Etropole (, ) is a town in western

Bulgaria Bulgaria, officially the Republic of Bulgaria, is a country in Southeast Europe. It is situated on the eastern portion of the Balkans directly south of the Danube river and west of the Black Sea. Bulgaria is bordered by Greece and Turkey t ...

, part of

Sofia Province Sofia Province () is a province (''oblast'') of Bulgaria. The province does not include Sofia in its territories, but Sofia remains the seat of its administration. The province borders on the provinces of Pernik, Kyustendil, Blagoevgrad, Paz ...

. It is located close to the northern slopes of the

Balkan Mountains The Balkan mountain range is located in the eastern part of the Balkan peninsula in Southeast Europe, Southeastern Europe. It is conventionally taken to begin at the peak of Vrashka Chuka on the border between Bulgaria and Serbia. It then runs f ...

in the valley of the

Iskar River The Iskar (, ; ) is a right tributary of the Danube. With a length of 368 km, it is the longest river that runs entirely within Bulgaria.

, from

Sofia Sofia is the Capital city, capital and List of cities and towns in Bulgaria, largest city of Bulgaria. It is situated in the Sofia Valley at the foot of the Vitosha mountain, in the western part of the country. The city is built west of the Is ...

History

The area was first settled by the

Thracian The Thracians (; ; ) were an Indo-European speaking people who inhabited large parts of Southeast Europe in ancient history.. "The Thracians were an Indo-European people who occupied the area that today is shared between north-eastern Greece, ...

tribe of the

Triballi The Triballi (, ) were an ancient people who lived in northern Bulgaria in the region of Roman Oescus up to southeastern Serbia, possibly near the territory of the Morava Valley in the late Iron Age. The Triballi lived between Thracians to the ...

in the 7th or 6th century BC due to its position as an important crossroad connecting the

Danube The Danube ( ; see also #Names and etymology, other names) is the List of rivers of Europe#Longest rivers, second-longest river in Europe, after the Volga in Russia. It flows through Central and Southeastern Europe, from the Black Forest sou ...

with

Macedonia Macedonia (, , , ), most commonly refers to: * North Macedonia, a country in southeastern Europe, known until 2019 as the Republic of Macedonia * Macedonia (ancient kingdom), a kingdom in Greek antiquity * Macedonia (Greece), a former administr ...

and

Thrace Thrace (, ; ; ; ) is a geographical and historical region in Southeast Europe roughly corresponding to the province of Thrace in the Roman Empire. Bounded by the Balkan Mountains to the north, the Aegean Sea to the south, and the Black Se ...

close to two key Balkan passes. The forces of

Philip II of Macedon Philip II of Macedon (; 382 BC – October 336 BC) was the king (''basileus'') of the ancient kingdom of Macedonia (ancient kingdom), Macedonia from 359 BC until his death in 336 BC. He was a member of the Argead dynasty, founders of the ...

(339 BC),

Alexander the Great Alexander III of Macedon (; 20/21 July 356 BC – 10/11 June 323 BC), most commonly known as Alexander the Great, was a king of the Ancient Greece, ancient Greek kingdom of Macedonia (ancient kingdom), Macedon. He succeeded his father Philip ...

(335 BC), the

Celts The Celts ( , see Names of the Celts#Pronunciation, pronunciation for different usages) or Celtic peoples ( ) were a collection of Indo-European languages, Indo-European peoples. "The Celts, an ancient Indo-European people, reached the apoge ...

and the

Roman legion The Roman legion (, ) was the largest military List of military legions, unit of the Roman army, composed of Roman citizenship, Roman citizens serving as legionary, legionaries. During the Roman Republic the manipular legion comprised 4,200 i ...

s passed through the valley in the Antiquity. The region developed as a centre of trade and economy, as evidenced by findings of

Macedon Macedonia ( ; , ), also called Macedon ( ), was an ancient kingdom on the periphery of Archaic and Classical Greece, which later became the dominant state of Hellenistic Greece. The kingdom was founded and initially ruled by the royal ...

ian and

Greek Greek may refer to: Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor of all kno ...

coins, Greek ceramics, luxurious items and decorations. The ore ledges brought

Saxon The Saxons, sometimes called the Old Saxons or Continental Saxons, were a Germanic people of early medieval "Old" Saxony () which became a Carolingian " stem duchy" in 804, in what is now northern Germany. Many of their neighbours were, like th ...

miners to the town in the 16th century. They introduced the ''samokov'' hammer technology and helped for the area's establishment as a centre of craftsmanship and mining, with

gold Gold is a chemical element; it has chemical symbol Au (from Latin ) and atomic number 79. In its pure form, it is a brightness, bright, slightly orange-yellow, dense, soft, malleable, and ductile metal. Chemically, gold is a transition metal ...

copper Copper is a chemical element; it has symbol Cu (from Latin ) and atomic number 29. It is a soft, malleable, and ductile metal with very high thermal and electrical conductivity. A freshly exposed surface of pure copper has a pinkish-orang ...

silver Silver is a chemical element; it has Symbol (chemistry), symbol Ag () and atomic number 47. A soft, whitish-gray, lustrous transition metal, it exhibits the highest electrical conductivity, thermal conductivity, and reflectivity of any metal. ...

and

iron Iron is a chemical element; it has symbol Fe () and atomic number 26. It is a metal that belongs to the first transition series and group 8 of the periodic table. It is, by mass, the most common element on Earth, forming much of Earth's o ...

being extracted in the 16th and 17th centuries. Handicrafts such as iron-, gold- and coppersmithing and cutlery prospered. The economic upsurge of the settlement aided the development of culture and education in the nearby

Etropole Monastery The Etropole Monastery of the Holy Trinity (, ''Etropolski manastir „Sveta Troitsa”''), also known as Varovitets (Варовитец), is a Bulgarian Orthodox Church, Bulgarian Orthodox monastery near the town of Etropole in west-central ...

in the period, where biblical and

liturgical book A liturgical book, or service book, is a book published by the authority of a church body that contains the text and directions for the liturgy of its official Church service, religious services. Christianity Roman Rite In the Roman Rite of ...

s were copied in a specific original

calligraphic Calligraphy () is a visual art related to writing. It is the design and execution of lettering with a pen, ink brush, or other writing instruments. Contemporary calligraphic practice can be defined as "the art of giving form to signs in an exp ...

style, of which 76 hand-written volumes were preserved. A monastery school was established in 1613 and a public one (yet still monastery) followed in 1811. One of the first school buildings in Bulgaria was constructed in 1828-1830 by merchants and rich craftsmen from Etropole. A revolutionary committee part of

Vasil Levski Vasil Levski (, spelled in Reforms of Bulgarian orthography, old Bulgarian orthography as , ), born Vasil Ivanov Kunchev (; 18 July 1837 – 18 February 1873), was a Bulgarians, Bulgarian revolutionary who is, today, a Folk hero, national ...

Internal Revolutionary Organization The Internal Revolutionary Organisation (IRO; ) was a Bulgarian revolutionary organisation founded and built up by Bulgarian revolutionary Vasil Levski between 1869 and 1871. The organisation represented a network of regional revolutionary commit ...

was founded in Etropole in 1870 in order to help the

Liberation of Bulgaria The Liberation of Bulgaria is the historical process as a result of the Bulgarian Revival. In Bulgarian historiography, the liberation of Bulgaria refers to those events of the Tenth Russo-Turkish War (1877–1878) that led to the re-establishme ...

from

Ottoman rule The Ottoman Empire (), also called the Turkish Empire, was an imperial realm that controlled much of Southeast Europe, West Asia, and North Africa from the 14th to early 20th centuries; it also controlled parts of southeastern Central Euro ...

. The town was liberated on 24 November 1877 by

Russia Russia, or the Russian Federation, is a country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia. It is the list of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the world, and extends across Time in Russia, eleven time zones, sharing Borders ...

n forces under

Joseph Vladimirovich Gourko Count Iosif Vladimirovich Romeyko-Gurko (; – ), also known as Joseph or Ossip Gourko, was a prominent Russian field marshal during the Russo-Turkish War (1877–1878). Biography Career Of Belarusian extraction, Gurko was educated ...

during the Russo-Turkish War of 1877-78 and served as a governing centre for the 40-day winter march of the Balkan Mountains of the

Imperial Russian Army The Imperial Russian Army () was the army of the Russian Empire, active from 1721 until the Russian Revolution of 1917. It was organized into a standing army and a state militia. The standing army consisted of Regular army, regular troops and ...

. Etropole Peak on

Livingston Island Livingston Island (Russian name ''Smolensk'', ) is an Antarctic island in the Southern Ocean, part of the South Shetland Islands, South Shetlands Archipelago, a group of List of Antarctic and subantarctic islands, Antarctic islands north of the ...

in the

South Shetland Islands The South Shetland Islands are a group of List of Antarctic and subantarctic islands, Antarctic islands located in the Drake Passage with a total area of . They lie about north of the Antarctic Peninsula, and between southwest of the n ...

Antarctica Antarctica () is Earth's southernmost and least-populated continent. Situated almost entirely south of the Antarctic Circle and surrounded by the Southern Ocean (also known as the Antarctic Ocean), it contains the geographic South Pole. ...

is named after Etropole.

Places of interest

The clockwork tower of Etropole built in 1710 is one of the oldest in Bulgaria. It originally served as a defensive structure until in 1821 a master builder by the name of Dido reconstructed it as a clock tower. With its height at about it stands above most of the buildings in the small town. The clockwork tower is one of the

100 Tourist Sites of Bulgaria 100 Tourist Sites of Bulgaria is a Bulgarian national Social movement, movement established in 1966 to promote tourism among Bulgaria's most significant cultural, historic, and natural landmarks. As part of this program, sites of cultural and his ...

along with the Monastery of the Holy Trinity and the History museum of Etropole. The

, also known as Varovitets, is located from the town. It is a Bulgarian Orthodox monastery and was founded in the 12th or 13th century. The monastery is also the home of the spectacular

Etropole Waterfall Etropole Waterfall (), known also as ''Varovitets'' (Варовитец) is a waterfall in the Balkan Mountains, Bulgaria, located near the Etropole Monastery. It is situated on a small river which flows near the monastery. See also * List of wa ...

“Varovitets”. To learn more about the history of Etropole you can visit the Historical Museum of Etropole. The History Museum in Etropole launched its first exhibition in 1958. Ten years later, in 1968, the second exhibition of the museum was opened in the restored building of the former Turkish police office. The museum of Etropole is still housed there. The building was constructed in the period 1853 – 1870. This is the second public building in Etropole after the Clock Tower (1710) that has survived to this day. The ten halls of the museum tell about the past of the Etropole Region. The village of Lopyan (Лопян) is located in the Etropole municipality and is situated at the foot of the northern slopes of the Central Balkan Mountain. It is one of the oldest villages in the region and its story began at the time of the Thracians, when the territory was inhabited by the tribe Luposi from where name of the village most likely origins. Three kilometres from Lopyan are the remains of the Thracian fortress Chertigrad (built in 4th or 3rd centuries BC and probably functioned until the 6th century AD).

Notable people

* Todor Peev (1842–1904) - revolutionary * Hristo Yasenov (1889–1925) - poet *

Sofi Marinova Sofiya Marinova Kamenova (, ), better known simply as Sofi Marinova () is a Bulgarian pop-folk and ethno-pop singer. She has won multiple music awards and contests. She is often called "the Romani pearl" and "the Romani nightingale". In February ...

- singer of

Roma Roma or ROMA may refer to: People, characters, figures, names * Roma or Romani people, an ethnic group living mostly in Europe and the Americas. * Roma called Roy, ancient Egyptian High Priest of Amun * Roma (footballer, born 1979), born ''Paul ...

descent

International relations

Twin towns — sister cities

Etropole is twinned with: * Feres, Greece *

Mozhaysk MozhayskAlternative transliterations include ''Mozhaisk'', ''Mozhajsk'', ''Mozhaĭsk'', and ''Možajsk''. (, ) is a types of inhabited localities in Russia, town and the administrative center of Mozhaysky District, Moscow Oblast, Mozhaysky Distri ...

, Russia *

Bela Palanka Bela Palanka (Serbian Cyrillic: Бела Паланка, ) is a town and municipality located in the Pirot District of southeastern Serbia. According to the 2022 census, the population of the town is 7,140, and the population of the municipality i ...

, Serbia

Gallery

File:Etropole-historical-museum.jpg, Historical Museum (built 1853–1870) File:Etropole-courthouse.jpg, Courthouse File:Etropole-monastery-outside.jpg, Etropole Monastery of the Holy Trinity File:EtropoleMonasteryChurch.jpg, Etropole Monastery Church File:Etropole-elementary-school-Hristo-Botev.jpg,

Hristo Botev Hristo Botev (, ), born Hristo Botyov Petkov (Христо Ботьов Петков; – ), was a Bulgarian revolutionary and poet. Botev is considered by Bulgarians to be a symbolic historical figure and national hero. His poetry is a prim ...

school File:Vodopad.varovitec.JPG, Varovitets Waterfall

References

External links

Nikola Gruev's gallery of Etropole Monastery

Etropole Home Page
{{Authority control Towns in Bulgaria Populated places in Sofia Province