Veliko Tarnovo, Bulgaria

Veliko Tarnovo (Cyrillic: Велико Търново, "Great Tarnovo", also Veliko Turnovo) is a city of approximately 65,000 people in North-central Bulgaria, 240km north-east of Sofia. It is the capital of the regional government (oblast) of the same name. The city sits upon the side of a ridge at the base of which runs the Yantra River. The river makes four sharp bends below the city and around three largely uninhabited hills: Tsaravets, Sveta Gora, and Trapezitsa.

Map
Information
Population	65,031(15 Mar 2004)
Area	530 sq/km
Altitude	320 m
Coordinates	43° 5′ 8″ N 25° 39′ 20″ E
Website	veliko-tarnovo.net

History

The known history of Veliko Tarnovo begins in the 4th millennium BC with evidence of human habitation in the western area of the city. Archaeological evidence of human settlement dating to the 3rd millennium BC has been found on Trapezitsa Hill. In the 2nd millennium BC the Thracians settled on the banks of the Yantra River below the steep sides of Tsaravets Hill. The hill was fortified by the Romans in the 1st century AD and in the 5th century the Byzantines, under Emperor Justinian, built a keep enclosing a small town on the hill.

In 681 AD a truce between Bulgarian khan Asparouh and Byzantine emperor Constantine IV established the First Bulgarian Empire. The kingdom flourished and expanded while hostility with Byzantium increased. In 972 Byzantine emperor John Tzimisces declared Northeast Bulgaria a Byzantine province. By 1018 all of Bulgaria was under Byzantine rule.

In 1185 the brothers Asen and Petar declared an uprising against the Byzantine Empire and the establishment of the Second Bulgarian Empire with Tarnovgrad, as Veliko Tarnovo was called then, as its capital. In 1186 the church "St. Dimitar" was inaugurated and Petar was proclaimed king. The city flourished and grew for 200 years until on July 17, 1393, Tarnovgrad is taken by the Ottoman Empire after a three-month siege and the fortress on the hill was destroyed. Tarnovgrad was the location of two uprisings against the Ottoman Empire in 1598 and 1686 that failed to liberate Bulgaria.

Tarnovgrad, along with the rest of Bulgaria, remained under Ottoman rule until the 19th century when national identity and culture re-asserted themselves as a strengthening resistance movement. The idea of the establishment of an independent Bulgarian church and nation motivated the 1875 and 1876 uprisings in Tarnovgrad. On April 23, 1876, the April uprising in the city marked the beginning of the end of the Ottoman occupation. It was soon followed by the Russo-Turkish War (1877-1878). On the 7th of July, 1877 Russian General Joseph Vladimirovich Gourko liberated Tarnovgrad. Bulgarian revolutionaries assisted by the Russian army ended the 480 year rule of the Ottoman Empire. In 1878 the Treaty of Berlin created a Principality of Bulgaria between the Danube and the Stara Planina range, with its seat at the old Bulgarian capital of Veliko Tarnovo. On April 17, 1879, the first National Assembly convened in Veliko Turnovo to ratify the countries new constitution, known as the Tarnovo Constitution, and officially make Sofia the capital of Bulgaria.

The old section of Veliko Tarnovo, Bulgaria.

In deference to the city's past, Tsar Ferdinand Saxe-Coburg Gotha chose the "Saint Forty Martyrs" church in Veliko Tarnovo as the place to declare the complete independence of Bulgaria on October 5, 1908.

In 1965 Tarnovo was renamed to Veliko Tarnovo.

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