149,

151, 154, 166, 168, 169, 212 Jovanovid, Jovan, 145, 148,

162, 163, 164, 165, 167, 169, 170, 171

Jovanovid, Slobodan, 147, 148, 149, 161, 162, 164, 170

Justin I., Emperor, 19 Justinian I., Emperor, 19 Justinian II., Rhinotmetus, Em­

peror, 20

Kachanovsky, Vladim ir, 80 Kaica, Prince, 15 Kaloyan, Emperor, 40, 65 Kanitz, Felix, 96 Karnidiju, Menda, 141 Karadjordjevid, A leksandar,

182, 185-7 Karadjordjevid, Petar I., 164 Karaivar.ov, Ivan, 249 Kazasov, Dimo, 120, 125, 129,

134, 137, 141, 178, 179, 180 Karavelov, Ljuben, 124 Kardelj, Eduard, 223-5 Karov, N ikola, 136 Khitrov, Panayot, 85, 101 Kiepert, H., 14 Klonimirovid, Caslav, 38 Klugmann, James, 222 Kneievid, Stefan, Bishop, 144 Kneievid, Timotije, 102 Knidanin, Stefan, 100 Kocev, Petar, 172 KoliSevski, Lazar, 208, 209 Kondakov, N . P., 73, 92-3 Koneski, BlaJo, 241-2 Kopitar, Jernej, 20, 47 Kostadinovid, Rista, 165 Rostov, Trajcho, 217 Kovadov, Slavdo,Krapdev, Daniel, 112 Krstid, D jodje, 151-5 Krstid, Micko, 165-6 Krum, Khan, 20, 34 Kunze, Georg Eugen, 83-84 Kutschbach, A lbin , 175

Lalid, Radovan, 242 Lape, Ljuben, 121 Lavrov, P. A ., 22 Lekovid, V asilije , 209 Leopold von Ranke, 9 Lulchev, K., 228-9 Ljudevit (Posavski), 35, 41, 49 Lozandev, Anastas, 135-6 Ljotid, Jakov, 152-3

M adi, v. Richard, 106, 108, 113, 240

Mallom ir, Khan, 35 Marko, K ing of Macedonia, 16,

73, 94, 148 Markovid, Simo, 199-200 M arkovid, T. J., 163 M arkovid, Neso, 72 M arkovid, Vasilije , 241 M atijevid, N., 192 Methodius, Archbishop, 21-2,

24-5, 26-7, 28 Mihailo, Metropolitan, 106, 154,

155, 156 M ihailov, Ivan-Vanda, 114,

126, 141, 177, 182, 183, 197 M ihailovski, Stefan, 129, 139 Michael Rhangabes, Emperor,

34Mihailo, K ing of Zeta, 44 MikloSich, Franz, 20, 47 M ikkola, J. J., 48 M ikov, D., 31 Mikotcy, G., 49-50 Milanovid, Ceda, 209 M ilenovid, M ., 166 M ilojevic, MiloS, 102 Milos, Prince, 102 Milutin, King, 21, 54, 60, 61,

64, 67Mintschev, 84, 105, 106, 113 M irkovid, Lazar, 16, 55, 56, 63,

67M isirkov, Krste, 119, 243 M itrev, Dimitar, 136, 226 M ladenov, Stevan, 42 Mlinarid, Bruno, 185 M ojsov, Lazar, 114, 120, 136,

212-13, 229-30, 231, 249 Mousset, A lbert, 219, 228 M urko, Mathias, 22, 38, 250

263

Mutimir, Prince, 52 M uller, Dr. Joseph, 71 M uller, Heinrich, 16

Naum , monk, 26-7, 65 Neskovic, Dr. B lagoje-M ihajlo,

213-14, 215 Nicholas, I., Pope, 38 Nem anja, Stevan, 29, 39, 51, 54,

56, 57, 59, 64-5, 67 Nikolid, T. R„ 75 Nikolov , Orce, 213 Nishani, Dr. Omer, 195 Novakovid , Kosta, 203 Novakovid , Stojan, 53, 161, 241

Oblak, V., 189 Obolensky, Dimitri, 26-7, 29,

45O brenovic, A leksandar, King,

163, 170 Obrenovic, M ihailo, Prince,

101-2Obrenovid, M ilan, Prince, King,

155, 156, 157, 158, 159, 160, 161

Oestreich, Dr. Karl, 11, 72, 91,92

Omortag, Khan, 35 Pajsije, monk, 96, 98 Pajsije, Patriarch, 67 Panica, Todor, 141 Pastukhov, Krsto, 228-9 Pasid, N ikola, 169, 170, 175 Pasko, Romac, 213 Pavelid, Dr. Ante, 182, 183, 184,

185, 187 Pavle, Bishop, 77 Pavlovid, Hristaki, 98 Pavlovid, Dragan, 208-9, 212 Pavlovid, Ljubomir, 48 Pavlov, Todor, 207 Peter, Emperor, 37, 38 Petkov, N ikola, 228-9 Petrov, Dimitrije, 153 Petrov, G 'orce, 93, 117-18, 121,

123, 125, 134 Petrovid, Karadjord je, 145 Philiph, King, 11 Pi jade, Mo§a, 217, 224, 251 Popovid, Dionisije, Bishop, 164

Popovic, Dusan, 199, 243 Popovid, V asil j, 150 Popovid, V eljko , 72 Pop-Tomov, Vladim ir, 216 Porphyrogenitus, Constantin,

37, 47, 49, 50, 51, 52 Pouqueville, consul, 95 Presijam, Khan, 35-36 Prodanov, V ikentije, Patriarch,

236, 245, 247 Prokid, Bozidar, 43 Protid, M ilosav, 155 Protid, Stojan, 88, 171 Protogerov, A leksandar, 77,

141, 183, 190

Radev, R., 182 Radev, Simeon, 123 Radic, Stjepan, 180 Radonid, Jovan, 50, 57, 58-9,

60, 63, 70 Radosavljevid, Dobrivoje, 212 Radoslav, King, 58 Radoslawoff, Vasil, 107, 172,

173, 174 Radowitz, Joseph M aria, 105 Racki, Franjo, 30 Rajid, Jovan, 96 Rakovski, G. K„ 199 Randa A lexander, 10 Rankovid, A leksandar, 218, 219 Redlich, A leksander, 111 Reinerius, Sacchoni, 29-30 Ribar, Ivo-Lola, 214 Rilski, Jovan, 98 Rilski, Neofit, 98-99 Ristid, Jovan, 153, 154, 159, 163 Rizoff, Dimitrije, 73, 103, 110,

131, 158, 159 Robert, Cyprian, 95 Roesler, Robert, 52 Rosen, George, 85 Rosie, Varnava, 164 Rutchi, Jakob, 141

Samardzijski, Jovan, 152 Samo, 49Samuil, Emperor, 38, 39, 41, 43,

44, 45Sandanski, Jane, 127, 135, 140,

141

264

Sarafov, Boris, 129, 131, 135,136, 139, 140, 141, 170

Sax, Carl Ritter, 107, 113 Seton-Watson, Hugh, 178, 187,

223, 224 Simeon, Emperor, 27, 36, 37, 45 Simonida, Queen, 61 Sirku, P. A ., 83 Sis, W ladim ir, 13 Slavejkov, Petko, 116 Sosnosky, v. Theodor, 11, 108,

109, 125Stamboliski, A leksandar, 177,

180Stambolov, 169 Stani&ev, 123, 184 Stankovid, M ina, 152 Stanojevid, Stanoje, 149, 161 Stefanovid-Karadzid, Vuk, 16,

243Stefanove, Constantin, 178, 179,

185Steiner, Stefan, 191 Stevan Dedanski, King, 55, 61,

62Stevan Provovendani, King, 40,

54, 56, 58, 59, 67 Stojanovid, Ljubomir, 15, 23, 70 Strez, Dobromir, 40, 54, 59 Sttilpnagel, F., 14St. Sava, Archbishop, 39-40, 54,

55, 65, 66, 68, 151 Satorov, Metodi-Charles, 207-8 Sdiadier, Gerhard, 13 Sdiacht, Horand Horsa, 11 Schafarik, Joseph Paul, 17, 19,

20, 21, 23, 31, 33, 34, 37, 42, 48, 50-51, 52

Sdimaus, A lois, 71 Siiman, M ihail, 38, 55, 62 Schulze, Joachim, 9, 13, 239 Schultze-Jena, Dr. Leonard, 23,

73Sl*id, Ferdo, 22, 101, 146 Slrouninjer, Josef Juraj, 103

Tnnnsovod, Andjelko, 165 TekelIJa, Sava, 14 Temperley, H. W . V., I l l , 239 Teodosije, monk, 40, 60

TerpeJev, Dobri, 217 Terterije, D jordje, Emperor, 54 Theophanes, 31 Tihomir, soldier, 44 Tomalevski, Naum, 182 Tomid, Svetozar, 163 Tosev, Krum, 240, 243 Trautmann, Reinhard, 239 Tsankov, A leksander, 189 Tsankov, Georgi, 217 Tuma, Anton von W aldkam pf,

72

Vangel, Dimo, 136 Vardarski, M „ 122 Vasmer, M ax, 118 Veljid , M ihailo, 150-1 Venelin, George Ivanovic (Hu-

ca George), 97 Verkovid, Stevan, 102 Velim irovic, Dr. N ikolaj,

Bishop, 181 Veselinovic, M ilo jko, 87-8, 89,

90, 91, 92, 151, 250 Vlad is lav , King, 39, 54 V lahov, Dimitar, 121, 122, 127,

128, 135, 137, 142, 188, 190, 194, 198, 216, 237, 243, 249

Vlastim ir, Prince, 47, 49 Voigt, F. A ., 210 Vojteh, D jordje, 44 Vujid, Dimitrije, 170 Vukasin, King, 16, 73 Vukmanovid, Svetozar-Tempo,

216, 219, 223, 233, 234 Vukm irovic, Boris-Crni, 209 Vukovic, Bozidar-Podgoridanin,

15

Ugljesa, Despot, 16 Ulam, B. Adam , 200 Uros, Emperor, 16, 37

W alsh , R., 12, 84, 85 W alter, Jakob, 239 W eigand, Dr. Gustav, 10 W endel, Hermann, 73, 99, 110,

111, 162 W hite, Leigh, 222

265

W indelband, W o lfgan g, 111 W oodhouse, S. M., 234

Zelid, Gerasim, Archimandrit, 144

Zeuss, Kaspar, 50, 52

Zlatarski, V . N „ 26-7, 28, 32, 33, 34-35, 36, 37, 38, 41, 52,53

Zivanovic, Zivan, 153, 154, 157, 160, 163

Yugov, Anton, 217

266

CONTENTS

I’r r f u c e ....................................................................... 5

Chapter I. Macedonia as A Geographical Concept . . 9

II. The Arrival of the Slavs in the Balkans . . 17

III. The Macedonian Slavs under Bulgarian Rule 31

IV. The Macedonian Slavs under Serbian Rule . 47

V. The Bulgarian National Revival and theMacedonian Q u e s t io n ............................. 76

a) The Spiritual and National Fate of the Bulgars under the Turks........................82

b) Significance of the Term “Bulgar” 86

c) The National Awaking of the Bulgars inthe Nineteenth C en tu ry ........................96

d) The Bulgarian Exarchate and the Mace­donian Q uestion ................................... 103

e) The Emergence of the Macedonian Ques­tion ..................................................... 113

VI. Serbian and the Macedonian Question . . 143VII. The Macedonian Question between the Two

World W a r s ............................................... 177

VIII. The Macedonian Question during and afterWorld War I I ......................................... 207

IX. The Macedonian Question Today . . . 236Mibliography.................................................................253

I n d e x ....................................................................... 261

267