The Ottoman Empire and the Bulgarian question (1867-1878)

The Bulgarian Question and the Bulgarian revolts between 1867 and 1876 were the most important and decisive moments among the events that led to the Ottoman-Russian War of 1877-1878, which resulted in the irrevocable separation of Bulgaria from Ottoman rule. The main objective in writing this study and evaluation, which uses Ottoman, Bulgarian, and English primary sources on the Bulgarian Question, is to overcome this deficiency, and to address the Bulgarian Question and rebellion in all its aspects. The struggle of the Bulgarian community living in Istanbul in the first half of the nineteenth century, which started with the aim of free-religious worship in the mother tongue and having an independent church, turned the geography of Bulgaria, the first settlement of the Ottoman Empire in Rumelia, into a battlefield in just a quarter of a century. The "Bulgarian Question", one of the most critical nodes of the "Eastern Question", started as a church struggle in the 1840s and evolved into a stage aiming at political independence with the Bulgarian committee activities in the 1860s and 1870s. The failure of the rebellion organized by the committees led to the Ottoman-Russian War of 1877-1878, which would cause the empire to suffer heavy losses in material, moral, and geographical terms.