What “the yoke” means
After 1396 the Bulgarian lands were part of the Ottoman Empire. The local aristocracy was destroyed or Islamised, the church was placed under the Patriarchate of Constantinople, and Christians paid higher taxes. In several places there were forced conversions to Islam – the best known were in the Rhodopes in the 17th century.
The resistance
- The haiduks – forest fighters against the authorities. Folk songs celebrate them as noble outlaws. The reality was more complicated, but the songs are better.
- The uprisings – the Tarnovo uprisings (1598 and 1686) and the Chiprovtsi uprising (1688). All of them crushed, none forgotten.
- The monasteries – Rila, Bachkovo and Troyan kept the books, the language and the hope alive.
How people lived
Life was not all darkness. Crafts and trade flourished in the mountain settlements, and wealthy little towns such as Koprivshtitsa, Zheravna and Tryavna grew. Tanners, makers of coarse woollen cloth and goldsmiths traded across the whole empire – from Constantinople to Vienna.
The subject is sensitive, and textbooks, films and family memories paint different pictures. Historians argue over the details. Bulgarian grandmothers do not. They simply say “five hundred years”, and everyone goes quiet.