Provadia ( ) is a town in northeastern

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 Varna Province, located in a deep

karst Karst () is a topography formed from the dissolution of soluble carbonate rocks such as limestone and Dolomite (rock), dolomite. It is characterized by features like poljes above and drainage systems with sinkholes and caves underground. Ther ...

gorge (Provadia

syncline In structural geology, a syncline is a fold with younger layers closer to the center of the structure, whereas an anticline is the inverse of a syncline. A synclinorium (plural synclinoriums or synclinoria) is a large syncline with superimposed ...

) along the Provadiya River not far from the

Bulgarian Black Sea Coast The Bulgarian Black Sea Coast (), also known as the Bulgarian Riviera, covers the entire eastern bound of Bulgaria stretching from the Romanian Black Sea resorts in the north to European Turkey in the south, along 378 km of ...

. It is the administrative centre of Provadia Municipality. As of December 2009, the town had a population of 12,901. Provadia served as a customs point since ancient times. It is well known for

salt In common usage, salt is a mineral composed primarily of sodium chloride (NaCl). When used in food, especially in granulated form, it is more formally called table salt. In the form of a natural crystalline mineral, salt is also known as r ...

mineral water Mineral water is water from a mineral spring that contains various minerals, such as salts and sulfur compounds. It is usually still, but may be sparkling ( carbonated/ effervescent). Traditionally, mineral waters were used or consumed at t ...

s, its mild

climate Climate is the long-term weather pattern in a region, typically averaged over 30 years. More rigorously, it is the mean and variability of meteorological variables over a time spanning from months to millions of years. Some of the meteoro ...

and a total of 70 km of

cave Caves or caverns are natural voids under the Earth's Planetary surface, surface. Caves often form by the weathering of rock and often extend deep underground. Exogene caves are smaller openings that extend a relatively short distance undergrou ...

s in the surrounding mountain walls. It can be reached by

train A train (from Old French , from Latin">-4; we might wonder whether there's a point at which it's appropriate to talk of the beginnings of French, that is, when it wa ... , from Latin , "to pull, to draw") is a series of connected vehicles th ...

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 ...

or Varna and there are also hourly buses from and to Varna, and a sophisticated road system.

History

Provadia is the site of Solnitsata, Europe's oldest prehistoric town. Excavations on city walls that started in 2005 reveal a town that dates back to between 4,700 BC and 4,200 BC. It is believed to have been the site of salt trading. Ovech fortress plan

Historical names of the medieval fortress, the ruins of which have been preserved until today, include ''Provat'' (

Byzantine Greek Medieval Greek (also known as Middle Greek, Byzantine Greek, or Romaic; Greek: ) is the stage of the Greek language between the end of classical antiquity in the 5th–6th centuries and the end of the Middle Ages, conventionally dated to the F ...

), ''Ovech'' (Овеч, Bulgarian), ''Provanto'' (

Italian Italian(s) may refer to: * Anything of, from, or related to the people of Italy over the centuries ** Italians, a Romance ethnic group related to or simply a citizen of the Italian Republic or Italian Kingdom ** Italian language, a Romance languag ...

) and ''Pravadı'' (

Turkish language Turkish ( , , also known as 'Turkish of Turkey') is the most widely spoken of the Turkic languages, a member of Oghuz languages, Oghuz branch with around 90 million speakers. It is the national language of Turkey and one of two official languag ...

). The Greek name and its adaptations stem from the word πρόβατο, ''provato'', "sheep", and the medieval Bulgarian name corresponds directly (being derived from овца, ''ovtsa'', with the same meaning). The fortress is open for visitors. During the Middle Ages the town was a key centre of the

First Bulgarian Empire The First Bulgarian Empire (; was a medieval state that existed in Southeastern Europe between the 7th and 11th centuries AD. It was founded in 680–681 after part of the Bulgars, led by Asparuh of Bulgaria, Asparuh, moved south to the northe ...

with an important monastery at the modern village of Ravna, the church of which was consecrated on 23 April 897, and a major

scriptorium A scriptorium () was a writing room in medieval European monasteries for the copying and illuminating of manuscripts by scribes. The term has perhaps been over-used—only some monasteries had special rooms set aside for scribes. Often they ...

of the Preslav Literary School. The rebel leader and subsequently emperor of Bulgaria Ivailo defeated a 10,000-strong Byzantine army near the city in 1279. During the

Second Bulgarian Empire The Second Bulgarian Empire (; ) was a medieval Bulgarians, Bulgarian state that existed between 1185 and 1422. A successor to the First Bulgarian Empire, it reached the peak of its power under Tsars Kaloyan of Bulgaria, Kaloyan and Ivan Asen II ...

it was the seat of a metropolitan in the 14th century. Ovech was captured by the Ottomans in 1388 after a long siege. In the 17th and 18th century Provadia was a commercial centre of the

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 ...

and was inhabited by many

Jewish Jews (, , ), or the Jewish people, are an ethnoreligious group and nation, originating from the Israelites of History of ancient Israel and Judah, ancient Israel and Judah. They also traditionally adhere to Judaism. Jewish ethnicity, rel ...

and Ragusan merchants. A 16th-17th-century

Dubrovnik Dubrovnik, historically known as Ragusa, is a city in southern Dalmatia, Croatia, by the Adriatic Sea. It is one of the most prominent tourist destinations in the Mediterranean Sea, Mediterranean, a Port, seaport and the centre of the Dubrovni ...

-style church still stands in the nearby village of Dobrina.

Today

South of Provadia lies the largest rock salt mine in Bulgaria, which is believed to be virtually inexhaustible with a

salt dome A salt dome is a type of structural dome formed when salt (or other evaporite minerals) intrudes into overlying rocks in a process known as diapirism. Salt domes can have unique surface and subsurface structures, and they can be discovered us ...

up to 3900 m high, and has been sporadically exploited for some 7500 years but industrially, through leaching, only since the 1960s; now it is part of Solvay Sodi AD in Devnya under the name Provadsol AD. Some of the leaching caverns are used for the storage of natural gas. Provadia is an important hub on both the Druzhba Gas Pipeline and as of 2015 abandoned South Stream. Other industrial facilities include a modern

biodiesel Biodiesel is a renewable biofuel, a form of diesel fuel, derived from biological sources like vegetable oils, animal fats, or recycled greases, and consisting of long-chain fatty acid esters. It is typically made from fats. The roots of bi ...

installation, a sunflower oil mill, a heavy earth-mover repair plant, shipbuilding machinery and textile factories. The town has a certain potential as a spa centre; its saline mineral water is allegedly similar in composition to the one at

Karlovy Vary Karlovy Vary (; , formerly also spelled ''Carlsbad'' in English) is a spa town, spa city in the Karlovy Vary Region of the Czech Republic. It has about 49,000 inhabitants. It is located at the confluence of the Ohře and Teplá (river), Teplá ri ...

. Places of interest include the Lambova Kashta ethnographical complex and ethnographical collections in Dobrina and Manastir villages, as well as cave monasteries and the ruins of the 9-10th-century Ravna Monastery, one of the most important centres of the Preslav Literary School, dubbed "language laboratory" by

Umberto Eco Umberto Eco (5 January 1932 – 19 February 2016) was an Italian Medieval studies, medievalist, philosopher, Semiotics, semiotician, novelist, cultural critic, and political and social commentator. In English, he is best known for his popular ...

for its graffiti by common folks in several languages and alphabets. Provadiya Hook in Greenwich Island,

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 for Provadia. The current mayor of the town is Dimo Dimov, elected in .

Municipality

Provadia is the seat of Provadia municipality (part of Varna Province), which also includes the following 24 villages:

References

External links

Official page (in Bulgarian)
{{Authority control Towns in Bulgaria Populated places in Varna Province