I'linh, l,\ I). W. lading,-,. Co|'} iiylii lj\ Key^t. 



native; bread drying in a village; stre;e;t: Bulgaria 



\icu L\ 



survived till 1825, when it was burnt by 

 the Greek Metropolitan Hilarion. 



When zvriting ivas employed for com- 

 mercial or other purposes, the Bulgarian 

 language zvas zvritten in Greek charac- 

 ters. 



The precursor of the literary revival 

 was the monk Paissi, of Mount Athos 

 (1762), whose Istoria Slaveno-Bolgar- 

 ski, a history of the Bulgarian tsars and 

 saints, recalled the long- forgotten glories 

 of the race. A number of Bulgarian 

 refugees and merchants at Bucharest in- 

 itiated the educational movement. The 

 result of their activity was the appear- 



ance of a series of simple educational 

 works — grammars, elementary treatises^ 

 etc. — written in the modern language. 



The opening of the first Bulgarian 

 school at Gabrovo in 1835 marked an 

 important era in the history of the na- 

 tional movement ; within the next ten 

 years some fifty Bulgarian schools were 

 at work, and education had ceased to be 

 a Greek monopoly. In the establishment 

 of schools a leading part was played by 

 Neophyt, a monk from Rilo monastery, 

 where the Slavonic ritual and language 

 had been maintained throughout the long 

 dark asres of alien domination. 



1 109 



