Russians in Bulgaria
Encyclopedia
Russians
The Russian people are an East Slavic ethnic group native to Russia, speaking the Russian language and primarily living in Russia and neighboring countries....
form the fourth largest ethnic group in Bulgaria
Bulgaria
Bulgaria , officially the Republic of Bulgaria , is a parliamentary democracy within a unitary constitutional republic in Southeast Europe. The country borders Romania to the north, Serbia and Macedonia to the west, Greece and Turkey to the south, as well as the Black Sea to the east...
, numbering 9,978 according to the 2011 census, and mostly living in the large urban centres, such as Sofia
Sofia
Sofia is the capital and largest city of Bulgaria and the 12th largest city in the European Union with a population of 1.27 million people. It is located in western Bulgaria, at the foot of Mount Vitosha and approximately at the centre of the Balkan Peninsula.Prehistoric settlements were excavated...
, Plovdiv
Plovdiv
Plovdiv is the second-largest city in Bulgaria after Sofia with a population of 338,153 inhabitants according to Census 2011. Plovdiv's history spans some 6,000 years, with traces of a Neolithic settlement dating to roughly 4000 BC; it is one of the oldest cities in Europe...
, Varna
Varna
Varna is the largest city and seaside resort on the Bulgarian Black Sea Coast and third-largest in Bulgaria after Sofia and Plovdiv, with a population of 334,870 inhabitants according to Census 2011...
and Burgas
Burgas
-History:During the rule of the Ancient Romans, near Burgas, Debeltum was established as a military colony for veterans by Vespasian. In the Middle Ages, a small fortress called Pyrgos was erected where Burgas is today and was most probably used as a watchtower...
. Although the largest wave of Russian settlers (White Guards
White movement
The White movement and its military arm the White Army - known as the White Guard or the Whites - was a loose confederation of Anti-Communist forces.The movement comprised one of the politico-military Russian forces who fought...
) arrived following the events surrounding the October Revolution
October Revolution
The October Revolution , also known as the Great October Socialist Revolution , Red October, the October Uprising or the Bolshevik Revolution, was a political revolution and a part of the Russian Revolution of 1917...
and the Russian Civil War
Russian Civil War
The Russian Civil War was a multi-party war that occurred within the former Russian Empire after the Russian provisional government collapsed to the Soviets, under the domination of the Bolshevik party. Soviet forces first assumed power in Petrograd The Russian Civil War (1917–1923) was a...
, compact groups of Russians had been living in Bulgaria for centuries before that.
Among the early Russian settlers were Old Believer Nekrasov Cossacks
Nekrasov Cossacks
Nekrasov Cossacks, Nekrasovite Cossacks, Nekrasovites, Nekrasovtsy are descendants of Don Cossacks which, after the defeat of the Bulavin Rebellion fled to the Kuban , headed by Ignat Nekrasov, hence the name. The Kuban was then under the rule of the Crimean Khanate...
, some of which founded the village of Tataritsa in then-Ottoman
Ottoman Empire
The Ottoman EmpireIt was usually referred to as the "Ottoman Empire", the "Turkish Empire", the "Ottoman Caliphate" or more commonly "Turkey" by its contemporaries...
-ruled Southern Dobruja
Southern Dobruja
Southern Dobruja is an area of north-eastern Bulgaria comprising the administrative districts named for its two principal cities of Dobrich and Silistra...
(nowadays part of the village of Aydemir
Aydemir
Aydemir is a village in northeastern Bulgaria, part of Silistra Municipality, Silistra Province. As of 2007, it is the most populous village in Bulgaria, with a population of 7,815 according to 2005 data. Aydemir lies at , 31 m above sea level. The village is located in the valley of the Danube, 3...
in Silistra Province
Silistra Province
Silistra Province is a province of Bulgaria, named after its main city - Silistra. It is divided into 7 municipalities with a total population, as of December 2009, of 127,659 inhabitants....
) in 1674, building a church in 1750. Another Russian-inhabited village in the northeast of Bulgaria is Kazashko in Varna Province, where descendants of Kuban
Kuban Cossacks
Kuban Cossacks or Kubanians are Cossacks who live in the Kuban region of Russia. Most of the Kuban Cossacks are of descendants of two major groups who were re-settled in the Western Northern Caucasus during the Caucasus War in the late 18th century...
and Don Cossacks
Don Cossacks
Don Cossacks were Cossacks who settled along the middle and lower Don.- Etymology and origins :The Don Cossack Host was a frontier military organization from the end of the 16th until the early 20th century....
have been living since 1905. The members of these Old Believer communities are locally known as Lipovans
Lipovans
Lipovans or Lippovans are the Old Believers, mostly of Russian ethnic origin, who settled in the Moldavian Principality, in Dobruja and Eastern Muntenia...
(липованци, lipovantsi) and belong to a group also inhabiting Romania
Romania
Romania is a country located at the crossroads of Central and Southeastern Europe, on the Lower Danube, within and outside the Carpathian arch, bordering on the Black Sea...
and Ukraine
Ukraine
Ukraine is a country in Eastern Europe. It has an area of 603,628 km², making it the second largest contiguous country on the European continent, after Russia...
. Their main occupation is fishing, in the Danube
Danube
The Danube is a river in the Central Europe and the Europe's second longest river after the Volga. It is classified as an international waterway....
for the Lipovans in Tataritsa and in Lake Varna
Lake Varna
Lake Varna is the largest by volume and deepest liman or lake along the Bulgarian Black Sea Coast, divided from the sea by a 2 km-wide strip of sand and having an area of 17 km², maximal depth 19 m, and a volume of 166 million m³....
for those in Kazashko.
Following the Russo-Turkish War of 1877-78, largely fought on what is today Bulgarian territory, and the Liberation of Bulgaria
Liberation of Bulgaria
In Bulgarian historiography, the term Liberation of Bulgaria is used to denote the events of the Russo-Turkish War of 1877-78 that led to the re-establishment of Bulgarian state with the Treaty of San Stefano of March 3, 1878, after the complete conquest of the Second Bulgarian Empire, which...
to which it led in 1878, a transitional Russian administration was established with Prince Alexander Mikhailovich Dondukov-Korsakov
Dondukov
Dondukov is a Russian princely family descending from Donduk-Ombo, the sixth khan of the Kalmucks . In 1732 he led 11,000 Kalmuck households from the Volga banks to the border of the Ottoman Empire at the Kuban River, asking the sultan for protection...
as its head.
Following their defeat by the Red Guards
Red Guards (Russia)
In the context of the history of Russia and Soviet Union, Red Guards were paramilitary formations consisting of workers and partially of soldiers and sailors formed in the time frame of the Russian Revolution of 1917...
in the Russian Civil War, a large number of White Guards fled to Bulgaria (then a monarchy) seeking refuge. They initially numbered around 24–29,000, but some 4,000 received amnesty and returned to the Soviet Union
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....
and many others were expelled under Aleksandar Stamboliyski
Aleksandar Stamboliyski
Aleksandar Stamboliyski was the prime minister of Bulgaria from 1919 until 1923. Stamboliyski was a member of the Agrarian Union, an agrarian peasant movement which was not allied to the monarchy, and edited their newspaper...
. With Bulgaria becoming part of the Eastern bloc
Eastern bloc
The term Eastern Bloc or Communist Bloc refers to the former communist states of Eastern and Central Europe, generally the Soviet Union and the countries of the Warsaw Pact...
following World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
, a number of Russians emigrated to the country. Today, foreign (including Russian) businessmen living in Bulgaria are eligible for Bulgarian passport under specific conditions (such as investing over $
United States dollar
The United States dollar , also referred to as the American dollar, is the official currency of the United States of America. It is divided into 100 smaller units called cents or pennies....
250,000 or running a business, and having a clean slate).
Nowadays, Russians in Bulgaria are represented by a number of organizations, such as Soyuz sootechestvenikov (Union of Compatriots), the Union of Russian Citizens and the Society of White Guardsmen.