Konstantin Dimitrov Tsipushev, also known as Kotse Tsipushev (1877 – 1968; Bulgarian/), was a Bulgarian 19th-/20th-century revolutionary. He was among the members of the

Bulgarian Macedonian-Adrianople Revolutionary Committees In the earliest dated samples of statutes and regulations of the clandestine Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization (IMRO) discovered so far, it is called Bulgarian Macedonian-Adrianopolitan Revolutionary Committees (BMARC)., T ...

. He was born in 1877 in

Radoviš Radoviš ( ) is a city in the Southeastern statistical region, southeastern part of North Macedonia. It is the second largest city in the southeastern region. The city is the seat of Radoviš Municipality, which is spread on the bottom of Plač ...

Ottoman Empire The Ottoman Empire (), also called the Turkish Empire, was an empire, 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 Centr ...

(in modern-day

North Macedonia North Macedonia, officially the Republic of North Macedonia, is a landlocked country in Southeast Europe. It shares land borders with Greece to the south, Albania to the west, Bulgaria to the east, Kosovo to the northwest and Serbia to the n ...

). Kosta graduated from the Bulgarian school in Radovish in 1895 and then the

Bulgarian Men's High School of Thessaloniki The Sts. Cyril and Methodius Bulgarian Men's High School of Thessaloniki (, ''Solunska balgarska mazhka gimnazia „Sv. sv. Kiril i Metodiy“'') was the first Bulgarian language, Bulgarian high school in Macedonia (region), Macedonia. One of th ...

. In 1899, he began to study in the

Sofia University Sofia University "St. Kliment Ohridski" () is a public university, public research university in Sofia, Bulgaria. It is the oldest institution of higher education in Bulgaria. Founded on 1 October 1888, the edifice of the university was constr ...

. Later he married the sister of the

Internal Macedonian-Adrianople Revolutionary Organization The Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization (IMRO; ; ), was a secret revolutionary society founded in the Ottoman territories in Europe, that operated in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Founded in 1893 in Salonica, it initia ...

(IMARO) leader

Todor Alexandrov Todor Aleksandrov Poporushov ( Bulgarian/ Macedonian: Тодор Александров Попорушов; 4 March 1881 – 31 August 1924), anglicised as Todor Alexandrov, was a Macedonian Bulgarian revolutionary, Bulgarian army officer, pol ...

and graduated in chemistry in Geneve. Afterwards Tsipushev returned to Radovish and worked there as a teacher, continuing his participation in the activity of IMARO. He was arrested several times by the Ottoman authorities and imprisoned for two years. At that time he worked subsequently as with

Gotse Delchev Georgi Nikolov Delchev (; ; 4 February 1872 – 4 May 1903), known as Gotse Delchev or Goce Delčev (''Гоце Делчев''),Originally spelled in older Bulgarian orthography as ''Гоце Дѣлчевъ''. - Гоце Дѣлчевъ. ...

Dame Gruev Damyan Yovanov Gruev (, , ; January 19, 1871 – December 23, 1906) was а Macedonian Bulgarian teacher, revolutionary and insurgent leader in the Ottoman regions of Macedonia and Thrace. He was one of the six founders of the Internal Macedonia ...

Boris Sarafov Boris Petrov Sarafov ( Bulgarian and ; 12 June 1872 – 28 November 1907) was a Bulgarian Army officer and revolutionary, one of the leaders of Supreme Macedonian-Adrianople Committee (SMAC) and of the pro-Bulgarian, rightist wing of the In ...

and

. During the Balkan Wars his cheta aided the Bulgarian Army. After the wars he continued to work in the Bulgarian administration in

Strumitsa Strumica (, ) is the largest city2002 census results
in English and Macedonian (PDF) in so ...

, but also as the

Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization The Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization (IMRO; ; ), was a secret revolutionary society founded in the Ottoman territories in Europe, that operated in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Founded in 1893 in Salonica, it initia ...

(IMARO) leader in the area. During the

First World War World War I or the First World War (28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918), also known as the Great War, was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War I, Allies (or Entente) and the Central Powers. Fighting to ...

he supported the Bulgarian army again and was prominent with his anti -

Serbomans Serbomans (Serbo-Croatian and , ''srbomani''; ; ) is a Bulgarian pejorative term used by Bulgarian nationalists for inhabitants in the region of Macedonia that claimed Serbian ethnicity (declared as Serbs) and supported Serbian national ideals u ...

activity. At the end of the war Tsipushev was captured by the English troops in the area and delivered to the Serbian authorities as war criminal. Tsipushev was sentenced to death, which sentence was substituted with 20 years prison and as a consequence he spent the next 19 years from his life in different Yugoslav prisons. After his liberation in 1938 he went back to Bulgaria. During Bulgarian annexation of

Vardar Banovina The Vardar Banovina, or Vardar Banate ( Macedonian and ; ), was a province ( banate) of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia between 1929 and 1941. History It was located in the southernmost part of the country, encompassing the whole of today's North Mace ...

between 1941 - 1944 he returned to Macedonia again. However, after 1944

Communist Bulgaria The People's Republic of Bulgaria (PRB; , NRB; ) was the official name of Bulgaria when it was a socialist state, socialist republic from 1946 to 1990, ruled by the Bulgarian Communist Party (BCP; ) together with its coalition partner, the Bul ...

and

Communist Yugoslavia The Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (commonly abbreviated as SFRY or SFR Yugoslavia), known from 1945 to 1963 as the Federal People's Republic of Yugoslavia, commonly referred to as Socialist Yugoslavia or simply Yugoslavia, was a country ...

began a policy of making Macedonia connecting link for the establishment of new

Balkan Federative Republic In late 19th and throughout the 20th century, the establishment of a Balkan Federation had been a recurrent suggestion of various political factions in the Balkans. The concept of a Balkan federation emerged in the late 19th century among left-w ...

and stimulating here a development of distinct

Slav Macedonian Macedonians ( ) are a nation and a South Slavic ethnic group native to the region of Macedonia in Southeast Europe. They speak Macedonian, a South Slavic language. The large majority of Macedonians identify as Eastern Orthodox Christians, ...

consciousness.Europe since 1945. Encyclopedia by Bernard Anthony Cook. , pg. 80

/ref> Tsipushev was expelled from Yugoslavia to Bulgaria, but as a concession to the Yugoslavian side, Bulgarian communist authorities agreed also with the recognition of a distinct Macedonian ethnicity as part of the Macedonian Bulgarians, population in the Bulgarian Macedonia. They made an attempt to gain Tsipushev on their side as collaborationist, but he refused. Because he openly opposed the official policy of

Macedonization Macedonian nationalism (, ), sometimes referred to as Macedonianism, is a general grouping of nationalist ideas and concepts among ethnic Macedonians that were first formed in the second half of the 19th century among separatists seeking the a ...

, he was repressed and exiled to the interior of Bulgaria. His memoirs called ''19 years in Serbian prisons'' issued in 1943 were banned and obliterated from the communists. At the end of the 1950s the Bulgarian Communist Party, however repealed its previous decision and adopted a position denying the existence of a “Macedonian” nation. Afterwards Tsipushev was partially rehabilitated. He died in 1968 in

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 ...

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 ...

. With the

fall of Communism The revolutions of 1989, also known as the Fall of Communism, were a revolutionary wave of liberal democracy movements that resulted in the collapse of most Marxist–Leninist governments in the Eastern Bloc and other parts of the world. Th ...

his book was issued in Republic of Macedonia in 2003 and reissued in Bulgaria in 2006.

Sources

Ципушев, К. 19 години в сръбските затвори. Спомени, София, 1943

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Tsipushev, Kosta 1877 births 1968 deaths People from Radoviš Bulgarian revolutionaries Members of the Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization Bulgarian people of the Balkan Wars Bulgarian people of World War I Bulgarian people imprisoned abroad Prisoners and detainees of Yugoslavia 20th-century Bulgarian educators Macedonian Bulgarians Bulgarian Men's High School of Thessaloniki alumni Burials at Central Sofia Cemetery Bulgarian nationalists Revolutionaries from the Ottoman Empire Emigrants from the Ottoman Empire to Bulgaria