If you ignore the sign you come down with another case of the Red Army. Much like chicken pox turning into shingles, it's going to be worse the second time...
First Balkan War : Greeks and Bulgarians are allies against the Turks Second Balkan War (2 months later) : Turks and Greeks are allies against the Bulgarians World War One (next year) : Turks and Bulgarians are allies against the Greeks
Most Bulgarian soldiers felt demoralized to have sided with the former invaders (ottomans) , to add worst: fighting and killing fellow orthodoxes (Greeks, Russians, Serbians etc)
@@saguntum-iberian-greekkons7014 One of the reasons is - Greece and Serbia start mass killing spree to clear those new lands they stole from bulgarians and ottomans. Hell even Romania killed all bulgarian government in the land they stole. My great grandma was witness to that in Romania...
@@saguntum-iberian-greekkons7014 this make no sense. Both sides are christians. allies or central powers. Also turkey mostly fought british in middle east and gallipolli. Nothing really side by side with bulgarians Who would be "sad" for fighting orthodox "brothers" with Ottoman invaders.
Most of his trip was lovely, lots of beautiful countryside and interesting people. There was just this one nasty bit at the end, can't let that spoil the whole vacation.
@@yavortashev 20.5% romanian, 37.9% bulgarian, 35.8% turks and tartars in 1930. Wikipedia said it was 25-28% romanian in 1940 but otherwise dont give a specific breakdown.
As a Serb I can say that every Balkan nation had(has) aspiration to neighboring territory for the last 1000 years. Today we are all depopulated and this is visible traveling throughout our beautiful landscapes. I've been travelling from Vidin to Sofia for almost 300km. Deserted villages and cities. The same situation in Serbia, Macedonia, Bosnia, Croatia.
No offense but speak for yourself. Bulgaria has never really had aspirations for serb territory. In medieval times Serbia always tended to side with the eastern Roman empire and that is why bulgaria was forced to invade to change leadership. If you guys didn't sell out it would not have ever happened.
“Bulgaria wished it was bigger and was still bitter about losing the second Balkan war. The central powers promised to make all of Bulgaria’s wildest dreams come true if they helped. So they signed on and together they knocked out Serbia.” Also: this enraged everyone, who punished Bulgaria severely
Important to mention that a lot of these lands had or were perceived to have a bulgarian majority so it was not only seen as a matter of prestige or power for the Tsar and Government, but also as a matter for national unification (which the people demanded for the majority of the 3rd bulgarian tsardom) and that every prime minister and cabinet had to pursue no matter the cost. This simply additional info on why the Bulgarian state pursued the San-Stefano borders and got itself into several wars. I'm not justifying anything that happened because of this fixation
When I look at ethnic Balkan map I see all bulgarians neatly confined to the Bulgarian borders. Is this just a happy coincidence that state finalized around all bulgarians at last?
@@MH-hu5pi They'll tell you Macedonia (modern day N.Macedonia, and parts of Greek Aegean Macedonia) is Bulgarian, and their people are Bulgarians. Don't believe me? Just look at the news at the ongoing Albanian demographic count, and see how they're trying really hard to persuade the Macedonian minority there to write themselves as Bulgarians.
@@MH-hu5pi This is just a plainly stupid (and wrong) statement by any metric, even Serbian and Greek sources of and sencuses from the distant past of right now show Bulgarian minorities still in their borders
@@yoavcohen2218 all Bulgarian Jews were saved. Bulgaria was the only European nation aligned with Germany that managed to save 100% of its Jews. The reason it isn’t venerated like Denmark, though, is because Bulgaria still deported Jews in territories it occupied immediately preceding and during the war to Nazi camps, since they were not Bulgarian citizens.
It's wild to think there's a timeline out there where Bulgaria has Mediterranean ports if only Bulgaria, Greece, and Serbia had managed to hold off declaring war on eachother
@@rafail2303 Mhmm. That doesn't exempt the possibility in an alternate timeline that Greece or Serbia wouldn't have made a move. The Balkans just be that way sometimes. Hence my wording. It would've required ALL parties involved to not make an aggressive move for this timeline to play out
Yep. All Bulgaria neighbors are very dumb. If they hold to this mighty alliance - they will gain soo much land from Ottomans, to the point of imagination. But greed is greed and Greece for example never recover massive amount of enslaved land and population in Anatolia...
@@rafail2303 Serbia and Greece were clever - they put army on Bulgaria new freed land and start harassing and some time killing local bulgarians civilians. To provoke war! Very clever and effective!
Bulgaria was called Balkan Prussia and the country dont have captured flag in battle,if a flag is captured you have to dismiss the whole devision ,that's the law,while Bulgaria captured flags from,British empire,Russian empire,French empire,ottoman empire,Italy,Greece,Serbia,romania,the third Reich they are all kept in the national military history museum in sofia
There was another incident regarding religious issues. Around the same time of Bulgaria's semi-indepedence from the Ottomans following the Russo-Turkish war of 1878, the Bulgarians created the Bulgarian Exarchate, which to put it mildly turned the Bulgarian Church into an independent Patriarchate. This created a fear within the Orthodox hierarchy, including the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople, since it created the first example of ethnophyletism, where the Church was bound by national criterions, not by ecclestiastical ones (a heresy in the Orthodox Christian world). Following the creation of the Bulgarian Exarchate, this created the opportunity to bolster the Bulgarian Church as a means of Bulgarian expansion in Ottoman lands that had Bulgarian population at that time, including Macedonia, creating the Macedonian Struggle, in which Greeks and Bulgarians fought in Ottoman lands to decide the fate of the land. Ultimately, the Young Turk Revolution and the subsequent Balkan and World War wars ended Bulgarian aspirations in Macedonia, and, gradually, the Bulgarian Exarchate ceased to exist after its Church was eventually turned into a Patriarchate during the Communist rule in the modern borders of Bulgaria.
@@Pasteurpipette You would be surprised that not only it was the home of the first autocephalous Orthodox Church, the founder of the Bulgarian alphabet (that everyone is calling "Cyrillic"), the oldest Germanic ally (since the times of Charlemagne) which are the major European nations such as Franks, Low countries, Germany, English (Anglo-Saxons) and Austrians. Also, Bulgaria was the driving factor of the creation and establishing the national-liberation identities to Serbia, Bosnia, Croatia and the leading factor of the resistance to the Ottoman Empire in Wallachia but that's what you get when your history is written by your neighbors who were such a young and delusional creations that they never stopped to pursue grandeur so that they could serve the ambitions to a few major powers... Such is life "History belongs to the Victors". Also Bulgarians are not Slavs. The So called Slavs are central-east Europe, Polaks, Czechs (Bohemia), Slovaks, Silesian's, Pomeranian's, Lithuanians and Latvians. The only Slavic people that are established in the Balkans are the Servii - Serbs. That is due to the old Bulgarian borders before the Magyar invasion when Bulgaria ruled the Avar conquest of what we call today Hungary and parts of Czechia and Slovakia (Moravia). It pains me that such a rich on history, culture and exploits nation is laughed and overlooked and not only Bulgaria but Poland, Nordic countries, central Asian countries, Caucasian countries and etc. too! Every "History" channel or book is preaching the "Glory" of England, France, Germany, Russia and U.S.A. and like the rest of the world never existed...
@@aaronmarks9366 Neither Turks nor Slavs despite some of the ruling dynasties been from Pecheneg or Mongol heritage. Bulgarians descend from the old Bulgar-Bolgar which were Indo-Iranian and today Bulgarians are predominant Indo-European. Little to none is known for sure of where and when they appeared and the same can be said for many like the Fino-Ugrik, Sumerians, Armenians and so on and so on. Fact is that modern history knows very little of the ancient times and the little we know is based on the classical literature which was heavily influenced by personal or state interests (not much is changed today regarding this...) and the free interpretations of wall paintings- pictographs/pictograms. Turks have insanely interesting myths about their origin too. I can only recommend you to look for the myths of Gokturk origins, it's fascinating to say the least.
This was very rich coming from the Greeks, who used the privileges granted to them by the Ottomans(the Patriarchate of Constantinople being recognized as the only church and leader of all Christians in the borders of the Ottoman empire) to make attempts at Hellenisation of the non-greek parts of the Ottoman empire and using the orthodox church to do so. They even worked with Ottoman officials against their orthodox brethren because they didn't make church liturgies in Greek. The peak of their hypocrisy was the Council of Constantinople in 1872 where the Greek patriarchs of Constantinople, Antioch, Alexandria, and Cyprus condemned the Bulgarian Echsarcy for wanting to restore its status as an autocephalous church, which it had since 870 until the fall of the second Bulgarian Tsardom under the Ottomans, on the basis that it was founded upon national ideals even though the Patriarchate of Constantinople had used its position to propagate Hellenistic ideals for the past 5 centuries. A very good historical example of the thief yelling catch the thief XD
we actually got south dobrudja after we joined in…. also we couldnt get macedonia and south thrace and we were under commie occupation so yea what a “ great” turn of events
@@dukedase7 The communists certainly didn’t allow for legitimate elections. So if you believe in democracy, they were under a system of government enforced by an imperialist foreign power (USSR). If you’re more of a “realist”, stop disenfranchising yourself.
Good video in general. Maybe, though, it would be good to mention that those lands that Bulgaria desired were inhabited in their majority by Bulgarians, which was confirmed by the Ottoman Sultan just 10 years before the liberation, with the establishment of the Bulgarian Church there. In his ferman, he recognized that in those lands, lived mainly Bulgarians. One more thing worth mentioning is that the Bulgarian army actually joined the Soviets in their fight against the German army, which was a positive point to leave us some gains after the war.
‘Came down with a case of the Red Amy’ lol brilliant 👍 Although your videos tend to be either 3/4 mins or 10 mins I often have to pause them to read the extra jokes within. My personal favourite was the ‘time for a purge’ clock joke in one of the Stalin videos. Thanks and keep them coming 👍
He s had a few crackers over the years "Monday the 4th of never" "I tried" the Czech president who was incharge for less then a week The Spanish flu holding up a sign saying hola! I laughed far more than i should have at that😮
Fun Fact: Tsar Ferdinand of Bulgaria and Archduke Franz Ferdinand absolutely hated each other, to the point that when travelling on the same train the Tsar wouldn't let the Archduke go through his carriage to get to the dining car
@@g.d.1722 Actually he wasn't that bad in private, he had anger management problems that tended to get triggered when the Hapsburg court mistreated his wife, which they did pretty much every time she was at court or a formal event and he never forgave anyone for how they treated her (she wasn't seen as 'royal' enough to be worthy of marriage to a Hapsburg)
The ever so elusive Southern Dobruja, giving trouble to map makers, because so little is ever written about it. At 0:09 it shouldn't be part of the 1914 map. At 0:20 it should be part of the map. (At 0:24 the whole of Dobruja should be dark red.) At 1:25, 1:39, 1:43, 2:14 it should be part of the map.
Thank you for making this video! I'm Bulgarian and I think it's very well made. Our history is very interesting and full of events and thanks to people like you it becomes more popular!
I heard that the Bulgarian king (tzar) was German at the time, and he wanted the war despite most of Bulgarians being against it. He supposedly later said that he was proud of what he had accomplished for the German (or Germanic) race, meaning that he successfully alienated two close Slavic nations that could have been friendly towards each other.
That happens when you have a german monarch - he don't give a shiet about his people, cuz he thinks its a conquest game, and knows he can run back to Germany if he screws up.
@@meganoobbg3387 It is really more about the person not the nationality. Romania also opted for a german monarch. And honestly they did work for the country.
Yeah, Germans and Austrians really tried (and succeeded) to devide Serbia and Bulgaria. Austrians convinced King Milan to attack Bulgaria in 1885, even though Serbs were not interested in war against Bulgaria. A lot of Serbs thought they were mobilized to JOIN Bulgarians, not invade them.
@@Smartness_itself Много лесно даваш определения... Не е вярно, ЗАЩОТО: На дали са го видели повече от 10 000 българи, което е далеч от цяла България и защото докато не спрем да се радваме на това, че са ни споменали във нечие видео (голямата работа), което сигурно дори е било предложено от българин и което не говори много добре за нас никой НИКОГА няма да ни уважава! Благодаря за вниманието и приятен ден!
@@dimitartodorov1352 Ти явно си пълен идиот и малоумник. Всеки нормален човек, който обича държавата си, ще се радва, че някой чужденец ѝ е обърнал внимание и е направил видео за нея, и за историята ѝ, стига казаното да е вярно. Видеото говори за история! Това са факти! Няма добро или лошо! И няма да ни уважават, докато има хора като теб! Това е истината!
Man, History Matters is really good at finding topics that have been bothering me on such a low key that I've never put the question into words, and then fixing it in 3 minutes and a laugh or two. I just love this channel!
Thank you so much for the attention, much love from a long time Bulgarian viewer 🇧🇬❤ You were so close to posting this on Bulgaria's Independence day (22 Sept), I see this video almost as an independence day special, thank you so much!
Little corrections: the province that existed between 1878 and 1885 was called Eastern Rumelia, not just Rumelia. Also, in 1885 Bulgaria had to fight a war with Serbia, who got upset over the new borders with the unification, which was won by Bulgaria. In 1908, when Bulgaria proclaimed its independence from the Ottoman Empire, it became a Tsardom, not a Kingdom, with Ferdinand I becoming the new Tsar.
yes thanks for bringing up the 1885 moronic war of King Milan of Serbia that his own people didnt support and that created a massive distrust between the two nations.
Конечно, но вас не существовало бы без России. И теперь мы, русские, хотим, чтобы вы вернулись в состав Османской империи. Так как вы - оказались неблагодарными тварями. Аллах Акбар!
@@goodwinwitcher And Russia got its culture and alphabet from Bulgaria. May Allah return all of Russia to the Golden Horde again by your logic. And not to mention that as bugarian I understand what you wrote but sadly I do not speak russian so I can't return your comment in russian.
A few points: 1. The San Stefano treaty was a preliminary treaty and did not have any legal power. It has been thrown around by Russians as some great gift from them but it was never their intention to establish such a big country (plus they had a treaty with AH on the matter). 2. The San Stafano borders did not come out of thin air though - they were based (largely) on the Bulgarian Exarchate borders from 1870 (minus parts ceded to Serbia (Nis) and Romania (Northern Dobrudja). The lands part of the Exarchate were considered lands where the predominant Christian population was Bulgarian. This was the ideal for united Bulgaria up to 1944. A few etnic cleansings leading to immigration waves to the USA/Australia/inner Bulgaria plus swaps of population between Bulgaria and Greece in the 20/30s changed this ethnic map by 1941. 3. Bulgaria lost lands because it was the last Balkan country to have its national state and had to challenge its neighbours which were liberated and had a form of nation state at least 60-70 years earlier which gave them a great advantage politically.
Militarily the Bulgarians were superior tho, that's the whole point of them attacking two countries at the same time. The reason they lost was more a diplomatic one.
You forgot to mention how Bulgaria defeated Serbia in the 1885 war, so your claim that the Bulgarians lost because they got independence 60-70 years later makes no sense. The main reason for the loss of territory is the imprudence of Ferdinand I, who pursued Germanic interests more than Bulgarian interests.
The Bulgarians weren’t the last to have a nation state they practically had a state since 1878 just like Serbia and Romania. On the other hand it was Albanians that were the last to have theirs, albeit a partitioned one
For this channel to exist, there must be a database of country, territory, and other land outlines broken down by date. And that alone boggles my mind. This particular video reinforces the necessity of such a database for the success of this channel.
It's not a scratch, it has made them mentally unstable, and recently they've been doing a lot idiotic things to their neighbors, especially towards Macedonia (aka, the brainwashed Bulgarians as they claim).
One more aspect, to make things even more complicated: Romania considered itself entitled to receive southern Dobrudja after 2nd Balkan War (although not inhibited by Romanians) for the Aromanian (vlach) population from the Balkan peninsula, which they considered to be more or less Romanians. They were located mostly in Macedonia and Albania, far and isolated from Romania. They claimed the territory for them and tried to relocate all aromanians/vlachs there afterwords, up to about one third of the population of Southern Dobrudja. Later, Romania was pressured by Germany to give back the land to Bulgarians and a population exchange took place - Bulgarians from Northern Dobrudja moved south and Aromanians were moved to Romania. Romania had no claim to Southern Dobrudja after ww2 because basically there were no Romanians or vlachs left there. All their attention was focus to get Transylvania, which they did. I live in Romania and my grandfather was an Aromanian from Greek Macedonia, who moved to Southern Dobrudja (my father was born there) and later relocated in Romania part of the population exchange.
As a Bulgarian I hope Romanians don't have grudge or animosity towards bulgarians about southern dobrogea, I think we both should be friends and brothers because we are so damn similar as people, no matter we used to fight and argue, bad should be forgiven and friendship and prosperity ought be propagated... Greetings 🇧🇬❤️🇷🇴
@@promeneuzivotu117 I meant that they mustered a very large amount of troops relative to their population. They also fought other countries, not just Serbia.
Ah yes, Bulgaria - the country who won all the battles and lost all the wars from 1878 onwards. 19th and 20th century Bulgarian military history is amazing, you should do some more detailed videos on it!
2:05 Seeing the ghost of King George I of Greece following the end of the first Balkan War made me realize that History Matters had made proper research on that subject.
one small comment at 1:43 - no, all of "these nations" (Montenegro, Serbia and Greece) didn't have a longstanding dislike of each other, since they were on the same side, basically since the Ottomans arrived to Balkan Peninsula in 14-th century. On the other hand, Serbia and Greece did had some issues with Bulgarians, before the First Balkan war.
Some puts it lightly. Bulgars were teh reason Byzantium was so weak from 200 years of fighting that when it finally won in the late 1100s it was far too weak to fend off the massive Seljuk invasion and 4th crusade Betrayal, that eventually led to its collapse, and 400 years of occupation by Ottomans. Basically Bulgars did so much damage they fucked up the chances for serbs, Greeks or croats to be able to fend off the Turkish horde. Kinda how everyone blames the Hunnic Turks attacks in the 300s, and Germanic migrations in 400s for the fall of Rome, Bulgar turkic attacks in the 800s-1100s weakened Byzantium to fall to the Seljuk/Ottoman turks in the 1400s
I can’t believe when I see the amount of subscribers I see you have. An important lesson for everyone to learn. Content is content. Bs or not people will watch it. And it might even generate more feedback when you purposely get something wrong. When you’re right you won’t be corrected but when you’re wrong someone will jump in to check you.
Pretty good video and a pretty nice Idea I must say, especially nice as a Bulgarian to get a video about us. Although it would also be nice to cover Medieval Bulgaria as it's importance is largely overlooked, but one can't be picky. I must say a big reason for Bulgaria being screwed over would be that it was in the middle of all these powers and their claims pretty much were all shared with one or another power. Despite that, Bulgaria still managed to remain the largest South Slavic country though, so you can say it's not all bad. Also, It's sad you forgot to mention the Serbo-Bulgarian war which is the war that actually helped legitimize the claim over Eastern Rumelia, as before that no power recognized the merger between the two. After the swift Bulgarian victory though, the Great Powers decided to relent on that matter. Then there's the Second Balkan War which isn't all that simple either. For example, Serbia had promised to give up large portions of today's North Macedonia after the war, which is an agreement it did not honor in the end, thus leading to the war. As for Greece? Claims there weren't entirely legitimate I'll admit, but that was a case of more so wanting Thessaloniki more than anything. Then there's Romania which wanted compensation for Bulgarian gains to the south by getting a border town (Silistra) from Bulgaria. Also, The Second Balkan War actually didn't go that bad for Bulgaria at first, if anything it went somewhat good considering that Bulgaria had no time to prepare and the monarch was an incompetent fool that started the war too early. After Romania joined though and the border with them was unguarded, then the Ottomans and yeah that was a complete loss. But that's all I have to add on to really, all other points are pretty much accurate.
Just copple observations: Bulgaria broke pact first. Serbs liberated Macedonia and Albania themselfs. Bulgarians pursued Turks towards Constantinopole, and then stopped to rest and celebrate, allowing Turks to regroup and strike back. Serbs have had to come and help. But when Serbs asked for help in case of Austro-Hungarian attack on Serbia (in order to expel Serbs from newely liberated Adriatic and Ionic coast and form puppet state of Albania) - Bulgarians and their german "tzar" refused, broking a pact. So Serbes retreated from Adriatic coast, but kept other territory that they self liberated, since "allies" screw them up.
@@ivancertic5197 Except the Bulgarians did not stop to celebrate allowing the Turks to regroup, the Bulgarians chased the Turks all the way to the outskirts of Constantinople before being pushed back. As for Serbian help? While it did arrive, it was downright minimal at best and didn't do much to change the tide of the war. Don't also forget that Bulgaria focused it's main forces in Thrace because that was the main front, what the Serbs and Greeks fought were garrisons, but what Bulgaria fought was the Ottoman army itself. As for the pact? Serbia broke it first. Because Bulgaria actually pushed the issue of Macedonia before that whole drama began, and only after it was made clear that Serbs wouldn't give it back (And that they already started a mass slaughter there) did the Bulgarians not support Serbia for Albania. Fact is, Serbia didn't honor it's alliance when it should have and instead went for a region with (AT THE TIME) a majority Bulgarian population. Not to mention the fact that Bulgaria statistically had the biggest army and the most casualties of the war, yet expanded the least out of all the Balkan powers. So how was any of this fair? I'm sorry man, but you gotta admit Serbia wasn't in the right here. Also, Serbian occupation of Macedonia was far from a liberation. It started a cruel campaign of Serbianization and Debulgarization of the region which lasted for decades and included many crimes against the Bulgarian majority of the region. So how is it a liberation if the region wasn't even Serb to begin with? If you ask me, the Ottomans treated Macedonia better than the Serbs did.
@@rawka_7929 ´´ It started a cruel campaign of Serbianization and Debulgarization of the region which lasted for decades and included many crimes against the Bulgarian majority of the region.´´ - It's hard now to say what were crimes, and what were legitimate action against VMRO terrorists and supporters. I wouldn't say that situation was the same as with Thracian Bulgarians, and yet i have impression that its perceived even worse amongst Bulgarians. And how much better was or would be treated Macedonia under Turks, it's shown precisely in that what happened to Thracian Bulgarians or Armenians, or nowdays Kurds.
I really hate being a pedant, but I'll still be one this time - yes, Bulgaria lost all its war gains at the end of WW1 plus Western Thrace plus some borderlands, as you showed, but what wasn't mentioned was that the small town of Svilengrad and a small patch of land around it, not far northwest of Edirne, was given to it in the peace treaty partitioning the Ottoman Empire. So Bulgaria got to walk away from both world wars with pieces of land it didn't have before it. (Even if for the first one it was a net loss)
Basically the great powers carved the borders on the balkans to maximize internal conflicts. After the first balkan war, the great powers decided to carve out Albania from the territories conquered by the serbs. The serbs were upset to they decided to keep the region of macedonia (which bulgarians were expecting to get). Bulgaria was upset it didn't get macedonia so it attacked Serbia but Serbia had signed a secret treaty with Greece so once bulgaria attacked Serbia, Greece attacked Bulgaria. Bulgaria tried to stay neutral in the second world war until it was pressured by Germany and promised southern Dobrudja if they joined on the side of Germany. It joined the war only in 1941.
Nah mate. New borders were drawn to create new nationstates that actually contained people of the same 'nation'. The great powers did a decent job, for once. Bulgars and Serbs and Russians just couldn't ever accept those limitations. And the Austro-Hungarian empire still needed to be dissolved of course so new nations could come into existence there, too.
Macedonia is in Greece get your facts right ,they did try to invade even there though. Bulgarians followed a hard method of Bulgarization and genocide on the Greeks in Macedonia and Thrace. Killing Greek leaders ,teachers ,priests,forcing Bulgarian language ,changing names of places among others. They even used WWII famine to black mail the populations to get Bulgarian identities
As a Bulgarian, this was pretty well done, thanks! If there's one thing I would add, it's that inbetween the wars, there was a fair amount of rebelling from the Bulgarians that were left outside the borders of Bulgaria. And a lot of massacaring by the Ottomans in retribution. So Bulgarians felt super-betrayed by the Great Powers for letting half of them remain "enslaved" by the Turks. This has been shaping Bulgarian public attitudes and foreign policy since 1878. It's also notable that one Bulgarian prime minister got kidnapped and tortured to death by the revolutionary organization for the Bulgarians left outside Bulgaria, because he agreed to give up on the goal of reclaiming Macedonia so that Bulgaria could join Yugoslavia. After his death that plan fell through, and so Yugoslavia has never managed to unite all the South Slavic nations.
You need to see the whole tennis tournament than... Bulgaria - established in 681 AD (arguably the oldest country in Europe) Have lost and gain A LOT MORE land through the ages than this video shows...
You misrepresented many things. Firstly, it was not just 'Greater Bulgaria', but United Bulgaria. The lands of San Stefano were not random, they roughly followed the borders of the Bulgarian Exarchate which encompassed most of the Bulgarian ethnic lands. The Bulgarians in Thrace and Macedonia that were left off in the Ottoman Empire continued to revolt against the Ottoman rule and it was a constant struggle to liberate those lands. Hundreds of thousands of Bulgarians from liberated Bulgaria and from (then) Turkish Thrace and Macedonia fought and died for this ideal. Secondly, Bulgaria did not attack Serbia just because it wanted more lands, but because Serbia and Bulgaria had signed a treaty before the war on how the lands should have been divided after the war, which the Serbs obviously broke. Also the attack was ordered unlawfully by the Tsar and when the government found out they ordered the army to halt, so the attack did not go well because of bad coordination in Bulgaria and not because of the Serbian army as it is implied. Also Bulgaria was not just allowed to unite with Rumelia. It is sth that Bulgarians from both sides achieved alone and fought a war in defense of the unification. Only after Bulgaria won the war, all of the Great powers decided to recognize it.
You committed a crime against your allies and now you play the victim card. This is so evil. Also, you were raised up with so many myths in Bulgaria. You call Bulgarians people who were and are Greeks speaking a slavic dialect you call bulgarian and others call ''macedonian''. Macedonia is part of greek history and greek history ferilized the whole world. Show respect to Greece.
@@jordantsak7683 I see you are still trolling with your toxic nationalism of how Fyromanians claim they are Ancient Macedonians. Modern Greece is nothing like Ancient one. Average Greek is only 174 cm tall which is much shorter than Serbs, Montenegrins, Bosnians... Yes, Bulgarians may not be that tall people as well but in Sofia average is almost 180 cm.
@@jordantsak7683 bro i dare u to go north macedonia really i dare u, as a bulgarian I understand them perfectly because 'macedonian' is a Bulgarian dialect that has nothing to do with Greece. Many people in the east of north macedonia even consider themselves bulgarian
I like how u guys speak on behalf of governments that do not care about u but the money they receive from foreigne governments. even if Bulgaria conquers entire world, NOTHING WILL CHANGE, cause elites will still abuse the rest 99.9999% of population....
History Matters and Oversimplied alone taught us more about history than our schools ever did. In fact, they should show these videos in schools, so it not only gets the kid's attention, but also gives them the gist of it and then they can go into more detail later on.
Soon history matters will have talked about everything that has happened, and so he will make his own history by becoming a leader in a country and conquering countries so he can keep making videos.
@@Nikblaster1980 I havd no idea what the nonsense you wrote was supposed to mean but having Hitler redraw borders by force and having those borders maintained is not a good thing and most of S Dobrujas inhabitants were turks and romanians who did not apreciate the border being redrawn the way it was.
@@AntoniuDraculea Exactly what you read dweeb. Dobrudzha has always been and will always be bulgarian. My family was there during the romanian occupation and have terrible stories to tell about it. The "nonsense" I wrote was a polite way of saying "Stay on your side of the river or get assfucked back to the stone age just like in ww1"
The borders of Bulgaria drawn in San Stefano weren't randomly drawn, these were lands with predominately Bulgarian population and were ruled for centuries by Bulgaria before the Ottoman invasion
@@HeroManNick132 Кърджали е, но да Смолян не е. Прочети в интернет не мога да ти кажа защо, може би защото така и така е бил само предварителен договор.
Bulgaria was not simply “allowed” to join Rumelia but did it completely independently against the will of the great powers and was attacked by the serbs because of it!
Honestly it's one of my favorite time periods, and I used to hate learning history (until I changed my mind later). Some known rulers from before and between the Middle Ages are Khan Asparuh, khan Krum, Tervel, Omurtagh, Ivan Asen, Simeon, Samuil. There's some 40 odd-something rulers if I remember correctly
20th century Bulgarian history in a nutshell: "The risk I took was calculated, but man, our math department is severely underfunded"
Bulgarian wacky adventures
Bulgaria saw one data point and assumed line go up forever.
That's a quote I'm going to be stealing and using just, like, all the time
To be fair, the risk paid off half of the times
Bulgarians always were very courageous and improvising.
In ww1 Ivan Kolev adapted cavalry to mechanical warfare
"Stalin told them to drop it and drop it, they did" whilst holding a sign that said SHUT UP had truly made my day.
Though he couldn’t get Tito to shut up.
And 70 years after Stalin's death they still have it dropped.
If you ignore the sign you come down with another case of the Red Army. Much like chicken pox turning into shingles, it's going to be worse the second time...
@@nusolog there it is, on the floor. Looking all lonely and forelorned.
That scene look like Stalin was going for the bad cop route
'Go to Bosnia, they said.' On behalf of all your fans in Bulgaria, another masterpiece.
existential turtle get out of here
do you still live in Bulgaria
No way exurbia lore
I do wish he had gone into the vast and rich history of the Bulgarian Empire, but that would be a far longer video, sadly.
Add to that, “Coming down with a case of the Red Army.”
First Balkan War : Greeks and Bulgarians are allies against the Turks
Second Balkan War (2 months later) : Turks and Greeks are allies against the Bulgarians
World War One (next year) : Turks and Bulgarians are allies against the Greeks
A typical day in the Balkan my friend.
@@Makis_Salamakis I would know, im turkish
Most Bulgarian soldiers felt demoralized to have sided with the former invaders (ottomans) , to add worst: fighting and killing fellow orthodoxes (Greeks, Russians, Serbians etc)
@@saguntum-iberian-greekkons7014 One of the reasons is - Greece and Serbia start mass killing spree to clear those new lands they stole from bulgarians and ottomans. Hell even Romania killed all bulgarian government in the land they stole. My great grandma was witness to that in Romania...
@@saguntum-iberian-greekkons7014 this make no sense. Both sides are christians. allies or central powers. Also turkey mostly fought british in middle east and gallipolli. Nothing really side by side with bulgarians Who would be "sad" for fighting orthodox "brothers" with Ottoman invaders.
I loved the joke with Franz Ferdinand. "Go by Bosnia, they said" and it went surprisingly well for him.
Most of his trip was lovely, lots of beautiful countryside and interesting people. There was just this one nasty bit at the end, can't let that spoil the whole vacation.
@@johnladuke6475hey at least he got carried back in a luxury wooden box.
Too bad Franz Ferdinand's life got ended by The Killers
@@morbidsearchoh well Black Hand was deemed as a terrorist organisation for a reason.
2:23
“Dear friends,
Please be Gentle.”
Your loving friend, Bulgaria
This channel is gold lmao
Another reason why Bulgaria kept southern debrusia was because they didn't join in on the invasion of the soviet union, unlike Romania.
@@cockroacherd yeah that’s another factor but it’s also interesting that The USSR wanted to place soviet troops in Bulgaria but we refused
Also, Southern Dobruja was inhabited by Bulgarians and Romania had no buisness controling it in the first place.
Do you have any idea how much of the population was Bulgarian?! Check Wikipedia
@@KekusMagnusThe Soviets have never cared about ethnic boundaries, look at Nagorno-Karabakh
@@yavortashev 20.5% romanian, 37.9% bulgarian, 35.8% turks and tartars in 1930. Wikipedia said it was 25-28% romanian in 1940 but otherwise dont give a specific breakdown.
i think its quite special how this channel is able to cover so much ground in such a short timeframe in decent detail. certainly a work of art.
The power of James Bissonnette infuses every episode!
It's the signs.
As a Serb I can say that every Balkan nation had(has) aspiration to neighboring territory for the last 1000 years. Today we are all depopulated and this is visible traveling throughout our beautiful landscapes. I've been travelling from Vidin to Sofia for almost 300km. Deserted villages and cities. The same situation in Serbia, Macedonia, Bosnia, Croatia.
North Macedonia.* You lost a Greek ally.
Абсолютно си прав брате. Винаги всички ние сме имали слаби и продажни политици
@@HeroManNick132 West Bulgaria* another ally gone 😂
@@krasimirmihaylov9551 gluposti
No offense but speak for yourself. Bulgaria has never really had aspirations for serb territory. In medieval times Serbia always tended to side with the eastern Roman empire and that is why bulgaria was forced to invade to change leadership. If you guys didn't sell out it would not have ever happened.
I think a 10 minutes history on the Balkan wars could be a great video idea
They cover it in the video about the Ottoman decline.
Plus I don’t think he will ever go back to the 10 minute format. It’s been so long since the last one.
You can’t cover the Balkan wars in 10 minutes smh
@@MH-jg6vk This channel has covered way more challenging topics in 10 minutes.
@@MH-jg6vk Yeah, more like 4 or so.
As A Bulgarian I want to thank you for making a video about my country. Keep up the good work!
whats 1 thing abt bulgaria u want more ppl to know?
I heard that your country has the fastest population decline. How is life in your country?
@@bowser3017depressing but the EU definitely has its benefits
@@Average_bulgarian8528good to know
@@bowser3017 Its not bad. The fact that we are in the Eu helps a lot. The standard of life in improving
As a bulgarian I have to make the obligatory "I'm a bulgarian" comment. Thanks for mentioning us History Matters. I adore your humour.
Bulgaria sounds fun to say
“Bulgaria wished it was bigger and was still bitter about losing the second Balkan war. The central powers promised to make all of Bulgaria’s wildest dreams come true if they helped. So they signed on and together they knocked out Serbia.”
Also: this enraged everyone, who punished Bulgaria severely
- Oversimplified
Oversimplified but yeah
-Missing individual
Oversimplified
Overused reference 🥱
Important to mention that a lot of these lands had or were perceived to have a bulgarian majority so it was not only seen as a matter of prestige or power for the Tsar and Government, but also as a matter for national unification (which the people demanded for the majority of the 3rd bulgarian tsardom) and that every prime minister and cabinet had to pursue no matter the cost.
This simply additional info on why the Bulgarian state pursued the San-Stefano borders and got itself into several wars. I'm not justifying anything that happened because of this fixation
When I look at ethnic Balkan map I see all bulgarians neatly confined to the Bulgarian borders. Is this just a happy coincidence that state finalized around all bulgarians at last?
@@MH-hu5pi They'll tell you Macedonia (modern day N.Macedonia, and parts of Greek Aegean Macedonia) is Bulgarian, and their people are Bulgarians. Don't believe me? Just look at the news at the ongoing Albanian demographic count, and see how they're trying really hard to persuade the Macedonian minority there to write themselves as Bulgarians.
@@MH-hu5pi This is just a plainly stupid (and wrong) statement by any metric, even Serbian and Greek sources of and sencuses from the distant past of right now show Bulgarian minorities still in their borders
Not really... absolutly not true
Stop trying to justify nationalist behaviour
@@MH-hu5pi
after all the genocide yes. there are less bulgarians in serbia and greece. my mothers family had to leave greece cos of this...
"There was only one way of asking this: asking politely... also war."
I love this channel. XD
As a Bulgarian I literally screamed when I saw that you made a video about Bulgaria. Thank you, it was a really nice video.
buwulgarian 👉👈
@@Ass_of_Amalekstop
Hello Bulgaria beautiful country
Now he should do one about how most of Bulgaria's Jews were saved during world war two. It's an interesting topic.
@@yoavcohen2218 all Bulgarian Jews were saved. Bulgaria was the only European nation aligned with Germany that managed to save 100% of its Jews. The reason it isn’t venerated like Denmark, though, is because Bulgaria still deported Jews in territories it occupied immediately preceding and during the war to Nazi camps, since they were not Bulgarian citizens.
It's wild to think there's a timeline out there where Bulgaria has Mediterranean ports if only Bulgaria, Greece, and Serbia had managed to hold off declaring war on eachother
Macedonia is a hell of a drug
But Bulgaria is the one that declared war on greece and Serbia in the second Balkan war and the 2 world wars
@@rafail2303 Mhmm. That doesn't exempt the possibility in an alternate timeline that Greece or Serbia wouldn't have made a move. The Balkans just be that way sometimes. Hence my wording. It would've required ALL parties involved to not make an aggressive move for this timeline to play out
Yep. All Bulgaria neighbors are very dumb. If they hold to this mighty alliance - they will gain soo much land from Ottomans, to the point of imagination. But greed is greed and Greece for example never recover massive amount of enslaved land and population in Anatolia...
@@rafail2303 Serbia and Greece were clever - they put army on Bulgaria new freed land and start harassing and some time killing local bulgarians civilians. To provoke war! Very clever and effective!
Pozdrowienia z Polski dla braci Bulgarow!
Поздрави от България за Полските братя!
Don't make me get out the polish remover
The subtle humor on this channel keeps me coming back for more.
"Go to Bosnia, they said. It's gonna be fun, they said"
I think the Ten Minute British History series was the best thing ever done on RUclips.
2:33 "Fortunately for Ferdinand, not Franz Ferdinand that is..."
I'm dead🤣 (Also the archduke for who knows how many times)
Loved this episode man. Anything to do with the crazy Bulgarian/Balkan history is worth watching!
Bulgaria was called Balkan Prussia and the country dont have captured flag in battle,if a flag is captured you have to dismiss the whole devision ,that's the law,while Bulgaria captured flags from,British empire,Russian empire,French empire,ottoman empire,Italy,Greece,Serbia,romania,the third Reich they are all kept in the national military history museum in sofia
There was another incident regarding religious issues. Around the same time of Bulgaria's semi-indepedence from the Ottomans following the Russo-Turkish war of 1878, the Bulgarians created the Bulgarian Exarchate, which to put it mildly turned the Bulgarian Church into an independent Patriarchate. This created a fear within the Orthodox hierarchy, including the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople, since it created the first example of ethnophyletism, where the Church was bound by national criterions, not by ecclestiastical ones (a heresy in the Orthodox Christian world). Following the creation of the Bulgarian Exarchate, this created the opportunity to bolster the Bulgarian Church as a means of Bulgarian expansion in Ottoman lands that had Bulgarian population at that time, including Macedonia, creating the Macedonian Struggle, in which Greeks and Bulgarians fought in Ottoman lands to decide the fate of the land. Ultimately, the Young Turk Revolution and the subsequent Balkan and World War wars ended Bulgarian aspirations in Macedonia, and, gradually, the Bulgarian Exarchate ceased to exist after its Church was eventually turned into a Patriarchate during the Communist rule in the modern borders of Bulgaria.
I do find it odd that there was such resistance, considering that Bulgaria had the first autocephalous Orthodox Church. But cool addition!
@@Pasteurpipette You would be surprised that not only it was the home of the first autocephalous Orthodox Church, the founder of the Bulgarian alphabet (that everyone is calling "Cyrillic"), the oldest Germanic ally (since the times of Charlemagne) which are the major European nations such as Franks, Low countries, Germany, English (Anglo-Saxons) and Austrians. Also, Bulgaria was the driving factor of the creation and establishing the national-liberation identities to Serbia, Bosnia, Croatia and the leading factor of the resistance to the Ottoman Empire in Wallachia but that's what you get when your history is written by your neighbors who were such a young and delusional creations that they never stopped to pursue grandeur so that they could serve the ambitions to a few major powers... Such is life "History belongs to the Victors". Also Bulgarians are not Slavs. The So called Slavs are central-east Europe, Polaks, Czechs (Bohemia), Slovaks, Silesian's, Pomeranian's, Lithuanians and Latvians. The only Slavic people that are established in the Balkans are the Servii - Serbs. That is due to the old Bulgarian borders before the Magyar invasion when Bulgaria ruled the Avar conquest of what we call today Hungary and parts of Czechia and Slovakia (Moravia). It pains me that such a rich on history, culture and exploits nation is laughed and overlooked and not only Bulgaria but Poland, Nordic countries, central Asian countries, Caucasian countries and etc. too! Every "History" channel or book is preaching the "Glory" of England, France, Germany, Russia and U.S.A. and like the rest of the world never existed...
@@domingesDo Bulgarians consider themselves Slavicized Bulgar Turks, rather than Slavs?
@@aaronmarks9366 Neither Turks nor Slavs despite some of the ruling dynasties been from Pecheneg or Mongol heritage. Bulgarians descend from the old Bulgar-Bolgar which were Indo-Iranian and today Bulgarians are predominant Indo-European. Little to none is known for sure of where and when they appeared and the same can be said for many like the Fino-Ugrik, Sumerians, Armenians and so on and so on. Fact is that modern history knows very little of the ancient times and the little we know is based on the classical literature which was heavily influenced by personal or state interests (not much is changed today regarding this...) and the free interpretations of wall paintings- pictographs/pictograms. Turks have insanely interesting myths about their origin too. I can only recommend you to look for the myths of Gokturk origins, it's fascinating to say the least.
This was very rich coming from the Greeks, who used the privileges granted to them by the Ottomans(the Patriarchate of Constantinople being recognized as the only church and leader of all Christians in the borders of the Ottoman empire) to make attempts at Hellenisation of the non-greek parts of the Ottoman empire and using the orthodox church to do so. They even worked with Ottoman officials against their orthodox brethren because they didn't make church liturgies in Greek. The peak of their hypocrisy was the Council of Constantinople in 1872 where the Greek patriarchs of Constantinople, Antioch, Alexandria, and Cyprus condemned the Bulgarian Echsarcy for wanting to restore its status as an autocephalous church, which it had since 870 until the fall of the second Bulgarian Tsardom under the Ottomans, on the basis that it was founded upon national ideals even though the Patriarchate of Constantinople had used its position to propagate Hellenistic ideals for the past 5 centuries. A very good historical example of the thief yelling catch the thief XD
Bulgaria! The only country that gained land after losing ww2.
But didn't get what it wanted in the end.
we actually got south dobrudja after we joined in…. also we couldnt get macedonia and south thrace and we were under commie occupation so yea what a “ great” turn of events
southern dobrudja for 60 years of communist occupation. was it worth it? @@ioanhogwarts4953
@@ioanhogwarts4953 "commie occupation"
@@dukedase7 The communists certainly didn’t allow for legitimate elections. So if you believe in democracy, they were under a system of government enforced by an imperialist foreign power (USSR). If you’re more of a “realist”, stop disenfranchising yourself.
Good video in general. Maybe, though, it would be good to mention that those lands that Bulgaria desired were inhabited in their majority by Bulgarians, which was confirmed by the Ottoman Sultan just 10 years before the liberation, with the establishment of the Bulgarian Church there. In his ferman, he recognized that in those lands, lived mainly Bulgarians.
One more thing worth mentioning is that the Bulgarian army actually joined the Soviets in their fight against the German army, which was a positive point to leave us some gains after the war.
‘Came down with a case of the Red Amy’
lol brilliant 👍
Although your videos tend to be either 3/4 mins or 10 mins I often have to pause them to read the extra jokes within.
My personal favourite was the ‘time for a purge’ clock joke in one of the Stalin videos.
Thanks and keep them coming 👍
He s had a few crackers over the years
"Monday the 4th of never"
"I tried" the Czech president who was incharge for less then a week
The Spanish flu holding up a sign saying hola! I laughed far more than i should have at that😮
Who could have thought a long-running winning streak of 1 win could end so quickly!?
I love the subtle humor of this channel!
Hey, at that point they had won every war in the history of their nation.
Fun Fact: Tsar Ferdinand of Bulgaria and Archduke Franz Ferdinand absolutely hated each other, to the point that when travelling on the same train the Tsar wouldn't let the Archduke go through his carriage to get to the dining car
Franz Ferdinand was universally hated by everyone. He is said to have been a bit of a psychopath.
@@g.d.1722 Actually he wasn't that bad in private, he had anger management problems that tended to get triggered when the Hapsburg court mistreated his wife, which they did pretty much every time she was at court or a formal event and he never forgave anyone for how they treated her (she wasn't seen as 'royal' enough to be worthy of marriage to a Hapsburg)
Habsburg*
For some reason I always retain so much more from these 3 minute videos than I did from any history lesson
Same.
Thats called low attention span
@@elgame6263you're ruthless but so true 😂
@@elgame6263everyone has it actually
@@Willlynillydillybased profile pic btw
The ever so elusive Southern Dobruja, giving trouble to map makers, because so little is ever written about it.
At 0:09 it shouldn't be part of the 1914 map.
At 0:20 it should be part of the map.
(At 0:24 the whole of Dobruja should be dark red.)
At 1:25, 1:39, 1:43, 2:14 it should be part of the map.
😂You're talking like it's medieval HRE. He's just incompetent.
Nice spot
Bulgaria: "I've lost so much land!"
Hungary: "Amateurs."
For Hungary it was different because most of their land lost wasn't populated by Hungarians
@@sos4iThe Hungarians still wanted the land
As a romanian i fell very sorry for the hungarians😢
@@sos4i They were still Hungarian lands for a millenium
Vatican city: these children are arguing over nothing!
3:34 That very much took me off guard lmao
"Go to Bosnia, they said"
I swear the tombstone lines are always what get more laughing
Another example of why I support this channel through Patreon. Because I want to see serious and under-appreciated content like this
Are you James Bisonette? Or Kelly money-maker?
Eat a dong
Make a video on why Northern Epirus is not a part of Greece despite being controlled by Greece for 3 times in it's modern history.
Greece? You mean South Albania? 🙃
@@aaronmarks9366You mean North-West Greece?
@@rarescevei8268 You mean West Macedonia?
Its northern Epirus as its a territory I am from there hoding both Greek and Albanian passports :P @@aaronmarks9366
@@aaronmarks9366You mean West Eastern Roman Empire?
love your video ,you are carrying me in history class
How? This man's videos are about obscure stuff
@@alvaroprieto2092 guy has told me about the british empire,ww1,ww2 and many more
"Politely asking... (pregnant pause) also war" Beautifully timed, as always.
I love Bulgaria, its people and its history 🙏🏻🙏🏻🙏🏻 underrated
Gypsys
Read about their atrocities on the Greeks and I am not sure you are gonna like them a lot.
@@KK-ku5zv And Macedonians
I am part Greek it's fine@@KK-ku5zv
who?@@poganpagan
2:37
Welcome to
Belgium
Est.: Like 3 weeks ago
The signs you have to freeze-frame to see the sarcasm.
Worth it.
Thank you for making this video! I'm Bulgarian and I think it's very well made. Our history is very interesting and full of events and thanks to people like you it becomes more popular!
The decision of the Bulgarian leadership to start The 2nd Balkan War is known militarily as “a bruh moment”.
Yes Adrianople could be a greek christian city ruled by Bulgaria today, a great roman heritage.....Ordin in bulgarian.
I heard that the Bulgarian king (tzar) was German at the time, and he wanted the war despite most of Bulgarians being against it. He supposedly later said that he was proud of what he had accomplished for the German (or Germanic) race, meaning that he successfully alienated two close Slavic nations that could have been friendly towards each other.
That happens when you have a german monarch - he don't give a shiet about his people, cuz he thinks its a conquest game, and knows he can run back to Germany if he screws up.
@@meganoobbg3387 It is really more about the person not the nationality. Romania also opted for a german monarch. And honestly they did work for the country.
Yeah, Germans and Austrians really tried (and succeeded) to devide Serbia and Bulgaria. Austrians convinced King Milan to attack Bulgaria in 1885, even though Serbs were not interested in war against Bulgaria. A lot of Serbs thought they were mobilized to JOIN Bulgarians, not invade them.
Brother, all of Bulgaria rejoices for being mentioned in a history video ❤
Не е вярно!
@@dimitartodorov1352 Глупак ли си? Защо да не е вярно?
@@Smartness_itself Много лесно даваш определения... Не е вярно, ЗАЩОТО:
На дали са го видели повече от 10 000 българи, което е далеч от цяла България и защото докато не спрем да се радваме на това, че са ни споменали във нечие видео (голямата работа), което сигурно дори е било предложено от българин и което не говори много добре за нас никой НИКОГА няма да ни уважава! Благодаря за вниманието и приятен ден!
@@dimitartodorov1352 Ти явно си пълен идиот и малоумник. Всеки нормален човек, който обича държавата си, ще се радва, че някой чужденец ѝ е обърнал внимание и е направил видео за нея, и за историята ѝ, стига казаното да е вярно. Видеото говори за история! Това са факти! Няма добро или лошо! И няма да ни уважават, докато има хора като теб! Това е истината!
Man, History Matters is really good at finding topics that have been bothering me on such a low key that I've never put the question into words, and then fixing it in 3 minutes and a laugh or two. I just love this channel!
Thank you so much for the attention, much love from a long time Bulgarian viewer 🇧🇬❤
You were so close to posting this on Bulgaria's Independence day (22 Sept), I see this video almost as an independence day special, thank you so much!
Little corrections: the province that existed between 1878 and 1885 was called Eastern Rumelia, not just Rumelia. Also, in 1885 Bulgaria had to fight a war with Serbia, who got upset over the new borders with the unification, which was won by Bulgaria. In 1908, when Bulgaria proclaimed its independence from the Ottoman Empire, it became a Tsardom, not a Kingdom, with Ferdinand I becoming the new Tsar.
yes thanks for bringing up the 1885 moronic war of King Milan of Serbia that his own people didnt support and that created a massive distrust between the two nations.
@@BozaCukuranovic3223exactly, Serbia says we Bulgaria stabbed them but it was Serbia who backed stabbed Bulgaria first
Конечно, но вас не существовало бы без России. И теперь мы, русские, хотим, чтобы вы вернулись в состав Османской империи. Так как вы - оказались неблагодарными тварями. Аллах Акбар!
@@goodwinwitcher And Russia got its culture and alphabet from Bulgaria. May Allah return all of Russia to the Golden Horde again by your logic. And not to mention that as bugarian I understand what you wrote but sadly I do not speak russian so I can't return your comment in russian.
@@petarkraev3896 Отговори му на български, той ще те разбере.
Spot-on timing for this posting, since I just came back from my first visit to the country 🙂 Very interesting and pleasant it was indeed.
Great info combined with great humour. Thanks as always. From a subscriber. 🙂
A few points:
1. The San Stefano treaty was a preliminary treaty and did not have any legal power. It has been thrown around by Russians as some great gift from them but it was never their intention to establish such a big country (plus they had a treaty with AH on the matter).
2. The San Stafano borders did not come out of thin air though - they were based (largely) on the Bulgarian Exarchate borders from 1870 (minus parts ceded to Serbia (Nis) and Romania (Northern Dobrudja). The lands part of the Exarchate were considered lands where the predominant Christian population was Bulgarian. This was the ideal for united Bulgaria up to 1944. A few etnic cleansings leading to immigration waves to the USA/Australia/inner Bulgaria plus swaps of population between Bulgaria and Greece in the 20/30s changed this ethnic map by 1941.
3. Bulgaria lost lands because it was the last Balkan country to have its national state and had to challenge its neighbours which were liberated and had a form of nation state at least 60-70 years earlier which gave them a great advantage politically.
Militarily the Bulgarians were superior tho, that's the whole point of them attacking two countries at the same time. The reason they lost was more a diplomatic one.
Well, they did lose also on a battlefield, big time.
You forgot to mention how Bulgaria defeated Serbia in the 1885 war, so your claim that the Bulgarians lost because they got independence 60-70 years later makes no sense. The main reason for the loss of territory is the imprudence of Ferdinand I, who pursued Germanic interests more than Bulgarian interests.
The Bulgarians weren’t the last to have a nation state they practically had a state since 1878 just like Serbia and Romania. On the other hand it was Albanians that were the last to have theirs, albeit a partitioned one
Funny thing that Austria still got Bosnia as proposed by Russia, despite they forgot to support Russia at Berlin Congress.
For this channel to exist, there must be a database of country, territory, and other land outlines broken down by date. And that alone boggles my mind. This particular video reinforces the necessity of such a database for the success of this channel.
Love Bulgaria from Italy 🇮🇹❣️🇧🇬
🇧🇬💙🇮🇹
Haha, love Italy from bulgaria
Bulgaria is such an interesting country with a rich History I would love to see more about this country ❤ from 🇫🇷
@ISLAMMEHMEDOVshut up turk they are European and christian so they are better than you
@ISLAMMEHMEDOVsleve ?
@ISLAMMEHMEDOV um... ok?
@ISLAMMEHMEDOV like shirts sleves ?
@ISLAMMEHMEDOV shitlum 💀
As a non-Bulgarian, I can confirm this is fascinating
their fakw history ia fascinating?
@@AlexMkd1984your probably Serbian or greek
bulgar 🤢
@@TexasRange4 He is Vardarskian. He is capitalizing the "Mkd" on his name.
@@TexasRange4he is Alex Makedonski 😅😅😅 epic troll 🧌
Bulgaria's history is the definition of "tis, but a scratch" and managed to survive
I see you everywhere 💀
It's not a scratch, it has made them mentally unstable, and recently they've been doing a lot idiotic things to their neighbors, especially towards Macedonia (aka, the brainwashed Bulgarians as they claim).
WE are wayy too hard to kill somehow. We are the cockroach lion
We will be gone in half a century tho, so don't worry
@@nevyanplamenov5409 That's not true.
I did, in fact, enjoy this episode. Thank you for wondering about that. It was informative and clarifying.
One more aspect, to make things even more complicated: Romania considered itself entitled to receive southern Dobrudja after 2nd Balkan War (although not inhibited by Romanians) for the Aromanian (vlach) population from the Balkan peninsula, which they considered to be more or less Romanians. They were located mostly in Macedonia and Albania, far and isolated from Romania.
They claimed the territory for them and tried to relocate all aromanians/vlachs there afterwords, up to about one third of the population of Southern Dobrudja.
Later, Romania was pressured by Germany to give back the land to Bulgarians and a population exchange took place - Bulgarians from Northern Dobrudja moved south and Aromanians were moved to Romania.
Romania had no claim to Southern Dobrudja after ww2 because basically there were no Romanians or vlachs left there. All their attention was focus to get Transylvania, which they did.
I live in Romania and my grandfather was an Aromanian from Greek Macedonia, who moved to Southern Dobrudja (my father was born there) and later relocated in Romania part of the population exchange.
As a Bulgarian I hope Romanians don't have grudge or animosity towards bulgarians about southern dobrogea, I think we both should be friends and brothers because we are so damn similar as people, no matter we used to fight and argue, bad should be forgiven and friendship and prosperity ought be propagated...
Greetings 🇧🇬❤️🇷🇴
2:56 that genuinely jump scared me
Seeing one victory and thinking you’re on a roll is the perfect example of reaching the wrong conclusion due to a small sample size
As land i can confirm i lost Bulgaria
At least they eventually got Southern Dobruja back. They really tried their hardest in WW1.
I would not call the stabbing of weakend Serbia in the back as "tried their hardest".
@@promeneuzivotu117 I meant that they mustered a very large amount of troops relative to their population. They also fought other countries, not just Serbia.
@@capncake8837 yeah they also jumped on Romania.
@@promeneuzivotu117 Serbia attacked Bulgaria first, it was revenge
@@vinceguerenskithat was the fault of the Obrenović dynasty that whanted to console their power at all cost.
Ah yes, Bulgaria - the country who won all the battles and lost all the wars from 1878 onwards. 19th and 20th century Bulgarian military history is amazing, you should do some more detailed videos on it!
2:05 Seeing the ghost of King George I of Greece following the end of the first Balkan War made me realize that History Matters had made proper research on that subject.
one small comment at 1:43 - no, all of "these nations" (Montenegro, Serbia and Greece) didn't have a longstanding dislike of each other, since they were on the same side, basically since the Ottomans arrived to Balkan Peninsula in 14-th century. On the other hand, Serbia and Greece did had some issues with Bulgarians, before the First Balkan war.
Some puts it lightly. Bulgars were teh reason Byzantium was so weak from 200 years of fighting that when it finally won in the late 1100s it was far too weak to fend off the massive Seljuk invasion and 4th crusade Betrayal, that eventually led to its collapse, and 400 years of occupation by Ottomans. Basically Bulgars did so much damage they fucked up the chances for serbs, Greeks or croats to be able to fend off the Turkish horde. Kinda how everyone blames the Hunnic Turks attacks in the 300s, and Germanic migrations in 400s for the fall of Rome, Bulgar turkic attacks in the 800s-1100s weakened Byzantium to fall to the Seljuk/Ottoman turks in the 1400s
Dope video on Bulgaria definitely should post more
Yes, finally a video about Bulgaria. 🇧🇬🇧🇬🇧🇬
Watching from Bulgaria, great video mate, keep it up❤❤
Same
I can’t believe when I see the amount of subscribers I see you have. An important lesson for everyone to learn. Content is content. Bs or not people will watch it. And it might even generate more feedback when you purposely get something wrong. When you’re right you won’t be corrected but when you’re wrong someone will jump in to check you.
As a Bulgarian I am happy someone famous made a video about us
That how failed state
Bulgaria is
As a Serb I am also happy that someone covers the history of the Balkan nations.
bulgar 🤢
@@micuna5743 macedon🤮
Pretty good video and a pretty nice Idea I must say, especially nice as a Bulgarian to get a video about us. Although it would also be nice to cover Medieval Bulgaria as it's importance is largely overlooked, but one can't be picky.
I must say a big reason for Bulgaria being screwed over would be that it was in the middle of all these powers and their claims pretty much were all shared with one or another power. Despite that, Bulgaria still managed to remain the largest South Slavic country though, so you can say it's not all bad.
Also, It's sad you forgot to mention the Serbo-Bulgarian war which is the war that actually helped legitimize the claim over Eastern Rumelia, as before that no power recognized the merger between the two. After the swift Bulgarian victory though, the Great Powers decided to relent on that matter.
Then there's the Second Balkan War which isn't all that simple either. For example, Serbia had promised to give up large portions of today's North Macedonia after the war, which is an agreement it did not honor in the end, thus leading to the war. As for Greece? Claims there weren't entirely legitimate I'll admit, but that was a case of more so wanting Thessaloniki more than anything. Then there's Romania which wanted compensation for Bulgarian gains to the south by getting a border town (Silistra) from Bulgaria.
Also, The Second Balkan War actually didn't go that bad for Bulgaria at first, if anything it went somewhat good considering that Bulgaria had no time to prepare and the monarch was an incompetent fool that started the war too early. After Romania joined though and the border with them was unguarded, then the Ottomans and yeah that was a complete loss.
But that's all I have to add on to really, all other points are pretty much accurate.
In the second to last paragraph you want to say the Second Balkan War.
@@Samuil-iq6eb Ah, thank you. I thought I did but Ig I was wrong.
Just copple observations: Bulgaria broke pact first. Serbs liberated Macedonia and Albania themselfs. Bulgarians pursued Turks towards Constantinopole, and then stopped to rest and celebrate, allowing Turks to regroup and strike back. Serbs have had to come and help. But when Serbs asked for help in case of Austro-Hungarian attack on Serbia (in order to expel Serbs from newely liberated Adriatic and Ionic coast and form puppet state of Albania) - Bulgarians and their german "tzar" refused, broking a pact. So Serbes retreated from Adriatic coast, but kept other territory that they self liberated, since "allies" screw them up.
@@ivancertic5197 Except the Bulgarians did not stop to celebrate allowing the Turks to regroup, the Bulgarians chased the Turks all the way to the outskirts of Constantinople before being pushed back. As for Serbian help? While it did arrive, it was downright minimal at best and didn't do much to change the tide of the war. Don't also forget that Bulgaria focused it's main forces in Thrace because that was the main front, what the Serbs and Greeks fought were garrisons, but what Bulgaria fought was the Ottoman army itself.
As for the pact? Serbia broke it first. Because Bulgaria actually pushed the issue of Macedonia before that whole drama began, and only after it was made clear that Serbs wouldn't give it back (And that they already started a mass slaughter there) did the Bulgarians not support Serbia for Albania. Fact is, Serbia didn't honor it's alliance when it should have and instead went for a region with (AT THE TIME) a majority Bulgarian population. Not to mention the fact that Bulgaria statistically had the biggest army and the most casualties of the war, yet expanded the least out of all the Balkan powers. So how was any of this fair? I'm sorry man, but you gotta admit Serbia wasn't in the right here.
Also, Serbian occupation of Macedonia was far from a liberation. It started a cruel campaign of Serbianization and Debulgarization of the region which lasted for decades and included many crimes against the Bulgarian majority of the region. So how is it a liberation if the region wasn't even Serb to begin with? If you ask me, the Ottomans treated Macedonia better than the Serbs did.
@@rawka_7929
´´ It started a cruel campaign of Serbianization and Debulgarization of the region which lasted for decades and included many crimes against the Bulgarian majority of the region.´´
- It's hard now to say what were crimes, and what were legitimate action against VMRO terrorists and supporters. I wouldn't say that situation was the same as with Thracian Bulgarians, and yet i have impression that its perceived even worse amongst Bulgarians.
And how much better was or would be treated Macedonia under Turks, it's shown precisely in that what happened to Thracian Bulgarians or Armenians, or nowdays Kurds.
Also War! I love the punch lines. Thanks for another history lesson, on history I never knew or thought of.
I really hate being a pedant, but I'll still be one this time - yes, Bulgaria lost all its war gains at the end of WW1 plus Western Thrace plus some borderlands, as you showed, but what wasn't mentioned was that the small town of Svilengrad and a small patch of land around it, not far northwest of Edirne, was given to it in the peace treaty partitioning the Ottoman Empire. So Bulgaria got to walk away from both world wars with pieces of land it didn't have before it. (Even if for the first one it was a net loss)
If only we could all find someone as loyal as James Bissonette.
Ikr.
I did not expect that video! Thank you very much.
Basically the great powers carved the borders on the balkans to maximize internal conflicts.
After the first balkan war, the great powers decided to carve out Albania from the territories conquered by the serbs. The serbs were upset to they decided to keep the region of macedonia (which bulgarians were expecting to get). Bulgaria was upset it didn't get macedonia so it attacked Serbia but Serbia had signed a secret treaty with Greece so once bulgaria attacked Serbia, Greece attacked Bulgaria.
Bulgaria tried to stay neutral in the second world war until it was pressured by Germany and promised southern Dobrudja if they joined on the side of Germany. It joined the war only in 1941.
Nah mate. New borders were drawn to create new nationstates that actually contained people of the same 'nation'. The great powers did a decent job, for once.
Bulgars and Serbs and Russians just couldn't ever accept those limitations. And the Austro-Hungarian empire still needed to be dissolved of course so new nations could come into existence there, too.
Macedonia is in Greece get your facts right ,they did try to invade even there though. Bulgarians followed a hard method of Bulgarization and genocide on the Greeks in Macedonia and Thrace. Killing Greek leaders ,teachers ,priests,forcing Bulgarian language ,changing names of places among others. They even used WWII famine to black mail the populations to get Bulgarian identities
As a Bulgarian, this was pretty well done, thanks!
If there's one thing I would add, it's that inbetween the wars, there was a fair amount of rebelling from the Bulgarians that were left outside the borders of Bulgaria. And a lot of massacaring by the Ottomans in retribution. So Bulgarians felt super-betrayed by the Great Powers for letting half of them remain "enslaved" by the Turks. This has been shaping Bulgarian public attitudes and foreign policy since 1878.
It's also notable that one Bulgarian prime minister got kidnapped and tortured to death by the revolutionary organization for the Bulgarians left outside Bulgaria, because he agreed to give up on the goal of reclaiming Macedonia so that Bulgaria could join Yugoslavia. After his death that plan fell through, and so Yugoslavia has never managed to unite all the South Slavic nations.
0:50
'Tell us what to do' :D
Love this channel
this video has felt like watching a tennis match
You need to see the whole tennis tournament than... Bulgaria - established in 681 AD (arguably the oldest country in Europe) Have lost and gain A LOT MORE land through the ages than this video shows...
You misrepresented many things.
Firstly, it was not just 'Greater Bulgaria', but United Bulgaria. The lands of San Stefano were not random, they roughly followed the borders of the Bulgarian Exarchate which encompassed most of the Bulgarian ethnic lands. The Bulgarians in Thrace and Macedonia that were left off in the Ottoman Empire continued to revolt against the Ottoman rule and it was a constant struggle to liberate those lands. Hundreds of thousands of Bulgarians from liberated Bulgaria and from (then) Turkish Thrace and Macedonia fought and died for this ideal.
Secondly, Bulgaria did not attack Serbia just because it wanted more lands, but because Serbia and Bulgaria had signed a treaty before the war on how the lands should have been divided after the war, which the Serbs obviously broke. Also the attack was ordered unlawfully by the Tsar and when the government found out they ordered the army to halt, so the attack did not go well because of bad coordination in Bulgaria and not because of the Serbian army as it is implied.
Also Bulgaria was not just allowed to unite with Rumelia. It is sth that Bulgarians from both sides achieved alone and fought a war in defense of the unification. Only after Bulgaria won the war, all of the Great powers decided to recognize it.
You committed a crime against your allies and now you play the victim card. This is so evil. Also, you were raised up with so many myths in Bulgaria. You call Bulgarians people who were and are Greeks speaking a slavic dialect you call bulgarian and others call ''macedonian''. Macedonia is part of greek history and greek history ferilized the whole world. Show respect to Greece.
@@jordantsak7683 I see you are still trolling with your toxic nationalism of how Fyromanians claim they are Ancient Macedonians. Modern Greece is nothing like Ancient one. Average Greek is only 174 cm tall which is much shorter than Serbs, Montenegrins, Bosnians... Yes, Bulgarians may not be that tall people as well but in Sofia average is almost 180 cm.
@@jordantsak7683 bro i dare u to go north macedonia really i dare u, as a bulgarian I understand them perfectly because 'macedonian' is a Bulgarian dialect that has nothing to do with Greece. Many people in the east of north macedonia even consider themselves bulgarian
I like how u guys speak on behalf of governments that do not care about u but the money they receive from foreigne governments. even if Bulgaria conquers entire world, NOTHING WILL CHANGE, cause elites will still abuse the rest 99.9999% of population....
Thank you for this episode!
If anyone's interested in Medieval Bulgarian history I strongly recommend Schwerpunkt's Balkan videos series
History Matters and Oversimplied alone taught us more about history than our schools ever did. In fact, they should show these videos in schools, so it not only gets the kid's attention, but also gives them the gist of it and then they can go into more detail later on.
I have a 1930's play. A Farce, where one of the running gags throughout is "Trouble in the Balkans again!".
The Balkans are very interesting to me. More Balkan videos please!
Can you also cover why Bolivia lost so much land?
Bolivia: Let me swim
Chile (Kratos voice): NO
bad posistioning and fucking around too much, pretty much the bulgaria of South America
@@akechijubeimitsuhide"the Gods of the Andes have abandoned me..."
Oil 🙂
Erosion?🤔
Great video as always.
0:31 trying to retake Byzantine cores for the reconquest CB I see
Soon history matters will have talked about everything that has happened, and so he will make his own history by becoming a leader in a country and conquering countries so he can keep making videos.
I love how it said there was only one way to gain them,politely asking.Also war.Needed this
"Go to Bosnia, they said" 😂 It sounded like a grand idea at the time
Bulgaria and Hungary every time there is a world war :
> *It's my time to shine*
> *Lose*
Gamer school of thought
I mean, Bulgaria did (sadly) get to keep S Dobruja after Hitler had Romania give it to Bulgaria.
So it did come ahead.
@@AntoniuDraculea Not sadly, its a very good thing to not have you family indoctrinated by Romanians just because they like good bread from our lands.
@@Nikblaster1980 I havd no idea what the nonsense you wrote was supposed to mean but having Hitler redraw borders by force and having those borders maintained is not a good thing and most of S Dobrujas inhabitants were turks and romanians who did not apreciate the border being redrawn the way it was.
@@AntoniuDraculea Exactly what you read dweeb. Dobrudzha has always been and will always be bulgarian. My family was there during the romanian occupation and have terrible stories to tell about it. The "nonsense" I wrote was a polite way of saying "Stay on your side of the river or get assfucked back to the stone age just like in ww1"
I never thought about this but now I'm glad that I know.
The borders of Bulgaria drawn in San Stefano weren't randomly drawn, these were lands with predominately Bulgarian population and were ruled for centuries by Bulgaria before the Ottoman invasion
Да, но интересно защо Кърджали и Смолян не е бил част от този договор?
@@HeroManNick132 Кърджали е, но да Смолян не е. Прочети в интернет не мога да ти кажа защо, може би защото така и така е бил само предварителен договор.
As an Englishman, i enjoyed this video!
Thanks for the video
When you lose a war but still gain territory: “Mission failed successfully”
One must imagine a greater Bulgaria.
Moar long form content plz! Thank you!
Bulgaria was not simply “allowed” to join Rumelia but did it completely independently against the will of the great powers and was attacked by the serbs because of it!
Now it would be interesting to know about Bulgaria during the middle ages, when they had more land and importance than they do now.
Honestly it's one of my favorite time periods, and I used to hate learning history (until I changed my mind later). Some known rulers from before and between the Middle Ages are Khan Asparuh, khan Krum, Tervel, Omurtagh, Ivan Asen, Simeon, Samuil. There's some 40 odd-something rulers if I remember correctly
@@galaxydeathskrill5607
It's not Khan, it's Kanas
Another great video 👍
3:07 “until they came down with a case of the Red Army” 😢
2nd Balkan War: "Hello, I'm Tzar Ferdinan, and this is Jackass"