Macedonians (ethnic group)

This article is about the Slavic ethnic group; for the unrelated people of ancient and modern Greece, see Ancient Macedonians and Macedonians (Greek) respectively. For other meanings, see Macedonian.

Macedonians
Македонци
Makedonci

File:Maceds2.jpg Risto Krle · Blaže Koneski · Simon Trpčeski
Total population
1.7 million (est.)
Regions with significant populations
Republic of Macedonia	1, 297, 981
Australia	81, 899
Germany	61, 105
Italy	58, 460
United States	42, 812
Brazil	40, 859
Canada	31, 265
Serbia	25, 847
Switzerland	6, 415
Austria	5, 145
Bulgaria	5, 071
Albania	4, 697
Croatia	4, 270
Slovenia	3, 972
Bosnia and Herzegovina	2, 278
Greece	962
Rest of the world	unknown
Languages
Macedonian
Religion
Macedonian Orthodox, Muslim, Protestant, Serbian Orthodox, Other, None
Related ethnic groups
• Slavs   • South Slavs    • South-Eastern Slavs      • Ethnic Macedonians      • Bulgarians

The Macedonians ([Македонци] Error: {{Lang-xx}}: text has italic markup (help), transliteration: [Makedonci] Error: {{Lang}}: text has italic markup (help)) - also referred to as Macedonian Slavs - are a South Slavic ethnic group who are primarily associated with the Republic of Macedonia. They speak the Macedonian language, a South Slavic language. The overwhelming majority of ethnic Macedonians live in the Republic of Macedonia, although there are also communities in a number of other countries.

Population

Ethnic Macedonians in the Republic of Macedonia, according to the 2002 census

The vast majority of Macedonians live in the valley of the river Vardar, the central region of the Republic of Macedonia and form about 64.18% of the population of the Republic of Macedonia (1,297,981 people according to the 2002 census). Smaller numbers live in eastern Albania, southwestern Bulgaria, northern Greece, and southern Serbia, mostly abutting the border areas of the Republic of Macedonia. A large number of Macedonians have immigrated overseas to Australia, USA, Canada and in many European countries: Germany, UK, Italy, Austria, etc.

Macedonians abroad

Serbia

Serbia recognizes the Macedonian minority on its territory as a distinct ethnic group and counts them in its annual census. 25,847 people declared themselves Macedonians in the 2002 census.

Bulgaria

In the 2001 census in Bulgaria, 5,071 people declared themselves Macedonians. Krassimir Kanev, chairman of the NGO Bulgarian Helsinki Committee, claimed 15,000 - 25,000 in 1998 [1]. In the same report Macedonian nationalists (Popov et al, 1989) claim that 200,000 Macedonians live in Bulgaria. The Encarta Encyclopedia states that Macedonians make up 2.5% [2] of the total population, i.e. approximately 190,000, with no mention of how this figure is obtained, as it is evidently refuted by the latest census figures.

Macedonian groups in the country have reported official harassment (see Human rights in Bulgaria), with the Bulgarian Constitutional Court banning a small Macedonian political party in 2000 as separatist and Bulgarian local authorities banning political rallies. A political organization of the Macedonian minority in Bulgaria – UMO Ilinden-Pirin – claims that the minority has experienced a period of intensive assimilation and repression. It should be noted though that the Republic of Macedonia banned a similar pro-Bulgarian organization - Radko [3]- as separatist[4].

Albania

Albania recognizes ethnic Macedonians as an ethnic minority and delivers primary education in the Macedonian language in the border regions where most ethnic Macedonians live. In the 1989 census, 4,697 [5] people declared themselves ethnic Macedonians.

Ethnic Macedonian organizations allege that the government undercounts their number and that they are politically underrepresented - there are no ethnic Macedonians in the Albanian parliament. Some say that there has been disagreement among the Slav-speaking Albanian citizens about their being members of a Macedonian nation as a significant percentage of their number are Torbeshes and self-identify as Albanians. External estimates on the population of ethnic Macedonians in Albania include 10,000 [6], whereas ethnic Macedonian sources have claimed that there are 120,000 - 350,000 ethnic Macedonians in Albania [7].

Greece

See also: Slavic-speaking minority of Greece, Slavic language (Greece)

According to the latest Greek census held in 2001, there are 962 holders of citizenship of the Republic of Macedonia in Greece [8], although it should be noted that Greek census, like the censuses of some other EU member states (Italy, Spain, Denmark, France etc), do not take into account the ethnicity of the inhabitants of the country and that immigration has significantly increased since then. According to a study conducted for the Hellenic Migration Policy Institute (ΙΜΕΠΟ, IMEPO), in 2003 90,651 visa applications were made by citizens of the Republic of Macedonia, out of which 90,549 were granted and 102 rejected [9].

Claims regarding the existence of an ethnic Macedonian minority in Greece are denied by the Greek government. These claims are directed at the Slavic-speaking community of northern Greece, which dominantly self-identifies as Greek (not as ethnic Macedonian) [10] and defines its language as Slavic or Dopia (a Greek word for 'local'). This community numbered by 41,017 people according to the latest Greek census to pose a question on mother tongue held in 1951, and local authorities in Greece continue to acknowledge its existence. Depending on dialect, this language is classified by linguists as either Bulgarian or Macedonian. The size of this community today is estimated at between 100,000 and 200,000 by the Greek Helsinki Monitor, however, it also states that only an estimated 10,000-30,000 of these people will have a clear ethnic Macedonian national identity, basing this figure on the electoral performance of the only political party in Greece promoting the recognition and existence of an ethnic Macedonian minority in Greek Macedonia: the Rainbow, which was founded in September 1998 and received only 2,955 votes in Greek Macedonia in the 2004 elections [11]. The rest of the Slavic-speakers of northern Greece who don't self-identify as ethnic Macedonians, but as Greeks are often pejoratively referred to as Grkomani (Гркомани) by people in the Republic of Macedonia [12]. In 1993, at the hight of the name controversy and just before joining the UN, the government in Skopje claimed that there are between 230,000 and 270,000 Macedonians living in northern Greece, while the Athens government claimed there were around 100,000 Greeks in the republic.[13].

In October 2006 [14] [15] [16], the Rainbow Party in Greece reprinted the original ABECEDAR Slavic language primer in Thessaloniki, Greece, which was printed in Athens in 1925 and was based on the Florina dialect, as well as an up to date primer in the standardized Macedonian language and script as taught in the Republic of Macedonia and presented it to the Greek Ambassador to the OSCE, Mr Manesis [17] [18]. The book is reportedly being distributed to people self-identifying as ethnic Macedonians in northern Greece and it has been promoted in Athens and Thessaloniki [19].

Other countries

Significant Macedonian communities can also be found in the traditional immigrant-receiving nations, as well as in western European countries. It should be noted that census data in many European countries (such as Italy and Germany) does not take into account the ethnicity of émigrés from the Republic of Macedonia:

• Australia: The official number of Macedonians in Australia by birthplace or birthplace of parents is 82,000 (2001). The main Macedonian communities are found in Melbourne, Geelong, Sydney, Wollongong, Newcastle, Canberra and Perth. (The 2006 Australian Census included a question of 'ancestry' which, according to Members of the Australian-Macedonian Community, will result in a significant increase of 'ethnic Macedonians' in Australia) ;
• Canada: The Canadian census in 2001 records 31,265 individuals claimed wholly- or partly-Macedonian heritage in Canada (2001), although community spokesmen have claimed that there are actually 100,000-150,000 Macedonians in Canada [20] (see also Macedonian Canadians);
• USA: A significant Macedonian community can be found in the United States of America. The official number of Macedonians in the USA is 43,000 (2002). The Macedonian community is located mainly in Michigan, New York, Ohio, Indiana and New Jersey [21];
• Germany: There are an estimated 61,000 citizens of the Republic of Macedonia in Germany (2001);
• Italy: There are 58,460 citizens of the Republic of Macedonia in Italy (2004).

Other significant ethnic Macedonian communities can also be found in the other western European countries such as Austria, France, Switzerland, Netherlands, United Kingdom, etc.

History

Origins and identities

The geographical region of Macedonia, which spans portions of Bulgaria and Greece, and the Republic of Macedonia, has been inhabited by a variety of peoples, including Greeks, ethnic Macedonians, Albanians, Bulgarians, Jews, Turks, Serbs, Roma and Vlachs. The oldest recorded continuous presence are the Greeks (who are also referred to as Macedonians). By contrast, the latest ethnic group to emerge are the ethnic Macedonians, since the beginning of the 20th century.

In Bulgaria, and to some extent in Greece, the question of whether the Macedonians constitute a distinct ethnic group is controversial - the popular and the academic consensus in these countries regards them as a branch of the Bulgarians. The majority of international organizations consider modern ethnic Macedonians to be a distinct cultural, if not ethnic group.

Historians generally date the arrival of the Slavs in Macedonia and the Balkans to the 6th or 7th centuries AD. Ethnic Macedonians (assuming such a group existed) had little or no political national identity of their own until the 20th century. Any Macedonian identity during the Byzantine centuries is mostly expressed through the Greek medium. Medieval sources traditionally describe them as Bulgarians, a definition which survived well into the period of Ottoman rule as attested by the Ottoman archives and by descriptions of historians and travelers, for example Evliya Celebi and his Book of Travels. There is ample evidence that certain Macedonian Slavs considered themselves Serbs and that the northern regions of Geographic Macedonia were sometimes considered Serbian during the Ottoman period. [22]

During the Ottoman rule, there is no documentation attesting to a specific Macedonian national identity, be it Slav, Greek or otherwise, until the 20th century. From the 17th century, authors who declared themselves 'Macedonian' did so in the context of publishing Greek books and belonging to the Greek nation. 19th century ethnographers and travelers were generally united in identifying the Slavic speakers as Bulgarians, at least until the period between 1878 and 1912 when the rival propaganda of Serbia, Greece and Bulgaria succeeded in engaging the Slavophone population of Macedonia into three distinct parties, the pro-Serbian, the pro-Greek or the pro-Bulgarian (Henry Brailsford).

In the late 19th century and the beginning of 20th century, there were many clashes between Serbophile Chetniks (originating from Macedonia) and Bulgarophile Komitas from all over Slavic-speaking Macedonia, which shows the lack of a distinctive urge to form a Macedonian nation state.

The key events in the formation of a distinctive Macedonian identity thus emerged during the first half of the 20th century in the aftermath of the Balkan Wars of 1912-1913 and especially following the Second World War. A significant number of the ancestors of the present-day ethnic Macedonians did, in fact, identify themselves as Bulgarians until the early 20th century. A high profile example included Lazar Koliševski who succeeded Tito as President of Yugoslavia. Originally born Kolishev, he later adopted an ethnic Macedonian identity and chanded his surname as many others did in that period, such the first president of Republic of Macedonia Kiro Gligorov. Citizens of the Republic of Macedonia who identify as ethnic Bulgarians have nevertheless survived, and composed about 0.5% of the population at the last census. During the last few years in which Bulgaria saw rising economic prosperity and admition to the EU, many citizens of Republic of Macedonia applied for Bulgarian citizenship.[23] The last high profile example included the former premier and vice-president Ljubcho Georgievski.

Ancient period

The modern Macedonian nation lives mostly in present-day Vardar Macedonia, which in ancient times was inhabited by different ethnic groups such as Paionians, Dardani and other Thraco-Illyrian tribes. Although the present-day ethnic Macedonians are primarily the descendants of the Slavic tribes which settled Macedonia during the 6th and 7th century AD, it is presumed by some historians (Kanchov, Weigand) that these Slavic tribes probably absorbed some indigenous populations such as Greeks, who formed the majority of Macedonia's population before the Slavic arrivals [24] when they came upon in the area, and mixed with later groups such as Bulgars as stated by the Byzantine chroniclers Theophanes and Nicephorus.

Arrival of Slavs

The Slavs are considered to start entering the area of Balkan Peninsula in the VI century, passing the Danube river and attacking the Byzantine settlements, fortresses, towns and villages. Many areas of Balkan Peninsula were gradually populated with the following Slav tribes: Dragovites, Velegezites, Berzites, Sagudates, Rinhines and other. Slavs were organized into many Sclavinaes as organized native-tribal units. This period is also known by very frequent battles between the Slavs and the Byzantines. In the year 586, Thessaloniki was besieged by the Slavs, and was only saved, so the people of Thessalonica believed, by the help of their patron Demetrios. According to John of Ephesus, the Slavs set out and plundered all of Greece, the regions surrounding Thessaloniki and Thrace, taking many towns and castles, laying waste, burning, pillaging, and seizing a whole country. Archbishop John of Thessaloniki mentions an attack on the city by 5000 Slav warriors.

Arrival of Bulgars

After several centuries of Bulgar raids against Byzantium around 680 a group of Bulgars led by Bulgarian Khan Kuber settled in the region of Pelagonia. He was son of Khan Kubrat and brother of Khan Asparuh, who found powerful Danubian state in 681, known as First Bulgarian Empire. In the following decades these Bulgars launched campaigns against Byzantine city of Thessaloniki and established contacts with Danubian Bulgaria.

Christianization

Slavic tribes in Macedonia accepted the Christianity as their own religion around the 9th century mainly during the reign of prince Boris I of Bulgaria. The creators of the Glagolitic alphabet were the Byzantine Greek monks Saint Cyril and Saint Methodius; under the guidance of the Patriarchate at Constantinople they were promoters of Christianity and initiated Slavic literacy among the Slavic people. Their work was accepted in early medieval Bulgaria and continued by the St. Clement of Ohrid, creator of Cyrillic alphabet and St.Naum of Ohrid as founders of the Ohrid Literary School. Cyril and Methodius evangelized from Constantinople into the Balkans In the legacy of Cyril and Methodious, carried on by Clement and Naum, the development of Slav literacy was crucial in preventing assimilation of the Slavs either by cultures to the North or by the Greek culture to the south.

Middle ages

During most of the Middles ages and Late Antiquity Macedonia (as a region) had been a province of the Byzantine Empire. In the 6th century AD, the part which today forms the Greek province of Macedonia was known as Macedonia Prima (first Macedonia), and contained the Empire's second largest city, Thessaloniki. The rest of the modern region (today's Republic of Macedonia and Western Bulgaria) was known as Macedonia Salutaris. In the 9th century, most of the region of Macedonia (excluding the area of Thessaloniki) was incorporated into the First Bulgarian Empire. From 997 to 1018, large parts of the Balkan Peninsula and other areas as well were part of the kingdom of Tsar Samuil of Bulgaria. At the peak of his kingdom, Samuel moved the seat of his kingdom from the island of St. Achilles, Prespa to Ohrid. He was crowned in Rome in 997 as Tsar of Bulgaria from Pope Gregory V.The remains of his castle are still present in the city of Ohrid. Under Samuil, who was based in Macedonia around the Ohrid and Prespa lakes, its fortunes once more revived the great military rivalry with Byzantium. Samuil’s army was soundly defeated in 1014 by Basil II The Bulgar-Slayer, emperor of Byzantium, and four years later Macedonia fell once again under Greek control. In the 13th century the region was briefly passed to Latin, Bulgarian and back to Greek rule. In the 14 century this area was part of the Serbian empire of Tsar Stefan Dušan, until it got gradually incorporated in the emerging Ottoman Empire.

Ottoman rule

This expansion of medieval states on the Balkan Peninsula was discontinued by the occupation of the Ottoman Empire in the 14th century. The region of Macedonia remained part of the Ottoman Empire for the next 500 years, i.e. until 1912. During the rule of the Ottomans, the locals organized a number of uprisings: Mariovo uprising (1564), Karposh uprising (1689), Kresna Uprising (1878) etc. Although Greece, Serbia and Bulgaria succeeded to liberate from the Ottoman rule by 1878, according to the decisions made on the Berlin Congress (1878) the territory of present Republic of Macedonia was left under the Ottoman rule.

Ilinden-Preobrazhenie Uprising

Main article: Ilinden-Preobrazhenie Uprising

In 1893 the Bulgarian Macedonian-Adrianople Revolutionary Committees (later Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organisation (IMRO)) was established. This organisation advocated the creation of an autonomous Macedonia and Thrace within a Balkan federation. Before 1902, in theory only Bulgarians could join, but afterwards, it invited anyone who lives in Macedonia, whether Greek, Bulgarian or Jew to join together. On August 2, 1903, IMRO led the locals in the Ilinden-Preobrazhenie Uprising, named after the festival of the Prophet Elijah on which it began. That was one of the greatest events in the history of the people in the region of Macedonia. The high point of the Ilinden revolution was the establishment of the Krushevo Republic in the town of Krushevo.

By November 1903, the Ilinden-Preobrazhenie Uprising was suppressed. The uprising was led by the following activists of the IMRO: Yane Sandanski, Nikola Karev, Dame Gruev, Pitu Guli, etc.

The Balkan Wars

The Balkan Wars resulted in drastic changes to Macedonia's demographics after the Ottomans were defeated and forced out of the region. What we may call Ottoman Macedonia was divided between the Balkan nations, with its northern parts going to Serbian, the southern to Greece, and the northeastern to Bulgaria.

The territory of the present-day Republic of Macedonia came under the direct rule of Serbia (and later the Kingdom of Yugoslavia), and was sometimes termed "southern Serbia", and, together with a large portion of today's southern Serbia, it belonged officially to the newly formed Vardar Banovina (district). An intense program of "Serbianization" was implemented during the 1920s and 1930s when Belgrade enforced a Serbian cultural assimilation process on the region. Between the world wars in Serbia, the dialects of Macedonia were treated as a Serbian dialects (UCLA Language Material Sources, [25]). Only the literary Serbian language was taught, it was the language of government, education, media, and public life; even so local literature was tolerated as a local dialectal folkloristic form. The Serbian National Theatre in Skopje even performed some plays (now the classical drama pieces) in the local language (UCLA Language Material Sources, [26]).

Greece, like all other Balkan states, adopted restrictive policies towards its minorities, namely towards its Slavic population in its northern regions, due to its experiences with Bulgaria's wars, including the Second Balkan War, and the Bulgarian inclination of sections of its Slavic minority. Many of those inhabiting northeastern Greece fled to Bulgaria and very small group to Serbia (68 families) after the Balkan wars or were exchanged with native Greeks from Bulgaria under a population exchange treaty in the 1920s.

The Slav speakers that stayed in northwestern Greece were regarded as a potentially disloyal minority and came under severe pressure, with restrictions on their movements, cultural activities and political rights; many emigrated, for the most part to Canada, Australia, USA and eastern European countries like Bulgaria. The Greek names for some traditionally Slavic or Turkish speaking areas became official and the Slavic speakers were encouraged to change their Slavic surnames to Greek sounding surnames, e.g. Nachev becoming Natsulis. A similar procedure was applied to Greek names in Bulgaria and Serbian Macedonia (eg. Nevrokopi becoming Goce Delchev [27]). In Greece, there was a government sponsored process of hellenization [28]. Many of the border villages were closed to outsiders, ostensibly for security reasons. The Greek government and people have never recognized the existence of a distinct "Macedonian" ethnic group, as the term "Macedonian" is already reserved for the ethnic Greek population that has traditionally inhabited Greece's northern-most region (Macedonia (Greece)). According to Peter Trudgill Slav speakers in northern Greece with a non-Greek national identity have tended to leave Greece. As a result, the overwhelming majority of remaining Slav speakers declare themselves as Greeks (Trudgill P. (2000) "Greece and European Turkey: From Religious to Linguistic Identity" in Language and Nationalism in Europe, Oxford University Press).

On August 10, 1920, upon signing the Treaty of Sèvres that "measures were being taken towards the opening of schools with instruction in the Slav language in the following school year of 1925/26". Thus, the primer intended for the "Slav-speaking minority" children in Greek Macedonia to learn their native language in school, entitled "ABECEDAR" [29], [30] [31] was offered as an argument in support of this statement. This primer, prepared by a special government commissioner was published by the Greek government in Athens in 1925, but was printed in a specially adapted Latin alphabet instead of the traditional Cyrillic, since Cyrillic was the official alphabet of neighboring Bulgaria and Serbia . The Abecedar schoolbooks were confiscated and destroyed before they got into the reach of the children HRW pg.42.

Second World War

At the beginning of the war all shows how complicated the situation was. The political sympathies were intertwined with the national feelings. As rulling the pro-Serbian elements were for the English-French block and the pro - Bulgarian, for the power of Axis. Besides, some of the former revolutionary activists were not far from the thought of solving the Macedonian question through accession of Macedonia or parts of it to Italy. The followers of Ivan Mihaylov fought for independent pro-Axis Macedonia. In this situa­tion the population was divided in different groups. And time was crucial.

Thus on April 8th. 1941 in Skopie - opposite Saint Dimitur church a meeting was held, where the question: “What had to be done?" was put up. What actions should be undertaken in those crucial days in order not to omit, as it had already happened, the precise moment for liberating Macedonia.On that meeting were present mainly followers of the idea for the liberation through independence of Macedonia, namely: Dimitur Giuzelev, Dimitur Chkatrov, Toma Klenkov, Ivan Piperkov and other popular activists of IMRO as well as members of Yugoslav Communist Party (YCP) - Kotse Stoianov, Angel Petkovski and Ilia Neshovski, invited by Traiko Popov. The latter despite a communist, member of YCP, was an active follower of the idea of IMRO for the creation of a pro-Bulgarian, Macedonian state under German and Italian protection.[32]

But the situation changed dynamically. As the Bulgarian army entered Yugoslav Vardar Macedonia on April 19th. 1941, it was greeted by most of the population as liberators and former IMRO members were active in organising Bulgarian Action Committees[33] charged with taking over the local authorities. Some former IMRO (United) members such as Metodi Shatorov [34], who were members of the Yugoslav Communist Party, also refused to define the Bulgarian forces as occupiers (contrary to instructions from Belgrade) and called for the incorporation of the local Macedonian Communist organisations within the Bulgarian Communist Party. This policy changed towards 1943 with the arrival of the Montenegrin Svetozar Vukmanovich Tempo, who began in earnest to organise armed resistance to the Bulgarian occupation.[35] Many former IMRO members assisted the authorities in fighting Tempo's partizans.

IMRO was also active in organising the resistance of the Bulgarian population in Aegean Macedonia against Greek nationalist and communist bands. With the help of Mihailov and Macedonian emigres in Sofia, several pro-German armed detachments -Ohrana were organised in the Kostur, Lerin and Voden districs of Greek Macedonia in 1943-44. These were led by Bulgarian officers originally from Aegean Macedonia - Andon Kalchev and Georgi Dimchev.[36]

During Second World War (1941-1945), some inhabitants of Vardar Macedonia took part in the anti-fascist coalition. The resistance began in 1941 in the cities of Prilep and Kumanovo. In Greece, it has been estimated that the military wing of the Communist Party of Greece (KKE), the Democratic Army of Greece (DSE) had 14 000 soldiers of Slavic Macedonian origin out of total 20 000 fighters.

On the 2nd of August 1944 in the St. Prohor Pchinski monastery at the Antifascist assembly of the national liberation of Macedonia (ASNOM) with Panko Brashnarov (the former IMRO revolutionary from the Ilinden period and the IMRO United) as a first speaker, the modern Macedonian state was officially proclaimed, as a federal state within Tito's Yugoslavia, receiving recognition from the Allies.

After the declaration of war by Bulgaria on Germany, in September 1944 , Ivan Mihailov the IMRO leader arrived in German occupied Skopje, where the Germans hoped that he could form an Independent Macedonian state with their support. Seeing that the war is lost to Germany and to avoid further bloodshed, he refused.

Macedonians after the Second World War

The People’s Republic of Macedonia was proclaimed at the first session of the Antifascist Assembly for the People’s Liberation of Macedonia (on St. Elia's Day – August 2, 1944). Later, by special Act, it became a constitutive part of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. In the next 50 years Republic of Macedonia was part of the Yugoslav federation. After the Second World War, the Communist Yugoslav leader Josip Broz Tito decided that the policy of Serbianization in Macedonia had failed - it had led to strong resentment of Belgrade. In addition, some Macedonians had been supporters of Bulgarian Communist partisan movement, let by Pavel Shatev and few in the Italian occupied area to Tito's Partisan resistance movement, fighting the occupying Bulgarians, Germans and Italians as well as opposing the Serbian royalist Chetniks, who were, until midway through the war, the West's favorite rebels in Serbia.. Although the inhabitants of Vardar Macedonia initially supported the Ivan Mihailov led Bulgarian occupation as "liberators from the Serbian occupation", the Macedonian resistance at the end of the war had a strongly nationalist character, not least as a reaction to Serbia's pre-war repression. It was clear well before the end of the war that Tito would seek major changes to the region's political balance .

Following the war, Tito separated Yugoslav Macedonia from Serbia, making it a republic of the new federal Yugoslavia (as the Socialist Republic of Macedonia) in 1946. He also promoted the concept of a separate Macedonian nation, as a means of severing the ties of the Slav population of Yugoslav Macedonia with Bulgaria, although the Macedonian language is close to and largely mutually intelligible with Bulgarian, and to a lesser extent Serbian. The differences were emphasized and the region's historical figures were promoted as being uniquely Macedonian (rather than Bulgarian or Serbian). A separate Macedonian Orthodox Church was established, splitting off from the Serbian Orthodox Church in 1967 (only partly successfully, because the church has not been recognized by any other Orthodox Church). The ideologists of a separate and independent Macedonian country, same as the pro-Bulgarian sentiment, was forcibly suppressed.

Tito had a number of reasons for doing this. First, he wanted to reduce Serbia's dominance in Yugoslavia; establishing a territory formerly considered Serbian as an equal to Serbia within Yugoslavia achieved this effect. Secondly, he wanted to sever the ties of the Macedonian population with Bulgaria as recognition of that population as Bulgarian could have undermined the unity of the Yugoslav federation. Thirdly, Tito sought to justify future Yugoslav claims towards the rest of geographical Macedonia; in August 1944, he claimed that his goal was to reunify "all parts of Macedonia, divided in 1915 and 1918 by Balkan imperialists." To this end, he opened negotiations with Bulgaria for a new federal state (see Bled agreement), which would also probably have included Albania, and supported the Greek Communists in the Greek Civil War. The idea of reunification of all of Macedonia under Communist rule was abandoned in 1948 when the Greek Communists lost and Tito fell out with the Soviet Union and pro-Soviet Bulgaria.

Tito's actions had a number of important consequences for the Macedonians. The most important was, obviously, the promotion of a distinctive Macedonian identity as a part of the multi-ethnic society of Yugoslavia. The process of ethnogenesis, started earlier, gained momentum, and a distinct national Macedonian identity was formed. There have been numerous accounts from northern Macedonia from the late 1940s that the policy of Bulgarisation during the Bulgarian occupation (1941 - 1944) was as abhorrent for the ordinary Macedonian as the policy of Serbisation until then. IMRO's leader in exile, Ivan Mihailov, and the renewed Bulgarian IMRO after 1990 have, on the other hand, repeatedly argued that between 120,000 and 130,000 people went through the concentration camps of Idrizovo and Goli Otok for pro-Bulgarian sympathies or ideas for independent Macedonia in the late 1940s., which has also been confirmed by former prime minister Ljubco Georgievski [37]. The critics of these claims question the number as it would implied roughly a third of the male Christian population at that time; and the reasons of imprisonment, they argue, were multiple as there were Macedonian nationalists, Stalinists, Middle class members, Albanian nationalists and everybody else who was either against the post war regime or denounced as one for whatever reasons. Unlike the time before WWII, when Macedonia was hotbed for unrest and terror and about 60% of the entire royal Yugoslav police force was stationed there [38] [39], after the war there were no signs of disturbances comparable with pre-war times or post war times in other parts of former Yugoslavia, such as Croatia, Bosnia and Serbia. [40] [41] [42]. Whatever the truth, it was certainly the case that most Macedonians embraced their official recognition as a separate nationality. Even so, some pro-Bulgarian or pro-Serbian sentiment persisted despite government suppression; even as late as 1991, convictions were still being handed down for pro-Bulgarian statements.[43]

In Greece, they faced considerably tighter restrictions as its government saw them as a potentially disloyal minority. Greeks were resettled in the region in two occasions, firstly following the Bulgarian loss of the Second Balkan War when Bulgaria and Greece mutually exchanged their populations in 1919[44], and secondly in 1923 as a result of the population exchange with the new Turkish republic that followed the Greek military defeat in Asia minor. After the Second World War many of the slavophone Macedonians who lived in Greece either chose to emigrate to Communist countries (especially Yugoslavia) to avoid prosecution for fighting on the side of the Greek communists (see: Greek Civil War), or were forced to do so . Although there was some liberalization between 1959 and 1967, the Greek military dictatorship re-imposed harsh restrictions. The situation gradually eased after Greece's return to democracy, but Greece still receives criticism for its treatment of some slavophone Macedonian political organizations. Greece, however, recognizes the Rainbow political party of the slavophone Macedonians who canvas during elections.

The Macedonians in Albania faced restrictions under the Stalinist dictatorship of Enver Hoxha, though ordinary Albanians were little better off. Their existence as a separate minority group was recognized as early as 1945 and a degree of cultural expression was permitted.

As ethnographers and linguists tended to identify the population of the Bulgarian part of Macedonia as Bulgarian in the interwar period, the issue of a Macedonian minority in the country came up as late as the 1940s. In 1946, the population of Blagoevgrad Province was declared Macedonian and teachers were brought in from Yugoslavia to teach the Macedonian language. The census of 1946 was accompanied by mass repressions, the result of which was the complete destruction of the local organizations of the Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization and mass internments of people at the Belene concentration camp. The policy was reverted at the end of the 1950s and later Bulgarian governments argued that the two censuses of 1946 and 1956 which recorded up to 187,789 Macedonians (of whom over 95% were said to live in Blagoevgrad Province, also called Pirin Macedonia) were the result of pressure from Moscow. [45] Western governments, however, continued to list the population of Blagoevgrad Province as Macedonian until the beginning of the 1990s despite the 1965 census which put Macedonians in the country at 9,630.[46] The two latest censuses after the fall of Communism (in 1992 and 2001) have, however, confirmed the results from previous censuses with some 3,000 people declaring themselves as "Macedonians" in Blagoevgrad Province in 2001 (<1.0% of the population of the region) out of 5,000 in the whole of Bulgaria.

During this period, ethnic Macedonians living in the region continue to complain of official harassment. This was confirmed in 2005 by the European Court of Human Rights with a judgment whereby Bulgaria was sentenced to pay damages amounting to 6800 euros for a violation of Article 11 (freedom of assembly and association) of the European Convention on Human Rights for its refusal to give court registration to "UMO Ilinden" and "UMO Ilinden-Pirin", the two Macedonian political parties in Bulgaria.

A similar judgment was passed against Greece for also violating Article 11 in regards of the members of the Greek far-left Rainbow party, which claims to be the "Party of the Macedonian minority in Greece" despite the fact that it enjoys minimal public support in the area where the minority purportedly lives.

Symbols

The official Coat of Arms The official Coat of Arms The flag of the Republic of Macedonia

Unofficial Coat of Arms Unofficial Coat of Arms The Vergina Sun (1980s to 1995) The Vergina Sun (1980s to 1995)

• Sun: The official flag of the Republic of Macedonia, adopted in 1995, is a yellow sun with eight broadening rays extending to the edges of the red field.
• Coat of Arms: After independence in 1992, the Republic of Macedonia retained the coat of arms adopted in 1946 by the People's Assembly of the People's Republic of Macedonia on its second extraordinary session held on July 27, 1946, later on altered by article 8 of the Constitution of the Socialist Federal Republic of Macedonia. The coat-of-arms is composed by a double bent garland of ears of wheat, tobacco and poppy, tied by a ribbon with the embroidery of a traditional folk costume. In the center of such a circular room there are mountains, rivers, lakes and the sun; where the ears join there is a red five-pointed star, a traditional symbol of Communism. All this is said to represent "the richness of our country, our struggle, and our freedom".

Unofficial symbols

• Lion: The lion first appears in 1595 in the Korenich-Neorich coat of arms, where the coat of arms of Macedonia is included among with those of eleven other countries. On the coat of arms is a crown, inside a yellow crowned lion is depicted standing rampant, on a red background. On the bottom enclosed in a red and yellow border is written "Macedonia". Later versions of these coat of arms include a more detailed crown and lion with the word "Macedonia" written in a scroll like style. These coat of arms have also been adopted as the official emblem of VMRO-DPMNE, a Macedonian political party. Initially, it was adopted as a state symbol by Bulgaria.

• Vergina Sun: (official flag, 1992-1995) The Vergina Sun is occasionally used to represent the Macedonian people by the diaspora through associations and cultural groups. The Vergina Sun is believed to have been associated with ancient Macedonian kings such as Alexander the Great and Philip II. The symbol was discovered in the Greek region of Macedonia and Greeks regard it as an exclusively Greek symbol, unrelated to Slavic cultures and it is copyrighted under WIPO as a State Emblem of Greece [47]. The Vergina sun on a red field was the first flag of the independent Republic of Macedonia, until it was removed from the state flag under an agreement reached between the Republic of Macedonia and Greece in September 1995. Nevertheless, the Vergina sun is still used [48] unofficially as a national symbol by some groups in the country along with the new state flag.

See also

• Bulgarians
• A list of prominent ethnic Macedonians
• Macedonian Canadians
• Ethnogenesis
• Macedonism

Notes

• Keith Brown, The Past in Question: Modern Macedonia and the Uncertainties of Nation, Princeton University Press, 2003. ISBN 0-691-09995-2.
• Jane K. Cowan (ed.), Macedonia: The Politics of Identity and Difference, Pluto Press, 2000. A collection of articles.
• Loring M. Danforth, The Macedonian Conflict: Ethnic Nationalism in a Transnational World, Princeton University Press, 1995. ISBN 0-691-04356-6.
• Anastasia N. Karakasidou, Fields of Wheat, Hills of Blood: Passages to Nationhood in Greek Macedonia, 1870-1990, University Of Chicago Press, 1997, ISBN 0-226-42494-4. Reviewed in Journal of Modern Greek Studies 18:2 (2000), p465.
• Peter Mackridge, Eleni Yannakakis (eds.), Ourselves and Others : The Development of a Greek Macedonian Cultural Identity since 1912, Berg Publishers, 1997, ISBN 1-85973-138-4.
• Hugh Poulton, Who Are the Macedonians?, Indiana University Press, 2nd ed., 2000. ISBN 0-253-21359-2.
• Victor Roudometof, Collective Memory, National Identity, and Ethnic Conflict: Greece, Bulgaria, and the Macedonian Question, Praeger Publishers, 2002. ISBN 0-275-97648-3.
• Τάσος Κωστόπουλος, Η απαγορευμένη γλώσσα: Η κρατική καταστολή των σλαβικών διαλέκτων στην ελληνική Μακεδονία σε όλη τη διάρκεια του 20ού αιώνα (εκδ. Μαύρη Λίστα, Αθήνα 2000). [Tasos Kostopoulos, The forbidden language: state suppression of the Slavic dialects in Greek Macedonia through the 20th century, Athens: Black List, 2000]

External links

• macedonia.org, a site representing the views of the ethnic Macedonians
• Online Journal on Macedonian History and Culture, including relevant sources, documents and texts, pro-ethnic Macedonian
• History of Macedonia according to ethnic Macedonians
• New Balkan Politics - Journal of Politics
• Macedonians in the UK
• United Macedonian Diaspora