Обсуждение:Болгария

Encyclopaedia of Islam, Second Edition / Bulgaria

Bulgaria, a country in the Balkans. It drew its name from the Bulgare, a people of Turkic origin, who first invaded the Dobrud̲j̲a [q.v.] under Asparuk̲h̲ or Isperik̲h̲ in 679 A.D. and founded an independent state in the Byzantine province of Moesia. Adopting Orthodox Christianity from Byzantium (865) and identifying themselves with the native Slavs who had previously settled Bulgaria, the Bulgare built up a strong empire in the Balkans which extended from the Danube to the Adriatic Sea under Czar Symeon (893-927).

The first Islamic accounts of Bulgaria belonged to this period through the reports of Muslim al-Ḏj̲armī (about 231/845), Hārūn b. Yaḥyā (349/960) and Ibrāhīm b. Yaʿḳūb (349/960). Hārūn reported (in Ibn Rusta, ed. De Goeje, 127) that the Christianised Slavs, al-Ṣaḳāliba al-Mutanaṣṣira , had adopted Christianity after Sūs, the ruler of the Bulgars. Incorporated into the Byzantine empire between 1018 and 1186 Bulgaria was organised in two themes, the theme of Bulgaria with its centre at Skoplje (Üsküb) and that of Paristrion or Paradunavon with its centre at Silistria.

The invasion and settlement of the Cumans in the lower Danube prepared the way for the creation of the so-called second Bulgarian empire under the Assenids (1185-1279).

In 1262 Michael VIII, the Byzantine emperor, took Anchialus and Mesembria from the Bulgarians ¶ and settled in the Dobrud̲j̲a the Anatolian Turks who had taken refuge in Byzantium with ʿIzz al-Dīn Kaykāwūs II [q.v.]. Most of them retumed to Anatolia in 707/1307 and those who remained were thought to be the ancestors of the Gagauzes [q.v.]. (P. Wittek, Yazi̊ji̊og̲h̲lu ʿAlī on the Christian Turks of the Dobruja , in BSOAS, xiv/3).

Terter I (1279-1300) recognised Nog̲h̲ay’s [q.v.] overlordship (1285) and gave his daughter in marriage to his son Čaḳa, who later took refuge in Trnovo and seized his father-in-law’s throne (1300), but soon was killed by Terter II (1300-1322).

In the contemporary Arabic sources (Baybars, Zubdat al-Fikra , in I. H. Izmirli, Altinordu ..., Ist. 1941, 221; Abu ’l-Fidāʾ, 295) Bulgaria is shown as the land of the Ūlaḳ , and the Bulgarians are considered as the same people as the Ūlaḳ. We know that Kalojan had called himself imperator totius Bulgarie et Vlachie (G. Ostrogorsky, Hist. of the Byzantine State , 358). It appears that the Christianised Cumans in Bulgaria, must have been shown under the general term of Vlach.

The S̲h̲is̲h̲manids (1323-1395) came to the Bulgarian throne with S̲h̲is̲h̲man, a Cuman magnate in Vidin.

The Anatolian g̲h̲āzī Turks came in contact with the Bulgarians when Aydi̊nog̲h̲lu Umūr [q.v.] allied himself with Cantacuzenus. First in 742/1341 Umūr aided him agaist Ivan Alexander, the Bulgarian Czar, and, then, on 5 Rabīʿ I 746/July 7, 1345 destroyed Momčilo, the Bulgarian adventurer who had been dominating the Rhodope region (P. Lemerle, L’Emirat d’Aydin , Paris 1957). The Ottomans replacing Umūr in his alliance with Cantacuzenus appeared to come into contact with the Bulgarians first in 753/1352 when these came to support his rival John V. After the conquest of Edirne [q.v.] in 762/1361 Lālā S̲h̲āhīn seemed to be active in the direction of Zag̲h̲ra (Berrhoea) and Filibe [q.v.] (different dates in the chronicles: 763/1362, 765/1364, 766/1365), but the Byzantine-Bulgarian clash in 765/1364 is thought to be connected with an Ottoman-Bulgarian agreement. In 766/1365 Czar Ivan Alexander divided his realm between his two sons: Stratsimir got the Vidin region and S̲h̲is̲h̲man the Czardom of Trnovo. Dobrotič in the Dobrud̲j̲a and Varna were actually independent [see dobrud̲j̲a ]. The same year Hungary seized Vidin, threatened Trnovo, and Amadeo of Savoy not only occupied Ottoman Gallipoli but also Mesembria, Sozopolis and Anchialus for Byzantium in 767/1366. With Ottoman auxiliary forces S̲h̲is̲h̲man tried to recover Vidin (769/1368), and gave his sister Thamar in marriage to Murād I. According to the Ottoman chronicles (see Saʿd al-Dīn, i, 84-87) the Ottomans reached the main Balkan passes by taking Ḳi̊zi̊lag̲h̲ač-yenid̲j̲esi, Yānboli̊ (Iambol), Ḳari̊n-ovāsi̊ (Karnobat). Aydos (Aitos), Sözeboli̊ (Sozopolis) under Tīmūrtās̲h̲ in about 770/1368. İhtiman and Samakov under Lālā S̲h̲āhīn in 772/1370 and 773/1371. Filibe on the one side and the Yānboli̊-Ḳari̊n-ovāsi̊ region on the other were then the main ūd̲j̲s [q.v.] where the aḳi̊nd̲j̲i̊s , Yürüks [q.v.] and Tatars were settled in large numbers. Nis̲h̲ was taken by the Ottomans only in 787/1385 (Nes̲h̲rī, Taeschner ed. i, 58). Sofia was still in S̲h̲is̲h̲man’s hands in 780/1378 (C. Jireček, Gesch. der Bulgaren , Prague 1876, 339). It seemed to surrender between this date and 787/1385. In 789/1387 when Murād I found that his vassals S̲h̲is̲h̲man in Bulgaria and Ivanko in Dobrud̲j̲a were not on his side against the Serbians he hastily sent an army under ʿAlī Pas̲h̲a to ¶ secure his rear. Our information on this expedition cornes from Nes̲h̲rī and Rūḥī who both used here a detailed and well informed source, and there is no need to change its chronology (cf. F. Babinger, Beiträge zur FrühGesch. der Türkenherrschaft in Rumelien , Munich 1944, 29-35). In the winter of 790-1/1388-9 ʿAlī Pas̲h̲a took Provadia (Pravadi), Venčan, Madera and S̲h̲umni̊ (S̲h̲umen) and passed the winter in the latter. In the spring of 791/1389 he sent Yak̲h̲s̲h̲ī Beg against ‘the son of Dobrud̲j̲a’ in Varna, then went to meet the Sultan in Yānboli̊. S̲h̲is̲h̲man came there, too, and made his submission to Murad I. But on his return he did not surrender Silistre (Silistria) to the Ottomans as he promised. Upon this ʿAlī appeared before Ti̊rnova (Trnovo), S̲h̲is̲h̲man’s capital; ‘The infidels brought him the keys of the city’ which meant submission. Accepting the submission of several other towns on his way ʿAlī came and laid siege to Nikeboli̊ (Nikopol, Nicopolis) where S̲h̲is̲h̲man had taken refuge. He asked pardon which was granted. ʿAlī was to join Murād’s army.

After the battle of Kossovo Bāyazīd was detained in Anatolia while Mirčea, supported by Sigismond, took Silistria and the Dobrud̲j̲a and made a succesful raid on the aḳi̊nd̲j̲i̊s of Kari̊n-ovasi̊, in 793/1391. Only in 795/1393 was Bāyazīd able to come and take Trnovo by force (6 Ramaḍān/17 July) and he also subjugated the Dobrud̲j̲a and Silistre. But still S̲h̲is̲h̲man was left in his stronghold, Nikeboli̊, as a vassal. He then appealed to Sigismond; this caused Bāyazīd’s [q.v.] invasion of Transylvania and the battle of Arges̲h̲ against Mirčea (26 Rad̲j̲ab 797/17 May, 1395). We find in a newly discovered document (Topḳapi Sarayi Archives, Istanbul, no. 6374) the following ‘Crossing Ark̲h̲is̲h̲ river Yi̊ldi̊ri̊m Ḵh̲ān came before the fortress of Nikeboli̊ the ruler of which was a lord named S̲h̲is̲h̲man. He was paying tribute to the Sultan in the same way as the Voyvode of Wallachia. The Sultan asked him to send ships, which he furnished. As soon as the Sultan was on the other side he fetched S̲h̲is̲h̲man, beheaded him, and seized Nikeboli̊ and transformed it into an Ottoman sand̲j̲aḳ .’ The Slavic sources (see J. Bogdan, Archiv f. slav. Philo. , xiii, 496) dated S̲h̲is̲h̲man’s death as 12 S̲h̲aʿbān 797/3 June 1395 which fits in with this Ottoman evidence.

The battle of Nikeboli̊ (24 D̲h̲u ’l-Ḥid̲j̲d̲j̲a 798/28 September 1396) sealed the fate of Bulgaria. After his victory Bāyazīd invaded Stratsimir’s Vidin too. He settled in Vidin, Silistre and Nikeboli̊ the powerful Ūd̲j̲-begis against Hungary and Wallachia. In 847/1443, when a Hungarian army advanced into Bulgaria, the Bulgarian reʿāyā and voynuḳs in the region of Sofia and Radomir joined the invaders, who appointed a ‘Vladika’ in Sofia for them. They were soon repressed by the Ottomans (see İnalcik, Fatih Devri , Ankara 1954, 20).

During this period, and especially after 805/1402, Bulgaria became strongly ottomanised. In Eastern Bulgaria the Muslim population was definitely in the majority as the surveys of 1520s show (see Ö. L. Barkan, İktisat Fakültesi Mecmuasi , vol. xi, map). In 859/1455 in Filibe there were 600 Muslim households as against 50 non-Muslim. Bulgaria was divided into the sand̲j̲aḳs of Čirmen, Sofya, Silistre, Nikeboli̊ and Vidin in the eyālet of Rūmeli [q.v.]. In the 11/17th century the sand̲j̲aḳs of Nikeboli̊ and Silistre were included in the eyālet of Özü which was created against the Cossacks. Its capital was Özü and Silistre. The sand̲j̲aḳ of Silistre included Pravadi, Yānboli̊, Harsova, Varna, Ak̲h̲yoli̊ (Anchialus), ¶ Aydos, Ḳari̊n-ovasi̊ and Rūsī-ḳasri̊ (Rhousokastron) in 924/1518. Bulgaria was put under typical Ottoman administration with the tīmār [q.v.] System (see the laws and regulations in Ö. L. Barkan, Kanunlar , Istanbul 1943, 255-289). Most of the members of the pre-Ottoman military class were integrated in the Ottoman military organisation (see my Fatih Devri, 136-184), pronijars as tīmār-holders, woiniks as Ottoman voynuḳs [q.v.]. As to the bulk of the Bulgarian population, they were given the status of d̲h̲immī reʿāyā [q.v.]. But among them many groups enjoyed financially a special status as derbendd̲j̲i (guardians at the mountain passes) or suppliers of rice, meat etc. for the palace or the army [see ʿawāriḍ ], and the Dews̲h̲irme [q.v.] was also extensively applied in Bulgaria.

As Istanbul and the army was dependent for a great proportion of their food supply on Bulgaria the government put restrictions on the export of the Bulgarian meat and rice. In 973/1565 the appointed sheep owners in western Bulgaria were ordered to provide 174,290 sheep for the army (A. Refik, Türk İdaresinde Bulgaristan , Istanbul 1933, document no. 3). The rice production in the upper Maritsa (Merič) valley brought to the state as muḳāṭaʿa [q.v.] a yearly revenue of about one million akča (20 thousand gold ducats) in about 888/1483 (T, Gökbilgin, Edirne ve Paşa Livasi , Istanbul 1952, 131). Timber from S̲h̲umni̊. Hezargrad, Ti̊rnova (Trnovo) and iron from Samakov were supplied for the construction of the warships at Ak̲h̲yoli̊ in 979/1571 (A. Refik, doc. 19, 22). An industry of cloth and felt developed in Filibe, S̲h̲umni̊ and Islimye (Sliven) in this period which was exported in other parts of the empire (A. Refik, doc. 18). Bulgaria experienced neither an enemy invasion nor an insurrection from 1450 to 1595. The Bulgarian towns, especially Filibe, Sofya and Silistre, developed as miltary and commercial centres on the main routes in Rūmeli [q.v.]. In these cities new Muslim districts sprang up around Ḏj̲āmiʿ s, ʿimārets , bedestāns and bazaars with rich waḳfs (see Ewliyā Čelebī’s detailed description in 1061/1651, vol. III, 301-421, and H. J. Kissling, Beiträge zur Kenntnis Thrakiens im 17. Jahr ., Wiesbaden 1956). According to the Ottoman census in 1520 (see Ö. L. Barkan, JESHO, vol. I, Part 1, 1957, 32) the sand̲j̲aḳs of Silistre, Čirmen, Nikeboli̊, Vidin and Sofya had about 125 thousand households altogether excluding the population in the places belonging to Pas̲h̲a in Bulgaria.

From the end of the 16th century onwards the rate of several taxes was raised and the complaints of the Bulgarian reʿāyā from the exactions of the local officiais and soldiers began (A. Refik, doc. 37, 38, 41, 42, 46, 47). In 1014/1605 the reʿāyā of the Sofya region complained that the agents of the Patriarch were trying to raise the rate of dues from 6 aḳča to 12 for the reʿāyā and from 60 to 400 for the local priests (A. Refik, doc. 38). The first important uprising in Bulgaria took place at Veliko-Trnovo in 1003/1595 when Michael, Wallachian Prince, made successful raids in Bulgaria. Sinān Pas̲h̲a [q.v.] put down the insurrection and thousands of Bulgarians took refuge in Wallachia. Also from this time on the Bulgarian haydūds or es̲h̲ḳiyāʾ begin to be mentioned more frequently in the Ottoman sources (A. Refik, doc. 52, 54, 75). Now almost with every enemy invasion the reʿāyā were joining them and when they withdrew large groups of reʿāyā followed them in spite of the assurances on the part of the Ottoman government (for example in 1100/1688 the reʿāyā of the region of ¶ Vidin, Kutlofd̲j̲a, Pirot and Berkofd̲j̲a (A. Refik doc. 59) in 1150/1737 the reʿāyā of the region of Izinbol (Znepolje) (A. Refik, doc. 81, 82); in 1208/1793 those of the region of Ismail and Stanimaka). In 1245/1829, seventy or eighty thousand Bulgarians followed the Russian army to settle in Bessarabia; in 1861 ten thousand of them left their home for the Crimea.

In the second half of the 18th century the aʿyān were particuiarly powerful in Bulgaria. As multazims [q.v.] and hereditary possessors of the large state lands, čiftliks [q.v.], they became real masters of the country since the govemment had to rely on them to collect the taxes of the reʿāyā and most powerful of them such as Trestenik-og̲h̲lu Ismāʿīl, Bayraḳdār Muṣṭafā [q.v.] in Rusd̲j̲uḳ, Ḥad̲j̲d̲j̲ī ʿUmar in Hezargrad even maintained private armies to which the Sultan had to have recourse at critical moments (A. Refik, doc. 90). The Rhodopes and the Balkan mountains sheltered an increasing number of bandits called Ki̊rd̲j̲ali̊ in this period. Profiting from this anarchy a soldier of fortune, Pazwand-og̲h̲lu or Pāsbān-og̲h̲lu ʿOt̲h̲mān [q.v.] rebelled, and then, as the Pas̲h̲a of Vidin, ruled over Western Bulgaria between 1212/1797-1221/1807 (Ḏj̲ewdet, Taʾrīk̲h̲ , vii, 237, 240, 250, viii, 146-48). Under Maḥmūd II [q.v.] the aʿyāns were eliminated and the central authority was established in Bulgaria. In the period of the Tanẓimāt in 1263/1846 Bulgaria was reorganised as the eyālets of Silistre, Vidin, Nis̲h̲ with the provincial councils in which the Bulgarian representatives were admitted. But the administrative reforms did not prevent unrest among the Bulgarians. An insurrection in the Nis̲h̲ region in 1257/1841 and a more violent one in the Vidin region in 1266/1850 broke out partly because of the provocation of the revolutionists in Serbia and Wallachia, and partly because of the abuses of the čiftlik System maintained there by the Muslim ag̲h̲as or gospodars (see my Tanzimat ve Bulgar Meselesi , Ankara 1943).

Many observers in the middle of the 19th century (N. V. Michoff, La population de la Turquie et de la Bulgarie , 3 vols. Sofia 1915-1929) came to the conclusion that one third of the population of Bulgaria was Muslim. Out of this about 400 or 500,000 were the Pomak ( Pomatzi ), the native Bulgarians who had adopted Islam in the iôth and 17th centuries in the central and western Rhodopes. Muslims were in the majority in the cities of Filibe Vidin, S̲h̲umni̊, Rusd̲j̲uḳ, Razgrad, Varna, Plevne, Osman-bazar, Eski-d̲j̲umʿa, Yenizag̲h̲ra and in the minority in those of Gabrovo, Nis̲h̲, Sofya, Ti̊rnova, Karnobat (Ḳari̊n-ovasi̊) by 1293/1876. After the Crimean war the Ottoman govemment had settled in Bulgaria 70 or 90,000 Čerkes and about 100,000 Tatars (in A. H. Midḥat, Midḥat Pas̲h̲a , Cairo 1322/1904, 35: 350,000 immigrants). Tension between these and the native Bulgarians was exploited by the Bulgarian revolutionists who had finally organised a Central Committee of Revolution in Bucharest in 1286/1869. In 1281/1864 the new administrative reform was for the first time applied in Bulgaria. The sand̲j̲aḳs of Rusd̲j̲uḳ, Varan, Vidin, Tulči (Tulča), Ti̊rnova (Trnovo) formed the wilāyet of Tuna and those of Sofya and Nis̲h̲ that of Sofya. Midḥat Pas̲h̲a [q.v.], fjrst governor of the wilāyet of Tuna, made it the most progressive province of the empire (A. H. Midḥat, 24-56). Although the tax revenue of the wilāyet increased fifty per cent under his administration, the peasantry had to pay more and do forced labour for the construction of the new routes. In 1287/1870 the struggle for an independent ¶ Bulgarian church resulted in the establishment of the Exarchate which was regarded as a national victory. In the same period the increased activities of the Bulgarian revolutionists, ḳomitad̲j̲i̊s , supported actively by the Russians, resulted in the great insurrection of 1293/1876 (April-May). Bulgaria became the main field of operations of the Ottoman-Russian war of 1293/1877. It caused an exodus of the Muslim population to the south. With the Treaty of San-Stefano Russia attempted to create under her protection a great Bulgaria from the Danube to the Aegean Sea. But the great powers replaced it by the Treaty of Berlin which created a principality of Bulgaria, Bulg̲h̲āristān Emāreti , under the Sultan’s suzerainty, and the autonomous Province of Eastern Rumelia ( Rūmelī-i S̲h̲arḳī Wilāyeti ). It united with the Principality as a result of a revolution in Filibe in 7 D̲h̲u ’l-Ḥid̲j̲d̲j̲a 1302/18 September 1885 (A. F. Türkgeldi, Mesail-i Mühimme-i Siyasiyye , Ankara 1957, 193-246). At the time of the revolution of 1326/1908 in Istanbul Prince Ferdinand declared the independence of Bulgaria and assumed the title of Czar (7 Ramaḍān 1326/3 October 1908).

(H. İnalcık)

Bibliography

N. V. Michoff, Bibliographie sur l’histoire de la Turquie et de la Bulgarie, 4 vols. Sofia 1914-34

C. Jireček, Geschichte der Bulgaren, Prague 1876

idem, Das Fürstenthum Bulgarîen, Prague-Vienna-Leipzig 1891

idem, Die Heerstrasse von Belgrad nach Constantinopel und die Balkanpässe, Prague 1877

V. Zlatarski, Geschichte der Bulgaren, Leipzig 1918

P. Nikov, Turskoto zavaldevane na Bůlgarija i sadbata na poslednite Šišmanovci, Izvestija na Istor. Druzestvo, 7/8 (1928), 41-112

A. Hajek, Bulgarien unter der Türkenherrschaft, Stuttgart 1925

idem, Die Bulgaren im Spiegel der Reiseliteratur des 16. bis 19. Jahrhunderts, Bulgaria 1942, 47-99

S. Runciman, A History of the First Bulgarian Empire, London 1930

R. L. Wolff, The ‘Second Bulgarian Empire’, its Origin and History to 1204, in Speculum 24 (1949), 167-206

Ahmed Refik, Türk Idaresinde Bulgaristan, Istanbul 1933

idem, ʿOt̲h̲manli̊ Imperatorluğunda Fener Patrikk̲h̲ānesi ve Bulgar Kilisesi, in TTEM, no. 8 (1341)

idem, 1284 Bulgar Ihtilali, in TTEM, no. 9 (1341)

N. Staneff, Geschichte der Bulgaren, Leipzig 1917

I. Sakazov, Bulgarische Wirtschaftsgeschichte, Berlin-Leipzig 1929

G. D. Galabov, Sources Osmano-Turques pour l’Histoire Bulgare, Annuaire de l’Uni, de Sofia, vols. 34-2, 35-6, 39 (1938-1943)

F. Ph. Kanitz, Donau-Bulgarien und der Balkan, 3 vols., Leipzig 1875-1879

H. Wilhelmy, Hochbulgarien, Kiel 1935-1936

N. Jorga, Geschichte des osmanischen Reiches, 5 vols., Gotha 1908-1913

H. Inalcik, Tanzimat ve Bulgar Meselesi, Ankara 1943

Z. V. Togan, article Balkan, in İA.

Cite this page

İnalcık, Halil, “Bulgaria”, in: Encyclopaedia of Islam, Second Edition, Edited by: P. Bearman, Th. Bianquis, C.E. Bosworth, E. van Donzel, W.P. Heinrichs. Consulted online on 18 March 2023 <http://dx.doi.org.wikipedialibrary.idm.oclc.org/10.1163/1573-3912_islam_SIM_1522> First published online: 2012 First print edition: ISBN: 9789004161214, 1960-2007