Bessarabian Bulgarians


The Bessarabian Bulgarians are a Bulgarian minority group of the historical region of Bessarabia, inhabiting parts of present-day Ukraine and Moldova.

Location and number

Modern Ukraine

In Ukraine, the number of Bessarabian Bulgarians is estimated at over 129,000 in Budjak, and 75,000 elsewhere, according to the 2001 Ukrainian Census, which counted a total of 204,600 Bulgarians in Ukraine.
Bulgarians are a majority in Bolhrad District, but they also inhabit other districts of Budjak: Arciz – 20,200 of the 51,700, Tarutino – 17,000 of the 45,200, Izmail – 14,100 of the 54,700, and Sarata – 10,000 of the 49,900. There are also 8,600 Bulgarians in the city of Izmayil.
Outside Budjak, Odessa has many Bulgarians that have moved there in recent years. The city of Bilhorod-Dnistrovsky is about 4% Bulgarian, making them the third-largest ethnicity there.

Modern Moldova

The results of the census held in October 2004, there are 65,072 Bessarabian Bulgarians in Moldova, concentrated mostly in the southern parts — chiefly in Taraclia district. In the census held in November 2004 in Transnistria, 3,164 Bulgarians have been counted in Tighina and surroundings and further 10,515 on the Eastern bank of the river Dnestr.
29,447 Bulgarians live in the cities, and 36,215 live in the countryside. 90.60% of ethnic Bulgarians were born in Moldova, 5,968 in other countries that were once in the Soviet Union, and 199 were born elsewhere.
In Moldova, the Bulgarians tend to use their native Bulgarian in rural areas, and Russian in cities and towns. 53,178 or 80.99% of ethnic Bulgarians declared Bulgarian language as native, 2,766 or 4.21% of them declared Romanian language as native, 9,134 or 13.91% of them declared Russian language as native, and 584 or 0.89% of them declared another language as native.
35,808 or 54.53% of ethnic Bulgarians declared Bulgarian language as first language in daily use, 5,698 or 8.68% of them declared Moldovan language/Romanian language as first, 23,259 or 35.42% of them declared Russian language as first, and 897 or 1.37% of them declared another first language.
Bessarabian Bulgarians represent 28,293, or 65.56% of the population of the Taraclia district. There are also Bulgarians in Chişinău, Găgăuzia, Cahul district, Leova district, and Cantemir district. The share of ethnic Bulgarians in Transnistria is 10,515, of which 2,450 in Tiraspol, and 7,323 in Slobozia sub-district. There are also 3,001 Bulgarians in the city of Tighina, and 342 in 3 suburbs. In total, there are 79,520 Bulgarians in Moldova, including Transnistria.
Bessarabian Bulgarians represent a majority in one city of Moldova, Taraclia and in 8 communes in the country:
The modern population of Bessarabian Bulgarians settled in the region of southern Bessarabia at the end of the 18th and beginning of the 19th centuries, at the time of feudal sedition in the Ottoman Empire, and after the Russo-Turkish Wars of the period. Particularly strong waves of emigration emerged after the Russo-Turkish Wars of 1806–1812 and 1828-1829. The settlers came primarily from what is now eastern Bulgaria, but many were also descendants from the western areas of the Bulgarian homelands but had moved east in and before the 18th century. Alongside the Bulgarians who immigrated to Bessarabia were also a handful of Albanians who also had settled in eastern Bulgaria some time before.
When Russian Armies were reaching and crossing Danube during the Russian-Ottoman Wars, some local Bulgarians supported them. These people were compromised in the eyes of the Ottomans and therefore had a better chance moving to the Russian Empire. The Russian Propaganda also worked to convince Bulgarians to settle in areas recently conquered by them, from which Tatars were removed. Bulgarians settled not only in Bessarabia, but also in the Kherson region.
For the first time, Bulgarian and Gagauzian refugees in Bessarabia are mentioned in 1769. The 1817 census found Bulgarians in 12 Bessarabian villages in the valleys of the Ialpug and Lunga Rivers : 482 Bulgarian and Gagauzian families and 38 Romanian families in these 12 villages. The leader of the Bulgarians and Gagauzians was a man referred to as Copceac. Seven of the 12 villages were Gagauzian, and 5 were Bulgarian.
After arriving in Bessarabia, Bulgarians and Gagauzians founded their own towns, such as Bolhrad and Comrat, and around 64 or 43 villages. In 1856, after the Treaty of Paris, three counties of southern Bessarabia, Cahul, Bolgrad and Ismail, reverted to the Principality of Moldavia. These included the cities of Bolgrad, Ismail and Chilia. Gaguzian settlements centred on Comrat, however, remained in the Russian Empire. A Bulgarian high school, the Bolhrad High School, was founded in Bolgrad on June 28, 1858 by the Moldavian authorities of Alexandru Ioan Cuza, which had a positive effect on the development of Bulgarian education and culture, and is in fact the first modern Bulgarian gymnasium.
In 1861, 20,000 Bulgarians from the Romanian part of Bessarabia moved to Russia, where they were given land in Taurida Governorate to replace the Nogais who had left what was formerly territory of the Crimean Khanate. Those settlers founded another Bulgarian community—the Tauridan Bulgarians.
After the whole region of southern Bessarabia was re-incorporated again by the Russia Empire in 1878, the process of Russification grew stronger, as many Bulgarian intellectuals returned to newly established Principality of Bulgaria to help set up the Bulgarian state. The Bulgarian minority was deprived of the rights earned during the Romanian control.
The whole of Bessarabia united with Romania in April 1918, after the Russian Revolution and the collapse of the Russian Empire. In contrast with the previous period of Romanian control, most cultural and educational rights of the Bulgarian minority were not returned, as many Bulgarians underwent Romanianization policies.
During the Tatarbunar Uprising of 1924, when Soviets unsuccessfully tried to overthrow the Romanian administration in southern Bessarabia, many Bulgarians sided with Romanian authorities, as pointed out by Gheorghe Tătărescu in the report given on behalf of the Ministry of the Interior to the Romanian Parliament in 1925.
The Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact of 1939 led to a Soviet ultimatum in June 1940, the invasion of Soviet forces into Bessarabia, and its inclusion into the Soviet Union. Although being an officially accepted minority under Soviet rule, the Bessarabian Bulgarians lost some features of their cultural identity in the period.
A movement of national revival originated in the 1980s, with Bulgarian newspapers being published, cultural and educational associations being established, and Bulgarian being introduced into the local schools especially after the dissolution of the Soviet Union: first only as an optional, but later as a compulsory subject. The Association of Bulgarians in Ukraine was founded in 1993, and Taraclia State University, co-funded by the Bulgarian state, was established in the largely Bulgarian-populated Moldovan town of Taraclia in 2004. The languages of education at the university are Bulgarian and Romanian.

Notable Bessarabian Bulgarians