ARTICLES CONSTANTIN N. VELICHI (Bucharest, Romania) Romanian-Bulgarian Relations during the Bulgarian Revival, 1762-1878 Within this limited space, a detailed study of Romanian-Bulgarian relations during the Bulgarian revival is obviously impossible: we offer here only a brief survey. First, we will discuss only the most important stages in these rela- tions. Second, in explaining these relations we recognize that the two peoples were politically unequal. At that time the Bulgarian people were ruled by the Turks, and the Romanian principalities were under the nominal suzerainty of the Sublime Porte. Third, the period of the Bulgarian revival witnessed a hard struggle by the Bulgarian people to regain their lost freedom. The struggle for Bulgaria's revival was waged not only by those in that country, but also by those who had emigrated to distant lands such as far-away Russia or to near-by Serbia and Romania. The Romanian principalities and Russia were major centers for the conduct of the political and cultural struggle. After 1862, Bucharest became, in fact, the most important center for the liberation struggle by Bulgarian emigres. Although great democratic revolutionaries like Georgi Sava Stoikov Rakovski, Liuben Karavelov, Basil Levski, and Khristo Botev lived and worked in other places, their most fruitful activity was mainly in Bucharest. Here were the main organizations for directing the political struggle, as well as the center of remarkable cultural achievements. Bulgarian and Romanian relations involved aid to the Bulgarian cause from distinguished Romanians, government officials, and the masses. The fall of Balkan peoples to the Turks signified not only their loss of freedom, but also a major impediment to the development of their material and spiritual culture. Bulgaria had an especially difficult situation, for it was near the capital of the Ottoman Empire and, in particular, it lay on the main path of Turkish expansion to Central Europe. Hence, the Bulgarian people were never reconciled to their plight; and the liberation struggle had highly varied forms. One of these fomls-common to all Balkan peoples- was emigration. In Southeastern Europe the Romanians enjoyed a situation completely different from that of other Balkan peoples since they were never directly ruled by the Turks. In return for the payment of tribute, the size of which continually fluctuated, the Romanians' vassalage allowed, nonetheless, con- 76 siderable autonomy in internal affairs.1 In order to abolish vassalage and Turkish domination, Romanians and Bulgarians waged, often together, a struggle for freedom. 'Expeditions by Iancu of Hunedoara and Michael the Brave (1593-1601) against the Turks are recorded in Bulgarian folk songs.2 Much has been written about attempts by Bulgarian Catholics of Chiprovets to create a Christian coalition, to be led by Romanian princes such as Matei Basarab (1633-54), Mihnea III (1658- 59), and others.3 By the second half of the eighteenth century, the situation had completely changed, with the Russo-Turkish wars hastening the dis- integration of the Ottoman Empire and with the beginning of the Bulgarian revival. _ The Bulgarian revival was the process of socioeconomic change occurring at the end of the eighteenth and beginning of the nineteenth centuries, a process which comprised the country's liberation from the chains of Ottoman feudalism and which involved a struggle for national and cultural freedom. This was a struggle of the Bulgarian people against the yoke of Turkish sultans, pashas, and beys as well as against the Phanariot clergy. The Bulgarian revival culminated in the Russo-Romanian-Turkish War of 1877-78 which produced Bulgaria's independence 4 During this period relations between the two neighboring peoples-were extremely close. Emigration-a form of the liberation struggle-then reached its climax. Thus, during the Russo-Austro-Turkish War of 1781-92, seven to eight thousand Bulgarian families emigrated northward across the Dan- ube.5 The exact figures of those who emigrated during and after the Russo- Turkish wars may not always be ascertained from documents. However, for emigration during and after the wars of 1806-12 and 1828-29, recent research yields almost exact figures. Thus, according to some Russian and Romanian documents concerning the 1806-12 war, about twenty thousand families emigrated across the Danube to Wallachia, Moldavia, and southern Russia. This especially high figure may be explained by the tsarist regime's desire to colonize southern Russian regions which had already been vacated 1. M. Berza, "Haraciul Moldovei §i Jårü-Rom1ne?ti in sec. XV-XIX," in Studii $i ma- teriale de istorie medie, 5 vols. (Bucure§ti: Editura Academiei Republicii Populare Ro- mirua, 1956-62), II, 7-47; and his "Vaiafifle exploatarii Taiii-Ronunesti de cstre Poarta otomanain secolele XVI-XVIII," Studii [hereafter S], 11, No. 2 (1958), 59-72. 2. Alexandru Jordan, Les relations culturelles entre les Roumains et les Slavesdu Sud (Bucarest: n.p., 1936). 3. Ivan Duichev, "Politicheskata deinost na Petur Parchevich za osvobozhdenie ot tursko vladichestvo," in Bulgaro-rumunski vrozki i otnosheniia prez vekovete (Sofiia: Iz- datelstvo Bulgarskata Akademiia na Naukite, 1965), pp. 157-91. 4. Istoriia na bulgarskata literatura [stet.] Sofiia: Izdatelstvo Bulgarskata Akademiia telstvo Bulgarskata Adademiia na Naukite, 1965), pp. 157-91. 5. D. Kosev, "Paisii Khilendarski i bulgarskoto natsional-osvoboditelnoto dvizhenie," Istoricheski pregled, 9, No. 1 (1953), 40 ff. .