Bulgaria and Bulgarians
Bulgaria
Bulgaria i/bʌlˈɡɛəriə/ (Bulgarian: България, IPA: [bɤ̞ɫˈɡarijɐ]), officially the Republic of Bulgaria, is a country located in Southeastern Europe. It is bordered by Romania to the north, Serbia and Macedonia to the west, Greece and Turkey to the south and the Black Sea to the east. With a territory of 110,994 square kilometres (42,855 sq mi), Bulgaria is Europe's 14th-largest country. Its location has made it a historical crossroad for various civilisations and as such it is the home of some of the earliest metalworking, religious and other cultural artifacts in the world.[6][7][8][9]
Prehistoric cultures began developing on Bulgarian lands during the Neolithic period. Its ancient history saw the presence of the Thracians, and later by the Greeks and Romans. The emergence of a unified Bulgarian state dates back to the establishment of the First Bulgarian Empire in 681 AD, which dominated most of the Balkans and functioned as a cultural hub for Slavic peoples during the Middle Ages. With the downfall of the Second Bulgarian Empire in 1396, its territories came under Ottoman rule for nearly five centuries. The Russo-Turkish War of 1877–1878 created the Third Bulgarian State. The following years saw several conflicts with its neighbours, which prompted Bulgaria to align with Germany in both World Wars. In 1946 it became a Socialist state with a single-party system. In 1989 the Communist Party allowed multi-party elections, following which Bulgaria transitioned to democracy and a market-based economy.
The population of 7.36 million people is predominantly urban and mainly concentrated in the administrative centres of its 28 provinces. Most commercial and cultural activities are concentrated in the capital Sofia. The strongest sectors of the economy are heavy industry, power engineering and agriculture, all relying on local natural resources.
The current political structure dates to the adoption of a democratic constitution in 1991. Bulgaria is a unitary parliamentary republic with a high degree of political, administrative and economic centralisation. It is a member of the European Union, NATO and the Council of Europe; a founding state of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE); and has taken a seat at the UN Security Council three times.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bulgaria
Bulgarians
The Bulgarians (Bulgarian: българи, IPA: [bɤ̞ɫɡɐri]; colloquially: българе [bɤ̞ɫɡɐrɛ], бугари [buɡɐri], бугарье [buɡɐrjɛ]) are a South Slavic[38][40][41][42] ethnic group native to Bulgaria and neighbouring regions. Emigration has resulted in immigrant communities in a number of other countries.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bulgarians
Bulgarian language
Bulgarian (български език, pronounced: [ˈbɤ̞ɫɡɐrski ɛˈzik]) is an Indo-European language, a member of the Southern branch of the Slavic language family.
Bulgarian, along with the closely related Macedonian language (collectively forming the East South Slavic languages), has several characteristics that set it apart from all other Slavic languages: changes include the elimination of case declension, the development of a suffixed definite article (see Balkan language area) and the lack of a verb infinitive; but it retains and has further developed the Proto-Slavic verb system. Various evidential verb forms exist to express unwitnessed, retold, and doubtful action. Estimates of the number of people around the world who speak Bulgarian fluently range from about 6.8 million in 2013[3] to 9 million in 1986[4] and reach as high as 12 million.[5][6][7][8][9][10]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bulgarian_language
Bulgarian Proverbs
Advice
¶ Ако сам не си помогнеш, и господ не може да ти помогне
Translation: If you don't help yourself, even God cannot help you.
Idiomatic translation: God helps those who help themselves.
Work
¶ Бързата работа - срам за майстора.
Hasty work - shame for the craftsman.
http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Bulgarian_proverbs
References
Bulgaria
[6]^ Roberts, Benjamin W.; Thornton, Christopher P. (2009). "Development of metallurgy in Eurasia". Department of Prehistory and Europe, British Museum. p. 1015. Retrieved 8 June 2012. "In contrast, the earliest exploitation and working of gold occurs in the Balkans during the mid-fifth millennium BC, several centuries after the earliest known copper smelting. This is demonstrated most spectacularly in the various objects adorning the burials at Varna, Bulgaria (Renfrew 1986; Highamet al. 2007). In contrast, the earliest gold objects found in Southwest Asia date only to the beginning of the fourth millennium BC as at Nahal Qanah in Israel (Golden 2009), suggesting that gold exploitation may have been a Southeast European invention, albeit a short-lived one."
[7]^ Sigfried J. de Laet, ed. (1996). History of Humanity: From the Third Millenium to the Seventh Century BC. UNESCO / Routledge. p. 99. ISBN 978-92-3-102811-3. Retrieved 8 June 2012. "The first major gold-working centre was situated at the mouth of the Danube, on the shores of the Black Sea in Bulgaria ..."
[8]^ Milisauskas, Sarunas (74). European Prehistory: A Survey. Springer. ISBN 978-1-4419-6633-9. Retrieved 8 June 2012. "One of the earliest dates for an Aurignacian assemblage is greater than 43,000 BP from Bacho Kiro cave in Bulgaria ..."
[9]^ a b "Early human marks are 'symbols'". BBC News. 16 March 2004. Retrieved 8 June 2012.
Bulgarians
[38]^ a b c Day, Alan John; East, Roger; Thomas, Richard (2002). Political and economic dictionary of Eastern Europe. Routledge. p. 96. Retrieved 2011-11-13.
[39]^ Gordon, Raymond G., Jr., ed. (2005). "Languages of Turkey (Europe)". Ethnologue: Languages of the World (Fifteenth edition ed.). Dallas, Texas: SIL International. ISBN 978-1-55671-159-6.
[40]^ One Europe, many nations: a historical dictionary of European national groups, James Minahan, Greenwood Publishing Group, 2000, ISBN 0-313-30984-1, pp. 134–135. Google Books. Retrieved 2011-11-13.
[41]^ Fine, John Van Antwerp (1991). The early medieval Balkans: a critical survey from the sixth to the late twelfth century. University of Michigan Press. p. 308. ISBN 978-0-472-08149-3.
[42]^ Kopeček, Michal (2007). In Balázs Trencsényi. Discourses of collective identity in Central and Southeast Europe (1770–1945): texts and commentaries. Central European University Press. p. 240. ISBN 978-963-7326-60-8.
Bulgarian language
[3]^ Ethnologue 2013
[4]^ Lewis, M. Paul (ed.) (1986–2009). "Bulgarian". Ethnologue: Languages of the World, Sixteenth edition. SIL International. Retrieved 10 march 2010.
[5]^ "Bulgarian language". Omniglot-Writing systems&Languages of the World. Retrieved 17 октомври 2010.
[6]^ "The Bulgarian language". Kwintessential. Retrieved 17 октомври 2010.
[7]^ "The languages spoken in Bulgaria". Spainexchange. Retrieved 17 октомври 2010.
[8]^ "Language of Bulgaria". Europecities. Retrieved 17 октомври 2010.
[9]^ "English to Bulgarian Translation". Bulgarian translation. Retrieved 18 октомври 2010.
[10]^ "Bulgarian for beginners". Bulgarian is a Southern Slavic language with approximately 12 million speakers in many countries. Retrieved 18 октомври 2010.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bulgaria
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bulgarians
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bulgarian_language
http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Bulgarian_proverbs
