The Macedonian Question and the Macedonians: A History 0367218267, 9780367218263

Table of contents :
Cover
Half Title
Series Page
Title Page
Copyright Page
Dedication
Contents
Preface and acknowledgements
1 Greek, Bulgarian and Serbian claims to Macedonia
2 The war of ethnographic maps
3 The VM(O)RO and other Macedonian organizations (1893-1940)
4 Tracing the birth of a new Balkan nation
5 Tito and the Macedonians: the crucial 1940s
6 The 'New Macedonian Question': the Greek-Macedonian naming dispute
7 Bulgaria's stance towards Macedonia
8 The Macedonian language
9 The Macedonian national historical narrative
10 The charm of Alexander the Great: who were the ancient Macedonians?
11 The crux of the Greek-Macedonian dispute: the skeletons in the cupboard
12 The settlement of the Greek-Macedonian dispute: the Prespa Agreement
13 The ephemeral Macedonian-Bulgarian rapprochement
Select bibliography
Index

Citation preview

The Macedonian Question and the Macedonians

This book is a comprehensive and dispassionate analysis of the intriguing Macedonian Question from 1878 until 1949 and of the Macedonians (and of their neighbours) from the 1870s until today, with the two themes intertwining. The Macedonian Question was an offshoot of the wider Eastern Question – i.e. the fate of the European remnants of the Ottoman Empire once it dissolved. The initial protagonists of the Macedonian Question were Greece, Bulgaria and Serbia, and a Slav-speaking population inhabiting geographical Macedonia in search of its destiny, the largest segment of which ended up creating a new nation, comprising the Macedonians, something unacceptable to its three neighbours. Alexis Heraclides analyses the shifting sands of the Macedonian Question and of the gradual rise of Macedonian nationhood, with special emphasis on the Greek, Bulgarian and Serbian claims to Macedonia (1870s–1919); the birth and vicissitudes of the most famous Macedonian revolutionary organization, the VM(O)RO, and other organizations (1893–1940); the appearance and gradual establishment of the Macedonian nation from the 1890s until 1945; Titos’s crucial role in Macedonian nationhood-cum-federal status; the Greek-Macedonian naming dispute (1991–2018), including the ‘skeletons in the cupboard’– the deep-seated reasons rendering the clash intractable for decades; the final Greek-Macedonian settlement (the 2018 Prespa Agreement); the Bulgarian-Macedonian dispute (1950–today) and its ephemeral settlement in 2017; the issue of the Macedonian language; and the Macedonian national historical narrative. The author also addresses questions around who the ancient Macedonians were and the international fascination with Alexander the Great. This monograph will be an essential resource for scholars working on Macedonian history, Balkan politics and conflict resolution. Alexis Heraclides is Emeritus Professor of International Relations and Conflict Resolution at the Panteion University of Social and Political Sciences (Athens) and author of several books on self-determination, secession, the CSCE, humanitarian intervention, the Middle East conflict, the Cyprus Problem, the Greek-Turkish antagonism with emphasis on the Aegean dispute, the Macedonian Question and others.

Routledge Histories of Central and Eastern Europe

Romania under Communism Denis Deletant Bulgaria under Communism Ivaylo Znepolski, Mihail Gruev, Momtchil Metodiev, Martin Ivanov, Daniel Vatchkov, Ivan Elenkov, Plamen Doynow From Revolution to Uncertainty The Year 1990 in Central and Eastern Europe Edited by Joachim von Puttkamer, Włodzimierz Borodziej, and Stanislav Holubec Identities in-Between in East-Central Europe Edited by Jan Fellerer, Robert Pyrah and Marius Turda Communism, Science and the University Towards a Theory of Detotalitarianisation Edited by Ivaylo Znepolski A Nation Divided by History and Memory Hungary in the Twentieth Century and Beyond Gábor Gyáni Historicizing Roma in Central Europe Between Critical Whiteness and Epistemic Injustice Victoria Shmidt and Bernadette Nadya Jaworsky The Macedonian Question and the Macedonians A History Alexis Heraclides www.routledge.com/Routledge-Histories-of-Central-and-Eastern-Europe/ book-series/CEE

The Macedonian Question and the Macedonians

A History

Alexis Heraclides

First published 2021 by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN and by Routledge 52 Vanderbilt Avenue, New York, NY 10017 Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business © 2021 Alexis Heraclides The right of Alexis Heraclides to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe. British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data A catalog record for this book has been requested ISBN: 9780367218263 (hbk) ISBN: 9780429266362 (ebk) Typeset in Times New Roman by Apex CoVantage, LLC

To Argyris and his generation

Contents

Preface and acknowledgements 1 Greek, Bulgarian and Serbian claims to Macedonia

ix 1

2 The war of ethnographic maps

20

3 The VM(O)RO and other Macedonian organizations (1893–1940)

36

4 Tracing the birth of a new Balkan nation

63

5 Tito and the Macedonians: the crucial 1940s

83

6 The ‘New Macedonian Question’: the Greek-Macedonian naming dispute

111

7 Bulgaria’s stance towards Macedonia

139

8 The Macedonian language

150

9 The Macedonian national historical narrative

167

10 The charm of Alexander the Great: who were the ancient Macedonians?

193

11 The crux of the Greek-Macedonian dispute: the skeletons in the cupboard

213

viii Contents

12 The settlement of the Greek-Macedonian dispute: the Prespa Agreement

224

13 The ephemeral Macedonian-Bulgarian rapprochement

243

Select bibliography Index

250 261

Preface and acknowledgements

The Macedonian Question is the most complex and multifaceted Balkan problem, with a troubled history of almost 150 years. This international question entered the Balkan landscape in the late 1870s, then as an offshoot of the wider Eastern Question, that is the fate of the European remnants of the Ottoman Empire (the ‘Sick Man’) when it would dissolve, which was regarded as inevitable. Yet the Macedonian Question outlived the Eastern Question. During these 150 years the Macedonia Question changed in shape like a kaleidoscope but its original protagonists remained by and large the same, though with certain shifts in view of changing circumstances: they were Greece, Bulgaria, Serbia and Serb-dominated Yugoslavia, and a Slav-speaking population initially swinging among three assertive nations, in search of its destiny, the larger part of which ended up creating a new Balkan nation, the Macedonians, something not acceptable to its three neighbours, all three known for their chauvinism. In the 1940s, the main actors in the conflict were Tito’s Yugoslavia, Greece, Bulgaria and the People’s later Socialist Republic of Macedonia, as one of the six constituent states of Yugoslavia under Tito. During the Cold War, the Serbs had, nolens volens, accepted Yugoslavia’s approach regarding the Macedonians, but with Macedonia’s independence in late 1991, rump Yugoslavia, headed by Milošević’s Serbia, disputed the country’s right to become and remain an independent state. The Macedonian Question lato sensu can be divided into two phases: the Macedonian Question stricto sensu from the 1870s until 1949 and conflicts that have arisen to a lesser extent between Macedonia (as a constituent federal unit of Yugoslavia, 1950–1991) and in particular by the independent Republic of Macedonia, now Republic of North Macedonia, and two of its neighbours, Greece and Bulgaria. The Macedonian Question stricto sensu can be divided into three periods: 1

1870–1913: National claims and conflicts among Greece, Bulgaria and Serbia, with the Ottoman Empire in danger of losing one of its most vital regions and evicted from Europe after five centuries. From 1893 onwards there was a new actor to reckon with: a revolutionary organization eventually named VMRO (the Internal Secret Revolutionary Organization) sought autonomy

x

2

3

Preface and acknowledgements for Macedonia and resisted attempts at annexation by the three claimants, including Bulgaria, despite the existing ethnic links with the latter. 1913–1940: The division of geographical Macedonia following the two Balkan Wars (1912–1913) with the Treaty of Bucharest (August 1913), with two aggrieved parties from the division, Bulgaria (defeated in the Second Balkan War) and the Macedonian revolutionary organizations, which in the interwar swayed between a Bulgarian identity (and eventual union with Bulgaria) and a new distinct national identity, as Macedonians. Comintern’s key involvement weighed in favour of the second option, though under a communist aegis. 1941–1949: The Macedonian Question from the advent of the Second World War until the end of the Greek Civil War (1946–1949), with the official formation of the Macedonian nation, shepherded by Tito, and the creation of the People’s, from 1963 onwards, Socialist Republic of Macedonia (SRM) within Yugoslavia, with Bulgaria under Georgi Dimitrov acquiescent from 1944 until 1948.

From 1950 onwards, following the 1948 Tito-Stalin split (YugoslaviaCominform split) and the end of the Greek Civil War in 1949, the Macedonian Question was dormant, within the reigning spirit of the Cold War, with the occasional minor turbulence, due mainly to statements by representatives of the SRM, with Greece and Bulgaria not recognizing the Macedonians as a nation with a distinct language, and rejecting the existence of a ‘Macedonian minority’ in their midst, in Greece’s northwestern Macedonia and in Bulgaria’s Pirin Macedonia. From 1991 onwards, the Macedonian Question is not the appropriate term to use, though some have called it the ‘New Macedonian Question’, to distinguish it from its classical phase until 1949.1 The drawback with such an approach is that it might imply that independent Macedonia, now North Macedonia, is to be placed within an ‘international question’, which could suggest that its very existence or future is still in doubt as seen in the attitude of two of its Balkan neighbours (or to be more exact by the many unremitting nationalists among its neighbours). I would argue that from 1950 until today the Macedonian Question, as we knew it has ceased to exist. As put almost six decades ago by Balkan historian Evangelos Kofos, in his classic book on the Macedonian Question: ‘the “Macedonian Question” can and should be considered a subject for the student of history rather than an issue for the policymaker’.2 Since 1991 what we are faced with is not the ‘Macedonian Question’ per se, but an acute dispute between Macedonia as a state and two of its bigger, more powerful and often bullying neighbours, Greece, Bulgaria and Milošević’s Serbia. The conflict between Athens and Skopje was in the limelight internationally and lasted for 27 years until the Prespa Agreement (2018), although there are still a number of loose ends and the full implementation of the agreement and its hopefully positive repercussions are not assured. The lesser known conflict between Sofia and Skopje remains in a state of adversity, despite a Friendship Treaty reached in 2017, which seemed to have resolved their differences.

Preface and acknowledgements xi The conflict between Athens and Skopje of almost three decades may be mystifying to outsiders or even bizarre, but it touches ‘existential nerves’ in both countries.3 It is not a classic interstate dispute involving contested borders or irredentism (irredentism is the purview of a minority of ultra-nationalists), as many tend to regard it especially in Greece. It is an emotional symbolic conflict involving national historical narrative-cum-identity, which made it impervious to a settlement for almost three decades, despite extended third party mediation. In the course of these years, in what came to be known as the ‘Macedonian naming dispute’, the two parties were at loggerheads not only regarding the present or the interpretation of the recent past (notably the turbulent 1940s), but strongly disagreed, in all seriousness, as regards the ethnic identity of the ancient Macedonians and who were entitled to the heritage of Philip II and Alexander the Great, and on that basis buttressing their claim to the use of the name Macedonia. The ongoing antagonism between Sofia and Skopje is again not a tussle over borders or an irredentist conflict, but an emotional symbolic rivalry over national narratives and national identity, which by its nature is far more difficult to cope with and resolve than the Greek-Macedonian dispute. Here Alexander the Great and the ancient Macedonians do not come into play; the apple of discord is the last phase of the first Bulgarian Empire under the great Tsar Samuil, the Cyrillic alphabet and Church Slavonic, with Skopje regarding them all part and parcel of its own Macedonian heritage and not Bulgarian and Sofia regarding this Medieval package Bulgarian and a fundamental aspect of Bulgaria’s history and glorious heritage. The Bulgarians reject any notion of a Macedonian nation or language, and consider Macedonian a mere Bulgarian dialect. An even more acute clash of historical narratives-cum-identities exists with regard to the events that had occurred – and in the name of whom they had occurred – in the years 1893–1903, the heroic period of the Macedonian struggle against the Sublime Porte and the Greek and Serbian incursions. The literature on the Macedonian Question and the Macedonians is legion and can be divided into three categories: (a) engagé nationalist tracts however cloaked as scientific; (b) balanced and to the degree possible objective works; and (c) an in-between category of works by acclaimed scholars, mostly Macedonians, Bulgarians and Greeks, who present subtle bias with a strong dose of self-censorship. This book aims to be a comprehensive and dispassionate analysis of the famous Macedonian Question from 1878 until 1949 and of the Macedonians from the late nineteenth century until today, with the two themes intertwining, including a reference to the ancient Macedonians (Alexander the Great) and their appeal. My ambition apart from presenting the overall picture in a balanced manner, highlighting its more pertinent aspects, is twofold: to have something worthwhile to offer to the cognoscenti who have been labouring for years to make sense of this complex and multifaceted problem (mainly by providing another angle, lesser known information and perhaps most of all, new insight); and that if the book were read without the knowledge of the author’s name, one would not spring to the conclusion that it is written by a Greek analyst. In preparing the book, I have benefitted from the generosity, advice and information provided by several individuals. I owe special thanks above all to

xii

Preface and acknowledgements

Professor Denko Maleski, independent Macedonia’s first foreign minister. Special thanks are also due to Dr. Tchavdar Marinov (for his valuable comments on three chapters of the book), Dr. Evangelos Kofos (for our many discussions in the early 1990s) and Dr. Dimitar Bechev. Regarding more recent events, I would like to thank Professor Biljana Vankovska, Professor Marilena Koppa, Professor Petros Liacouras, Ambassador Dimitris Yiannakakis, Dr. Ioannis Armakolas, adviser François Lafond, Dr. Yorgos Christidis, Dr. Vemund Aarbakke, Dr. Nicolaos Tzifakis and Dr. Athena Skoulariki. In addition, on the Macedonian side, thanks are due, in alphabetical order, to minister-counsellor Lidija Boshkovska, Dr. Αna Chupeska, Ambassador Victor Gaber, Professor Natasha Gaber Damjanovska, Professor Zoran Ilievski, Professor Mirjana Maleski, special advisor Bojan Maricik, Zoran Nechev, counsellor Dragan Tilev, Dr. Petar Todorov and Dr. Anastas Vangeli. Thanks are also due to Professor Dimitris Christopoulos, Professor Ada Dialla, Ambassador George Kaklikis, counsellor Evangelos Kalpadakis, journalist Spyros Kakouriotis, journalist Takis Michas and Ambassador Dimitris Moschopoulos.

Notes 1 See, e.g. James Pettifer (ed.), The New Macedonian Question (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1999). 2 Evangelos Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia: Civil Conflict, Politics of Mutation, National Identity (New York: Aristide D. Karatzas Publisher, 1993) [1964], 226. 3 Evangelos Kofos, ‘A Review of ICG’s Report “Macedonia’s Name: Breaking the Deadlock’, Macedonian Studies Journal, 2:1 (2015), 92.

1

Greek, Bulgarian and Serbian claims to Macedonia

Macedonia: geography, history, ethnography The geographical region of the Balkans known as Macedonia was not fixed but changed shapes and sizes from its first appearance in Antiquity in the seventh century BC. In the second century AD, the great geographer and astronomer Claudius Ptolemy included a map of Macedonia in his famous book Geography, which is roughly half the size of geographical Macedonia as understood today, to which he chose to add Thessaly. In the Roman Empire it was larger, split into two parts and under the Byzantines (eastern Roman Empire) it depicted various regions, all of them smaller, between the great cities of Constantinople and Thessaloniki. By the ninth century, Macedonia was a region of Thrace from where the Byzantine Macedonian dynasty hailed, while geographical Macedonia as we know it today corresponded to the ‘themes’ (Byzantine administrative regions) of Thessaloniki and Strymon.1 In the Renaissance, Ptolemy’s map was reproduced and the Europeans perceived Macedonia on that basis, but the Ottomans who seized the region in the mid-fourteenth century did not call it Macedonia.2 Macedonia as the name of a political entity had appeared only once prior to 1944, in Antiquity, as the Kingdom of Macedonia or Macedon. The ancient Macedonians gave the Balkans its first large state and ‘Europe its first intercontinental empire’.3 The Macedonian name ‘disappeared from the historical stage and consciousness’,4 with the battle of Pydna (168 BC) when the Romans under Aemilius Paullus (to be known as Macedonicus) defeated the Macedonians under King Perseus.5 Thereafter, Macedonia was ‘merely a geographical expression describing a disputed territory of indeterminate boundaries’ under medieval states and ‘a little known land, virtual terra incognita, until the nineteenth century’.6 In lieu of example, as late as 1870 it was believed in the West that there existed an ‘impassable’ chain of mountains splitting Macedonia into two parts, the ‘savage and inhospitable’ north and the ‘agreeable and polished’ south (this misconception was largely due to Ptolemy’s map).7 Geographical Macedonia (as it is known internationally from the midnineteenth century onwards) was from 395 AD until the ninth century under Byzantine rule, and then under Bulgarian rule (First Bulgarian Empire) until 1014,

2

Greek, Bulgarian and Serbian claims to Macedonia

to revert to the Byzantines from 1014 (with Tsar Samuil’s defeat at the Battle of Kleidion) to 1230, to then again become Bulgarian (Second Bulgarian Empire) until 1250, followed until 1371 by a division of the region among the Serbs (Stefan Dušan’s Empire), the Epirote Byzantines and the Byzantines of Nicea, concluding with the Ottoman conquest of the entire region in 1389 (Battle of Kosovo) with the Ottoman rule lasting until 1912.8 This central region of the Balkans also witnessed many a Völkerwanderung (migration), but the most decisive one, which led to permanent settlement, was that of the Slavs in the course of the sixth and seventh centuries.9 From the mid-nineteenth century onwards Macedonia is defined as the area with the Shar Mountain to the north, Mountain Olympus to the south, the Rhodope Mountains to the east and Lake Ohrid to the west. Contemporary Macedonian authors tend to regard the territory of their present state as part of ancient Macedon, while Greek authors regard the ancient kingdom roughly corresponding to the region acquired by Greece in 1913, with the ‘Republic of Macedonia’ part of the ancient state of Paionia or Paeonia.10 In fact, ancient Macedon comprised present-day Greek Macedonia in addition to the southernmost parts of today’s Republic of North Macedonia, while most of the latter’s territory was part of the ancient states of Paeonia and Dardania.11 Geographical Macedonia was one of the first regions of the Balkans to form part of the Ottoman Empire and one of the last to be ‘liberated’ from the Ottoman rule in 1912–1913.12 In the Ottoman Empire, Macedonia did not comprise an administrative unit, but in Europe it was understood as comprising three provinces (vilâyet), those of Thessaloniki (Selânik), Bitola (Monastir or Manastir), and Kosovo centred in Skopje (Üsküb),13 amounting to 68,000 square kilometres, about 15 percent of the Balkan Peninsula.14 In fact, during the reign of Sultan Abdulhamid II, the Ottoman bureaucracy ‘was not allowed to use the word Macedonia (along with many others considered harmful and seditious) in its official correspondence’ for its ‘mere designation’ was considered a ‘concession to all the parties, especially the insurgents fighting in the region, that anticipated the Ottomans’ imminent and complete departure from Europe’.15 The population of Macedonia (three districts) was strikingly heterogeneous linguistically, ethnically and religiously. By and large, the cities and towns were dominated by Muslims and Greeks (the latter mostly in southern Macedonia) and the countryside by Slavs.16 The various communities were well over a hundred. The largest groups were the Muslims (divided into Turkishspeakers, Albanianspeakers, Greekspeakers, Bulgarianspeakers, Romanian-Vlachspeakers, Romaspeakers and other smaller groups), the Slavs (Bulgarians, Slavspeakers and Serbs), Greeks, Christian Romanian-Vlachs, Christian Albanians, Roma and the Jews of Thessaloniki. The Muslims as a whole and the Slavs were the two largest groups, and among the Slavs, the Bulgarians or Slavspeakers (mainly speakers of western Bulgarian dialects) were the most numerous. In fact, the largest single group was the Muslims, despite the tendency of several ethnographic maps to limit their numbers for obvious reasons, to ‘throw the Turks’ out of Europe.17

Greek, Bulgarian and Serbian claims to Macedonia 3 From the 1840s until the Balkan Wars (1912–1913), there were an astounding number of ethnographic maps depicting ‘Turkey in Europe’ or Macedonia (see Chapter 2). If the map-maker happened to be from the Balkans (Greek, Serb, Bulgarian or Romanian), the aim was to highlight the dominant presence of one’s own group, at the expense of the ‘Turks’ and other groups regarded as rivals in the region. Most present-day scholars are of the view that the great majority of ethnographic maps should be discarded as unreliable.18 Yet most maps had something to offer one way or another. If a map was considered authoritative, it had impact, influencing international diplomacy, as seen during the 1875–1878 Balkan Crisis. As for maps by the Balkan contenders they were useful as primary sources and gave rise to rebuttals. Several introduced a new parameter, for instance greater emphasis on religion instead of language, the discovery of a new ethnic group or that the ‘Turks’ (Muslims) were more numerous after all. What all the ethnographic maps had in common was the astonishing ethnic variety, hence the humorous Orientalist label, ‘la salade macedoine’, for Macedonia, a mixed salad or fruit salad comprising an array of ingredients with each one retaining its distinct flavour.19 John Reed, the famous American journalist, had described Macedonia as ‘the most frightening mix of races ever imagined’.20 In fact, Macedonia was hardly unique in this respect; heterogeneity was the rule, not the exception, in many imperial settings not only of the Ottoman Empire but also of other land empires, such as Austria-Hungary or Russia.21 From the 1870s onwards and until the division following the Balkan Wars (1912–1913), the main contenders for Macedonia were Greece and Bulgaria almost simultaneously, followed by Serbia, with Romania as a lesser contender, in view of the Vlachs (Romanian-speakers) residing mainly in the Pindos Mountain range.

Greece and Macedonia For Greece, the first independent state to emerge in the Balkans in 1830–1832, the territorial claims were limited to securing Thessaly, with Mount Olympus and the River Aliakmon as the northern limits. These were regarded ‘the northern limits of the Greek language and learning’.22 According to Greece’s first head of state, Ioannis Capodistrias, a revered figure in European diplomacy since the days he was the co-foreign minister of the Russian Empire, this was a ‘defensible frontier’ for the new state; and it had ‘separated Greece from the northern neighbouring countries in ancient times. . . . Thessaly was always kept Greek, while Macedonia was conquered by the Slavs and other races’.23 Yet the Greeks ‘pushed their northern national frontier deep into Slav-speaking Macedonia and made themselves part of the Macedonian Question – with considerable delay but with a vengeance’.24 What had caused it? Two things: the appearance and predominance of the irredentist Megali Idea (Great Idea) and the concomitant striving for a ‘Greek Empire’, and the Bulgarian claim to the very same region.25

4

Greek, Bulgarian and Serbian claims to Macedonia

Ironically, given today’s clash between Athens and Skopje regarding the identity of the ancient Macedonians and Alexander the Great, the original Greek national narrative that dominated the scene until the early 1850s did not regard the Macedonians as Greeks. According to scholar Adamantios Korais, the doyen of what came to be known as the Greek or Neo-Hellenic Enlightenment,26 and his disciples who held high positions in the new state, the Macedonians were a ‘barbarian people’ who had conquered the Greeks in the battlefield (at the Battle of Chaeronea in 338 BC) and through bribery (Macedon was known for its gold).27 In those days, this was also the dominant view of intellectuals in Europe and the Americas, echoing the assessment of Edward Gibbon in The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (1788–1789).28 Even historian Constantine Paparrigopoulos, the father of the Greek historical narrative (which has dominated the scene from the 1850s until today), had written, before becoming professor at the University of Athens, that the Macedonians were a mixture of Greeks and Illyrians, and that Chaeronea was a battle between Greeks and Macedonians, adding that the Macedonian epoch is to be distinguished from the Greek one.29 But in the 1850s and 1860s, within his concept of an uninterrupted Greek history, he placed Macedonia within Greek history, as ‘Macedonian Hellenism’, claiming the unity and continuity of ‘the Greek nation’ from the Homeric days until the modern era. As with Gibbon, this Greek shift was bolstered by a foreign historian, the German Johann Gustav Droysen, with his 1833 magnum opus, Geschichte Alexanders des Grossen (History of Alexander the Great). Droysen claimed that when the Macedonians arrived on the scene, Greek values were in decline, especially in view of their obsessive attachment to local autonomy, and the ‘racially Greek Macedonians’ initiated a ‘national’ war against Persia, ‘a goal that eventually united all Greeks into a free and powerful sovereign state’, and as for Alexander he ‘advanced a war of unity and the liberation of all Hellenes’.30 Droysen’s views were of course music to the ears of Paparrigopoulos and other Greeks, but his stance did not go unchallenged, being disputed by one of the foremost scholars of ancient Greece, the British historian George Grote. For Grote in his seminal 12-volume History of Greece (1846–1856), the Athenian and Greek golden period was regrettably interrupted by Macedonian expansionism; the Macedonians were not Greeks, and Alexander was a Macedonian and Epirot barbarian prince only ‘partially imbued with Grecian sentiment and intelligence’.31 Paparrigopoulos was greatly disturbed for he held Grote in high esteem and a rebuttal on his part was called for. According to Paparrigopoulos, Grote’s mistake was that he was so attached to an idealized image of political autonomy and Athenian (Hellenic) democratic rule and individual liberty, that he jumped to the conclusion that the Macedonians (in view of their autocratic rule) were not Hellenes.32 For the national Greek historiographer, Macedonian rule ‘succeeded in purging the Greek nation of the curse of centuries, namely, disunion’ and ‘Alexander opened the gates of Hellenism to the East, paving the way for dissemination of Christianity’ and for the coming of the Byzantine Empire as a Greek empire.33 Macedonia was central to Paparrigopoulos’s idea of ‘the progressive continuity of the Greek

Greek, Bulgarian and Serbian claims to Macedonia 5 nation’, with the Greek Macedonians ‘pioneers in promoting the national cause’.34 This approach, and not the one by Grote, was to gain ascendency in Europe due also to the contribution of the Oxford historian Edward Augustus Freeman and in particular to the works of an array of distinguished German historians specializing on ancient Macedonia from the 1880s until the first decades of the twentieth century.35 The incorporation of the Macedonia by Paparrigopoulos as well as of Byzantium was aimed at affirming and justifying ‘the legitimacy of irredentism’,36 the new notion of a ‘Greater Greece’ founded on the Megali Idea, which dominated the Greek landscape from the second part of the 1850s until 1922 (until the ‘Asia Minor Catastrophe’ as it is known to the Greeks). This concept was the brainchild of statesman Ioannis Kolettis, in a speech he delivered to the Greek Parliament in January 1844. However, it took a decade to sink in, but when this occurred, it became the Greek idée fixe and main axis of Greece’s foreign policy for seventy years by all shades of opinion until 1922, save for the Communist Party of Greece (KKE)37 established in 1918.38 The Megali Idea in its most extreme rendition amounted to the resurrection of the Byzantine Empire, with Constantinople as the capital, as a ‘Greek Empire’ and in doing so Hellenizing the south Slavs. In its more realistic version, it sought to ‘liberate’ those regions of the Ottoman Empire where the Greek element either was in the majority (Thessaly, Crete and the eastern Aegean islands) or had made its mark in the economic, educational and intellectual spheres (as in southern Macedonia and Epirus).39 Within the concept of the Megali Idea, Greece claimed, from the 1860s until most of the 1870s, the whole of geographical Macedonia, but thereafter, with the dynamic involvement of the Bulgarians and the realization by the Greeks that the Slavic presence was considerable in the middle and northern parts of Macedonia, Greece tempered its claims to what it called ‘historical Macedonia’, roughly corresponding to Macedon under Philip II, before his northern conquests.40 The initial Greek position of acquiring the whole of Macedonia was not grossly far-fetched as it seems to us today. Until the 1850s Greek influence in the region of Macedonia was unassailable, with hundreds of Greek schools (under the Patriarchate of Constantinople). This had led to the Hellenization of a portion of the Slavs, mainly of the Bulgarians and other Slavspeakers (though not the Serbs), who studied in Greek schools in the Ottoman Balkans or at the prestigious University of Athens, the first university in the Balkans. This voluntary individual assimilation of Slavspeakers into Greek culture was aimed on their part at upward social mobility, a process that had also taken place among many of the Orthodox Albanianspeakers and Orthodox Vlachs (speakers of a Romanian dialect).41 Until the mid-nineteenth century most affluent Slav Macedonians ‘tended to regard themselves, especially abroad, as Hellenes, for reasons of both prestige and material gain and well-being’.42 They believed that ‘they could express themselves in a “cultured” way only in Greek’ and that their native tongue was ‘common’ and was ‘not proper for a cultured man’.43 Put differently, ‘[r]egardless of the language that one spoke at home, becoming a member of the nascent bourgeoisie meant learning to speak Greek in public’.44

6 Greek, Bulgarian and Serbian claims to Macedonia A new generation of Bulgarian historians points out that for the educated Bulgarians until the 1860s, the Greeks had functioned as the mediators of the ideas of the Enlightenment and of Romanticism, and also as the harbingers of the idea of patriotism and of the concomitant need to struggle for the freedom of one’s nation. The educated Bulgarians were divided into three groups: those who ended up becoming Greeks, many thriving in Greece, attaining high positions in the University of Athens, in the administration or in politics; those who became fullyfledged Bulgarian patriots, having previously experienced, in the Greek schools of the Ottoman Empire or in the University of Athens, the scorn of their Greek teachers or fellow students for being ‘vulgar’ Slavs or Bulgarians (hence the Bulgarian narrative of the Greek ‘spiritual yoke’ from Greece and the Patriarchate)45; and those who took a, however precarious, middle position, having become Bulgarians but with no resentment towards the Greeks to whom they felt indebted for bringing them into modernity.46

The Bulgarian challenge and the Greek response The rise of Bulgarian nationalism in the course of what is known as the Bulgarian National Revival (Balgarsko natsionalno vazrazhdane or simply Vazrazhdane), from the 1830s until 1878,47 by the 1870s put an end to Greek wishful thinking and to the belief that somehow all the Slav Christians of Macedonia were in fact Greeks (even if they were not aware of it) or could be Hellenized. Bulgarian nationalism was also alarming for another reason: it interrupted the northeastern imagined onward march of the Greeks to Constantinople.48 Bulgarian nationalism regarded as its main spiritual rival the Greeks and the Patriarchate in Constantinople. Hence ‘[e]cclesiastical autonomy was considered as the first step toward Bulgarian nationalism’.49 Bulgarian churchmen called for an independent Church (initially flirting with the Catholic Church) and the Patriarchate seemed willing to allow Bulgarian metropolitans and the use of Bulgarian liturgical language in Bulgaria proper, but was not prepared to make such concessions in Macedonia, where the population was more mixed.50 The Bulgarian Exarchate (the autocephalous Bulgarian church) under an Exarch (a rank between Archbishop and Patriarch) was recognized by an imperial fireman of Sultan Abdülaziz in 1870 (with the parallel recognition of a Bulgarian millet, distinct from the Rum millet).51 Antim (Anthimos), the first Bulgarian Exarch, who unlike the other candidates for the position had kept his ties with the Patriarchate, tried to earn the Patriarch’s endorsement but was turned down.52 Thus, in May 1872 Antim proclaimed the independence of the Bulgarian Church and the Ecumenical Patriarchate declared it ‘schismatic’.53 In a major synod convened by the Ecumenical Patriarch in 1872, the Bulgarian initiative was branded as an expression of phyletism (in essence nationalism) contrary to the brotherhood of Christ founded on all peoples.54 Clearly this was seen as a clash of authority within the Orthodox Church which the Ecumenical Patriarchate could not tolerate. It was also a historical juncture: from then on the Constantinople Patriarchate, even though officially ‘ecumenical’, became the organ of Greek irredentism in the Ottoman Balkans,

Greek, Bulgarian and Serbian claims to Macedonia 7 though the Patriarchate was at times more subtle trying to also meet – or rather to seem as meeting – its ecumenical mission, as when it was headed by the astute Joachim III (in 1878–1884 and 1901–1912), who also tried, unsuccessfully, to find a solution to the Bulgarian schism.55 There followed the Bulgarian ‘April Uprising’ (Aprilsko vǎstanie) of 1876 against the Ottoman rule, which was a cause of concern for Greece. For the Greeks, the shock reached nightmarish proportions two years later, when a Greater Bulgaria seemed imminent, following the end of the devastating Russo-Ottoman War (April 1877–March 1878), with the Russians within a short distance from the Ottoman capital.56 The Preliminary Treaty of San Stefano (3 March 1878) between Russia and the Sublime Porte envisaged a Greater Bulgaria, covering Bulgaria proper, Eastern Rumelia and almost the whole of Macedonia (but for the city of Thessaloniki and the Chalkidiki Peninsula), which would have made it the largest state in the Balkans (albeit autonomous and not independent).57 San Stefano was the handiwork of Nikolay Ignatiev (a pan-Slavist Russian diplomat, then serving as the Russian ambassador in Constantinople, who had been instrumental in the Sultan’s recognition of the Bulgarian Exarchate).58 The Bulgarian gains were so astounding (the Bulgarians had been subdued following the April Uprising) that, as Evangelos Kofos has humourlessly put it, ‘[e]ven the most ardent Bulgarian nationalists were pleasantly surprised’.59 For the Bulgarians, San Stefano was seen ‘as a short term fulfillment of the national idea’.60 By contrast, in Macedonian historiography San Stefano is depicted as an expression of ‘Great Bulgarian chauvinism and annexation desires’.61 In any event, the San Stefano Treaty was rendered null and void within a few months at the risk of war with Britain, and the final outcome was the Treaty of Berlin (see Chapter 2). In the Bulgarian narrative the revision of San Stefano is denounced as a ‘great injustice’ and a ‘national catastrophe’62 (though these claims are not very convincing for the Russians had done all the fighting after the April Uprising). According to Maria Todorova, ‘[t]he San Stefano Treaty became the sui generis metahistorical event in the development of Bulgarian nationalism, a dream almost come true, and an idée fixe for decades to come’.63 Note that Bulgaria’s National Day is 3 March (the date of the signing of the San Stefano Treaty) officially known as the ‘Day of Liberation of Bulgaria from the Ottoman Dominion’. As for the Greeks, even though the idea of a Greater Bulgaria was stillborn, they could not get over their shock, and from then on until the first decade of the twentieth century, the Bulgarians were regarded as their worst enemies, branded as ‘Tatars’, ‘immoral’, ‘barbarian’, ‘bloodthirsty’ and ‘worse than the Turks’. And it was from then onwards that the ‘bogey of Pan-Slavism’ made its entry into the Greek public domain, with the Bulgarians seen as the spearhead of Pan-Slavism orchestrated by Russia.64 However, potentially more ominous for the Greek cause in Macedonia was the justification for a Greater Bulgaria, which was based on the radical new principle of nationalities (known as national self-determination in the early twentieth century), which was founded on ethnic and linguistic definitions of nationhood, with

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the speakers of Bulgarian dialects in Macedonia the most populous single ethnolinguistic group in the whole of Macedonia.65 The language aspect was ‘the Achilles heel of the Greek theory about the Greekness of Macedonia’.66 The Greeks reacted by claiming that the real ‘sentiments’ (phronima) and ‘consciousness’ of the Christian Orthodox people of Macedonia were Greek and that Greece had ‘historical rights’ to the land, and they also referred to the ‘superior’ Greek education and attachment of many whose mother tongue was not Greek to the powerful and omnipresent Ecumenical Patriarchate.67 Here a parenthesis is in order. The principle of nationalities, though popular in Europe, especially since 1848 (‘Spring of Nations’) had not been incorporated into international law in the nineteenth century. But it was championed by a minority of influential international lawyers, notably Italians,68 as well as by political thinkers of all political shades, including Giuseppe Mazzini, John Stuart Mill, Ernest Renan, Otto Bauer and many others. Moreover, from the 1850s onwards a number of plebiscites were conducted to ascertain the will of the people, which amounted to an indirect acceptance of the principle.69 In 1877–1881, the apprehensive Greek Government chose to bend with the wind, opting for a ‘small idea’, namely to acquire Thessaly, Epirus (southern Albania) and Crete, and this was the Greek request to the great powers at the Berlin Congress.70 Despite this momentary switch, the dominant perception in Greece continued to be, well into the first decade of the twentieth century, that the ‘Slavspeakers’ living in the three Ottoman provinces of Macedonia were ‘Greeks’ and had Greek sentiments, but had forgotten their mother tongue, having been forced to learn the language of their Bulgar conquerors in the Middle Ages.71 At the turn of the century, there were even attempts to prove that their Slavic spoken language had a mixed vocabulary with Greek roots,72 implying that they were descendants of the ancient ‘Greek Macedonians’ and spoke a version of ancient ‘Greek Macedonian’! The Greek teachers of the Greek-speaking schools in Ottoman Macedonia were instructed to teach their Slav and Bulgarian-speaking pupils the glory of Alexander the Great, trying to make them identify with him and convince them that they were his true descendants.73 They were also supplied with books of Greek nationalist content from which to teach, such as a volume titled The Prophesies of Alexander, written by Athanasios Souliotes-Nikolaidis, a prominent activist, which included a prediction by Alexander the Great that Macedonian was bound to become part of Greece.74 Even the more realist Greeks were of the view that the Bulgarian or Slavspeakers who remained faithful to the Patriarchate (known as ‘Patriarchists’) – and not to the Exarchate (known as ‘Exarchists’) – had opted for Greek rather than Bulgarian or Serbian ‘national consciousness’.75 However Greece, after acquiring Thessaly peacefully in 1881, sought to secure ‘historical Macedonia’, that is some 60 percent and not almost the whole of Macedonia like the Bulgarians. The limits were to be Ohrid and Monastir, which was still overambitious given the limited Greek presence, in a majority only in the Chalkidiki Peninsula.76 The strength of Greek irredentism in the contested areas of Macedonia depended largely on ‘the loyalty of the Vlachs’, who, according to Evangelos Kofos, if ‘lost to an alien

Greek, Bulgarian and Serbian claims to Macedonia 9 national idea, Greek positions in Macedonia would come under fire and would be seriously compromised’.77 Thus, the Greek Government put pressure on the Romanian Government and the Ecumenical Patriarchate to the head of the Romanian Church, to dissuade them from trying to instil the Vlachs of Macedonia with the Romanian national idea.78 From the 1870s until the eve of the Balkan Wars, the Greek arguments were the following: (a) that the ancient Macedonians were ethnic Greeks; (b) that the Slavs and Bulgarians of the Middle Ages had experienced considerable influence from the Byzantine Greeks and thus a substantial number of them had been assimilated; and (c) that the Slavspeakers of Macedonia were not necessarily Bulgarians or Slavs, and taking into consideration the loyalty of many of them to the Patriarchate and their participation in the Greek national struggle of the 1820s, they were more Greek in their national consciousness than Slav or Bulgarian.79 Until the last decade of the nineteenth century, the main vehicle for expanding the Greek influence was education in the Greek-speaking schools, propaganda and the influence of the Patriarchate and Greek churchmen in Macedonia, all of them trying to stem the Bulgarian influence. In Athens the Society for the Propagation of Greek Literacy, assisted and funded by the Greek foreign ministry, was in the business of trying to Hellenize the Slav-speaking inhabitants.80 The schools in Macedonia from around 600 rose to 1400, with the Greek state spending more funds on education in Macedonia than in Greece. In Greece, apart from the government and the diplomats (the Greek diplomats in Macedonia included major figures such as Ion Dragoumis and Lambros Koromilas), an organization named National Society was formed in 1894, an ultra-nationalist outfit whose aim was the ‘liberation’ of all the Greeks living in the Ottoman Empire.81 The Ilinden Uprising of 1903 (see Chapter 3) had alarmed Greece, given that the Patriarchists had joined the Exarchists in the uprising and this was also the case with some of the Vlachs.82 Thus, 1904 saw the start, in earnest, of what is known in Greece as the ‘Macedonian Struggle’, a limited guerrilla warfare, pitting the Greek guerrilla fighters (many of them former officers of the Greek Army as volunteers) with the Bulgarians, at times with some assistance from the Ottomans who were keen to oblige, apparently fearing the Bulgarians more than the Greeks. The bulk of the Slavic-speaking inhabitants of Macedonia were faced with an acute dilemma, often changing sides depending on which guerrilla band had sojourned in their village intimidating them, for their imagined world was still the pre-modern era, hence they were unable to identify ‘with national ideologies, which others tried to impose upon them’.83 For them the only identity was Orthodox Christianity, distinguishing them from the Muslims, the Catholics or the Jews, and as Orthodox Slavspeakers they were split into Exarchists and Patriarchists.84 The Greek and Bulgarian Macedonian struggle ended in 1908 with the Young Turk Revolution. The overall assessment of the Greek Macedonian struggle is that the Greeks managed to curb the Bulgarian inroads and influence especially in the southern part of Macedonia. But this also happens to be the view of the Bulgarians that they were able to instil Bulgarian identity to the Slavspeaking Christians.85

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Bulgaria followed by Serbia For both the Bulgarians and the Serbs, Macedonia was the imagined cradle of their culture and nation, the points of reference being the first and second Bulgarian Empires, and the Serbian Empire of Stefan Dušan, respectively, this despite the fact that these empires were hardly national but multiethnic, as was the case with the Basileia Rhōmaiōn (the eastern Roman Empire, Byzantium) as well as the Ottoman Empire. Bulgaria, when established as a principality under Ottoman suzerainty with the 1878 Treaty of Berlin (which in practice amounted to de facto independence), claimed almost the whole of Macedonia, ‘undivided Bulgaria’ (Tselokupina Bǎlgariya) as it was called. It amounted to ‘San Stefano plus’, including Thessaloniki though not Chalkidiki and a small part of Macedonia south of the Aliakmon River.86 In order to secure it, Bulgaria initiated an impressive educational and propaganda campaign, headed by the Exarchate and the Cyril and Methodius Society (set up in 1884), and the main objective was to convince the Slavspeakers of the region who spoke various Slav dialects close to Bulgarian, that they are Bulgarians and that they would be saved from Ottoman misgovernment if their territory became part of Bulgaria.87 However, even though the Exarchate’s reach did expand considerably, the Slav-speaking inhabitants of Macedonia, surprisingly, did not all join the Bulgarian Church but many remained attached to the Patriarchate, despite the undeniable fact that most of the Slavspeakers of Macedonia did speak Bulgarian dialects and not a Serbo-Croatian dialect or Greek.88 The Bulgarian justification for eventually annexing the region was based on the ethnic composition that the majority of Christians spoke Bulgarian dialects, which gave them the edge by comparison to the other two contenders. Other justifications include the following: (a) the Bulgarians were basically Slavs and as for the original Bulgars (a Turkic ethnic group) they were totally Slavisized in the Middle Ages; (b) the Slavs of Macedonia had merged with the Bulgarians and not with the Serbs or with the Greeks; and (c) during the nineteenth century and despite the Patriarchate in Constantinople, which supported Greece’s Megali Idea, the Slavophone Macedonians remained a distinct group and the majority in Macedonia, whose elite favoured union with Bulgaria.89 Serbia initially stood aloof and did not seem concerned with Macedonia, but from 1878 onwards it joined the fray, putting its emphasis mainly on northwestern Macedonia, which it regarded as ‘Old Serbia’ (Stara Srbija), roughly the region incorporated into Serbia in 1913. And as we will see, at the end of the day the winners were Greece and Serbia, gaining more territory than their share of the population, with maximalist Bulgaria the net loser. The Serbian arguments were that (a) the Macedonian Slavs in the Middle Ages were Serbs and not Bulgarians, and had amalgamated with the Serbs, at the latest under the Serbian Empire of Stefan Dušan; (b) the Slav Macedonians retained their Serbian customs and traditions from the fourteenth century onwards and their Slavic dialect was closer to Serbian than to Bulgarian; and (c) their identification with the Bulgarians was non-existent until the mid-nineteenth century, and

Greek, Bulgarian and Serbian claims to Macedonia 11 afterwards any such link was the product of the intense Bulgarian propaganda which was trying to persuade them that they were not Serbs or linked to the Serbs, but Bulgarians.90 We will now examine the Serbian claim to Macedonia for the Bulgarians, although very active in the region, were not prominent internationally presenting their case with ethnographic maps, texts and the like, as did Greece and Serbia. Until the end of the nineteenth century Bulgaria left this task to foreigners (or referred to those works in their exchanges with foreigners), for whatever the Greeks and Serbs did to present their case to Europe they could not match the Bulgarian cause presented by non-Bulgarians.

Serbia and Macedonia Serbia was a principality within the Ottoman Empire (1817–1878), following the partly successful ‘Serbian Revolution’ (Srpska revolucija) of 1804–1813 and 1815–1817. For Serbia prior to the 1860s, Macedonia was largely an unknown territory for which the Serbs showed little interest or so it seemed. But the shortlived Treaty of San Stefano, with its Greater Bulgaria, sent alarm bells to the Serbs, and they entered the scene as a serious contender for Macedonia, joining Greece and Bulgaria in rivalry.91 The spectre of Greater Bulgaria and the rising Bulgarian influence in the region were perceived as a blow to vital Serbian national interests, for Macedonia was seen as a region for landlocked Serbia to expand and find an opening to the sea, in the Aegean. The Adriatic via Bosnia-Herzegovina was closed after 1878, with the Austro-Hungarian occupation in 1878 (and annexation in 1908). As for reaching the Adriatic, by taking over the northern Albanian littoral, Serbia was to face firm Austro-Hungarian as well as Italian opposition (Vienna as well as Rome favoured Albanian independence so as to curb the Serbian ambitions).92 As in the case of Greece with its dream of the Great Idea and the Bulgarian dream of a Greater Bulgaria, the Serbs also had their concept of aggrandizement, Greater Serbia, with Serbia aspiring to become the Piedmont of Serbian nationalism, ‘liberating’ and ‘unifying’ all the Serbs or those regarded as Serbs in the Balkans. The groundwork for Greater Serbia had been set by Vuk Karadžić, the great Serbian language reformer, with the standardization of the Štokavian Serbian dialect and his ‘linguistic Serbianism’, according to which all who spoke Štokavian, irrespective of their religion, were in fact Serbs. As early as1814, Karadžić held that the Croats were Catholic Serbs and the Muslims who spoke Štokavian were Muslim Serbs.93 The Serbian grand design appeared in a secret text titled Načertanije (Outline), a programme of foreign policy written in 1844 by Ilija Garašanin, the Serbian statesman who dominated the Serbian political scene from the 1840s until the 1860s. Načertanije94 (by a curious coincidence conceived in the same year as Greece’s Megali Idea) envisaged the liberation and unification of all the lands regarded as Serbian, with reference to the medieval empire of Stefan Dušan. It envisaged union with Montenegro, acquisition (‘liberation’) of Bosnia,

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Herzegovina, Kosovo, Vojvodina and Northern Albania with an outlet to the Adriatic. Garašanin like Karadžić regarded the Croats and the Muslims of BosniaHerzegovina as Catholic and Muslim Serbs, respectively.95 Načertanije, contrary to Greece’s Megali Idea, which was widely known to the Greeks and to international diplomacy, remained secret until 1906,96 known only to a handful of Serbian insiders.97 Macedonia is not referred to in the Outline, but given the Serbian attachment to Old Serbia and to Stefan Dušan’s empire, with Skopje as its capital, Macedonia or at least its northern part was part of the Greater Serbian scheme of things.98 Characteristically, in 1848 Serbia published a motion to the Sublime Porte calling for elections and the nominations of Slav bishops and metropolitans in Macedonia, and Garašanin wrote a detailed study on the suffering of the Slav populations in the region by the ‘Turkish rulers and the Greek bishops’.99 A few years later Garašanin sent the Croat folklorist Stjepan Verković (an advocate of the Serbian cause) to Macedonia, ostensibly to study Slavic folklore (he published a book of folksongs) but in fact on a mission to stem Greek influence and convince the Macedonian Slavs that they were Serbs. Verković resided in Serres from 1857 until the early 1870s, sending regular reports to the Serbian Government, and at the end of his mission, he felt confident that he had succeeded in not allowing the Macedonian Slavs to fall prey to Hellenism (as he had put it).100 However, the greater threat to Serbian interests in Macedonia came from the Bulgarians. One of the first to sense this danger was the Serb lawyer Miloš Milojević. Milojević, having studied law in Belgrade, pursued studies at Lomonosov Moscow University. There he became acquainted with the Russian panSlavists who envisaged the creation of Greater Bulgaria from the Black Sea to the Adriatic. Milojević upon returning to Belgrade in 1865 made sure to inform Garašanin accordingly and the prime minister was duly alarmed.101 Thus, by the late 1860s Belgrade became active in trying to abet Bulgarian influence in Macedonia. It set up two committees for the establishment of Serbian schools in Macedonia, the protagonists being Milojević and the major historian and statesman, Stojan Novaković (President of the Serbian Academy of Science, three times minister of education, envoy to Constantinople, Paris, Vienna and St. Petersburg and twice prime minister). From the late 1870s onwards many personalities became actively involved in the Serbian cause, with ethnographic and historical books and other texts. Among them were geographers Jovan Dragašević, Jefto Dedijer, Vladmir Karić and Milojko Veselinović, and the astronomer Spiridon Gopčević, a Serb from Austria-Hungary.102 The first Serbian maps appeared in the 1880s and were grossly exaggerated, presenting the Serbs as dominant in most of Macedonia, with all the Macedonian Slavs presented as Serbs as seen by a map by Karić issued in 1887. But it was Gopčević’s 1889 map that caught the attention of Europe, due to his improved technical methods of depicting ethnographic distributions.103 Not surprisingly, these maps by Serbs failed to convince anyone outside Serbia. However, they managed to put the Serbian marker which few had anticipated until then in Europe, Bulgaria or Greece.104 In the 1890s and until the Balkan Wars among those involved in the efforts to Serbianize the Macedonian Slavs were historians, such as Vasilije Derić and Panta

Greek, Bulgarian and Serbian claims to Macedonia 13 Srećković, political figures, such as Vladan Đorđević (writer, mayor of Belgrade, diplomat, foreign minister and prime minister), Stojan Protić (publicist, interior and economics minister and prime minister of Yugoslavia), and an array of diplomats and experts of the Serbian foreign ministry, where a Macedonian propaganda section had been set up.105 Various other state institutions and organizations were active, such as the Society of Saint Savva, set up by philologist Svetomir Nikolajević (professor at Belgrade University), historian Ljubomir Kovačević (dean of Belgrade University), Milojević, Veselinović, Gopčević and others. But the Serbian scientists, apart from Novaković, who were to leave their imprint on Serbia’s claim to Macedonia were, decades later, the ethnologist Jovan Cvijić and the linguist Aleksandar Belić (both with impeccable credentials as academics). Cvijić came up with the notion that the Macedonian Slavs had an unclear national identity and dubbed them ‘Macedoslavs’ (see Chapter 2). Belić presented the Slavic dialects of Macedonia as closer to Serbian than to Bulgarian, but not as Serbian dialects.106 There were two main schools of thought in Serbia as regards Macedonia and how to acquire it: the moderate line advocated by Novaković and later by Cvijić, which was a minority view, and the maximalist uncompromising approach, the view of the majority, which regarded all the Macedonian Slavs as Serbs. According to the more plausible approach, first voiced by Novaković (in a letter to the education minister when serving as the Serbian envoy to Constantinople), the Slavophone Macedonian population was not yet equipped with a national consciousness; these people were an in-between link between the Serbs and the Bulgarians. However, the Bulgarian idea was well established in Macedonia. Thus, Serbia did not stand a chance trying to convince the Slavophones, in Serbian schools in Macedonia and by propaganda, that they were in fact Serbs. And his proposal was that the best device for the Serbs to deal with the spreading of ‘Bulgarism’ was ‘Macedonism’ (Makedonizam).107 The Macedonism school of Novaković and Cvijić faced aheavy wind in Serbia by the maximalists whose views remained dominant. They branded it as an ‘Austrian scheme’, aimed at splitting the Serbian people, so as to allow the Austrians to move southwards; and as a ‘Bulgarian scheme’, with the Bulgarian often referring to those people as ‘Macedonians’, as if the term had an ethnic or national meaning, whereas it simply referred to the region wherein they lived. For the maximalist Serbians the Macedonian Slavs were simply ‘southern Serbs’.108 For either of the two trends to stand any chance of success, it had to convince not only the Macedonian Slavspeakers but also European audiences (academics, diplomats, governments and the press) whose interest for Macedonia had markedly increased from 1878 onwards. As regards the historical argument, it was based on Medieval Serbian Empire with Skopje as its capital. The language argument was trickier, given the affinity of the Macedonian Slavic dialects to Bulgarian. Predictably the emphasis was on the sound (phonemes) of their speech, which upon hearing it seemed closer to Serbian than to Bulgarian, and on some letters used by those who wrote in the Macedonian dialects, as argued, among others by Dragašević, Gopčević and others. Gopčević also referred to the placement of the

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accent, pointing out that in ‘the Macedonian dialects’ the accent is either antepenultimate or penultimate, as in Serbian, while in Bulgarian the accent falls mostly on the last syllable.109 The moderates Novaković and Cvijić acknowledged that the Macedonian Slav dialects were halfway between Serbo-Croatian and Bulgarian, having borrowed elements from both south-Slav languages. Ultimately, the main Serbian thrust was propaganda. Serbian propaganda went as far as to claim that the present Macedonian Slavs were descendants of the ancient Macedonians, with the ancients depicted as non-Greeks. Within this context, the Bulgarians were depicted as Tatars or Turks and not as true Slavs.110 The Bulgarian influence in Macedonia made the Serbs come up with farfetched justifications, which, though imaginative, run the danger of being seen as ludicrous. For instance, according to Gopčević, there also existed in Macedonia ‘crypto-Serbs’ or ‘Albanisized Serbs’, and as for the Muslim Slavspeakers they were Serbs who had espoused Islam to avoid the influence of the Patriarchate of Constantinople, which was more oppressive than the Ottomans, not allowing them to have their own Church.111 More plausible were two other Serbian forays by Milojević, Đorđević, Gopčević and others: the custom of slava, that every family had a protector saint, which is non-existent among the Bulgarians; and zadruga, that is the cooperation and support which exists within the extended family, again a Serbian and not a Bulgarian tradition.112 As for the term ‘Bulgarian’, widely used as a self-definition by the Macedonian Slavs, the Serbian reaction, based on the accent, was that there were two variants – ‘Bulgarians’ and ‘Bugarians’; both intended to dupe the Ottomans, who regarded the Bulgarians timid and docile, by comparison to the Serbs, a line taken by Đorđević, Dragašević, Veselinović and others. Novaković, Gopčević, Dragašević, Cvijić and others claimed that the term ‘Bulgarian’ was not an ethnic attribute, it merely referred to simple Christian peasants.113 According to Cvijić, ‘Bulgar’ was widely used in the Balkans with the meaning ‘country bumpkin [rustaud]’ and ‘before the establishment of the Exarchate and the establishment of present-day Bulgaria, the word Bulgar did not signify anything other than this pejorative sense [used by] the Greek people and Turkish functionaries’.114 As a result, ‘the travelers in the Balkans saw Bulgarians everywhere because this was what their Greek and Turkish guides called the peasant populations of the Balkans’.115 Cvijić also referred to anthropological features then in vogue internationally, such as that the standard Bulgarian type had a broad forehead and protruding cheekbones alluding to Tatar origins, while the Macedonian Slavs were similar to the Serbs, with Indo-European characteristics.116

Notes 1 M.B. Hatzopoulos, ‘Macedonian Studies’, in Robin J. Lane Fox (ed.), Brill’s Companion to Ancient Macedon: Studies in the Archaeology and History of Macedon, 650 BC–300 AD (Leiden: Brill, 2015) [2011], 35. 2 Ibid., 35–6; H. R. Wilkinson, Maps and Politics: A Review of the Ethnographic Cartography of Macedonia (Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 1951), 1–2; Evangelos Livieratos, ‘On the Cartographic Placement of the Toponym “Macedonia” ’, in

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20 21 22 23

24

Ioannis D. Stefanidis, Vlasis Vlasidis and Evangelos Kofos (eds), Macedonian Identities through Time: Interdisciplinary Approaches (Thessaloniki: Foundation of the Museum for the Macedonian Struggle, Epikentro, 2010) [2008], 11–20; Tchavdar Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander: Macedonian Identity at the Crossroads of Greek, Bulgarian and Serbian Nationalism’, in Roumen Daskalov and Tchavdar Marinov (eds), Entangled Histories of the Balkans, Volume One: National Ideologies and Language Policies (Leiden: Brill, 2013a), 277–80. Stoyan Pribichevich, Macedonia: Its People and History (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1982), 48, 58. Andrew Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians: A History (Stanford: Hoover Institution Press, 2008), xviii. Peter Green, Alexander the Great and the Hellenistic Age (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 2007), 111. Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, xviii. Pribichevich, Macedonia, 4–5. Vemund Aarbakke, Ethnic Rivalry and the Quest for Macedonia, 1870–1913 (Boulder, CO: East European Monographs, 2003), 4. Alexis P. Vlasto, The Entry of the Slavs into Christendom: An Introduction to the Medieval History of the Slavs (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1970). Zhidas Daskalovski, ‘Clashing Historical Narratives and the Macedonian Name Dispute–Solving the Unsolvable’, Trames Journal of the Humanities and Social Sciences, 21:4 (2017), 335. Dimitar Bechev, Historical Dictionary of North Macedonia, Second Edition (Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield, 2019), 4–5. Hugh Poulton, The Balkans: Minorities and States in Conflict (London: Hurst & Company, 1991), 46. Bechev, Historical Dictionary of North Macedonia, 10. Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 1. İpek K. Yosmaoğlu, Blood Ties: Religion, Violence and the Politics of Nationhood in Ottoman Macedonia, 1878–1908 (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2014), Kindle Edition, location 286. Nadine Lange-Akhund, The Macedonian Question, 1893–1908: From Western Sources (Boulder, CO: East European Monographs, 1998), 13. Wilkinson, Maps and Politics, 1, 7; Hugh Poulton, Who Are the Macedonians? (London: Hurst & Company, 1995), 67. L.S. Stavrianos, The Balkans since 1453 (London: Hurst & Company, 2000) [1958], 517; Stephen Palmer and Robert R. King, Yugoslav Communism and the Macedonian Question (Hamden: Archon Books, 1971), 3–4; Aarbakke, Ethnic Rivalry and the Quest for Macedonia, 8. Tchavdar Marinov, ‘We, the Macedonians: The Paths of Macedonian Supra-Nationalism (1878–1912)’, in Diana Mishkova (ed.), We, the People: Politics of National Peculiarity in Southeast Europe (Budapest: Central European University Press, 2013c), 112; Ivo Banac, The National Question in Yugoslavia (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1993) [1984], 307. Quoted in Yosmaoğlu, Blood Ties, location 266. Ibid., location 266. John S. Koliopoulos, Plundered Loyalties: Axis Occupation and Civil Strife in Greek West Macedonia, 1941–1949 (London: Hurst & Company, 1999), 14. Quoted in ibid., 15. See also Basil C. Gounaris, ‘Greek Views of Macedonia: From the Enlightenment to the First World War’, in Ioannis D. Stefanidis, Vlasis Vlasidis and Evangelos Kofos (eds), Macedonian Identities through Time: Interdisciplinary Approaches (Thessaloniki: Foundation of the Museum for the Macedonian Struggle, Epikentro, 2010) [2008], 145–6. Koliopoulos, Plundered Loyalties, 16.

16

Greek, Bulgarian and Serbian claims to Macedonia

25 Ibid., 13, 16. 26 K.Th. Dimaras, Neohellinikos Diafotismos [Neo-Hellenic Enlightenment] (Athens: Hermes, 2002) [1977]. 27 Alexis Politis, Romandica chronia: ideologies kai nootropies stin Ellada tou 1830–1880 [Romantic Years: Ideologies and Mentalities in the Greece of 1830–1880] (Athens: EMNE-Mnimon, 1993), 40–3; Yiannis Koumbourlis, ‘I idea tis synehias tou ellinikou ethnous stous ekprosopous tou Ellinikou Diafotismou’ [The Idea of the Continuity of the Greek Nation According to the Representatives of the Greek Enlightenment], Dokimes, 13–14 (2005), 153–5, 157, 175–80; K.Th. Dimaras, Ellinikos romantismos [Greek Romanticism] (Athens: Hermes, 1994), 339; Vangelis D. Karamanolakis, I sigrotisi tis istorikis epistimis kai i didaskalia tis istorias sto Panepistimio Athinon (1837–1932) [The Formation of Historical Science and the Teaching of History in the University of Athens (1837–1932)] (Athens: Institouto Neoellinikon Erevnon, 2006), 53, 102 fn. 234. 28 Karamanolakis, I sigrotisi tis istorikis epistimis kai i didaskalia tis istorias sto Panepistimio Athinon, 53. 29 Politis, Romandica Chronia, 43; Koumbourlis, ‘I idea tis synehias tou ellinikou ethnous stous ekprosopous tou Ellinikou Diafotismou’, 188; Karamanolakis, I sigrotisi tis istorikis epistimis kai i didaskalia tis istorias sto Panepistimio Athinon, 102. 30 Kyriakos N. Demetriou, ‘Historians on Macedonian Imperialism and Alexander the Great’, Journal of Modern Greek Studies, 19:1 (2001), 30; Hatzopoulos, ‘Macedonian Studies’, 37. 31 Demetriou, ‘Historians on Macedonian Imperialism and Alexander the Great’, 31–2. 32 Ibid., 41, 47, 49. 33 Ibid., 50. 34 Ibid. 35 Ibid., 51–2. 36 Ibid., 24. 37 KKE was strongly opposed to Greece’s invasion in Asia Minor in 1919–22, which it considered (correctly) as an imperialistic war. 38 Elli Skopetea, To ‘Protypo Vasileio’ kai i Megali Idea [The ‘Prototype Kingdom’ and the Great Idea] (Athens: Polytypo, 1988). 39 Ibid., 269–324. 40 Gounaris, ‘Greek Views of Macedonia’, 149. 41 Stavrianos, The Balkans since 1453, 518; Roumen Daskalov, ‘Bulgarian-Greek Dis/ Entanglements’, in Roumen Daskalov and Tchavdar Marinov (eds), Entangled Histories of the Balkans, Volume One: National Ideologies and Language Policies (Leiden: Brill, 2013), 149, 151–61, 168. 42 Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 84. 43 Pribichevich, Macedonia, 108. 44 Yosmaoğlu, Blood Ties, location 1416. 45 Maria Todorova, ‘Self-Image and Ethnic Stereotypes in Bulgaria’, Modern Greek Studies Yearbook, 8 (1992), 147–50. 46 See Daskalov, ‘Bulgarian-Greek Dis/Entanglements’, 149, 151, 159, 164–8, 178, 187–8. 47 Roumen Daskalov, The Making of a Nation in the Balkans: Historiography of the Bulgarian Revival (Budapest: Central European University Press, 2004); R.J. Crampton, A Short History of Modern Bulgaria (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987), 9–20. 48 Basil C. Gounaris, Ta Valkania ton Ellinon: apo ton Diafotismo eos ton Proto Pangosmio Polemo [The Balkans of the Greeks: From the Enlightenment Until the First World War] (Thessaloniki: Epikentro, 2007), 149. 49 Evangelos Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia: Civil Conflict, Politics of Mutation, National Identity (New York: Aristide D. Karatzas Publisher, 1993) [1964], 14. 50 Ibid., 14.

Greek, Bulgarian and Serbian claims to Macedonia 17 51 R.J. Crampton, A Concise History of Modern Bulgaria (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005) [1997], 66–76; Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia, 14–15; Daniela Kalkandjieva, ‘The Bulgarian Orthodox Church’, in L.N. Leustean (ed.), Orthodox Christianity and Nationalism in Nineteenth Century Southeastern Europe (New York: Fordham University Press, 2014), 164–201. 52 Yosmaoğlu, Blood Ties, location 1571. 53 Anastasia N. Karakasidou, Fields of Wheat, Hills of Blood: Passages to Nationhood in Greek Macedonia, 1870–1990 (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1997), 78. 54 Paschalis M. Kitromilides, “ ‘Imagined Communities” and the Origins of the National Question in the Balkans’, in Martin Blinkhorn and Thanos Veremis (eds), Modern Greece: Nationalism and Nationality (Athens: Sage–ELIAMEP, 1990), 55–6. 55 Evangelos Kofos, ‘Patriarch Joachim (1878–1884) and the Irredentist Policy of the Greek State’, Journal of Modern Greek Studies, 4:2 (1986), 107–20. 56 Basil C. Gounaris, To Makedoniko Zitima apo ton 19o eos ton 21o aiona: istoriografikes prosengisis [The Macedonian Question from the 19th Until the 21st Century: Historiographical Approaches] (Athens: Alexandria, 2010), 185–6; Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander’, 290, 295; Spyros Karavas, ‘Oi ethografikes peripeties tou “hellinismou’” [The Ethnographic Adventures of ‘Hellenism’], Ta Istorika, 36 (2002), 25–7. 57 Duncan M. Perry, ‘The Macedonian Question: An Update’, in Benjamin Stolz (ed.), Studies in Macedonian Language, Literature and Culture: Proceedings of the First North American-Macedonian Conference on Macedonian Studies, Ann Arbor, 1991 (Ann Arbor: Michigan Slavic Studies, 1995), 144. 58 Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia, 14. 59 Ibid., 17. 60 Vemund Aarbakke, ‘Who Can Mend a Broken Heart? Macedonia’s Place in Modern Bulgarian History’, in Ioannis D. Stefanidis, Vlasis Vlasidis and Evangelos Kofos (eds), Macedonian Identities through Time: Interdisciplinary Approaches (Thessaloniki: Foundation of the Museum for the Macedonian Struggle, Epikentro, 2010) [2008], 187. 61 Ibid. 62 Ibid. 63 Maria Todorova, ‘The Course and Discourses of Bulgarian Nationalism’, in Peter F. Sugar (ed.), Eastern European Nationalism in the Twentieth Century (Washington, DC: American University Press, 1995), 77. 64 Gounaris, ‘Greek Views of Macedonia’, 156–7, 160–1; Ada Dialla, ‘ “Oi filoi ton Voulgaron oudepote dinandai na osi sinama filoi ton Ellinon” ’ [‘The Friends of the Bulgarians Can Never Be the Friends of the Greeks’], In the Year 1878/1922 (Athens: Etairia Spoudon Neoellinikou Politismou kai Genikis Paideias, 2008), 95–105. 65 Todorova, ‘The Course and Discourses of Bulgarian Nationalism’, 81. 66 Gounaris, ‘Greek Views of Macedonia’, 153. 67 Koliopoulos, Plundered Loyalties, 17–8. 68 Angelo Piero Sereni, The Italian Conception of International Law (New York: Columbia University Press, 1943), 161, 163–4. 69 Alfred Cobban, The Nation State and National Self-Determination (New York: Thomas Y. Crowell, 1969). 70 Spyros Karavas, ‘I Megali Voulgaria kai i “Mikri Idea” ’ [Greater Bulgaria and the ‘Small Idea” ’], In the Year 1878/1922, 11–12, 20–1, 35–7. 71 Gounaris, ‘Greek Views of Macedonia’, 153. 72 Ibid., 153–4, 159. 73 Kyril Drezov, ‘Macedonian Identity: An Overview of the Major Claims’, in James Pettifer (ed.), The New Macedonian Question (Basingstoke: Macmillan Press, 1999), 50; Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander’, 284–5, 289, 291, 293, 329; Tasos Κostopoulos, I apagorevmeni glossa: kratiki katastoli ton slavikon dialekton stin

18

74 75 76

77 78 79 80 81 82

83 84 85

86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94

Greek, Bulgarian and Serbian claims to Macedonia elliniki Makedonia [The Forbidden Tongue: State Repression of the Slavic Dialects in Greek Macedonia] (Athens: Mavri Lista, 2000), 59–62. Karakasidou, Fields of Wheat, Hills of Blood, 96. Koliopoulos, Plundered Loyalties, 17–8. Evangelos Kofos, ‘National Heritage and National Identity in Nineteenth- and TwentiethCentury Macedonia’, in Martin Blinkhorn and Thanos Veremis (eds), Modern Greece: Nationalism and Nationality (Athens: Sage–ELIAMEP, 1990), 107–8; Basil C. Gounaris, ‘Historiography on the Struggle for Macedonia 1904–8’, in Peter Mackridge and Eleni Yannakakis (eds), Ourselves and Others: The Development of a Greek Macedonian Cultural Identity since 1912 (Oxford: BERG, 1997), 11. Kofos, ‘Patriarch Joachim (1878–1884) and the Irredentist Policy of the Greek State’, 116. Ibid., 116. Basil C. Gounaris, ‘Social Cleavages and National ‘Awakening’ in Ottoman Macedonia’, East European Quarterly, 29:4 (1995), 16–18. See also Lange-Akhund, The Macedonian Question, 20. Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 75. Poulton, Who Are the Macedonians?, 59; Poulton, The Balkans, 47; Karakasidou, Fields of Wheat, Hills of Blood, 95–9; Aarbakke, Ethnic Rivalry and the Quest for Macedonia, 123. Dimitris Lithoxoou, Ellinikos antimakedonikos agonas: apo to Ilinden sti Zagoritsani [The Greek Anti-Macedonian Struggle: From Ilinden to Zagoritsani] (Athens: Megali Poreia, 1998), 38–9; Dimitar Ljorovski Vamvakovski, ‘Greek-Macedonian Struggle: The Reasons for Its Occurrence’, Macedonian Historical Review, 3 (2012), 117–22. Dimitris Livanios, ‘Conquering the Souls: Nationalism and Greek Guerilla Warfare in Ottoman Macedonia, 1904–1908’, Byzantine and Modern Greek Studies, 23 (1999), 196–7, 204–5. See also Koliopoulos, Plundered Loyalties, 22. Livanios, ‘Conquering the Souls’, 197–205, 216. Douglas Dakin, The Greek Struggle in Macedonia 1897–1913 (Thessaloniki: Institute for Balkan Studies, 1966), 473–7; Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia, 34–6; Koliopoulos, Plundered Loyalties, 19–22; Livanios, ‘Conquering the Souls’, 195–221; Aarbakke, Ethnic Rivalry and the Quest for Macedonia, 129–39. Gounaris, To Makedoniko Zitima apo ton 19o eos ton 21o aiona, 15–6. Dakin, The Greek Struggle in Macedonia, 44; Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia, 19–22. Dakin, The Greek Struggle in Macedonia, 44. Gounaris, ‘Social Cleavages and National “Awakening” in Ottoman Macedonia’, 19–20. Ibid., 21–2. Ibid. Stavrianos, The Balkans since 1453, 507, 510–11; Basil Kondis, Greece and Albania, 1908–1914 (Thessaloniki: Institute for Balkan Studies, 1976), 85–6. Banac, The National Question in Yugoslavia, 80–1; Leonard J. Cohen, Broken Bonds: Yugoslavia’s Disintegration and Balkan Politics in Transition (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1993), 4. Garašanin was influenced by the exhortations to the Serbs by the Polish statesman Adam Czartoryski (foreign minister of Tsar Alexander I and President of the Polish National Government during the 1830 Polish Uprising against Russia), in his Conseils sur la conduit à suivre par la Serbie of 1843, and by a related note given to him by the Czech military strategist, František Zach, who was initially Czartoryski representative in Belgrade and ended up being Serbia’s first general. See Banac, The National Question in Yugoslavia, 83; Miloš Mišić, ‘On a One-sided Interpretation of the Yugoslav Past’, Balcanica: Annual of the Institute of Balkan Studies, XLVI (2015), 353.

Greek, Bulgarian and Serbian claims to Macedonia 19 95 Banac, The National Question in Yugoslavia, 82–5; Charles Jelavich and Barbara Jelavich, The Establishment of the Balkan National States, 1804–1920 (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1977), 63; Barbara Jelavich, History of the Balkans: Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983), 244–5; Stefan K. Pavlowitch, A History of the Balkans 1804–1945 (London: Longman, 1999), 57; Stavrianos, The Balkans since 1453, 255. 96 Cohen, Broken Bonds, 6. 97 Mišić, ‘On a One-sided Interpretation of the Yugoslav Past’, 353. 98 Konstantinos Katsanos, ‘Macedonia of the Serbs, 1870–1941: From Old Serbia to Southern Serbia’, in Ioannis D. Stefanidis, Vlasis Vlasidis and Evangelos Kofos (eds), Macedonian Identities through Time: Interdisciplinary Approaches (Thessaloniki: Foundation of the Museum for the Macedonian Struggle, Epikentro, 2010) [2008], 14; Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 75. 99 Slavenko Terzić, ‘The Serbs and the Macedonian Question’, The Serbian Question in the Balkans (Belgrade: Faculty of Geography, University of Belgrade, 1995), 66. 100 Spyridon Sfetas, I diamorfosi tis slavomakedonikis taftotitas: mia epodyni diadikasia [The Formulation of the Slav-Macedonian Identity: A Painful Process] (Thessaloniki: Ekdoseis Vanias, 2003), 13–4, and 14 fn.5. 101 Ibid., 26; Katsanos, ‘Macedonia of the Serbs’, 165. 102 Gounaris, To Makedoniko Zitima apo ton 19o eos ton 21o aiona, 36; Yosmaoğlu, Blood Ties, locations 2584–2591. 103 Wilkinson, Maps and Politics, 97–103; Yosmaoğlu, Blood Ties, location 2584. 104 Wilkinson, Maps and Politics, 93–103; Terzić, ‘The Serbs and the Macedonian Question’, 68; Yosmaoğlu, Blood Ties, location 2591. 105 Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia, 29. 106 Katsanos, ‘Macedonia of the Serbs’, 163–7. 107 Ibid., 168; Bojan Aleksov, ‘Documentation. One Hundred Years of Yugoslavia: The Vision of Stojan Novaković Revisited’, Nationalities Papers, 39:6 (2011), 999; Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander’, 307; Aarbakke, Ethnic Rivalry and the Quest for Macedonia, 15; Sfetas, I diamorfosi tis slavomakedonikis taftotitas, 60–1. Novaković as the Serbian minister in Constantinople and St. Petersburg supported the activities of the Macedonian intellectuals who were seeking to establish a separate Macedonian identity from the previous Bulgarian one (see Chapter 4). See Aleksov, ‘Documentation’, 1007, note 7; Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 76. 108 Katsanos, ‘Macedonia of the Serbs’, 180–1. 109 Tchavdar Marinov, ‘In Defense of the Native Language: The Standardization of the Macedonian Language and the Bulgarian-Macedonian Linguistic Controversies’, in Roumen Daskalov and Tchavdar Marinov (eds), Entangled Histories of the Balkans, Volume One: National Ideologies and Language Policies (Leiden: Brill, 2013b), 428. 110 Katsanos, ‘Macedonia of the Serbs’, 174–7; Sfetas, I diamorfosi tis slavomakedonikis taftotitas, 26–7. 111 Katsanos, ‘Macedonia of the Serbs’, 174–7. 112 Ibid., 178. 113 Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander’, 321. 114 Quoted in Yosmaoğlu, Blood Ties, location 2651. 115 Ibid. 116 Katsanos, ‘Macedonia of the Serbs’, 178–80.

2

The war of ethnographic maps

Ethnographic maps, a subgroup of ‘thematic maps’, came to the fore with the rise of ethnography as a scientific discipline in the nineteenth century (mainly within departments of geography), with its emphasis on races, usually placed in a hierarchy, with white Europeans at the top of the scale.1 From 1842 with the first ethnographic map of the region by the Slovak ethnographer Pavel Šafárik, until 1920, there appeared well over a hundred ethnographic maps of ‘Turkey in Europe’ or Macedonia. The maps can be divided into those published until the Congress of Berlin (1878) and the maps thereafter. Until 1878, the maps that were influential in Europe were by the FrenchAustrian geographer Amie Boué (1847), the French diplomat and geographer Guillaume Lejean (1861), the German geographer August Heinrich Petermann (1869), the German geography professor in Berlin Heinrich Kiepert (1876) and the Austrian diplomat Karl Sax (1877). All the maps by non-Balkan experts not commissioned by one of the three contenders indicate the preponderance of the Bulgarians or Bulgarianspeakers in the whole of Macedonia, the unimpressive presence of the Greeks, with a clear majority only in Chalkidiki, hardly any Serbian presence and the strong presence of the ‘Turks’ (Muslims).2 The year 1878 was a watershed for the Macedonian Question; it was the year of its entry in the annals of European diplomacy as one of the thorniest problems within the wider Eastern Question. The key event that had sent shockwaves to Greece and Serbia was the Russo-Ottoman Treaty of San Stefano (see Chapter 1). Ignatiev, who had convinced the Russian Imperial Government under Alexander Gorchakov (who was no pan-Slavist) of the need for a Greater Bulgaria that would serve Russian interests, had made use of the maps by Lejean and Kiepert, with their Bulgarian preponderance.3 Ignatiev’s initial plan was to hand all of Macedonia to Bulgaria, including the city of Thessaloniki, but Tsar Alexander II and Gorchakov thought that this was going too far.4 Of course, the Treaty of San Stefano was scuttled, due to strong British and Austro-Hungarian pressure (with British Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli threatening war),5 but San Stefano was to remain the unattained dream of the Bulgarians until the end of the Second World War, and the reason that Sofia opted for joining the wrong side in both world wars. For the Serbs and even more for the Greeks, San Stefano continued to haunt them for decades even though it was withdrawn for good.6

The war of ethnographic maps 21 At the Congress of Berlin (13 June–13 July 1878) under the chairmanship of Otto von Bismarck, there were two tendencies among the delegates on Macedonian ethnography: those who adhered to the maps by Lejean and Kiepert (Bismarck greatly admired Kiepert),7 which held that the region was Slav-dominated and especially Bulgarian dominated; and those who followed Sax’s map that presented a more complicated picture. In any event, with the Treaty of Berlin and the creation of small Bulgaria, as a principality within the Ottoman Empire, geographical Macedonia remained beyond Bulgarian reach and continued to be even more than before the apple of discord with three contenders.8 The ethnographic map by Sax is worth referring to, despite its hidden Austrian agenda. Sax was more generous towards the Greeks but pointed to the greater presence of the ‘Turks’ by comparison to all the previous maps. He introduced the following elements, and all of them are valid and not apparent previously: (a) the greater importance of religion by comparison to spoken language or ‘race’ as defining characteristics; (b) what he called ‘group consciousness’ which also applied to smaller groups; and (c) the partial limitation of the Slav presence, retaining the greater Bulgarian presence but robbing it of its preponderance, by distinguishing the Slavs of ‘Turkey in Europe’ into nine groups: Orthodox Serbs, Catholic Serbo-Croats, Muslim Serbo-Croats, a mixed group which he called Serbo-Bulgarians, the Orthodox Bulgarians that were supporters of the Exarchate, the Hellenized Orthodox Bulgarians, the Muslim Bulgarians (Pomaks) and two small groups, Uniate Bulgarians and Catholic Bulgarians.9 These maps had exasperated the Greeks, but it was Kiepert’s map, titled ‘Ethnographic map of the European East’, which worried them more because the German professor wielded great authority as a geographer and also happened to be a philhellene. In fact, Kiepert had presented a sympathetic view regarding Greek presence, by comparison to all the other maps until then, with favourable commentaries on the dynamism of Hellenism, claiming the ‘intellectual superiority’ of the ‘Greek race’ by comparison to the other ‘races’ residing in Ottoman Europe.10 Greek diplomacy was keen to provide evidence that would undermine the Bulgarian claim.11 For instance, the Greek embassy in Paris was instructed to approach the French professor of geography, Eugène Cortambert, to come up with a suitable map, supposedly for Greek educational purposes, but the French geographer was not tempted. The London Greek legation, headed by Ioannis Gennadios, was able to convince Edward Stanford to produce a map favouring Greece (Stanford was not a geographer, but his publishing house was known for its authoritative maps). The Stanford map, whose author was anonymous (the author was Gennadios),12 titled ‘Ethnological Map of European Turkey and Greece’ of 1877, was extreme, showing the Greeks in the majority in the whole of the region. The standard Greek practice in all its maps was to regard as Greeks, not only the Greekspeakers, but also all the Christian Vlachs, the Christian Albanians as well as the Exarchists Slavs. In the Stanford map there was even a category dubbed ‘Bulgarian-speaking Greeks’, who defined themselves as ‘Thracians’ or ‘Macedonians’! Sax and Kiepert ‘dismissed the map as utter nonsense’ but the map managed to ‘acquire a certain degree of attention in Britain, having been published by a respectable

22

The war of ethnographic maps

institution’.13 The map though available (it was translated into various languages and circulated in Europe)14 was not taken into consideration by European diplomacy, which consulted mainly Kiepert’s map in its attempt to resolve the Balkan Crisis of 1876–1878 and in particular address the Bulgarian issue.15 During the same period two other pro-Greek maps appeared, one by a French geographer named Sylvest, a teacher in the Greek schools in Constantinople, and the other by a French mechanical engineer, named F. Bianconi, who held a senior position in the Ottoman Railways. The maps had been commissioned by the thriving Greek (Rum) community in Constantinople after consultations with the Greek legation there. Both maps went as far as presenting all the Orthodox Christians of Macedonia as Greeks, having based their assessment on the Ottoman millet system of religious communities, where all the Orthodox Christians were members of the Rum millet. No one outside Greece took these maps seriously.16 Greek ‘map mania’17 persisted with a more ambitious scheme. The Greek foreign ministry engaged the national historian, Paparrigopoulos, who was then at the apex of his prestige in Greece and in European academic circles. He was called upon ‘to convince the European community of the righteousness of the Greek claims with scientific arguments to the degree possible bearing on reality’.18 Paparrigopoulos came up with a device intended to bypass the well-known hurdle (known to the Greek Government and elite) of the Greeks not being the majority in Macedonia. He dubbed it an ‘ethnocentric map’ that was to present the future likely limits of the Balkan states, the main criterion being what was called the ‘excelling race’, that is which nation was considered prevailing culturally, educationally and economically in the region. To see this through, Paparrigopoulos corresponded repeatedly with Kiepert and met him at least twice in Berlin.19 The outcome was indeed an ethnocentric map, which presented a future Greek state taking almost the whole of Macedonia and half the lands inhabited by the Albanians on the Adriatic coast.20 A reluctant Kiepert seemed to go along and the map produced in 1878 bears his name, but a bit later he disclaimed it (with a letter made public). And in 1882, Kiepert produced another map, in which the Greek presence is very limited and the majority only in Chalkidiki, but he compensated by showing overwhelming Greek presence in the southern Albanian inhabited territory (which was hardly the case).21 The various maps of Greek inspiration made their appearance in the Congress of Berlin, but had no influence among the delegates, who regarded them as no more than the product of the exaggerated claims along the Megali Idea.22 It was then that Greek diplomacy, realizing that it had gone too far, switched to a ‘small idea’ (see Chapter 1) and ended up acquiring (in 1881) Thessaly and the southern tip of Epirus from the Ottomans without firing a shot.23 Thereafter, the most worthwhile ethnographic maps of the region appeared in the second part of the 1890s, in 1895 by the German linguist, Gustav Weigand, professor at the University of Leipzig, and in 1899 by the Austrian F. Meinhard. The first map emphasized the Bulgarian presence even as far south as Thessaloniki and around the city, but also the considerable presence of the ‘Turks’ (Muslims) all over Macedonia, with the Greeks limited to Chalkidiki but prominent in the

The war of ethnographic maps 23 southern part of the Albanian inhabitant territories, more or less as in the 1882 Kiepert map. The second map presented a more complex landscape, a compromise between the Serbian and Bulgarian claims, with the Bulgarians being the largest ethnic group though not the absolute majority, with the Greeks again numerically disadvantaged.24 As ethnographic maps continued to be produced, the Greek foreign ministry approached Kleanthis Nicolaides, an obscure Greek journalist living in Berlin who published a journal propagating the nationalist Greek views. Thus, Nicolaides produced a booklet and a map in 1899, where he came up with a new theory, what he called the ‘commercial language’, the one used for transactions, claiming that Greek was that language throughout southern Macedonia and he presented half of Macedonia as a Greek linguistic region. Nicolaides made sure to acknowledge Serbian presence in northern Macedonia so as to limit the Bulgarians. However, no one in Europe was persuaded by the Greek antics.25 Despite this flurry of activity by the Greeks, their case remained weak with no adherents, not even among philhellenes, as previously seen with Kiepert. In lieu of an example, the famous archaeologist and philhellene Arthur Evans, in a letter to The Times (30 September 1903), had the following to say regarding the Greek claim to Macedonia: ‘the Greek claim to Macedonia, at least as regards the greater part of the interior of the country, is a dream. . . . [T]he statistics rest on an artificial basis. The truth is that a large number of those described as Greeks are really Roumans’ [emphasis probably added].26 The beginning of the twentieth century is of significance as to the real or imagined ethnography of Macedonia, for it witnessed the appearance of a concept that was to prove decisive in the decades to come, a nemesis to the Greater Bulgarian dream and one that anticipated the birth of a new Balkan nation. The Serbian Jovan Cvijić, a geographer and ethnographer held in high esteem in Europe, came up with a new concept, building on Novaković’s idea of Macedonism (see Chapter 1). Cvijić, in his book titled Remarks on the Ethnography of the Macedonian Slavs (1906), published in English, French and Russian, rejects the nationalistic hyperboles of his compatriots Milojević, Gopčević and others. According to Cvijić, the Slavspeakers of Macedonia were a mix with unclear national sentiments. They appertained neither to the ‘Dynaric Type’ as the Serbs nor to the ‘East Balkan Type’ like the Bulgarians, but to a third kind that he called ‘Central Type’, a population with fluid ethnic-national characteristics.27 Along his famous phrase, ‘The Macedonian Slavs are an archaic Slav mass, a floating mass, with no welldefined awareness of nationhood’.28 He named this ‘floating mass’ (masse flotante in the French version) ‘Macedo-Slavs’. The amorphous Macedonians were potentially Serbs and, to the same degree, potentially Bulgarians; ‘the rights of Serbs to [Macedonia] was no less real, no less justified, than the right of Bulgars’.29 It all depended on which state, Serbia or Bulgaria, could gain control of Macedonia for any considerable time and manage to assimilate them.30 The great merit of this approach was that it appeared to outsiders as even-handed and plausible, while in fact it was a subtle device aimed at furthering the Serbian claims more effectively.31

24

The war of ethnographic maps

With one map after another and the situation appearing more complex than before, the Bulgarians decided they had little choice but to join the fray. They were more concerned with the Greek claims for they regarded the Serbian ones ludicrous. However, they were apprehensive with the views aired by Cvijić. As put by the Bulgarian ethnographer Anastas Ishirkov, he would not have bothered with the views of Cvijić regarding the name ‘Bulgar’ (see Chapter 1) for it was ‘not a scientific question, but a question of nationalist [Serbian] politics’,32 but Cvijić had targeted ‘the educated people of the whole world’ by writing in French, and since his readers were not ‘ “familiar with the literature on the Balkans,” they might be misled by the author, especially because he was “well known in scholarly circles” ’.33 The first Bulgarian ethnographic map for international audiences was that of Vasil Kanchev, an inspector of the Bulgarian schools in Ottoman Macedonia, whose map published in 1900 is regarded as the most authoritative presentation of the geographical limits of Macedonia and has set the standard in this regard ever since (the book was translated into French and English).34 The Kanchev map was followed a year later by a map by the Bulgarian Exarchate and in 1905 by a map by Brancov, which was a reproduction of an earlier map (in Bulgarian) by Mischev, the secretary of the Bulgarian Exarchate. All these maps presented a pervasive Bulgarian presence, with all the Slavspeakers of Macedonia presented as Bulgarians, including the Bulgarian-speaking Muslims (the Pomaks), even though the latter had never identified themselves with the Bulgarian claims in Macedonia or elsewhere in Thrace.35 The Bulgarian aim was to secure almost the whole of geographical Macedonia, and not part of it as did the Serbs (‘old Serbia’) or the Greeks (‘historical Macedonia’). Kanchev claimed that the Bulgarians in Macedonia comprised 52 percent of the inhabitants, and they amounted to 1,181,336 (this is reiterated today by Macedonian historians though they speak of 52 percent ‘Macedonians’ living there and not Bulgarians).36 Brancov made the valid point that the Greek presence seemed greater than it really was due to the greater number of Greek schools by comparison to the Bulgarian ones, noting that many Bulgarianspeakers continued to study in Greek institutions despite the existence of Bulgarian schools.37 Initially, however, Cvijić’s thesis, which had worried the Bulgarians, had little impact. Ishirkov pointed out, correctly, that historically the Slavs of Macedonia had consistently taken part in the Bulgarian national struggles from the 1870s onwards, but accepted that the Slavs living in Skopje and Tetovo were probably Serbs or closer to the Serbs than to the Bulgarians. The Greeks reacted to Cvijić, by enlisting Giovanni Amadori-Virgilj, an Italian publicist, who came out with a map that presented as Greeks all the Orthodox Vlachs and Albanians as well as the Slavspeakers who remained loyal to the Patriarchate, but Europe was not duped.38 In Greece, Neoklis Kazazis, professor of jurisprudence and one of the most resourceful proponents of the Megali Idea, for decades president of the society O Ellinismos (Hellenism), devoted to the various Greek irredentist causes, came out with two books, L’Hellénisme et la Macédoine (1903) and Greeks and Bulgarians

The war of ethnographic maps 25 in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries (1907). And the Greek cause for Macedonian was regularly presented by the journal Bulletin d’Orient (financed by the Greek foreign ministry) and in lectures delivered by various Greek personalities traveling abroad, especially to Paris.39 At this juncture, worth referring to are the views of Henry Noel Brailsford, a prolific left-wing British journalist, then member of the liberal British Balkan Committee, whose senior members included Arthur Evans and James Bryce.40 Brailsford, initially a philhellene who had been to Crete to cover the Cretan attempt at union with Greece,41 stayed in Macedonia for five months in 1903– 1904, leading the British Relief Mission in Macedonia and as a correspondent of The Manchester Guardian to study the situation in Macedonia in the wake of the Ilinden Uprising of August 1903. He ended up with a book published in 1906 titled Macedonia: Its Races and Their Future (which included an ethnographic map), which retains its value even today as a testimony.42 And in those days the book was influential at a time when Macedonia had sparked considerable international interest.43 Brailsford’s book is generally regarded as pro-Bulgarian. Indeed its author stressed the considerable presence of the Bulgarianspeakers all over Macedonia, but this was the reigning perception in Europe at the time.44 He placed the Serbs to the far north and the Greeks in Chalkidiki, and was of the view that after the Bulgarians, the second largest group was the Albanians (something not entertained until then). As for the Vlachs he calculated them at around 200,000 inhabiting mostly the Pindos Mountains. Regarding the Greek presence, he claimed that it was non-existent in the interior of Macedonia, save in the town of Kastoria and regarded the Greek assertions that Macedonia was Greek, like Crete or Cyprus, a myth.45 Brailsford made the following apt point: notwithstanding his belief that the ‘Macedonians are Bulgarians’, he admitted that a large segment of the Slavs had not become Bulgarians, in spite of the attempts in this regard by the Exarchate, Exarchate schoolteachers and educationalists. They continued to have an unclear sense of nationality, especially the peasants who had not been touched by education, be it Bulgarian, Greek or Serbian. His conclusion was that they were neither Bulgarians nor Serbs, despite their linguistic affinity with the Bulgarian language; indeed that ‘[t]hey are probably very much what they were before either a Bulgarian or a Servian Empire existed – a Slav people derived from rather various stocks. . . . But they had originally no clear consciousness of race, and any strong Slavonic Power was able to impose itself upon them’.46 Less nuanced views were voiced by other foreigners who visited Macedonia in the aftermath of the Ilinden Uprising. The noted British anthropologist of the Balkans, Mary Edith Durham, who visited Macedonia after the Ilinden Uprising (like Brailford as a member of the British Relief Mission in Macedonia) was convinced that the Macedonian rising of 1903 was purely Bulgarian. She notes that when the uprising failed ‘[t]housands of refugees fled into Bulgaria – thus emphasizing their nationality . . . not a single one of these many revolutionaries fled to Serbia or claimed that

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they were Serbs’.47 And she is convinced that they ‘were rising [in 1903] to make Big Bulgaria, not Great Serbia’.48 The American novelist Arthur Howden Smith, who lived for a while with the Macedonian insurgents, claimed in his 1908 book that ‘the Bulgarians undoubtedly form a majority of the Macedonian population’,49 and that ‘there is no Macedonian race . . . a Macedonian Bulgar is just the same as a Bulgar of Bulgaria proper. He looks the same, talks the same, and very largely, thinks the same way. In short he is of the same stock’.50 The contemporary reports of the British diplomats stationed in Thessaloniki, Bitola (Monastir) and Skopje to their Constantinople embassy corroborate the above, with all of them claiming that they are ‘Bulgarian insurgents’ closely linked to the Exarchate and that Ilinden was the work of the ‘Bulgarian Macedonians’.51 Alfred Rappoport, the Austrian consul general in Skopje, was more nuanced, referring to ‘Macedonian cause’ and ‘Macedonian fighters’, maintaining that their aim was a ‘Macedonian-Bulgarian autonomy’ leading to an independent ‘Macedonian state’, and that their relation with Sofia was one of alliance and not of subordination. But he acknowledged that irrespective of their aims, their leaders were in the majority ‘Bulgarians’ and that ‘the Bulgarians were the majority in Macedonia’.52 When Austria-Hungary annexed Bosnia-Herzegovina in 1908, which they had occupied since 1878, a move that shattered the Serbian dream of an exodus in the northern Adriatic, the Serbs focused their attention on the south, on acquiring an exodus in the Aegean. Cvijić threw his supposed even-handedness to the wind, and came out with a map, in 1909, that presented almost all the Slavspeakers of Macedonia as Macedo-Slavs and those not influenced by the Greeks, as closer to the Serbs, limiting the Bulgarians only to Bulgaria proper. He based his approach on linguistic factors, pronunciation, customs and general mentality which, he claimed, brought them closer to the Serbs than to the Bulgarians, though he acknowledged that they still lacked ‘a permanent national consciousness’.53 But again he had no influence outside Serbia. The influential British historian and specialist on the Slavs, Robert William Seton-Watson, in his own map and commentaries ignored Cvijić, adopting the view of Brailsford. A similar line was taken a little later by Arnold Toynbee.54 However, the great powers with geopolitical, economic and other interests in the Balkan, and most of all Russia and Austria-Hungary, were favourable to the idea that Macedonia was inhabited by Slavs who were neither Bulgarians nor Serbs, for this put a lid on the expansionist bids of both Bulgaria and Serbia, aggrandizements that were not to the liking of St. Petersburg and Vienna. Thus, at the turn of the century, various studies saw the light of day to reinforce the view of a distinct south Slav people, such as by the Austrian linguist Karl Hron, and several studies by noted Russian linguists, such as Leonhard Masing, Pyotr Lavrov and Jan Baudouin de Courtenay (see chapter 8), who maintained that the Macedonian Slavs constitute a separate ethno-linguistic language.55 Previously, in the early 1890s the few existing Russian ethnographic maps had shown Bulgarian preponderance to such an extent that even the Bulgarians found it exaggerated.56

The war of ethnographic maps 27 Thereafter, however, they ‘used a neutral color for Macedonian Slavs, marking them as neither Serb nor Bulgarian’, apparently trying ‘to strike a delicate balance in appeasing the Serbs and the Bulgarians’.57 In 1904, the Ottomans conducted the second and last Ottoman census (the first had taken place in 1893)58 in the three provinces comprising Macedonia. The task was entrusted to the General Inspector of the Rumeli Provinces (that is Ottoman Europe), Hüseyin Hilmi Pasha, who was to serve, during the Ottoman Empire’s second constitutional period (1908–1912) twice as a grand vizier. There were two versions of the census which was conducted in the presence of Austrian and Russian observers. The Muslims were registered as being 1,508,507 or 1,720,007, comprising of 54.2 percent; the Bulgarian loyal to the Exarchate 575,534 (19.8 percent), the Bulgarians loyal to the Patriarchate 320,962 (11 percent), all in all the Bulgarians were 30.8 percent. The Greeks were 307,000, the Serbs 100,717 or 167,601, the Vlachs 99,000 and the Jews 48,720. In other words, the Greeks (those with Greek as their mother tongue) that is without the Vlachs, the Orthodox Christian Albanians and the Bulgarians loyal to the Patriarchate, were less than 11 percent of the total population of Macedonia as a whole.59 As regards the vilâyet of Thessaloniki, the Greeks comprised about one-third of the population.60 The year 1904 also witnessed the start of the Greek, Bulgarian and to a much lesser extent Serbian struggle for Macedonia, with the employment of armed bands that included volunteers, especially from Bulgaria and Greece who were officers and soldiers on leave. The clash between the three sides ended with a momentous event that took place in the Ottoman state, which had started in southern Macedonia (in the vilayet of Thessaloniki) and for a while put the Macedonian Question in abeyance, ending the Bulgarian-Greek-Serbian struggle for Macedonia. The event in question is of course the Young Turk Revolution of July 1908. In fact, it was no revolution, in the sense of a popular uprising, but a military insurrection organized by the Ottoman Committee of Union and Progress (CUP), whose first nucleus had been set up in 1889 in Thessaloniki.61 The use of ‘Ottoman’ and ‘Union’ implied the cooperation of all the nationalities within the concept of Ottoman unity.62 The Young Turk Revolution espoused liberty, equality and ‘a new fraternal Ottoman identity’.63 The restless minorities hailed the Revolution, rejoicing in the cities of the Empire, in Thessaloniki, Bitola, Constantinople, Izmir/Smyrna and beyond.64 The Young Turks promised elections and kept their word. The elections (November–December 1908) were surprisingly fair and the ensuing Parliament represented, proportionately, the various ethnic communities (only the Arabs were under-represented), with the Turkishspeakers comprising only slightly more than half of the deputies. The deputies in the Ottoman Parliament included a sizeable group of Greek and Bulgarian (or Slavophone) deputies, the latter from Macedonia and Thrace. Thus, for the first time since 1878 (when for about a year the Ottoman Empire under Grand Vizier Midhat Pasha functioned democratically), the hopes for the much-needed democratic transformation of the Ottoman Empire seemed a possibility. But the two main protagonists seeking change, the nationalist and liberal wings of the Young Turk movement, were at loggerheads, often clashing violently, having irreconcilable visions of the Ottoman future. Needless

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to say, only if the liberals were to prevail could real change for the better take place, but unfortunately the nationalists had the upper hand most of the time, making the non-Muslim communities all the more apprehensive.65 The tragic irony is that in August 1912, two months prior to the First Balkan War, the liberals managed to take over power, following a putsch in July by disgruntled CUP officers (known as ‘Saviour Officers’). A government was formed, composed of elder statesmen, known as the ‘Great Cabinet’ (due to the fact that seven of its ministers had previously been grand viziers) with liberal tendencies, and headed by the respected former field marshal Ahmed Muhtar Pasha. Thus, it is far from fanciful to claim that ‘Had it not been for the outbreak of the Balkan War in October 1912, they might have succeeded in destroying the Committee [CUP] and purging its supporters in the army. Had they done so, the history of Turkey under the liberals would have been very different’.66 The Balkan Wars took place in 1912–1913, when a coalition of four states, Montenegro, Serbia, Bulgaria and Greece, attacked the Ottoman Empire, ostensibly to deal with the Ottoman misrule in ‘European Turkey’, but in fact to throw the Ottomans out of Europe and ‘liberate’ territories regarded rightfully theirs for historical and other reasons. Following victory in the First Balkan War, in which Bulgaria, with the largest army, had engaged the bulk of the well-equipped Ottoman forces, the victors were divided over the spoils, especially as regards Macedonia. An overconfident Bulgaria attacked the coalition of Greece, Serbia and Montenegro only to meet defeat.67 The Treaty of Bucharest (August 1913) settled the territorial disputes with regard to Macedonia as follows: Greece gained 51.56 percent (about 34,000 square kilometres), Serbia 38.32 percent (25,775 kilometres), Bulgaria only 10.12 percent (6,778 square kilometres) and the new state of Albania 1.5 percent.68 The First Balkan War was a disaster for the Ottomans, who had been there since the mid-fourteenth century, losing more than 96,000 square kilometres (Macedonia, Albania, Epirus and Western Thrace), an area inhabited by four million people, a region that had been the core area of the empire, from where the majority of the Ottoman ruling elite hailed especially in the nineteenth century.69 For Serbia the Balkan War had been a success, having gained far more territory than the one where the Serbs were preponderate. For Greece, the Balkan Wars were a triumph, having gained ‘the lion’s share’70 of Macedonia and more: Epirus, the eastern Aegean islands de facto (save for the Dodecanese islands held by Italy) and having assured the future annexation of Crete. The incorporation of such a large chunk of Macedonia was a considerable feat, given Bulgaria’s opposition, stronger army and the greater presence of Slavspeakers in the whole of Macedonia. In the region secured by Greece, the ethnic Greeks amounted to barely onethird of the population. In the course of the two Balkan wars, the Muslim refugees who fled were about 180,000, with 69,000 from the regions acquired by Greece.71 But the majority of Muslims remained in Macedonia, Epirus and Thrace, creating a considerable problem for Greece and Serbia as fledging national states, aspiring to ethnicnational homogeneity. In Greece alone there were no fewer than 300,000 Muslims

The war of ethnographic maps 29 still in residence (Turkishspeakers as well as Greekspeakers). Actually Eleftherios Venizelos, Greece’s most outstanding statesman of the first half of the twentieth century and a consummate realist, tried to mend his fences with the Porte by negotiating the voluntary exchange of population between Muslims living in newly acquired Macedonia and Greeks living in the Asia Minor littoral (except for the inhabitants of the region of Smyrna/Izmir).72 The unexpected Greek victory was for the Bulgarians a ‘national catastrophe’,73 with Bulgaria gaining only one-tenth of Macedonia instead of the some two-thirds that it seemed justified to acquire, if the wishes of the Muslims, who formed half of the population, are not taken into consideration, however unjust and cruel this may be. The Bulgarians were understandably shocked and bitter for this ‘amputation of the imagined “historical” heritage’74 and for their ‘dismemberment’ (razpokîsvane).75 The blow was even more unbearable for it was the Bulgarian Army that had done most of the fighting and had suffered the greater number of casualties during the Balkan Wars. Moreover, there were no fewer than 200,000 Bulgarian refugees who arrived in Bulgaria from the regions of Macedonia taken over by Greece and Serbia. Thereafter, the mood in Bulgaria was revanchist and remained so until the Second World War.76 These developments regarding Macedonia were regarded as unjust by the European-dominated international community and the Serbian and Greek gains unjustified, but the great powers ‘for the first time since the Eastern Question began to dominate European diplomacy, had been onlookers instead of active participants in the Balkan drama’.77 According to a credible Bulgarian source, the Bulgarians on the eve of the Balkan Wars in the area that was to be acquired by Greece in 1913 amounted to 31.6 percent, with the British foreign office estimate even higher.78 Serbia on its part came out with an ethnographic map for international audiences by Belić, presenting Serbia’s acquisitions as justified. Greece reacted with a new map by Nicolaides (1914) to justify its own acquisitions (though Nicolaides ‘admitted the presence of large minorities of Turks, Slavs and Vlachs in southern Macedonia’).79 In the course of the Balkan Wars, the armies of the Greeks, Bulgarians and Serbs burned, plundered and killed in what was a deliberate strategy of ‘ethnic cleansing’ (the term did not exist at the time, but the policy was well understood). In view of this, there was an intense war of words between Bulgaria and Greece as to which side had committed the most despicable and greater number of atrocities in the two wars. The Bulgarian linguist and historian, Lyubomir Miletich (later president of the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences), published a book titled Atrocités grecques en Macédoine pendant la guerre greco-bulgare (1913). In 1914, Greece answered with Les cruautés bulgares en Macédoine orientale et en Thrace, 1912–1913. The same year saw the publication of the famous report by the Carnegie Endowment, titled Report of the International Commission to Inquire into the Causes and Conduct of the Balkan Wars, whose authors, included Brailsford, the Russian professor of history Pavel Miljukov and the French historian Victor Bérard, all three pro-Bulgarian according to Greece (though Bérard was well-known for his Hellenistic publications).80

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The Carnegie Report included an ethnographic map by the Bulgarian academician, Jordan Ivanov, based on Kanchev’s 1900 map, which presented the Greek presence in Macedonia very limited by comparison to the Bulgarians. Venizelos was perturbed and asked Archibald Reiss, a Swiss professor, who was no linguist or ethnographer, but a noted forensic scientist, to tour northern Greece to ascertain the situation. Reiss in his report published in 1915 asserted, among others, that the Slav-speaking inhabitants in Greece’s Macedonia were ‘Macedonians’ and their mother tongue was not Bulgarian or Serbian.81 The First World War provided Bulgaria with the opportunity of regaining Macedonia, and indeed Sofia managed to gain the promise of the Central Powers to acquire Serbian Macedonia and parts of Greek Macedonia, and when Bulgaria entered the war with the Central Powers, the Bulgarian Army took over Serbian Macedonia and the eastern part of Greek Macedonia. The three-year Bulgarian occupation of Greek Macedonia was appalling, with almost a hundred villages demolished, 30,000 people dead of hunger, disease and beatings, 42,000 deported to Bulgaria, to provide room for Bulgarian habitation, and 16,000 fleeing to the rest of Greece.82 The aftermath of the 1913 division of Macedonia was played out in the Paris Peace Conference (1919–1920), with Bulgaria on the losing side (together with Germany, Austria-Hungary and the Ottoman Empire) trying in vain to acquire the other parts of Macedonia or at least some of them. At the Paris Peace Conference (1919–1920), Cvijić, as a member of the Serbian delegation, was regarded as the prime expert on Balkan ethnography. He had produced a new map in 1918 and various other maps of the Balkans that followed were variations of his map and included the Macedo-Slavs.83 The Bulgarians, who regarded the outcome of the war yet another ‘national catastrophe’ within five years,84 sent to Paris their most eminent intellectuals, ethnographers, geographers, lawyers and even top literary figures to convince the other delegations of the righteousness of the Bulgarian claims, with Ivanov circulating an impressive book titled, La question macédoine au point de vue historique, ethnographique et statistique (1920). But no delegation was convinced, but for the Italians who circulated a plan for an autonomous Macedonia, which met with some favour from members of the United States and Japanese delegations.85 Even Seton-Watson, whose opinion mattered in the Conference, changed his pro-Bulgarian stance and adopted the Cvijić line, having produced, in 1917, a map of his own which was similar to that of the Serb expert a year later.86 In general the overall spirit in the conference was that a strong Greece and a strong Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes (as Yugoslavia was called until 1929) were the best guarantees for peace and security in the troubled Balkans, with Venizelos in particular held in high esteem, especially by his British and French counterparts, Lloyd George and Georges Clemenceau. Moreover, as pointed out by President Woodrow Wilson, the principle of self-determination annunciated in his 14 Points (January 1918), applied only to the defeated powers, and not to the winners, adding cynically that is not the business of the Peace Conference ‘to inquire into ancient wrongs’87 (even though this wrong was hardly ancient but very recent).

The war of ethnographic maps 31 As far as Greece was concerned, Venizelos asked a personal friend, Georgios Soteriades, history professor at the University of Athens, to arrive at a more balanced map than the previous Greek ones. Soteriades came up with a less extreme map, putting the Greeks in the majority in Chalkidiki, with sizeable enclaves in various cities to the north now in Greek Macedonia. He persisted with the old Greek line of presenting the Vlachs, Christian Albanians and Patriarchate Bulgarians as ‘Greeks’, but acknowledged the existence of ‘Macedonoslavs’. In Greek Macedonia, he accepted that there were six nationalities: Greeks, Bulgarians, Muslims (Turks and Pomaks), Macedonoslavs, Albanians and Rumanians (Vlachs). This map of 1918 was presented in Paris and it was seen as representing the more realistic approach of Venizelos.88 Soteriades faced the wrath of the nationalists in Greece, who, as in Serbia and Bulgaria, formed the majority among those concerned with Macedonia. They included the publicist and economist Spyridon Fokas-Kosmetatos, with his book titled La Macedoine, son passé et son present (published in Lausanne in 1919) and diplomat Vasilios Colocotronis, with La Macédoine et l’hellenism: étude historique et ethnologique (1919). In this 400-page volume, Colocotronis includes all the Greek arguments peddled since the 1870s and claimed that the Macedonia acquired by Greece in 1913 corresponds to ancient Macedonia before the northern conquests of Philip II and that in the modern era Macedonia had been under Greek intellectual guidance and a substantial number of Slavs had gained Greek national consciousness. For Colocotronis there were no Macedonoslavs, but only ‘Slavspeaking Greeks’ residing in Greece.89 At the Paris Peace Conference, the Treaty of Neuilly with Bulgaria (1919) provided for a voluntary exchange of population between Bulgaria and Greece, but which both sides treated as ‘compulsory transfers’.90 As a result, about 53,000 Bulgarians emigrated from Greece to Bulgaria, and 30,000 Greeks emigrated from Bulgaria to Greece (during the First World War 39,000 and 16,000 had fled either way, respectively).91 This process limited the number of Slavophones living in Greece (see the end of Chapter 3). As for Bulgaria, the events from 1913 until 1920 had led to more than 250,000 refugees or emigrants from geographical Macedonia and Thrace settling in Bulgaria, which ‘brought with them the seeds of an aggressive expansionist dream’.92

Notes 1 İpek K. Yosmaoğlu, Blood Ties: Religion, Violence and the Politics of Nationhood in Ottoman Macedonia, 1878–1908 (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2014), Kindle Edition, location 2428. 2 H. R. Wilkinson, Maps and Politics: A Review of the Ethnographic Cartography of Macedonia (Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 1951), 33–68, 76–81; Yosmaoğlu, Blood Ties, locations 2453–2514, 2535–2548; Spyros Karavas, ‘Oi ethografikes peripeties tou “hellinismou’” (1876–1878) [The Ethnographic Adventures of ‘Hellenism’ (1876–1878)], Ta Istorika, 36 (2002), 29–30; Basil C. Gounaris, To Makedoniko Zitima apo ton 19o eos ton 21o aiona: istoriografikes prosengisis [The Macedonian Question from the 19th Until the 21st Century: Historiographical Approaches] (Athens:

32

3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15

16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28

The war of ethnographic maps Alexandria, 2010), 26; Vemund Aarbakke, Ethnic Rivalry and the Quest for Macedonia, 1870–1913 (Boulder, CO: East European Monographs, 2003), 9. Wilkinson, Maps and Politics, 87; Aarbakke, Ethnic Rivalry and the Quest for Macedonia, 8. B. H. Sumner, Russia and the Balkans, 1870–1880 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1937), 399–405. Ibid., 419, 460; Miloš Ković, Disraeli and the Eastern Question (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011), 242–6. Elizabeth Barker, Macedonia: Its Place in Balkan Power Politics (London: Royal Institute of International Affairs, 1950), 15. Yosmaoğlu, Blood Ties, location 2514. Wilkinson, Maps and Politics, 84–5, 98. Ibid., 75–81; Yosmaoğlu, Blood Ties, locations 2535–2548; Gounaris, To Makedoniko Zitima apo ton 19o eos ton 21o aiona, 32. Gounaris, To Makedoniko Zitima apo ton 19o eos ton 21o aiona, 30–1. Robert Shannan Peckham, ‘Map Mania: Nationalism and the Politics of Place in Greece, 1870–1922’, Political Geography, 19 (2000), 79, 81. Yosmaoğlu, Blood Ties, locations 3016–3024. Ibid., location 3018. Ibid., locations 3018–3023. Peckham, ‘Map Mania’, 80; Karavas, ‘Oi ethografikes peripeties tou “hellinismou” (1876–1878)’, 34–56; Basil C. Gounaris, ‘Greek Views of Macedonia: From the Enlightenment to the First World War’, in Ioannis D. Stefanidis, Vlasis Vlasidis and Evangelos Kofos (eds), Macedonian Identities through Time: Interdisciplinary Approaches (Thessaloniki: Foundation of the Museum for the Macedonian Struggle, Epikentro, 2010 [2008], 147–8; Aarbakke, Ethnic Rivalry and the Quest for Macedonia, 8. In Spyros Karavas, ‘Oi ethnografikes peripeties tou “hellinismou”, B (1877–1878’ [The Ethnographic Adventures of “Hellenism” B (1877–1878)’, Ta Istorika, 37 (2003), 71; Yosmaoğlu, Blood Ties, locations 2521–2527. Peckham, ‘Map Mania’. Karavas, ‘Oi ethografikes peripeties tou “hellinismou” (1876–1878)’, 71. Peckham, ‘Map Mania’, 80. See for details of their written exchanges, Yosmaoğlu, Blood Ties, locations 3096–3194. Wilkinson, Maps and Politics, 75. Karavas, ‘Oi ethnografikes peripeties tou “hellinismou” (1876–1878), B (1877–1878’, 69–112. Ibid., 91. Spyros Karavas, ‘I Megali Voulgaria kai i “Mikri Idea” ’ [Greater Bulgaria and the ‘Small Idea” ’, In the Year 1878/1922 (Athens: Etairia Spoudon Neoellinikou Politismou kai Genikis Paideias, 2008), 11–37. Wilkinson, Maps and Politics, 112–17, 125–9; Aarbakke, Ethnic Rivalry and the Quest for Macedonia, 6, 10. Wilkinson, Maps and Politics, 120–5; Aarbakke, Ethnic Rivalry and the Quest for Macedonia, 12–13, 21; Gounaris, To Makedoniko Zitima apo ton 19o eos ton 21o aiona, 35, 37. Cited in Bulgarian Academy of Sciences (Institute of History, Bulgarian Language Institute), Macedonia: Documents and Material (Sofia: Bulgarian Academy of Sciences, 1978), 541. Ivo Banac, The National Question in Yugoslavia (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1993) [1984], 311–12. Quoted in Konstantinos Katsanos, ‘Macedonia of the Serbs, 1870–1941: From Old Serbia to Southern Serbia’, in Stefanidis, Vlasidis and Kofos (eds), Macedonian Identities through Time: Interdisciplinary Approaches (Thessaloniki: Foundation of the Museum for the Macedonian Struggle, Epikentro, 2010) [2008], 169.

The war of ethnographic maps 33 29 Quoted in Banac, The National Question in Yugoslavia, 313. 30 Ibid., 313; Katsanos, ‘Macedonia of the Serbs, 1870–1941’, 169. 31 Wilkinson, Maps and Politics, 139–43, 146–53; Stephen Palmer and Robert R. King, Yugoslav Communism and the Macedonian Question (Hamden: Archon Books, 1971), 8; Banac, The National Question in Yugoslavia, 311–12. 32 Quotes in Yosmaoğlu, Blood Ties, location 2659. 33 In ibid, location 2659. 34 Ibid., location 2624; Tchavdar Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander: Macedonian Identity at the Crossroads of Greek, Bulgarian and Serbian Nationalism’, in Roumen Daskalov and Tchavdar Marinov (eds), Entangled Histories of the Balkans, Volume One: National Ideologies and Language Policies (Leiden: Brill, 2013a), 297. 35 Aarbakke, Ethnic Rivalry and the Quest for Macedonia, 12. 36 Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander’, 298. 37 Wilkinson, Maps and Politics, 129–31, 136–8; Aarbakke, Ethnic Rivalry and the Quest for Macedonia, 9–10; Yosmaoğlu, Blood Ties, locations 2598–624. 38 Wilkinson, Maps and Politics, 159–65. 39 Gounaris, To Makedoniko Zitima apo ton 19o eos ton 21o aiona, 46–7. 40 Georgios Giannakopoulos, ‘A British International Humanitarianism? Humanitarian Intervention in Eastern Europe (1875–1906)’, Journal of Modern Greek Studies, 34:2 (2016), 311. 41 Ibid., 310–11. 42 Dimitar Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia (Lanham: The Scarecrow Press, 2009), 30, 262. 43 Wilkinson, Maps and Politics, 143. 44 Ibid., 139. 45 H. N. Brailsford, Macedonia: Its Races and Their Future (London: Mathuen & Co., 1906), 103, 105, 107, 130, 194–200. 46 Ibid., 101. See also 102–7, 111–15, 121–3, 130–3, 191–219. 47 M. E. Durham, Twenty Years of Balkan Tangle (London: George Allen & Unwin, 1920), 92. 48 Ibid., 92. 49 Arthur D. Howden Smith, Fighting the Turks in the Balkans: An American’s Adventures with the Macedonian Revolutionaries (New York: G.P. Putnam’s Sons, Knickerbocker Press, 1908), 3. 50 Ibid., 3–4. 51 Spyridon Ploumidis, ‘Symvoli stin katanoisi tis ethnikis taftotitas tis Esoterikis Makedonikis Epanastatikis Organosis (1893–1912)’ [A Contribution to the Understanding of the Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization (1893–1912)], Makedonika, 33 (2002), 98. 52 Ibid., 97, based on Rappoport’s 1927 autobiography, titled, Au pays des martyrs. Notes et souvenirs d’un Consul Général d’Autriche-Hongrie en Macédoine (1904–1909). 53 Wilkinson, Maps and Politics, 161–5; Banac, The National Question in Yugoslavia, 311–13. 54 Wilkinson, Maps and Politics, 167, 216. 55 Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander’, 318–19. 56 Yosmaoğlu, Blood Ties, location 2562. 57 Ibid., location 2577. 58 Nadine Lange-Akhund, The Macedonian Question, 1893–1908: From Western Sources (Boulder, CO: East European Monographs, 1998), 13. 59 Dimitris Lithoxoou, ‘To Makedoniko Zitima kai i sigrotisi tou ellinikou ethnikou mythou’ in Tassos Kostopoulos, Leonidas Empeirikos and Dimitris Lithoxoou, Ellinikos ethikismos, Makedoniko Zitima: i ideologiki chrisi tis istorias [Greek Nationalism, Macedonian Question: The Ideological Use of History] (Athens: Ekdosi tis kinisis aristeron, 1992), 39.

34

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60 Ibid., 38–9; Aarbakke, Ethnic Rivalry and the Quest for Macedonia,13–19. 61 M. Şükrü Hanioğlu, A Brief History of the Late Ottoman Empire (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2008), 147–8. 62 Niyazi Berkes, The Development of Secularism in Turkey (London: Hurst & Company, 1998) [1964], 325. 63 Hanioğlu, A Brief History of the Late Ottoman Empire, 150. 64 Alexis Alexandris, The Greek Minority of Istanbul and Greek-Turkish Relations (Athens: Center for Asia Minor Studies, 1983), 38–40. 65 Bernard Lewis, The Emergence of Modern Turkey (London: Oxford University Press, 1968) [1961], 210–30; Eric J. Zürcher, Turkey: A Modern History (London: I.B. Tauris, 1993), 97–108; Feroz Ahmad, The Making of Modern Turkey (London: Routledge, 1993), 31–47; Hanioğlu, A Brief History of the Late Ottoman Empire, 150–7. 66 Ahmad, The Making of Modern Turkey, 6. 67 Myron Wiener, ‘The Macedonian Syndrome: An Historical Model of International Relations and Political Development’, World Politics, 23:4 (1971), 671. 68 Evangelos Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia: Civil Conflict, Politics of Mutation, National Identity (New York: Aristide D. Karatzas Publisher, 1993) [1964], 3, 47; Andrew Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians: A History (Stanford: Hoover Institution Press, 2008), 2. 69 Şerif Mardin, ‘The Ottoman Empire’, in Karen Barkey and Mark von Hagen (eds), After Empire: Multiethnic Societies and Nation-Building (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1997), 115–17; Ahmad, The Making of Modern Turkey,17; Zürcher, Turkey, 114. 70 Dimitris Livanios, The Macedonian Question: Britain and the Southern Balkans 1939–1949 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008), 22. 71 Arnold Toynbee, The Western Question in Greece and Turkey: A Study in the Contact of Civilisations (New York: Howard Fertig, 1970) [1922], 138. 72 Michael Llewellyn Smith, Ionian Vision: Greece in Asia Minor (London: Allen Lane, 1973), 32–3. 73 Maria Todorova, ‘The Course and Discourses of Bulgarian Nationalism’, in Peter F. Sugar (ed.), Eastern European Nationalism in the Twentieth Century (Washington, DC: American University Press, 1995), 83; Maria Bakalova, ‘Bulgarian “Macedonian” Nationalism in the Post 1989 Decade’, New Balkan Politics, 6 (2003), 63. 74 Evangelos Kofos, ‘National Heritage and National Identity in Nineteenth- and TwentiethCentury Macedonia’, in Μartin Blinkhorn and Thanos Veremis (eds), Modern Greece: Nationalism and Nationality (Athens: Sage-ELIAMEP, 1990), 116. 75 Aarbakke, Ethnic Rivalry and the Quest for Macedonia, 53. 76 R. J. Crampton, A Short History of Modern Bulgaria (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987), 59, 63; Bakalova, ‘Bulgarian “Macedonian” Nationalism in the Post 1989 Decade’, 63–4. 77 Wilkinson, Maps and Politics, 187. 78 Tasos Kostopoulos, I apagorevmeni glossa: kratiki katastoli ton slavikon dialekton stin elliniki Makedonia [The Forbidden Tongue: State Repression of the Slavic Dialects in Greek Macedonia] (Athens: Mavri Lista, 2000), 26–7. 79 Wilkinson, Maps and Politics, 191. 80 Gounaris, To Makedoniko Zitima apo ton 19o eos ton 21o aiona, 52. Basil C. Gounaris and Iakovos Michailidis, ‘The Pen and the Sword: Reviewing the Historiography of the Macedonian Question’, in Victor Roudometof (ed.), The Macedonian Question: Culture, Historiography, Politics (Boulder, CO: East European Monographs, Columbia University Press, 2000), 103, 109–10. 81 Gounaris, To Makedoniko Zitima apo ton 19o eos ton 21o aiona, 52–3. 82 Barker, Macedonia, 19–20, 29–30; Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia, 41. 83 Wilkinson, Maps and Politics, 202–3. Gounaris, To Makedoniko Zitima apo ton 19o eos ton 21o aiona, 55–6. 84 Todorova, ‘The Course and Discourses of Bulgarian Nationalism’, 83.

The war of ethnographic maps 35 85 Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 129; Gounaris, To Makedoniko Zitima apo ton 19o eos ton 21o aiona, 54–5. See also Stoyan Christowe, Heroes and Assassins (New York: Robert M. MacBride and Company, 1935), 121. 86 Wilkinson, Maps and Politics, 223–5. 87 Ibid., 233. 88 Ibid., 192–3; Gounaris, To Makedoniko Zitima apo ton 19o eos ton 21o aiona, 56. 89 V. Colocotronis, La Macédoine et l’Hellénisme (Paris: Berger-Levrault, 1919); Wilkinson, Maps and Politics, 241–2; Gounaris, To Makedoniko Zitima apo ton 19o eos ton 21o aiona, 56. 90 Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia, 43. 91 Dimitri Pentzopoulos, The Balkan Exchange of Minorities and It Impact upon Greece (London: C. Hurst, 1962), 60; Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia, 43; Barker, Macedonia, 31. 92 Bakalova, ‘Bulgarian “Macedonian” Nationalism in the Post 1989 Decade’, 63; Kiril Kertikov, ‘Macedonia-Bulgaria: From Confrontation to Euro-Integration’, New Balkan Politics, 6 (2003), 35.

3

The VM(O)RO and other Macedonian organizations (1893–1940)

While Greece, Bulgaria and Serbia were vying for the apple of discord named Macedonia, an indigenous Macedonian revolutionary organization was founded in 1893–1894, which eventually came to be known as the VMRO (IMRO: Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization) and was to become the most famous and controversial revolutionary organization of the region for almost half a century. Its historical trajectory can be divided into four periods: (1) the ‘heroic phase’ from 1893 until 1903, concluding with the Ilinden Uprising; (2) the years 1904– 1912, the conflict between the genuine autonomists and the autonomists who ultimately sought union with Bulgaria; (3) the early interwar, a clash between the leftist federalists and nationalists (1919–1923), ending with a brief reconciliation in the spring of 1924; and (4) the final rivalry from 1924 to 1940 between the leftists, aligned with the Communist International (Comintern), and the nationalists of VMRO turned fascists by the late 1930s. All four periods and in particular the heroic one are presented differently by Macedonia and Bulgaria. For the former, the VMRO is a ‘Macedonian’ revolutionary organization-cum-national Macedonian struggle for self-determination; for the latter VMRO is ‘Bulgarian’ and its struggle is part and parcel of the wider Bulgarian effort for national consolidation. In fact, the landscape of the Macedonian revolutionary movement is far more complex and elusive, than presented by the two narratives or by the periodization described earlier. There is no pervading or constant division between ‘proBulgarians’ and ‘genuine Macedonian patriots’. Various personalities or factions within the movement evolved over time, with many ‘leaps’ from one camp to another taking place over the years. Moreover, ‘Macedonian autonomists’ are not necessarily opponents of Bulgaria.1

The heroic years Several factors led to the formation of an indigenous Macedonian revolutionary organization in 1893–1894. One was Ottoman maladministration and heavyhandedness, with all attempts at amelioration fruitless. But probably more decisive for launching the revolutionary organization were the intense propagandist, educational, religious and political activity of the three antagonists for Macedonia, especially of Serbia and Greece, which had to be countered. As for the initial ideology

The VM(O)RO and other Macedonian organizations (1893–1940)

37

of the founders of the revolutionary organization, it was inspired by the Russian socialists (Herzen), anarchists (Kropotkin and Bakunin) and nihilists (Nechayev),2 with the conservative ideology of the Bulgarian state and the Exarchate unappealing to the prospective revolutionaries.3 The organization was modelled along the Internal Revolutionary Organization of the Bulgarians, set up by Vasil Levski in 1869.4 On 23 October 1893, six intellectuals met at a bookshop on Çelebi Bakkal Street in what was then Selânik (Thessaloniki in Greek, Solun in Bulgarian) and founded the revolutionary organization that was initially known as Macedonian Revolutionary Organization (MRO). Four of them were Exarchist schoolteachers, one was a bookshop owner and former teacher, and one was a medical doctor. Most of them were related as teachers or former pupils at the Sts. Cyril and Methodius Bulgarian Men’s High School of Soloun, the most prestigious Bulgarian school in Macedonia. The four schoolteachers were Dame (Damjan or Damyan) Gruev, who was also editor in the city’s Bulgarian printing house, Petar Poparsov (or Pop-Arsov), a founding member of the Young Macedonian Literary Society, Andon Dimitrov (who later became a lawyer) and Hristo Batandjiev (also Secretary of the Bulgarian Bishopric). The bookshop owner former teacher was Ivan Hadjinikolov (or Hadzhinikolov, who had studied commerce in Linz) and the medical doctor was Dr. Hristo Tatarchev, the physician of the Bulgarian High School, who had studied medicine in the universities of Zurich and Berlin. In January 1894 (when the organization was officially set up), Tatarchev became its first chairman and Gruev the first secretary and treasurer. Within the next couple of years the organization was joined by Georgi Delchev, known as Gotse Delchev (Goce Delčev), a socialist, former cadet in the Bulgarian Army and teacher, who was the most charismatic and popular among them, the teacher Gyorche Petrov, the teacher Dimo Hadzhidimov, and a little later the military Boris Sarafov and the schoolteacher Ivan Garvanov (both of them controversial figures, especially Garvanov), as well as the philologist Hristo Matov (director the Bulgarian pedagogical school of Skopje), the teacher Pere Toshev, the activist Yane Sandanski and the military Hristo Chernopeev. In both the Macedonian and Bulgarian national narratives, the most celebrated among them are the visionary Delchev, the organizer Gruev, the negotiator Petrov and the fiery Sandanski.5 Hadjinikolov, who claims to have been the first to have conceived of such an organization, holds that it had been set up so as to ‘neutralize the foreign propaganda in Macedonia’, especially the ‘activities of the Serbian agitators’, and preserve ‘the Bulgarian national feeling in Macedonia’.6 Gruev in his memoirs also refers to Serbian propaganda, including attempts to lure them by providing them with scholarships to study in Belgrade University, as one of the main triggering factors for setting up their organization.7 Hadjinikolov, in his memoirs, lists five basic principles of the MRO upon its foundation (which he presented to Delchev and to the publisher Kosta Šahov in Sofia in June 1892, and both readily agreed)8: 1

The revolutionary organization should be founded in Macedonia and be active there so that the Greeks and Serbians should not consider it as a weapon of the Bulgarian Government.

38

The VM(O)RO and other Macedonian organizations (1893–1940)

2 3 4

Its founders should be local citizens living in Macedonia. The political slogan of the organization should be autonomy of Macedonia. The organization should be secret and independent and should not establish contacts with the governments of neighbouring countries. From the Macedonians in Bulgaria and the Bulgarian population, it should ask only for moral and material support for the struggle of the Macedonian revolutionaries.

5

In the beginning of 1894, according to Tatarchev, the six met again ‘in order to lay the foundations of a revolutionary organization’ and after discussing ‘the aims of the organization at length . . . we settled on the autonomy of Macedonia, with the predominance of the Bulgarian element’.9 On the basis of Tatarchev’s later testimony, in his memoirs,10 written in 1928 while living in Bulgaria,11 ‘We could not accept the principle of the “direct unification of Macedonia with Bulgaria” because we could see that this would be opposed by the Great Powers and by the aspirations of the small neighbouring states and Turkey’.12 And he adds that ‘an autonomous Macedonia could later be more easily united with Bulgaria, or, if this could not be achieved, it could be the uniting link of a federation of the Balkan peoples’.13 From 1893 until 1903, the organization ‘grew from a committee of six young men dedicated to an autonomous Macedonia to a virtual state within a state’.14 Within a short time-span the Revolutionary Committee was able to develop an extended network which was active in all the three Ottoman provinces comprising Macedonia as well as in Thrace, in the Adrianople vilâyet. The area was divided into six revolutionary districts, each one of them headed by ‘a hierarchy of representative and executive bodies’, in several instances acting as the de facto local administration,15 collecting taxes or dispensing justice.16 Interestingly, the Ottoman authorities were initially not aware of the existence of the Revolutionary Organization, due to ‘its secretive methods of recruitment and organization and its ruthless punishment of any violation of its rules’, and discovered its existence by chance in November 1897.17 As regards links with other groups, apart from Bulgarian ones, the closest ties were with Armenian organizations (notably the Armenian Revolutionary Federation founded in 1890), including seeking Armenian bomb-making skills.18 The Committee held steadfastly to its aim of autonomy within the Ottoman Empire and was not in good terms with the Exarchate (even though many of its leaders were teachers appointed by the Exarchate) and opposed to Great Bulgarian chauvinism.19 As for autonomy,20 there is a consensus among scholars that this was indeed the aim and it followed the model of other Balkan entities which had gone through an autonomy phase before becoming independent from the Ottoman Empire. But disagreements arise as to whether this was the final aim that could later lead to an independent or federated multiethnic Macedonia, or whether it was a stepping stone for another destination, eventual union with Bulgaria. Probably the most secure answer is to claim that both hold water, in the sense that there were two tendencies, the more genuine autonomists and the autonomists who were more wedded to final union with Bulgaria.21

The VM(O)RO and other Macedonian organizations (1893–1940) 39 As regards key figures, such as Gruev, Petrov, Sandanski as well as Delchev, the most cherished revolutionary, one should avoid a posteriori characterization of the ‘founding fathers’ of the movement as genuine autonomists or not. Any characterization is precarious for sheer lack of written or other evidence. For instance, Delchev’s written legacy is largely useless in this regard, consisting of letters and writings mostly on practical aspects, such as the import of weapons, financial issues and so on; retroactively many supposed statements by Delchev were ‘put in his mouth’ or in the mouth of Sandanski and others, but one cannot be certain that they really expressed such views and what were their real political projects.22 As Keith Brown points out, ‘for leaders like Goce Delčev, Pitu Guli, Damjan Gruev, and Jane Sandanski – the four national heroes named in the anthem of the modern Republic of Macedonia – the written record of what they believed about their own identity is open to different interpretations. The views and self-perceptions of their followers and allies were likely even less conclusive’.23 The revolutionary organization set up in 1893 changed its name several times before ending up with the name that it is known today. Regarding the years 1893–1895 no documents have been found but the more common name used was probably Macedonian Revolutionary Organization (as pointed out by Tatarchev). In 1896 it was renamed Bŭlgarski Makedono-Odrinski Revoliutsionni Komitet (BMORK), that is Bulgarian Macedonian-Adrianople Revolutionary Committees (BMARC). According to its statute ‘Membership is open to any Bulgarian, irrespective of sex, who has not compromised himself in the eyes of the community by dishonest and immoral actions, and who promises to be of service in some way to the revolutionary cause of liberation’ (emphasis added).24 Six years later, in 1902 the reference to ‘Bulgarian’ was omitted upon the insistence of Delchev, so as to be able to reach a wider audience in multiethnic Macedonia.25 The new name was Tayna Makedono-Odrinska Revoliutsionna Organizatsiya (TMORO), that is Secret Macedonian-Adrianopole Revolutionary Organization (SMARO), upon the suggestion of Delchev and Petrov. According to TMORO’s statute drafted by Delchev and Petrov, it was open to membership to every ‘Macedonian or Adrianopolitan’; it was a call for a common front to ‘all discontent elements’ in Macedonia and in the vilâyet of Adrianople, regardless of nationality.26 And the organization managed to recruit a number of Vlachs (the most famous was Pitu Guli)27 and some Albanians, but not Greeks (and apparently they were not interested in recruiting Greeks, Jews or Turks).28 The general political objective was declared to be the ‘complete political autonomy’ of the two regions. The slogan of the Macedonian revolutionaries was ‘Macedonia to the Macedonians’. It is in 1905, at the Congress of Rila (October 1905), that the Macedonian revolutionaries settled for the name Vŭtreshna MakedonoOdrinska Revoliutsionna Organizatsiya (VMORO) that is Internal MacedonianAdrianopolitan Revolutionary Organization (IMARO); and finally in 1920 for Vŭtreshna Makedonska Revoliutsionna Organizatsiya (VMRO) that is Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization (IMRO), the name with which it is better known.29

40

The VM(O)RO and other Macedonian organizations (1893–1940)

The change of names described earlier has led to an ongoing debate between Bulgarian and Macedonian historians, as well as within Macedonian historiography, regarding the names, statutes and how authentic they are. Macedonian historians question the authenticity of the BMORK statute that was found on a piece of paper in a provincial town in the Rhodope Mountains. However, the memoirs of some of the Organization’s founders confirm that, initially, the membership in the organization was indeed reserved for Bulgarians. The Macedonian scholars who accept the authenticity of the BMORK statute, such as the late academician Ivan Katardžiev (or Katardjiev), claim that the name TMORO was in place as early as 1896, that the Bulgarian name lasted for a short period of time and it was not Delchev and Petrov who drafted the BMORK, instead they wrote the TMORO statute. Bulgarian historians for their part, such as Konstantin Pandev (the first to introduce a periodization based on the names), insist that BMORK lasted longer and this proves the essential Bulgarian character of the movement.30 Reverting to the slogan ‘Macedonia to the Macedonians’ (actually coined by William Gladstone),31 does it imply that the ‘Macedonians’ were a new nationality?32 This does not seem to have been the case for two main reasons. One was that the core of the revolutionary organization regarded themselves as ‘Macedonian Bulgarians’ and not as representatives of a putative Macedonian nation. And there was also the multiethnic composition of Macedonia to reckon with; hence, the more realistic goal was a multiethnic ‘supranational’ autonomous (or independent) Macedonia within the Ottoman Empire or within a new Balkan federation. Be this as it may, the Macedonian revolutionaries stated that the three neighbouring states only sought ‘territorial expansion, which would result in the partitioning of geographic Macedonia’.33 The finger was pointed at the Greeks and Serbs who had such ambitions, but Bulgaria was also accused of ‘exploiting “unhappy Macedonia” in favor of ephemeral political interests’.34 Thus, the immediate goal of the organization was, from 1902 onwards, ‘the separation of Macedonia vis-à-vis Greater Bulgaria, Greater Serbia, or Greater Greece’.35 And they called for all the people of Macedonia to unite in achieving autonomy, the long-term aim being ‘the eventual establishment of a Balkan confederation’.36 In 1894–1895 a group of Macedonian immigrants living in Sofia formed the Brotherly Union aimed at liberating Macedonia, soon to be named the Vŭrhoven Makedonski Komitet (Supreme Macedonian Committee), in 1900 renamed Vŭrhoven Makedono-Odrinski Komitet (Supreme Macedono-Adrianopolitan Committee), known as Vŭrhovists (Supremists), whose first president was the famous activist and poet Trayko Kitanchev.37 Among the Supreme Committee’s first members were Ivan Tsonchev, Anastas Jankov and Boris Sarafov. The Supremists requested Prince Ferdinand’s intervention ‘in favor of the rights of our brothers’ in Macedonia.38 The aim of the Supreme Committee, according to the Bulgarian Government and the Exarchate, was to control and shepherd the Macedonian Revolutionary Organization, tying it with the interests of Bulgaria, with the annexation of Macedonia as the final destination, but with autonomy as the immediate goal for Macedonia as well as the Adrianople region. After Kitanchev death in 1895, retired major general Danail Nikolaev became president, and the Supremists, many of

The VM(O)RO and other Macedonian organizations (1893–1940) 41 whom were military personnel, favoured the extended use of armed violence in Macedonia far more than the leaders of the internal organization.39 Relations between the two organizations were strained because the obvious aim of the Supreme Committee was to direct the Internal Organization40 and on several occasions there were even armed clashes between the Supremist detachments and the VMORO bands.41 The main temporary exception to the existing tension was from 1899 until 1901 when the Supreme Committee was headed by former lieutenant Boris Sarafov,42 originally an officer in the Bulgarian Army who hailed from Macedonia and was a member of BMORK (as it was then called). This meant that in effect the two organizations were momentarily merged.43 Delchev and Petrov had approached Dimitar Blagoev,44 the outstanding leader of the Bulgarian Socialists, for him to head the Supreme Committee (Blagoev was born in the village of Zagorichani, today’s Vasileiada near Kastoria in Greece), but he declined though he participated in the deliberations of the Supremists.45 Thus, Delchev and Petrov settled for Sarafov, who had been with Delchev in the Bulgarian High School of Soloun and in the Bulgarian Military Academy as a cadet. Sarafov became the chairman of the Supreme Committee, and though able, bold and hyperactive (travelling widely in Europe as a kind of ‘ambassador at large’ until 1902,46 to propagate the Macedonian cause and raise funds, often with unorthodox methods),47 was arrogant and unpredictable, with Petrov and Delchev unable to harness him.48 A crucial question to posit is to what extent the VMORO was Bulgarian or independent, trying to limit Bulgarian influence.49 And if the second is the case, whether this implied genuine separatism? Marinov’s assessment is that from the late 1880s until the early twentieth century there developed ‘a peculiar kind of Macedonian “supranational” identity: under the rubric of “Macedonians,” they tried to unite all the “national elements” of Macedonia for the sake of its political “liberation” ’.50 With the term ‘Macedonians’ the leaders of VMORO referred to the population of Macedonia as a whole, irrespective of nationality or religion, though for themselves they did retain the designation ‘Bulgarian Macedonians’ (or ‘Macedonian Bulgarians’) and their aim was indeed an autonomous or independent Macedonia and not union with Bulgaria.51 And Marinov observes: ‘[p]erhaps paradoxically, the achievement of autonomous, politically separate Macedonia was seen as the guarantee that the Bulgarians would preserve their identity’,52 while ‘the plan of Greater Bulgaria – entailed the risk that parts of the “Bulgarian tribe” would fall under Greek, Serbian or other domination’.53 Yet by the same token the VMORO ‘promoted a separate political loyalty, different from the one to the Bulgarian state’.54 An independent Macedonia was to be a kind of ‘Balkan Switzerland’, along with its federal model (Hadzhidimov seems to have been the main architect of the federative idea),55 and the nucleus for a broader Balkan federation of all the Balkan peoples. The Macedonian leftists in the VMORO as well as other Macedonian socialists regarded national ambitions ‘stupid chauvinism and patriotism’ and this was also the case with Bulgarian nationalism, and pointed out that the ‘Macedonian’ should not be regarded as a Bulgarian, Serb or Greek, as he was, above all, a political ‘slave’.56

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Autonomous Macedonia remained the official political agenda supported by the Bulgarian Governments until the Balkan Wars.57 But after the Balkan wars, the Bulgarians did not ‘take seriously the Macedonians’ slogan of autonomy’.58 As put by the noted Macedonian-American journalist, Stoyan Christowe, who visited Bulgaria several times in the interwar years, the Bulgarians ‘always felt that it [autonomy] was a mere maneuver on the part of these precocious children, who, however they romped and shouted for independence, as children always will, generally came home to the comfort and security of the parental roof when things got too hot or too cold in the outside world’.59 From the mid-1950s onwards, the Bulgarian national historical narrative stresses the earlier Bulgarian character of the VMORO and asserts that it was ‘a genuinely Bulgarian organization, aimed at annexation of the three historical regions’ of Macedonia.60 This claim is reinforced by the fact that the VMORO also included Adrianople in Thrace in its scope ‘whose Bulgarian population is by no means claimed by modern Macedonian nationalism’.61 And the VMORO leaders indeed called themselves ‘Macedonian Bulgarians’ or simply ‘Bulgarians’ (as seen in written texts by Delchev, Petrov, Tatarchev, Hadjinikolov and others).62 The Macedonian national historical narrative, from 1960s onwards, claims that the abandoning of the Bulgarian reference was no coincidence but a proof of a new evolving non-Bulgarian identity. Moreover, the option of autonomy was genuine, not including union with Bulgaria, and that the clash between Supremists and the Internal Movement was ‘in its essence . . . of a national character’.63 As for referring to themselves ‘as Macedonian Bulgarians’, this was due to the fact that they ‘had studied in Exarchist (Bulgarian) schools and worked in Exarchist (Bulgarian) institutions and organizations’.64 I would venture to suggest four variants at the turn of the century and in the 1900s: (1) the Bulgarian-Macedonian thesis of ultimate union with the Bulgarian ‘brothers’ (Tatarchev, Matov); (2) the supranational Macedonian thesis, with autonomy, independence or federated entity within a Balkan federation or confederation (Delchev, Petrov, Poparsov, Hadzhidimov, Šahov, Sandanski as well as by socialists such as Glavinov and Karev with his Kruševo Manifesto; see later), probably with the Bulgarian Macedonians as the dominant though tolerant majority among the various Macedonian ‘peoples’, ‘nationalities’, ‘minorities’ and tribes (mostly Gruev but probably the aforementioned as well)65; and (4) the gradual emergence of a putative new nation of Macedonians or Slav-Macedonians (maybe Sarafov and certainly Misirkov and Čupovski who were not VMORO members; see Chapter 4). Having come up with this foursome suggestion, caution is in order. As Brown has put it: ‘I argue that the Macedonian Revolutionary Organization’s emergence and reception among the Christian population of Turkey in Europe reveals not the presence or absence of national identity, but rather a process of the creation, interaction, and conscious reordering of diverse loyalties’.66 Yosmaoğlu has made a similar point: ‘it would behoove us to pause and consider whether by thinking of them as either this or that we place ourselves in an analytical straight jacket symptomatic of our own internalization of the notion that national consciousness is inherently exclusive and immutable’.67

The VM(O)RO and other Macedonian organizations (1893–1940) 43

The Ilinden uprising and its aftermath When Sarafov lost the presidency of the Supreme Committee in 1901, the post was taken over by colonel, later major general, Ivan Tsonchev, who headed the organization until 1903. Now the Supremists pressed for an uprising, with the assistance of the Bulgarian military, but the Internal Organization considered it premature.68 And Tsonchev and Jankov orchestrated a limited revolt in the Struma valley, at Gorna Dzumaja (today’s Blagoevgrad, in October 1902), across the border from Bulgaria which was crushed by the Ottomans.69 The decision to go ahead with an uprising in 1903 was taken at an extraordinary meeting of the VMORO labelled a ‘Congress’ held in Thessaloniki (January 1903), which was hardly a congress with only 17 or 18 participants, and with no participation of the major leaders, but for Garvanov. The aim of the forthcoming uprising was to achieve the status of autonomy for Macedonia and for the Adrianople region, the model being the recent Cretan autonomy, in the hope of triggering an intervention on the part of the great powers.70 At the Thessaloniki meeting the decision for launching an uprising was Garvanov’s,71 and one of the main arguments was that if they did not act soon, the Ottomans would destroy the organization’s infrastructure following the abortive 1902 insurgency.72 In any event the decision for an uprising or not had been discussed from December 1902 (prior to the Thessaloniki meeting) onwards and was supported by Gruev (who summed up the mood as follows: ‘Better an end with horrors than horrors without end’),73 Tatarchev, Hadjinikolov, Sarafov (who was initially against the decision)74 and Matov, while Delchev, Petrov, Toshev, Chernopeev and Sandanski were opposed.75 They felt that a ‘premature resort to widespread violence was doomed to failure and would worsen conditions further’,76 and would lead ‘people to slaughter’.77 And Petrov (who contrary to Delchev was an adroit debater78 and adept at political manoeuvring79) was able to convince most of them, momentarily, that an uprising was unwise.80 But at the end Delchev (whom Gruev tried to convince) only managed to delay the uprising from May to August, to commence on 2 August (with the new Gregorian calendar), Prophet Elijah’s day, and for this reason this momentous episode is known as the Ilinden Uprising. Tragically, well before the uprising, on 4 May 1903, the inspiring Delchev was ambushed by Ottoman troops and met his death (until today there is ‘no satisfactory explanation of the ambush’81).82 Prior to the uprising, a series of episodes shook Thessaloniki in late April 1903, known as the ‘Thessaloniki bombings’, by a small group of young Macedonian anarchists known as Gemidzhii (Boatmen), headed by Yordan Popyordanov (known as Ortzeto) and including Pavel Shatev, who were followers of Bakunin, Kropotkin and the nihilist Stepnyak. Apparently it was the Bulgarian anarchist Slavi Merdzanov (whom the Ottomans executed in 1901) who had radicalized them. The aim of the Gemidzhii was to propagate the Macedonian cause through bombings in Constantinople and Thessaloniki. But following setbacks in Constantinople, the Gemidzhii settled for Thessaloniki, having decided not to survive the bombings (a death vow). Delchev (who treated them kindly)83 and

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other VMORO leaders tried to dissuade them so as not to mar the Macedonian cause (but Sarafov was forthcoming, providing them with cash as well as dynamite). The explosions were striking and several, and the most spectacular were the explosion and sinking of the French steamship, Guadalquivir of Messagette Maritime (by Shatev, incredibly with no victims from the passengers or crew),84 the explosion of Casino Alhambra, of the Grand Hotel and of the Ottoman Bank (by Popyordanov).85 Public opinion abroad was ‘shaken by the explosions’, and the assessment was mixed: it had tarnished the image of the Macedonian cause; or it had done the opposite, in view of the ‘heroic, death-defying courage’ of the Gemidzhii and the fact that those killed by the actual bombs were very few and killing people was clearly not their intention.86 Reverting to Ilinden, the VMORO in the Ilinden Uprising was headed mainly by Gruev, Sarafov and Anastas Lozančev, and the Supremists by Tsonchev.87 The uprising took place in the vilâyet of Monastir and was widespread.88 The insurgents received the support of the local Macedonians speaking Slavic dialects (Exarchists as well as Patriarchists) and of a number of local Vlachs. A provisional government was established by the VMORO in the picturesque (mainly Vlach inhabited) town of Kruševo (at an altitude of 1250 metres) headed by Nikola Karev, a leftist member of the VMORO and member of Blagoev’s Socialist Party. Karev declared the ‘Kruševo Republic’, styled as the ‘first socialist republic in the Balkans’.89 He organized an assembly of 60 inhabitants, representing the three main ethnic groups of the town (Bulgars, Greeks and Vlachs), and set up a temporary government,90 which governed for only ten days, before being overrun by the Ottoman forces. Karev’s Kruševo Manifesto (whose text has not survived) called upon all the inhabitants of Macedonia, irrespective of ethnicity to join, and flags that bore the phrase Sloboda ili Smrt (Liberty or Death) were waved.91 However, other ‘acts such as singing Bulgarian marching songs and waving the Bulgarian flag undermined the committee claim that this was a general uprising and associated the insurgents – more or less accurately – with Bulgaria’.92 Note also that in early September, when it had become clear that the great powers would not intervene to save them, the General Staff of the Monastir Region (Gruev, Saravof and Lozančev) sent a letter to the Bulgarian Government calling ‘on behalf of the enslaved Bulgarians, to come to their assistance in the most effective way, by declaring war’.93 On 19 August there was a related revolt, known as the Preobraženie Uprising far away to the east, in Thrace, which set up the ‘Strandzha Republic’ which lasted for twenty days.94 The Ilinden Uprising took Europe by surprise95 but not the neighbouring states which had taken wind that it was in the making. Due to the inadequate preparation and the limited number of men with arms, its failure was a foregone conclusion. The only hope was an international diplomatic or military intervention, as had been the case – though belatedly – with the famous Bulgarian April Uprising of 1876, which had been poorly organized and condemned to failure and had led to massacres.96 Such an intervention did not come about with Ilinden, but it attracted ‘significant international attention to the plight of Macedonia – which was its goal for at least some of its planners – and even won admiration’.97

The VM(O)RO and other Macedonian organizations (1893–1940) 45 And until today two questions remain unanswered or inadequately answered, as put by Keith Brown98: The attention to violence, and to the historical rights and wrongs of different national movements, has tended to obscure the magnitude of this achievement and the double puzzle it represents: First, how and why did so many members of a society generally perceived as composed of fatalistic peasants with profoundly limited intellectual and moral horizons, and in a context of widespread, oppressive violence, come to invest so much in a revolutionary movement over such a short time? And second, how did this organization equip, train, and mobilize such a significant armed force despite the efforts of better-resourced political actors, including the Ottoman Empire itself, neighboring states with their own expansionist agendas, and rival ethnically based national movements, to sabotage, co-opt, or undo its work? In August and September 1903, the Ottoman offensive of 150,000–350,000 regular and irregular troops (apparently due to the fact that they had overestimated the strength of the revolutionaries)99 and 3,700 cavalrymen, with almost 500 canons, obliterated the 20,000–26,000 armed Macedonians. The death toll was about a thousand armed VMORO members and Supremists, and about 4,500–8,000 civilians (most of them female), with many women brutalized or raped (3,000 reported rapes),100 with 205 burned villages, 12,500 houses and stores destroyed, 70,000–100,000 homeless and 30,000 refugees fleeing to Bulgaria, many of them ending up in the United States.101 The Ilinden Uprising and the Kruševo Republic, although failures and stillborn, are regarded milestones, almost ‘sacred’, in the national historical narrative of the Macedonians, but are also referred to by the Bulgarians, with the former stressing its ethnic Macedonian or pan-Macedonian (multi-ethnic) character and the latter its Bulgarian features.102 Macedonian national historians have ‘presented Ilinden as an early expression of Macedonian commitment to national liberation’, focusing ‘attention on those leaders who had espoused socialist ideals and had reached out to Macedonia’s Albanian, Turkish, and Vlah victims of Ottoman oppression and bourgeois (Greek) exploitation’, and it ‘became part of a longer process of Macedonian national awakening’ culminating with the 1944 establishment of the Macedonian Republic.103 On the contrary, generations of Bulgarian historians, drawing on the archives and the Macedonian organizations and linking Ilinden to the Preobraženie Uprising, in the vilâyet of Adrianople, claim that the ‘Christian inhabitants of Macedonia who joined the uprising were motivated by shared Bulgarian ethnonational consciousness, which they also expressed by adherence to the Exarchist Church’.104 However, Ilinden does not carry the same weight for Macedonia and Bulgaria, despite their present-day clash over Ilinden and Delchev (see Chapter 13). As Marinov has put it, Ilinden is the ‘the foundation myth of the Macedonian identity in all its articulations: Bulgarian-Macedonian (during the interwar period,

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especially within the Macedonian organizations and brotherhoods in Bulgaria) and Yugoslav Macedonian/Macedonian national (the Macedonian communists, the Partisans during the Second World War and the Macedonian nation after 1944)’; and the Bulgarian state has, to some extent, ‘tried to appropriate this myth a posteriori – and to include it into a “pan-Bulgarian” narrative’, but ‘Ilinden is far from being as popular among Bulgarians as is the 1876 April Uprising and its heroes’, which is the Bulgarian foundation myth.105 In the wake of the Ilinden Uprising and until the Young Turk Revolution of July 1908, gone was ‘the fragile unity of the organization’,106 with an open clash between the leftists, known as ‘federalists’, and the right-wing exponents, known as ‘centralists’. The leftists-federalists were represented by Sandanski (the leader of the Serres VMORO committee), with Dimo Hadzhidimov as the main ideologist, and the group included Petrov, Poparsov, Toshev, Chernopeev, Philip Atanasov, Todor Panitsa (or Panica) and Dimitar Vlahov (who had studied chemistry in Germany, Switzerland and Bulgaria). The centralists were headed by Sarafov, Garvanov and Tatarchev, with Matov as their main ideologist. Gruev tried to reconcile the two opposing groups but to no avail and ended up with the centralists.107 The aims of the federalists, according to Hadzhidimov, were the principles of ‘political separatism’ and of ‘federalism’, which in practice meant Macedonian autonomy leading to full political independence, to then become a separate polity in a future Balkan federation that would secure freedom and equality to all its nationalities as in Switzerland.108 And the federalists were adamantly opposed to ‘national unification’ or a San Stefano Bulgaria.109 Matov regarded this approach irrelevant and an expression of Marxist dogmatism and called for limiting the goal to autonomy, stressing the Bulgarian element.110 The centralists took over, more or less, the role of the Supreme Macedonian Committee when it was finally dissolved in 1905 upon General Tsonchev’s resignation (following a decision at the Rila Congress, in October 1905).111 At the Rila Congress, where Gruev was elected as chairman, the two groups (federalists and centralists) reached an ephemeral unity.112 The name of the organization was changed to VMORO and the goals remained the same: ‘regardless of nationality to gain full political autonomy for these two regions’ (Macedonia and Adrianople), membership to ‘each inhabitant of European Turkey, regardless of sex, faith, nationality, and conviction’ and the struggle ‘for the removal of the chauvinistic propaganda’ which split the population.113 At Rila the federalists prevailed in the new central committee.114 But unity proved ephemeral, after the death of Gruev, on 23 December 1906, like Delchev in a skirmish with the Ottomans, which was a major blow to the organization.115 The clash between federalists and centralists became irreversible and deadly. The most acute clash was between Sarafov and Sandanski, who blamed each other as traitors to the cause.116 Sandanski in the Serres Regional Committee issued a death sentence for Sarafov and Garvanov, accusing them that they were acting on behalf of the Bulgarian state and intended to subjugate the Serres activists who were struggling for the integrity and independence of the organization.117 Sarafov and Garvanov met their death on 28 November 1907, in Sarafov’s house, assassinated by Panitsa upon instructions from Sandanski (Matov was also to be killed

The VM(O)RO and other Macedonian organizations (1893–1940) 47 but had not arrived at Sarafov’s house). Sandaski lived to regret this decision and at the time he was sentenced to death by the centralists (following several assassination attempts by the centralists, he was killed on 22 April 1915, while he was travelling from Melnik to Nevrokop).118 It has been claimed, especially by Macedonian historians, that the confrontation between federalists and centralists also involved a national dimension, in the sense that the leftists were poised against Bulgaria and its chauvinism because they no longer regarded themselves as Bulgarians, but ethnically or nationally ‘Macedonians’.119 This happened to be the original view of, among others, the late Katardžiev, the foremost Macedonian specialist on the VMORO (together with Krste Bitovski and Manol Pandevski) and one of the most respected Macedonian historians. To his credit however, in the 1990s and much to the dismay of many of his colleagues, he changed his view and argued that the difference between federalists and centralists was political rather than national.120 Indeed it is unlikely that Sandanski or the other leftists had developed a sense of separate Macedonian nationhood stricto sensu; they continued to regard themselves as Macedonian Bulgarians, despite their firm opposition to the Bulgarian nationalist agenda.121 At this juncture, a subtle point raised by Marinov is worth referring to: that the above speculation involves a ‘complex and more general conceptual issue’, namely ‘to what extent ethnicity or national belonging was always the leading principle structuring the social worldview and the question with the foremost relevance to all modern political actors?’ He speculates that probably ‘Sandanski never questioned his own Bulgarian ethnic belonging but to what extent was it important to him and/ or to people of his circle? What if for them “Bulgarian” was simply a trivial and “tribal” belonging, while the “big aim” was something else’? And Marinov cautions that we ‘tend to project our categories and their degrees of relevance over a particular context that might have been structured very differently’, in what is ‘a serious risk of unconscious “methodological nationalism”122 here – leaving aside the conscious and very clear nationalist bias of Bulgarian and Macedonian historians’.123 The Macedonian revolutionaries’ ‘autonomism’ and ‘separatism’ were supranational and not a Macedonian national project. However, this ‘pro-autonomy revolutionary tradition undoubtedly contributed to the formation of contemporary Macedonian nationalism’.124 And Marinov makes the following telling point125: even if they were Bulgarians by national self-identification and supranationalists as a political theory, with their propaganda of “Macedonia to the Macedonians,” the revolutionaries promoted a concurrent political loyalty that generated new symbolic boundaries and also, in this manner and in certain contexts, transformations of the sense of ethnicity. They undoubtedly created some of the premises that the specific political setting after World War I transformed into identity patterns that could certainly be qualified as Macedonian nationalism. The Young Turk Revolution of July 1908 was hailed by the VMORO leadership, in particular by the leftists Sandanski, Hadzhidimov and Vlahov, who

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participated in the Young Turk movement, forming their own party, the People’s Federative Party, ‘in the hope of gaining equality within the Ottoman state’126 and aspiring ‘to unite all of Macedonia’s nationalities’,127 with Vlahov elected as a deputy in the Ottoman Parliament in 1908.128 Four years later, during the Balkan Wars (1912–1913), many members of the VMORO fought as volunteers in the Bulgarian Army, including Sandanski, and during the First World War they served in a separate brigade of the Bulgarian Army headed by brigadier general Aleksandar Protogerov, a former Supremist (Tatarchev served as a surgeon in the Bulgarian Army). Meanwhile, in 1911 a new Central Committee of the VMORO was established and headed by Todor Aleksandrov (a schoolteacher), Hristo Chernopeev and Petar Chaulev. When Chernopeev was killed in 1915 in the course of the First World War, he was replaced by Protogerov, but the main leader was the younger and more charismatic Aleksandrov, who revived the VMORO in Pirin Macedonia, renamed VMRO in 1919.129

The interwar years: the VMRO in decline and the VMRO (ob.) After the end of the First World War, a small group of surviving leftist federalists, including Hadzhidimov, Atanasov, Chaulev, Vlahov, Panitsa, Poparsov, Shatev (the former anarchist of the Gemidzhii, who went on to study law at Sofia University) and Panko Brašnarov, still dreamt of a reunited multi-ethnic Macedonia, with a generally accepted common language, maybe Esperanto. Their adversaries were Aleksandrov and Protogerov, whose base was Pirin Macedonia in Bulgaria (known as the Petrich district).130 Both factions addressed the Paris Peace Conference, with the leftists calling for ‘the autonomy of Macedonia’ and the right wing for ‘Macedonia, undivided and as a whole to be attached to Bulgaria’.131 The interwar was the worst period for the VMRO, with one assassination after another, starting with the assassination of Petrov on 28 June 1921. The VMRO was mainly active in Bulgaria, initially under Aleksandrov and Protogerov and later, from the mid-1920s onwards, under Ivan (Vancho) Mihailov, now operating as ‘a hybrid criminal/terrorist enterprise’.132 The official aim remained the reunification and autonomy of Macedonia, as the ‘Switzerland of the Balkans’,133 but the real goal was the annexation of the parts of Macedonia that had gone to Greece and to Serb-dominated Yugoslavia.134 In Bulgaria, the VMRO had malign influence on Bulgarian politics, placing or replacing governments, murdering politicians, especially those who were seen as adversaries to the reunification of Macedonia. The most appalling case was the brutal torturing, mutilation and murder of Bulgarian prime minister Aleksandar Stamboliyski by the VMRO under Aleksandrov (June 1923), because he had been friendly with Belgrade (he had signed the Treaty of Niš with the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes and had undertaken to suppress the operations of the VMRO). Even foreign officials fell victims of VMRO assassins, such as King Alexander I of Yugoslavia (in October 1934), who was murdered upon his arrival in Marseilles, on a state visit, together with French foreign minister Louis Barthou.135 Following this event, and in the wake

The VM(O)RO and other Macedonian organizations (1893–1940) 49 of a Bulgarian coup d’état of 1934, the Bulgarian Government dealt with the degenerated VMRO, by banning and liquidating it.136 Mihailov fled to Turkey but ordered his supporters not to resist the authorities. He lived in Turkey, Poland and Hungary, and finally settled in Zagreb, the capital of the ‘Independent State of Croatia’ (a fascist puppet-state under Germany) under the odious Ustasha of Ante Pavelić.137 But let us return to the 1920s. From early 1924 until May 1924 there was an attempt to bring the two factions together, the leftist federalists and the conservatives, under Aleksandrov. Extensive talks took place in Vienna, upon the initiative of the Soviet Union and the Communist International (Comintern) with which Vlahov had been in contact, at the behest of Aleksandrov, who at that stage was unhappy with the stance of the Bulgarian Government and thus approached the Comintern.138 The common ground was the goal of a reunited independent federalist state of Macedonia within a Balkan federation. Vlahov, Atanasov, Panitsa and Chaulev were the main protagonists with the assistance of Christian Rakosky, the Soviet ambassador in Paris, who was of Bulgarian origin, and there were talks with both Aleksandrov and Protogoreov.139 The final draft was prepared by Vlahov on the part of the Comintern and Nikola Kharlakov, a member of the Bulgarian Communist Party. The draft was corrected and revised by the VMRO Central Committee and the end result was what is known as the ‘May Manifesto’, a secret document signed on 6 May 1924 by the three members of the VMRO Central Committee (Chaulev, Protogerov and Aleksandrov, in that order of signatures, though it is not clear whether Aleksandrov had ‘authorized his signature or not’140).141 The Manifesto stated that ‘Macedonia, in its natural geographical frontiers . . . of about 65,000 square kilometres . . . has all the rights and conditions necessary for an independent political existence, forming an independent and self-governing State’.142 It also referred to ‘the liberation and reunion of the separated parts of Macedonia’ and to the formation of a ‘Balkan Federation’.143 The Manifesto was a triumph of the Comintern, and as such it infuriated the Bulgarian Government of Aleksandar Tsankov, leading Aleksandrov and Protogerov to deny having signed it and denouncing it as a communist forgery.144 Shortly afterwards, Aleksandrov was assassinated by two of his men, possibly upon instructions by Protogerov (who despised him)145 or from Mihailov, Aleksandrov’s personal secretary, a plot which seemed to have the approval of the Bulgarian minister of the army.146 Protogerov took over as head of the VMRO until 1928, and from 1924 until 1928 there was a fratricidal war between ‘Protogerovists’ and ‘Mihailovists’. During these years the following leading figures of the VMRO were assassinated upon Mihailov’s instructions: Hadzhidimov, Chaulev, Atanasov and Panitsa in 1924, others in 1925, including many intellectuals,147 and Protogerov in 1928 (Mihailov admitted to having ordered the ‘execution’ to avenge the death of Aleksandrov, which he said had been plotted by the general),148 with Vlahov escaping several assassination attempts before leaving for the Soviet Union in 1936. The ruthless Mihailov took over the leadership of the VMRO in 1928, but the clash between ‘Mihailovists’ (in the Petrich district) and

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‘Protogerovists’, the latter led by Petŭr Šandanov (the group’s informal leader), continued even after 1928, with the former, who were more numerous and wellequipped, winning at the end.149 Mihailov’s leadership was the darkest hour of the VMRO150; it ‘degenerated into a self-serving terrorist organization’151 and in effect a fascist outfit, with close relations with the Italian fascists and especially with the Croatian fascists of Pavelić’s Ustasha.152 Now let us revert to the aftermath of the failure of the May Manifesto. Following the attempt at reunification, the leftists of VMRO set up a new organization in Vienna (October 1925) named VMRO (obedinena), that is Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization (United),153 VMRO (ob.) for short, whose leaders were Dimitar Vlahov (its main founder),154 Vladimir Poptomov, Pavel Shatev, Georgi Zankov, Hristo Jankov (or Yankov), Filip Atanasov, Panko Brašnarov and Metodi Shatorov (Sharlo). The VMRO (ob.) was linked to the Comintern, whose creation it largely was and became a member of the Balkan Communist Federation that had been set up in 1920–1921, and was immediately recognized by the communist parties of Bulgaria (some considered it as an offshoot of the Bulgarian Communist party),155 Yugoslavia and Greece. Within the VMRO (ob.) there were two tendencies, the communist wing under Vlahov, Poptomov, Shatorov and Brašnarov, and the national-revolutionary one under Shatev and Zankov, who, after a while, left the organization.156 Until its dissolution in 1936, the VMRO (ob.) was in direct and unbridgeable antagonism with its ideological foe, the mainstream VMRO.157 The aim of the VMRO (ob.) was the materialization of the goals of the May Manifesto and in particular the creation of an independent Macedonia, with the help of the Comintern and the Soviet Union. It issued two publications, La Fédération Balkanique and Makedonsko Delo (written in literary Bulgarian). It declared the freedom and independence, to be based on the equality of the national, political, civil and cultural rights of all the nationalities which inhabited Macedonia, and denounced the VMRO of Mihailov as an expression of Bulgarian fascism.158 The VMRO (ob.) was not a mass organization with many adherents. However, it did provide a valuable double service to the Macedonian cause: with its constant reference to the existence of a separate ‘Macedonian nation’ (not in the 1920s but from the early 1930s onwards),159 and by providing a milieu where a group of educated and able Macedonians, who were both communists and nationalists, an ideal combination which was later, in the 1940s, to provide the personnel active in the official establishment of Macedonian identity and nation-building within federal Yugoslavia under Tito, with the participation of among others, Vlahov and initially Poptomov, Brašnarov, Shatev and others (see Chapter 5).160

The Comintern’s role Another fundamental aspect ‘of the utmost importance for the maturing and consolidation of Macedonian nationalism’161 was the role played by the Comintern. At a Moscow meeting of the Comintern in 1923, at the initiative of the Bulgarians Vasil Kolarov and Georgi Dimitrov, who were leading figures of the Comintern,

The VM(O)RO and other Macedonian organizations (1893–1940) 51 the idea of an autonomous or independent Macedonia within a future communist Balkan Federation was adopted, and there was reference to a ‘Macedonian people’, though not to a ‘Macedonian nation’ as such.162 The Yugoslav communists under Sima Marković163 and KKE (the Communist Party of Greece) were vexed with the 1923 decision (former General Secretary of KKE, historian Yianis Kordatos denounced the decision as propping ‘Bulgarian chauvinism’).164 In 1924, the 5th session of the Comintern referred to the desire of the Macedonian people for the creation of ‘a united independent Macedonia’.165 This time round the Yugoslav as well as the Greek communists gave in reluctantly, so as to avoid a split in their parties.166 In 1934, the Comintern recognized the existence of a ‘Macedonian nation’, and again called for a united Macedonia,167 which meant that it had the blessing of the Soviet Union.168 Both the Yugoslav and Bulgarian communist parties embraced this decision, which meant that it was ‘a mutually acceptable solution to the national question in the area and a basis for a future union between the two countries or even a Balkan federation’.169 Only the Communist Party of Greece had the nerve ‘to bypass Comintern directives’170 and in its 6th Conference of March 1935 adopted a resolution on ‘complete equality for the minorities’ living in Greece.171 Interestingly, the wording of the 1934 Comintern decision seems to have been formulated by a Polish communist who had little knowledge of the Macedonian Question (he was assisted in his task by Vlahov).172 But Vlahov, in his memoirs, acknowledges that this decision had come ‘from above’ and was controversial, and that it was not well received by local cadres in Yugoslav Macedonia.173

Yugoslavia, Greece and the Macedonian issue This presentation of the state of play on the Macedonian Question until the coming of the Second World War would not be complete without a brief reference to interwar Serbian-led Yugoslavia and Greece. In Yugoslavian Macedonia (Vardar Macedonia), there were attempts at Serbianization, under the rationale that the region was ‘South Serbia’ (Južna Srbija) or ‘Old Serbia’ (Stara Srbija), and the ‘Macedonian Slavs’ were in fact Serbs or ‘Southern Serbians’ (Južnosrbijanci) that had to be made pravi Srbi (pure Serbs).174 The Bulgarian, Greek and Romanian schools were shut down and most Exarchist teachers and priests were expelled from Yugoslavia. The inhabitants who did not happen to regard themselves as Serbs or were not prepared to become Serbs were to leave (something carried through only in part). For good measure and in order to Serbianize the region, Belgrade settled about 70,000 Serb colonists.175 There were also some killings and mainly political arrests of hundreds of people. The Macedonian Orthodox community was placed under the Serbian Orthodox Church.176 However, the overall approach of the Yugoslavian state was a mixture of repression with some attempts at milder integration.177 As a result of the repressive measures, many of the inhabitants started flirting with the Bulgarian option, a sentiment also stirred by VMRO members that had infiltrated the region from

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Bulgaria.178 The VMRO activists made hundreds of attacks from 1919 until 1934 (when Bulgaria clamped down on the VMRO), with victims on either side.179 Others, such as the local communists, began to identify themselves as Macedonians nationally and favoured self-determination. More generally, as maintained by Ivo Banac, in the interwar years when the Macedonians had to deal with the Serbs or the Greeks they brought to the fore their Bulgarian features, but when facing the Bulgarians they invoked their distinct Macedonian characteristics.180 Be this as it may, there was a process of consolidation of Macedonian identity in Yugoslav Macedonia – especially among intellectuals of the younger generation.181 During the very same period, some Serbian politicians put aside the outrageous view that the Macedonians were merely Serbs, and accepted that they were ‘Macedonians’, along the logic that after all it is preferable for them to be ‘Macedonians’ instead of Bulgarians.182 In the case of Greece there was a drastic change of the population in Greek Macedonia (as well as Epirus and Greek Thrace) as a result of the arrival of almost 700,000 refugees from Asia Minor, following the compulsory exchange of populations adopted during the Lausanne Peace Conference (1922–1923). The number of Bulgarianspeakers diminished due to the voluntary exchange of population between Greece and Bulgaria as part of an agreement reached in the Treaty of Neuilly, although those who immigrated to Bulgaria came from Greek Thrace and eastern Macedonia, the region bordering Bulgaria and not the one bordering Yugoslavia. About 53,000 Bulgarians emigrated from Greece to Bulgaria, while 30,000 Greeks emigrated from Bulgaria to Greece. Previously during the First World War, 39,000 and 16,000 had fled either way, respectively.183 By 1925, according to the relevant report of the League of Nations, the number of Greeks in Greek Macedonia amounted to 1,341,000, that is 88 percent of the population, which meant that the population of Greeks of Macedonia had risen to 828,000 in comparison to 1913, and the Slavspeakers or Bulgarianspeakers amounted to 77, 000, which is to only 5.1 percent.184 The League of Nations report was based on the evidence provided by Alexander Pallis, a distinguished Greek geographer, who participated in the committees on refugees. According to Pallis’s research, no fewer than 17 population movements had taken place from and to Greek Macedonia from 1912 until 1923.185 In the Greek census of 1928 the so-called ‘Slavspeakers’ were depicted as amounting to 81,984. Obviously this last figure is unreliable.186 Bulgaria claimed that the Bulgarians in Greece were as many as 330,000. But probably the most reliable figure for the interwar ranges from a minimum of 100,000187 to probably somewhere between 160,000 and 200,000 Slavspeakers who lived mainly in the Greek prefectures of Kastoria, Florina and Pella.188 Greece began by regarding them as Bulgarians, then as Slav-Macedonians or Macedono-Slavs (in the 1928 census), ending up with the term ‘Slavophone Greeks’.189 In general, in interwar Greece the dominant ‘scientific view’ was that their language, the Slav-Macedonian, was a distinct dialect or tongue and not a dialect of the Bulgarian and certainly not a Serbian dialect.190 The Macedonians of Greece had only one ‘defender’, KKE and its newspaper Rizospastis, from which

The VM(O)RO and other Macedonian organizations (1893–1940) 53 they could voice their concerns and claims to nationhood with many letters that the newspaper published.191 The Greek policy towards the ‘Slavspeakers’ (a large number of whom had ‘Bulgarian consciousness’)192 residing in Greece can be divided into three phases: (1) 1920–1925, the view that they were a Bulgarian minority, which gave way to the view that they were neither Bulgarians nor Serbians, but a people with an ‘independent language’ (Greece went as far as preparing a primer of the ‘Macedonian Slav’ language, entitled Abecedar, that is ABC, curiously not in the Cyrillic but in the Latin alphabet, a move that infuriated the Bulgarians as well as the Serbs)193; (2) 1926–1935, the period of ‘mild assimilation’, a campaign of linguistic Hellenization, including the change of names, with subtle non-coercive means, which bore modest fruit as far as Greece was concerned (mainly rendering the Slavspeakers bilingual); and (3) 1936–1940, the Ioannis Metaxas dictatorship, a period of compulsory and forced assimilation, with a complete prohibition of the use of the ‘Slavic idiom’ in public as well as privately and imprisonment, torture or internal exile for the offenders.194 Anthropologist Loring Danforth has claimed that this last phase of harsh treatment made the Slavspeakers reach the conclusion that they were ‘Bulgarians’ or ‘Macedonians’ and certainly ‘not Greeks’.195 This is also the view of Greek historians who blame Metaxas for this outcome and also point out that those who had suffered under Metaxas (banished in Aegean islands or in mainland prisons) later sought revenge and joined the Italian or Bulgarian occupiers.196

Notes 1 This clarification is due to Tchavdar Marinov, whom I thank. 2 Nadine Lange-Akhund, The Macedonian Question, 1893–1908: From Western Sources (Boulder, CO: East European Monographs, 1998), 39–40. 3 Vemund Aarbakke, ‘Who Can Mend a Broken Heart? Macedonia’s Place in Modern Bulgarian History’, in Ioannis D. Stefanidis, Vlasis Vlasidis and Evangelos Kofos (eds), Macedonian Identities through Time: Interdisciplinary Approaches (Thessaloniki: Foundation of the Museum for the Macedonian Struggle, Epikentro, 2010) [2008], 151–2. 4 Duncan M. Perry, The Politics of Terror: The Macedonian Revolutionary Movements, 1893–1903 (Durham: Duke University Press, 1988), 39. 5 Kosta Todoroff, ‘The Macedonian Organization Yesterday and Today’, Foreign Affairs, 6 (1927–1928), 473–4; L.S. Stavrianos, The Balkans since 1453 (London: Hurst & Company, 2000) [1958], 519–20; Evangelos Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia: Civil Conflict, Politics of Mutation, National Identity (New York: Aristide D. Karatzas Publisher, 1993) [1964], 25–6; Douglas Dakin, The Greek Struggle in Macedonia 1897–1913 (Thessaloniki: Institute for Balkan Studies, 1966), 47, 51–3; Ivo Banac, The National Question in Yugoslavia (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1993) [1984], 314–15; Perry, The Politics of Terror, 39–41, 127; Hugh Poulton, Who Are the Macedonians? (London: Hurst & Company, 1995), 53–5; LangeAkhund, The Macedonian Question, 36–7; Vemund Aarbakke, Ethnic Rivalry and the Quest for Macedonia, 1870–1913 (Boulder, CO: East European Monographs, 2003), 97–8; Andrew Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians: A History (Stanford: Hoover Institution Press, 2008), 94, 102–3; Krste Bitovski, ‘Macedonia in the XIX Century’, in Todor Chepreganov (ed.), History of the Macedonian People (Skopje: Institute of National History, 2008), 174. See also Stoyan Pribichevich, Macedonia: Its People and History (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1982), 120–1.

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6 Ivan Hadjinikolov on the Serbian propaganda in Macedonia which led to the creation of the Revolutionary Organization, in Bulgarian Academy of Sciences (Institute of History, Bulgarian Language Institute), Macedonia: Documents and Material (Sofia: Bulgarian Academy of Sciences, 1978), 414. 7 Damyan Grouev on the creation of a revolutionary organization in Macedonia, in Macedonia: Documents and Material, 550–1. See also Lange-Akhund, The Macedonian Question, 36. 8 Ivan Hadjinikolov on the Serbian propaganda in Macedonia which led to the creation of the Revolutionary Organization, 415. 9 From the memoirs of Dr Christo Tatarchev on the foundation and the aims of the Internal Macedonian Adrianople Revolutionary Organization, in Macedonia: Documents and Material, 661. 10 Perry, The Politics of Terror, 42; Aarbakke, Ethnic Rivalry and the Quest for Macedonia, 97 fn.71. 11 Which may not be a coincidence as implied in İpek K. Yosmaoğlu, Blood Ties: Religion, Violence and the Politics of Nationhood in Ottoman Macedonia, 1878–1908 (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2014), Kindle Edition, location 575. 12 Macedonia: Documents and Material, 661–2. 13 Ibid. 14 Keith Brown, Loyal unto Death: Trust and Terror in Revolutionary Macedonia (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2013), 70. 15 Dimitar Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia (Lanham: The Scarecrow Press, 2009), 100. 16 Yosmaoğlu, Blood Ties, location 806. 17 Ibid., location 792. 18 Brown, Loyal unto Death, 62. 19 Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, 100, 217; Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia, 25–6. See also Stoyan Christowe, Heroes and Assassins (New York: Robert M. MacBride and Company, 1935), 48–9; Pribichevich, Macedonia, 121–2. 20 It seems that the idea of an autonomous Macedonia was first suggested by Emperor Frantz Joseph of Austria to Tsar Alexander II of Russia at a meeting at Reichstadt (Zákupy) in July 1876. See Dakin, The Greek Struggle in Macedonia, 47 fn 11. 21 Lange-Akhund, The Macedonian Question, 38–9, 102–3; Alice Ackerman, Making Peace Prevail: Preventing Violent Conflict in Macedonia (Syracuse: Syracuse University Press, 1999), 54–5; Tchavdar Marinov, ‘We, the Macedonians: The Paths of Macedonian Supra-Nationalism (1878–1912)’, in Diana Mishkova (ed.), We, the People: Politics of National Peculiarity in Southeast Europe (Budapest: Central European University Press, 2013c), 112–13. See also Pribichevich, Macedonia, 122. 22 This paragraph is based on comments conveyed to me by Tchavdar Marinov, whom I thank. 23 Brown, Loyal unto Death, 174. 24 The Statute of the Bulgarian Macedonian-Adrianople Revolutionary Committees, in Macedonia: Documents and Material, 419. 25 Dimitris Livanios, The Macedonian Question: Britain and the Southern Balkans 1939–1949 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008), 18–19. See also Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 105; Pribichevich, Macedonia, 121. 26 Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, 56, 99, 173. 27 Pitu Guli participated in the Ilinden Uprising and was killed defending the Kruševo Republic. 28 Dakin, The Greek Struggle in Macedonia, 47 fn 10. However, there were some exceptions that confirm the rule. For instance, Ivan Anastasov (Yannis Anastasiadis or Anastasiou?) known as Grcheto (the little Greek) was a Greek from Meleniko/Melnik, and Rafael Kamhi was a Jew from Bitola/Monastiri. I thank Tchavdar Marinov for this information.

The VM(O)RO and other Macedonian organizations (1893–1940) 55 29 Banac, The National Question in Yugoslavia, 315; Tchavdar Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander: Macedonian Identity at the Crossroads of Greek, Bulgarian and Serbian Nationalism’, in Roumen Daskalov and Tchavdar Marinov (eds), Entangled Histories of the Balkans, Volume One: National Ideologies and Language Policies (Leiden: Brill, 2013a), 299–301; Marinov, ‘We, the Macedonians’, 113–14, 117; Aarbakke, Ethnic Rivalry and the Quest for Macedonia, 98–100; Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, 99–101. 30 Marinov, ‘We, the Macedonians’, 114. This paragraph is also based on further information I received from Tchavdar Marinov and Vemund Aarbakke whom I thank. Interestingly the longer period as regards BMORK, with its Bulgarian character is confirmed by Rossos, who is known to largely espouse the Macedonian national narrative. See Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 105. 31 The expression ‘Macedonia for the Macedonians’ had been Gladstone’s in a letter to The Times in 1897 (a year before his death). His exact words were ‘Why not Macedonia for Macedonians, as Bulgaria for Bulgarians and Servia for Servians’, clarifying that ‘next to the Ottoman Government nothing can be more deplorable and blameworthy than jealousies between Greek and Slav, and plans by the States already existing for appropriating other territory’, predicting that if these peoples did not stand together in common defence, they would be ‘devoured by others’. Quoted in Brown, Loyal unto Death, 14. 32 Dakin, The Greek Struggle in Macedonia, 47. 33 Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander’, 301. 34 Ibid., 301. 35 Ibid., 299–300. 36 Ibid., 301. 37 Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, 116, 216–17. 38 Lange-Akhund, The Macedonian Question, 45. 39 Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia, 26–7; Perry, The Politics of Terror, 42–4, 52; Aarbakke, Ethnic Rivalry and the Quest for Macedonia, 98; LangeAkhund, The Macedonian Question, 48–9, 104–5; Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, 217; Mercia MacDermott, Freedom or Death: The Life of Gotse Delchev (London: Journeyman Press, 1978), 125–6, 132–3, 135–8. 40 Perry, The Politics of Terror, 54–5; Lange-Akhund, The Macedonian Question, 51–3, 102–6; Aarbakke, Ethnic Rivalry and the Quest for Macedonia, 99–100; Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, 217; Marinov, ‘We, the Macedonians’, 117; Bitovski, ‘Macedonia in the XIX Century’, 186; MacDermott, Freedom or Death, 135. 41 Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, 217. 42 Marinov, ‘We, the Macedonians’, 116. 43 Yosmaoğlu, Blood Ties, location 811. 44 Delchev in particular was influenced by the socialist ideas of Blagoev. See MacDermott, Freedom or Death, 131. 45 From Gyorche Petrov’s memoirs about the Collaboration with the Supreme Committee, headed by Boris Sarafov, in Macedonia: Documents and Material, 558. 46 Keith Brown, ‘Villains and Symbolic Pollution in the Narratives of Nations: The Case of Boris Sarafov’, in Maria Todorova (ed.), Balkan Identities: Nation and Memory (London: Hurst & Company, 2003), 242; Brown, Loyal unto Death, 61. 47 For Sarafov’s techniques to raise money for the cause, including charming ladies of all ages in western Europe, see Christowe, Heroes and Assassins, 64, 66–8. For more details regarding Sarafov’s behaviour, deeds and misdeeds, see Brown, ‘Villains and Symbolic Pollution in the Narratives of Nations’, 241–7. 48 Elizabeth Barker, Macedonia: Its Place in Balkan Power Politics (London: Royal Institute of International Affairs, 1950); Stavrianos, The Balkans since 1453, 519–20; Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia,27; Dakin, The Greek Struggle in Macedonia, 48–50, 53–4; Banac, The National Question in Yugoslavia, 314; Perry,

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The VM(O)RO and other Macedonian organizations (1893–1940) The Politics of Terror, 52–5, 82–4; Poulton, Who Are the Macedonians?, 53–5; Aarbakke, Ethnic Rivalry and the Quest for Macedonia, 104; Lange-Akhund, The Macedonian Question, 53–4; Livanios, The Macedonian Question; MacDermott, Freedom or Death, 215–18, 226–8; Mercia MacDermott, For Freedom and Perfection: The Life of Yané Sandansky (London: Journeyman Press, 1988), 49–50, 52. Aarbakke, Ethnic Rivalry and the Quest for Macedonia, 98. Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander’, 299. Ibid.; Marinov, ‘We, the Macedonians’, 116. Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander’, 301. Ibid.; Marinov, ‘We, the Macedonians’, 117–18. Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander’, 301; Marinov, ‘We, the Macedonians’, 116–8. Yosmaoğlu, Blood Ties, location 575. Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander’, 301–2; Marinov, ‘We, the Macedonians’, 122. As pointed out to me by Tchavdar Marinov. Christowe, Heroes and Assassins, 131. Ibid. Stefan Troebst, ‘IMRO+100=FYROM? The Politics of Macedonian Historiography’, in James Pettifer (ed.), The New Macedonian Question (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1999), 61. Marinov, ‘We, the Macedonians’, 114–15. See for such texts, Macedonia: Documents and Material, 414, 418, 437, 661–2. Bitovski, ‘Macedonia in the XIX Century’, 186. Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 104. Marinov, ‘We, the Macedonians’, 111, 113–14, 118–19, 122, 124–5. Brown, Loyal unto Death, 19. Yosmaoğlu, Blood Ties, location 385. Ibid., location 811, 818. Dakin, The Greek Struggle in Macedonia, 72–80; Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, 217; Bitovski, ‘Macedonia in the XIX Century’, 187–8; Yosmaoğlu, Blood Ties, location 837; MacDermott, Freedom or Death, 313–14. Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, 95; Yosmaoğlu, Blood Ties, location 875. Brown, Loyal unto Death, 61. Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, 95. Quoted in Brown, Loyal unto Death, 4. Dakin, The Greek Struggle in Macedonia, 95. Bitovski, ‘Macedonia in the XIX Century’, 188–9; Perry, The Politics of Terror, 125; Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, 57, 90, 95, 196. See also Pribichevich, Macedonia, 122–3. Brown, Loyal unto Death, 4. Dakin, The Greek Struggle in Macedonia, 95. MacDermott, Freedom or Death, 326. Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, 173. Bitovski, ‘Macedonia in the XIX Century’, 185–6, 188–9. See also MacDermott, Freedom or Death, 326. Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 108. Ibid., 107–8; Perry, The Politics of Terror, 125, 127; Lange-Akhund, The Macedonian Question, 119–20, 123; Aarbakke, Ethnic Rivalry and the Quest for Macedonia, 109, 112; Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 107–8; Dakin, The Greek Struggle in Macedonia, 94–5; MacDermott, Freedom or Death, 324–8, 330, 361–2; Bitovski, ‘Macedonia in the XIX Century’, 186, 188–9. See also Pribichevich, Macedonia, 122–3. MacDermott, Freedom or Death, 352. Ibid., 354.

The VM(O)RO and other Macedonian organizations (1893–1940) 57 85 Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, 82; Brown, Loyal unto Death, 62–3, 65; Yosmaoğlu, Blood Ties, location 882; Pribichevich, Macedonia, 124–5. For details of the bombings and of the views of the boatmen, based on an interview with Shatev (one of the two boatmen who survived to be imprisoned by the Ottomans), see Christowe, Heroes and Assassins, 76–112. For even more details, see MacDermott, Freedom or Death, 349–56. 86 MacDermott, Freedom or Death, 356. 87 Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 102, 107–9; Aarbakke, Ethnic Rivalry and the Quest for Macedonia, 112–3; Bitovski, ‘Macedonia in the XIX Century’, 189. See also Christowe, Heroes and Assassins, 114. 88 Contra, that the Ilinden Uprising was not ‘a widespread popular movement’ and that this view is ‘entirely a myth’ mainly propagated by Brailsford, see Dakin, The Greek Struggle in Macedonia, 101. 89 Pribichevich, Macedonia, 129. 90 Lange-Akhund, The Macedonian Question, 126–7. 91 Brown, Loyal unto Death, 70. 92 Yosmaoğlu, Blood Ties, location 901. 93 Letter No. 534 from the General Staff of the Second Macedonian-Adrianople Revolutionary Region to the Bulgarian Government on the position of the insurgent population, requesting assistance from Bulgaria (9 September 1903), Macedonia: Documents and Material, 531–3. 94 Perry, The Politics of Terror, 125, 127–35; Poulton, Who Are the Macedonians?, 56–8; Aarbakke, Ethnic Rivalry and the Quest for Macedonia, 103, 105, 109–13; Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 107–11; Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, 95; Bitovski, ‘Macedonia in the XIX Century’, 189– 91; Lange-Akhund, The Macedonian Question, 125–7; Livanios, The Macedonian Question, 19; Dimitris Lithoxoou, Ellinikos antimakedonikos agonas: apo to Ilinden sti Zagoritsani [The Greek Anti-Macedonian Struggle: From Ilinden to Zagoritsani] (Athens: Megali Poreia, 1998), 38–45. See also H.N. Brailsford, Macedonia: Its Races and Their Future (London: Methuen & Co, 1906), 150–62; Pribichevich, Macedonia, 127–30; Christowe, Heroes and Assassins, 115–17. For a detailed though convoluted presentation, see Dakin, The Greek Struggle in Macedonia, 98–106. 95 Yosmaoğlu, Blood Ties, location 908. 96 R.J. Crampton, A Concise History of Modern Bulgaria (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005) [1997], 80; Roumen Daskalov, The Making of a Nation in the Balkans: Historiography of the Bulgarian Revival (Budapest: Central European University Press, 2004), 107–8. 97 Brown, Loyal unto Death, 4. 98 Ibid., 5. 99 Lange-Akhund, The Macedonian Question, 127. 100 Hilmi Pasha, in disgust, ordered a martial court to punish the Ottoman culprits, without a right of appeal. See Lange-Akhund, The Macedonian Question, 127. 101 Dakin, The Greek Struggle in Macedonia, 103–4; Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 110; Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia. See also Pribichevich, Macedonia, 128; Bitovski, ‘Macedonia in the XIX Century’, 191–2; Brown, Loyal unto Death, 4. See also Christowe, Heroes and Assassins, 117–20. 102 Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, 96. For the relevant Bulgarian narrative, see Aarbakke, ‘Who Can Mend a Broken Heart?’ 153. For Macedonian mythologizing regarding Ilinden, see Keith Brown, ‘A Rising to Count On: Ilinden between Politics and History in Post-Yugoslav Macedonia’, in Victor Roudometof (ed.), The Macedonian Question: Culture, Historiography, Politics (Boulder, CO: East European Monographs, Columbia University Press, 2000), 143–72; Keith Brown, The Past in Question: Modern Macedonia and the Uncertainties of Nation (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2003); Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 61, 99; Poulton, Who Are the Macedonians?, 56; Victor Roudometof,

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116 117 118 119 120 121 122 123 124 125 126

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The VM(O)RO and other Macedonian organizations (1893–1940) ‘Nationalism and Identity Politics in the Balkans: Greece and the Macedonian Question’, Journal of Modern Greek Studies, 14:2 (1996), 265. Brown, Loyal unto Death, 17. Ibid., 15. As pointed out to me by Tchavdar Marinov in writing, whom I thank. Brown, Loyal unto Death, 15. Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, 90. Martin Valkov, ‘The Internal Macedonian-Adrianople Revolutionary Organization and the Idea for Autonomy for Macedonia and Adrianople Thrace, 1893–1912’, M.A. dissertation, Central European University (Budapest, 2010), 53. Ibid. Ibid. Bitovski, ‘Macedonia in the XIX Century’, 196–7. Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 120. Quoted in Valkov, ‘The Internal Macedonian-Adrianople Revolutionary Organization and the Idea for Autonomy for Macedonia and Adrianople Thrace, 1893–1912’, 56–7. Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 120. Aarbakke, Ethnic Rivalry and the Quest for Macedonia, 154–6, 160, 163; Aarbakke, ‘Who Can Mend a Broken Heart?’ 189; Lange-Akhund, The Macedonian Question, 202–7; Andrew Rossos, ‘Macedonianism and Macedonian Nationalism on the Left’, in Ivo Banac and Katherine Verdery (eds), National Character and National Ideology in Interwar Eastern Europe (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1995), 226–7; Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 94–5, 118–21; Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, 75, 100, 174, 196, 217; Yosmaoğlu, Blood Ties, location 997. Lange-Akhund, The Macedonian Question, 234–5. Valkov, ‘The Internal Macedonian-Adrianople Revolutionary Organization and the Idea for Autonomy for Macedonia and Adrianople Thrace, 1893–1912’, 61. Aarbakke, Ethnic Rivalry and the Quest for Macedonia, 163–4, 167; Aarbakke, ‘Who Can Mend a Broken Heart?’ 191; Poulton, Who Are the Macedonians?, 57; MacDermott, For Freedom and Perfection, 187. Aarbakke, ‘Who Can Mend a Broken Heart?’, 189; Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander’, 303. Aarbakke, ‘Who Can Mend a Broken Heart?’, 190. Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander’, 303. On methodological nationalism, see also Brown, Loyal unto Death, 17. For the important insight in this paragraph, which I have quoted almost verbatim from our exchanges, I thank Tchavdar Marinov. Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander’, 303. Ibid., 304. Duncan M. Perry, ‘The Macedonian Question: An Update’, in Benjamin Stolz (ed.), Studies in Macedonian Language, Literature and Culture: Proceedings of the First North American-Macedonian Conference on Macedonian Studies, Ann Arbor, 1991 (Ann Arbor: Michigan Slavic Studies, 1995), 144. Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, 75. Todoroff, ‘The Macedonian Organization Yesterday and Today’, 475; Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia, 61; Aarbakke, ‘Who Can Mend a Broken Heart?’ 191; Bitovski, ‘Macedonia in the XIX Century’, 198–201; Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, 235. Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, 10, 101; Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia, 52–3; Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 156; Aarbakke, Ethnic Rivalry and the Quest for Macedonia, 115; Marinov,

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132 133 134 135 136 137

138 139 140 141

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145 146 147 148 149 150

‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander’, 303–5; Todoroff, ‘The Macedonian Organization Yesterday and Today’, 477, 480; Poulton, Who Are the Macedonians?, 57. See also Christowe, Heroes and Assassins, 123–6, 129–41, 178. Barker, Macedonia, 39–40; Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia, 52–3; Banac, The National Question in Yugoslavia, 324; Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 156–7. Ivan Katardziev, ‘Macedonia in the Period from the Balkan Wars to the Beginning of the World War II in the Balkan (sic) (1912–1941)’, in Chepreganov (ed.), History of the Macedonian People (Skopje: Institute of National History, 2008), 215; Pribichevich, Macedonia, 139. Brown, Loyal unto Death, 5. Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 162. Poulton, Who Are the Macedonians?, 82–3. The murderer was a VMRO assassin, a friend of Mihailov whom he provided to Pavelić, so as to commit the act on behalf of the Croatian Ustasha. See Christowe, Heroes and Assassins, 216–9. Poulton, Who Are the Macedonians?, 85; Christowe, Heroes and Assassins, 274–8. Todoroff, ‘The Macedonian Organization Yesterday and Today’, 476, 480–2; Christowe, Heroes and Assassins, 281; Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia, 52–3; Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 156, 159–64; Pribichevich, Macedonia, 141–3; Myron Wiener, ‘The Macedonian Syndrome: An Historical Model of International Relations and Political Development’, World Politics, 23: 4 (1971), 678–9. Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, 10, 235. Christowe, Heroes and Assassins, 176. Ibid., 178. Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, 10, 144; Paul Shoup, Communism and the Yugoslav National Question (New York: Columbia University Press, 1968), 32–3; Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 158; Katardziev, ‘Macedonia in the Period from the Balkan Wars to the Beginning of the World War II in the Balkan’, 237–8. See also Christowe, Heroes and Assassins, 176–8; Pribichevich, Macedonia, 140. Quoted in Barker, Macedonia, 55. Ibid., 57; Shoup, Communism and the Yugoslav National Question, 32. Barker, Macedonia, 55; Ibid., 57; Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia, 53, 88–9; Shoup, Communism and the Yugoslav National Question, 33; Stephen Palmer and Robert R. King, Yugoslav Communism and the Macedonian Question (Hamden: Archon Books, 1971), 36–7; Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 158; Katardziev, ‘Macedonia in the Period from the Balkan Wars to the Beginning of the World War II in the Balkan’, 238; Aarbakke, ‘Who Can Mend a Broken Heart?’ 194. Christowe, Heroes and Assassins, 180–8, 237–9. Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 159. Contra, that Mihailov was not responsible for Aleksadrov’s assassination, that he adored him and avenged his death, see Christowe, Heroes and Assassins, 137–41, 194. Christowe, Heroes and Assassins, 194, 197–202, 252–4; Ivan Katardjiev, Macedonia and Its Neighbours: Past, Present, Future (Skopje: Memora, 2001), 90. Christowe, Heroes and Assassins, 237–9. Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, 101, 147, 184; Christowe, Heroes and Assassins, 242–51. For a more sympathetic image of Mihailov, see the view of the MacedonianAmerican journalist Stoyan Christowe, who had met Mihailov on several occasions in the 1920s and 1930s, see Christowe, Heroes and Assassins, 23–28, 256. But even

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161 162 163

164 165 166 167 168 169 170 171 172 173 174 175 176

The VM(O)RO and other Macedonian organizations (1893–1940) Christowe’s conclusion is that ‘[t]here is little that is virtuous and humane to distinguish or redeem Michailoff’s epoch . . . [his] reign in Imro history will go down as one of bloodletting and mutual extermination’. In ibid., 256. Rossos, ‘Macedonianism and Macedonian Nationalism on the Left’, 237. Barker, Macedonia, 44; Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia, 53–4; Palmer and King, Yugoslav Communism and the Macedonian Question, 13, 38–9; Aarbakke, ‘Who Can Mend a Broken Heart?’ 194–5; Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 162–4; Pribichevich, Macedonia, 140–3. Katardziev, ‘Macedonia in the Period from the Balkan Wars to the Beginning of the World War II in the Balkan’, 239–40. Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, 235. Ibid., 105. Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia, 53, 89; Shoup, Communism and the Yugoslav National Question, 33; Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 165–8. Troebst, ‘IMRO+100=FYROM?’, 69. Barker, Macedonia, 42, 54–7. Palmer and King, Yugoslav Communism and the Macedonian Question, 48; Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 166; Vlasis Vlasidis, ‘I aftonomisi tis Makedonias: apo ti theoria stin praxi’ [The Autonomy of Macedonia: From Theory to Praxis], in Basil C. Gounaris, Iakovos D. Michailides and Georgios B. Angelopoulos (eds), Taftotites sti Makedonia [Identities in Macedonia] (Athens: Ekdoseis Papazisi, 1997), 82. Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, 105, 235. Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia, 53; Palmer and King, Yugoslav Communism and the Macedonian Question, 39–40; Rossos, ‘Macedonianism and Macedonian Nationalism on the Left’, 238–48; Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 165–9; Livanios, The Macedonian Question, 39–40. Rossos, ‘Macedonianism and Macedonian Nationalism on the Left’, 240. Aarbakke, ‘Who Can Mend a Broken Heart?’ 195. Palmer and King, Yugoslav Communism and the Macedonian Question, 13–14, 22–35; Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia, 73; Aarbakke, ‘Who Can Mend a Broken Heart?’ 195. For more details on the Yugoslavian communist position, see Walker Connor, The National Question in Marxist-Leninist Theory and Strategy (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1984), 137–44. Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia, 73–4. Palmer and King, Yugoslav Communism and the Macedonian Question, 37; Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia, 76. Evangelos Kofos, ‘The Impact of the Macedonian Question on Civil Conflict in Greece (1943–1949)’, Hellenic Foundation for Defense and Foreign Policy, Occasional Paper No 3 (1989), 5. Poulton, Who Are the Macedonians?, 94–5, 98; Aarbakke, ‘Who Can Mend a Broken Heart?’, 195. Rossos, ‘Macedonianism and Macedonian Nationalism on the Left’, 240. Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, LXI–LXII. Kofos, ‘The Impact of the Macedonian Question on Civil Conflict in Greece’, 5. Ibid.; Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia, 91. Barker, Macedonia, 52–4, 58–63, 66; Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia, 68–87. Aarbakke, ‘Who Can Mend a Broken Heart?’ 195. Christowe, Heroes and Assassins, 45. Dimitar Becher, Historical Dictionary of North Macedonia, Second Edition (Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield, 2019), 13. Palmer and King, Yugoslav Communism and the Macedonian Question, 12; Hugh Poulton, ‘Macedonians and Albanians as Yugoslavs’, in Dejan Djokić (ed.), Yugoslavism:

The VM(O)RO and other Macedonian organizations (1893–1940) 61

177 178 179 180 181 182

183

184 185 186

187 188

189 190 191 192 193

194

Histories of a Failed Idea (London: Hurst & Company, 2003), 117; Katardziev, ‘Macedonia in the Period from the Balkan Wars to the Beginning of the World War II in the Balkan’, 217–19. See also Christowe, Heroes and Assassins, 45–6. See for details Nada Boškovska, Yugoslavia and Macedonia before Tito: Between Repression and Integration (London: I.B. Tauris, 2017). Palmer and King, Yugoslav Communism and the Macedonian Question, 13. Poulton, ‘Macedonians and Albanians as Yugoslavs’, 118. Banac, The National Question in Yugoslavia, 327. Becher, Historical Dictionary of North Macedonia, xxxi, 14–15, 192. Marilena Koppa, Mia efthrafsti democratia: i Proin Yiougoslaviki Democratia tis Makedonias anamesa sto parelthon kais to mellon [A Fragile Republic: The Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia between the Past and the Future] (Athens: Ekdoseis Papazisi, 1994), 38–9. Stephen P. Ladas, The Exchange of Minorities: Bulgaria, Greece and Turkey (New York: Macmillan, 1932); Dimitri Pentzopoulos, The Balkan Exchange of Minorities and Its Impact upon Greece (London: C. Hurst, 1962), 60; Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia, 43; Barker, Macedonia, 31; John S. Koliopoulos, Plundered Loyalties: Axis Occupation and Civil Strife in Greek West Macedonia, 1941–1949 (London: Hurst & Company, 1999), 33. Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia, 47–8; H.R. Wilkinson, Maps and Politics: A Review of the Ethnographic Cartography of Macedonia (Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 1951), 263–73. A.A. Pallis, ‘Racial Migration in the Balkans during the Years 1912–25’, Geographical Journal (1925), 317–20. Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia, 47–8. For the lack of credibility of Pallis’s assessment, see Wilkinson, Maps and Politics, 265, 268; Tasos Κostopoulos, I apagorevmeni glossa: kratiki katastoli ton slavikon dialekton stin elliniki Makedonia [The Forbidden Tongue: State Repression of the Slavic Dialects in Greek Macedonia] (Athens: Mavri Lista, 2000), 27–8. See also Katardziev, ‘Macedonia in the Period from the Balkan Wars to the Beginning of the World War II in the Balkan’, 221–2. Barker, Macedonia, 31; Kofos, ‘The Impact of the Macedonian Question on Civil Conflict in Greece’, 6; Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia, 48. Basil C. Gounaris, ‘Oi slavophonoi tis Makedonias’ [The Slavophones of Macedonia], in Konstantinos Tsitselikis and Dimitris Christopoulos (eds), To meionotiko phenomeno stin Ellada [The Minority Phenomenon in Greece] (Athens: Kritiki, 1997), 96. Kostopoulos, based on confidential Greek documents, estimates the number of Slavophones in Greece during the interwar from 162,500 to as many as 200,000. See Κostopoulos, I apagorevmeni glossa, 29. According to the Greek Communist Party (KKE) the ‘Slavomacedonian population’ was estimated to be (in 1935) around 250,000 to 300,000. See Katardziev, ‘Macedonia in the Period from the Balkan Wars to the Beginning of the World War II in the Balkan’, 222. Kofos, ‘The Impact of the Macedonian Question on Civil Conflict in Greece’, 6. Κostopoulos, I apagorevmeni glossa, 38–9. Rossos, ‘Macedonianism and Macedonian Nationalism on the Left’, 241–3. Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia, 48. Iakovos D. Michailidis, ‘Minority Rights and Educational Problems in Greek Interwar Macedonia: The Case of the Primer “Abecedar” ’, Journal of Modern Greek Studies, 14:2 (1996), 329–43; Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 143; Poulton, Who Are the Macedonians, 88–9; Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander’, 294–5. Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia, 49–50; Hugh Poulton, The Balkans: Minorities and States in Conflict (London: Hurst & Company, 1991), 177; Rossos, ‘Macedonianism and Macedonian Nationalism on the Left’, 233; Christowe,

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Heroes and Assassins, 145; Katardziev, ‘Macedonia in the Period from the Balkan Wars to the Beginning of the World War II in the Balkan’, 219–24, 229. 195 Loring M. Danforth, The Macedonian Conflict: Ethnic Nationalism in a Transnational World (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1995), 72. 196 See Koliopoulos, Plundered Loyalties, 44–5, 60–1.

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Belated ethnogenesis As L.S. Stavrianos had pointed out in his seminal book, The Balkans since 1453: ‘At the outset the Greeks had no competition in Macedonia’, with the region ‘under the jurisdiction of the Patriarch of Constantinople’, especially since 1766, the date of the abolition of the Ipec (Pec) patriarchate (Serbian) and 1767, the date of the abolition of the Ohrid archbishopric (Bulgarian).1 And Stavrianos makes the following convincing point2: This meant Greek education in the schools, Greek liturgy in the churches, and Greek prelates in all the higher ecclesiastical posts. Thus the Macedonians were subjected to an unchallenged process of Hellenization. In fact, they might well have become completely Hellenized were it not for the fact that they were almost all illiterate. The few who did acquire a formal education become Greeks to a greater or lesser extent. But the peasant masses of Macedonia were largely untouched by Greek culture . . . and they continued to speak their Slavic dialects. This is significant because so long as they retained their dialects and their customs they possessed the prerequisites for a national awakening in the future. This dimension had also been touched upon half a century earlier by Brailsford (see Chapter 2). He also makes the point regarding the huge Greek influence through the Orthodox Church and Greek education, and adds: ‘The few Slavs in the interior [of Macedonia] who were educated at all were taught to regard themselves as Greeks, and the very tradition of their origins was in danger of dying out. . . . The women were not educated, and for all the Greeks schools might do every Slav child learned his own despised tongue at his mother’s knee’.3 According to Brailsford, a major Greek mistake in their attempt to Hellenize Macedonia was that they treated the Slav inhabitants with ‘unmeasured and stupid contempt’, as ‘beasts of burden’ and ‘refused to accept them as brethren’, and the consequence was‘that the peasants never quite lost their sense of separation . . . rooted in injuries and hatred’.4 Reverting to Stavrianos, he makes the pertinent point that5: [L]anguage was not of great consequence during the prenationalist period. Religious affiliation was then the all-important consideration. The Macedonian

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Tracing the birth of a new Balkan nation peasant did not think of himself as being a Serb or a Bulgarian because he spoke a Slavic language. Rather, he identified himself with his village. And if he thought in broader terms he would style himself as an Orthodox Christian in order to set himself apart from Catholic or Moslem neighbors.

Few specialists on the Balkans would dispute the claim that in the nineteenth century the predominant identity of the Slavspeakers in the three vilayets of Ottoman Macedonia was the sense of being Christian Orthodox. The Slavspeakers from the 1860s who acquired an ethnic or national identity (in addition to their religious identity or distinct from it) can be put into four categories: a majority claiming that they were Bulgarians tout court or Macedonian Bulgarians (mostly Exarchists); a smaller group in the south claiming that they were – or had become–Greeks (known as Grecomans); an even smaller group, mostly in the north-west claiming that they were Serbs; and a fourth group, whose number is unknown, who insisted that they were neither Bulgarian, nor Serbian or Greek, but ‘Macedonians’ or ‘Orthodox Christian Macedonians’.6 Note that being ‘Patriarchist’ did not necessarily mean having Greek identity (and being Grecoman) and being ‘Exarchist’ was not tantamount to a Bulgarian patriot. And prior to the Young Turk Revolution, in the course of the three-sided Macedonian struggle of the 1900s, peasant communities in Macedonia often changed affiliation, depending on what armed band had threatened their village. But why did the national awareness of the Macedonians start belatedly, trailing behind the Greeks, the Serbs, the Romanians, the Bulgarians and even the Albanians? One reason was the aforementioned Stavrianos-Brailsford thesis of illiteracy which may have proved an asset, by resisting Greek assimilation and later Bulgarian or Serbian assimilation attempts via education. But its negative aspect was that the bulk of the Slavspeakers of Macedonia were also untouched by the Enlightenment, modernity and the spirit of nationalism. But this was also the case with the Bulgarians who were barely more literate than the Slavs of Macedonia (with a literacy of only 3–4 percent as late as 1878)7 and with the Albanians, who were probably even more illiterate at the end of the nineteenth century than the future Macedonians. Yet they both developed a sense of nationhood well before the Macedonians. A second possible reason for their belated nationalism is the fact that the emergence of a ‘Macedonian nation’ that came about in the 1930s and 1940s was not an inevitable outcome of the historical process, as presented today by Macedonian national historians (see Chapter 9); it was not pre-ordained, as it seems to us today, given the emergence of the Macedonians as a new Balkan nation. The Slavspeakers of Macedonia which had not followed the line of a minority that had merged with the Serbs or the Greeks had another obvious option before them at least until the 1920s, to become Bulgarians, which was reinforced by the fact that the educated among them attended Bulgarian Exarchate schools, whose language was much closer to their own Slavic dialects than to Serbian. As Keith Brown has argued, one need not assume that the establishment of a nation-state was necessarily ‘the ultimate goal’; this ‘disguises a strongly

Tracing the birth of a new Balkan nation 65 presentist, politicized orientation in the debate. For what it really asks is, “Of which subsequent nation-state were these people members-in-waiting?” ’8 If the compelling Bulgarian option is put aside, a number of other factors were decisive for their lag behind as a prospective nation. An obvious cause pointed out by Macedonian historians is the lack of separate Macedonian institutions (religious, educational and others) and the pervasive presence of institutional agencies of Bulgaria, Serbia and Greece.9 Of course, the answer here is that there were no such institutions because no Macedonian nationalism existed at the time to make them necessary. Another problem for the development in the future of Macedonian nationalism is that they lacked a ‘historical state’ (in, say, the Middle Ages) as a reference point, a ‘distinct literature, a cultural or political elite, and clearly defined historical boundaries and ethnic territory’.10 As Rossos has put it, ‘they possessed no distinct ethnic name that would have clearly distinguished . . . them from peoples with which they had in the distant past shared common experiences and traditions. . . . The Greeks put forth exclusive claims to the heritage of Byzantium; the Bulgarians, to that of their first and second empires’, including Samuil’s empire; and the Serbs to the empire of Stefan Dušan.11 All these were absent in the Macedonian case, who found themselves in the dismal position of having to struggle for survival not only against the Ottomans but also against ‘voracious’ neighbours12 and ‘their great-power patrons’.13 But despite these daunting disadvantages, the twentieth century was to witness the birth of a new Slavic nation, the ‘Macedonians’.14 The predominant view from the 1950s onwards in Greece and particularly in Bulgaria that ‘a Macedonian nation’ is a figment of the imagination and an arbitrary construction by Tito, with no historical or other roots, is mistaken, for nations across the world are above all self-defined, along Ernest Renan famous dictum that a nation is an ‘every-day plebiscite’. However, three Bulgarian and Greek claims contain elements of truth even though they pertain to their respective mythologized national narratives. First is the aforementioned Bulgarian option, though it was hardly the only one available. Second, the emergence of the Macedonian nation is a fairly recent phenomenon, a product of the twentieth century, mainly of the 1930s and 1940s. Third, international communism (the Comintern) and Yugoslav communism under Tito played a decisive role in consolidating this emerging new sense of Macedonian identity, distinct from the Serbs and in particular from the Bulgarians, but this was not the result of an arbitrary fiat as claimed by the Bulgarians and Greeks. But could it be that these three points are somewhat harsh, and that there existed a putative ethnic group or ‘proto-nation’ prior to the 1930s, a collectivity in search of a nation, distinct especially from the Bulgarians? As Anthony Smith would have put it, could it be that a pre-existing ethnie15 was in place prior to the twentieth century? The ethnosymbolist approach of Anthony Smith argues that today’s nations have roots in pre-modern myths and symbols, that nations and nationalism may indeed be modern phenomena (that first appeared from the late eighteenth century onwards, with the partition of Poland and the French Revolution),16 but

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that the modern construction of nationalism, as claimed by the modernist theories of nationalism (Eric Hobsbawn, Ernest Gellner, Benedict Anderson, John Breuilly and others), goes too far by claiming the ‘invention of tradition’ and the arbitrariness of the various national social constructions. According to Smith’s ethnosymbolism, nations can be constructed so long as they do have ethnic roots; others cannot do so because they do not have a pool of pre-existing memories, traditions and values from which to draw.17 Indeed, ‘ex nihilo invention of collective identity which have no roots in the history and cultural inclinations of the community has always met with failure’.18 Perhaps ‘it is no coincidence that Smith is one of the few theorists of nationalism discussed by historians in the Republic of Macedonia’.19 Another reason for this is that Smith, contrary to Walker Connor and others, regards the existence of nationhood even if it is limited to a sense of distinct national identity held only by the elite or a segment of the elite, while Connor regards a nation existing only if it is ‘a mass, not an elite phenomenon . . . shared across a broader spectrum of the putative nation’.20 There is also another theory of nationalism, that, as we shall see, Macedonian national historians have toyed with (see Chapter 9), what Smith has dubbed ‘recurrent perennialism’,21 in the sense that nations or ethnic groups disappear and reappear in history as ‘cyclical perrenials’22; to use Ernest Gellner’s sarcastic image of nations ‘waiting to be “awakened” . . . from their regrettable slumber’,23 or Kenneth Minogue’s metaphor of a ‘sleeping beauty’ awakened by the nationalist ‘prince charming’.24 This point is taken by many national historians regarding their nation, with ‘national awakeners’ playing a crucial role in this endeavour, which present the past as ‘the story of the nation’s perpetual struggle for self-realization’.25

Macedonian nationalism and the VM(O)RO: an ambivalent relationship The approach of the more astute Macedonian historians, such as Ivan Katardžiev (see Chapter 9), is that Macedonian nationhood is a twentieth-century phenomenon; its formative years from 1900 to the 1930s, though only at elite intellectual level, or to be more precise part of the intellectuals and activists. The 1930s is, as we shall see, a more convincing date, but 1900 is less so, let us see why. The ΤΜΟRO and even more so the VMORO had as its aim the autonomy of the whole of geographical Macedonia, but this does not render them automatically a nation and one in search of statehood qua a national state, as claimed today by most Macedonian historians. During the heroic years of the Macedonian revolutionary organization, all its leaders identified themselves as Macedonian Bulgarians.26 And when referring to ‘Macedonian people’ they meant all the inhabitants of Macedonia, irrespective of language, ethnicity or religion (see Chapter 3).27 As regards the founding fathers of the VMORO, it seems that only two of them can be gleaned for references to something other than being a Bulgarian or Macedonian Bulgarian. Petrov had stated that Macedonia represented a ‘distinct moral unit’ (otdelna moralna edinitsa) with its own ‘ideology’ and ‘aspirations’.28

Tracing the birth of a new Balkan nation 67 Sarafov, while travelling in Europe for the Macedonian cause, had asserted, when chairman of the Supreme Revolutionary Committee, in an interview to a Viennese newspaper (in 1901), that the Macedonians possessed a distinct ‘national element’.29 And a year later, when he was no more chairman, he claimed that ‘We the Macedonians are neither Serbs nor Bulgarians, but simply Macedonians. The Macedonian people exist independently of the Bulgarian and Serbian [people]. . . . Macedonia exists only for the Macedonians’.30 In this regard, it is worth referring to Hadzhidimov, the ideologue of the federalist leftists. He admitted that the autonomy idea had been a ‘Bulgarian idea’, that is was a programme launched by the ‘Bulgarian element’ in Macedonia.31 He was convinced that the ‘Macedonian Bulgarians’, whom he regarded as ‘half of the Bulgarian tribe’, should exist outside Bulgaria together with the other ‘nationalities’ of Macedonia, a scenario far better than the partition of Macedonia.32 In the same vein, Sandanski’s justification for ‘demanding autonomy’ within the Ottoman framework was aimed at maintaining Macedonia’s territorial integrity.33 However, as Marinov points out, ‘the same scenario surely promoted an identity that was becoming more and more “Macedonian” ’.34 As one would expect the Macedonian historians stress the desire for autonomy and not union with Bulgaria, the change of name of the organization and the consistent condemnation of Bulgarian nationalism and Great Bulgarianism by Delchev, Petrov, Sandanski and others, as proofs of an emerging Macedonian national identity. This view may not be convincing, but the very opposite, the well-known Bulgarian national narrative (that they were nothing more than Bulgarians seeking union with Bulgaria)35 fails to perceive that this revolutionary tradition contributed with time to the emergence of contemporary Macedonian nationalism.36 Yosmaoğlu posits the following for consideration37: There was, in fact, an undeniable attachment to the ideas of autonomy for Macedonia and action independent of Bulgaria in the program and manifestos of IMRO from its inception, which can reasonably be considered as indication of a separate Macedonian identity. Whether that attachment should be viewed exclusively as one borne out of nationalism is, however, a different matter. The modern Macedonian historiographic equation of demands for autonomy with a separate and distinct national identity does not necessarily jibe with the historical record. As a scholar of ethnicity and secession,38 it seems to me that the insistence from as early as 1893 onwards for Macedonia not to become part of Bulgaria implies something significant, if compared with the attitude of other ethnic brethren, such as the quest for Italian, German and Romanian unification, or the case of Greece, with the quest for union with the ‘motherland’ by the Epirote Greeks (from the 1890s until 1920 and even as late as the 1990s), the Cretans (from the 1860s until 1912), and even the faraway Pontic Greeks (in 1918–1922) as well as the faraway Greek Cypriots (from the late nineteenth century until the early 1960s and even

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later until the early 1970s). In the Macedonian case alienation from Bulgaria as the presumed ‘motherland’ gradually gained ground. After decades of living separately and given the fact that the Greater Bulgaria of San Stefano had not been achieved, estrangement increased.39 The last straw that broke the camel’s back was the arrogant Bulgarian attitude in occupied Yugoslav Macedonia in 1941– 1944 (see Chapter 5). Another crucial factor leading to estrangement was the Bulgarian adoption of a literary Bulgarian based exclusively on the eastern Bulgarian dialects,40 despite the warnings of Bulgarian ‘awakeners’ and Macedonian Bulgarian intellectuals (see Chapter 8). One should probably add a third alienating factor, ideology. A section of the original VMORO and a bit later the leftist federalists and the VMRO (ob.) had little in common with Bulgaria, a conservative, monarchist state that held little appeal for them. It was during the interwar and especially in the 1930s that a gradual though hardly crystal-clear Macedonian identity appeared, which chose to distance itself from the Bulgarians. It was then that the original multi-ethnic sense of being a Macedonian gave way, to a sense of ‘Macedonism’ or ‘Macedonianism’, of being ‘a distinctive national group’, shared by a segment of the people, mainly among younger intellectuals and activists, both in Vardar Macedonia and among the leftleaning Macedonian emigrants in Bulgaria.41 In the course of the Second World War, this new identity was solidified with the help of Tito’s well-known policy toward them (see Chapter 5), which would have been impossible to implement by sheer imposition and indoctrination if it did not touch the sensitive chords of a substantial portion of the inhabitants. Put differently, this new identity did not come about ex nihilo, as if the Macedonian people were a tabula rasa.42 Moreover, the fact that the Macedonian national identity and nationalism came later than the other Balkan nationalisms (bar the Muslim Bosnians) and that it is ‘largely the result of dis/entanglement of Greek, Bulgarian and Serbian national ideologies does not make Macedonian identity less “legitimate” or more “constructed” than the others’.43

The early harbingers of Macedonian identity Prior to the 1930s, there is sparse evidence of a new emerging Macedonian national identity. However, there were exceptions, lone voices in the wilderness, ‘a handful of intellectuals and activists’44 worth referring to as harbingers of a putative nation. A central figure is Krste Misirkov, in the beginning of the twentieth century, and before him, in the nineteenth century, at least four figures are worth mentioning. The earliest pioneers of a sense of Macedonian identity, at least as conceived by contemporary Macedonian historians and other scholars, are the brothers Dimitar and Konstantin Miladinov, Georgi Pulevski and Grigor Parlichev. The two brothers, who had studied in Greek schools in Macedonia and in Ioannina (with the younger brother, Konstantin, having studied philology in the University of Athens and Slavic philology at Lomonosov Moscow University), taught

Tracing the birth of a new Balkan nation 69 ancient Greek, modern Greek literature and other subjects in Greek schools in Ottoman Macedonia (and could initially express themselves far better in Greek than in their mother tongue).45 They found and published a collection of more than 600 Macedonian folk songs in 1861, which they named ‘Bulgarian Folk Songs’, although they were written in the dialects of Macedonia and only one hundred were Bulgarian.46 They had been prompted to collect these folk songs by Victor Grigorovich, a noted Russian Slavist, who was touring Macedonia. The two brothers had a tragic end: they were accused as pan-Slavists and as Russian agents, by a local Greek bishop, and were imprisoned in Constantinople, where they died of typhus in 1862. Although the Miladinov brothers regarded their language Bulgarian, contemporary Macedonian historians claim that their works are early literature in the Macedonian language and they are important representatives of the ‘Macedonian Renaissance’.47 At this juncture, it is worth mentioning a revealing extract from a letter of Konstantin Miladinov to the Bulgarian ‘awakener’ Georgi Rakowski, in which he tried to explain the use of the term ‘Bulgarian’ as the title of their collection of folk songs: ‘In the announcement I called Macedonia West Bulgaria (as it should be called) because . . . the Greeks treat us like sheep. They consider Macedonia a Greek land and cannot understand that [Macedonia] is not Greek’.48 Apparently Miladinov and other Macedonian intellectuals at the time were ‘worried that use of the Macedonian name would imply attachment to or identification with the Greek nation’.49 In the second part of the nineteenth century, there were some personalities in Ottoman Macedonia whose identity ‘largely “floated” between the Serbian and the Bulgarian national option’ and by doing so give credence to the famous Cvijić thesis (see Chapters 2).50 A characteristic such case was the autodidact Georgi Pulevski, a masterbuilder, a freedom fighter in Serbia, Bulgaria and Macedonia, and a self-styled historian and lexicographer. Pulevski’s first volume, published in Belgrade in 1873, was entitled ‘Dictionary of Four Languages’, followed in 1875 by a ‘Dictionary of Three Languages’, which has deservedly intrigued contemporary Macedonian historians for it was probably the first time that the term Slavic Macedonian or Slav-Macedonian (slavjano makedonski) was introduced with reference to the vernacular language of the Slavs of Macedonia.51 In 1880, Pulevski published in Sofia a vocabulary and a grammar of the Macedonian language. He also left for posterity two voluminous unpublished writings: a ‘Slav-Macedonian’ history (Slavjano-makedonska opšta istorija) and another grammar book. In his grammars he included many neologisms that have not been included in contemporary Macedonian, and he chose a phonological orthography inspired by the work of Vuk Karadžić, the father of the Serbian literary language.52 Pulevski, who was no historian and had no formal education, was one of the first Macedonians to come up with the outlandish idea that the ancient Macedonian kings, Phillip and Alexander, were of Slavic origin, thereby instilling the ‘modern Macedonians’ with ‘ancient ancestry’.53 Pulevski claimed that the Slav people speaking the Slav-Macedonian language were in fact a people (narod).54 As he put it: ‘a nation is a term for a people who

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have the same origin, who speak the same language, . . . and who have the same customs, songs, and festivals, . . . Thus, the Macedonians are a nation, and Macedonia is their fatherland’.55 However, Pulevski’s claim cannot be taken as implying a clear-cut adherence to Macedonian or Slav-Macedonian national identity. There is confusion in his works and at one point he declared himself a ‘Serb patriot’, and was actually involved in planning a pro-Serbian uprising in northern Macedonia. Moreover, there is evidence to show that Serbia was keen to enlist him in its own propaganda in Macedonia.56 There is also the intriguing case of poet Grigor Parlichev from Ohrid, who, while a student at the University of Athens, won a prestigious poetic competition in 1860 with his epic poem in Greek, titled ‘Armatolos’ [The guardsman], written in classical Homeric verse,57 to be hailed in Greece as a ‘second Homer’ (he was regarded as a Greek named Grigoris Stavrides). Parlichev wrote later of ‘the anger and humiliation he felt’ when his Greek fellow students ridiculed the Bulgarians as ‘oxen’ and concluded that the constant abuse of the Bulgarians by other nationalities should make them ‘become aware of themselves and, instead of despising themselves self-defeatingly, to become confident of their abilities and rely on their hard work to achieve progress’.58 Consequently he became a Bulgarian patriot, an advocate of ‘Bulgarian Macedonianism’,59 as he had put it. But due to the fact that he was ridiculed by the Bulgarians literati for not being able to master literary Bulgarian (as he had mastered literary Greek and ancient Greek), he eventually acquired, as Roumen Daskalov has put it, ‘an alternative Macedonian regional identity, a kind of Macedonian particularism’.60 Given the fact that when in Ottoman Macedonia he wrote in the Macedonian vernacular, he is regarded by contemporary Macedonians philologists as the most talented and renowned poet of the ‘Revival period of Macedonian literature’.61 Another figure which corroborates the appearance of an incipient Macedonian self-consciousness prior to the twentieth century is paradoxically not a Macedonian or supporter of the quest for a Macedonian national identity, but a harsh critic of any such notion. He is Petko Slaveykov, a major figure of the Bulgarian National Revival, publicist, poet and philologist (with an important contribution in the development of literary Bulgarian). In 1871 he wrote a much-discussed article in Makenoniya (a publication of his own issued in Constantinople), were he put to task and ridiculed the views of the ‘Makedonists’ (makedonisti) as he called them.62 Slaveykov describes the ideology of some ‘young patriots’, whom he calls ‘Macedonists’, who claim that they are ‘not Bulgarians but Macedonians, descendants of ancient Macedonians’.63 They believe that they have ancient ‘Macedonian blood’, but are also ‘pure Slavs’ and different from the Bulgarians. For them the Bulgarians are ‘Tatars’ and their Slavic language ‘mixed with Tartarisms’, while the language of the Macedonists is closer to Old Slavonic. Moreover, they believe that the Bulgarian Church is as oppressive as the Greek Church.64 As Marinov points out, ‘[t]he main points of the “Macedonists” underlined by Slaveykov are shockingly close to some of the beliefs and the agendas of today’s Macedonian nationalism’.65 Included is ‘the idea that the contemporary

Tracing the birth of a new Balkan nation 71 Macedonians are descendants of both ancient Macedonians and Slavs, unlike the “Tatars” from Bulgaria’,66 and that they regard ‘the Macedonian language as distinct from Bulgarian and closer to medieval Slavonic’.67 And it is no coincidence that today’s Macedonian historians refer extensively to Slaveykov’s viewpoint even though he was very critical of the Macedonists.68 Obviously this is one of the rare instances where one’s avowed adversary can become, unwittingly, one’s convincing advocate. Unfortunately Slaveykov did not do us – or the future Macedonians – the favour to mention who he had in mind as Macedonists. However, contemporary Macedonian scholars are almost certain that he had in mind Kuzman Šapkarev and/or Metropolitan Partenij Zografski (see on their role Chapter 8).69 In the 1890s and early twentieth century, a number of separatist intellectuals made their presence visible. According to none other than Misirkov, writing in 1903, this amounted to ‘a national-separatist movement’ aimed at ‘divorcing Macedonian interests from those of Bulgaria by introducing a Macedonian tongue which would serve as the literary language of all Macedonians’.70 In 1891, Konstantin Šahov, Petar Poparsov, Evtim Sprostranov, Andrej Ljapčev, Toma Karajovov and Dame Gruev set up the Young Macedonian Literary Company (or Society) in Sofia, whose organ was the journal Loza (Grapevine), whose aim was that the dialects from Macedonia be represented in the Bulgarian literary language (the Bulgarian version)71 or that the dialects become a literary language (the Macedonian version). Ten years later the ‘Macedonian Scholarly and Literary Society’ was established in St. Petersburg by Misirkov, Dijamandija Mišajkov (the first chairman of the Society who had published in Belgrade a newspaper of Macedonist orientation), Dimitrija Čupovski (who became the second chairman of the Society), Stefan Dedov, Nace Dimov and others (see Chapter 8).72

Krste Misirkov The philologist Krste Μisirkov is, according to the late Blaže Ristovski (the foremost specialist on Misirkov), the ‘first to pose the question of the independent Macedonian culture as early as 1903’,73 with his book Za makedonskite raboti (On Macedonian Matters). Μisirkov, who was born in Postol (today’s Pella in Greece), studied at the universities of Belgrade, St. Petersburg and Odessa. He published his book in Sofia, in 1903, a little after the Ilinden Uprising, choosing to write in the dialect of the Veles-Prilep-Bitola region. Apparently the Bulgarian police intervened, confiscating it and expelled Misirkov from Bulgaria (he left for Russia), but fortunately copies of the book were saved and thus we know its full content. Misirkov’s book is ‘considered the “manifesto” of Macedonian nationalism’ and it could be ‘considered both a political pamphlet and the first serious attempt at standardization of the Slavic vernacular language of Macedonia’.74 Μisirkov, in this sober and convincing book, claims the emergence of a ‘separate and independent Slav people’ and called for its recognition by the Ottomans (and supported the territorial integrity and unity of the Ottoman Empire75).76

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Misirkov readily accepts that ‘We have . . . called ourselves Bulgarians’, ‘our fathers and grandfathers and great-grandfathers have always been called Bulgarians’.77 But today ‘the greatest demon Macedonia must battle against is Bulgarian’.78 In claiming the emergence of a Macedonian nation, he puts it thus: my opponents would say that ‘Macedonian as a nationality never existed’, but ‘[w]hat has not existed in the past may still be brought into existence later, provided that the appropriate historical circumstances arise’.79 And he asserts that ‘[t]he emergence of the Macedonians as a separate Slav people is a perfectly normal historical process which is quite in keeping with the process by which Bulgarian, Croatian and Serbian peoples emerged from the South Slav group’.80 Misirkov frankly accepts that ‘the most powerful spur to national awakening amongst the Macedonians was in fact the Serbian propaganda movement in Macedonia. Up until that moment our national self-awareness had been only half aroused; nobody had bothered particularly with the question of our nationality. We did indeed call ourselves “Bulgarians” and “Christians” in the national sense’.81 He adds that ‘[m]any, perhaps, will accuse me of being a Serbophile’,82 but it was ‘the rivalry between the Serbs and the Bulgarians over the Macedonian question, both from the political and the national point of view’ that ‘brought the Macedonians themselves onto the political scene’,83 which ‘led to the growing awareness that the fate of Macedonia should rest in the hands of the Macedonians’84; as a result ‘[t]he Macedonians began to delve more deeply into their nationality and their interests and reached the conclusion that they were neither Serbs nor Bulgarians, that the only interests that mattered to them were those of Macedonia’.85 Writing in the aftermath of the Ilinden Uprising, he calls it ‘a complete fiasco’ and ‘one of the greatest, if not the greatest misfortune to befall our people’, adding pointedly that ‘[t]he main reason why the Uprising failed was that it took on a Bulgarian bias’.86 But on the positive side, he asserts that it ‘prevented Macedonia from being partitioned’, which was ‘one of its more worthwhile results’, adding prophetically that it ‘does mark an epoch in the life and growth of self-awareness of the Macedonian Slavs. It will make our people and our intellectuals look back upon these actions which brought about the unsuccessful uprising’.87 As for the VMORO, he acknowledges that it ‘has close links with Bulgaria’ and that it ‘is working behind a Bulgarian front’.88 But ‘both by origin and by constitution’ it is ‘a purely Macedonian organization; in its work, however, it represented only a part of one of the nationalities in Macedonian, linked in name, and in church and school matters, to the people of Bulgaria, their country and their interests’89; acknowledging that ‘autonomy is regarded a transition phase in the process of joining Macedonia to Bulgaria’.90 But further down, Misirkov makes an astounding about-face, claiming that the VMORO was ‘in fact making use of the Bulgarian people, their official representatives and institutions to serve their own, Macedonian, aims and interests’91; indeed that they ‘have so far been playing a double role – telling the Bulgarians that the Macedonians are Bulgarians and that Macedonia will one day be attached to Bulgaria, and telling the Europeans that they are seeking an autonomous Macedonia for the Macedonians only because they have no intention of uniting with the Bulgarians’, and he adds

Tracing the birth of a new Balkan nation 73 pointedly that ‘they are lying to the Bulgarians and not to Europe’.92 And he goes as far as to claim that ‘the unfortunate Bulgarian leaders found themselves in a fix over the Macedonian question: the Macedonians had outmanoeuvred them and used them for their own ends’.93 Finally, as regards the Macedonian language he refers to the views of Russian linguists, Baudouin de Courtenay, Lavrov (his teacher) and V. Jagich that the Macedonian dialects are ‘special forms of the Slav family of languages’.94 He argues that ‘the central Macedonian dialect’ is ‘equally removed from both the SerboCroatian and the Bulgarian literary languages, and concludes that the dialect of VelesPripel-Bitola-Ohrid should become the Macedonian ‘general literary language’, being ‘sufficiently distant from the Serbian and Bulgarian language centres’.95 Today Misirkov is regarded, deservedly, as one of ‘the founding fathers of the Macedonian nation’ and ‘the first great advocate of a national Macedonian identity’.96 In Macedonia he is ‘cherished as an apostle of “national rebirth” and a towering figure’, on a par with Delchev.97 At the time, however, Misirkov had no impact whatsoever, not even within the circle of the leftist VMORO revolutionaries who were opposed to Bulgarian hegemony and union with Bulgaria. And Misirkov, after writing his book, ‘oscillated between extreme Macedonian nationalism – sometimes . . . with clear pro-Serbian elements – and Greater Bulgarian irredentism’.98 When he lived in Moldavia in Russia, he became a representative of the Bulgarian minority in the Bessarabian Assembly. And after the First World War he lived in Bulgaria, where he published newspaper articles that were clearly nationalist Bulgarian in character. Yet in other articles he seems to be a separatist, and referred to the ‘Macedonians’ and to a ‘Macedonian population’. Even more baffling is a series of articles where he claims that although he is a Macedonian nationalist, the Macedonian language and culture are ‘identical’ to the Bulgarian one (no doubt music to the ears of the Bulgarians until today). In other articles he called for Macedonia to become a bridge between Serbs and Bulgarians in the framework of a future ‘better’ Yugoslavia. In any event after his death in 1926, his publications and his 1903 book were forgotten until 1944.99 There seem to have been three phases in his writings, the earliest which was Macedonian, to be followed by the Bulgarian phase (1905–1920) while in Moldova and a return to the Macedonian nationhood ideas in the mid-1920s as a schoolmaster in Karlovo, Bulgaria.100 According to Ivo Banac, this paradoxical vacillation by Misirkov was not uncommon among other Macedonian intellectuals even as late as the 1930s: ‘They were Bulgars in struggles against Serbian and Greek hegemonism, but within the Bulgar world they were increasingly becoming exclusive Macedonians’.101 Put differently when faced with encroachment by the Greeks or Serbs, Misirkov and others like him, become advocates of ‘panBulgar patriotism’, but within the Bulgarophone milieu they were advocates of ‘Macedonian patriotism’.102 This exegesis also fits with Fredrik Barth’s approach regarding ethnic boundaries that shift depending on the interaction with specific outgroups.103 More generally, Misirkov’s case is ‘a good illustration of the theories insisting on the multiple and shifting character of identity’.104 And his case and some others

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express ‘the shifting boundaries of Macedonian self-identification’, including its Bulgarian ‘national self-identification’, other ‘identity options’ and supra-nationalism as a political theory.105

Dimitrija Čupovski Misirkov’s associate, Dimitrija Čupovski, was far more consistent in his views.106 Following the First Balkan War, in December 1912, while in Skopje, he called upon the elite of the city to send a memorandum to the Russian Government requesting the recognition of the Macedonians as a separate people with a distinct language and asking for the establishment of an independent Macedonian state. This initiative was ignored by the notables of the city who insisted on their Bulgarian identity. A few months later, in March 1913, he addressed the London Peace Conference (following the First Balkan War) with a memorandum calling for the reunification of the parts of Macedonia that had been annexed by the three Balkan states and for the proclamation of an independent Macedonian state.107 After these setbacks, Čupovski moved to St. Petersburg, where he published, in Russian, the journal Makedonskiy Golos (Macedonian Voice), which claimed that the ‘Macedonians’ were ethnically distinct and a nation. In the first issue of the journal he wrote a memorandum where it is stated that the ‘Macedonians’ were ‘a homogeneous Slavic race, which had its own history, its own way of life . . . its ideals and has the right to self-determination’, ‘Macedonia should constitute an independent state’, assuring his readers that we are not ‘Bulgarians, Serbs or Greeks . . . but a separate people with its own specific name–Slav-Macedonian’ (emphasis apparently in the original).108 Čupovski also referred to the glorious ancestors of the Macedonians, which he claimed included Cyril and Methodius and Tsar Samuil, who ‘with their culture and blood refined the Mongolians who came to us and transformed them into the brotherly Bulgarian people’.109 Čupovski ‘seems to be the first historical figure who suggested a full-fledged Macedonian nationalist program’, reconciling the ‘pro-autonomy’ or ‘politically separatist’ agenda of the ‘Macedonian Bulgarian’ revolutionaries ‘with the ethnographic thesis of the distinctiveness of Macedonian Slavs’.110 He went further than Misirkov, for the later in his 1903 book ‘did not anticipate the establishment of Macedonian statehood: instead, it declared loyalty to the Ottoman Empire’.111 However, Čupovski, even more than Misirkov, had hardly any influence during his lifetime and died in 1940 completely forgotten (to be rediscovered by the Macedonian linguist Blaže Koneski in the 1960s).112

Other contributors to Macedonian nationalism As Marinov points out, ‘until the interwar period, Macedonian nationalism remained relatively weak – if politically visible at all’, and ‘despite all the memoranda, manifestos and articles published by the fathers of modern Macedonian national ideology, they represented rather isolated cases without real international

Tracing the birth of a new Balkan nation 75 importance’.113 However, the sense of a separate Macedonian national identity as distinct from the original super-national Macedonian identity appears in other intellectuals as well. Nikola Pushkarov, who had participated in the Ilinden Uprising (he headed the Skopje committee of the internal organization), who in his lifetime was better known than Misirkov or Čupovski, in a text written in 1919, called for the creation of an independent Macedonian state and with it the evolution of the Macedonian population (makedonski narod) into a distinct nation (natsiya). Only as a result of such a national emancipation would ‘the Macedonian’ cease to be the victim of ‘the Greek, the Serbian or the Bulgarian’.114 Pushkarov, who was not even a Macedonian, ‘seems to be the first one to attribute some national meaning to the supranational Macedonian identity propagated by the revolutionary movement since the late Ottoman period’.115 In 1920, a group of activists published a newspaper called Avtonomna Makedoniya (Autonomous Macedonia), with a ‘purely Macedonian colouring’, avoiding any mention of a ‘Bulgarian population’ in Macedonia and referring to ‘Macedonians’ and to a ‘Macedonian people’.116 The next year, this group of activists set up what they called the ‘Macedonian Federative Organization’ (MFO). Its main ideologue, Slavcho (Vladislav) Kovachev, came out with an interesting though unrealizable formula which tried to bridge the two different notions of being a Macedonian: the supra-national notion and the newer national one. He argued that Macedonia, which was originally a geographic designation, could lead to the creation of a new nation of ‘Macedonians’, that would unite the ‘Macedonian Bulgarians’, the Albanians and other elements of the local Macedonian population, including even the ‘Turks’, and he urged for the creation of a consciousness of belonging to a ‘common nation’.117 Another MFO intellectual, Trifon Grekov, drew up a constitution and state symbols for a future Macedonian republic. The republic was to be based on federative principles, with cantons for each nationality in what was to be a ‘Switzerland on the Balkans’. Grekov ‘traced the historical continuity of the modern Macedonians from Alexander the Great through Cyril and Methodius’ and he insisted that ‘Macedonia was not a Bulgarian land’.118 Contemporary Macedonian historians also refer favourably to a group called Ilinden Organization, set up in Sofia, in 1921, which sided with the left wing in the Macedonian movement.119 Surprisingly this organization is regarded favourably by contemporary Bulgarian historiography, despite the fact that the organization’s main leaders, Georgi Zankov and Arseniy Yovkov (or Arseni Jovkov), did not hide their Macedonian separatist feelings. In an interview in Sofia (November 1923), they stated that ‘the ideal of independent Macedonia’ and ‘the Bulgarian state ideal’ were separated from each other by an ‘irreducible contradiction’.120 And in April 1924, Yovkov wrote a memorandum to the Bulgarian Government where he maintained that the ‘Macedonians’ were an ‘independent political element’ that did not wish to have anything in common with Bulgaria, that there was nothing in common between ‘Bulgarian state patriotism’ and ‘Macedonian patriotism’.121

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At the level of political organizations, worth quoting is a characteristic extract from a 1935 declaration of the VMRO (ob.)122: Just as the Macedonians under Greek rule are neither ‘Slavophones’ nor ‘pure’ Greeks, [just] as the Macedonians under Serbian rule are not ‘pure’ Serbs, so too the Macedonians under Bulgarian rule are not Bulgarians nor do they wish to become [Bulgarians]. The Macedonian people have their own past, present and future. . . . [They are] an independent Slav element which possesses all the attributes of an independent nation, [and] which, for decades now, has been struggling to win its right to self-determination, including secession into a political state unit independent from the imperialist states than now oppress it. Various intellectuals associated with the VMRO (ob.), who wrote in its two publications (La Fédération Balkanique and Makedonsko Delo), stressed the national character of the Macedonians. They include Pavel Shatev, Vasil Ivanovski, Angel Dinev, Kosta Veselinov and Anton Popov.123 Shatev (the 1890s anarchist-turned lawyer) formulated the Macedonian ‘national ideal’ in the following terms: the creation of a self-governing Macedonian state ‘with a Macedonian nation (natsiya) having its own history, an independent political and cultural life’.124 But he referred to the Macedonians ‘regardless of their confession and nationality’, not in the sense of ‘ethnic Macedonians’ as such.125 The publicist Vasil Ivanovski, who was stationed in Sofia as the political secretary of VMRO (ob.) and was also a member of the Bulgarian Communist Party, wrote an oft-quoted article, titled ‘Why We the Macedonians Are a Separate Nation’. It was written in the Greek publication Kommounistiki Epitheorisi (Communist Periodical) in February 1935,126 where he argued that we ‘the Macedonians’ are a ‘distinct nation’, we are not Serbians, Greeks or Bulgarians, ‘but a self-defined Macedonian nation which is struggling for its national liberation and its union in a special Macedonian state’, and that they belong ‘to a common Macedon-Slavic dialect’.127 Ivanovski placed the modern Macedonians into a historical continuity, claiming that the first Macedonians were Illyrians or ‘Macedono-Illyrians’, who later merged with the Slavs when they migrated en masse to the Balkans. For Ivanovski, the ‘Macedonian Slavs’ created their first state under the reign of Tsar Samuil, though he did point out, to his credit, that at the time the Bulgarian empires were not national in character and the notion of a ‘Bulgarian nation’ simply did not exist. He also referred to a Macedonian national ‘Revival’ in the nineteenth century – which, according to him, was distinct from the Bulgarian Revival. According to Ivanovski, the ‘exterior form’ of the VMORO may have been Bulgarian but ‘objectively’ it was Macedonian. And he claimed that the left wing of the VMORO in the late Ottoman period (1893– 1912), which included figures such as Sandanski, supported the idea of a separate Macedonian nationhood.128 The intellectual Angel Dinev, also a member of the VMRO (ob.), wrote studies on the ‘Macedonian Slavs’, in which he proudly claimed that the Macedonian Slavs ‘gave the alphabet to the entire Slav world’, produced ‘the great

Tracing the birth of a new Balkan nation 77 revolutionary reformer Bogomil’ and ‘the Puritan warrior Samuil’.129 Thus, Dinev, together with Ivanovski, could be regarded as the precursors of the future (post-1944) Macedonian national historical narrative. Dinev’s contribution went beyond the field of historiography. Between 1938 and 1941, his overall project led to the development of a ‘Macedonian’ literary circle that brought together poets, writers and journalists linked with members of the defunct VMRO (ob.) or with the Bulgarian Communist Party. Many of them were the future founders and participants of the Association of the Writers of Macedonia, the University of Skopje and the Macedonian Academy of Sciences and Arts.130 The 1930s witnessed the writing and the performance (in Vardar Macedonia) of theatrical plays by Vasil Iljoski, Risto Krle and Anton Panov and poetry by Kočo Racin (real name Kosta Apostolov Solev), Venko Markovski and Kole Nedelkovski, all of them writing in a language very similar to the future literary Macedonian, which ‘attests to a certain attempt to create an original literature in the local Slavic language’.131 The talented leftist poet Racin wrote that in the case of the Macedonians, as previous in the case of the Serbs and the Bulgarians, a process of ethnogenesis had taken place (see Chapter 8).132 As Marinov points out, this ‘younger generation certainly differed from that of its parents: in general, it did not have a Bulgarian identity. In the specific social and cultural contexts of Yugoslavia, throughout the 1930s, most of the young people of the Vardar region developed a Macedonian self-identification free of the pro-Bulgarian leanings of the previous intelligentsia’.133 Another manifestation of a sense of a distinct Macedonian nationality and language was MANAPO (Makedonski naroden pokret), the Macedonian People’s/ National Movement,134 a left-wing organization of Macedonian students in Belgrade, Zagreb and Skopje set up in 1936. MANAPO ‘sought to “awaken” Macedonian national consciousness, to develop the local language and to achieve the autonomous status of Vardar Macedonia in the framework of federalized Yugoslavia’.135 In 28 August 1936, in Ohrid, MANAPO issued a declaration, stating that ‘We, the Macedonians, as a separate nation join the struggle united in the independent national movement’ aimed at the ‘recognition of Macedonia as a historical unit and the Macedonian people as a separate nation . . . within the Federative Yugoslavia’.136 Apparently the MANAPO activists vacillated between forming a part of a future federal Yugoslavia and ‘full separation from Yugoslavia’.137 It is in the interwar years that the late Ivan Katardžiev places the ‘hour of maturity’138 and genuine ‘affirmation’ of Macedonian national consciousness, which compensated for ‘their “delay” in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries’,139 which was made possible due to ‘the elimination of the activity of rival propaganda, especially Bulgarian’.140 It is clear that it was then that the foundations were put at the levels of intellectuals and young activists, for the future all-out ethnogenesis. It was in Yugoslav Macedonia, and not in Pirin Macedonian and even less so in Greek Macedonia, that ‘an interesting process of consolidation of Macedonian identity’ took place ‘within most of the Slavic population’.141 Prior to the mid-1930s, things look different even at the level of the VMRO (ob.), as seen by a statement made by Vlahov in 1948. In a letter he sent to Macedonian

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Prime Minister Lazar Koliševski, he candidly accepted that until December 1933 and January 1934 ‘when reference was made to the national composition of Macedonia, the term Macedonian Bulgarians or Bulgarians of Macedonia was used and not Macedonians’.142 And he added that the VMRO (ob.) in its various statement ‘did not use the term Macedonian Bulgarians, but Macedonian people’, the former was used ‘only with reference to the national composition’, along with ‘other nationalities who lived there’.143 In conclusion, the Macedonians, as a new nation of the Balkans, is first conceived by a few individuals, mostly intellectuals, who remained solitary figures from 1900 until the 1920s, and hardly an emerging critical mass of Macedonian nation-builders. The second wave came in the 1930s when Macedonian national identity crystallized, separately by the VMRO (ob.), by a group of intellectuals who were part of a Macedonian-Bulgarian elite, and also by a grass-root movement of young intellectuals and activists (nationalists or leftists or both). But this process was neither complete upon the start of the Second World War nor was Macedonian nationalism assured or preordained. Thus, even in the 1930s it barely meets the criteria of Anthony Smith’s ethnosymbolism, of a phenomenon of an elite group acting as harbingers of nationalism. What is certain is that it was created en masse, along Walker Connor’s definition of nationhood, in the second part of the 1940s.

Notes 1 L.S. Stavrianos, The Balkans since 1453 (London: Hurst & Company, 2000) [1958], 518. 2 Ibid., 518–9. 3 H.N. Brailsford, Macedonia: Its Races and Their Future (London: Methuen & Co, 1906), 106–7. 4 Ibid., 107. 5 Ibid., 519. 6 Victor Roudometof, ‘Nationalism and Identity Politics in the Balkans: Greece and the Macedonian Question’, Journal of Modern Greek Studies, 14:2 (1996), 263; Duncan M. Perry, The Politics of Terror: The Macedonian Revolutionary Movements, 1893– 1903 (Durham: Duke University Press, 1988), 21. 7 Tchavdar Marinov, ‘We, the Macedonians: The Paths of Macedonian Supra-Nationalism (1878–1912)’, in Diana Mishkova (ed.), We, the People: Politics of National Peculiarity in Southeast Europe (Budapest: Central European University Press, 2013c), 109. 8 Keith Brown, Loyal unto Death: Trust and Terror in Revolutionary Macedonia (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2013), 17–8. 9 Strashko Stojanovski, ‘National Ideology and Its Transfer: Late Ottoman and AustroHungarian Relations’, Macedonian Historical Review, 3 (2012), 147; Andrew Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians: A History (Stanford: Hoover Institution Press, 2008), 82. 10 Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 82. 11 Ibid. 12 Marinov, ‘We, the Macedonians’, 109. 13 Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 83. 14 Andrew Rossos, ‘Macedonianism and Macedonian Nationalism on the Left’, in Ivo Banac and Katherine Verdery (eds), National Character and National Ideology in Interwar Eastern Europe (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1995); Ivan

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15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38

Katardjiev, Macedonia and Its Neighbours: Past, Present, Future (Skopje: Menora, 2001); Tchavdar Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander: Macedonian Identity at the Crossroads of Greek, Bulgarian and Serbian Nationalism’, in Roumen Daskalov and Tchavdar Marinov (eds), Entangled Histories of the Balkans, Volume One: National Ideologies and Language Policies (Leiden: Brill, 2013a); Loring M. Danforth, The Macedonian Conflict: Ethnic Nationalism in a Transnational World (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1995); Irena Stefoska, ‘Nation, Education and Historiographic Narratives: The Case of the Socialist Republic of Macedonia (1944–1990)’, in Ulf Brunnbauer and Hannes Grandits (eds), The Ambiguous Nation: Case Studies from Southeastern Europe in the 20th Century (Munich: Oldenbourg Verlag München, 2013), 195–29. Anthony D. Smith, National Identity (London: Penguin Books, 1991); Anthony D. Smith, Myths and Memories of the Nation (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000). John Hutchinson and Anthony D. Smith, ‘Introduction’, in John Hutchinson and Anthony D. Smith (eds), Nationalism (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1994), 5. Antony D. Smith, Nationalism and Modernism: A Critical Survey of Recent Theories of Nations and Nationalism (London: Routledge, 1998), 170–98. Athena S. Leoussi, ‘The Ethno-Cultural Roots of National Art’, in Montserrat Guibernau and John Hutchinson (eds), History and National Destiny: Ethnosymbolism and Its Critics (Oxford: Blackwell Publishers, 2004), 144. Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander’, 278. Walker Connor, ‘The Timelessness of Nations’, in Guibernau and Hutchinson (eds), History and National Destiny: Ethnosymbolism and Its Critics (Oxford: Blackwell Publishers, 2004), 40–1. Smith, Myths and Memories of the Nation, 5. John Armstrong, ‘Definitions, Periodization, and Prospect for the Longue Durée’, in Guibernau and Hutchinson (eds), History and National Destiny: Ethnosymbolism and Its Critics (Oxford: Blackwell Publishers, 2004), 12. Ernest Gellner, Nations and Nationalism (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1983), 48. In Anthony D. Smith, ‘Memory and Modernity: Reflections on Ernest Gellner’s Theory of Nationalism’, Nations and Nationalism, 2:1 (1996), 372. Umut Özkιrιmlι, Theories of Nationalism: A Critical Introduction (Basingstoke: Palgrave, 2000), 67. Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 104; Tchavdar Marinov, La question macédoine de 1944 à no jours: communism et nationalism dans les Balkans (Paris: L’Harmattan, 2010b), 29. Ivo Banac, The National Question in Yugoslavia (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1993) [1984], 314–5, 326–7; Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander’, 301. Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander’, 304–5. Ibid., 304 fn. 85. In Spyridon Sfetas, I diamorfosi tis slavomakedonikis taftotitas: mia epodyni diadikasia [The Formulation of the Slav-Macedonian Identity: A Painful Process] (Thessaloniki: Ekdoseis Vanias, 2003), 77 fn 89. My translation from the Greek version. Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander’, 305. Ibid. İpek K. Yosmaoğlu, Blood Ties: Religion, Violence and the Politics of Nationhood in Ottoman Macedonia, 1878–1908 (Ithaca: Cornell University Press), Kindle Edition, location 391. Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander’, 305. Brown, Loyal unto Death, 15–6. Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander’, 303. Yosmaoğlu, Blood Ties, Kindle Edition, Locations 363–370. See, e.g. Alexis Heraclides, The Self-Determination of Minorities in International Politics (London: Frank Cass, 1991).

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39 There are several other instances where separate political existence for decades has given rise to a quest for separate statehood despite ethnic or national affinity, such as Montenegro, Moldova, Somaliland and the various Arab states. 40 Stojanovski, ‘National Ideology and Its Transfer’, 147. 41 Dimitar Bechev, Historical Dictionary of North Macedonia, Second Edition (Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield, 2019), 192. 42 Stefoska, ‘Nation, Education and Historiographic Narratives’, 206; Kyril Drezov, ‘Macedonian Identity: An Overview of the Major Claims’, in James Pettifer (ed.), The New Macedonian Question (Basingstoke: Macmillan Press, 1999), 54. 43 Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander’, 277. 44 Bechev, Historical Dictionary of North Macedonia, 192. 45 Rumen Daskalov, ‘Bulgarian-Greek Dis/Entanglements’, in Daskalov and Marinov (eds), Entangled Histories of the Balkans, Volume One: National Ideologies and Language Policies (Leiden: Brill, 2013), 170. 46 Stoyan Pribichevich, Macedonia: Its People and History (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1982), 111. 47 Sfetas, I diamorfosi tis slavomakedonikis taftotitas, 17–8. 48 Quoted in Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 84. 49 Ibid. 50 Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander’, 315; Danforth, The Macedonian Conflict, 50. 51 Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander’, 315–6. 52 Ibid., 316. 53 Ibid. 54 Ibid. 55 Quoted in Danforth, The Macedonian Conflict, 50. 56 Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander’, 316–7. 57 Dimitar Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia (Lanham: The Scarecrow Press, 2009), 185. 58 Daskalov, ‘Bulgarian-Greek Dis/Entanglements’, 167. See for more details from Parlichev’s autobiography, see Yosmaoğlu, Blood Ties, locations 1869–1881. 59 Basil C. Gounaris, ‘Greek Views of Macedonia: From the Enlightenment to the First World War’, in Ioannis D. Stefanidis, Vlasis Vlasidis and Evangelos Kofos (eds), Macedonian Identities through Time: Interdisciplinary Approaches (Thessaloniki: Foundation of the Museum for the Macedonian Struggle, Epikentro, 2010 [2008], 146. 60 Daskalov, ‘Bulgarian-Greek Dis/Entanglements’, 171. 61 Boris Vishinski, ‘Culture through the Centuries’, Macedonian Review, 3 (1973), 215; Danforth, The Macedonian Conflict, 50. 62 Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 86. 63 Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander’, 286. 64 Ibid., 286–7. 65 Ibid., 287. 66 Ibid. 67 Ibid. 68 See, e.g. Dragan Tashkovski, The Macedonian Nation (Skopje: Nik. Nasha Kniga, 1976), 21–2. Blaže Ristovski devotes 15 pages in a book on the Macedonian people. See Blaže Ristovski, Macedonia and the Macedonian People (Vienna and Skopje: SIMAG Holding, 1999), 133–48. See also Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 86–7. 69 Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander’, 287. 70 Krsté Missirkov, On Macedonian Matters, translated by Alan McConnell (Skopje: Macedonian Review Editions, 1974) [1903], 117. 71 Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, 241. 72 Ristovski, Macedonia and the Macedonian People, 124–5; Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 96; Marinov, ‘We, the Macedonians’, 120–1, 132. 73 Ristovski, Macedonia and the Macedonian People, 16.

Tracing the birth of a new Balkan nation 81 74 Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander’, 319. 75 Missirkov, On Macedonian Matters, 63, 65. 76 Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 227–8; Vemund Aarbakke, Ethnic Rivalry and the Quest for Macedonia, 1870–1913 (Boulder, CO: East European Monographs, 2003), 120–1; Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander’, 319–21; Hugh Poulton, Who Are the Macedonians? (London: Hurst & Company, 1995), 58; Danforth, The Macedonian Conflict, 50, 63. 77 Missirkov, On Macedonian Matters, 105, 150, 181. 78 Ibid., 103. 79 Ibid., 151–2. 80 Ibid., 153. 81 Ibid., 115. 82 Ibid., 183. 83 Ibid., 115. 84 Ibid., 121. 85 Ibid., 135–6. 86 Ibid., 37–8, 57. 87 Ibid., 75, 123. 88 Ibid., 42, 49. 89 Ibid., 43. 90 Ibid., 52. 91 Ibid., 118. 92 Ibid., 125–6. 93 Ibid., 122. 94 Ibid., 135, 95 Ibid., 164, 195, 197. 96 Ermis Lafazanovski, ‘The Intellectual as Place of Memory: Krste Petkov Misirkov’s Role in the Macedonian and Moldavian National Movements’, in Ulf Brunnbauer and Hannes Grandits (eds), The Ambiguous Nation: Case Studies from Southeastern Europe in the 20th Century (Munich: Oldenbourg Verlag, 2013), 180. 97 Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, 153. 98 Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander’, 321. See also Vemund Aarbakke, ‘Who Can Mend a Broken Heart? Macedonia’s Place in Modern Bulgarian History’, in Stefanidis, Vlasidis and Kofos (eds), Macedonian Identities through Time, 190. 99 Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander’, 321–2; Lafazanovski, ‘The Intellectual as Place of Memory’, 186, 88. 100 Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, 153. 101 Banac, The National Question in Yugoslavia, 327. 102 Ibid. 103 Fredrik Barth, ‘Introduction’, in Fredrik Barth (ed.) Ethnic Groups and Boundaries (Boston, MA: Little, Brown and Company, 1969), 9–38. 104 Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander’, 322. 105 Marinov, ‘We, the Macedonians’, 134. 106 Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander’, 322. 107 Ibid., 321–2. 108 Sfetas, I diamorfosi tis slavomakedonikis taftotitas, 78–80, 82–3. My translation from the Greek version. 109 Ibid., 80; Marinov, ‘We, the Macedonians’, 132. 110 Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander’, 323. 111 Ibid. For more details on the views of Čupovski, see Ristovski, Macedonia and the Macedonian People, 200–14, 220–30, 240–4, 248–51. 112 Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, 52. Bulgarian scholars in particular dismiss him as a marginal figure in the service of the Asian Department of Russia’s foreign ministry. In ibid., 52. 113 Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander’, 323.

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114 115 116 117 118 119 120 121 122

Ibid., 305. Ibid. Ibid. Ibid., 305–6. Ibid., 306. Bechev, Historical Dictionary of North Macedonia, 141. Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander’, 307. Ibid. Quoted in Rossos, ‘Macedonianism and Macedonian Nationalism on the Left’, 247–8. Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander’, 310–2; Ristovski, Macedonia and the Macedonian People, 124–5. Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander’, 310. Ibid. Ivanovski’s article was first published in Detroit, in a publication of the Macedonian People’s Union, to be translated into Greek and other languages. See Bechev, Historical Dictionary of North Macedonia, 154. In Sfetas, I diamorfosi tis slavomakedonikis taftotitas, 117–8, my translation from the Greek version. See also in Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 248. Sfetas, I diamorfosi tis slavomakedonikis taftotitas, 117–22; Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander’, 311–2. Rossos, ‘Macedonianism and Macedonian Nationalism on the Left’, 249. Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander’, 312. Ibid., 327. Rossos, ‘Macedonianism and Macedonian Nationalism on the Left’, 246–8; Ivan Katardziev, ‘Macedonia in the Period from the Balkan Wars to the Beginning of the World War II in the Balkan (sic) (1912–1941)’, in Todor Chepreganov (ed.), History of the Macedonian People (Skopje: Institute of National History, 2008), 242–3, 245; Ristovski, Macedonia and the Macedonian People, 124–5; Marinov, ‘In Defense of the Native Language’, 448; Victor Friedman, ‘The Modern Macedonia Standard Language and its Relation to Modern Macedonian Identity’, in Victor Roudometof (ed.), The Macedonian Question: Culture, Historiography, Politics (Boulder, CO: East European Monographs, Columbia University Press, 2000), 192. Marinov, ‘In Defense of the Native Language’, 448. Katardziev, ‘Macedonia in the Period from the Balkan Wars to the Beginning of the World War II in the Balkan’, 243. Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander’, 326. Katardziev, ‘Macedonia in the Period from the Balkan Wars to the Beginning of the World War II in the Balkan’, 244. Bechev, Historical Dictionary of North Macedonia, 190. In Rossos, ‘Macedonianism and Macedonian Nationalism on the Left’, 219. See also Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander’, 36. In Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander’, 326. In ibid. Based on the overall assessment of Marinov whom I thank. In Sfetas, I diamorfosi tis slavomakedonikis taftotitas, 271. My translation from the Greek version. Ibid., 271–2.

123 124 125 126 127 128 129 130 131 132

133 134 135 136 137 138 139 140 141 142 143

5

Tito and the Macedonians The crucial 1940s

In the interwar years within the Serb-dominated Yugoslavia, the Macedonian region (Vardar Macedonia) was regarded and treated as ‘South Serbia’ or ‘Old Serbia’. Yugoslavia was a unitary state and its Macedonian region was a prefecture (banovina), Vardar Banovina (or Vardar Banate). Despite the various harsh measures and Serbianization attempts (see the end of Chapter 3), the Slav Macedonian inhabitants were allowed to use their mother tongue, for it was regarded as nothing more than corrupted Serbian, ‘a south Serbian dialect’.1 But the negative stance towards them was not shared by all Yugoslavian politicians. A case in point was Svetozar Pribićević, the main leader of the Croatian Serbs, who believed that the Macedonians of Vardar Banovina constituted a separate people.2 At this juncture, it is worth referring to a revealing British assessment of the situation. According to a 1926 report of the British legation in Belgrade, ‘the Macedo-Slavs’ insist ‘on calling themselves neither Serbs nor Bulgars, but Macedonians’ and ‘[t]here seemed to be no love lost for the Bulgars in most places’.3 In early 1941, prior to the German invasion, the British assessment was ‘that 90 percent of all Slav Macedonians were autonomists in one sense or another’, there was a ‘close relationship between communism and “autonomism” or nationalism in Macedonia’,4 with the younger generation and intelligentsia of the left at the forefront of this trend.5 And the British conclusion was ‘revealing, indeed almost prophetic’6: ‘the only possible solution of the Macedonian problem would seem to be in giving the Macedonians some sort of autonomy within Jugoslavia [sic]’, even though ‘such a measure would, no doubt, incur the risk of whetting the appetite of the Macedonians for complete independence’.7

Tito and the communist party of Yugoslavia For the Macedonians, the role of the Communist Party of Yugoslavia (CPY) under Josip Broz Tito was to prove crucial. It was through its initiatives that the Macedonians become officially a nation and attained the status of a constituent political entity within ‘the Yugoslav ethnofederal system’.8 As Denko Maleski has put it: ‘the idea of Misirkov of a separate (Slavic) Macedonian nationhood was realized during the Second World War by the Communist movement as part of the solution

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of the Yugoslav national question. A new native Macedonian blend that existed as a tendency for overcoming Greek, Serbian and Bulgar influences, finally came to the surface. The new Macedonian nation was born’.9 However, this process was by no means a foregone conclusion in 1940–1942. The CPY, first under Sima Marković (1921–1932) and then under Milan Gorkić (1932–1937), was not on good terms with the Comintern, with both sides to blame for this state of affairs. From 1923 until 1934 the Comintern favoured the breakup of Yugoslavia and the secession of Croatia, Slovenia as well as Macedonia, with CPY decidedly opposed (Marković actually clashed with Stalin at the Fifth Plenum of the Comintern in Moscow, in March-April 1925), but in 1935, following the rise of Hitler, Stalin and the Comintern switched to Yugoslavian unity as a federation.10 The CPY, which had participated as a party in the first parliamentary elections of 1920, gaining 58 seats, was outlawed in 1921 and functioned clandestinely.11 The CPY faced major internal problems,12 to such an extent that the Comintern wondered whether the CPY ‘was worth keeping’.13 Macedonia, in particular, had been a headache for the CPY, ‘because of the vagaries of the Comintern line’.14 Gorkić as well as Marković were among the victims of Stalin’s Great Purge along with 800 other communist Yugoslavians. And Tito, the obvious replacement for general secretary, was in real danger of becoming a victim himself, but he survived and took over ‘at the eleventh hour to give the party some cohesion’.15 Tito has presented eight different versions of how he came to be appointed general secretary of the CPY by the Comintern. In the spring of 1938, pending a decision by Moscow as to who would be appointed general secretary, Tito set up a CPY provisional leadership composed of Milovan Djilas, Edvard Kardelj and Aleksandar Ranković (they were to be the governing quadrumviarate throughout the war), making sure to inform the Comintern. From 5 January 1939 until 15 October 1940 he was in a curious state of ‘probation’ until the Comintern’s Executive Committee finally confirmed him as general secretary.16 Thereafter, Tito made sure to Bolshevise the CPY, while becoming adept at initiating ‘his own interpretation of the Comintern line’.17 Thus, with ‘the blessing of, and occasional words of caution from, the Comintern’, Tito made the CPY ‘ready to seize the opportunity the Second World War would offer’.18 Apparently Tito and the rank and file of the CPY were convinced of the victory of the Red Army.19 When the German Army under Walther von Brauchitsch (with the assistance of Italian and Hungarian forces) invaded Yugoslavia in what is known as the ‘April War’ (6–18 April 1941), the formidable Royal Yugoslav Army collapsed within eleven days (surrendering on 17 April into effect the following day). On 1 May 1941, Tito issued a pamphlet calling on the people to unite against the occupation and on 27 June the Central Committee of the CPY appointed him Commander-in-Chief of all the liberation forces. A few days later (1 July 1941), the Comintern sent instructions for immediate action. The main armed struggle of Tito’s Partisans (official name ‘National Liberation Army and Partisan Detachments of Yugoslavia’) was launched following Operation Barbarossa by Hitler against the Soviet Union in June 1942.20 Tito’s Partisans earned the fame of the most effective anti-Axis resistance movement.21

Tito and the Macedonians 85 The Tito undertaking as regards Macedonia was conceived between 1939 and 1943, although it is not clear when exactly. The obvious aim was to secure the region within a future socialist federal Yugoslavia. As early as 1939 or 1940, two of Tito’s closest associates, both of them Montenegrins, Milovan Djilas (later a major theorist and critic of communism) and activist Svetozar Vukmanović (soon to be known as Tempo), had been advocates of this approach.22 And of course there was the Comintern line on Macedonia from 1924 to 1934 to reckon with, with its gradual recognition of the existence of a ‘Macedonian nation’ (see Chapter 3). As early as 1937, there is evidence of quiet work aimed at convincing the Serbs that the Macedonians were a distinct nationality. For instance, at a conference of a regional committee of the CPY in Kosovo-Metohija, its members were informed ‘for the first time’ that there were five nationalities in Macedonia, one of which was the ‘Macedonians’.23 In the spring of 1939, a declaration entitled ‘Communist Party of Yugoslavia and the Macedonian national issue’ stated that ‘The Macedonians represent a separate nation. . . . [T]hey are not Greek, nor Serbs or Bulgarians’ and without an absolute freedom of the Macedonian people ‘the consolidation of Yugoslavia could not be imagined’.24 In order to gain popularity with the Macedonians, Tito took the risk of bringing from Paris the communist Metodi Shatorov (Sharlo), formerly of the VMRO (ob.) to Skopje, who was known as a Macedonian nationalist with strong Bulgarian ties, and he was made to head the Provincial Committee of the CPY.25 And six months after the German invasion, the 5th CPY Conference adopted a resolution for ‘a struggle for the equality and self-determination of the Macedonian people’.26

Bulgaria’s occupation of Macedonia An obvious problem for Tito’s Macedonian policy was Bulgaria. Bulgaria’s initial neutrality in the war did not last for long; for Sofia, it was impossible not to seek ‘a revanche’27 for what had occurred in 1913 and 1919. Having first secured Southern Dobrudja from Romania (upon Hitler’s insistence),28 Bulgaria, for the second time in 25 years and for exactly the same reasons, to incorporate – ‘liberate’29 – Vardar Macedonia and Aegean Macedonia, made the fatal mistake of aligning with the Axis powers (March 1941), now going as far as becoming an ally of the most horrible regime of the contemporary world, Nazi Germany.30 As Myron Wiener has put it, ‘[t]he Bulgarian Governments from 1913 onward had an uncanny instinct for engaging in losing wars and allying with the losing side’ so as to secure Macedonia.31 And he graphically adds32: To the very end, Bulgaria’s revisionist goals dominated her foreign policy, even when it meant becoming a supporter of German efforts to occupy all of the Balkans militarily. Bulgaria had literally cut off her own nose to spite her face. Moreover, Bulgaria’s alliances with Germany ran counter to deeply felt historical, religious, and cultural associations with Russia, thus demonstrating the overwhelming role that irredentist sentiments have played in the choice of allies.

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Germany’s ‘reward’ to Bulgaria was the occupation of most of Vardar Macedonia, the eastern part of Aegean Macedonia as well as Greek (Western) Thrace.33 The Germans to the irritation of the Bulgarians gave a slice of western Vardar Macedonia, which was inhabited mainly by Albanians, to the Italians, along the Italian-sponsored ‘Greater Albania’ scheme.34 Another source of annoyance for the Bulgarians was that the Germans had not permitted a Bulgarian formal annexation of Vardar Macedonia. Apparently this was done ‘in order to keep the fate of the province as a useful bargain for the extraction of more concessions from Bulgaria in the future’.35 This stance by Germany may also have been influenced by the German assessment that the ‘Slav Macedonians’ differed from the Bulgarians, as depicted by German ethnographic maps of that period.36 For his part the Bulgarian Prime Minister, the Germanophile Bogdan Filov, did not fail to express his deep gratitude to Hitler for ‘the liberation’ of Macedonia and Thrace by the German Army.37 The Bulgarian Army entered Vardar Macedonia on 18 April 1941.38 The Bulgarians were exuberant at having attained Tselokupina Bǎlgariya (undivided or complete Bulgaria), with Vardar and part of Aegean Macedonia as well as Western Thrace, and made every effort to ensure that ‘undivided Bulgaria’ remained so.39 Thus, Sofia treated the region as ‘liberated’ and incorporated into ‘motherland Bulgaria’, with Filov’s Government dividing the province into oblasti (Bulgarian administrative districts), with Skopje and Bitola as their respective centres.40 In Greek Thrace and in the eastern part of Greek Macedonia acquired by Bulgaria, the Bulgarians were brutal, their aim being to annex the occupied Greek lands.41 The use of Greek was forbidden, schools were shut down, there were killings of ‘a large number of Greeks’,42 many shops were expropriated, many Greeks were deprived of the right to work and there were attempts to alter the ethnic composition of the region by evicting tens of thousands of Greeks and colonization by some 120,000 Bulgarians. The Bulgarian ‘extreme savagery’,43 with the Greeks witnessing twice within one generation Bulgarian occupation, enhanced Greek hate for the Bulgarians and the fear of what the Macedonian Question could still entail. The Slavophones of the region, whose language was close to Bulgarian, were initially content with this turn of events, but this did not last for long, in view of the burden of occupation and the haughty stance of the Bulgarians towards them. Thus, many of them chose to join the National Liberation Front (EAM: Ethniko Apeleftherotiko Metopo) and its Greek People’s Liberation Army (ELAS: Ellinikos Laikos Apeleftherotikos Stratos), headed by the Communist Party of Greece (KKE).44 In Yugoslav Macedonia, the landscape appeared different in the beginning, with the inhabitants, who were overwhelmingly Macedonians, welcoming the Bulgarians as ethnic brethren and liberators (with Mihailov’s VMRO organizing many of the receptions), in various places with the people showering flowers on the Bulgarian soldiers, with several prominent Macedonian nationalists ‘(re)converted to Bulgariandom’.45 They seemed prepared to collaborate with them after two decades of Serbianization. This welcome, however, did not amount to a desire on their part to become fully fledged Bulgarians and annexed by Bulgaria, as Sofia assumed at the time.46

Tito and the Macedonians 87 This was to be the last historical opportunity for Bulgaria to integrate the Macedonians to the presumed (imagined) ‘Bulgarian fatherland’. But the Bulgarians ‘soon squandered their credit’.47 This came about because the Bulgarians, in their enthusiasm at having achieved the undivided Bulgaria of their dreams, and regarding the Macedonians as no more than unruly ‘Vardaci Bulgarians’ who had to be treated with severity to find the true path48 and learn properly standard Bulgarian, wanted to transform the region into an integral part of Bulgaria, treating it ‘as a liberated extension of Bulgaria’.49 Thus, they established 800 Bulgarian schools, a national Bulgarian theatre and a Bulgarian university in Skopje, named Tsar Boris III University, which was the first institution of higher education to be set up in Vardar Macedonia.50 The Bulgarian authorities expelled most of the Serbs, mostly colonists (this was one of their most popular moves)51 and took various measures to make the region a Bulgarian province, extending ‘its occupation duties in the Balkans, thus earning, and preparing for, formal annexation of the occupied lands’.52 In pursuit of this aim, the Bulgarians were arrogant, causing resentment within months of the occupation. They were insensitive to the local needs and discriminated against the Vardaci, whom, for instance, they did not employ in the public sector (the official reason was that they lacked a good command of Bulgarian).53 The bureaucrats sent from Sofia were incompetent and corrupt. Even Filov admitted that due to the bureaucracy ‘the population begins to regret the Serbian regime’,54 and the Bulgarian defence minister called upon the administrators to behave like ‘liberators’ and not as ‘invaders’.55 Bulgarian bishops were also sent to run religious affairs, an act which the Macedonians strongly resented.56 The indignation was more deeply felt by the members of the intelligentsia, who had a keener sense of their differences from the Bulgarians.57 It was mainly Mihailov (from Zagreb) and his VMRO cronies in Yugoslav Macedonia, who supported the occupation and envisaged incorporation into Bulgaria (for Mihailov the Macedonians were ‘Bulgarians’ and the concept of a ‘Macedonian nation’ was merely a Bolshevik ploy).58 The end result was that an increasing number of inhabitants came to regard the Bulgarians as no better than the Serbs, as occupiers and chauvinist advocates of Greater Bulgaria (as the Serbs were of Greater Serbia), indeed that they ‘had exchanged serbianisation for bulgarianisation’.59 As put at the time by Macedonians, ‘four years of Bulgarian occupation had done more harm to Macedonia than twenty years of Serbian yoke’.60 Thus, many started to favour the CPY and joined Tito’s Partisans. A sizeable group, however, remained loyal to the ‘Bulgarian idea’,61 including initially most of the Macedonian communists, causing serious problems to Tito’s efforts to tie Macedonia to Yugoslavia.62

Events in Vardar Macedonia In 1941, the CPY in Macedonia was controlled by the Serbs, with its Macedonian members split among ‘pro-Bulgarians, pro-Serbs and intermediary Macedonians’, with Tito trying to convince the Serbs that the ‘Macedonians were a distinct nationality’.63 The Bulgarophile Shatorov was reluctant to pursue a guerrilla struggle against

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the Bulgarians, arguing that conditions were not ripe, contrary to the rest of Yugoslavia (and most Macedonians were not keen to fight in order to bring to life the old Yugoslavia they detested).64 For Shatorov, the ‘occupiers’ were the Serbs, not the Bulgarians65; he called for a ‘free and independent’ Macedonia’66 and defected with the provisional organization to the Bulgarian Communist Party (BCP), which the Comintern seemed to accept.67 A furious Tito appealed to the Comintern and it ‘approved the Yugoslav view, but only after Germany’s attack’ on the Soviet Union68 (obviously Stalin wanted to keep as many German forces away from the Soviet front). Thus, the Comintern verdict in a radiogram (August 1941) to the Bulgarian and Yugoslav communist parties was that ‘Macedonia should be attached to Yugoslavia for practical reasons and for the sake of expediency. . . . The two [communist] parties should take up the stand of the self-determination of the Macedonian people’,69 and the Skopje Committee was to remain within the CPY.70 The Comintern also ruled that the BCP had erred trying to dominate the Macedonian communists and that an armed struggle had to commence there as soon as possible under the CPY.71 As a result, Shatorov left for Bulgaria (he was sentenced to death by the CPY)72 and a brief but sharp conflict ensued between the CPY and the Bulgarian communists.73 The CPY set up another Provincial Regional Committee under Lazar Koliševski to follow the Tito line (September 1941), which included Bane Andreev, Vera Aceva, Mara Naceva and others.74 The first Macedonian Partisan Detachments (Partizanski Odredi) were set up, which made a series of attacks against the Bulgarians only to be rooted by the Bulgarian Army.75 But the situation in Yugoslav Macedonia was far from satisfactory with the pro-Bulgarian attitude of the Macedonian communists persisting.76 The BCP insisted on limiting the influence of Koliševski’s Provincial Committee and sent two of its cadres to Skopje, Petar Bogdanov followed by Bojan Balgarianov.77 Clearly at this stage the BCP was in collusion with the Bulgarian occupying force. Koliševski was arrested by the Bulgarian police in November 1941 (he was imprisoned in Sofia throughout the war) and for almost two years the CPY did not control events in Macedonia.78 Koliševski successor, Andreev, cooperated with Balgarianov and took orders from the BCP, with the Bulgarian administration having managed to penetrate the BCP.79 Despite these setbacks, Tito continued to regard ‘Macedonia as potentially favourable terrain’ from which the CPY ‘could benefit from the population’s alienation from both the pre-war Serb-Yugoslav rule and wartime Bulgarian rule’.80 Thus, from 1941 until 1943 Tito sent one after another five emissaries to Macedonia to persuade the ‘ill-disciplined comrades to follow the official line’ and launch guerrilla warfare.81 It was the fifth emissary, VukmanovićTempo, who was to be successful. The other four emissaries were unsuccessful not so much due to the continued Macedonians’ fondness for their Bulgarian occupiers but because of the still existing anti-Yugoslavian and in particular anti-Serbian sentiments, and due to the presence of the VMRO.82

The CPY operation in Vardar Macedonia A CPY manifesto was issued for the Macedonians, ‘calling for an uprising against all enemies–Bulgarian occupiers, Mihailović’s Serb hegemonists, Albanian

Tito and the Macedonians 89 hegemonists and Vancha Mihailov’s Macedonian fascists – in brotherly union with other peoples in Yugoslavia’.83 Tempo, who was energetic, resourceful and a persuasive speaker, and enjoyed the full confidence of Tito, had to face three implacable adversaries of the CPY in Macedonia, apart from the Bulgarian occupiers and the BCP: the unrepentant Bulgarophile Macedonians, who regarded themselves Bulgarians; the supporters of Mihailov’s VMRO; and an independent group which flirted with the idea of complete independence for Macedonia. As a result, according to Stefan Pavlowitch, ‘[u]ntil the autumn of 1943, the Yugoslav communists had had less success in Macedonia than any of the contending groups there’, and despite an indigenous ‘movement for recognition of a Macedonian individuality. . . . Macedonian nationalism was elusive’.84 As regards the Bulgarophile ‘Greater Bulgarian chauvinists’, Tempo could do little to change their mind, given their devotion to Bulgaria, so he had their leaders arrested and some were executed without any legal procedure.85 As for Mihailov’s VMRO, which called for an ‘autonomous Macedonia’ with support and material aid from Nazi Germany, with Pavelić acting as the go-between, Tempo branded them as fascists and traitors, making sure to point out that their champions, the Axis powers, were facing certain defeat, the only uncertainty was when it was to come about. It was the third tendency which Tempo found potentially more alarming, given its independent character. This trend by a group known as the ‘Skopje intellectuals’ included the economist Lazar Sokolov, Kiro Petrušev and Blagoj Hadji Panzon. They advocated self-determination, implying a federated state within a Balkan federation or an independent state within a Balkan confederation. But at the end this group proved less threatening, with the Tempo being able to sully them as expressing the nationalist bourgeoisie and as enemies of the CPY, which, he argued, was the only guarantee for Macedonia’s existence as a nationality and federated state.86 Tempo arrived in Skopje on 25 or 26 February 1943, propagating the CPY’s project for the future socialist Yugoslavia, which had been adopted in November 1942 at the Congress of Bihač (western Bosnia) that had set up the AntiFascist Council for the People’s/National87 Liberation of Yugoslavia (AVNOJ: Antifašističko vijeće narodnog oslobođenja Jugoslavije). At Bihač the principle of equal national rights was agreed for the ‘peoples of Yugoslavia’, with the ‘Macedonians’ as one of the constituent five nationalities.88 Tempo called upon the Macedonian communists to leave aside their bickering, condemn Mihailov’s VMRO for what it was, fascist and treasonous, and to set up a Macedonian Communist Party and embark upon a struggle to drive out the Occupiers, together with the other ‘brotherly peoples’ of Yugoslavia, the brotherly Bulgarians under the BCP, as well as the brotherly Greek and Albanian people under their respective communist parties. The word ‘Macedonian’ in the title of the new party was intended to meet the sensitivities of the Macedonians who were allergic to the word ‘Yugoslav’, which they regarded as implying Serbian domination.89 In March, Tempo set up the Macedonian Communist Party (MCP), which included Koliševski (though still incarcerated in Sofia) and other cadres which were supporters of the Titoist path. The landscape in Macedonia changed considerably by the summer

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and especially by the autumn of 1943, following the initiatives of Tempo, now with an increasing number of Macedonians supporting the Titoist model.90 In June 1943, the MCP issued a proclamation calling for ‘the establishment of a new Macedonian republic and nation transcending the old divides between proSerbians, pro-Greeks, or Bulgarophiles (srbomani, grkomani, and bugarofili)’.91 In the meantime, the Partisan Detachments of Macedonia was reactivated, now headed by major general Mihailo Apostolski (previously a major in the Royal Yugoslav Army). The Macedonian Partisans issued a manifesto (October 1943) which referred to the tradition of Ilinden, the Kruševo Republic, and Goce Delchev.92 The Macedonian Partisans fought bravely in 1943 and 1944, suffering immense hardships, but being poorly trained and with few weapons, they were merely a nuisance to the Bulgarian and German forces. It was only by 1944 that they were able to put their act together and manage to inflict heavy losses on the Bulgarians (Apostolski boasted that by 1944 there were fifteen Macedonian brigades comprising no less than 60,000 men, but this was an exaggeration)93; moreover when the Bulgarians switched sides (September 1944), it was the Bulgarian Army that was more effective in driving out the Germans.94 At this point, two things are worth mentioning as regards the Macedonian Partisans, both related to solidifying Macedonian national identity. One was that the Macedonian guerrillas ‘developed a particularly virulent anti-Bulgarian attitude’ and were ‘extremely anxious to ensure that the Bulgarians would leave and never come back’.95 And more crucially, as Dimitris Livanios points out, ‘[t]hese detachments primarily served as a political instrument for the indoctrination of the Macedonians along the lines set by the CPY’, thus the Macedonian Partisan Army ‘was an instrument for the “Macedonianization” of the Macedonians’.96 With the benefit of hindsight, it seems that acquiring Macedonian nationhoodcum-federated status could not have been easily rejected. Moreover, ‘[t]he blend of communism and nationalism proved a popular magnet’.97 By late 1943 and early 1944 it was mainly members of the older generation who continued to cling to Bulgaria. And there was also a group that sought complete independence (some of them VMRO sympathizers).98 But imagine a people whom the Serbs regarded as southern Serbs, so primitive as to be unable to properly speak their language (Serbian), the Bulgarians as Bulgarians who spoke a vulgar version of Bulgarian, the Greeks as non-existent and merely Slavophone Greeks, to give to this longsuffering people, all of a sudden, status, a name, pride and self-respect. It was an enticing proposal that was bound to win the day across the political spectrum. Tempo visited occupied northern Greece (June 1943) and spoke to the Macedonians living there, referring to their separate nationhood,99 so as to extract them from Bulgarian propaganda. He also visited the headquarters of EAM/ELAS and discussed means for improving military cooperation in the fight against the occupation forces, and called for the formation of separate Macedonian battalions within ELAS, which the then leadership of KKE (in the absence of General Secretary Nicos Zachariadis imprisoned in Dachau) could accept only if they formed an integral part of ELAS.100 The Slavo-Macedonian Popular Liberation Front (SNOF) was launched in early 1944, formally under ELAS and the KKE,

Tito and the Macedonians 91 but in fact under the control of Tempo and the CPY, and it voiced the idea of selfdetermination within a southern Slav federation, much to the irritation of EAM/ ELAS. Relations between SNOF and the KKE were strained and by late 1944 deteriorated to such an extent that the SNOF units were pushed out of occupied Greece to seek refuge in Vardar Macedonia.101 At the 2nd session of AVNOJ, held in Jajce (southern Bosnia), it was decided (29 November 1943) that the future state would be federal (‘federative’ as it was called), ‘on the basis of the right of every people to self-determination, including the right of secession, in compliance with the true will of the nations of Yugoslavia’.102 Federal Yugoslavia was to be ‘a community of equal nations’, and Macedonia was to be one of the constituent nations and republics.103 Among the 556 participants, well-known Macedonians were listed, such as Koliševski, Andreev, Naceva, Apostolski, Metodija Andonov-Čento, Poptomov and Vlahov, but curiously none of them or any other Macedonians participated.104 Yet Vlahov, representing Aegean Macedonia, and Poptomov, representing Pirin Macedonia, were elected in the presidium of AVNOJ (even though both were still in Moscow).105

Dimitrov’s posture BCP General Secretary Georgi Dimitrov protested to both Stalin and Tito for the elections of Vlahov and Poptomov, because both had been away from Macedonia for years and both were known as members of the BCP and not of the CPY.106 Vlahov sent a letter of protest to Dimitrov, stressing his unrelenting efforts for the liberation of Macedonia. He also made another point worth mentioning: that in Vardar Macedonia 20 percent had Bulgarian national consciousness, 40 percent had ‘pure Macedonian consciousness’ and 40 percent did not have a fully developed Macedonian consciousness.107 Dimitrov’s stance was due to the fact that he did not regard the ‘Macedonians’ a nation with the right to self-determination. In early June 1942, in a telegram to Tito, Dimitrov referred to ‘a united struggle of Serbs, Croats, Montenegrins and, Slovenes against the common enemy’, making no reference to the Macedonians.108 In the spring of 1944 he expressed the view that the Macedonians were a ‘populace’ (naselenie), ‘an ethnic conglomerate made up of Bulgarians, Macedonians, Slavs, Greeks, Serbs’, ‘but not a nation’ (natsiia).109 But in a lengthy telegram to Stalin (16 April 1944), he referred ‘the establishment of a federation of South Slavs consisting of Bulgars, Serbs, Croats, Slovenes, Montenegrins and Macedonians all on an equal footing’,110 and added pointedly: ‘In such a federation, Macedonia could obtain its national freedom and statehood and would cease to be the apple of discord among the Balkan states’.111 Dimitrov at a meeting with Vlahov (22 April 1944) presented his reservations regarding the notion of a Macedonian nation. As recorded in his famous dairy: ‘ “The Macedonian nation” or the Macedonian populace! (Bulgars, Mac[edonians], Slavs, Greeks, Serbs.); “Macedonian national consciousness”? (Where and how does it exist?); Is Macedonia capable of existing as a separate state?’.112 He told Vlahov that the best prospects for Macedonia were to be part of

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a ‘Federation of South Slavs’ (Bulgars, Serbocroats, Montrenegrins, Slovenes, and Macedonians) and in such a federation Macedonia ‘could obtain its freedom and statehood, despite the ethnograph[ic] conglomeration that it represents’.113 We do not know what was Vlahov’s response, but after nine months (on 21 December 1944), Dimitrov finally ‘recognized the Macedonians as a people (narod) with full right to self-determination’114 in the context of a treaty of alliance between Yugoslavia and Bulgaria.115 Thereafter, Dimitrov reached the other extreme, going as far as to support the promotion of the newly standardized Macedonian language in Bulgaria’s Pirin Macedonia (see later) and as a result he is until today praised by the Macedonians, while the Bulgarians regard his actions as amounting to ‘national treason’.116

The declaration of Macedonian nationhood and its aftermath Now let us return back in time, in the aftermath of the Congress of Jajce (November 1943). Stalin had made sure to specify that the right to self-determination did not necessarily entail secession, and in the case of the Macedonians it amounted to their right to opt for a union within a federal community with other peoples.117 In the following year, on the anniversary of the Ilinden Uprising (2 August 1944), the Anti-fascist Assembly for the People’s/National Liberation of Macedonia (ASNOM) convened in the eleventh-century Serbian monastery of Prohor Pčinjski in southern Serbia (a location chosen by Apostolski).118 The Assembly was attended by 115 deputies and it declared the creation of the ‘People’s Republic of Macedonia’ as an equal unit with the other republics of Yugoslavia and as the ‘first Macedonian state after Samuil’.119 In this manner ‘the Macedonian partisans sought to obtain the legitimacy of continuators of a long historical tradition – especially of the revolutionary movement from the late Ottoman period, led by the Internal Organization’.120 ASNOM elected Andonov-Čento as its president, with Brašnarov as one of the vice-presidents. Brašnarov, the doyen among the participants, was the first speaker, which was befitting, having been an Exarchate schoolteacher, a member of the VMORO in its heroic phase, a fighter during the Ilinden Uprising, a member of the leftist federalists under Sandanski, a leading member of the VMRO (ob.), a member of the CPY and recently a Partisan. Brašnarov ‘announced in an emotional speech the “Second Ilinden” of the Macedonian people and its definitive “liberation” ’.121 For his part the President of ASNOM, Andonov-Čento, linked their present efforts with the Ilinden tradition and with the medieval state of Tsar Samuil.122 It was decided that Macedonian was to be the official language of the new federated state and its national anniversary 2 August, the commemoration of the Ilinden Uprising. In a declaration of the Central Committee of the MCP dated 4 August 1944) reference was made to the unification of all parts of Macedonia that had been divided by the Balkan imperialists in 1913, with Vardar Macedonia acting as the Piedmont of the ‘Macedonian nation’.123 Here a brief parenthesis is in order as regards the Macedonians and Greece. The Macedonian irredentist claims against Greece continued but were on ice by

Tito and the Macedonians 93 Kardelj and Tempo. And Tito, in late February 1945, summoned Andonov-Čento, Vlahov, Apostolski and Shatev to ‘pour cold water on the Macedonian demands for immediate action against Greece’,124 even though on his part he did not abandon his own ambitions regarding northern Greece until 1949 (see later).125 In September 1944 chaos reigned in Bulgaria, which initially declared neutrality and called for German evacuation, withdrawing its troops from Macedonia (2 September), then it declared war on Germany with the Soviet Union declaring war on Bulgaria, with the latter at war with all the belligerents for a few agonizing hours.126 On the ‘Ninth of September’ (Deveti Septemvri), the Fatherland Front seized power, with the participation of the BCP in a government headed by the leftist Kimon Georgiev, with Bulgaria immediately switching sides.127 In the meantime Hitler decided to make use of Mihailov, whom he had held in reserve as a possible alternative, so as to set up a puppet state of Macedonia. Mihailov was flown from Zagreb to Skopje (3 September) but realizing that it was too late to do anything worthwhile he left (8 September).128 From 1944 until 1946 the Macedonians were far from united, notwithstanding their common claim to nationhood and to being a distinct entity. Andonov-Čento, who represented the nationalists, sought unrealizable goals, such as the unification of all the three Macedonian regions followed by independence and only after that accession to a Balkan federation. The Skopje intellectuals (Sokolov and the others) remained wedded to the idea of a Balkan (not Yugoslav) federation, with Macedonia as one of its constituent units. Such centrifugal tendencies were not tolerated by Tito and his close associates. At the 3rd session of ASNOM (14–16 April 1945) ASNOM was transformed into a Parliament. Andonov-Čento was made president, with Koliševksi becoming the first prime minister of the People’s Republic of Macedonia (with Vlahov kicked upstairs, as one of the vice-presidents of the presidium of the Popular Assembly of Yugoslavia). Koliševksi had to face two main opponents: the nationalists led by AndonovČento and the pro-Bulgarian faction led by Poptomov (who left for Bulgaria, to become foreign minister in the late 1940s), Brašnarov and Shatev. The second group also included Vasil Ivanovski, the first editor-in-chief of the daily Nova Makedonija, who had disagreed with the ‘Serbian solution’ on the linguistic problem (see Chapter 8), and as a result left Skopje for Sofia, while retaining his national Macedonian identity. The poet Venko Markovski, who was also proBulgarian and a leading member of the committee on language (see again Chapter 8), fell out of favour, and Shatev, who was initially minister of justice of Macedonia, lost his post in the first reshuffle (January 1947).129 The first victim was Andonov-Čento, who was forced to resign from the presidency of ASNOM (March 1946) when, during the drafting of the Yugoslavian Constitution, he proposed a right to self-determination-cum-secession for all the constituent republics of Yugoslavia (ironically this provision was later incorporated in the Preamble of the Yugoslavian Constitution). He also called for the formation of a separate Macedonian Orthodox Church and was clearly antiSerbian and an advocate of Greater Macedonia. Andonov-Čento faced trial on two grounds: that he sought the breakaway of Macedonia and its union with Greece,

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and that he sought Macedonia to become a protectorate of Britain and the United States. He rejected the first allegation but did not deny that he sought the support of Britain, the United States and the United Nations for a reunited ‘Greater Macedonia’ within Yugoslavia or an independent state. He was convicted to eleven years’ imprisonment and died when he was set free in 1957 due to his suffering in prison.130 In Yugoslav Macedonia, with the nationalists neutralized, an impressive nationbuilding process was initiated by Macedonian and Yugoslav intellectuals,131 from late 1944 onwards, though this process hardly started from scratch (see Chapter 4). The main emphasis was placed on (a) establishing a literary Macedonian language and alphabet, and of Macedonian literature (the latter could pick up from the literature that had been produced in the 1930s; see Chapters 4); (b) forging a national history; and (c) the establishment of a Macedonian Church, distinct from the Serbian one. Only the last was delayed until 1967, when the synod of Macedonian clerics declared their independence despite the strong opposition of the Serbian Church.132 And this process of change (or ‘mutation’ as Kofos has put it with a strong dose of exaggeration)133 was successful, especially as regards the newer generations. Those of the older generation who still clung to Bulgaria were rendered irrelevant and, in several instances, persecuted.134

Yugoslavian-Bulgarian relations and Macedonia At the level of Yugoslavian-Bulgarian relations, the overall mood was one of ‘brotherhood, comradeship, and cooperation’.135 Regarding Macedonia no less than five options had been entertained, from 1944 until early 1946: (a) attaching the Bulgarian part of Macedonia (Pirin Macedonia) to the Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia and rendering it part of the Yugoslav federation; (b) joining the Yugoslav and Bulgarian parts of Macedonia within a federation between Yugoslavia and Bulgaria as equal constituent parts, known as the ‘1:1 ratio’; (c) joining the two parts of Macedonia but within a Yugoslav federation with Bulgaria as one of the six constituent republics, known as the ‘6:1 ratio’; (d) a broader federation of Yugoslavia and Bulgaria with Albania and Greece (if the communists won in the Greek Civil War), in which the Greek part of Macedonia would join the Republic of Macedonia; and (e) the preservation of the status quo as it existed prior to the Second World War, with geographical Macedonia remaining divided among Yugoslavia, Bulgaria and Greece.136 Tito in those days was carried away by his wartime laurels and had huge ambitions, seeking options ‘a’, ‘c’ or even ‘d’, as a Balkan federation under Yugoslav leadership. Dimitrov envisaged the ‘1:1 ratio’ but was also keen for a wider Balkan federation (option ‘d’) though not under Yugoslav leadership, but his leeway was limited as the leader of a defeated country that had joined the Axis.137 Tito went to Moscow (21–28 September 1944), where he met Stalin and Dimitrov and discussed the issue of a South Slav federation.138 According to Dimitrov in his diary regarding that meeting: ‘Between ourselves [Tito and himself], naturally, there is perfect mutual understanding’ concerning ‘the formation of a union

Tito and the Macedonians 95 between Bulgaria and Yugoslavia, that actually amounts to a federation of South Slavs (consisting of Bulgars, Macedonians, Serbs, Croats, Montenegrins, and Slovenes) extending from the Adriatic to the Black Sea’, but admits ‘[d]ifficulties especially on the part of the English and their Great Greek and Great Serbian agents’.139 Indeed Britain was very much against such a South Slav federation, which it regarded as a Soviet plan to control the Balkans, and did its utmost to make Belgrade, Sofia and Moscow abandon any such idea.140 And the British had little difficulty in persuading the Americans for joint pressure on Sofia and Belgrade as well as Moscow ‘to annul their federation plans’.141 Yugoslavia pressed Bulgaria and the BCP for option ‘a’ (attaching the Bulgarian part of Macedonia to the Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia).142 Tempo and Koliševski went to Sofia and met with members of the Central Committee of the BCP, where, after reprimanding them for their attitude during the Bulgarian occupation, Tempo called for the granting of ‘cultural autonomy’ to Pirin Macedonia. The Bulgarians seemed compliant, or so it seemed to Tempo, but later they tried to wriggle themselves out of this difficult situation and ended up accusing the ‘arrogant’ Macedonians of prematurely trying to detach Pirin Macedonia.143 Dimitrov for his part sent a letter to Tito (27 October 1944), asking him ‘to explain to the Maced[onian] comrades that . . . they ought not to raise the question of annexing Bulg[arian] Macedonia, which would be done only upon determining the new boundaries between Bulgaria and Yugoslavia’.144 From November 1944 until the end of January 1945, no less than six draft proposals were exchanged between the two sides on a common federation, with the Yugoslav side coming up with the ‘6:1 ratio’ and Bulgaria with the ‘1:1 ratio’. Clearly there could be no meeting of minds between the two sides on this question.145 The various options were presented to Stalin, but he rejected the wider Balkan ‘ethnic’ federation, adding that the time was not yet ripe for such a venture, and made it clear that the absorption of Bulgaria by Yugoslavia (Tito’s 6:1 ratio) was inadmissible; the only possible option was the one suggested by Bulgaria that of ‘equal partners’, and Stalin envisaged ‘a coequal state on a parity basis, something along the lines of the former Austria-Hungary’.146 In 1946, the idea of a federation became less popular in both Belgrade and Sofia.147 When Stalin met Tito in Moscow (May 1946) and discussed the federation option, Tito stated that ‘the two states were at different stages of economic and political development’ and in Bulgaria the communists were not as fully in control as they were in Yugoslavia.148 In this meeting Tito mentioned Yugoslavia’s desire to acquire ‘Aegean Macedonia and Salonika’, to which Stalin’s reaction was the following: ‘Yes, Salonika, is an old Slavic city. You need access to the Aegean’.149 However, the federation idea was back on track when Dimitrov, in an address to the BCP (July 1946), stated that the People’s Republic of Macedonia represented the Macedonian nation, and that the other Macedonias, Pirin and Aegean, should join it, and as for Pirin (the Petrich region) this could happen ‘as part of a general Bulgarian-Yugoslav agreement’.150 In August 1946 the Central Committee of the BCP under Dimitrov accepted the cultural autonomy of Pirin Macedonia.151 And

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in the February 1947 census the inhabitants of Pirin Macedonia were allowed to choose between a Macedonian and a Bulgarian identity and 70 percent opted for being Macedonians.152 In July and August 1947, Tito and Dimitrov met in Bled (Slovenia) and signed a series of protocols, including recognition of cultural autonomy for Pirin Macedonia and recognition of a ‘Macedonian nation’ in Bulgaria, with the teaching of the Macedonian language and history in the schools by teachers from Macedonia (with Bulgaria paying their salaries)153; no less than a hundred so-called ‘cultural workers’ arrived in Pirin Macedonia. These concessions on the part of Dimitrov were ‘extremely unpopular among most Bulgarians’.154 At the time it was rumoured that Dimitrov was even ready to accept the union of Pirin Macedonian with Yugoslavia, if it was within of a wider South-Slav or Balkan federation and provided Bulgaria was compensated elsewhere, for instance by acquiring Western Thrace (which had been Bulgarian from 1913 until 1919).155 Note that at the 1946 Paris Peace Conference, Bulgaria claimed Greek Thrace as ‘an integral part’ of its ‘geographical and economic zone’, and Yugoslavia openly endorsed this claim.156 A few months later, in October 1947, a generous gesture took place on the part of Bulgaria: the sending of the remains of Gotse Delchev from Sofia, where he had been buried, to Skopje. Thus, the legendary revolutionary was to become, 44 years after his death, symbolically from a Macedonian Bulgarian that his was, a Macedonian.157 Note that today in Bulgaria this act is deemed treasonous (see Chapter 13).

Stalin on a Balkan federation and on the Greek Civil War With Dimitrov’s enthusiasm for a socialist Balkan federation unquenched, and going as far as suggesting a wider federation, that would include Hungary, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Romania, Albania and even Greece, actually emphasizing Greece (he called it a ‘Danubian Federation’),158 ideas that were not to the liking of Stalin (as seen by a critical article in Pravda, which had previously presented Dimitrov’s views positively),159 the Bulgarian and Yugoslavian leaders were summoned to Moscow.160 The prudent Tito fainted illness and avoided the day of reckoning with Stalin, sending in his place Kardelj (as head of the Yugoslav delegation), together with the Croatian communist leader Vladimir Bakarić and Djilas (who was already in Moscow, having met Stalin). At the meeting held at the Kremlin, on 10 February 1948, Dimitrov was reprimanded by Stalin and foreign minister Vyacheslav Molotov for having signed the Bled agreements and for supporting ‘the establishment of a federation or confederation’ and ‘custom union’, both ‘harmful’ and ‘helping the Anglo-Americans’, and for having done these on his own, without prior consultation and approval by Moscow.161 Unexpectedly, however, Stalin called for the immediate merger of Yugoslavia and Bulgaria, and at a later stage union with Albania as well.162 The Yugoslav delegation also faced the brunt of Stalin for the Bled agreements and in particular for their dealings with Albania (both without consulting Moscow), namely wanting to send the Yugoslavian Army there and trying to incorporate

Tito and the Macedonians 97 Albania into Yugoslavia,163 both of which, said Stalin, would have ‘serious international complications’, and after all Albania was ‘an independent state’.164 Stalin also broached the Greek Civil War, repeatedly making the point that the situation was hopeless; the Greek communists could achieve military victory only as a result of external intervention on their part, which was unthinkable, given the international implications, with Britain as well as the United States not permitting it under any circumstances. Thus, he called for the suspension of Yugoslav aid to the Greeks (according to Djilas, he used the word svernut, which means literally ‘to roll up’165).166 Djilas, two decades later, pondering on Stalin’s stance regarding the Greek communists, offers the following insight167: Not even today am I clear on Stalin’s motives in condemning the uprising in Greece. Perhaps he thought that to create still another Communist state– Greece – in the Balkans, when not even the others were reliable and subservient, could hardly have been in his interest, to say nothing of possible international implications, which were becoming more and more threatening and even if they did not drag him into war, they might endanger positions he had already won. It seems that Stalin was well aware that ‘the West regarded the Greek civil war as an indicator of Soviet expansionist plans’.168 In the February meeting he referred twice, apparently in awe, to ‘the United States, the most powerful state in the world’, which was directly engaged in the matter and would in no way permit a Greek communist victory.169 Stalin addressing Dimitrov made a wider point, which echoes vintage Realpolitik thinking170: You should not be afraid of any ‘categorical imperative’ regarding moral responsibility. We are not bound by any ‘categorical imperatives’. The key is the balance of forces. If you are strong, then strike a blow. If not, do not enter the fray. We agree to fight not when the adversary wants us to, but when it is in our interests to do so. Thus, one can draw the conclusion that Stalin, on the basis of considerations of power balance, knew his (the Soviet Union’s) limits. To remember the infamous percentages agreement (at the Moscow Conference of October 1944), on a sheet of paper, between him and Churchill regarding the Balkans (which Churchill, who had written it, wanted to destroy, but Stalin told him to keep it), Greece was ‘90 percent’ sphere of influence for Britain, Bulgaria ‘75 percent’ for the Soviet Union and Yugoslavia ‘50–50 percent’.171 Stalin agreed but wanted Bulgaria to change to ‘90 percent for the Soviet Union’ (and later Molotov and Eden agreed to 80 percent).172 Churchill was of the view that with the percentages agreement he had saved Greece from falling under the Soviet orbit.173 In fact, the Soviet Archives indicate that even prior to the meeting Soviet officials (such as Litvinov,

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Molotov’s predecessor as foreign commissar, the former Soviet ambassador in London and others), including Stalin, had reached the conclusion that the Greek communists, who had made a number of blunders, were not worth supporting because theirs was a lost cause.174 Indeed in the Stalin-Churchill meeting in Moscow, and before Churchill had made the percentages proposal, Stalin had flatly told him that ‘he agreed that England must have the right of the decisive voice in Greece’.175 In any event, in January 1945, Stalin told Dimitrov the following176: I advised not starting this fighting in Greece. The ELAS people should not have resigned from the Papandreou government. They’ve taken on more than they can handle. They were evidently counting on the Red Army’s coming down to the Aegean. We cannot do that. We cannot send our troops into Greece, either. The Greeks have acted foolishly. And Stalin added the following, according to Dimitrov: ‘The Yugoslavs want to take Greek Macedonia. They want Albania, too, and even parts of Hungary and Austria. This is unreasonable. I do not like the way they are acting’.177 Be this as it may, by early 1948 the Soviet Union had won more as regards Bulgaria and Yugoslavia than what had been agreed with Churchill. And Stalin did not want to ‘endanger positions he had already won’178 and discover that the Soviet Union had bitten more than it could chew. Stalin was keen ‘to avoid provoking the west and giving grist to the mill of the “reactionaries” in the United States’.179 The other intriguing question is Stalin’s stance regarding the formation of a federation larger than the Yugoslav one. By 1948 he was clearly against it (a) fearing the Western reactions (Britain and the United States had made their opposition abundantly clear); and (b) not wanting a strong state in the Balkans that ‘might slip out of Soviet control’.180 Thus, why on earth did he instruct Kardelj and Dimitrov otherwise, for Bulgaria and Yugoslavia to merge immediately, with Albania to follow later? On this, two hypotheses have been entertained. One is that ‘shifting the focus on Bulgaria’ was intended ‘to disrupt Yugoslavia’s efforts to incorporate Albania’.181 The other is that a Bulgarian-Yugoslav federation was injected ‘in order to use Bulgaria and Dimitrov as a “Trojan horse” against Tito’,182 making him abandon the whole idea, which is what Stalin wanted after all. In any event, after the momentous Moscow meeting, the CPY Politburo under Tito, met to discuss the Moscow talks (19 February), and unanimously agreed that Yugoslavia should not form a federation with Bulgaria and ‘decided not to change their policy substantially with regard to either Albania or Greece’.183 Tito went as far as to say that ‘if a federation were to take place it would be little more than a Trojan horse inside the CPY’, for, as he put it, ‘[i]n Bulgaria the Russians have their fingers in every pie’.184 On the surface this was probably the first time that Tito clearly disobeyed what seemed to be ‘an unambiguous order’ from Stalin,185 though he probably obeyed him without knowing it. And two days later a second defiance was to take place (and now with no hidden agenda on the part of Stalin), when Tito, Kardelj and Djilas met with top Greek communist officials, including

Tito and the Macedonians 99 KKE General Secretary Nikos Zachariadis, and ‘informed them that Stalin had spoken in favor of ending the Greek civil war. Tito, however, promised to continue to support the Greek “war of liberation” with military aid’.186

The Tito-Stalin split and its repercussions The astounding Tito-Stalin split or Tito-Cominform split (March-June 1948) was to follow, with the excommunication of Yugoslavia from the communist ranks, following a three-month exchange of letters (including two detailed letters signed by Stalin and Molotov and a 30-page letter by the Central Committee of the Soviet Communist Party). As R.J. Crampton has put it, ‘[t]he outside world was stunned. In the communist community there was confusion, consternation and fear. . . . In the Yugoslav leadership there was anger, puzzlement and a kafkaesque sense of unreality’.187 The fear in the communist bloc proved justified, for within a short period of time, the accusation of ‘nationalist deviation’ or ‘Titoism’ from the Marxist-Leninist line ‘was to be used as a charge in purges in almost every ruling communist party’.188 Since then, both sides have come up with various justifications of why the split came about. Until the Soviet archives became available, the main source of information during the Cold War was the Yugoslavian version, mainly based on the work of the Serbian historian Vladimir Dedijer and on statements on the part of Tito and his associates. According to the Yugoslav literature, ‘the break with Moscow arose because Yugoslavia was pursuing a separate path toward socialism that could not be reconciled with the hegemonic Soviet concept of the hierarchical organization of the socialist bloc’.189 And the Yugoslavs claimed (unconvincingly) that these differences were apparent as early as 1941, when the Yugoslav Partisans began their struggle.190 Ironically this ideological ‘separate paths’ aspect could be deduced from the official Soviet pronouncements at the time, namely that the Yugoslav deviated from the Marxist-Leninist line.191 This is due to the fact that the conflicts that arose among Eastern bloc states during the Cold War had to be seen – and presented – as clashes over ideology since their legitimacy was founded on adherence to Marxist-Leninist dogma and so as to avoid giving the impression of being manifestations of power politics.192 However, what is beyond doubt is that Tito neither wanted the split nor risked rebelling – or was about to rebel – against Stalin.193 Thus, the booting-out of Yugoslavia from the socialist camp ‘caught not only Western diplomats and observers by surprise’194; it ‘was equally shocking to the leaders’ of the CPY who did not anticipate the split.195 Upon receiving the brutal first letter from Stalin, Tito later confided to Dedijer, ‘I felt as if a thunderbolt had struck me’.196 The event was even more startling for Yugoslavia, under Tito, was considered the most loyal of the ‘people’s democracies’ of Eastern Europe, with the Yugoslav communists poised to build socialism and run the state, the economy, the bureaucracy and education along the Soviet model, and Stalin for his part rallied on Tito (whom he ‘treated virtually as the heir apparent in the international communist movement’)197 and regarded Yugoslavia as a reliable ally and a model for the other

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people’s democracies.198 As Djilas has put it: ‘the Yugoslav Communists, despite all their bitterness over experiences whose significance they could comprehend only after the break with Moscow in 1948, and despite their differing ways of life, considered themselves to be ideologically bound to Moscow and regarded themselves as Moscow’s most consistent followers’.199 Thus, on the basis of today’s available evidence, one could come up with two interpretations of the split, one specific and the other more general, one reinforcing the other. The specific one is Stalin’s irritation and dismay for Tito’s seemingly ‘expansionist foreign policy agenda toward Yugoslavia’s neighbors, especially Albania, against Moscow’s stern advice at a time when Soviet policy toward Eastern Europe as a whole was hardening’.200 Note that Yugoslavia was keen to annex Albania, for it was of the view that by so doing, it ‘could have solved the question of the Albanian minority in Yugoslavia’.201 Stalin was also unhappy with Yugoslavia’s material support to the Greek communists, which he regarded a lost cause, not worth pursuing and provoking the West.202 The more general reason for the split is within the realm of power politics within the communist bloc. Tito came to regard himself as a protagonist within the communist world, now in its ascendency worldwide, and saw himself as second only to Stalin; moreover, he had great ambitions beyond Yugoslavia (annexing Bulgaria, Albania and northern Greece) and rendering Yugoslavia the ‘regional hegemon’ in the Balkans.203 This ‘was the real cause of his conflict with Stalin’,204 a conduct which hardly endeared him to the other communist leaders. Stalin was ‘worried by Yugoslav appetites’ and furious that its actions could endanger relations with the West, leading to confrontation.205 He could not stomach Tito trying to head a regional communist centre autonomous from the Kremlin and by doing so jeopardizing the Soviet Union’s difficult relations with the West. Plausibly ‘Tito’s policy in the Balkans provided an opportunity to clamp down on Yugoslavia and thereby tighten Soviet control over the whole socialist camp’.206 Be this as it may, from 1948 until 1950 Stalin tried everything possible in order to overthrow Tito (the Yugoslavs for their part feared the worst, even an armed attack),207 everything short of war which he could not risk with the Cold War now on (Britain and a little later the United States, with the latter initially hesitant,208 decided ‘to keep Tito afloat’,209 with Stalin accusing Tito of joining the imperialist camp).210 Following the Tito-Stalin split of 1948, Bulgaria abandoned its favourable attitude towards the Pirin Macedonians, though its Macedonian character was not dropped. This was to come later from the mid-1950s onwards (see Chapter 7). The Cominform and Bulgaria ‘advocated a free and united Macedonia as part of a Balkan federation’, which Dimitrov endorsed in the Fifth BCP Congress (December 1948).211 The Tito-Stalin split led to the persecution of pro-Bulgarian Macedonians, such as Shatev and Brašnarov, who in 1948, in the wake of the split, had the temerity to send letters to Stalin and Dimitrov, requesting their help and calling for good relations with the Soviet Union and Bulgaria. Shatev was jailed for a year in 1948, for alleged pro-Bulgarian and anti-Yugoslav sympathies, later put in home custody in Bitola

Tito and the Macedonians 101 and found dead in a dunghill in January 1951. Poet Markovski was imprisoned in Goli Otok for five years (a forbidding barren island in the Adriatic that functioned as a high-security prison and labour camp for political prisoners).212 Brašnarov was arrested in 1950 and sent to Goli Otok, where he met his death in 1951.213 This was also the fate of the main Albanian Macedonian, the young jurist Nexhat Agolli, who had served as deputy-president of ASNOM and minister of social works.214 On the whole, however, the percentage of personalities purged as ‘Cominform agents’ in Yugoslavia was the smallest among the six republics, and very few significant figures sided with the Cominform, apart from Shatev, Brašnarov, Markovski and Agolli, they included Sokolov and Andreev.215 However, recent research by Macedonian revisionist historians, such as Stojan Risteski and Violeta Ačkoska, indicates that the repression was much more pervasive (something pointed out previously mainly by the Bulgarians for obvious reasons), with 2,500 political prisoners in Skopje prison in 1949–1951, which included Bulgarophiles, Macedonian nationalists, Albanian radicals and pro-Cominform activists.216 The Tito-Stalin split had a crucial bearing in the Greek Civil War. Clearly the Greek communists could hardly side with Tito and face Stalin’s wrath217 (although they were aware of his lack of support for them). After a lull, Markos Vafiades, the ‘prime minister’ and commander-in-chief of the Democratic Army of Greece (DSE: Demokratikos Stratos tis Elladas) was relieved of his duties, given his pro-Tito sentiments, by General Secretary Zachariadis, who remained loyal to Moscow. The leaders of the Macedonians fighting with the Greeks, organized in separate units, known as NOF (National Liberation Front)218 that were proTito were removed by Zachariadis, but the pro-Stalinist Macedonians of NOF remained to fight with their Greek comrades.219 With more than one-third of the fighters being Macedonians (probably 40 percent220 or more by 1948–1949), Zachariadis, without consulting Moscow,221 took a highly controversial decision. In the Fifth Plenum of the Central Committee of KKE, its resolution (dated 31 January 1949) states the following222: In Northern Greece, the Macedonian (Slavo-Macedonian) people have offered everything to the struggle, and [now] fight with such overwhelming heroism and self-sacrifice that it commends admiration. There should be no doubt that with the victory of the Democratic Army of Greece [and] of the people’s revolution, the Macedonian people will realize their full national restitution, as they themselves want it, offering today their blood to win it. The resolution was condemned in Greece by the entire political spectrum, as amounting to treason, leading to Greece’s dismemberment, as well as by KKE cadres, but the damage was done for KKE and has haunted it ever since.223 Zachariadis went even further. In the 2nd Congress of NOF (March 1949), he endorsed ‘the NOF’s new policy lines’, namely of ‘the Union of Macedonia into a complete, independent and equal Macedonian state within the People’s Democratic Federation of the Balkan Peoples’,224 a claim which sent alarm bells in Athens and in the Western capitals.225

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The ending of the Greek Civil War came following a whole year of ‘indecisiveness’226 on the part of Tito. The vital material aid to the Greek communists came (from 1946 until the Stalin-Tito split) from Yugoslavia, Bulgaria and Albania with a nod from the Kremlin, the main source of aid being Yugoslavian.227 Following the split, Moscow did not allow Bulgaria to continue providing supplies, and thus the Greek communists were left mainly with Yugoslavia’s aid.228 Indeed notwithstanding the split and the pro-Stalin attitude of Zachariadis, Tito continued with the assistance. But after more than a year, in view of continued United States pressure ‘to cease his aid to the communist guerrillas’ for American aid to Belgrade to continue,229 and understanding with the British,230 and ‘a modus vivendi with Athens’,231 the Yugoslav-Greek frontier was closed (23 July 1949), which amounted to a ‘near fatal blow’ for the Greek communists.232 Apart from the aid which ceased, the DSE camps in Yugoslav Macedonia were disbanded, with the DSE using only the Albanian border territories, which was a poor substitute. This resulted, a month later, in late August and September, to the DSE’s collapse. Zachariadis visited Stalin in Gagra (Georgia) and, after three days of discussion he came out with an announcement to the effect that the armed struggle would stop to be replaced by ‘a strategy based on political and economic agitation’.233 Bulgaria, Zachariadis and the KKE accused Tito of a dagger’s stab in the back,234 but, as Kofos points out, this was ‘inaccurate and unfair’,235 and he points to Tito’s non-closure of the frontier for more than a year, despite several feelers from Athens and Western capitals to do so, even though Zachariadis had sided with Stalin and had ejected the Macedonian Titoists from NOF, and even though the stance of KKE raised serious security problems for Yugoslav Macedonia with the guerrillas moving in and out of the region.236 When the border was closed Zachariadis accused Tito and Yugoslavia of ‘Bolshevik chauvinism’ and of trying to grab Thessaloniki from Greece.237 This accusation was not farfetched. Tito’s policy toward the Greek communists was altruistic (helping a common communist struggle) only on the surface. His real goal in supporting them was for Yugoslavia to avail itself of the Slav-populated areas of Greek Macedonia.238 An outcome of the ending of the Greek Civil War, with consequences until today, was the flight of a large number of Macedonians from northern Greece to Yugoslavia, Bulgaria and other countries of the communist bloc, mainly those that had participated, one way or another, in the Greek Civil War and ended up on the losing side. Those Macedonians who left as refugees from 1945 until 1949, perhaps as many as 100,000, had their property confiscated, and until today are not allowed to return, as ‘non-Greeks’239; and Greece regards the issue non-existent until today. The Macedonians of Greece are burdened by a threesome accusation: of having been the equivalent of the Sudeten Germans, with their support for the Bulgarian occupation of northern Greece; of having wholeheartedly joined the Left that, if successful, would have placed Greece on the wrong side of the Iron Curtain, under the Soviet Union; and of having a sinister agenda, to grab a chunk of Greek Macedonia.240

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Notes 1 Tchavdar Marinov, ‘In Defense of the Native Language: The Standardization of the Macedonian Language and the Bulgarian-Macedonian Linguistic Controversies’, in Roumen Daskalov and Tchavdar Marinov (eds), Entangled Histories of the Balkans, Volume One: National Ideologies and Language Policies (Leiden: Brill, 2013b), 447–8. 2 Elizabeth Barker, Macedonia: Its Place in Balkan Power Politics (London: Royal Institute of International Affairs, 1950), 11; Nada Boškovska, Yugoslavia and Macedonia before Tito: Between Repression and Integration (London: I.B. Tauris, 2017). 3 In Andrew Rossos, ‘The British Foreign Office and Macedonian National Identity, 1918–1941’, Slavic Review, 53:2 (1994), 383. 4 In ibid., 393. 5 Ibid., 392, 394. 6 Ibid., 394. 7 In ibid. 8 Dimitar Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia (Lanham: The Scarecrow Press, 2009), 221. 9 Denko Maleski, ‘Law, Politics and History in International Relations: Macedonia and Greece’, New Balkan Politics, 12 (2010). 10 Paul Shoup, Communism and the Yugoslav National Question (New York: Columbia University Press, 1968), 22–30, 39–40, 51. 11 Vojislav Pavlović, ‘Stalinism without Stalin: The Soviet Origins of Tito’s Yugoslavia’, in Vojislav Pavlović (ed.), The Balkans in the Cold War (Belgrade: Institute for Balkan Studies of the Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts, 2011), 13. 12 Shoup, Communism and the Yugoslav National Question, 34–8, 40–6. 13 S.K. Pavlowitch, Hitler’s New Disorder: The Second World War in Yugoslavia (London: Hurst & Company, 2008), 6. 14 Ibid., 7. 15 Ibid., 6; Stefan K. Pavlowitch, Tito: Yugoslavia’s Great Dictator (London: Hurst & Company, 1992), 21–2, 24, 29. 16 Pavlowitch, Tito, 21–7; J. Ridley, Tito: A Biography (London: Constable and Company, 1994), 135. 17 Pavlowitch, Tito, 29. 18 Ibid. 19 Pavlović, ‘Stalinism without Stalin’, 27. 20 Ibid., 26. 21 W.R. Roberts, Tito, Mihailović and the Allies: 1941–1945 (New Brunswick: Duke University Press, 1987), 24; Joso Tomasevich, War and Revolution in Yugoslavia, 1941–1945: Occupation and Collaboration (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2001), 104. See also Stoyan Pribichevich, Macedonia: Its People and History (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1982), 30, 43. 22 Dimitris Livanios, ‘Politikes exelixeis sti yugoslaviki Makedonia (1941–1948)’ [Political Developments in Yugoslavian Macedonia (1941–1948)], in Thanos Veremis (ed.), Valkania: apo ton dipolismo sti nea epohi [The Balkans: From Bipolarity to the New Era] (Athens: Ekdoseis ‘Gnosi’, 1994), 585. 23 Shoup, Communism and the Yugoslav National Question, 52 and note 99; Stefan Troebst, ‘Yugoslav Macedonia, 1943–1953: Building the Party, the State, and the Nation’, in Jill A. Irvine, Melissa K. Bokovoy and Carol S. Lilly (eds), State-Society Relations in Yugoslavia, 1945–1992 (Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1997), 245. 24 Quoted in Ivan Katardziev, ‘Macedonia in the Period from the Balkan Wars to the Beginning of the World War II in the Balkan (sic) (1912–1941)’, in Todor Chepreganov (ed.), History of the Macedonian People (Skopje: Institute of National History, 2008), 246–7. 25 Shoup, Communism and the Yugoslav National Question, 52–3; Pavlowitch, Hitler’s New Disorder, 7; Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, 200.

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26 Pribichevich, Macedonia, 145. 27 George B. Zotiades, The Macedonian Controversy (Thessaloniki: Etairia Makedonikon Spoudon, 1961) [1954], 72. 28 Stefan K. Pavlowitch, A History of the Balkans 1804–1945 (London: Longman, 1999), 308. 29 Vemund Aarbakke, ‘Who Can Mend a Broken Heart? Macedonia’s Place in Modern Bulgarian History’, in Ioannis D. Stefanidis, Vlasis Vlasidis and Evangelos Kofos (eds), Macedonian Identities through Time: Interdisciplinary Approaches (Thessaloniki: Foundation of the Museum for the Macedonian Struggle, Epikentro, 2010) [2008], 184. 30 However, Bulgaria under Tsar Boris III (who dominated the political scene more than the premier) did not provide full and unconditional support to Nazi Germany. Dismayed with the German attack on the Soviet Union, it did not sever diplomatic relations with the Soviet Union throughout the war, and Boris refused to send Bulgarian troops to fight the Soviet Union. Boris died a fortnight after a visit to Hitler and it is believed that he was poisoned for not sending troops to the Soviet Union and for not complying with the German demands regarding the deportation of the Bulgarian Jews. See Pavlowitch, A History of the Balkans, 322–3. 31 Myron Wiener, ‘The Macedonian Syndrome: An Historical Model of International Relations and Political Development’, World Politics, 23:4 (1971), 671. 32 Ibid. 33 R.J. Crampton, The Balkans since the Second World War (London: Longman, 2002), 51. 34 Dimitris Livanios, The Macedonian Question: Britain and the Southern Balkans 1939–1949 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008), 118. 35 Ibid. 36 Stephen Palmer and Robert R. King, Yugoslav Communism and the Macedonian Question (Hamden: Archon Books, 1971), 64. 37 Zotiades, The Macedonian Controversy, 72. 38 Vanche Stajchev, ‘Macedonia during the Second World War (1941–1945)’, in Chepreganov (ed.), History of the Macedonian People (Skopje: Institute of National History, 2008), 251. 39 Livanios, The Macedonian Question, 119. 40 Ibid., 118. 41 Evangelos Kofos, ‘The Impact of the Macedonian Question on Civil Conflict in Greece (1943–1949)’, Hellenic Foundation for Defense and Foreign Policy, Occasional Paper No. 3 (1989), 6; Livanios, The Macedonian Question, 136. 42 R.J. Crampton, A Short History of Modern Bulgaria (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987), 125. 43 Ibid.; R.J. Crampton, A Concise History of Modern Bulgaria (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005) [1997], 172. See also Andrew Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians: A History (Stanford: Hoover Institution Press, 2008), 185. 44 Barker, Macedonia, 80–1; Zotiades, The Macedonian Controversy, 73–5; Evangelos Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia: Civil Conflict, Politics of Mutation, National Identity (New York: Aristide D. Karatzas Publisher, 1993) [1964], 100–7; Evangelos Kofos, ‘National Heritage and National Identity in Nineteenth- and Twentieth-Century Macedonia’, in Μartin Blinkhorn and Thanos Veremis (eds), Modern Greece: Nationalism and Nationality (Athens: Sage-ELIAMEP, 1990), 118–20; Palmer and King, Yugoslav Communism and the Macedonian Question, 65; Hugh Poulton, The Balkans: Minorities and States in Conflict (London: Hurst & Company, 1991), 177; Crampton, A Short History of Modern Bulgaria, 125; Livanios, The Macedonian Question, 136. 45 Troebst, ‘Yugoslav Macedonia, 1943–1953’, 245. 46 Palmer and King, Yugoslav Communism and the Macedonian Question, 64; Pavlowitch, Hitler’s New Disorder, 82; Livanios, The Macedonian Question, 179; Hugh

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47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62

63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81

Poulton, Who Are the Macedonians? (London: Hurst & Company, 1995), 101; Victor Roudometof, ‘Nationalism and Identity Politics in the Balkans: Greece and the Macedonian Question’, Journal of Modern Greek Studies, 14:2 (1996), 266–7. Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, LXIII. Palmer and King, Yugoslav Communism and the Macedonian Question, 64. Pavlowitch, Hitler’s New Disorder, 82. Crampton, A Concise History of Modern Bulgaria, 168; Pribichevich, Macedonia, 149. Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, LXII. Pavlowitch, Hitler’s New Disorder, 82; Poulton, Who Are the Macedonians?, 101; Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 184. Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, LXIII. In Livanios, The Macedonian Question, 180. Ibid. Poulton, Who Are the Macedonians?, 101–2. Palmer and King, Yugoslav Communism and the Macedonian Question, 64. Aarbakke, ‘Who Can Mend a Broken Heart?’, 196; Stajchev, ‘Macedonia during the Second World War (1941–1945)’, 253. Pavlowitch, Hitler’s New Disorder, 83. Livanios, The Macedonian Question, 134; Pribichevich, Macedonia, 149–50. Livanios, The Macedonian Question, 180. Barker, Macedonia, 79–80; Zotiades, The Macedonian Controversy, 79–80; Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia, 108–9; Palmer and King, Yugoslav Communism and the Macedonian Question, 14, 64–5; Pavlowitch, Hitler’s New Disorder, 82–3, 101; Livanios, ‘Politikes exelixeis sti yugoslaviki Makedonia’, 576–80; Poulton, Who Are the Macedonians?, 101–2; Poulton, The Balkans, 48; Aarbakke, ‘Who Can Mend a Broken Heart?’, 196; Roudometof, ‘Nationalism and Identity Politics in the Balkans’, 263–4. Pavlowitch, Hitler’s New Disorder, 7. Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, LXIII, 200. Livanios, The Macedonian Question, 120. Shoup, Communism and the Yugoslav National Question, 53–4; Pribichevich, Macedonia, 146. Pavlowitch, Hitler’s New Disorder, 83; Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia, 113–4. Milovan Djilas, Conversations with Stalin (Harmondsworth: Penguin Books, 1967) [1962], 32. Kofos, ‘The Impact of the Macedonian Question on Civil Conflict in Greece (1943– 1949)’, Hellenic Foundation for Defense and Foreign Policy, Occasional Papers No. 3 (1989), 7, 37 note 18; Shoup, Communism and the Yugoslav National Question, 82. Livanios, The Macedonian Question, 120. Palmer and King, Yugoslav Communism and the Macedonian Question, 65–7; Poulton, Who Are the Macedonians?, 102; Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 191. Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, 201. Shoup, Communism and the Yugoslav National Question, 82. Stajchev, ‘Macedonia during the Second World War (1941–1945)’, 257; Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, 2, 14, 117–8, 158, 200–1. Livanios, The Macedonian Question, 122; Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia, 114; Pribichevich, Macedonia, 147. Livanios, The Macedonian Question, 121. Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia, 115. Pavlowitch, Hitler’s New Disorder, 83. Ibid., 208. Ibid. Livanios, The Macedonian Question, 121.

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82 Palmer and King, Yugoslav Communism and the Macedonian Question, 67–9; Spyridon Sfetas, I diamorfosi tis slavomakedonikis taftotitas: mia epodyni diadikasia [The Formulation of the Slav-Macedonian Identity: A Painful Process] (Thessaloniki: Ekdoseis Vanias, 2003), 152–5. 83 Pavlowitch, Hitler’s New Disorder, 208. 84 Ibid., 238. 85 Troebst, ‘Yugoslav Macedonia, 1943–1953’, 255–6. 86 Palmer and King, Yugoslav Communism and the Macedonian Question, 70–1, 84–5. 87 Strictly speaking, narodnog means people’s, but most authors, apart from most Bulgarians, tend to use the term national, implying that in this context people is tantamount to nation. 88 Pribichevich, Macedonia, 150. 89 Livanios, The Macedonian Question, 121. 90 Palmer and King, Yugoslav Communism and the Macedonian Question, 74–85; Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia, 116–7; Poulton, Who Are the Macedonians?, 102–3; Sfetas, I diamorfosi tis slavomakedonikis taftotitas, 154–8. See also Pribichevich, Macedonia, 148–9. 91 Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, LXIII. 92 Ibid., LXIII. 93 Livanios, The Macedonian Question, 124, 177. 94 Ibid., 123–4, 134. 95 Ibid., 133. 96 Ibid., 125. 97 Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, LXIII. 98 Shoup, Communism and the Yugoslav National Question, 86–7, 90–1. 99 Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia, 122. 100 Ibid. 101 Ibid., 121–8; Kofos, ‘The Impact of the Macedonian Question on Civil Conflict in Greece’, 8–9, 15; Shoup, Communism and the Yugoslav National Question, 147–9; Palmer and King, Yugoslav Communism and the Macedonian Question, 97–9; John S. Koliopoulos, Plundered Loyalties: Axis Occupation and Civil Strife in Greek West Macedonia, 1941–1949 (London: Hurst & Company, 1999), 108–23; Livanios, The Macedonian Question, 148–50; Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, 208. See also Poulton, The Balkans, 177–8; Pribichevich, Macedonia, 154. 102 Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia, 117; Pavlowitch, Hitler’s New Disorder, 211; Crampton, The Balkans since the Second World War, 13. 103 Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia, 117; Pavlowitch, Hitler’s New Disorder, 211; Poulton, Who Are the Macedonians?, 103; Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, 16. 104 Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, 16. According to another version three participated, including Apostolski and Andonov-Čento. See Poulton, Who Are the Macedonians?, 103. 105 Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, 16, 180, 235; Poulton, Who Are the Macedonians?, 103. 106 Georgi Dimitrov, The Dairy of Georgi Dimitrov 1933–1949, Ivo Banac (ed.) (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2003), 313–4; Ivo Banac, ‘Introduction. Georgi Dimitrov and His Diary: The Rise and Decline of the Lion of Leipzig’, in The Dairy of Georgi Dimitrov, XXXIX. 107 In Sfetas, I diamorfosi tis slavomakedonikis taftotitas, 160–1. 108 Dimitrov, The Dairy of Georgi Dimitrov, 220. 109 Banac, ‘Introduction’, XXXIX. 110 Dimitrov, The Dairy of Georgi Dimitrov, 315. 111 Ibid. 112 Ibid.

Tito and the Macedonians 107 113 Ibid. 114 Banac, ‘Introduction’, XL. 115 Dimitrov, The Dairy of Georgi Dimitrov, 347. However according to Djilas, who had several amicable conversations with Dimitrov in the mid-1940s, ‘I do not believe that even he maintained that the Macedonians were a separate nationality, despite the fact that his mother was a Macedonian and that his attitude toward the Macedonians was distinctly sentimental’. See Djilas, Conversations with Stalin, 33. 116 Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, 60 117 Palmer and King, Yugoslav Communism and the Macedonian Question, 105. 118 Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, 15. 119 Tchavdar Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander: Macedonian Identity at the Crossroads of Greek, Bulgarian and Serbian Nationalism’, in Daskalov and Marinov (eds), Entangled Histories of the Balkans, Volume One: National Ideologies and Language Policies (Leiden: Brill, 2013a), 328. 120 Ibid. 121 Ibid. 122 Ibid.; Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, 15–6; Pribichevich, Macedonia, 151. For the various decisions taken on 2 August, see Stajchev, ‘Macedonia during the Second World War’, 275–80. 123 Palmer and King, Yugoslav Communism and the Macedonian Question, 111–2; Roudometof, ‘Nationalism and Identity Politics in the Balkans’, 266–7; Sfetas, I diamorfosi tis slavomakedonikis taftotitas, 177–79; Poulton, Who Are the Macedonians?, 105–6. 124 Livanios, The Macedonian Question, 191–2. 125 Jeronim Perović, ‘Josip Broz Tito’, in Steven Casey and Jonathan Wright (eds), Mental Maps in the Early Cold War Era, 1945–68 (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011), 136. 126 Theodora Dragostinova, ‘On “Strategic Frontiers”: Debating the Borders of the PostSecond World War Balkans’, Contemporary European History, 27:3 (2018), 7. 127 Ibid. 128 Pavlowitch, Hitler’s New Disorder, 239–40; Livanios, The Macedonian Question, 186; Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia, 109; Stajchev, ‘Macedonia during the Second World War’, 271–2. 129 Sfetas, I diamorfosi tis slavomakedonikis taftotitas, 179, 191–4. 130 Shoup, Communism and the Yugoslav National Question, 167; Troebst, ‘Yugoslav Macedonia, 1943–1953’, 249; Livanios, The Macedonian Question, 196; Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 197, 225. 131 Irena Stefoska, ‘Nation, Education and Historiographic Narratives: The Case of the Socialist Republic of Macedonia (1944–1990)’, in Ulf Brunnbauer and Hannes Grandits (eds), The Ambiguous Nation: Case Studies from Southeastern Europe in the 20th Century (Munich: Oldenbourg Verlag München, 2013), 200. 132 Livanios, The Macedonian Question, 194. 133 Evangelos Kofos, ‘The Macedonian Question: The Politics of Mutation’, Institute for Balkan Studies, 27 (March 1985). 134 Palmer and King, Yugoslav Communism and the Macedonian Question, 154; Kofos, ‘The Macedonian Question’, 1985; Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, LXIV–LXV. 135 Dragostinova, ‘On “Strategic Frontiers” ’, 12. 136 Rumen Daskalov, Debating the Past. Modern Bulgarian History: From Stambolov to Zhivkov (Budapest: Central European University Press, 2011), 263. 137 Palmer and King, Yugoslav Communism and the Macedonian Question, 118–20, 129; Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia, 138, 140, 142–3; Daskalov, Debating the Past, 263–4; Pribichevich, Macedonia, 248–9; Livanios, The Macedonian Question, 152; Perović, ‘Josip Broz Tito’, 136. 138 Livanios, The Macedonian Question, 152, 154.

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139 Dimitrov, The Dairy of Georgi Dimitrov, 337. 140 Livanios, The Macedonian Question, 143. 141 Kofos, ‘The Impact of the Macedonian Question on Civil Conflict in Greece’, 14; Dragostinova, ‘On “Strategic Frontiers” ’, 13. 142 Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 205. 143 Shoup, Communism and the Yugoslav National Question, 146–7; Livanios, The Macedonian Question, 155; Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia, 138, 142. 144 Dimitrov, The Dairy of Georgi Dimitrov, 341. 145 Poulton, Who Are the Macedonians?, 107; Livanios, The Macedonian Question, 155; Dragostinova, ‘On “Strategic Frontiers” ’, 13–14. 146 In Dimitrov, The Dairy of Georgi Dimitrov, 352. 147 Crampton, The Balkans since the Second World War, 29. 148 Ibid. 149 Ibid., 35. 150 Ibid., 30; Dragostinova, ‘On “Strategic Frontiers” ’, 14. 151 Tchavdar Marinov, La question macédoine de 1944 à no jours: communisme et nationalisme dans les Balkans (Paris: L’Harmattan, 2010b), 57; Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 205–6. 152 Kofos, ‘National Heritage and National Identity in Nineteenth- and TwentiethCentury Macedonia’, 136. 153 Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia, 161–3; Shoup, Communism and the Yugoslav National Question, 154–5; Daskalov, Debating the Past, 264; Crampton, The Balkans since the Second World War, 30; Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 205–6; Pribichevich, Macedonia, 153, 249. 154 Crampton, The Balkans since the Second World War, 62. 155 Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia, 157–8; Palmer and King, Yugoslav Communism and the Macedonian Question, 124–5; Poulton, Who Are the Macedonians?, 107. 156 Kofos, ‘Greece and the Balkans in the ‘70s and ‘80’s’, 7; Dragostinova, ‘On “Strategic Frontiers” ’, 19. 157 Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia, 160. 158 Crampton, The Balkans since the Second World War, 30; Livanios, The Macedonian Question, 232; Jeronim Perović, ‘The Tito-Stalin Split: A Reassessment in Light of New Evidence’, Journal of Cold War Studies, 9:2 (2007), 51. 159 Crampton, The Balkans since the Second World War, 30. 160 Palmer and King, Yugoslav Communism and the Macedonian Question, 164; Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia, 163–4; Banac, ‘Introduction’, XLI. 161 Dimitrov, The Dairy of Georgi Dimitov, 437–38; Djilas, Conversations with Stalin, 134–8; Perović, ‘The Tito-Stalin Split’, 52–3; Crampton, The Balkans since the Second World War, 31. 162 Djilas, Conversations with Stalin, 137; Perović, ‘The Tito-Stalin Split’, 55; Crampton, The Balkans since the Second World War, 31. 163 A few days earlier Stalin, in a friendly conversation with Djilas, did not seem unhappy with such a prospect and spoke in term of Yugoslavia ‘swallowing’ Albania, much to Djilas’s discomfort. See Djilas, Conversations with Stalin, 111. 164 In Djilas, Conversations with Stalin, 139. 165 Ibid., 140. 166 Ibid., 140–1; Perović, ‘The Tito-Stalin Split’, 53–4. 167 Djilas, Conversations with Stalin, 141. 168 Perović, ‘The Tito-Stalin Split’, 54. 169 Djilas, Conversations with Stalin, 141. 170 In Dimitrov, The Dairy of Georgi Dimitov, 442–3. 171 Albert Resis, ‘The Churchill-Stalin Secret “Percentages” Agreement on the Balkans, Moscow, October 1944’, American Historical Review, 83:2 (1978), 368–87.

Tito and the Macedonians 109 172 Geoffrey Roberts, ‘Beware Greek Gifts: The Churchill-Stalin “Percentages” Agreement of October 1944’, Anglo-Russian Seminar on Churchill and Stalin, Foreign and Commonwealth Office, London (March 2002), 3. 173 Ibid., 5–7. According to Churchill in an interview to the American journalist Sulzberger (in 1956), ‘Stalin never broke his word to me. We agreed on the Balkans. I said he could have Rumania and Bulgaria; and he said we could have Greece. . . . He signed a slip of paper. And he never broke his word. We saved Greece that way. When we went in in [sic] 1944 Stalin didn’t interfere’. In ibid., 6–7. 174 Ibid., 7–9; Geoffrey Roberts, ‘Moscow’s Cold War on the Periphery: Soviet Policy in Greece, Iran, and Turkey, 1943–8’, Journal of Contemporary History, 46:1 (2011), 59, 62–3. 175 Roberts, ‘Moscow’s Cold War on the Periphery’, 60. 176 Dimitrov, The Dairy of Georgi Dimitov, 352–3. 177 Ibid., 353. 178 Djilas, Conversations with Stalin, 141; Perović, ‘The Tito-Stalin Split’, 55. 179 Crampton, The Balkans since the Second World War, 31. 180 See on this point the view of Bulgarian historians, in Daskalov, Debating the Past, 264. 181 Perović, ‘The Tito-Stalin Split’, 55. 182 Daskalov, Debating the Past, 264. 183 Perović, ‘Josip Broz Tito’, 137. 184 In Crampton, The Balkans since the Second World War, 31. 185 Perović, ‘The Tito-Stalin Split’, 55–6. 186 Ibid., 56. 187 Crampton, The Balkans since the Second World War, 32. 188 Ibid. See also Perović, ‘Josip Broz Tito’, 137–8. 189 Perović, ‘The Tito-Stalin Split’, 32. 190 Ibid., 32, 36. 191 Ibid., 36. 192 Ibid.; Perović, ‘Josip Broz Tito’, 138. 193 Pavlowitch, Tito, 57. 194 Perović, ‘The Tito-Stalin Split’, 39. 195 Ibid. 196 Quoted in Pavlowitch, Tito, 55. 197 Crampton, The Balkans since the Second World War, 32. 198 Perović, ‘The Tito-Stalin Split’, 32, 37; Crampton, The Balkans since the Second World War, 32–3; Perović, ‘Josip Broz Tito’, 134–5. 199 Djilas, Conversations with Stalin, 14. 200 Perović, ‘The Tito-Stalin Split’, 35. See also Djilas, Conversations with Stalin, 133, 139. 201 Djilas, Conversations with Stalin, 105. See also Perović, ‘The Tito-Stalin Split’, 43; Perović, ‘Josip Broz Tito’, 136. 202 Perović, ‘The Tito-Stalin Split’, 35, 42, 44–50, 52–6; Livanios, The Macedonian Question, 232–3. 203 Perović, ‘The Tito-Stalin Split’, 42. 204 Pavlović, ‘Stalinism without Stalin’, 42. 205 Crampton, The Balkans since the Second World War, 33, 35. 206 Perović, ‘The Tito-Stalin Split’, 35. 207 Perović, ‘Josip Broz Tito’, 139. 208 Lorraine M. Lees, ‘The American Decision to Assist Tito’, Diplomatic History, 2:4 (1978), 407–16. 209 Pavlowitch, Hitler’s New Disorder, 61; Perović, ‘The Tito-Stalin Split’, 35–6, 45–62. 210 Pavlowitch, Hitler’s New Disorder, 54–61; Poulton, Who Are the Macedonians?, 107–8. 211 Shoup, Communism and the Yugoslav National Question, 160.

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212 Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, 142. 213 Shoup, Communism and the Yugoslav National Question, fn.95 in 173–4; Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 226; Sfetas, I diamorfosi tis slavomakedonikis taftotitas, 268–9; Livanios, The Macedonian Question, 207. 214 Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, 4. 215 Shoup, Communism and the Yugoslav National Question, 173–4; Troebst, ‘Yugoslav Macedonia, 1943–1953’, 256–7; Livanios, The Macedonian Question, 207. 216 Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, 190, 221. 217 Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia, 175. 218 On NOF and its role, see ibid., 170–3. 219 Ibid., 176–9. 220 Poulton, Who Are the Macedonians?, 114. 221 Kofos, ‘The Impact of the Macedonian Question on Civil Conflict in Greece’, 32–3. 222 Quoted in Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia, 177. It was added that ‘the Macedonian communists should guard against the fractionist and disrupting activities of alien-motivated chauvinistic and reactionary elements aimed at breaking the unity of the Macedonian (Slavo-Macedonian) and Greek people’. Cited in ibid., 177, fn 6. 223 Poulton, Who Are the Macedonians?, 114. 224 Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia, 179; Kofos, ‘The Impact of the Macedonian Question on Civil Conflict in Greece’, 28. 225 Kofos, ‘The Impact of the Macedonian Question on Civil Conflict in Greece’, 29. 226 Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia, 174. 227 Pribichevich, Macedonia, 155, 238. 228 Crampton, The Balkans since the Second World War, 102. 229 Lees, ‘The American Decision to Assist Tito’, 415–6, 418. 230 Livanios, The Macedonian Question, 240. 231 Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia, 184. 232 Ibid. 233 Roberts, ‘Moscow’s Cold War on the Periphery’, 65. 234 Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia, 185. 235 Kofos, ‘The Impact of the Macedonian Question on Civil Conflict in Greece’, 31. 236 Ibid., 31, 46 note 109. 237 Zotiades, The Macedonian Controversy, 89. 238 Ibid., 88; Perović, ‘The Tito-Stalin Split’, 45. 239 Dimitris Christopoulos and Kostis Karpozilos, 10+1 Questions & Answers on the Macedonian Question (Athens: Rosa Luxemburg Stiftung Office in Greece, 2018), 56. 240 Kofos, Nationalism and Communism in Macedonia, 185–7; Tasos Kostopoulos, I apagorevmeni glossa: kratiki katastoli ton slavikon dialekton stin elliniki Makedonia [The Forbidden Language: State Repression of the Slavic Dialects in Greek Macedonia] (Athens: Mavri Lista, 2000), 213–8, 220–59; Poulton, Who Are the Macedonians?, 167.

6

The ‘New Macedonian Question’ The Greek-Macedonian naming dispute

The Greek-Macedonian conflict known as the ‘Macedonia naming dispute’ over the use of the term ‘Macedonia’ started in late 1991, when the Socialist Republic of Macedonia within federal Yugoslavia declared its independence as ‘Republic of Macedonia’. The Greek-Macedonian conflict from 1991 until its settlement in 2018 can be divided into four phases: (1) the peak of the conflict from 1991 until 1995; (2) 1996–2005, the conflict downplayed with abortive attempts at a settlement and relations partly normalized; (3) 2006–2016, a new peak of the conflict and a stalemate over the name issue; and (4) 2017–2018, the gradual amelioration of relations concluding with a five-month process of conflict settlement. Geographical naming disputes are not uncommon between states, to name the most serious ones, the People’s Republic of China (PRC) and the Republic of China (ROC) over the official name of Taiwan, and the dispute between Britain and Ireland associated with Northern Ireland. All other similar cases involving geographical names – i.e. disputes over the name of a state because a similar name exists across the border in the region of another country – either have not generated into conflicts or were settled early on, amicably or by default (see Chapter 12). With the exception of the two aforementioned cases, no other geographical naming dispute has led to a diplomatic confrontation such as the one between Athens and Skopje, which seemed intractable for almost three decades. Indeed this Greek-Macedonian dispute stands in a league of its own as a naming dispute, poisoning bilateral relations for 27 years, destabilizing one of the two states, bringing it to the brink of collapse, politically and economically; and bringing the older state to a state of jingoism and hysteria, thereby undermining its democratic political culture and curtailing the freedom of speech and information; and most worrying of all it had made the two peoples enemies. Moreover, no geographical naming dispute in modern and contemporary history has engaged international diplomacy, at times at high gear, by the UN and three of its organs (SecretaryGeneral, Security Council, General Assembly), the EC/EU and its organs as well as NATO and the OSCE (Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe), not to mention the diplomatic initiatives and mediations by several states, including the United States, Britain, Germany, Portugal, Austria, the Nordic countries and others.

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The start of the dispute Following the end of the Greek Civil War in 1949, the Macedonian issue ‘continued to be a delicate one’ during the Cold War, for decades, with Belgrade trying ‘to strike a balance’, at times allowing the Macedonians ‘to raise their anti-Greek tones, in order to satisfy their newly found nationalism and to secure their consensus for more important matters’,1 or if Tito wanted to put pressure on Greece. But to all this there were limits, not to jeopardize Yugoslavia’s international position or mar relations with Greece,2 which after the Tito-Stalin split of 1948 (see Chapter 5) functioned as ‘a much-needed doorway to the West’ for Yugoslavia.3 Prior to the 1990s, Greece and Yugoslavia, despite the Macedonian thorn, had found a modus vivendi, so as not to derail their overall friendly relations. A case in point was a gentleman’s agreement reached between foreign ministers Evangelos Averoff and K. Popović in March 1962, to play down the Macedonian issue and not to allow it to mar their good relations which benefitted both parties.4 Following Greece’s return to democratic rule in July 1974, the Macedonian issue remained dormant and Greek-Yugoslav relations continued to flourish, especially under the socialist government of Andreas Papandreou, with the Greek side apparently ready to be more flexible on the question of the existence of a Macedonian nation within Yugoslavia,5 although this new realistic thinking was not diffused to the Greek public. In the late 1980s there were clashes between the Greek and Macedonian diasporas, especially in Australia, and the hardening of the position of Skopje regarding the existence of a Macedonian minority in northern Greece.6 The advance notice of the upcoming dispute between Athens and Skopje, of the ‘new Macedonian Question’ as it is sometimes called,7 to distinguish it from the traditional Macedonian Question from 1878 until the 1940s, is to be found in two episodes prior to the independence of Macedonia and was a sign of things to come, especially on the Greek side, the spoiler par excellence in the dispute for most of the 1990s. The first episode took place in June 1990 at the Copenhagen Meeting on the Human Dimension of the CSCE (Conference on Security and Co-operation in Europe), where the Yugoslavian delegate accused Greece of not respecting the rights of the ‘Macedonian minority’ residing in Greece, to which the Greek delegate reacted with a lengthy speech (written by Evangelos Kofos) on the wider Macedonian Question. Ten months later, the annual United States volume, ‘Country Reports on Human Rights Practices’ (1991), issued by the Bureau of Democracy and Human Rights of the state department, referred to 20,000 to 50,000 ‘Slav-Macedonians’ whose mother tongue was not taught in school, noting that Greece does not allow them to have contacts with people across the border with Yugoslavia, for fear that they will acquire ‘a Macedonian national consciousness’. The report was picked up by the emotional Greek public and media, with all the political parties claiming that the mention in the report was outrageous. Foreign minister Andonis Samaras denounced the claim as a ‘flagrant inaccuracy’. Even conspiracy theories were

The ‘New Macedonian Question’ 113 aired that this was part of a treacherous plan by Washington aimed at the dismemberment of Greece! For Greece its initial desire was for Yugoslavia to remain united and not to disintegrate.8 The thrust of the Greek argumentation was that disintegration would give rise to unviable entities. In Samaras’s memorandum to his EC counterparts (27 August 1991), he put it thus: ‘A detached observer may well consider that an independent Macedonian state is hardly viable’, being landlocked with no material basis for survival, and with one-third of its population composed of ethnic Albanians.9 Furthermore ‘[t]hey are currently named ethnic Macedonians, but the Bulgarians and to a lesser degree the Serbs claim them as their own’.10 Greece contacted Bulgaria in 1991, whose views regarding the non-existence of a Macedonian nation and language coincided with those of Athens. Greek Prime Minister Konstantinos Mitsotakis met with Prime Minister Dimitur Popov in Athens as well as Sofia and they declared Yugoslavia’s claims of the existence Macedonians and of a ‘Macedonian minority’ in both countries as ‘absurd assertions’.11

A new independent state In 1990, two newly formed political organizations surfaced in the Socialist Republic of Macedonia (SRM) as it was still called: the Movement for All-Macedonian Action (MAAK), comprised of major intellectuals, and Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization-Democratic Party of Macedonian National Unity (VMRO-DPMNE), consisting of younger people, mainly nationalists, headed by twenty-four-year-old Ljubčo Georgievski, a self-styled poet.12 Both called for independence. The League of Communists of Macedonia transformed itself into a party and in April 1991 was renamed Social Democratic Union of Macedonia (SDSM). MAAK and VMRO-DPMNE formed the Front of Macedonian National Unity so as to be better able to challenge the former communists.13 Some twenty parties participated in the elections in the SRM (November 1990), with 80 percent of the electorate voting in two rounds. There was no overall winner in the 120-seat national assembly (the Narodno Sobranie). The VMRO-DPMNE, with 29.9 of the vote, took 38 seats, and the socialists (then named League of Communists of Macedonia–Party for Democratic Transformation), with 27.7 of the vote, took 31 seats.14 In January 1991, Kiro Gligorov was elected president (following an initiative by a group of prominent liberal politicians and intellectuals known as the ‘Young Lions’, who obviously had made ‘a wise choice’).15 Gligorov was an astute veteran politician, having held ministerial and other high positions in the Yugoslav federation, though not in Macedonia, including being president of the Yugoslav Assembly and member of the presidency of Yugoslavia.16 At this stage, the Macedonians had two options, to remain within a reduced Yugoslavia (as Belgrade and Athens desired), or to go ahead with independence. The dissolution of Yugoslavia was a ‘daunting prospect’ for the Macedonians, who were to find themselves without federal funds for their ‘backwardness and

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impoverished economy’ and without ‘federal protection from neighbours whom history suggested might have claims upon its territory’.17 Indeed ‘many Macedonians doubted whether their republic could survive separation from Yugoslavia’, not least because the Albanians, who formed a fourth of the population ‘might not accept a Slav-dominated independent state’.18 An opinion poll in April 1991 found that 60 percent of the population preferred to be part of a reconstructed Yugoslavia of sovereign republics.19 President Gligorov, together with Alija Izetbegović, his counterpart in Bosnia-Herzegovina, proposed ‘the preservation of Yugoslavia as a confederal state’.20 But following the Serbian attack against Slovenia and Croatia and calls by Serbian parties to name Macedonia ‘South Serbia’ or ‘Vardarska Bugovina’,21 the die was cast for independence. It was felt with good reason that without the Croats and Slovenes counterbalancing the Serbs, they would be placing themselves in a very precarious position with the Serbs calling the shots.22 On 8 September 1991, a referendum on independence took place. A percentage of 71.6523 or 75.7224 voted (the Albanians chose not to participate), of which 95.0925 or 96.4626 percent endorsed the independence option (actually 68 percent of the total of the eligible voters),27 albeit by accepting the possibility of joining a future union of Yugoslav states (such was the wording of the question put to the voters at the referendum).28 In the Macedonian declaration of independence, it is stated that the new state will respect all the generally accepted principles of international relations included in ‘the UN Charter, in the Helsinki Final Act and in the Charter of Paris’ and will base its ‘international legal existence on respect for international norms . . . and on the full respect for the territorial integrity and sovereignty, the non-interference in the internal affairs, on the strengthening of mutual respect and confidence and cooperation’.29 According to President Gligorov, one of the main principles of the new state as it entered the word scene was strict adherence to ‘the inviolability of frontiers’,30 and it was for this reason that the Declaration confirms that it has no territorial claims towards any neighbouring state.31 At the time Gligorov pondered on the grave historical injustice that had been committed with the division of Macedonia in 1913, but concluded that things were different now; that the solution could only be found with the accession of Macedonia into the EC, which made present borders a formality rather than something substantive. As he put it, within the EC ‘the spiritual union of the Macedonian people’ could be achieved and he also advised this road for the Albanians, who, he pointed out, had also been wronged.32

The dispute in full swing (late 1991–1993): the naming dispute and attempts at mediation On 17 November 1991 the Constitution of the Republic of Macedonia was adopted, which included an article stating that Macedonia has no territorial claims and does not intend to interfere in the internal affairs of any neighbouring or other state. But Greece was not placated. The concerns of Athens were based on the appraisal of Dr. Evangelos Kofos, the expert par excellence on the Macedonian Question in the

The ‘New Macedonian Question’ 115 Greek foreign ministry since the 1960s (and an acclaimed scholar of the Balkans). According to Kofos, four provisions in the Macedonian Constitution were suspect and could give ground to irredentist claims in the future: two references to the Kruševo Republic, which in its manifesto (the one by Karev, see Chapter 3) had called for an autonomous Macedonia comprised of all the Macedonian territories of the Ottoman Empire; a reference to the ASNOM of 1944 (see Chapter 5), which had called upon the Macedonians in Greece and Bulgaria to take up arms against their occupiers and unite with Yugoslavian Macedonia; the article on no territorial claims added a proviso to the effect that changes in the frontiers could come about so long as they were based on the Constitution; and article 49, which referred to the right of the Republic to be concerned with the regime and rights of the members of the Macedonian people in neighbouring countries.33 Clearly this assessment by Kofos was based on a worst-case scenario and on the presumed bad faith of the Macedonians.34 Had Greece been more selfconfident, befitting a more experienced and far more powerful state, it could have deduced that the reference to Kruševo and ASNOM was made for sentimental reasons and were hardly springboards for future irredentism.35 And Kruševo (whose manifesto has not been preserved) and arguably ASNOM were associated with other epochs and other contingencies that are inapplicable today. As for the change of frontiers, the Helsinki Final Act (1975) provides for such changes ‘in accordance with international law, by peaceful means and by agreement’.36 As for concern for their people living elsewhere, the Greek Constitution has a similar provision (Article 108), as pointed out by Skopje37 (though it is meant for the Greek diaspora). In fact, Macedonia, under President Gligorov and foreign minister Professor Denko Maleski, was correct towards Greece, given no pretext whatsoever for irredentism via the name or otherwise.38 To placate Greece, Macedonia adopted two amendments to its Constitution affirming that it ‘has no territorial claims against any neighbouring states’; that its borders can be changed only in accordance with the Constitution and ‘generally accepted international norms’; and that, in exercising care for the status and rights of its citizens and minorities in neighbouring countries, it ‘shall not interfere in the sovereign rights of other States and their internal affairs’.39 But Athens was not convinced and did not drop its negative attitude. Gligorov followed what was known as a ‘three-pillar foreign policy’ (EU, NATO, and good neighbourliness)40 and on 20 December 1991 Macedonia called upon the EC to recognize it as a state.41 The two states that were most dissatisfied with the independence of Macedonia were Greece and Yugoslavia (SerbiaMontenegro) under Milošević, both hoping that the new Macedonian state would ‘disappear from the face of the earth’.42 As Stefan Troebst has sarcastically put it, ‘the Greek political class’ could not understand why ‘this “Stalinist-Titoist soap bubble” (as it saw it) did not burst immediately’,43 and ‘Serbian nationalism was stunned by the fact that the “amorphous, temporary construction”, populated primarily by “Gypsies, Bulgarians and Shiptars [Albanians]” on the territory of “historical Southern Serbia” did not collapse like a house of cards after the withdrawal of the Yugoslav National Army in March 1992’,44 to then be acquired by

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Serbia as an ‘artificial nation’ that it was.45 The Serbian leader for his part voiced his deep disappointment for Macedonian independence to Gligorov when the two leaders met in Ohrid towards the end of 1991,46 and in the next two years Milošević made a number of threatening remarks regarding the future of the new state.47 Greece and Serbia had their own nationalist agenda, but as Gligorov acknowledges in his memoirs, in those days few international observers were of the view that this small state could survive.48 For Greece the independence of Macedonian raised two issues: the question of the name ‘Macedonia’ and the question of a ‘Slav-Macedonian national minority’ in Greece. The former entered the picture for three reasons: in the belief that the name ‘Macedonia’ was a cover for future irredentism and expansionism; the presumed Greek national heritage regarding ancient Macedonia was affronted; and fact that some two million Greeks in Greek Macedonia identify themselves as ‘Macedonians’. The minority issue was due to Greece’s unwavering position that such a minority does not exist. From 1945 onwards the Macedonians in Greece are dubbed ‘Slavophone Greeks’ presumably with Greek national consciousness. The main reason for this stance followed until today by almost all shades of political opinion is that their recognition as a minority would give grounds to accepting ‘foreign territorial claims’ and ‘would imply the right of foreign supervision and intervention on Greek territory’.49 Moreover, Athens strongly believed that the recognition of such a minority would whet the appetite of its neighbour on irredentist grounds. Foreign minister Samaras and President Konstantinos Karamanlis were wedded to the first issue, Premier Mitsotakis to the second one, which he regarded as far more important and indeed the essence of the dispute between Athens and Skopje (for him the name had psychological and emotional value, with little real significance).50 But from January 1992 onwards it was the name that dominated the scene as the main issue at stake for Athens sidelining the minority dimension. On 4 December 1991, Greece set forth three prerequisites for recognizing its northern neighbour: (1) the change of the name ‘Macedonia’ on the grounds that the term was geographical and thus could not be the name of a national entity; (2) the recognition that this state has no territorial claims against Greece; and (3) the recognition that no ‘Macedonian minority’ exists in Greece.51 Only the second prerequisite could reasonably be put forward, even though it was redundant in view of the various statements by Macedonia that covered that aspect. The first prerequisite made little sense: if it is mainly a geographical term, obviously it can be used by any people who happen to reside in this region, preferably, one would add, with the addition of an qualifier in order to understand which of the three Macedonias it concerns; and the ‘Macedonians’ are a selfdefined south Slav nation and no other present-day nations happens to bear the same name. As for the non-existence of the minority, Mitsotakis’s idée fixe, here one enters the realm of the theatre of the absurd: the existence or not of a minority is a reality (as recognized as early as the interwar by the Permanent Court of International Justice), based on the self-definition of the members of a sizeable minority.

The ‘New Macedonian Question’ 117 Be this as it may, it would seem that Mitsotakis, contrary to Samaras, regarded the three prerequisites as the basis of future negotiations with Skopje and negotiable, apart from the last proviso, the issue of a minority, and he believed that by showing flexibility on the two other prerequisites, Greece could clinch the minority bit, which was his main concern.52 The 16 December 1991 EC Council of Foreign Ministers, in an extended session on the criteria and procedure for recognition of the new states from former Yugoslavia, adopted the following cryptic wording53: The Community and its member States also require a Yugoslav [unnamed] Republic to commit itself, prior to recognition, to adopt constitutional and political guarantees ensuring that it has no territorial claims toward a neighbouring [also unnamed] Community State and that it will conduct no hostile propaganda activities versus a neighbouring Community State, including the use of a denomination which implies territorial claims The passage had been adopted upon the insistence of the Greek foreign minister. The mention of ‘territorial claims’ was based on the Greek concerns regarding its northern provinces; ‘hostile propaganda’, referred to minority claims, which, in the eyes of Greek political elites, involved security concerns; and of course there was the question of the ‘name’, linked to the aforementioned ‘territorial claims’, but its ‘true focus was on issues of conflicting identities’.54 The wording was the result of a quid pro quo between the German foreign minister Hans-Dietrich Genscher, who was keen to pocket the recognition of Croatia and Slovenia as soon as possible, and Samaras. The adoption of the Greek wording was accepted in exchange for the recognition of Croatia and Slovenia but also with the undertaking that Greece was to abandon its support for Milošević (on the latter Athens reneged).55 This was a high point of Greek influence in the EC on the Macedonian issue. Athens was jubilant and arrived at the erroneous perception that it would carry the day and, as a result, the Greek Government became even more intransigent throughout1992.56 In fact, the EC decision was an ephemeral compromise, and hardly a carte blanche for Greece to do as it pleased, and it hardly reflected the real views of most of the EC member states, in particular of Germany, Italy, Britain, the Netherlands and Denmark, which all sought an early recognition of Macedonia so as to prop that country and ensure wider peace and stability in the Balkans.57 Greece by delaying the recognition of the new state and not allowing its entry into the UN, the OSCE and other international organizations, threatened the viability of Macedonia at a time when Bosnia-Herzegovina was up in flames.58 The first sign of Greece’s intransigence was seen in the first meeting held in the Greek foreign ministry between a Greek and a Macedonian delegation on 3 January 1992, which had taken place upon the insistence of the EC. The two parties stuck to their uncompromising positions: excluding the name Macedonian completely (Greece), keeping the name as it is (Macedonia). After only a few hours of talks, the Greeks, outraged, broke the talks, stating that they would never approve

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a bogus identity which forges history and insults the Greeks.59 On the same day, President Karamanlis sent a letter to the leaders of the EC member states, calling them not to recognize the so-called ‘Republic of Macedonia’, a name, he said, coined by Tito in 1944, claiming that this state harbours expansionist ambitions (exodus in the Aegean and to dismember Greece). A few days later (17 January 1992) Samaras sent a lengthy letter to his EC counterparts, where he referred to expansionism, through the use of the name, and insisted on its non-recognition by the EC, clearly implying a Greek veto on the matter.60 In the meantime, the Arbitration Commission of the Conference on Yugoslavia headed by the French lawyer Robert Badinter (commonly known as the Badinter Commission), set up by the Council of Ministers of the EC on 27 August 1991, so as to provide the Conference with legal advice,61 dealt with the recognition of Macedonia. The Badinter Commission had followed the uti possidetis juris line as far as the disintegration of Yugoslavia was concerned, namely that the previous internal borders between the federated states of a federation were to be maintained and become international.62 Upon the Arbitration Commission’s request, Macedonia reaffirmed that it would abstain from all hostile propaganda against all neighbouring states. Thus, the Arbitration Commission stated that Macedonia had ‘renounced, in unambiguous and internationally binding declarations, all territorial claims which it might have; . . . [and] the use of the name “Macedonia” could not be taken to imply any territorial claim with respect to another State’.63 Consequently, the Badinter Commission ruled that Macedonia satisfied the conditions for recognition by the EU and its member states.64 Athens was astounded with the recommendation.65 The Greek foreign ministry dismissed it as technocratic and erroneous, claiming that it was nonbinding and lacked political backing66 and managed to thwart the recognition decision of Macedonia by the EC and its member states.67 Thus, the European Council decided to recognize Slovenia and Croatia but not Macedonia, ‘which caused shock and great disappointment’ in Skopje.68 But Athens found itself isolated in the EU and in the Balkans, with only Milošević prepared to listen to and pamper the Greeks.69 In fact, Greece’s understanding with Milošević went further. Samaras, who championed an ‘AthensBelgrade axis’, pursued a ‘pincer’ strategy (known as the ‘Samaras pincer’), with or without the approval of Mitsotakis, namely to put economic pressure on the new state, through an informal embargo, with Milošević the other part of the pincer, by threatening intervention with his formidable army, the aim being for Macedonia to be destabilized and collapse.70 According to Samaras, Milošević had suggested a common border between Serbia (officially still Yugoslavia) and Greece, apparently with Belgrade taking over all of Macedonia (Mitsotakis was informed by Samaras but the prime minister remained non-committal).71 According to another version, Milošević had actually implied the division of Macedonia between Serbia and Greece, a scheme favoured by extreme nationalists in Greece.72 According to Macedonian foreign minister Denko Maleski, at a lunch organized by Lord Carrington in Brussels with the presidents and foreign ministers of the Yugoslav republics, one of Carrington’s

The ‘New Macedonian Question’ 119 aides, the Portuguese ambassador José Cutilleiro told Maleski about this preposterous plan.73 Greece’s emotional foreign policy,74 with its descent into ‘archaeologization’ as Kofos has dubbed it,75 was boosted by a huge demonstration, a ‘Rally for Macedonia’ of almost a million people in Thessaloniki on 14 February 1992 (and again on 31 March), calling for no compromise with the ‘Skopjeans’ and that ‘Macedonia is Greek’.76 The rally adopted a resolution calling on ‘the Foreign Minister that he continues to fight, and not accept the recognition of the state of Skopje with a name or designation that will include the name Macedonia’.77 Mitsotakis had not been informed of the 14 February rally (he was absent in Italy for personal reasons), which had been orchestrated by Samaras and wellknown nationalist Greek Macedonian personalities, and this was to lead to clash between the two, with Samaras calling the shots with his inflexibility.78 Many other massive demonstrations followed in Athens and in other Greek cities as well as a major rally in Melbourne, organized by the Greek Macedonians of Australia, where about 100,000 people protested. And in 1992 and 1993 there were in Greece and in the Greek diaspora in Australia and North America an array of meetings, pamphlets, books, resolutions, petitions and concerts, all aimed against the ‘despicable Macedonians’.79 There was even talk of the need for ‘military pressure’ against ‘Skopje’, with the press in particular going as far as ‘advocating a military confrontation’.80 Samaras for his part informed his EU colleagues, even sending them photos from the rally, presenting the demands as legitimate security concerns and as an expression of the will of the Greek people as a whole from which no deviation was conceivable.81 On 1 April 1992, the Portuguese EU Presidency presented what came to be known as ‘the Pineiro Package’, put together by Cutilleiro and the Portuguese foreign minister, João de Deus Pineiro, following several meetings with officials in Athens and Skopje.82 The package consisted of two documents: a draft treaty acknowledging the existing borders of the two countries, and a draft letter to be addressed by Skopje to Athens based on Greece’s main grievances, as outlined in the EC Council.83 Reference was made to the condemnation of acts or propaganda against Greek sovereignty and the like,84 and Pineiro orally suggested the name ‘New Macedonia’, having had prior assurances of a positive stance by Gligorov and what he took for a nod on the part of Mitsotakis.85 A settlement would have spared both sides a lot of anguish and would have benefitted both parties, but the spoiler Samaras did everything in his power to shelve it, with Mitsotakis unable to intervene constructively.86 In April 1992, an informal meeting of foreign ministers at Guimaraes stated that the member states ‘are willing to recognize that State as a sovereign and independent State, within its existing borders, and under a name that can be accepted by all parties concerned’.87 As one commentator has put it, ‘this Solomonic compromise confirms that Macedonia is indeed a state, and it permits recognition of that state by individual EC members’, but ‘the question of the state’s name was diplomatically circumvented and left to be settled in later negotiations on “Macedonia’s” future relationship with the Community’.88

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The culmination of Greece’s intransigency came on 12–13 April 1992, at a meeting of the heads of the political parties chaired by the President of the Hellenic Republic, which tied the hands of the Greek Government and of subsequent governments. The following was decided89: In reference to the Skopje issue, the political leadership of the country, with the exception of KKE (Communist Party of Greece) agreed that it will recognize the independent state of Skopje only if the three terms, set out by the EC in 16 December 1991, will be observed, with the understandable clarification that the word “Macedonia” will not be included in the state name. At the meeting, following an extreme proposal made by Samaras for several aggressive initiatives, he was made to leave the room by President Karamanlis, and Mitsotakis then referred to ‘nationalist frenzy’ and of Greek ‘self-entrapment’ if it pursued an intransigent course. But he found no support on the part of Karamanlis (who remained non-committal), with the opposition leader, Andreas Papandreou, competing with Samaras in inflexibility.90 The decision came to imply that Greece could not recognize a neighbouring country bearing the name ‘Macedonia’, but also none of its derivatives and this was to be the Greek ‘battle cry’ for most of the 1990s.91 In view of this, the Greek ‘political leaders found it difficult to deviate from the self-imposed constraints that originated with this meeting. Yet mostly they stuck with this position because of its broad endorsement by the masses, both in Greece and in the diaspora’.92 Following the meeting of the heads of the political parties, Mitsotakis tried to convince Karamanlis to call for another meeting to iron things out but to no avail.93 Mitsotakis then dismissed Samaras, for a while taking over as foreign minister, and there were signs that Athens would mellow, or so it seemed to the EU, the UN and the United States. The respected former ambassador Ioannis Tzounis, whom Mitsotakis has placed as deputy foreign minister, in a memo called for moderation and a compromise solution, stating that the new state was by no means a threat and was rather ‘a geopolitical gift’ to Greece.94 However, Mitsotakis ended up appearing as uncompromising as Samaras, and the flirtation with Milošević continued, to the anger of Greece’s EU and NATO partners.95 Mitsotakis later attributed his hard-line approach, which, he admitted, he did not favour, to the internal opposition in his own party, New Democracy, headed by senior figures who were not hard-liners like Samaras and to the fact that he could not find support for a more accommodative stance from the President96 (President Karamanlis, then in his mid-80s, being a Greek Macedonian was very sentimental on the Macedonian issue).97 During 1992 Greece also initiated an informal embargo against Macedonia, which included petroleum, an act which was a major blow to the new country, the obvious aim being to make Macedonia accept the Greek position.98 With Greek pressure towards the EU continuing, the EU Council of Ministers (May 1992) stated its ‘willingness to recognize Macedonia as a sovereign and independent State within its actual borders’, but only ‘under a name which can be accepted by all parties concerned’.99 And the Lisbon EU Summit (June 1992) refused

The ‘New Macedonian Question’ 121 to recognize the country whose name included ‘Macedonia’, another high point of Greek influence in the EU. At the time ‘New Macedonian Republic’ was suggested, but Greece could not accept it and suggested ‘Democratic Republic of Skopje’.100 However, a little later, there was a certain shift in the Greek stance when Mihalis Papaconstantinou, a moderate, took over as Greek foreign minister (August 1992).101 The Greek stance had prevented the wider international recognition of Macedonia, though several states did recognize it with its constitutional name, and among neighbouring states, Bulgaria and Turkey (among the first to recognize it). Macedonia officially applied for membership in the UN (30 July 1992), but the matter remained in a state of limbo for almost a year due to the Greek stance, with its EU partners supportive, apparently unaware of the extent of Greece’s obstinacy. The delay had severe repercussions for the new country, economic as well as political, with its status precarious and stability far from assured, given also the uneasy relations between Macedonians and Albanians in the country. This was a time, remember, when the armed conflict in Bosnia and Herzegovina was raging on with no end in sight. The UN, NATO, the EU, the OSCE and the international community were increasingly concerned with Macedonia’s predicament, and the UN, following an official request by Macedonia to the UN SecretaryGeneral Boutros Boutros-Ghali (in 12 November 1992),102 initiated its first ever preventive peacekeeping force in the history of the UN,103 in December 1992: the already existing United Nations Protection Force (UNPROFOR), active in Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina as a peace-keeping force, extended its mandate, now as a preventive deployment force in Macedonia, with units deployed to monitor, among others, possible border violations from Serbia to Macedonia as well as to monitor the border with Albania (this UN initiative had the backing of the Clinton Administration, which in July 1993 sent 300-strong US mechanized infantry company). In 1995, the UNPROFOR Macedonia operation was renamed United Nations Preventive Deployment Mission (UNPREDEP).104 Apparently, the idea of a preventive UN force was conceived in a discussion between Maleski and Gligorov in Skopje in 1992, in view of the fact that without an army, the borders of Macedonia were totally unprotected and as for creating an adequate army it needed much time and funds. Maleski discussed the matter with Cyrus Vance and David Owen, the mediators for former Yugoslavia. Their reaction was that the UN had never before sent troops in a preventive mission and warned him that the UN cannot defend the Macedonian borders so what would be the point of sending such a force.105 The British EU Presidency (second part of 1992) also tried its luck to make Athens and Skopje arrive at an acceptable name. Retired ambassador Robin O’Neil was put in charge of this endeavour and paid several visits to Athens and Skopje. In Skopje the Macedonians assured him that they had no territorial claims whatsoever towards Greece, that they were prepared to change certain constitutional provisions, adding, pointedly, that after all they had not demanded the exclusive use of the name ‘Macedonia’, and moreover that this name was acceptable to the Albanians in the country. They also proposed a treaty of friendship with Greece, where the inviolability of frontiers could be confirmed bilaterally.106

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O’Neil suggested ‘Republic of Macedonia (Skopje)’.107 This was the outcome of Maleski’s suggestion to O’Neil, with Congo-Leopoldville and Congo-Brazzaville in mind.108 Papaconstantinou suggested to O’Neil to try for ‘Macedonia of Skopje’.109 President Gligorov went along with ‘Republic of Macedonia (Skopje)’, only to be accused in his country of having caved in. But Greece rejected this name as well, and thus the European Council left it at that.110 In the EU Summit Meeting held in Edinburgh (12 December 1992), it was decided that the state members of the EU were no more bound by the rule of Community solidarity on the Macedonian issue, and that economic aid would be given to Macedonia. It was now clear that Athens had lost its EU support which it had been able to muster until then.111 In the course of 1992, the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank and the International Conference on the Former Yugoslavia all adopted the appellation ‘the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia’ in their dealings with Skopje. This appellation was also proposed in January 1993 by France, Spain and Britain (the EU members in the UN Security Council), and the proposal was circulated by Boutros-Ghali on 22 January 1993. But neither Athens nor Skopje was accommodating. However, following intense diplomatic pressure, especially from Boutros-Ghali, President Clinton and the EU, first Mitsotakis and then Gligorov, accepted this appellation reluctantly, despite strong opposition from the nationalist hardliners in both countries. Gligorov was impressed by the pressure from Clinton and the EU, and accepted the compromise solution. There were also two other factors which convinced him: that the name Macedonia did appear and he had been given to understand that most states would choose to recognize with their constitutional name, which did occur.112 Irrespective of this assessment, the compromise reached with the provisional name was ‘a major diplomatic success for Greece’.113 On 7 April 1993, the Security Council in its Resolution 817 (April 1993), drafted by France, Spain and Britain, recommended admission to the UN General Assembly as follows: ‘this State being provisionally referred to for all purposes within the United Nations as “the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia” pending settlement of the difference that has arisen over the name of the State’.114 The Security Council clarified that the dispute ‘needs to be resolved in the interest of maintaining peaceful and good-neighbourly relations in the region’.115 The recommendation was accepted by the General Assembly the next day, and the Republic of Macedonia became the 181st member state of the UN.116 The compromise solution, as set out in the two resolutions, was carefully worded to meet the concerns of both parties, as follows117: •

•

The term was a reference, not a name, merely reflecting the historic fact that it had been in the past a constituent part of the former Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. By being a reference rather than a name, it also met Greek concerns that the term ‘Macedonia’ would not be used as the state’s internationally recognised name. The use of the term was purely for the purposes within the UN and was not mandatory for other states; they were free to recognize Macedonia under this appellation or under its constitutional name.

The ‘New Macedonian Question’ 123 In 1993, the international community became very active in the search for a compromise formula on the naming dispute, with two senior politicians in charge, both former foreign ministers as mediators on the part of the UN: Cyrus Vance and David Owen. This initiative had the strong backing of the Clinton administration.118 At the time, Genscher’s successor, Klaus Kinkel, suggested to Papaconstantinou the name ‘Vardar Macedonia’ (he was under the impression that Gligorov could accept it), to which Papaconstantinou counter-proposed ‘Vardar Republic’. Papaconstantinou’s counterparts, and in particular the foreign ministers of France, Britain and the Netherlands, pointed out to him that it was inconceivable for Greece to impose to another state its name, and to do so after the use of this name for half a century. Vance on his part suggested the name ‘New Macedonia’. Papaconstantinou, who was at the UN in New York (May 1993), heading a large Greek delegation (which included Kofos), started flirting with the name ‘Nova Makedonija’ or ‘Novomakedonija’, in its Slavic form untranslatable, having found several names of cities in Slavic place names with the ‘Nov’ (new) attached to it, such as Novgorod, Novorossiysk and others.119 A little later, on 14 May 1993, Vance and Owen proposed what came to be known as the ‘Vance-Owen Package’, a thoughtful compromise, which included a draft treaty on friendly relations and Confidence-Building Measures, and Vance and Owen proposed the name ‘New Macedonia’ or ‘Nova Makedonija’.120 At this juncture, it seemed that a final settlement was in sight.121 But on the previous day, Mitsotakis had phoned Papaconstantinou telling him not to accept anything and to return to Athens at once, for the government was faced with a prunciamento on the part of three deputies of the ruling party,122 which in reality amounted, as one commentator had put, to an ‘ultimatum by Samaras’.123 In any event, the name suggested by Vance and Owen was not acceptable to Gligorov either, for, as he put it, no Macedonian could accept being called ‘New Macedonian’.124 A few days later, on 27 May, Greece came out with its first compromise solution, ‘SlavMacedonia’ or ‘Slavomakedonija’.125 The Mitsotakis Government was unable to prevent its downfall, despite its tactical retreat of May 1993. Following the formation of a new political party under Samaras, named Political Spring (June 1993), the New Democracy party was left with a majority of one deputy. On 9 September 1993 it lost the vote of confidence of Parliament when two deputies of the ruling party joined Political Spring. The ensuing elections (13 October 1993) brought PASOK (Pan-Hellenic Socialist Movement) to power under Andreas Papandreou, with 47 percent of the votes, with New Democracy trailing behind with 39.5 percent.

The Greek embargo and the 1995 Interim Accord The new government under Papandreou, who as head of the opposition had rivalled Samaras in his hawkish remarks, was in no mood for a compromise. Talks on the naming dispute which had started under UN auspices were broken off, and the Greek general consulate in Skopje was closed down and even more was in store. Papandreou in a show of even greater implacability than the previous government

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adopted an official wholesale economic embargo (or blockade) against its neighbour (16 February 1994), the main aim being to bring Macedonia to its knees economically and make it accept the Greek ‘no’ to the name Macedonia. Obviously this was a totally unjustified ‘punishment’ and a hostile act.126 The embargo in question was a major blow to Macedonia, ‘an economic disaster’, especially due to the cut-off of oil supplies,127 with the availability of foodstuff decreasing by 40 percent and its exports by 85 percent, with the monthly cost of the blockade amounting to 40 million dollars, thereby ruining Macedonia’s economy and undermining its stability.128 Note that this coincided with the UN embargo on the remnant Yugoslavia (Serbia-Montenegro) on its northern border. The embargo did not allow Macedonia access to its nearest and most accessible sea port, Thessaloniki, and rendered its main north-south trade route useless. The country was forced to supply itself through the undeveloped east-west route, with oil imported from the Bulgarian port of Varna, 700 km away, which was brought to Macedonia by trucks through precarious mountain roads. In all Macedonia suffered damages of about two billion US dollars as a result of the Greek embargo.129 Greece faced the opprobrium of the international community.130 As Kofos had put it, the embargo had made Greece appear ‘bullish and aggressive’,131 and had placed the country ‘in the unenviable position of a social pariah of Europe’, ‘reminiscent of the seven-year ostracism during the colonels’ regime’.132 Apparently, the more realistic aim of Papandreou’s embargo was to use it as a bargaining chip for Macedonia to change its flag (Macedonia had adopted as its flag the Vergina sun or star, found in a famous ancient Macedonian tomb at Vergina in northern Greece) and on other issues, putting aside the delicate name question for later.133 A week later Grigorov sent a letter to Papandreou (23 February 1994) proposing a bilateral agreement on the inviolability of frontiers.134 More generally the embargo had raised sympathy for beleaguered Macedonia, with more and more states recognizing it, most of them with its constitutional name.135 By the next year, Vance, as Special Envoy of the UN Secretary-General, became involved, together with American diplomat Mathew Nimetz, Clinton’s special representative and on the Greek side, Lucas Tsilas, Greece’s ambassador in Washington. But the main architect of the prospective agreement was the US diplomat and trouble shooter Richard Holbrooke, who, however, had great difficulty convincing Premier Papandreou to be more accommodating and reach a provisional agreement.136 Τhe end result of the efforts of Holbrooke and the others was the adoption in New York of the ‘Interim Accord’, signed by foreign ministers Karolos Papoulias and Stevo Crvenkovski on 13 September 1995. Bilateral relations were thus formalized but their two representations in Skopje and Athens were not formally called embassies until the ratification of the Prespa Agreement in January 2019.137 Under the agreement, the Vergina sun flag of Macedonia (which had so enraged the Greeks) was changed, hostile acts and propaganda were forbidden, and the allegedly irredentist clauses of the Macedonian Constitution were amended, and both states committed themselves to resuming their talks on the naming dispute under the auspices of the UN Secretary-General. Greece was not to object to any

The ‘New Macedonian Question’ 125 application by the other party for accession to an international organization, provided the application was made with the appellation ‘former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia’. This permitted Macedonia to become a member of a number of international organizations and initiatives, including the Council of Europe, the OSCE and Partnership for Peace. All disagreements recording the interpretation of the Accord were to be resolved by the International Court of Justice (ICJ), apart from the name issue. The Accord could be superseded or revoked, but its provisions were legally binding in terms of international law.138 The Interim Accord was welcomed by, among others, the UN, the United States, Russia, Britain and Germany, and it proved to be a turning point, opening the road for an amelioration of relations and cooperation between Athens and Skopje despite the unresolved name dispute.139 In the following month Athens lifted the embargo, having first seen the change of the flag and other concessions by its neighbour.140

Cooperation and stalemate (1996–2017) The negative Greek stance changed to the better under the new PASOK Government of Costas Simitis, with the emphasis now placed on enhancing economic cooperation. Between 1995 and 2000, Greece became Macedonia’s second largest trade partner and the largest investor in the country.141 Greece was also in the third place as a destination for Macedonia’s exports and in the second place as the country of origin of its imports.142 However, as regards the name controversy, the Simitis Government trod carefully given the opposition of the Greek public and appeared uncompromising (not accepting any version of the name Macedonia) until the end of the 1990s.143 Gligorov, in an interview to Greek daily, suggested a double formula, as a solution ‘without winners or losers’: retaining ‘Republic of Macedonia’ for the rest of the world, with Greece calling ‘our country what it like[s]’, adding that ‘I would never monopolise the name Macedonia’.144 For a fleeting moment towards the end of the 1990s a solution seemed in sight, with Vance suggesting the name ‘Republic of Macedonia-Skopje’.145 Talks under UN auspices continued mainly in New York, from 1999 onwards with Nimetz as the UN mediator,146 and there was the occasional meeting between the respective foreign ministers. The two governments came closer to an agreement on the pending naming dispute in 2000–2001, following a meeting of Simitis and foreign minister George Papandreou with Prime Minister Ljubčo Georgievski, the main protagonist being the Greek ambassador in Skopje, George Kaklikis. As a result, in the autumn of 2001, Georgievski as well as the opposition leader, Branko Crvenkovski, seemed prepared to accept the name Gorna Makedonija (Upper Macedonia).147 But at the end Georgievski backed down for fear of the internal cost of such a decision for his government and for the ruling party.148 It is worth stressing, however, that the Macedonian understanding was that ‘Upper Macedonia’ was to be used by Greece alone in its dealing with them so as to distinguish it from Greek Macedonia.149 The talks under UN auspices (Nimetz) continued in New York, headed by ambassadors Adamantios Vassilakis and Nikola Dimitrov. Nimetz for his part

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came up with various suggestions, including ‘Upper Macedonia’, ‘New Macedonia’, ‘North Macedonia’, ‘Republika Makedonija’ and others. In March 2005 he suggested ‘Republica Makedonija-Skopje’, which Skopje could not accept but Athens viewed favourably as a basis for negotiations.150 Then Nimetz came up with what came to be known as ‘the double name formula’, one for relations with Greece and one for the rest of the world (first suggested by Gligorov), which caused grave concern to the Greeks.151 Note that in the previous year (2004), the Bush Administration had recognized Macedonia under its constitutional name. This had been a major disappointment for Athens and a major boost for Skopje, and from then on the so-called ‘double formula’ (or ‘double name’), as proposed by Macedonian Prime Minister Vlado Bučkovski in 2005,152 was to be the Macedonian position: Republic of Macedonia erga omnes (for all concerned) and another name chosen by Greece for their bilateral relations.153 But Athens was adamantly opposed to the double formula.154 In August 2006, the VMRO-DPMNE with Nikola Gruevski as prime minister (whose family hails from ‘Aegean Macedonia’) took over power in Macedonia and relations with Greece were bound to sour, given the ill-conceived and untimely anti-Greek antikvizacija (antiquization)155 line that was adopted,156 with concrete results (for instance, Skopje Petrovec Airport was renamed ‘Aleksandar Veliki’, that is Alexander the Great, the highway to the Greek border named ‘Alexander of Macedon’ and others) to the furry of the Greeks. Yet surprisingly, the Greek government of Kostas Karamanlis seemed conciliatory. Foreign minister Dora Bakoyiannis stated in Parliament (30 September 2007) that Greece ‘pursues the finding of a mutually acceptable solution on the basis of a compound name’, which meant that the inclusion of the term ‘Macedonia’ was acceptable.157 At the time there was a near consensus in Greece among the political parties for a composite name, with only a small nationalist party named Popular Orthodox Alarm (LaOS) opposed.158 However, according to opinion polls, 68 percent of the Greek public remained opposed to such a solution. Thus, Athens, probably in order to appease the emotional public, clarified that its aim was a compound name with a geographical connotation applicable erga omnes.159 In February 2008, the two sides met in Athens, under Nimetz, in what seemed promising talks, but after two weeks the UN mediator announced that the talks had not achieved their goal. Then Karamanlis stated unambiguously that ‘No solution means no invitation’ as far as accession to NATO was concerned,160 while the Greek public opinion hardened (81.7 percent against a compromise in general, 70.4 percent opposed a compound name that included the term Macedonia and 66.6 percent were against a dual-name formula).161 As the 2008 NATO Summit was approaching, the Greek Premier reiterated that ‘No solution means no invitation’.162 And with the Gruevski Government choosing not to seek conciliation with Athens,163 Greece embarked on a campaign to vilify Macedonia for its antiquization narrative164 and made sure to circulate to the NATO member states maps by nationalist groups based in Skopje depicting parts of Greece, including Thessaloniki, as part of a future ‘United Macedonia’. The outcome is well known: Greece did not give its consent to inviting

The ‘New Macedonian Question’ 127 Macedonia to join NATO (Bucharest NATO Summit Meeting, August 2008) even though Skopje, in its formal application, had made sure to use the UN appellation, fYROM.165 The Macedonians were shocked with the rejection and ‘Greece’s veto in Bucharest signalled the start of a new phase in Macedonia’s political development, marked by the surge of nationalism, creeping state capture by Gruevski and his entourage, and ultimately isolation from the West’.166 Now antiquization grew out of proportion, despite its implausibility. As Macedonian President Gjorge Ivanov pointed out, the ‘classical drive’ has its roots in ‘the frustration and depression felt after the NATO Summit in Bucharest’.167 As put by the Macedonian Albanian sociologist Jonuz Abdullai, the Greek rejection was a ‘grist to the mill of the government’s ethno-nationalist and populist agenda’168; the NATO rejection together with the delaying of EU accession (due to the Greek stance) fuelled ‘the deep-rooted nationalist agenda and authoritarian rule’ of the governing party that could present itself ‘as the sole defender of the identity and dignity of Macedonia’, thereby ‘promoting a policy of ethno-nationalism’ such as the one that had damaged the Balkans in the 1990s, embarking ‘on a controversial policy of giving citizens a false sense of identity while fomenting dangerous undercurrents that upset the delicate inter-ethnic co-existence’.169 Another shock for the Macedonians was to come with EU membership. Macedonia had officially applied for membership on 22 March 2004, and in December of the same year the European Council granted candidate country status, but when the European Commission recommended the start of accession negotiations in October 2009, Athens vetoed it in the European Council, given Skopje’s inflexibility on the name issue.170 What was more than clear was that EU as well as NATO accession could only be achieved following a settlement with Greece regarding the name. Another aspect of antiquization that did little to enhance Macedonia’s credentials vis-à-vis its rival came in 2010, with the launching of the ‘Skopje 2014 project’,171 which meant spending, in the midst of the global financial crisis, of ‘vast amounts of the state budget on “cultural elevation” by erecting sculptures’ (the central piece is a monument of Alexander the Great, over 35 metres in height), ‘constructing monumental buildings and undertaking archaeological excavations in which the Macedonian continuity from antiquity has the central place’ (see Chapter 9).172 The project attracted sharp criticism and ridicule from opposition parties, nongovernmental organizations, and civic groups and antagonized the ethnic Albanians.173 This Disneyland ‘architectural extravaganza’174 left Macedonia with one of the worst economies and highest unemployment rates in Europe.175 However, antiquization that had infuriated the Greeks proved for Athens a blessing in disguise, because from 2008 until 2016 Greece was off the hook despite its ongoing veto on Macedonia’s quest for integration in the Euro-Atlantic structures. Antiquization was frowned upon internationally, with EU diplomats in particular very critical.176 As acknowledged by Macedonian commentators, antiquization ‘only strengthened the Greek arguments on irredentist aspirations’ and weakened the Macedonian position making their ‘case more difficult

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to advocate’.177 And it ‘undermined friends of Macedonia who have previously sought to defend the country against the Greeks’.178 Moreover, antiquization was coupled with increased inflexibility on the name issue. Gruevski’s strong political position in Macedonia made him stubborn and more inflexible with his ‘red lines’ now including the following: no change whatsoever in the Constitution, ‘no use of the imposed name in the internal affairs’, and ‘consultation with the electorate through a mandatory referendum’, all of which ‘made an agreement with Athens all but impossible’,179 with Skopje clearly to blame for the impasse. Reverting to the aftermath of the 2008 Bucharest decision, Macedonia resorted to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) for it obviously had a very good case of Greece having violated the Interim Accord. The Greek defence at the ICJ was by all accounts admirable, providing a list of nine ingenuous arguments, but it could not achieve the impossible, since Greece’s breach of the Interim Accord was flagrant.180 The ICJ rightly vindicated Macedonia and found Greece on the wrong, with fifteen votes to one by the international judges (the lone vote was by the Greek ad hoc judge).181 However, the Court did not regard it necessary to call upon the defendant (Greece) to abstain in the future from such an action, as had been requested by the demandeur. This lack of mention was done on the basis of the following according to the ICJ: ‘As a general rule, there is no reason to suppose that a State whose act or conduct has been declared wrongful by the Court will repeat that act or conduct in the future, since its good faith must be presumed’.182 Clearly Macedonia had won ‘a moral victory’, but this did nothing to change the Greek position.183 Thus, for Skopje it was rather a Pyrrhic victory and had no impact on NATO’s position until the signing of the Prespa Agreement in 2018 (see Chapter 12).184 However, in the years 2010–2011 and in spite of Gruevski’s antics, Greek Prime Minister George Papandreou had a number of secret meetings with him so as to reach a solution185 and entrusted a close adviser to discuss the matter with a representative of Gruevski. But the Macedonians were in no mood for a compromise, coming up with non-compound names, such as ‘Independent Republic of Macedonia’, ‘Constitutional Republic of Macedonia’ or ‘Democratic Republic of Macedonia’,186 clearly a charade. In 2010–2011, Greece seemed to favour a qualifier that would include the Vardar River, such as ‘Vardar Macedonia’. In April 2013, Nimetz reverted to ‘Upper Macedonia’, with Greece toying with ‘Slavic-Albanian Macedonia’. And the talks continued in New York between the Greek and Macedonian chief negotiators, ambassadors Adamantios Vassilakis and Vasko Naumovski under UN auspices (Nimetz). The standard Greek position from the mid-2000s until late 2017 was that ‘the resolution of the name issue’ is ‘a prerequisite for the opening of accession negotiations’ between the EU and the fYROM, accession to NATO and ‘as a criterion for the maintaining of good neighbourly relations with Greece’.187 In 2015 when SYRIZA (Coalition of the Radical Left) won the Greek elections, there were contacts with the Gruevski Government by Greek foreign minister Nicos Kotzias, despite the outcry of the opposition. The two sides signed an agreement on ‘Strengthening Mutual Confidence and Bilateral Relations’, on a wide range of areas of low politics, such cooperation between universities, the police force, the fire brigades and constructing a gas pipeline.188

The ‘New Macedonian Question’ 129 Table 6.1 List of names proposed New Macedonia New Republic of Macedonia Republic of New Macedonia Nova Makedonija Novomakedonija Novomacedonian Republic Novomakedonska Republika Republic of Nova Makedonija Republika Nova Makedonija .... North Macedonia Northern Macedonia Republic of North Macedonia Republic of Northern Macedonia Northern Macedonian Republic Severna Makedonija Republika Severna Makedonija .... Upper Macedonia Republic of Upper Macedonia Upper Republic of Macedonia Gorna Makedonija Republika Gorna Makedonija Outer Macedonia ... Vardar Macedonia Republic of Macedonia of Vardar Republic of Vardar Macedonia Vardar Republic of Macedonia Republic of Macedonia (Vardar) Macedonian Republic of Vardar Republika Vardarska Makedonija Vardarska Makedonija189 ... (Continued)

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Table 6.1 (Continued) Macedonia (Skopje) Republic of Macedonia-Skopje Republic of Macedonia (Skopje) Republika Makedonija-Skopje Republika Makedonija (Skopje) Makedonija (Skopje) Macedonian Republic Skopje .... Slavo-Macedonia190 Slavomacedonia Slavomakedonija ... Makedonija191 Republika Makedonija ... Slavic-Albanian Macedonia Slav-Albanian Republic of Macedonia Central Balkan Republic of Macedonia ... Republic of Ilinden Macedonia192 Ilindenska Republika Makedonija ... Constitutional Republic of Macedonia193 Democratic Republic of Macedonia Independent Republic of Macedonia

To conclude, there was hardly a lack of ideas regarding a possible logical compound name. Almost 50 such names had been suggested from the Pineiro Package onwards (see Table 6.1). But what was lacking was the lack of political will by both sides or by one of them, depending on the period involved, above all due to the fear of the internal political cost of being seen as selling-out on a vital ‘national issue’, which in the case of the Macedonians was even more acute given that it centred on their very name, implying that their prized national identity was at stake. The more than obvious split-the-difference solution took so long to be sealed, although it could have been settled early, in 1992 or 1993 (had it not been for Greece’s striking posture) and would have spared both parties 27 years of arid diplomacy, populism, jingoism and frustration. In any event by the second decade

The ‘New Macedonian Question’ 131 of the twenty-first century over 140 member states of the United Nations (142 until 2018) had recognized Macedonia with its constitutional name (Republic of Macedonia), to the chagrin of Greece.

Notes 1 Dimitris Livanios, The Macedonian Question: Britain and the Southern Balkans 1939–1949 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008), 192. 2 Ibid. 3 Evangelos Kofos, ‘Greece and the Balkans in the ‘70s and ‘80’s’, Center for Soviet and Southeast European Studies, No. 3, Hellenic Foundation for Defense and Foreign Policy (Athens, 1991), 8. 4 Yiorgos Kalpadakis, To Makedoniko Zitima (1962–1995): apo ti siopi sti laiki diplomatia [The Macedonian Question (1962–1995): From Silence to Popular Diplomacy] (Athens: Ekdoseis Kastanioti, 2011), 31–5. 5 Evangelos Kofos, ‘The Macedonian Name Controversy. Texts and Commentaries’, Südosteuropa, 58 (2010), 417–9. 6 Kalpadakis, To Makedoniko Zitima (1962–1995), 167–74. 7 James Pettifer, ‘The New Macedonian Question’, in James Pettifer (ed.), The New Macedonian Question (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1999). 8 Kofos, ‘Greece and the Balkans in the ‘70s and ‘80’s’, 12; Kalpadakis, To Makedoniko Zitima (1962–1995), 177–8. 9 Takis Michas, Unholy Alliance: Greece and Milošević’s Serbia (College Station: Texas A&M University Press, 2002), 45. 10 In ibid. 11 Duncan M. Perry, ‘The Macedonian Question: An Update’, in Benjamin Stolz (ed.), Studies in Macedonian Language, Literature and Culture: Proceedings of the First North American-Macedonian Conference on Macedonian Studies, Ann Arbor, 1991 (Ann Arbor: Michigan Slavic Studies, 1995), 151–2. 12 Alice Ackerman, Making Peace Prevail: Preventing Violent Conflict in Macedonia (Syracuse: Syracuse University Press, 1999), 57. 13 Andrew Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians: A History (Stanford: Hoover Institution Press, 2008), 262–3; Ackerman, Making Peace Prevail, 57–8. 14 Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 263. 15 Ackerman, Making Peace Prevail, 58. 16 Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 264–5; John Shea, Macedonia and Greece: The Struggle to Define a New Balkan Nation (Jefferson: McFarland and Company, 2008) [1997], 215. 17 R.J. Crampton, The Balkans since the Second World War (London: Pearson Education Limited, Longman, 2002), 246. 18 Ibid. 19 Ackerman, Making Peace Prevail, 58. 20 Dimitar Bechev, Historical Dictionary of North Macedonia, Second Edition (Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield, 2019), 20. 21 Todor Chepreganov, ‘Independent Republic of Macedonia’, in Todor Chepreganov (ed.), History of the Macedonian People (Skopje: Institute of National History, 2008), 324. 22 Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 266. 23 Ulf Brunnbauer, ‘Historiography, Myths and the Nation in the Republic of Macedonia’, in Ulf Brunnbauer (ed.), (Re)Writing History-Historiography in Southeast Europe after Socialism (Berlin: LIT, 2004), 168. 24 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1991_Macedonian_independence_referendum. Based on Dieter Nohlen and Philip Stöver, Elections in Europe: a data handbook (2010). 25 Kiro Gligorov, Apomnimonevmata [Memoirs] (Athens: Courier Ekdotiki, 2001) [2000], 123.

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26 See above note 24. 27 Ackerman, Making Peace Prevail, 59. 28 Brunnbauer, ‘Historiography, Myths and the Nation in the Republic of Macedonia’, 168 fn 9. 29 From the Greek translation, in Yiannis Valinakis and Sotiris Dalis (eds), To zitima ton Skopion: apopires anagnorisis kai i elliniki stasi. Episima keimena 1990–1996 [The Issue of Skopje: Attempts at Recognition and the Greece Stance. Official Documents 1990–1996] (Athens: ELIAMEP, I. Sideris, 1996), 41–2. 30 Gligorov, Apomnimonevmata, 124. 31 Valinakis and Dalis (eds), To zitima ton Skopion, 39–43; Gligorov, Apomnimonevmata, 124. 32 Gligorov, Apomnimonevmata, 126–8. 33 Comments by Kofos, in Valinakis and Dalis (eds), To zitima ton Skopion, 48–9. 34 Kofos’s assessment was partly due to the fact that he had detected, in the late 1980s, a hardening of positions on the part of Skopje, with Greece together with Albania branded as the ‘the enemies of the Macedonian people’. See Kofos, ‘Greece and the Balkans in the ‘70s and ‘80’s’, 11. 35 Alexis Heraclides, To Makedoniko Zitima, 1878–2018: apo tis ethnikes diekdikiseis stis syngrousiakes ethnikes taftotites [The Macedonian Question, 1878–2018: From National Claims to Conflicting National Identities] (Athens: Themelio, 2018), 168. 36 Cited in Alexis Heraclides, Security and Co-operation in Europe: The Human Dimension, 1972–1992 (London: Frank Cass, 1993), 24. 37 Victor Roudometof, ‘Nationalism and Identity Politics in the Balkans: Greece and the Macedonian Question’, Journal of Modern Greek Studies, 14:2 (1996), 258. 38 Denko Maleski, ‘On Nationalism, Identity and the Foreign Policy of Macedonia’, New Balkan Politics, 14 (2013), 24. 39 Zhidas Daskalovski, ‘Clashing Historical Narratives and the Macedonian Name Dispute–Solving the Unsolvable’, Trames Journal of the Humanities and Social Sciences, 21:4 (2017), 328. 40 Hristijan Ivanovski, ‘The Macedonia-Greece Dispute/Difference over the Name Issue: Mitigating the Inherently Unsolvable’, New Balkan Politics, 14 (2013), 49. 41 Marc Weller, ‘The International Response to the Dissolution of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia’, American Journal of International Law, 86:3 (1992), 593; Thanos Veremis, ‘Greece and the Balkans in the Post-Cold War Era’, in Van Coufoudakis, Harry J. Psomiades and Andre Gerolymatos (eds), Greece and the New Balkans: Challenges and Opportunities (New York: Pella Publishing Company, Inc., 1999), 34. 42 Stefan Troebst, ‘IMRO+100=FYROM? The Politics of Macedonian Historiography’, in James Pettifer (ed.), The New Macedonian Question (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1999), 65. 43 Ibid., 62. 44 Ibid. 45 Duncan M. Perry, ‘Macedonia: Balkan Miracle or Balkan Disaster?’ Current History, 95 (1996), 114. 46 Gligorov, Apomnimonevmata, 126. 47 Gabriel Munuera, ‘Preventing Armed Conflict in Europe: Lessons from Recent Experience’, Chaillot Papers, 25/16 (June 1994), Paris: Institute for Security Studies, 51. 48 In Biljana Vankovska, ‘David vs. Goliath: The Macedonian Position(s) in the Socalled “Name Dispute” with Greece’, Südosteuropa, 58 (2010), 449. 49 As had been put in the early 1960s by foreign minister Averoff to journalist Stoyan Pribichevich. See Stoyan Pribichevich, Macedonia: Its People and History (University Park: Pennsylvania State University, 1982), 238. 50 Konstantinos Mitsotakis, ‘Prologos’ [Prologue], in Theodoros Skylakakis (ed.), Sto onoma tis Makedonias [In the Name of Macedonia] (Athens: Euroekdotiki, 1995), 3. 51 Christos Rozakis, ‘I krisi sti Yugoslavia’ [The Crisis in Yugoslavia], in Thanos Veremis (ed.), Valkania: apo ton dipolismo sti nea epohi [The Balkans: From Bipolarity to the

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52 53 54 55

56 57

58 59

60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72

73 74

New Era] (Athens: Ekdoseis ‘Gnosi’, 1994), 48; Thanos Veremis, Greece’s Balkan Entanglement (Athens: ELIAMEP, 1995), 69; Theodoros Skylakakis, Sto onoma tis Makedonias, 48–9. Kalpadakis, To Makedoniko Zitima (1962–1995), 181. Quoted in Kofos, ‘The Macedonian Name Controversy’, 414. Ibid., 415. Evangelos Kofos, ‘The Unresolved “Difference over the Name”: A Greek Perspective’, in Evangelos Kofos and Vlasis Vlasidis (eds), Athens-Skopje: An Uneasy Symbiosis (1995–2002) (Athens: ELIAMEP, 2005), 127; Veremis, ‘Greece and the Balkans in the Post-Cold War Era’, 346; Weller, ‘The International Response to the Dissolution of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia’, 588. Rozakis, ‘I krisi sti Yugoslavia’, 49–50; Veremis, ‘Greece and the Balkans in the PostCold War Era’, 36. Rozakis, ‘I krisi sti Yugoslavia’, 49; Skylakakis, Sto onoma tis Makedonias, 63–4; Neophytos Loizides, ‘Trapped in Nationalism? Symbolic Politics in Greece and the Macedonian Question’, in Neophytos Loizides, The Politics of Majority Nationalism: Framing Peace, Stalemates, and Crises (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2015), 63. Shea, Macedonia and Greece, 217–8. Athina Skoulariki, ‘O dimosios logos gia to ethnos me aformi to Makedoniko (1991– 1995)’ [The Public Discourse on the Nation Prompted by the Macedonian Question (1991–1995)], in Maria Kontochristou (ed.), Taftotita kai MME sti sygchroni Ellada [Identity and Mass Media in Contemporary Greece] (Athens: Ekdoseis Papazisi, 2007), 69. Valinakis and Dalis (eds), To zitima ton Skopion, 63–4, 72–82; Kofos, ‘The Unresolved “Difference over the Name” ’, 128–9. Weller, ‘The International Response to the Dissolution of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia’, 589–96. Matthew C.R. Craven, ‘What’s in a Name? The Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia and Issues of Statehood’, Australian Yearbook of International Law, 16 (1995), 230–3. Quoted in Weller, ‘The International Response to the Dissolution of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia’, 594. Craven, ‘What’s in a Name?’, 204. Skylakakis, Sto onoma tis Makedonias, 70–1. Loizides, ‘Trapped in Nationalism?’, 63. Weller, ‘The International Response to the Dissolution of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia’, 594. Chepreganov, ‘Independent Republic of Macedonia’, 325. Skylakakis, Sto onoma tis Makedonias, 70–1; Rozakis, ‘I krisi sti Yugoslavia’, 50–1; Munuera, ‘Preventing Armed Conflict in Europe’, 50–1. Alexandros G. Tarkas, Athina-Skopje: piso apo tis kleistes portes [Athens-Skopje: Behind Closed Doors] (Athens: Labyrinthos, 1995), vol. A, 135–6, 146; Michas, Unholy Alliance, 47–55; Kalpadakis, To Makedoniko Zitima (1962–1995), 182, 187. Tarkas, Athina-Skopje, vol. A, 34–6. For an English version of the extract from Tarkas’s book, see Michas, Unholy Alliance, 49. Nikolaos Zahariadis, ‘Nationalism and Small-State Foreign Policy: The Greek Response to the Macedonian Issue’, Political Science Quarterly, 109 (1994), 663; Roudometof, ‘Nationalism and Identity Politics in the Balkans’, 259; Loizides, ‘Trapped in Nationalism?’, 41; Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 270–1. According to yet another rumour, that was circulated by Bulgaria, shortly after the declaration of independence of Macedonia, ‘President Zhelev of Bulgaria had scuppered a GreekSerbian plan for a Greek-Serbian-Bulgarian partition of Macedonia’. See Crampton, The Balkans since the Second World War, 296. I thank Denko Maleski for this valuable information. Rozakis, ‘I krisi sti Yugoslavia’, 51; Mihalis Papaconstantinou, To imerologio enos politikou: i embloki ton Skopion [The Diary of a Politician: The Skopje Embroilment]

134

75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85

86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94

95 96 97

98 99

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(Athens: Estia,1994), 31; Evangelos Kofos, ‘Greece’s Macedonian Adventure: The Controversy over FYROM’s Independence and Recognition’, in Coufoudakis, Psomiades and Gerolymatos (eds), Greece and the New Balkans: Challenges and Opportunities (New York: Pella Publishing Company, Inc., 1999), 390. Kofos, ‘Greece’s Macedonian Adventure’, 387. Eric Sjöberg, Battlefields of Memory: The Macedonian Conflict and Greek Historical Culture, Doctoral dissertation, Umeå University (Studies in History and Education 6, 2011), 67–70; Skylakakis, Sto onoma tis Makedonias, 86. In Aristotle Tziampiris, ‘The Macedonian Name Dispute and European Union Accession’, Southeast European and Black Sea Studies, 12:1 (2012), 154. Skylakakis, Sto onoma tis Makedonias, 83–152; Skoulariki, ‘O dimosios logos gia to ethnos me aformi to Makedoniko’, 69–70. Veremis, Greece’s Balkan Entanglement, 76–7; Sjöberg, Battlefields of Memory, 69–70. Loizides, ‘Trapped in Nationalism?’, 41–2. Kalpadakis, To Makedoniko Zitima (1962–1995), 183. According to Maleski, the Portuguese presidency did not come forward with any initiative but sent them confusing messages. I thank Maleski for this information. Kofos, ‘The Macedonian Name Controversy’, 424. Valinakis and Dalis (eds), To zitima ton Skopion, 87–90; Kofos, ‘The Unresolved “Difference over the Name” ’, 134. Skylakakis, Sto onoma tis Makedonias, 121–2. Evangelos Kofos, ‘Greek Policy Considerations over FYROM Independence and Recognition’, in James Pettifer (ed.), The New Macedonian Question (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1999), 239; Veremis, ‘Greece and the Balkans in the Post-Cold War Era’, 36–7; Nikolaos Zahariadis, ‘Greek Policy toward the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, 1991–1995’, Journal of Modern Greek Studies, 14:2 (1996), 311. Skylakakis, Sto onoma tis Makedonias, 120; Kofos, ‘Greek Policy Considerations over FYROM Independence and Recognition’, 239; Veremis, ‘Greece and the Balkans in the Post-Cold War Era’, 37 and 37, fn. 15. Quoted in Weller, ‘The International Response to the Dissolution of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia’, 594. Ibid. Quoted in Kofos, ‘The Macedonian Name Controversy’, 420. Kalpadakis, To Makedoniko Zitima (1962–1995), 196. Kofos, ‘The Macedonian Name Controversy’, 420. Ibid. Kalpadakis, To Makedoniko Zitima (1962–1995), 197. Loizides, ‘Trapped in Nationalism?’, 63. See on this geopolitical gift aspect also Skylakakis, Sto onoma tis Makedonias, 33. What is implied is that if Macedonia is not an independent state, basically a ‘buffer state’ as far as Greece is concerned, its dissolution would lead to a Greater Bulgaria, Greater Albania or even Greater Serbia, all three prospects disadvantageous to Greece. Kofos, ‘Greek Policy Considerations over FYROM Independence and Recognition’, 242; Zahariadis, ‘Greek Policy toward the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia’, 314–5; Veremis, ‘Greece and the Balkans in the Post-Cold War Era’, 37. Mitsotakis, ‘Prologos’, 5. Karamanlis had seen his home village in Macedonia (near Serres), three times in his lifetime occupied by the Bulgarians (in 1912, 1915–1918 and 1941–1944), as he told the next Greek foreign minister, Mihalis Papaconstantinou. Based on discussions I had with Papaconstantinou in the late 1990s, who told me that whenever he mentioned ‘Slav-Macedonians’ to the President, he retorted ‘no Bulgarians’. Rozakis, ‘I krisi sti Yugoslavia’, 57–8; Gligorov, Apomnimonevmata, 132, 275. Craven, ‘What’s in a Name?’, 205.

The ‘New Macedonian Question’ 135 100 Ibid. 101 Veremis, Greece’s Balkan Entanglement, 83–4. See in particular Papaconstantinou, To imerologio enos politikou. 102 Munuera, ‘Preventing Armed Conflict in Europe’, 52; Ackerman, Making Peace Prevail, 84. 103 Ackerman, Making Peace Prevail, 114. 104 Ibid., 114–5, 119–22; Munuera, ‘Preventing Armed Conflict in Europe’, 52; Chepreganov, ‘Independent Republic of Macedonia’, 326–8. 105 And Maleski remembers that ‘we all laughed at my comment that our voices would be better heard if we all shouted for help. In fact, we were desperate and helpless’. I thank Denko Maleski for this information. 106 Rozakis, ‘I krisi sti Yugoslavia’, 55–7; Valinakis and Dalis (eds), To zitima ton Skopion, 111–22. 107 Aristotle Tziampiris, ‘The Name Dispute in the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia after the Signing of the Interim Accord’, in Evangelos Kofos and Vlasis Vlasidis (eds), Athens-Skopje: An Uneasy Symbiosis (1995–2002) (Athens: ELIAMEP, 2005), 227. 108 According to Maleski, whom I thank. 109 Papaconstantinou, To imerologio enos politikou, 205–6. 110 Kofos, ‘The Macedonian Name Controversy’, 425. 111 Veremis, ‘Greece and the Balkans in the Post-Cold War Era’, 38. 112 Gligorov, Apomnimonevmata, 242–4. 113 Matthew Nimetz, ‘The Macedonian “Name” Dispute: The Macedonian Question– Resolved?’, Nationalities Papers, 48 (2000), 207. 114 Craven, ‘What’s in a Name?’, 206. 115 Quoted in Kofos, ‘The Unresolved “Difference over the Name” ’, 126. 116 Ackerman, Making Peace Prevail, 123; Chepreganov, ‘Independent Republic of Macedonia’, 329. See also https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macedonia_naming_dispute 117 See previous note. 118 Kofos, ‘Greek Policy Considerations over FYROM Independence and Recognition’, 240. 119 Papaconstantinou, To imerologio enos politikou, 386–7. 120 Valinakis and Dalis (eds), To zitima ton Skopion, 169; Veremis, ‘Greece and the Balkans in the Post-Cold War Era’, 39; Kofos, ‘The Unresolved “Difference over the Name” ’, 135; Tziampiris, ‘The Macedonian Name Dispute and European Union Accession’, 155. 121 Kofos, ‘Greece’s Macedonian Adventure’, 373; Ackerman, Making Peace Prevail, 124. 122 Papaconstantinou, To imerologio enos politikou, 405. See also Veremis, ‘Greece and the Balkans in the Post-Cold War Era’, 40. 123 Veremis, Greece’s Balkan Entanglement, 84–5. 124 Gligorov, Apomnimonevmata, 302–4. 125 Valinakis and Dalis (eds), To zitima ton Skopion, 169. 126 Gligorov, Apomnimonevmata, 363; Shea, Macedonia and Greece, 218–20, 284–99. 127 Ackerman, Making Peace Prevail, 74. 128 Duncan M. Perry, ‘On the Road to Stability–Or Destruction?’, Transition (25 August 1995), 44–5. 129 Roudometof, ‘Nationalism and Identity Politics in the Balkans’, 262; Zahariadis, ‘Nationalism and Small-State Foreign Policy’, 665; Ackerman, Making Peace Prevail, 123–4; Munuera, ‘Preventing Armed Conflict in Europe’, 54. 130 Veremis, Greece’s Balkan Entanglement, 91–2; Zahariadis, ‘Greek Policy toward the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, 319. 131 Kofos, ‘Greek Policy Considerations over FYROM Independence and Recognition’, 246. 132 Ibid., 245.

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133 Veremis, ‘Greece and the Balkans in the Post-Cold War Era’, 43; Ackerman, Making Peace Prevail, 123–4. 134 Gligorov, Apomnimonevmata, 307. 135 Veremis, ‘Greece and the Balkans in the Post-Cold War Era’, 44; Kofos, ‘Greek Policy Considerations over FYROM Independence and Recognition’, 245. 136 Kalpadakis, To Makedoniko Zitima (1962–1995), 217–19; Gligorov, Apomnimonevmata, 308–9; Ackerman, Making Peace Prevail, 124–5. 137 Shea, Macedonia and Greece, 305. 138 Valinakis and Dalis (eds), To zitima ton Skopion, 361–70; Kofos, ‘Greece’s Macedonian Adventure’, 382–3; Gligorov, Apomnimonevmata, 324–9; Shea, Macedonia and Greece, 305–6; Ackerman, Making Peace Prevail, 127. 139 Kofos, ‘The Unresolved “Difference over the Name” ’, 125; Tziampiris, ‘The Name Dispute in the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia after the Signing of the Interim Accord’, 226; Shea, Macedonia and Greece, 307–10. 140 Veremis, ‘Greece and the Balkans in the Post-Cold War Era’, 45. 141 Tziampiris, ‘The Macedonian Name Dispute and European Union Accession’, 155. 142 Ibid., 155–6. 143 Kofos, ‘The Unresolved “Difference over the Name” ’, 149. 144 In Tziampiris, ‘The Name Dispute in the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia after the Signing of the Interim Accord’, 234. See also Gligorov, Apomnimonevmata, 318–19, 327–8. 145 Kofos, ‘The Unresolved “Difference over the Name” ’, 150, 157–9. 146 Bechev, Historical Dictionary of North Macedonia, 215. 147 Gorna literary means ‘mountainous’ in Macedonian, but in this context ‘Upper’ is more appropriate. 148 Costas Simitis, Politiki gia mia dimiourgiki Ellada, 1996–2004 [Politics for a Creative Greece, 1996–2004] (Athens: Polis, 2005), 152–3; Kofos, ‘The Unresolved “Difference over the Name” ’, 164–70; Marilena Koppa, ‘PYD Makedonias: i dyskolies den teliosan akomi . . .’ [FYR Macedonia: The Difficulties Have Not Yet Ended . . .], in Ioannis Armakolas and Thanos P. Dokos (eds), Apo ta Valkania sti Notioanatoliki Evropi [From the Balkans to Southeastern Europe] (Athens: I. Sideris, 2010), 122. 149 International Crisis Group, ‘Macedonia’s Name: Why the Dispute Matters and How to Resolve It’ (Brussels: ICG, 2001), 15. 150 Tziampiris, ‘The Macedonian Name Dispute and European Union Accession’, 158. 151 Ibid. 152 Bechev, Historical Dictionary of North Macedonia, 215. 153 Vankovska, ‘David vs. Goliat’, 454. 154 Tziampiris, ‘The Macedonian Name Dispute and European Union Accession’, 158. 155 The term was concocted by its critics in Macedonia. 156 Ivanovski, ‘The Macedonia-Greece Dispute/Difference over the Name Issue’, 50. 157 Tziampiris, ‘The Macedonian Name Dispute and European Union Accession’, 160. 158 Koppa, ‘PYD Makedonias’, 122. 159 Tziampiris, ‘The Macedonian Name Dispute and European Union Accession’, 160. 160 In ibid. 161 Ibid., 161. 162 Tziampiris, ‘The Macedonian Name Dispute and European Union Accession’, 161. 163 Bechev, Historical Dictionary of North Macedonia, 215. 164 Ivanovski, ‘The Macedonia-Greece Dispute/Difference over the Name Issue’, 51. 165 Francesco Messineo, ‘Maps of Ephemeral Empires: The ICJ and the Macedonian Name Dispute’, Cambridge Journal of International and Comparative Law, 1:1 (2012), 176–7. 166 Bechev, Historical Dictionary of North Macedonia, 24. 167 Quoted in Anastas Vangeli, ‘Nation-Building Ancient Macedonian Style: The Origins and the Effects of the So-Called Antiquization in Macedonia’, Nationalities Papers,

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168

169 170 171

172

173 174 175 176 177 178 179 180 181 182 183 184 185 186 187 188 189 190

39:1 (2011)’, 18. See also Ivanovski, ‘The Macedonia-Greece Dispute/Difference over the Name Issue’, 59. Jonuz Abdullai, ‘The Political Crisis in Macedonia and the Relations with Its Neighbors’, in Ali Pajaziti et al. (eds), The Balkans in the New Millennium: From Balkanization to Eutopia (Tetovo-Skopje: Balkan Sociological Forum, 2015), 48. See also Biljana Vankovska, ‘Geopolitics of the Prespa Agreement: Background and AfterEffects’, Journal of Balkan and Near Eastern Studies, 22:3 (2020), 6. Abdullai, ‘The Political Crisis in Macedonia and the Relations with Its Neighbors’, 52. Bechev, Historical Dictionary of North Macedonia, 24, 110. Arianna Piacentini, ‘Make Macedonia Great Again! The New Face of Skopje and the Macedonians’ Identity Dilemma’, in Evinç Doğan (ed.), Reinventing Eastern Europe: Imaginaries, Identities and Transformations (London: Transnational Press, 2019), 77–94; Athena Skoulariki, ‘Skopje 2014: Antiquisation, Urban Identity and the Rejection of Balkan Otherness’, in Aikaterini S. Markou and Meglena Zlatkova (eds), Post-Urbanities, Cultural Reconsiderations and Tourism in the Balkans (Athens: Hêrodotos, 2020), 225–53. Anastas Vangeli, ‘Quest for the Glorious Past Reconsidered: Alexander the Great between Greece, Macedonia and the Liberal-Democratic Perspectives’, 15th Annual ASN World Convention ‘Nation and States: On the Map and in the Mind’, Columbia University, New York (15–17 April 2010), 12. Bechev, Historical Dictionary of North Macedonia, 24. Sašo Ordanoski, ‘The Story of Macedonian Populism: “All We Want Is Everything!” ’, in Jacques Rupnik (ed.), The Western Balkans and the EU: “The Hour of Europe” ’, Chaillot Papers, June 2011 (European Union, Institute of Security Studies), 100. Abdullai, ‘The Political Crisis in Macedonia and the Relations with Its Neighbors’, 46. Boris Georgievski, ‘Ghosts of the Past Endanger Macedonia’s Future’, Balkan Insight, 27 (October 2009). Bojan Maracik, in Bozan Maracik and Ioannis Armakolas, ‘Perspectives on the Skopje-Athens Dialogue’, Political Trends & Dynamics in Southeast Europe, Friedrich Ebert Stiftung (August/September 2018), 6. Abdullai, ‘The Political Crisis in Macedonia and the Relations with Its Neighbors’, 50–1. Vankovska, ‘Geopolitics of the Prespa Agreement’, 10. Messineo, ‘Maps of Ephemeral Empires’, 178–80. Ivanovski, ‘The Macedonia-Greece Dispute/Difference over the Name Issue’, 51. International Court of Justice, Reports of Judgments, Advisory Opinions and Orders Application of the Interim Accord of 13 September 1995 (The Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia v. Greece). Judgment of 5 December 2011, 52–3. Abdullai, ‘The Political Crisis in Macedonia and the Relations with Its Neighbors’, 51–2. Vankovska, ‘Geopolitics of the Prespa Agreement’, 10. Matthew Nimetz, ‘The Macedonian “Name” Dispute: The Macedonian Question– Resolved?’, Nationalities Papers, 48 (2020), 209. Based on the information I gathered from the participants on the basis of non-attribution. Ioannis Armakolas and Giorgos Triantafyllou, ‘Greece and EU Enlargement to the Western Balkans: Understanding an Ambivalent Relationship’, South East European and Black Sea Studies, 17:4 (2017), 8. Ibid., 9; Nicos Kotzias and Serafim Kotrotsos, I megali diapragmatefsi: Prespes [The Great Negotiation: Prespes] (Athens: Ekdoseis Pataki, 2019), 164–5. This appellation had been suggested by Kofos; see Kofos, ‘The Macedonian Name Controversy’, 434. This and its two following versions were a standard Greek position, which was discussed by Greek officials as early as the 1980s, but was unacceptable to both the Macedonians and Albanians of Macedonia (see the end of Chapter 11).

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191 Suggested by the International Crisis Group in its 2001 Report, see International Crisis Group, ‘Macedonia’s Name’, III, 20. 192 The last two appellations were suggested by Skopje in the course of the successful Greek-Macedonian negotiations in May 2018 (see Chapter 12). 193 The last three do not fit the compound name desiderata, but are mentioned simply because they were proposed by Nimetz and in particular by the Gruevski Government.

7

Bulgaria’s stance towards Macedonia

For Greece the dispute with Macedonia and the non-acceptance of Macedonia and the Macedonians under their chosen name was widely known internationally and very difficult to resolve (with the majority of Greeks still against the agreement reached). But it is Bulgaria’s lesser known quarrel with Macedonia and its denial of the Macedonians which is by its nature even more existential and intractable. Sofia’s stance is unflinching since the mid-1950s, namely that the ‘Macedonians’ are non-existent as a nation; those claiming to be Macedonians ‘are in reality Bulgarians’, as for their language, ‘Macedonian’, it is a western Bulgarian dialect, easily intelligible to all Bulgarians.1 In February 1990, prior to the independence of Macedonia, the spokespersons of all the main Bulgarian political parties, ‘stressed that there was no “Macedonian Question” and that Macedonians were Bulgarians’.2 Yet despite Macedonia’s ‘tangled relationship with Bulgaria’,3 with its wellknown historical roots, Bulgaria was the first state to recognize Macedonia (15 January 1992) and to recognize it under its official constitutional name (‘Republic of Macedonia’). As then pointed out by Prime Minister Philip Dimitrov, Bulgaria had a ‘historic responsibility’ to be the first country to recognize it.4 But a little later it was specified that Bulgaria did not recognize Macedonia as a separate nation with a distinct language.5 President Zhelyu Zelev made it clear that ‘Sofia recognized only the political formation named “Republic of Macedonia” and would never affirm the existence of a Macedonian nation or language’.6 And in an interview to Süddeutsche Zeitung, the anti-communist president (and former dissident) stated that the nation in question had been artificially created by the Comintern for specific political reasons.7 According to the ‘canonical’ view in Sofia, the Macedonian nation is ‘artificially created’ and so is the language ‘created by political fiat: it is in fact a Bulgarian “dialect,” modified through a politically motivated “Serbification” ’.8 The Macedonians are called upon to recognize the ‘historical fact’ that ‘the Slavs of Macedonia have always been Bulgarians’ and that today’s ‘ethnic Macedonians’ are ‘their descendants’.9 As put by Zelev10: We have a common history. A common language, a common religion. . . . For the vast majority of Bulgarians, and for our historians, the idea has therefore

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Bulgaria’s stance towards Macedonia arisen that Macedonia is not a nation in its own right. But politically, we cannot all allow ourselves, to impose a national identity on the Macedonians. They have the right to choose for themselves – that is the most essential democratic right of the individual.

This is known in Bulgaria as the ‘state-yes, nation-no formula’ and the core of the Bulgarian-Macedonian controversy is known as the ‘language problem’.11 But Bulgaria made it clear from the beginning (in early 1992) that it had no territorial claims to Macedonia, a position upheld and shared by all the Bulgarian political parties.12 In practice, this boils down to two main questions: ‘Bulgaria’s refusal to acknowledge the existence of a separate Macedonian national language as well as a Macedonian minority in Pirin Macedonia’.13 In its more benign rendition the Bulgarian approach has been characterized as ‘romantic’ or ‘passionate’,14 a manifestation of ‘national historical romanticism’.15 But romantic or not, it amounts to a stark rejection and non-recognition of Macedonian national identity. From 1991 onwards, Bulgarian officials, historians and other scientists, as well as the Bulgarian mass media, have repeatedly made the point that the ‘so-called Macedonian nation’ and ‘Macedonian language’ are arbitrary constructions, artificially created by Tito, so as to retain Vardar Macedonia and not allow the most obvious and natural development: unification with the ‘Bulgarian motherland’.16 The situation has remained static though some practical solutions have been in found in managing more smoothly their bilateral relations. And in August 2017 what seemed to be a historic Treaty of Friendship was signed, which appeared to resolve or at least manage the issues that torment the two parties, but from 2019 onwards it became apparent that this was too good to be true (see Chapter 13). But let us start from the beginning, from 1948–1949.

Bulgaria’s attitude towards the Macedonians (1950–1989) The 1948 Tito-Stalin rift and Yugoslavia’s expulsion from the Cominform led Sofia to abandon its favourable position towards the Macedonians living in the region of Pirin (see Chapter 5), which had ‘seriously breached one of the cornerstones of Bulgarian nationalism, namely that the Macedonians are Bulgarians’.17 Bulgaria reverted to its older standard posture that the Macedonians do not exist as a separate nation. However, this switch was not immediate. Georgi Dimitrov, in the Fifth Conference of the BCP (1948), stated that the party continued to support the view that ‘Macedonia belongs to the Macedonians’, but that their national aspirations could be achieved within the framework of a South Slav federation. At official level the new policy of rejection, evolved gradually after Dimitrov’s death (July 1949) until the mid-1950s. In particular the recognition of cultural autonomy for Pirin Macedonia in 1947 (see Chapter 5) had become ‘a source of Bulgarian embarrassment’.18 Todor Zhivkov, the Bulgarian leader from March 1954 until 10 November 1989, stated in clear terms that the ‘Macedonians’ are Bulgarians, whether they lived in Yugoslavia or Bulgaria.19 The first refutation by a historian probably came in the aforementioned Fifth Conference of the BCP, on the part of Dino Kjosev, the historian of the communist

Bulgaria’s stance towards Macedonia 141 party, and was a sign of what was to come later. Kjosev pointed out that the VMORO and its leaders, and he named Delchev, Gruev and Sandanski, ‘the heroes of the glorious Ilinden uprising . . . never thought that the Macedonian liberation movement would be linked or subdued within the dogma of a Macedonian nation’, on the contrary ‘they felt Bulgarian’.20 In April 1956, the BCP Plenum withdraw its recognition of a Macedonian nationality21 and of the Macedonian ethnic group in its territory, although in December of the same year, in the census conducted, the presence of 187,789 ‘Macedonians’ in Bulgaria is recorded (in the 1960 census there is no reference to Macedonians).22 And in the early 1960s, there were a number of political trials of persons accused of activities related to Macedonian nationalism, with members of the Macedonian minority forcibly resettled in areas far from Pirin.23 In 1958, following the celebration of the 80th anniversary of the Treaty of San Stefano, with reference to the creation of Greater Bulgaria, which included most of Macedonia, an energetic Bulgarian propaganda picked up, ‘denying the existence of the Macedonian language, culture and nationality and reaffirming Bulgarian rights to Macedonia’.24 The Bulgarian Academy of Sciences for its part ‘instructed the Bulgarian historians to defend the “Bulgarian” history of Macedonia against “falsifications” by the Skopje historians’.25 Koliševski’s response to the Bulgarians was that the Bulgarians had ‘developed imperialist appetites, which the Serbs had abandoned’, and a booklet came out, titled Macedonian Reality and Foreign Aspirations (1958), which accused the leaders of the BCP of having ‘reactivated the old thesis of the Greater Bulgarian bourgeoisie that Macedonians are not Macedonians but Bulgars’.26 In 1963, Zhivkov stated that he accepted the establishment of the Socialist Republic of Macedonia, and the formation of ‘Macedonian national consciousness’ as ‘an objective fact’, but this was limited to Yugoslavian Macedonia and did not include part of Bulgaria. But he pointed out that it was deplorable that this new national consciousness was founded on an anti-Bulgarian, nationalistic and chauvinistic basis. On the other hand, he declared that the existing border was respected and no question of ‘minorities’ existed in the two countries.27 From the late 1950s until the fall of Zhivkov (November 1989) and the end of the Cold War, Bulgarian-Yugoslavian relations with Macedonia as the linchpin were tense, although there were several attempts to iron out their differences. Such initiatives focused mainly on the question of the respective national historical narratives, particularly in the years 1965–1967, when Krste Crvenkovski was leader of the Socialist Republic of Macedonia.28 In 1965 Tito visited Sofia and Zhivkov promised to return to Dimitrov’s approach on Pirin Macedonia and Macedonia, but nothing came out of it, and when Crvenkovski visited Sofia in 1967 he discovered that the positions of the two sides were irreconcilable.29 In the meantime, the Bulgarian historians were engaged in a restrained though all-out intellectual attack from the end of the 1950s onwards, presenting an array of evidence to prove the following: 1

In the Middle Ages, Macedonia did not exist as a political entity and the Macedonians were not a discernible linguistic or ethnic group. The First and

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2 3

4

5 6

7

8 9

Bulgaria’s stance towards Macedonia Second Bulgarian Empires were Bulgarian and that is how they were defined by the neighbouring Byzantines as well as by the leaders and inhabitants of the two Bulgarian empires. In the second part of the nineteenth century the Slav-speaking activists and fighters of geographical Macedonia assisted and participated in all the Bulgarian struggles for national liberation and national fulfillment. The Supreme Macedonian Committee as well as the VMORO was Bulgarian, and its leaders, with no exception, regarded themselves as Bulgarians (Macedonian Bulgarians) and their model and inspiration were the Bulgarian awakeners and activists of the Bulgarian Revival and of the 1876 April Uprising. The autonomy option on the part of the VMORO (and not union with Bulgaria) was a deliberate strategy so as to avoid the division of Macedonia into three or more parts, with only one part to be acquired by Bulgaria, its most legitimate claimant. The Ilinden Uprising was a Bulgarian uprising, as had been the case with the 1876 April Uprising. The Slav ‘Macedonians’ (both the VMORO and the people) had a Bulgarian national consciousness and were not oscillating among a Bulgarian, Serbian or Greek identity; they were not a ‘floating masse’ à la Cvijić, this was a devious Serbian ploy for obvious reasons. The ‘so-called Macedonian nation’ is an arbitrary invention of Tito and hence today’s ‘Macedonians’ are in fact Bulgarians (as they had been from the very beginning, as the Slav Bulgars of the Middle Ages), even though they do not accept this in view of decades of brainwashing by Titoist Yugoslavia. The ‘Macedonian language’ is a technical construction by Tito ex nihilo, from what were Bulgarian dialects, by adding arbitrarily and imperatively certain Serbian linguistic elements. No ‘Macedonian minority’ exists in Bulgaria and it would be nonsensical to say otherwise, and try to prove that a distinct non-Bulgarian minority exists within Bulgaria itself.

This Bulgarian incursion during the communist period was relatively milder and more contemplative by comparison to the onslaught that was to follow from 1990 onwards (see below). Moreover, scholarly international historiography would hardly disagree with the first five points, but the other four points and in particular the last three could (and can) convince only Bulgarians, especially Bulgarian nationalists and most Greek nationalists (actually the majority in both countries). Needless to say, the Macedonian historians, especially the nationalists, reject all nine points, but the most astute among them do accept the first four points and more grudgingly even the fifth one, regarding Ilinden (see Chapter 9), something also accepted by Misirkov in the very aftermath of Ilinden (see Chapter 4). For the Bulgarians the tragic events of their history related to Macedonia are two: the non-implementation of the San Stefano Treaty and the partition of 1913 with their country ending up with the smaller part of Macedonia, only some

Bulgaria’s stance towards Macedonia 143 10 percent, instead of a much larger chunk to which it was entitled to on the basis of percentage of the population. In particular, the 1913 division (confirmed again in 1919 at the Paris Peace Conference) is known in Bulgarian history and national narrative as the dismemberment (razpokîsvane) of Bulgaria,30 ‘a great injustice’ and ‘a national catastrophe’ (see Chapters 1 and 2).31 The turning point was the Second Conference of Bulgarian Historians, which was convened in January 1966. It was then that internationalism, the class struggle, class consciousness and other Marxist interpretations of history were abandoned, but for some superficial references. Marxist discourse was supplanted by a new discourse, that of nationalism as well as pan-Bulgarism.32 At the 1966 Conference, the party historian Venelin Kocev pointed out that Bulgarian historiography since 1945 was depersonalized, without an inkling of national identity and had unjustifiably neglected the grandeur of the Bulgarian Middle Ages, with its two empires, and had not given the Ilinden Uprising its due as a significant national Bulgarian event, known in Bulgarian historiography as the Ilinden-Preobraženie Uprising. Other participants in the Conference were more trenchant, such as Georgi Bokov and Pantelej Zarev, proposing the rewriting of Macedonian historiography, as regards Cyril and Methodius and the heroes of VMORO, of Delchev and the others. Angel Balevski, a distinguished inventor, who was then the President of the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences, referred to the considerable contribution of the Bulgarians and their sacrifices as defenders of civilization and Christianity against the encroaching Arabs, Tatars and Turks, thereby adding one more myth to the Bulgarian national historical narrative, that of the champions of civilization and Christendom.33 In the next years, Zhivkov made the point that Bulgarian historiography was unique in downgrading its heroic past and its glorious age, and announced that from now on in the country there would be ‘patriotic education of the youth’.34 The assertive Bulgarian approach especially from the 1960s onwards led to a ‘historiographic ping-pong’, between the historians of Sofia and those of Skopje, but for a temporary respite in the middle of the 1960s.35 The most authoritative publication during the Cold War is a 900-page volume titled Macedonia: Documents and Material, which was published in 1978, jointly by the Institute of History and by the Bulgarian Language Institute of the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences. It is a text comprising 452 documents, intended to speak for themselves, with only a short eleven-page Preface. The preface which does not mention the author, perhaps in order to reinforce the objectivity of the whole endeavour, makes the following point from the start: ‘The aim of the present volume is to acquaint the reader in a scholarly manner, as revealed in documents and other material of Bulgarian and foreign origin, including books and chronicles, newspapers and literature, with the historical fate and development of the Bulgarian population in Macedonia’.36 Further down it is specified that ‘The documents in this volume demonstrate not only the inseparable ties of the population in Macedonia with the population in the rest of Bulgaria’s territory, but also its direct participation in the all-Bulgarian historical process and in the entire political and cultural history of the Bulgarian people’.37

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As stated in the volume, it ‘covers the period from the arrival of the Slavs and Proto-Bulgars in the Balkan Peninsula, leading to the formation of the SlavBulgarian state in 681, and of the Bulgarian nationality (Slav in essence and Bulgarian in name), towards the end of the 9th century, up to 1940, i.e. until the beginning of the Second World War in the Balkans’.38 The 1978 volume is divided into four sections: (1) the Middle Ages, with 71 documents, which starts with the First Bulgarian Empire when it was under Tsar Samuil, where one finds the Bulgarian character of the state in question (which also covered Macedonia), on the basis of Bulgarian, but also contemporary Byzantine sources; (2) the National Revival Period, with 170 documents, starting with 1762, with extracts from the famous book of Paisii of Hilandar, A Slav-Bulgarian History (Istoriya Slavyanobolgarskaya), and concluding with 1878 (Treaty of San Stafano), where one sees the participation of the ‘Bulgarian Macedonians’ in the Bulgarian Revival; (3) the National-Liberation Struggle (1878–1918), with 143 documents, including texts by the first leaders of the VMORO (Tatarchev, Hadjinikolov, Delchev, Petrov, Gruev and others), where they clearly say that they are Bulgarians and that the goals of their movement were Bulgarian, even though the aim was autonomy and not necessarily union with Bulgaria; and (4) Macedonia in the period between the two world wars, with 68 documents. The volume led to a heated debate between Bulgarian and Macedonian historians, not least regarding Samuil’s Empire.39 According to the Macedonians, Samuil’s Empire was in essence Macedonian rather than Bulgarian despite its official name (see Chapter 9). The overall clash at times reached extremes, such as, for instance, the onslaught of historian (and former general) Mihailo Apostolski, then President of the Macedonian Academy of Sciences, who spoke with racist overtones, claiming that the Bulgarians were an ‘ethically inferior’ people.40 Until the end of the Cold War, the Bulgarian historians presented a wealth of evidence in order to prove beyond reasonable doubt the Bulgarian character of geographical Macedonia from the early Middle Ages until 1944. On the ‘1300 anniversary of the Bulgarian state’ (October 1981), Zhivkov in an oft-quoted speech, mentioned the ‘glory’ of ‘the great prime builders’, as he put it, of the Bulgarian ‘centralized state: the khans Asparuh, Krum and Omurtag; Prince Boris I; the tsars Simeon, Samuil, Assen, and Peter, Kaloyan and Ivan Assen II’ and that ‘Bulgaria is the home of the Slavic alphabet, of the Slavic script and culture’ (emphasis in the original).41 In this celebration of the 1300 ‘Bulgarian State’, the various ‘Macedonian heroes’, and in particular Delchev and Sandanski were called ‘national heroes who fought for the freedom of the Bulgarian nation’, with Delchev in particular as an ‘apostle of freedom’ almost to the level of the legendary Vasil Levski, with even Aleksandrov rehabilitated as a Bulgarian patriot.42 The original VMORO is presented as an integral component of Bulgarian national history, as ‘proven’ by ‘successive generations of Bulgarian historians, who can draw on both state archives and those of Macedonian organizations, many of which had their headquarters in Sofia’.43 They made sure to ‘link Ilinden, in the Monastir region, with

Bulgaria’s stance towards Macedonia 145 the Preobraženie Uprising, in the vilayet of Adrianople’,44 where the Bulgarian presence and participation is undeniable. It is argued that the ‘Christian inhabitants of Macedonia who joined the uprising were motivated by shared Bulgarian ethnonational consciousness, which they also expressed by adherence to the Exarchist Church’.45 During the Cold War these claims of the historians were strongly encouraged at the highest level by the BCP.46 To conclude, from the 1960s until the end of the Cold War, the Bulgarian state and its historians insisted on the presentation of the traditional Bulgarian thesis that the ‘Macedonians’ are in fact Bulgarians, they were the ‘kidnapped daughter’ of ‘mother Bulgaria’, which, given the first opportunity, would rush into the open arms of ‘the motherland’. As for the claim of a ‘Macedonian nation’, it is a Serbian ploy, starting with the ‘schemes’ of Novaković and Cvijić, culminating with Tito’s arbitrary creation,47 all aimed at depriving the ‘daughter’ from her ‘beloved mother’.48

The post-Cold War era: the dispute at its peak Given these Bulgarian perceptions, one can imagine the traumatic shock of the Bulgarians (even greater than that of the Romanians with the Moldovans or the Serbs with the Montenegrins) when, given the historical opportunity, with the end of the Cold War, ‘the “daughter Macedonia”, “kidnapped and raped” in 1913 by Serbia and Greece’ did not ‘return to the bosom of “Mother Bulgaria” after her “release” ’.49 The Macedonians, instead of uniting with the Bulgarians, chose independence and even persisted with the ‘preposterous claim’ that they are a separate nation with a distinct language and culture, adding insult to injury. As Vemund Aarbakke correctly points out, Bulgaria’s ‘reaction was characterised by historical inertia and wishful thinking relying on the past’, and ‘was out of touch with the situation in Macedonia and held unrealistic expectations’.50 Thus, in the post-Cold War era things worsened, with Bulgarian frustration breeding virulence. BCP’s policy under Georgi Dimitrov regarding Pirin Macedonia in the 1940s was branded as ‘national treason’.51 The Macedonian Scientific Institute, ‘which studies the region of Macedonia and mostly the Macedonian Bulgarians’,52 was reconstituted. The Institute had been set up in 1923 as the bastion of Bulgarian nationalism, to contribute to the well-known expansionist aims of Sofia, and was abolished by Dimitrov in 1947 as a gesture of good will towards Skopje. In 1994 the Institute organized a conference on the hundred years from the creation of the VMORO and in the same year the Institute published a three-volume book titled Macedonia: History and Political Fate (second edition in 1998), with the authors of individual chapters, eminent historians, such as the Institute’s President, Dimitar Gotsev, as well as Doyno Donev, Petar Petrov, Georgi Daskalov and Dobrin Michev.53 In the Preface of the three volumes, Petar Petrov states that the book is written following ‘persistent requests’ from a group of intellectuals in Skopje, who wanted a book ‘to present in a scholarly-documented fashion the history and

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political fate of Macedonia, something that has been assiduously concealed or falsified by Skopje historians’.54 And he adds the following55: The book will provide the citizens of the Macedonian Republic . . . with the opportunity to learn the truth about their heritage and linguistic roots. Thus they can liberate themselves from nearly 70 years of manipulation and disinformation that the Serbian propaganda . . . carried out in Macedonia. In this fashion they realized one of the main goals of the Serbian national doctrine, developed by Garashanin and Novakovich for the denationalisation through Macedonisation of the Bulgarian people of Macedonia. Petrov asserts that the book contains ‘the truth, nothing but the truth and the whole truth about the history and political fate of Macedonia’.56 And his preface ends by expressing the hope that the book ‘will be a moral support for the Macedonian Bulgarians, so they can be able to defend the vitality of the Bulgarian and the ideals of the Bulgarian nation in its struggle against the attempts of denationalisation through Macedonisation’.57 The leading historian, Dobrin Michev, was absolutely convinced that ‘the socalled “Macedonian nation” bears every trace of an artificial edifice, in which its founders aim for unclean, opportunistic goals’.58 It is a product of ‘oppression and terror’, and as such ‘it will inevitably collapse with its founders under the condition of free will of the Macedonian Bulgarians’.59 A delicate issue is the case of the existence or non-existence of a ‘Macedonian minority’ in Bulgaria, with Skopje claiming that it certainly exists and the Bulgarians vehemently denying it. If such a minority does exist and the Macedonians have not been assimilated by the Bulgarians, even though they live in Bulgaria and have experienced the Bulgarian socialization efforts and were not ‘brain-washed’ by Tito’s Yugoslavia, then this undermines the Bulgarian claims and reinforces the Macedonian ones. Note that in the Bulgarian censuses of 1946 and of 1955–1956, the Macedonians were recorded as being 161,000 and 179,000 (or 187,789) respectively, most of whom lived in the Pirin region. But in the 1992 census, in Pirin, 96.0 percent are presented as Bulgarians, which is the highest level of Bulgarian homogeneity in the whole of Bulgaria. In 1992, only 6000 stated that they are Macedonians (non-Bulgarian sources estimate the Macedonians in Bulgaria at 2.5 to 3.5 percent of the inhabitants of the country).60 In Bulgaria, an extreme national political group named VMRO-UMCS (Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization-union of Macedonian Cultural Societies) emerged in the 1990s, whose members were elected as mayors and at times participated in coalition governments. Their shrill call was for severing relations with the Republic of Macedonia, whose nation, they said, is non-existent but Bulgarian. During the greatest part of the 1990s they influenced BulgarianMacedonian relations not permitting an amelioration of relations. But on the whole this outfit was not very popular in Bulgaria, with most Bulgarians feeling uneasy with it.61 The mainstream mouthpiece of ‘anti-Macedonianism’ is VMROBND (IMRO-Bulgarian National Movement), which has participated in several coalition governments.62

Bulgaria’s stance towards Macedonia 147 This is also the very opposite: fringe political parties, as early as November 1989, upon the fall of Zhivkov, claiming that they represent the ‘Macedonian nation’, starting with the Independent Macedonian Organization renamed, in 1990, United Macedonian Organization-Ilinden,63 and later another organization appeared under the name United Macedonian Organization-Ilinden-Pirin. The Bulgarians regard these organizations as a ‘Trojan horse’, initially of Yugoslavia and later of Macedonia.64 The moderates in these organizations simply call for the recognition of minority rights but the extremists for separation, the ‘liberation of Pirin Macedonia from Bulgaria’ and its ‘unification with Macedonia’. Curiously there are ‘mirror images’ of such fringe parties in Macedonia as well, calling for union with Bulgaria.65 In 2017, Skopje and Sofia seemed to be on the road to reconciliation, with a Treaty of Friendship signed in August 2017, but from 2019 onwards things turned increasingly sour, with the two sides at loggerheads again, with the main responsibility for this turn of events on the Bulgarian side (see Chapter 13).

Notes 1 Victor Roudometof, ‘Culture, Identity, and the Macedonian Question: An Introduction’, in Victor Roudometof (ed.), The Macedonian Question: Culture, Historiography, Politics (Boulder, CO: East European Monographs, Columbia University Press, 2000), 6; Marija Bakalova, ‘Bulgarian “Macedonian” Nationalism in the Post 1989 Decade’, New Balkan Politics, 6–7 (2003), 62–9; Stefan Troebst, ‘IMRO+100=FYROM? The Politics of Macedonian Historiography’, in James Pettifer (ed.), The New Macedonian Question (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1999), 61; Kiril Kertikov, ‘Macedonia-Bulgaria: From Confrontation to Euro-Integration’, New Balkan Politics, 6–7 (2003), 34. 2 Hugh Poulton, The Balkans: Minorities and States in Conflict (London: Hurst & Company, 1991), 109. 3 Dimitar Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia (Lanham: The Scarecrow Press, 2009), 31. 4 Yorgos Christidis, ‘Historical Disputes Threaten North Macedonia-Bulgaria Rapprochement’, European Western Balkans (15 May 2020). Apparently the decision was taken at the spur of the moment by Dimitrov, without the knowledge of the foreign minister or the Bulgarian president. I thank Yorgos Christidis for this information. 5 Bakalova, ‘Bulgarian “Macedonian” Nationalism in the Post 1989 Decade’, 68–9; Vemund Aarbakke, ‘Who Can Mend a Broken Heart? Macedonia’s Place in Modern Bulgarian History’, in Ioannis D. Stefanidis, Vlasis Vlasidis and Evangelos Kofos (eds), Macedonian Identities through Time: Interdisciplinary Approaches (Thessaloniki: Foundation of the Museum for the Macedonian Struggle, Epikentro, 2010) [2008], 202. 6 Tchavdar Marinov, ‘In Defense of the Native Language: The Standardization of the Macedonian Language and the Bulgarian-Macedonian Linguistic Controversies’, in Roumen Daskalov and Tchavdar Marinov (eds), Entangled Histories of the Balkans, Volume One: National Ideologies and Language Policies (Leiden: Brill, 2013b), 420. 7 In Vrban Todorov, ‘The Conflict in Macedonia–Hypotheses for Development’, Journal of Politics, 6–7 (2003), 40. 8 Marinov, ‘In Defense of the Native Language, 420. 9 Ibid. 10 Quoted in Roudometof, ‘Culture, Identity, and the Macedonian Question’, 6. 11 Bakalova, ‘Bulgarian “Macedonian” Nationalism in the Post 1989 Decade’, 69. 12 Ibid., 68–9. 13 Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, 31.

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14 Bakalova, ‘Bulgarian “Macedonian” Nationalism in the Post 1989 Decade’, 72; Todorov, ‘The Conflict in Macedonia–Hypotheses for Development’, 40. 15 Bakalova, ‘Bulgarian “Macedonian” Nationalism in the Post 1989 Decade’, 71. 16 Kyril Drezov, ‘Macedonian Identity: An Overview of the Major Claims’, in James Pettifer (ed.), The New Macedonian Question (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1999), 47, 51; Roudometof, ‘Culture, Identity, and the Macedonian Question’, 6–7; Troebst, ‘IMRO+100=FYROM?’, 61–2; Ivan Katardjiev, Macedonia and Its Neighbours: Past, Present, Future (Skopje: Menora, 2001), 29–30; Marinov, ‘In Defense of the Native Language’, 420; Bakalova, ‘Bulgarian “Macedonian” Nationalism in the Post 1989 Decade’. 17 Bakalova, ‘Bulgarian “Macedonian” Nationalism in the Post 1989 Decade’, 64–5. 18 Aarbakke, ‘Who Can Mend a Broken Heart?’, 197. 19 Stephen Palmer and Robert R. King, Yugoslav Communism and the Macedonian Question (Hamden: Archon Books, 1971), 163–5; Ulf Brunnbauer, ‘Ancient Nationhood and the Struggle for Statehood: Historiographical Myths in the Republic of Macedonia’, in Pål Kolstø (ed.), Myths and Boundaries in South-Eastern Europe (London: Hurst & Company, 2005), 272; Aarbakke, ‘Who Can Mend a Broken Heart?’, 185, 196, 198; Tchavdar Marinov, La question macédoine de 1944 à no jours: communism et nationalism dans les Balkans (Paris: L’Harmattan, 2010b), 94–5, 181. 20 Quoted in Spyridon Sfetas, I diamorfosi tis slavomakedonikis taftotitas: mia epodyni diadikasia [The Formulation of the Slav-Macedonian Identity: A Painful Process] (Thessaloniki: Ekdoseis Vanias, 2003), 260 [my translation from the Greek version]. 21 Poulton, The Balkans, 108; Bakalova, ‘Bulgarian “Macedonian” Nationalism in the Post 1989 Decade’, 65. 22 Victor Roudometof, ‘Nationalism and Identity Politics in the Balkans: Greece and the Macedonian Question’, Journal of Modern Greek Studies, 14:2 (1996), 266; Stoyan Pribichevich, Macedonia: Its People and History (University Park: Pennsylvania State University, 1982), 250; Poulton, The Balkans, 107; Andrew Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians: A History (Stanford: Hoover Institution Press, 2008), 7; Bakalova, ‘Bulgarian “Macedonian” Nationalism in the Post 1989 Decade’, 83–4 endnote 6. 23 Poulton, The Balkans, 108. 24 Pribichevich, Macedonia, 250. 25 Ibid. 26 Ibid., 251. 27 Aarbakke, ‘Who Can Mend a Broken Heart?’, 198–9; Marinov, La question macédoine de 1944 à no jours, 91–2. See also Dragan Tashkovski, The Macedonian Nation (Skopje: Nik. Nasha Kniga, 1976), 12–7; Katardjiev, Macedonia and Its Neighbours, 34. 28 Marinov, La question macédoine de 1944 à no jours, 97–171. 29 Pribichevich, Macedonia, 252. 30 Vemund Aarbakke, Ethnic Rivalry and the Quest for Macedonia, 1870–1913 (Boulder, CO: East European Monographs, 2003), 53. 31 Bakalova, ‘Bulgarian “Macedonian” Nationalism in the Post 1989 Decade’, 63; Aarbakke, ‘Who Can Mend a Broken Heart?’, 187. 32 Marinov, La question macédoine de 1944 à no jours, 181. 33 Ibid., 184–6. 34 Ibid., 182–3. 35 Ibid., 188–90. 36 Bulgarian Academy of Sciences (Institute of History, Bulgarian Language Institute), Macedonia: Documents and Material (Sofia: Bulgarian Academy of Sciences, 1978), 5. 37 Ibid., 5–6. 38 Ibid., 5. 39 Irena Stefoska, ‘Nation, Education and Historiographic Narratives: The Case of the Socialist Republic of Macedonia (1944–1990)’, in Ulf Brunnbauer and Hannes

Bulgaria’s stance towards Macedonia 149

40 41 42

43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60

61 62 63 64 65

Grandits (eds), The Ambiguous Nation: Case Studies from Southeastern Europe in the 20th Century (Munich: Oldenbourg Verlag München, 2013), 217. Marinov, La question macédoine de 1944 à no jours, 194. In Maria Todorova, ‘The Course and Discourses of Bulgarian Nationalism’, in Peter F. Sugar (ed.), Eastern European Nationalism in the Twentieth Century (Washington, DC: American University Press, 1995), 64. James Frusetta, ‘Common Heroes, Divided Claims: IMRO between Macedonia and Bulgaria’, in John R. Lampe and Mark Mazower (eds), Ideologies and National Identities: The Case of Twentieth-Century Southeastern Europe (Budapest: Central European University Press, 2006), 115. Keith Brown, Loyal unto Death: Trust and Terror in Revolutionary Macedonia (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2013), 15. Ibid. Ibid. Frusetta, ‘Common Heroes, Divided Claims’, 114. Tashkovski, The Macedonian Nation, 20–1; Katardjiev, Macedonia and Its Neighbours, 37–8. Troebst, ‘IMRO+100=FYROM?’, 62. Ibid. Aarbakke, ‘Who Can Mend a Broken Heart?’, 200. Frusetta, ‘Common Heroes, Divided Claims’, 119. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macedonian_Scientific_Institute Aarbakke, ‘Who Can Mend a Broken Heart?’, 185 and 185 footnote 1. Ibid., 185. Ibid. Ibid. Ibid. Ibid., 199. Ibid., 199–200. Bonka Stoyanova-Boneva, Stephan E. Nikolov and Victor Roudometof, ‘In Search of “Bigfoot”: Competing Identities in Pirin Macedonia, Bulgaria’, in Victor Roudometof (ed.), The Macedonian Question: Culture, Historiography, Politics (Boulder, CO: East European Monographs, Columbia University Press, 2000), 238–9; Poulton, The Balkans, 107–8. Frusetta, ‘Common Heroes, Divided Claims’, 119; Victor N. Roudometof, Collective Memory, National Identity and Ethnic Conflict: Greece, Bulgaria and the Macedonian Question (New York: Praeger, 2002), 42–3. Kertikov, ‘Macedonia-Bulgaria’, 33. Poulton, The Balkans, 109; Todor Chepreganov, ‘Independent Republic of Macedonia’, in Todor Chepreganov (ed.), History of the Macedonian People (Skopje: Institute of National History, 2008), 334; Frusetta, ‘Common Heroes, Divided Claims’, 119. Poulton, The Balkans, 110. Bakalova, ‘Bulgarian “Macedonian” Nationalism in the Post 1989 Decade’, 66–7; Duncan M. Perry, ‘The Macedonian Question: An Update’, in Benjamin Stolz (ed.), Studies in Macedonian Language, Literature and Culture: Proceedings of the First North American-Macedonian Conference on Macedonian Studies, Ann Arbor, 1991 (Ann Arbor: Michigan Slavic Studies, 1995), 146–8; Kertikov, ‘Macedonia-Bulgaria’, 33.

8

The Macedonian language

Macedonian is a South Slav literary language from 1945 onwards when it was officially standardized. It is a language closer to Bulgarian, with some elements of Serbian but also with unique elements of its own.1 As put by the American linguist Horace Lunt, who, in 1952, wrote the first grammar of the Macedonian language2: Before 1940 the very term ‘Macedonian language’ occurred only in the writings of certain professional linguists on the one hand and of a few political dissidents on the other. And yet by late 1944, when the triumphant Partisans turned from the relatively uncomplicated task of driving out the Bulgarian and German invaders to the enormous and complex problems of governing, the existence of the language was already an unquestioned assumption; the burning issue was how most quickly to establish it in all spheres of public life. A series of conferences resulted in the adoption of the final form of the alphabet in May, 1945, and the issue in June of a booklet outlining the major orthographical conventions. A somewhat more detailed manual of orthography came out in 1950, followed by a comprehensive normative grammar in 1952–54.

The Cyrillic alphabet The Macedonians have claimed that the alphabet created by Cyril and Methodius was derived from the spoken language of the Slavs in and around Thessaloniki and pride themselves that ‘Macedonian’ is the first written Slav language in the world, prior to Bulgarian, Russian or Czech (Moravian). Indeed in the ninth century, the two Byzantine missionaries based the alphabet they devised on the vernacular of the Byzantine Slavs who lived in the Byzantine thema (province) of Thessaloniki. It is from that spoken language that they created a totally new alphabet, the Glagolitic – not the Cyrillic – alphabet, which is the earliest known Slavic alphabet,3 and it is in that alphabet that the Bible was first translated in Great Moravia, where the two brothers had been sent by Emperor Michael III (following a request by Moravia’s King Rastislav) to spread Christianity and literacy. The Cyrillic alphabet, which replaced Glagolitic, was

The Macedonian language 151 developed in the Bulgarian Empire, about half a century later, during the reign of Tsar Simeon I, in the Preslav Literary School and in the Ohrid Literary School, where Cyril’s pupils, Clement and Naum continued to cultivate the Glagolitic alphabet, and this elaborate alphabet survived for three centuries.4 The new Slavic alphabet, which was named Cyrillic (to honour Cyril), is credited to Clement, who combined the Glagolitic characters with those of the Greek alphabet.5 The new alphabet was handier than the elaborate rounded Glagolitic,6 and closer to the Greek ‘uncial alphabet’.7, 8 Both written languages, the Glagolitic and the Cyrillic, were – and are – known as Old Slavonic or Οld Church Slavonic (or Old Slavic), and are not known as ‘Macedonian’ or ‘Bulgarian’. And at the time the language was simply known as ‘Slavic’.9

The Macedonian dialects In the early nineteenth century, the situation in the Balkans regarding Slavic tongues was chaotic. For instance, Vuk Karadžić, the founder of the Serbian alphabet and literary language, had to convince the then dean of linguistic Slavology, the Czech Josef Dubrovský that Bulgarian was not a Serbian dialect as Dubrovský happened to believe until then.10 Among the South Slavs, the Croatians, in their attempt to deal with rising Hungarian nationalism and German influence, developed the Illyrian movement in the 1830s and 1840s, intended to unite all the South Slavs as ‘Illyrians’, under a common South Slav language. The inaugurator of this new concept was the Croatian linguist Ljudevit Gaj (who was influenced by Dubrovský and Šafaŕik), assisted by Janko Drašković from the Croatian nobility and others. Gaj advocated that both Kajkavian, with an old literary tradition, was structurally close to Slovene idioms and Čakavian, spoken in the Dalmatian littoral, had to be abandoned in favour of Štokavian, a language associated with the works of eminent Ragusan Baroque poets, such as Ivan Gundulić. The Štokavian dialect was spoken by most Serbs in Austria as well as in Serbia and Montenegro and it was the one chosen by Karadžić for literary Serbian. The selection of Štokavian had the effect of isolating the speakers of the vernacular varieties of southern Serbia, Macedonia and western Bulgaria.11 Another version of Illyrianism came later, under the famous Croatian philanthropist, Bishop Josip Juraj Strossmayer, and his associate the historian Canon Franjo Rački, both advocates of Yugoslavism (јugoslavizam), preferring this term to Illyrianism. Yugoslavism was at odds with the ‘Greater Serbia’ project of Karadžić and Garašanin, with Serbia wanting to act as the Piedmont of Serbian nationalism (see Chapter 1). And the Serbian nationalists found the term ‘Illyrianism’ absurd. However, Strossmayer (who, incidentally, sponsored and financed the Miladinov brothers’ collection of folk poems)12 corresponded with Garašanin, in search of common ground and for a fleeting moment in the mid-1860s, they came to an agreement for both sides to toil for a Yugoslav state independent from both Austria-Hungary and ‘Turkey’.13 Turning now to the Macedonian dialects, the standard Bulgarian stance is that they are nothing but ‘western Bulgarian dialects’, which lack the attributes to become a

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distinct South Slav language, and as for Tito’s construction of a ‘Macedonian language’, it is arbitrary. The Serbs for their part claimed, until Tito came into the picture, that the Macedonian dialects were closer to Serbian, phonetically and otherwise, as advocated until the early twentieth century by Gopčević, Belić and others (see Chapter 1).14 The Greeks followed a more tortuous path. In the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, they went as far as claiming that the Macedonian vernacular was ‘a corrupted version of ancient Macedonian – in other words, a form of Greek’ (see Chapter 1 and 2).15 But in the interwar Greece regarded ‘Slav-Macedonian’ a separate Slavic language, so as to avoid any link with Bulgarian and thus cope with the well-known Bulgarian claims, but from 1945 until the Prespes Agreement (2018) the dominant trend has been that the dialect in question is a Bulgarian idiom.16 Among non-Balkan ethnologists and linguists, there were two tendencies from the last decades of the nineteenth century until the eve of the Second World War: (a) it is a dialect or dialects of Bulgarian or (b) it is an in-between language, between Bulgarian and Serbian, which is closer to Bulgarian but had several Serbian elements, and by this token it had the vestiges to develop into a separate literary language. The first view prevailed until the beginning of the twentieth century, a view shared by linguistics, ethnographers, geographers, historians and diplomats who had served in Macedonia. One of the most authoritative presentations of this viewpoint was by the German linguist Gustav Weigand in his book Ethnographie Makedoniens (1923).17 Another authoritative presentation of this line was by the Slavist French linguist, André Mazon of the Collège de France, in his book Contes slaves de la Macédoine sud-occidentale (1923). This was also the approach of Arnold Toynbee, H.N. Brailsford, based on his sojourn in Macedonia (see Chapter 2), and Arthur Evans, who had made several excavations in Macedonia.18 The first to have come up with the view that the Macedonian dialects were neither Bulgarian nor Serbian dialects, but distinct and capable of evolving into a separate language, is probably the Austrian linguist Karl Hron (in 1890), in Das Volkstum der Slaven Makedoniens (The nationality of the Macedonian Slavs), who expressed the opinion that the Macedonians ‘are a separate nation by its history as well as by its language’.19 This new concept flourished in Russia a few years later, with linguist Petar Draganov (in 1894), who was of Bulgarian origin, the Estonian Leonhard Masing, and was also voiced by the most distinguished Russian Slavist linguists, Pyοtr Lavrov and Jan Baudouin de Courtenay.20 This approach tallied with Russian foreign policy thinking at the turn of the century with regard to the Balkans, for ‘[b]y the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, St. Petersburg was trying to sustain a balance between Bulgarian and Serbian influence in Macedonia, and the idea that the local Slavs were neither Serbs nor Bulgarians was welcome’.21

From a Bulgarian dialect to a potential literary language To begin with a point regarding dialects and languages is in order. Apart from the well-known quip that ‘a language is a dialect with an army and navy’22 that points to the arbitrariness of the distinction between the two, ‘the simplistic distinction

The Macedonian language 153 between “languages” and “dialects” falls apart’ when one sees the process of the standardization of national languages.23 Thus, modern sociolinguistics have tried to avoid ‘the risk of essentialization of non-standardized idioms in ethnonational categories’ or ‘the naturalization of national language’ by abandoning the distinction between language and dialect altogether and replacing it by ‘the distinction between non-standardized language variety and standardized/normalized variety’.24 This shift of Macedonian to being a distinct dialect (non-standardized language) and not a mere Bulgarian dialect (non-standardized language) became more convincing from the late 1920s onwards, with the assertions of two eminent French linguists both of the prestigious Collège de France, André Meillet and André Vaillant. Meillet argued (in 1928) that at the end of the day it is politics that will decide what the Macedonian idiom is to be, but according to him, it was neither a Bulgarian language nor a Serbian language and that written Bulgarian was based on a form of Bulgarian that was very distant from the Macedonian dialects. Ten years later (in 1938), Vaillant claimed, in his comparative grammar of the Slav languages, that a quasi-literary Macedonian language exists from the late nineteenth century, and that after close scrutiny Macedonian is not simply a dialect of the Bulgarian, being influenced by Serbian as well as by non-Slav languages, especially by the Aromanian dialect of the Vlachs. And his conclusion was that it would be safer to speak in terms of a separate Bulgarian-Macedonian group, in contradistinction from Serbo-Croatian. In 1938, the Great Soviet Encyclopedia included an article by the Soviet linguist, Samouil Bernstein, a specialist on Bulgarian, titled ‘The Macedonian Language’, who followed a similar line, which he repeated in 1944.25 This was also the view of the Polish Slavist linguist M. Malecki, who, after visiting the region, asserted that it was a mixture of Bulgarian and Serbian, and as such a distinct language.26 From the 1950s onwards, Horace Lunt, Victor Friedman and others are of the view that the Macedonian language has become distinct and did not come about ex nihilo by a Titoist fiat.27 Friedman, on the basis of the studies of Blaže Koneski, the main contributor to the codification of Macedonian as a literary language (see below), has periodized the gradual development of the Macedonian dialects into a language, from the early nineteenth century until the early 1940s, into four phases28: 1 2

3

1794–1840: The first texts written in Macedonian dialects, in particular by Hadži Joakim Krčovski and Hadži Kiril Pejčinoviḱ, where one sees the rise of a sense of Slavic identity at elite level. 1840–1870: The writing of textbooks and the collection of folk songs by Jordan Hadži Konstantinov-Džinot, Partenij Zografski, the Miladinov brothers, Grigor Parlichev and Rajko Žinzifov (all of them having studied in Greek schools),29 as well as Kuzman Šapkarev, all of whom struggled against Greek influence, stressing south Slav identity. 1870–1913: The phase of the first grammars and first nationalist texts, the protagonists being Pulevski, Misirkov, Čupovski, Poparsov and others,

154

4

The Macedonian language where one sees the emergence of a sense of Macedonian identity, distinct from Bulgarian or Serbian identity. 1913–1944: The development of Macedonian literature in both Yugoslavia and Bulgaria, which was to lead to the crystallization and later codification of the Macedonian language from 1945 onwards.

The first two authors who published works in the dialect, Krčovski and Pejčinoviḱ called the language they wrote ‘Bulgarian’, at a time when Bulgarian was not a literary language. In the years 1840–1870, during the Bulgarian Revival the question was put, especially from 1860 onwards, on which dialects should Bulgarian be based? Dimitar and Konstantin Miladinov supported the formation of a common Macedonian-Bulgarian language, which they called Bulgarian. The advocates of a common language included Parlichev (who had been a student of Dimitar Miladinov in a Greek school), Žinzifov, and the philologist and cleric, Partenij Zografski (another student of Dimitar Miladinov in a Greek school) who wrote in a common mixed language. Zografski pointed out that there were two main dialects of Bulgarian (this was before the standardization of Bulgarian), the one spoken in Bulgaria and Thrace, and the one spoken in Macedonia, and he suggested the second as the basis of literary Bulgarian.30 The rival group, known as ‘separatists’ or Makedonisti, came to the fore when it became apparent that the dominant trend was to opt for the eastern dialects for Bulgarian, which differed significantly from the western dialects. Šapkarev, who had been a student of Zografski, tried to bridge the two trends, but realizing that his attempt was futile, ended up writing textbooks in the western dialects and criticized the supremacy of the eastern dialects that were, he claimed, incomprehensible in Macedonia, facing the wrath of the Bulgarian press for his views.31 It is more than clear, however, that at the time the Macedonians Slavophones were not striving to create a separate language from the Bulgarian, for they ‘did not have a clearly defined national or territorial consciousness or a sense of belonging’.32 According to Marinov33: it would be farfetched to interpret the linguistic debates between authors from (eastern and central) Bulgaria and Macedonia from the 1860s and 1870s as a conflict between two national camps. Nothing in the activity of those ‘Macedonian Bulgarian’ writers suggests that they perceived their ‘Macedonian’ tongue as something essentially different from the Bulgarian language or sought to codify a separate literary norm. What was at stake was the definition of the proper basis for the codification of the Bulgarian language. In the first part of the nineteenth century, the first Bulgarian writers tended to write in the Bulgarian dialects of western Macedonia, but from the mid-century onwards the dominant trend was to write in the eastern Bulgarian dialects, as had been suggested by the educationalist Vasil Aprilov, who donated the first secular Bulgarian school in the Balkans (set up in 1835).34 Moreover, the Bulgarians were not prepared to follow another option, a mixed language, for they regarded the

The Macedonian language 155 western dialects poor, simplistic and mixed with Albanian, Greek, Aromanian, Serbian and even Turkish. Thus, the calls for a mixed language were not heeded, even though they came from major figures, such as ‘awakener’ Georgi Rakowski and ‘enlighteners’, Vasil Stoyanov, Hristo Danov and Petko Slaveykov. Thus, in the last decades of the nineteenth century, the Bulgarian literary language was based only on the eastern Bulgarian dialects, which had already become the language of the intelligentsia, producing important works of prose and poetry.35 This rejection of the western Bulgarian dialects had serious consequences, the alienation of their ethnic-linguistic brethren (see Chapter 4), and it ‘was largely decisive for the development of a separate Macedonian norm’, aimed at doing away with Bulgarian linguistic domination by ‘taking into account the Serbian educational influence’.36 This would have been less likely ‘if the Bulgarian standard language were based also on Macedonian dialects’.37 To this was added partition and one that proved final. No doubt until the end of the Ottoman rule (1912), ‘the Slavic intelligentsia of Macedonia had a clearly (pro-)Bulgarian character’, but the partition of the region in 1913 ‘deeply reshaped categories of local identity’.38 However, in order to arrive at a new linguistic norm, the new Macedonian language had to have ‘a sufficient repertoire of specific traits that made possible the creation of a distinct standard language’,39 ‘a norm that would be closer to the local Slavic vernacular than the Bulgarian norm’, based on the eastern Bulgarian dialects.40 Hence ‘the western-central (zapadnocentralen) dialect of Macedonia (previously also known as “central” or “central-western”) became, since the [late] nineteenth century, “Macedonian” par excellence’.41 The third phase (1870–1913) starts with the works of Pulevski (see Chapter 4) and ends with Misirkov, Čupovski, Dedov, Mišajkov and a dozen other intellectuals and students who founded, in St. Petersburg (28 October 1902), the Macedonian Scholarly and Literary Society (see Chapter 4). According to the Society’s constitution (written in Russian), ‘conversation in the Society will be conducted in the Macedonian language (Slav-Macedonian); and reports and protocols will also be written in the same language’.42 Mišajkov was the first chairman of the Society, followed in 1903 by Čupovski, who held the position until its dissolution in 1917.43 Dedοv and Mišajkov submitted, on behalf of the Society, a ‘Memorandum on the Macedonian Question’ (12 November 1902) to the Imperial Russian Government, calling for the autonomy of Macedonia and of the recognition of the Macedonian Slavs ‘as a distinct people with a distinct literary language which, together with Turkish will become the official language of the three vilayets of Macedonia’.44 The memorandum also called for the recognition of an independent Church and stated that a ‘free Macedonia’ could in the future attract other neighbouring states to create a federation, with Macedonia as the ‘Piedmont for the unification of Balkan Slavdom and Orthodoxy’.45 A high point in this endeavour were Misirkov’s speeches to the Society (Misirkov was a student of Lavrov),46 which ended up with his well-known book, On Macedonian Matters, where he set out the foundation for a separate Macedonian linguistic norm.47 The booklet was written in the western-central dialect of the Veles-Prilep-Bitola

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region, though inspired by the Serbian phonetic graphic of Karadžić. The language he proposed was similar to the one adopted in the 1940s, though the latter is closer to Serbian than Misirkov’s model (see Chapter 4).48 However, the leaders and activists of the VMORO (Delchev, Gruev, Tatarchev, Petrov, Sarafov, Sandanski and the others) used in their official documents as well as in their personal correspondence, standard Bulgarian, at times with some minor dialectal influences. Pulevski and even Misirkov or Čupovski were little known to their contemporaries. The literary and journalistic work of those who are today regarded as ‘the fathers of Macedonian nationalism’ were ‘discarded during their lifetime by their compatriots’.49 Characteristically the official review of VMORO condemned what it called ‘Misirkov’s mess’.50 Indeed ‘most of them were unknown to their contemporaries, and their heritage was literally excavated by scholars of the Yugoslav republic of Macedonia’.51 However, in the 1930s, literary works did appear in the Macedonian vernacular and in this sense the spirit of Misirkov did not disappear, especially poetry and theatrical plays by Vasil Iljoski, Risto Krle, Anton Panov, Venko Markovski and Kole Nedelkovski (see Chapter 4), in what was not merely ‘literature in dialect’, but ‘conscious attempts to standardize Macedonian Slavic vernacular’.52 The poet Kočo Racin, an author also of novels, youthful studies on Hegel and historical studies on the Bogomil movement, in his poems presented the sorry state of the Macedonian peasants in Yugoslav Macedonia, as seen in his poetical collection titled Beli Mugri (White Dawns), considered as one of the masterpieces of Macedonian modern literature, in which he calls on the peasants to take up arms.53 This trend can also be seen in the periodical Luč (The Ray) published in 1937, which although written in Serbian, published some texts in Macedonian, such as a play by Anton Panov, and tried to promote the cultural and historical distinctiveness of the province. The Serbian authorities initially tolerated the periodical but then banned it.54

A new South Slav literary language In the early 1940s, when Yugoslavian Macedonia was occupied by Bulgaria, the Macedonian Partisans began to use their own dialects in their clandestine leaflets, their morale-building songs, their clandestine press and the mimeographed newsbulletins they came out with.55 Thus, it has been claimed that the official pronouncements about the Macedonian language at the end of the Second World War were ‘formal affirmations of what was already believed to be the status quo’.56 On 2 August 1944, ASNOM (the Anti-fascist Assembly of the People’s/ National Liberation of Macedonia (ASNOM) (see Chapter 5) stipulated that the ‘popular Macedonian language’ was to be the official one, namely the language that had been used in the region during the interwar and under Bulgarian occupation but had not been codified.57 The codification of the vernacular required the use of phonetic orthography for a more traditional script would not have permitted an adequate transliteration of certain phonetic particularities of Macedonian and would not have achieved

The Macedonian language 157 the well-known desideratum, the much-needed distance from standard Bulgarian. The ‘phonetization’ of the Cyrillic script meant proximity to the standards introduced by Karadžić. Thus, inevitably there was a more or less conscious Serbianization of the Macedonian language, but it did not promote linguistic Serbianization, for it also introduced new characters, not existing in Karadžić’s script, obviously in order to prevent Macedonian from appearing too close to Serbian. Inclining towards Serbian rather than Bulgarian was also due to the fact that the Serbian phonetic script is much easier than the Bulgarian one.58 The task of arriving at an alphabet and standardized language was entrusted to a Commission for the Establishment of the Macedonian Language, Alphabet and Orthography, in fact three successive commissions which functioned from the summer of 1944 until spring 1945.59 The Commission comprised a small group of intellectuals of the region, most of them teachers, who had been educated in Serbian schools and some in Bulgarian ones. The most qualified were Gjorgji Šoptrajan(ov), with a doctorate in the French language, Mihailo Petruševski, with a doctorate in classical philology, the poet Venko Markovski, the future writer Vlado Maleski (author of the Macedonian national anthem) and the young linguist Blaže Koneski, who was still a student of linguistics. Markovski was the one with the greater prestige, as a member of ASNOM and of the staff of the Yugoslav Macedonian Army under Apostolski, but at the end of the day it was Koneski’s views that prevailed. Given the fact that most of the members of the Commission were not professional linguists, some of them came up with naive suggestions, such as that everyone in Macedonia should be allowed to write as he desires (a view shared even by Markovski), which runs counter to the very concept of codifying a language. But all agreed on the choice of the dialect, which they called ‘central’ and most of them favoured the creation of a distinct Macedonian alphabet. Markovski for his part made sure to acquaint the other participants with Misirkov and his suggestions for a Macedonian language.60 The selection of dialects spoken in central Macedonia, in the Prilep-BitolaKicevo-Veles region, was based on two criteria: (a) it was widely used and understood by most Macedonians and (b) it was safely distant from both Serbo-Croatian and Bulgarian.61 The first version of Macedonian alphabet was announced on 28 December 1944. The suggested graphic system was original and introduced several special characters, imitating not only certain letters of Karadžić but also the round elements characterizing the letters from the Glagolitic script. Koneski disagreed and departed from the Commission, considering the participants ill-prepared for their task. The suggested alphabet was rejected by Koliševki, and a new commission accepted the Karadžić alphabet which had been Koneski’s suggestion from the beginning. The main innovation was the letter ‘s’, distinguishing the Macedonian alphabet from the Serbian one. At a final closed meeting held in Belgrade within the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Yugoslavia, it was Koneski’s suggestions that were finally accepted.62 On 3 May 1945, the alphabet project was presented to the Macedonian Ministry of Education, which duly approved it, and in the next month, the Ministry

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of Education also approved an orthographical and morphological guide. Apart from the alphabet, the codifiers of the Macedonian language produced a phonetic orthography that was very close to Serbian.63 As one would have expected, there was opposition by a number of Macedonians who regarded the Macedonian script and norm too ‘Serbified’. Among those opposed were major figures, such as Markovski and Ivanovski (then editor of Nova Makedonija) and leading older Macedonian activists, such as Shatev and Brašnarov.64 However, the Macedonian linguistic and philologist, including Koneski, made sure to gradually finesse and correct certain errors, limiting the Serbian flavour of Macedonian, by among others coining new words and an original lexicon.65 And by the time of the adoption of Macedonian orthography in 1951 and grammar in 1952, the language had achieved uniformity and considerable acceptance.66 In 1952, Koneski issued the Phonology of his Grammar of the Macedonian Language. In 1953, the Krste Misirkov Institute for Macedonian Language (Institut za makedonski jazik ‘Krste Misirkov’) was established. The Institute published the scholarly review Makedonski jazik, and endorsed the standard version of many orthographical, phonetic and morphological features. Koneski, Todor Dimitrovski, Blagoja Korubin and Trajko Stamatoski published the first volume of the Dictionary of the Macedonian Literary Language with Serbo-Croatian Translations and Koneski became the first president of the Macedonian Academy of Sciences and Arts, deservedly gaining the reputation of ‘father of the Macedonian literary language’. He was also the author of the History of the Macedonian Language. As regards Macedonian dialectology, its main founder is Božidar Vidoeski, editor of Makedonski jazik, with high positions at the Krste Misirkov Institute as well as at the Saints Cyril and Methodius University of Skopje. Both Koneski and Vidoeski were also active in international Slavist networks in various European countries.67 Now let us present in a nutshell the new literary Macedonian language in comparison to the pre-existing Serbian and Bulgarian, without dwelling into a specialist linguistic discussion which would be difficult to fellow by those of us who are not linguists or philologists. To begin with, standard Macedonian shares most of the characteristics which distinguish Bulgarian from the other Slav languages, namely the lack of cases, the post-positive definite article, the replacement of the infinite form, and the preservation of the simple verbal forms for the past and imperfect tenses.68 But as Hugh Poulton has put it, ‘whether it is truly a different language from Bulgarian or merely a dialect of it is a moot point’,69 in other words, it is a subject open to discussion and controversy for which no satisfactory answer can be found. The features shared by Macedonian and Serbian are largely phonetic, but as regards morphology which is more important, Macedonian is similar to Bulgarian.70 According to Lunt71: The differences between Macedonian and the spoken Bulgarian of Sofia are by no means so great. Perhaps the most significant is the accent. Western

The Macedonian language 159 Macedonian usually has a weak stress accent bound to the antepenult (the penult in some dialects). Bulgarian has a strong expiratory accent accompanied by significant qualitative differences between stressed and unstressed vowels . . . moreover the stress may fall on any syllable, and in many morphemes and morphological categories it shifts about in a complicated manner. This makes the overall acoustic effect of Bulgarian quite different from Macedonian. And Lunt makes the point that if the Macedonians had ended up accepting standard Bulgarian for their own use, this would have demanded ‘far fewer concessions on their part than have been made by Bavarians and Hamburgers, by Neapolitans and Piedmontese, and even, within Yugoslavia, by natives of Niš in the southeast and Senj in the northwest’.72 Lunt has also drawn our attention to an interesting psychological aspect: ‘the subjective impression on both sides of a bilingual Serbian-Macedonian conversation seems to be that the other is using an irritating kind of pidgin. The attitude is important, since it always appears to be one of annoyance that a grown person should persist in speaking so stupidly’.73 And he illustrates this with the following example: The Serbs are under the impression that Macedonian ‘has no grammar’ and is ‘inferior’, as seen from the fact that of lack of declension (as is the case also with Bulgarian and other languages, such as English).74 Thus, the Serbs in interwar Yugoslavia ‘seem genuinely to have believed that Macedonians were their ignorant brothers who would be all right after a few years of education, but they quickly became annoyed at the linguistic ineptitude of the mass of Macedonians and found a righteous justification for accusing them of stupidity and ingratitude and hence for treating the region almost as a colony’.75 The Macedonians for their part have great difficulty mastering the Serbian case-system which they regard superfluous and hardly a sign of a superior language.76

The ongoing Bulgarian-Macedonian language dispute Now let us address the pending ‘language controversy’ between Bulgaria and Macedonia. But first a flavour of what it can amount to in bilateral diplomacy. In April 1994 in the course of an official visit to Skopje, the Bulgarian minister of education declined from signing a bilateral agreement composed ‘in the Bulgarian language and the Macedonian language’. As a result by the late 1990s more than twenty bilateral agreements between the two states were left unsigned.77 The Tito-Stalin split (see Chapter 5) gave rise to a controversy between Bulgarian and Macedonian scholars, with the Serbian scholars remaining largely silent. As early as 1952 the Bulgarian linguist Kiril Mirchev of Macedonian origin (in 1944 he was asked to join the Commission on the codification of the language but declined) wrote a study in which he tried to prove that ‘Macedonian’ was merely a branch of Bulgarian, a posteriori having been developed into literary language. But he ‘did not deny the “need” for a specific Macedonian norm: he only condemned the “Serbification” of its lexicon and orthography’.78 Koneski was outraged with the Serbification accusation, and reacted with a rebuttal in an essay.79

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There was a gradual evolution on the part of the Bulgarian academics from a softer approach to harder ones through time. This trend is well illustrated in recurring editions of Stoyko Stoykov’s Bulgarian Dialectology. The first edition of 1949 treats the various Macedonian dialects separately but mentions that they there was a ‘particularly strong connection’ between the Macedonian and Bulgarian dialects. The second edition of 1956 refers to twelve centuries of Macedonian dialects existing ‘within’ the Bulgarian ‘nationality’ before becoming standardized. The 1963 edition places all the Macedonian dialects squarely within the Bulgarian language. But Stoykov, to his credit, accepted that the Macedonians did have the right to erect their own nation and national language. In those days, other linguists in the Institute of Bulgarian Language of the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences referred to ‘BulgaroMacedonian dialects’, but this overall approach was soon abandoned.80 Bulgarian historiography set the pace by reverting to the older view that Macedonia was a Bulgarian land. And in March 1963, Todor Zhivkov stated, in a plenum of the party leadership, that the Macedonian language was nothing more than an ‘idiom belonging to our western idioms, a dialect’.81 And the 1968 edition of Stoykov’s Bulgarian Dialectology asserted that the Macedonian dialects could not develop into a separate language.82 In the 1980s, the Bulgarian attacks intensified. The Institute of Bulgarian Language was encouraged by the party and state leadership, to oppose ‘every attempt to falsify the truth about the Bulgarian people [and] the unity of its language’.83 In the mid-1980s, Konstantin Popov, a scholar from Sofia University, dismissed the Macedonian standard language as a ‘provincial jargon’.84 The Bulgarian linguists also tried to enlist foreign linguists to buttress their viewpoint, but did not have much success in this regard internationally. Apart from Greek linguists who have supported the Bulgarian views, such as Nikolaos Andriotes85 and Georgios Babiniotis, the main supporter of the Bulgarian position by the end of the communist era is the Austrian Slavist linguist, Otto Kronsteiner, who has labelled Macedonian a ‘Bulgarian language written on a Serbian typewriter’.86 Historically, in the Bulgarian opposition against both the Greeks and the Turks, it was ‘the linguistic divider’ that was ‘evoked earlier and remained stronger than the religious one’.87 This also harks back to the ‘first articulation of Bulgarian nationalism’ made by Paisii of Hilandar, in his famous 1762 volume, Istoriya Slavyanobolgarskaya, regarded as the ‘bible of Bulgarian nationalism’,88 where he called upon his compatriots to ‘learn your language’.89 This emphasis on language may perhaps explain the Bulgarian fixation with language in their heated tussle with the Macedonians. There is also another important reason for the Bulgarian stance on language, apart from their bitterness at having lost Macedonia, leaving aside their responsibility for its occurrence. It is Cyril and Methodius, the alphabet and Old Church Slavonic, claimed by the Macedonians as their own heritage, which happen to be ‘foundation myths’ of the Bulgarians from the nineteenth-century Bulgarian Revival onwards.90 Indeed today the demonstration of ‘the unity’ of the Bulgarian language depends on confirming its unity also in the past.91 As Marinov has put it: ‘Here,

The Macedonian language 161 the Bulgarian scholars walked onto a somewhat larger battlefield: the definition of the “ethnic” identity of Old (Church) Slavonic, that is, of the language variety used in the first translations and original works in Slavic’.92 According to Bulgarian scholars, ‘the demonstration of its “Bulgarian character” would a fortiori corroborate the present “unity” of the Bulgarian language, hence the “Bulgarian” nature of Macedonian’.93 In Bulgarian studies, the language codified by the two missionaries is labelled ‘Old Bulgarian’ (starobălgarski), a designation also found in the works of Germanspeaking scholars, some of whom used the term Altbulgarisch as equivalent to Altkirchenslawisch.94 The two Byzantine missionaries are regarded as partly of Bulgarian origin and their achievement, ‘the creation of the Slavic Glagolitic script’ and ‘its development into Cyrillic in the late ninth- and tenth-century Bulgarian state (during the so-called Golden Age of Old Bulgarian literature and culture) constitute the most important alleged “contributions” of the country [Bulgaria] to world civilization’95 and to ‘all of Slavdom’.96 According to one of the most popular Bulgarian verses by the poet Ivan Vazov, ‘the patriarch of Bulgarian literature’, ‘We have given something to the world’, ‘We too in this world have performed a good deed/Given all Slavic peoples the books they read’.97 This ‘national selfimage of givers [which] is the most generally accepted one in [Bulgarian] textbook historiography, as well as on every day consciousness’98 runs as follows: ‘We have given Orthodoxy, the alphabet and the Slavonic liturgy to the Serbs, the Russians, the Romanians’.99 But in view of the birthplace of Cyril and Methodius and from where they drew their inspiration (in and around Thessaloniki) ‘it is not surprising that, following the Bulgarian example, Macedonian nationalism also claims them as national emblems. In an attempt to prove the historical continuity of their language, scholars from Skopje insist that Old Slavonic was essentially Macedonian’.100 Note that Vaillant had called the idiom of the creators of the Slavic script ‘Old Macedonian’ (vieux macédonien).101 As Bulgarian-Macedonian relations deteriorated from the late 2019 onwards, in spite of the Treaty of Friendship of 2017 (see Chapter 13), the Bulgarian attacks on the ‘non-existent Macedonian language’ became more bitter. Foreign minister Ekaterina Zaharieva (who had signed the Treaty of Friendship in 2017) stated that Bulgaria did not recognize ‘the so-called Macedonian language as separate from Bulgarian’, and this is based ‘on historical facts that are not open to interpretation’.102 And in May 2020, the Bulgarian Academy of Science joined in with a 68-page volume, written by 12 authors, titled Za Ofitsialnja ezik na Republika Severna Makedonja (On the Language of the Republic of North Macedonia), which ‘proved’ that the constitutional language of North Macedonia is a variant of the Bulgarian, a regional dialect very similar to standard Bulgarian. The Bulgarian President Rumen Radev praised the short volume at a meeting with the president and vice-president of the Academy, Julian Rewalski and Vasil Nikolov (the editor of the volume). And Radev did not miss the opportunity to state that ‘the European integration of the Republic of Macedonia will not take place at the expense of Bulgaria’s history and language’(see Chapter 13).103

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The Macedonians linguistics reacted accordingly, referring to various works by Koneski and others, claiming that the booklet is ‘flat and tendentious’, presenting distorted facts about the history of the Macedonian language and they referred to the origins of their language in Old Slavic and the Glagolitic alphabet. Macedonian foreign minister Nikola Dimitrov (who had signed the 2017 Treaty of Friendship) rejected the Bulgarian claims on language as having no basis on international law with the Macedonian a well-establish language.104

In lieu of a conclusion I will conclude with a number of points raised by Tchavdar Marinov regarding the Macedonian language, which seem very convincing. To begin with, as Marinov points out, ‘if the “long” historical continuity of modern Macedonian as a literary language is doubtful, the Bulgarian idea that it appeared out of nowhere – as a result of Tito’s political fiat – is just as dubious’.105 The Bulgarian claim that Macedonian is ‘non-existent’ and ‘artificial’ is based on two arguments: that it is similar to Bulgarian and that ‘political fiat’ determined its codification. The Bulgarians maintain that the relationship between Bulgarian and so-called Macedonian is like the one between German and Austrian, English and American, Romanian and Moldovan or Serbian and Croatian. But socio-linguistically they are mistaken. There is no Austrian or American standard language, as for the difference between Moldovan and Romanian it is limited to the accent and to the use of some Russian loanwords in Moldova (as well as the use of Cyrillic for Moldovan in Transnistria). Unlike Serbian/Croatian/Bosnian/ Montenegrin, which could be classified as the same language norm based on the Štokavian mega-dialect, ‘Bulgarian and Macedonian are based on dialects that are geographically distant and divided by a number of linguistic traits’.106 Moreover, ‘they were normalized under different foreign influences (Russian vs. Serbian). As a result, the relationship between the norms of Sofia and Skopje is instead comparable to that between Russian and Ukrainian, or Danish and Swedish’.107 On the other hand ‘the historical disentanglement of the Bulgarian and Macedonian national identities is certainly much more recent than the one between the Russian and Ukrainian – not to mention the Danish and Swedish – identities. It is this fact that makes recognizing the existence of Macedonian so difficult for the Bulgarians’.108 However, the fact of ‘political decisions behind the establishment of the contemporary Macedonian norm do not discredit it either’.109 Political decisions were behind a number of historical ‘cases of languages whose “legitimacy” is never disputed: Modern Turkish, Polish, even Hebrew’,110 and I would add Urdu (modern standard Urdu) in Pakistan. Furthermore, as Marinov points out, the fact that111 Macedonian was largely codified by a single individual–Blaže Koneski – is also not unnatural. Koneski had a number of illustrious precursors elsewhere whose activity had clear political stakes, including Vuk Karadžić (for Serbian and Serbo-Croatian), Aasen (New Norwegian or Nynorsk), Ben Yehuda

The Macedonian language 163 (Modern Hebrew), Atatürk (Modern Turkish) and Aavik (Estonian). What the simplistic conclusions ignore is that every national language is an ‘artifact’, a result of meta-linguistic intervention that separates the ‘correct’ from the ‘incorrect’. It is a social and cultural reality, constructed through projects and actions that are eminently political. And he adds112: While scholars from Sofia insist that the codification of Macedonian was ‘politically motivated’, they do not note that their own idiom was also constructed in a given political context. For Bulgarian, this context was the late Ottoman era and the first decades after the creation of a nation-state in 1878. For Macedonian, this was Yugoslav Macedonia before and after the creation of a ‘national’ republic. Both cases represent language planning: there are no ‘natural’ national languages distinct from the ‘artificial’ ones. To conclude, with the establishment of literary Macedonian from 1945 onwards, the dominant trend internationally among linguists is that it is a separate language, despite its far greater communality to Bulgarian than to Serbian. One can now speak in terms of a separate sub-family of South Slav languages, the Eastern South Slav languages, comprised of Bulgarian, Macedonian and the extinct Old Church Slavonic, distinct for the Western South Slav languages, the Serbo-Croatian and Slovene.

Notes 1 Horace G. Lunt, ‘The Creation of Standard Macedonian: Some Facts and Attitudes’, Anthropological Linguistics, 1:5 (1959), 19–26; Victor Friedman, ‘The Modern Macedonia Standard Language and Its Relation to Modern Macedonian Identity’, in Victor Roudometof (ed.), The Macedonian Question: Culture, Historiography, Politics (Boulder, CO: East European Monographs, Columbia University Press, 2000); R.G.A. de Bray, Guide to the South Slavonic Languages (Columbus: Slavic, 1980); Claude Hagège, Le Souffle de la langue. Voies et destins des parlers d’Europe (Paris: Odile Jacob, 1992), 188; Tchavdar Marinov, ‘In Defense of the Native Language: The Standardization of the Macedonian Language and the Bulgarian-Macedonian Linguistic Controversies’, in Roumen Daskalov and Tchavdar Marinov (eds), Entangled Histories of the Balkans, Volume One: National Ideologies and Language Policies (Leiden: Brill, 2013b), 423. 2 Lunt, ‘The Creation of Standard Macedonian’, 19. 3 Pavel Serafimov, ‘The Origin of the Glagolitic Alphabet’, 99–117. www.korenine.si/ zborniki/zbornik08/glagolitic.pdf 4 Stoyan Pribichevich, Macedonia: Its People and History (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1982), 71. 5 Dimitar Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia (Lanham: The Scarecrow Press, 2009), 45. 6 For these elaborate rounded letters, see Serafimov, ‘The Origin of the Glagolitic Alphabet’,103–11. 7 See Francis Dvornik, The Slavs: Their Early History and Civilization (Boston: American Academy of Arts and Sciences, 1956), 179; Florin Curta, Southeastern Europe in

164

8 9 10 11 12 13

14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28

29 30 31

The Macedonian language

the Middle Ages, 500–1250. Cambridge Medieval Textbooks (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006), 221–2; Andrew Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians: A History (Stanford: Hoover Institution Press, 2008), 33. Serafimov, ‘The Origin of the Glagolitic Alphabet’, 99. A.P. Vlasto, The Entry of the Slavs into Christendom: An Introduction to the Medieval History of the Slavs (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1970), 38–57, 174. Friedman, ‘The Modern Macedonia Standard Language and Its Relation to Modern Macedonian Identity’, 173. Marinov, ‘In Defense of the Native Language’, 436–7. Pribichevich, Macedonia, 110. Charles Jelavich and Barbara Jelavich, The Establishment of the Balkan National States, 1804–1920 (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1977), 250–2; Barbara Jelavich, History of the Balkans: Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983), 306–8, 319; Ivo Banac, The National Question in Yugoslavia (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1993) [1984], 75–81; Stefan K. Pavlowitch, A History of the Balkans 1804–1945 (London: Longman, 1999), 67, 69, 71, 96; Leonard J. Cohen, Broken Bonds: Yugoslavia’s Disintegration and Balkan Politics in Transition (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1993), 4–6. Lunt, ‘The Creation of Standard Macedonian’, 21, 25 note 3; Marinov, ‘In Defense of the Native Language’, 428–9. Marinov, ‘In Defense of the Native Language’, 430. Tasos Κostopoulos, I apagorevmeni glossa: kratiki katastoli ton slavikon dialekton stin elliniki Makedonia [The Forbidden Tongue: State Repression of the Slavic Dialects in Greek Macedonia] (Athens: Mavri Lista, 2000), 41–2. Marinov, ‘In Defense of the Native Language’, 431. Κostopoulos, I apagorevmeni glossa, 37–8. Cited in Krste Bitovski, ‘Macedonia in the XIX Century’, in Todor Chepreganov (ed.), History of the Macedonian People (Skopje: Institute of National History, 2008), 171. See also Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 80. Marinov, ‘In Defense of the Native Language’, 430; Bitovski, ‘Macedonia in the XIX Century’, 171. Marinov, ‘In Defense of the Native Language’, 430. This aphorism is usually attributed to the Russian Jewish linguist, Max Weinreich, who specialized in sociolinguistics and Yiddish. Marinov, ‘In Defense of the Native Language’, 426. Ibid., 427. Ivan Katardjiev, Macedonia and Its Neighbours: Past, Present, Future (Skopje: Menora, 2001), 101. Marinov, ‘In Defense of the Native Language’, 430–1; Friedman, ‘The Modern Macedonia Standard Language and Its Relation to Modern Macedonian Identity’, 191–2; Κostopoulos, I apagorevmeni glossa, 37–8. Lunt, ‘The Creation of Standard Macedonian’; Friedman, ‘The Modern Macedonia Standard Language and Its Relation to Modern Macedonian Identity’. Friedman, ‘The Modern Macedonia Standard Language and Its Relation to Modern Macedonian Identity’, 193–4. Koneski distinguishes three periods in the evaluation of the language: prior to 1913, 1913–44 and 1944–today. Ristovski starts with 1814, with the work of Krčovski and distinguishes three phases: 1814–77, 1878–1903 και 1903–44. See Blaže Ristovski, Macedonia and the Macedonian People (Vienna and Skopje: SIMAG Holding, 1999), 128–34, 149–92. A similar periodization is made by the MacedonianCanadian historian Rossos. See Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 83–92. Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 83. Marinov, ‘In Defense of the Native Language’, 441. Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 83–4, 93. Friedman, ‘The Modern Macedonia Standard Language and Its Relation to Modern Macedonian Identity’, 179–83; Pribichevich, Macedonia, 112–3; Marinov, ‘In Defense

The Macedonian language 165

32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66

of the Native Language’, 440–2; Spyridon Sfetas, I diamorfosi tis slavomakedonikis taftotitas: mia epodyni diadikasia [The Formulation of the Slav-Macedonian Identity: A Painful Process] (Thessaloniki: Ekdoseis Vanias, 2003), 24–5. Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, 83. Marinov, ‘In Defense of the Native Language’, 442. Victor N. Roudometof, To Makedoniko Zitima: mia koinologiki prosegisi [The Macedonian Question: A Sociological Approach] (Thessaloniki: Epikentro, 2019), 115. Sfetas, I diamorfosi tis slavomakedonikis taftotitas, 23–4; Marinov, ‘In Defense of the Native Language’, 442–3, 445. Marinov, ‘In Defense of the Native Language’, 445. Ibid. Ibid., 447. Ibid., 445. Ibid. Ibid. Friedman, ‘The Modern Macedonia Standard Language and Its Relation to Modern Macedonian Identity’, 186. Ristovski, Macedonia and the Macedonian People, 189. Ibid., 188. Quoted in ibid. Ibid., 186. Marinov, ‘In Defense of the Native Language’, 444. Friedman, ‘The Modern Macedonia Standard Language and Its Relation to Modern Macedonian Identity’, 184–7, 199–200, note 23; Marinov, ‘In Defense of the Native Language’, 444–5. Marinov, ‘In Defense of the Native Language’, 446. Ibid., 447. Ibid., 446. Ibid., 448. Ivan Katardziev, ‘Macedonia in the Period from the Balkan Wars to the Beginning of the World War II in the Balkan (sic) (1912–1941)’, in Chepreganov (ed.), History of the Macedonian People (Skopje: Institute of National History, 2008), 242–3, 247. Marinov, ‘In Defense of the Native Language’, 446–8; Sfetas, I diamorfosi tis slavomakedonikis taftotitas, 133–6. Lunt, ‘The Creation of Standard Macedonian’, 23; Marinov, ‘In Defense of the Native Language’, 448. Lunt, ‘The Creation of Standard Macedonian’, 23. Marinov, ‘In Defense of the Native Language’, 449; John Shea, Macedonia and Greece: The Struggle to Define a New Balkan Nation (Jefferson: McFarland and Company, 2008) [1997], 207. Marinov, ‘In Defense of the Native Language’, 450–1. Stefan Troebst, ‘Yugoslav Macedonia, 1943–1953: Building the Party, the State, and the Nation’, in Jill A. Irvine, Melissa K. Bokovoy and Carol S. Lilly (eds), StateSociety Relations in Yugoslavia, 1945–1992 (Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1997), 252. Marinov, ‘In Defense of the Native Language’, 452–4; Shea, Macedonia and Greece, 207–8. Stephen Palmer and Robert R. King, Yugoslav Communism and the Macedonian Question (Hamden: Archon Books, 1971), 154–5. Marinov, ‘In Defense of the Native Language’, 454–5; Troebst, ‘Yugoslav Macedonia, 1943–1953’, 252–3. Marinov, ‘In Defense of the Native Language’, 456; Hugh Poulton, The Balkans: Minorities and States in Conflict (London: Hurst & Company, 1991), 50. Marinov, ‘In Defense of the Native Language’, 456. Ibid., 456–8. Shea, Macedonia and Greece, 208.

166 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 100 101 102 103 104 105 106 107 108 109 110 111 112

The Macedonian language Marinov, ‘In Defense of the Native Language’, 461. Hugh Poulton, Who Are the Macedonians? (London: Hurst & Company, 1995), 116. Ibid. Lunt, ‘The Creation of Standard Macedonian’, 21. Ibid., 22. Ibid. Ibid. Ibid., 26, note 5. Ibid., 22. Ibid., 26 note 5. Marinov, ‘In Defense of the Native Language’, 420–1. Ibid., 464. Ibid., 463–4. Ibid., 464–5. In ibid., 465. Ibid., 465–6 In ibid, 475. Ibid. Nikolaos Andriotis, To omospondo kratos ton Skopion kai i glossa tou [The Federated State of Skopje and Its Language] (Athens: Ekdoseis Trohalia, 1992) [1960]. In Marinov, ‘In Defense of the Native Language’, 475. Maria Todorova, ‘The Course and Discourses of Bulgarian Nationalism’, in Peter F. Sugar (ed.), Eastern European Nationalism in the Twentieth Century (Washington, DC: American University Press, 1995), 75. Ibid., 74. Ibid., 74–5. Marinov, ‘In Defense of the Native Language’, 472; Albena Hranova, ‘Historical Myths: The Bulgarian Case of Pride and Prejudice’, in Pål Kolstø (ed.), Myths and Boundaries in South-Eastern Europe (London: Hurst & Company, 2005), 316–18. Marinov, ‘In Defense of the Native Language’, 472. Ibid. Ibid. Ibid. Ibid. Zhivkov cited in Todorova, ‘The Course and Discourses of Bulgarian Nationalism’, 64. Hranova, ‘Historical Myths’, 318. Ibid., 316. Ibid., 318. Marinov, ‘In Defense of the Native Language’, 472. Ibid., fn 153. ‘Long-Dead Hero’s Memory Tests Bulgarian-North Macedonian Reconciliation’. Based on reports in the Bulgarian press on 8 May 2020. https://mia.mk/dimitrov-za-nas-prasha-eto-za-makedonskiot-azik-e-zatvoreno-i-kanas-i-vo-svetot/ Marinov, ‘In Defense of the Native Language’, 447. Ibid., 484. Ibid. Ibid. Ibid. Ibid., 485. Ibid. Ibid.

9

The Macedonian national historical narrative

Nations and national narratives The creation of a national historical narrative which, although mythologized, is also partly based on facts so as to make it appear plausible, especially to the ingroup, is a common almost indispensable phenomenon when it comes to nations, nationalism, ‘ethnogenesis’ or ‘national awakening’.1 As Ernest Renan had pointed out, national memory is by definition selective. As he had famously put it: ‘Forgetting, and I would say historical error, is an essential factor in the creation of a nation, and so it is that progress in the historical studies is often a danger to nationality’.2 According to Anthony Smith in ‘tracing a distinguished pedigree for his nation’, ‘[t]he intellectual is the interpreter, par excellence, of historical memories and ethnic myths’.3 Among intellectuals, it is the historians who are tasked with the ‘particular important function of constructing the nation’s past and presenting the nation as the inevitable outcome of the historical process. Nations need myths of descent, spatial origin, ancestry, a heroic or “golden” age, decline and regeneration’.4 National historical narratives-cum-national myths exalt ‘our’ nation, presenting it with a contribution to world civilization and thus worthy of self-respect, but also of admiration and respect by outgroups, and place the birth or origins of the nation in question as far back chronologically as possible, fishing in the nebulous past, when ‘nations’ in the present sense did not exist as self-defined human collectivities and nationalism did not exist as a mobilizing ideology. The need for exaltation and the need for longevity combine to present a glorious past in the Renaissance, or further back in the Middle Ages or in some cases even in Antiquity or pre-history. As Denko Maleski has put it, ‘[t]he nationalisms of the Balkans demonstrate a mental habit characteristic of all European nationalisms: the mythology of belonging to a group of very distinct people marching from the down of history to the present, fighting battles, suffering and celebrating defeats and victories and above all, never forgetting humiliations’.5 As regards longevity and a glorious past, there are two main variants: primordialism tour court, a continued history and existence since Antiquity, as seen in the national narratives-myths of the Greeks, the Jews, the Chinese, the Ethiopians, the Iranians or the Armenians, and ‘recurrent perennialism’,6 that nations

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disappear and reappear in history (with the help of ‘national awakeners’), as seen with the national narratives of the Albanians, the Romanians, the Serbs, the Bulgarians and, as we will see, the Macedonians. The first model in the Balkans was the Greek one,7 which initially was one of recurrent perennialism but soon gave way to primordialism, claiming a history as a nation since the Homeric days (see Chapter 1). The imitation and inspiration from the Greek model was probably due to the fact that many future Balkan nationalist intellectuals, especially Bulgarians and Albanians, had studied in Greek schools in the Ottoman Empire and at the University of Athens. In the Balkans and Asia Minor, there have been attempts to establish links with Antiquity, as seen in one of the first Turkish national narratives (Kemal Ataturk’s outlandish Turkish History Thesis, which since the 1970s has lost ground as the Turkish narrative), the Romanians with their link to the ancient Dacians and Romans (the Daco-Roman theory), the Albanians, claiming ancestry from the ancient Illyrians and the pre-historic Pelasgians and the Bulgarians claiming links with the ancient Thracians. But having been unable to present a plausible myth of uninterrupted continuity from Antiquity until today (plausible to their ingroup as well as internationally), they ended up with variants of recurrent perennialism prompted by ‘national awakeners’.

Macedonian national narrative(s) When the Macedonians became officially a nation in 1944 and the ‘signifier’ Macedonian gained an ‘ethno-national connotation’ (previously it was used as a common term for all the inhabitants) they were in a better position to come up with a national historical narrative of their own.8 But the endeavour was much harder, for the neighbouring nations, the Greeks, the Serbs, the Bulgarians as well as the Albanians had previously ‘almost completely plundered the historical events and characters from the land, and there was only debris left for the belated nation’.9 The Macedonians tried to retrieve parts of this ‘plundered history’ and also render the remaining ‘debris’ meaningful.10 The Macedonian national historical narrative is not one as in the Greek case (see Chapter 1) but three competing narratives: (a) the origins of the Macedonian nation and nationalism to be found in modernity, from the start of the twentieth century with some tenuous roots in the last decades of the nineteenth century, what could be called the Misirkov-Katardžiev school; (b) the origins to be found in the Middle Ages, based on Slavic roots, as one of the South Slavic peoples, whose ancestors arrived with the ‘Slavic sea’ in the Balkans in the sixth and seventh century AD, what could be called the Ivanovski-Taškovski-Ristovski school; and (c) the earliest and main ancestors of today’s Macedonians are the ancient Macedonians, a VMRO-DPMNE concept, with its more subtle rendition by a handful of historians, such as Hristo Andonovski and Mitko B. Panov. Chronologically, the Macedonian historical narratives can be divided into those within Yugoslavia and those under independent Macedonia, now North Macedonia. However, there is no sharp discontinuity between the two periods, contrary

The Macedonian national historical narrative 169 to other former socialist Balkan countries, but, as Ulf Brunnbauer points out, a ‘remarkable continuity, in terms of examined problems, as well as methodology’, with the changes or revisions from 1991 onwards limited mainly to the Yugoslav legacy,11 and to the far greater emphasis on ancient Macedonia. Under the Socialist Republic of Macedonia, the aforementioned first and second narratives dominated the scene; under the independent Macedonian state, the second and third narratives are more popular. Under socialism, the historically more correct view was the first to appear, which points to ‘ethnogenesis’, the birth of a new nation from the turn of the century until the 1930s, a trend that tallies with the modernist theories of nationalism (see Chapter 4). By the late 1950s this approach had a rival, the ‘national awakening’ approach, in the sense that after centuries of disappearance, the Macedonians were ‘awakened’ (by ‘national awakeners’), with their original existence as a people-cum-state to be found in the Middle Ages, with the Samuil’s Empire dubbed ‘Macedonian’, since it had as its capital Ohrid and its territory covered all of Macedonia, with today’s Macedonia as its centre. Within this narrative the Slavonic alphabet, Cyril and Methodius and the Bogomils also come into the picture. This line of recurrent perennialism, if true (which is highly unlikely), would fall under John Armstrong’s ‘nations before nationalism’,12 Josep Llobera’s nationcreation during the Middle Ages,13 or Adrian Hastings’s emergence of nations at the level of monarchies and aristocracy prior to modernity.14 From independence until today, antiquization, as labelled by its adversaries, made its entry in full swing, especially from the mid-2000s onwards, rivalling the other two approaches. Initially it was the domain of a few pseudo-historians, but it was picked up with a vengeance by the VMRO-DPMNE when it rose to power in 2006 under Gruevski. It claimed roots to the ancient Macedonia going as far as to downplay the Slavic origins. Thus, since the 2000s there are two rival narratives for the hearts and minds of the Macedonians, which also happen to correspond to the viewpoints of the two largest political parties: the Slavist line advocated by the centre-left Social Democratic Union of Macedonia (SDPM) and the ancient Macedonian by the VMRO-DPMNE.15 The Macedonians as ‘latecomers had to catch up with the new phase that opened in the history of the European nation-state: the construction of a strong connection between the state as a political unit and the nation as a cultural one’.16 The study of history was firmly institutionalized and primarily the purview of the Institut za nacionalna istorija (INI) (Institute of National History), which was set up in 1948, formally under the Cyril and Methodius University of Skopje. History is also studied in the History Department of the University of Skopje, established in 1946, and in the Macedonian Academy of Sciences and Arts set up in 1957.17 The express aim of Macedonian historiography (and of INI in particular) was – and is – the study and promotion of the history of Macedonia, the main focus being Macedonian national history presented as the ‘objective history’ of the country and its people. More specifically, the aims are (a) the affirmation and consolidation beyond any doubt of the existence of the Macedonian nation; (b) the solidification of a worthy Macedonian nation, with considerable cultural contribution, so

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as to evoke national pride and a worthwhile national identity rivalling that of the older neighbouring nations; and (c) the establishment of the view that the Macedonians have a long history in the Balkans.18 According to Stefan Troebst, there is ‘no similar case of mutual dependence of historiography and politics on such a level in Eastern and Southeast Europe’.19 The fruits of the historians of ΙΝΙ appeared some ten years after its establishment, towards the end of the 1950s. From then until the end of the Cold War they had managed to publish, within three decades, an impressive 140 volumes, and most of them were devoted to Macedonian national history.20 This process that had started in earnest in the mid-1940s, initially not by professional historians, had before it a major existential task, to distance itself as much as possible from everything Bulgarian, since the new nation was culturally and historically closer to the Bulgarians than to the Serbs (see Chapters 3 and 4).21 This meant baptizing a part of Bulgarian history and historical process as ‘Macedonian’. This enterprise faced serious problems and did not find supporters among scholars outside the country, including non-Balkan historians specializing on south-east Europe, because not only had they been already part of Bulgarian national history, but more crucially most of them were regarded Bulgarian by the international scientific historical community.22 Thus, the Macedonian faced heavy wind from foreign historians the further back they tried to go. Foreign anthropologists and scholars of nationalism have been more sympathetic, pointing out that the need for a national mythology is prevalent in all nations and in their national histories, and crucial especially in their formative early years of a new nation; all nations have their myths of glory and grandeur, their misrepresentations, their fabrications, their necessary oblivions and their forgeries. The Macedonians may appear less convincing but this hardly makes them greater forgers of history than their Balkan neighbours who preceded them.23 Three of their immediate neighbours believed that they simply do not exist, hence the overreaction and defensive attitude of the Macedonians.24 However, the wishful thinking and the expansionist agendas against them of Greece, Serbia and Bulgaria, were not fulfilled, despite their many attempts. One reason that this did not come about is the indefatigable efforts to hammer out a national identitycum-history and a worthy one to boot, especially by INI, even though it was often presented in a negative fashion, as not Bulgarian, not Serbian and not Greek, and with no relationship to them, even though the links and entanglements with all three of them are more than obvious.25 But let us take the thread from the mid-1940s, when for the first time the Macedonians found themselves officially a nation.

The years 1944–1991 At the start, the Macedonian Partisans, within a spirit of leftist revolutionary romanticism, espoused the view that everything had commenced with their struggle against the Occupiers, and were prepared to forget Ilinden and even questioned to what extent Delchev and the others had ‘Macedonian consciousness’. But this line did not last for long.26

The Macedonian national historical narrative 171 The first quest for a Macedonian national historical narrative probably appears in 1946 on the part of Vasil Ivanovski. According to Ivanovski, Antiquity had nothing to offer, apart from the name ‘Macedonia’, for the ancestors of today’s Macedonians are Slavs who arrived en masse during the early Middle Ages. What may have been left of the ancient Macedonians (probably a people of mixed ThracianIllyrian stock) was absorbed into the ‘Slavic sea’. As regards Cyril and Methodius, their contribution was both Bulgarian and Macedonian, and basically a ‘common Slavic’ achievement and they did not write in Bulgarian, but Old Slavic, based on the oral language of the Slavs in the region of Thessaloniki. And he correctly points out that at the time there was no sense of ‘national consciousness’ in the Balkans for the people did not distinguish themselves on the basis of ethnic attributes.27 It was much later, when the initial struggle was against the dominance of the ‘Greek Patriarchate’, that the Miladinov brothers, Žinzifov and others, spoke and wrote in the Macedonian dialect and dreamt of some kind of ‘Macedonian freedom’, although they defined themselves as ‘Bulgarians’, but without realizing it they also set the roots for a future Macedonian literature and culture.28 With Delchev, who changed the name of the revolutionary organization (abandoning the term ‘Bulgarian’), autonomy became the true goal, though he acknowledges that Delchev, Gruev and the others did not have a clear view of ‘a Macedonian national character’. However, it was mainly through their struggle and sacrifices that it was possible to arrive later at a free and autonomous Macedonia.29 In the People’s Republic of Macedonia, before the advent of professional historians of the INI, the tone was set by political leaders, with experience from the pre-1940 period, especially by Dimitar Vlahov and Lazar Koliševki. Vlahov, in his various speeches (which he published in 1947 as a book), upheld that the Macedonians have now become a nation; they had a ‘national individuality’ in spite of the ‘cultural yoke’ imposed on them by the Greeks, the Serbs and the Bulgarians.30 Now they had ‘all the elements’ that make a nation, such as ‘common culture’, ‘common territory’, ‘a complete geographical entity’, ‘geographical border’, ‘similar mentality and a similar national character that differ from the character of other nations’, they have ‘the same language, with its own features, a language which is different both from Bulgarian and Serbian’.31 And the crafty politician risked making the following point: ‘It is whispered that a federal Macedonia today or tomorrow will . . . become Bulgarian again’.32 To this, his answer was unequivocal: ‘That will never happen. Macedonia stays where it is now by the will of the entire Macedonian people. These whispers come from supporter of “Greater Bulgaria” who cannot endure the thought that they have lost’ Macedonia.33 Vlahov accepted that historically the Macedonians had participated with the Bulgarians in common causes, but now things had changed: ‘within the last decade there has occurred an acute shift in the consciousness of the Macedonian people about its classification as a nation’.34 Vlahov also referred to the medieval heritage of the Macedonians, in his book titled Macedonia–Comments of the History of the Macedonian People (1950), namely that ‘we Macedonians’ should be proud for our gift to Slavism ‘with the brothers Cyril and Methodius, the apostles from Salonika, the brothers, the creators of the Slavic alphabet and of literacy, men who eleven centuries ago gave the

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Slavic world the instrument to enlighten and develop that very world’.35 He called Samuil’s empire a ‘Macedonian state’.36 Vlahov also injected the ancient Macedonian dimension, claiming that as for the racial origins of the modern Macedonians they were ‘the product of fusion of Slavs with Ancient Macedonians, a tribe akin to the Thracians’.37 Koliševski, prime minister for a decade (1945–1953) and the senior leader until 1963, set forth in a speech (in 1958) the main guidelines for writing ‘Macedonian history’: ‘to clarify national history . . . to refute the “fabrications” in neighbouring states”, especially those who advocate a Greater Bulgaria’.38 To his credit he did not shun away the fact that ‘many of the Slav Macedonians ancestors, and even heroic figures’ of their pantheon, had felt ‘Bulgarian, Greek, or Serb’,39 adding that ‘there is no reason to suppress this or to be ashamed of it’.40 What matters ‘was what they were after’ what ‘true process their movement stood for . . . and what direct and definite result it did achieve’.41 After all, he said, ‘the Macedonian nation was not built in a day’, but ‘by reflecting its own particular conditions’, as is the case with all other nations.42 Kiro Miljovski, the first rector of the Cyril and Methodius University of Skopje and the Party theoretician, also joined in. He claimed that the emergence of the Macedonian nation was a product of capitalism and of the encroaching aspirations of the bourgeoisies of the neighbouring Balkan states. As for the label ‘Bulgarian’ and the fact that Delchev wrote in Bulgarian and never stated that ‘we are Macedonians’, he regarded this as secondary and mainly a product of the reigning spirit at the time.43 He rejected Poptomov’s postulate that if the Bulgaria of San Stefano had been established, no ‘Macedonian nation’ would have emerged, as an anachronism and something disproved by history.44 According to Miljovski, the Macedonian nation is not the product of a ‘decision of the progressive forces’ in 1934, on the contrary it is the ‘result of a relatively developed, evolutionary stage in the shaping of the Macedonian nation’, the recognition of an already existing situation.45 The ethnogenesis or national awakening was placed in the decade from 1893 until 1903, from the formation of the Macedonian revolutionary organization in 1893 until the Ilinden Uprising. Ilinden, in particular, is presented as the first uprising, albeit abortive, of the oppressed Macedonians, in search of a national existence. Vlahov as well as Koliševski referred to Ilinden as the great inaugural moment in which the Macedonians entered history, as had been symbolized on 2 August 1944, at the Prohor Pčinjski monastery, whose declaration spoke of a ‘Second Ilinden’ so as to stress the inseparable organic link with the first Ilinden.46 The aim was ‘de-bulgarization’,47 by ‘baptizing everything Bulgarian – or anything which in the sources is attributed as Bulgarian – to being “Macedonian’”.48 Macedonia had little choice. As Mirjana Maleska has put it, ‘Macedonia could confirm itself as a state with its own past, present and future only through differentiating itself from Bulgaria’.49 Thus, important Bulgarian figures or seminal events of Bulgarian history are made ‘Macedonian’ so long as they transpired in geographical Macedonia, from Samuil to Ilinden.50 Moreover, any possible positive role of the Bulgarians in favour of the Slavs of Macedonia is hushed, and

The Macedonian national historical narrative 173 everything Bulgarian, its government, its Church, its military, end up being classified as ‘enemies or rivals’ of the Macedonians.51 The approach of the Macedonian origins to be found in the late nineteenth century was initially followed by the first generation of professional Macedonian historians, from the second part of the 1950s onwards,52 such as Hristo Antonovski, Mihail Karamičiev, Risto Kirjazovksi, Krste Bitovski and Todor Simovski (all five of them refugees from Greece with an axe to grind as regards Greece),53 Gligor Todorovski, Alexandar Hristov, Alexandar Trayanovski, Lazar Mojsov, Stojan Kiselinovski, Manol Pandevski and Dragan Taškovski,54 as well as Ivan Katardžiev and Blaže Ristovski (the last two are regarded by historians outside the region, as the ones with the most original and authoritative scientific contribution).55 According to the Macedonian historians until the 1980s, the pantheon of Macedonians heroes starts with the Miladinov brothers and others in the course of the second part of the nineteenth century and in particular with the revolutionaries from 1893 onwards, especially Delchev and Gruev, as well as Tatarchev, Petrov, Sandanski and others. As for the well-known obstacle that they all wrote in Bulgarian and defined themselves as ‘Macedonian Bulgarians’, they attribute this to the fact that all had attended Bulgarian schools,56 while in fact they had been struggling for Macedonia and its autonomy, and not for its incorporation into Bulgaria, and in doing so they expressed the desires of the Macedonian people at the time.57 The dominant line was that around the 1880s the Macedonians had the attributes that could turn them from a people to a nation. However, they faced the intense multi-sided efforts of the Greek, Bulgarian and Serbian propaganda that was trying to enlist them on their side and assimilate them. This led to a Macedonian reaction, as seen with the creation of an indigenous revolutionary organization and by its goal, autonomy leading to independence. But their vision could not be realized then, above all due to the Bulgarians, with the activities of the Exarchate, their impressive educational campaign and in the 1890s with the setting up of the Supreme Committee to control the VMORO and through other actions aimed at stifling the development of a separate Macedonian identity. Despite the setbacks, their vision of freedom did not peter out, to later develop into a fully-fledged Macedonian consciousness.58 As regards Ilinden, the more scholarly Macedonian historians acknowledge that it was Garvanov’s idea, prompted by the Supremists, and that Delchev, Petrov and others had been against the whole endeavour, but at the end of the day and with the benefit of hindsight, the Ilinden Uprising became a de facto ‘Macedonian event’. As Kofos has argued, this definition was necessary due to ‘the need to find a heroic event-milestone, which would illuminate the national liberation struggle’ of the Macedonians, something analogous to the April Uprising for the Bulgarians and the Greek Revolution for the Greeks.59 Thus Ilinden and Kruševo gained legendary status, which bears little resemblance to what had actually transpired in the dramatic two months of 1903, and on whose name the uprising had taken place (as pointed out by none other than Misirkov; see Chapter 4).60

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In Macedonian national history, special emphasis is put, as one would have expected, on Misirkov. The late Ristovski, the main expert on Misirkov, has characterized him as ‘the most eminent, most significant and more versatile cultural and national worker before liberation’.61 Misirkov is regarded as a forefather of the ‘Macedonian nation’, even though from his death in 1926 until the early 1940s his pace-setting book had been forgotten (see Chapter 4). His name was given to the Macedonian language institute, but until the mid-1960s he was rarely referred to. Things changed in 1966, forty years after his death, when an impressive conference was held devoted to his book, which led to an edited volume and a monograph by Ristovski on Misirkov. As for Misirkov’s glaring inconsistencies, which have led the Bulgarians to regard him today as a great Bulgarian patriot, Ristovski’s answer, based on the testimony of Misirkov’s son and grand-daughter, is that when he lived in Sofia and especially in Bessarabia, where there were very few Macedonians but many Bulgarians, he had no other choice than to assist them.62 Another twist to the Misirkov story came about in 2007, when his diary was found in an antique shop in Sofia. Specialists pronounced that the diary, which was written in Russian, was genuine. It was translated immediately into Macedonian and Bulgarian, but the outcome was hardly clear-cut, satisfying one side and disappointing the other, for at times he sounded Bulgarian and other times Macedonian, with either party of course highlighting the passages that suited it.63 From 1950 until 1991, the following major VM(O)RO figures were outside the Macedonian pantheon: Sarafov, Garvanov and in particular Aleksandrov, Protogerov and of course Mikhailov. Also not included in the pantheon were Andonov-Čento, being a nationalist and non-communist (see Chapter 5), as well as Brašnarov and Shatev.64 It was from the mid-1960s onwards that Macedonians historians added to the narrative their Slav ancestors, who immigrated to the Balkans in the sixth century, with special emphasis on Cyril and Methodius, and Tsar Samuil and his empire in the tenth century. More generally, the Slavic character of the Macedonians was not in doubt until the early 1990s, which was also in accord with the whole philosophy of Yugoslavia as a state of the southern Slavs.65 The identification with the Middle Ages and the need to establish older roots than the late nineteenth century was also a reaction to the impressive Bulgarian campaign with its spirited rejection of a ‘Macedonian nation’ and of the Macedonians having been always Bulgarians from the Middle Ages until today (see Chapter 7).66 According to the authoritative three-volume Historija na Makedonskiot narod (History of the Macedonian People), first published in 1969 by the INI, edited by historians Apostolski, Zografski, Stoyanovski and Todorovski, the ancestors of Macedonian Slavs had arrived from the Danube, while the ancestors of the Bulgarians from the Volga river from 600 until 700 AD, and the former were called at the time ‘Macedonians’ because they lived in the geographical region known as Macedonia. And in this context Samuil’s empire and the Cyrillic alphabet are Macedonian – not Bulgarian – contributions.67 According to Ristovski, Slavic and non-Slavic ethnic groups contributed to the ethnogenesis of the Macedonians. As for the Bulgarians they are not Slavs as such,

The Macedonian national historical narrative 175 but a mixture of Slavs and Proto-Bulgars, a Tatar (Turkic) ethnic group. And the Slavs who Slavisized the Bulgars were distinct from the Slav ancestors of the Macedonians; those Slavs who inhabited the future Bulgaria were Antians or Antes, while those who inhabited the future Macedonia and future Serbia were Slavini or Sclavini. Thus, there are two distinct wider cultures in the region, the SlavsBulgarians who were initially pagans, and the Macedonians-Slavs-Byzantines who were Christians.68 Cyril and Methodius are referred to as ‘Macedonians’ who codified the alphabet and language based on the one spoken by the ancestors of the Macedonians. In this sense Church Slavonic was the first form of ‘Macedonian’, and the ancestors of the present-day Macedonians the first Slavs to acquire an alphabet and written language. And Samuil’s Empire, with its capital in Ohrid and extending to almost all of geographical Macedonia, is described as ‘the first Macedonian state’, with a great cultural contribution, and not as Bulgarian (despite its name). In Skopje, this idea had been introduced by the Croatian historian, Stjepan Antoljak, who headed the department of ancient and medieval history at ΙΝΙ and had written a monograph on Samuil’s empire in 1969.69 In the 1969 History of the Macedonian People, the empire is not called ‘Macedonian’; it is accepted that its name was Bulgarian Empire (hence Samuil’s nemesis, the Byzantine Emperor Basil II the Bulgar Slayer), but it is claimed that the majority of the inhabitants of that empire were ‘Macedonians’ or ‘Macedonian Slavs’ and the state’s tradition was ‘Macedonian’. Even Macedonian historians who place the birth of the Macedonian nation from the late nineteenth century onwards, such as Taškovski, try to associate the Macedonians with Cyril and Methodius, Samuil and the Bogomils (though not with the Serbian Empire of Stefan Dušan, which also included Macedonia and had Skopje as its capital, no doubt a clever omission on the part of the Macedonian historians), all considered as illustrious ancestors of today’s Macedonians.70 Note that two acclaimed Byzantinists outside the Balkans have argued that Samuil’s Empire was Macedonian rather than Bulgarian. The Russian George Ostrogorsky claimed that it was a ‘Macedonian kingdom’ but the ruling elite, including Samuil, continued to call the state Bulgarian Empire, ‘for reasons of political and ecclesiastic legitimacy, crucial in the Middle Ages’.71 This was also the view of the Russian-British Dimitri Obolensky.72 Following the defeat of Samuil, the ‘Macedonians’ came under the rule of the Byzantines, the Bulgarians (Second Bulgarian Empire) and finally the Ottoman Turks, but despite the ‘Turkish subjugation’ of five centuries, the Macedonian people did not lose their ‘national memory’.73 According to the 1979 INI edition of History of the Macedonian People, when other Balkan peoples, the Greeks, the Serbs and the Bulgarians were nationally awakened and started creating their national states, the Macedonians were unable to follow them during that crucial period. This was due to social and economic reasons, the fact that capital was in the hands of the Greek, Vlach, Jewish and Armenian middle class, and in view of the educational and propaganda efforts of Greece (given also the millet system which favoured the Greeks), Serbia and Bulgaria, which were all able to absorb sections of the Macedonian people. The Macedonians were at last able to cover

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the lost ground only when they acquired a middle class of their own in the second part of the nineteenth century and as a result become ‘nationally awakened’.74

The name Macedonia and the ancient Macedonians, 1960–1991 The identification with the ancient Macedonians is not completely new, as it goes back to Dimitar Miladinov, the Macedonists (referred to by Slaveykov in the early 1870s), in the 1890s by Kosta Šahov in his journal, Glas makenonski (The Macedonian Voice), in the review Loza (The Grapevine) of the Young Macedonian Literary Society,75 and in the 1920s by Trifon Grekov of the Macedonian Federative Organization (see Chapters 4 and 10). From the end of the 1960s until 1991 some Macedonian historians referred to the ancient Macedonians, in the sense that when their Slav ancestors arrived in the Balkans in the sixth and seventh centuries they hardly found a region without inhabitants, and thus they intermingled with these people who were obviously the descendants of the ancient Macedonians and other peoples who had lived in the region, such as the Illyrians, the Thracians, the Romans and others. They were infused with ‘blood’ from the ancient Macedonians, who, it was noted, were not Greeks, and only their governing elite had become Hellenisized (the non-Greekness of the ancient Macedonians had been aired by the Bulgarians and Serbs in the nineteenth century and later by the Albanians). According to a more sophisticated rendition, it is accepted that their ancestors did not use the designation Macedonia because the term did not exist then (and as for the Byzantine Empire, Macedonia was a totally different region, near Constantinople). However, having lived for so long in this region of the Balkans, they gradually used the term, initially as a geographical concept, but then they began to be moved by the glory of the ancient Macedonians and felt attached to these illustrious people who had lived in the very same region that they now inhabited.76 The irony is that the future Macedonians learned about the famous ancient Macedonians, Philip II and Alexander III, in the Greek schools of Ottoman Macedonia, and in fact one of the explicit aims of Greek education was precisely to make them believe that they were not Slavs, but the descendants of the ‘Greek’ ancient Macedonians (see Chapter 1).77 However, until 1974 no edition of the ΙΝΙ or other scholarly publication had been devoted to ancient Macedonia. In the 1969 three-volume edition of INI, History of the Macedonian People, there was only a twenty-page chapter on the ancient Macedonians, written by historian Dušica Petruševska, where no connection or origin from the ancient Macedonians is made; it only points to the fact that it was the first state to bear the name Macedonia.78 A year later, in 1970, Taškovski, in his book The Birth of the Macedonian Nation, and in an interview to Nova Macedonija he referred to a romantic sentimental attachment of the present Macedonians with the glorious ancient Macedonians. He made the point that the Macedonians may be Slavs, but it is difficult for them to be indifferent to those great people who had lived in the very same region.

The Macedonian national historical narrative 177 Thus, Philip and Alexander became ‘Slavs’ even though they were not; and by assuming the ‘Macedonian name’, the ‘downtrodden and apathetic people came out from the historical darkness’, and felt that they could present themselves in the scene of history without lagging behind other nations around them with a glorious history and illustrious ancestors.79 Taškovski, in his 1975 book, The Macedonian Nation (translated into English), is mainly interested in distancing the Macedonians from the Bulgarians and coping with Bulgarian criticism against them.80 He rejects the well-known Bulgarian accusation of a Serbian ploy by Novaković, and instead refers to the points raised by Slaveykov, who, after all, was an advocate of Greater Bulgaria.81 As for Samuil’s state in substance, and despite its name, it was not Bulgarian but a ‘Macedonian Slavic state’, even though at the time ethnicity was unimportant, within the ‘ecumenism’, which dominated all the then empires.82 Regarding Antiquity he accepts that today’s Macedonians are Slavs and the only thing in common with the ancient Macedonians is the name. However, when the Slavs arrived, they no doubt intermingled with the remaining descendants of the ancient Macedonians, who in the meantime had become Romans, at a time when the designation Macedonians did not exist.83 In itself this selection of the name is not that surprising, according to Taškovski: the Slav Bulgarianspeakers of the nineteenth century chose the Medieval name Bulgarians, and the French chose a name from a German tribe (the Franks) instead of calling themselves Gauls.84

Macedonia and the ancient Macedonians, 1992–2018 From the mid-1990s onwards antikvizacija appeared as a new national historical narrative, adopted at the political level by the VMRO-DPMNE, especially when Gruevski took over as leader of the party in 2003 and in the ten years he was prime minister (2006–2016).85 This major switch in the national narrative was ‘conditioned by the dramatically worsening relations between Macedonia and Greece at that time’, with Greece asserting ‘exclusive claim on the name Macedonia’.86 This is the overall assessment of most specialists on the recent Greek-Macedonian naming dispute.87 As Maleski has put it: ‘Since nationalism was a commodity in demand on the political market, this national exaltation was followed by a nationalistic revision of Macedonian history, with an accent on the previously neglected period of Ancient Macedonia, and loss of interest for objective historical truth. In that sense, Macedonian politics became a mirror image of Greek politics’.88 The Macedonians, especially right-wing Macedonians, reacted in this way ‘to the hysteric anti-Macedonian campaign in Greece in the early nineties’,89 the obvious aim being ‘to appropriate the ancient Macedonians for their own national history, in order to refute Greek claims to the name “Macedonia” and to ancient Macedonian symbols’.90 This idea was mainly fomented among the Macedonian diaspora of Australia and North America, and they managed to sell it to the Macedonians back home (the sun of Vergina to become the Macedonian flag was their idea).91 Thus, they ended up claiming that they – and not the Greeks – were the

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true heirs of the ancient Macedonians and by doing so they appeared as indigenous people of the region, with continuity, from Antiquity until the present.92 As regards Greece and the ancient Macedonians, the initial strategy was to claim that the ancient Macedonians were not Greeks and spoke a different language, unrelated to ancient Greek which the ancient Greeks could not understand. For instance, in the 1993 publication of the Council for Research into SouthEastern Europe of the Macedonian Academy of Sciences and Arts, titled Macedonia and Its Relations with Greece, the authors claim that ‘the Macedonian people are the product of an ethnic mixture between the Ancient Macedonians and the Slavs’ and that ‘the Macedonian people occupied the whole of geographical Macedonia beginning in the Middle Ages’.93 It is also asserted that94 It is universally known that the classical Greek authors did not recognize the Macedonians as their fellow-countrymen, calling them barbarians, and they considered Macedonian domination in Greece as an alien rule, imported from outside by the members of other tribes. . . . Alexander spread Hellenism in the Greek language, which he considered to be the language of culture, but his mother tongue was not understood by the Greeks: a fact of which there are explicit proofs. The authoritative Macedonian Historical Dictionary, published in 2001 by the INI, tries to establish a historical and ethnic continuity between the ancient and modern Macedonians,95 by using the following device96: After the settlement of the Slavs in Macedonia (6th – 7th century), there was an integration of the greater part of the assimilated Hellenic and Roman descendants of the ancient Macedonians into a Slavic majority, and in this way they gave their contribution to the creation of the new ethnicity on Macedonian soil, in which the dominant role was played by the Slavic element (the language, the habits) and Christian culture. The 2008 INI edition of History of the Macedonian People, funded by the Gruevski government,97 reinforced the non-Greek elements of the ancient Macedonians and the presumed Macedonian-Slav fusion in the Middle Ages. Aneta Shukarova, writing in the 2008 volume, maintains that ‘[t]he Ancient Macedonians are a paleo-Balkan population of Indo-European origin. They formed as a separate ethnos in the VIII century BC’98; that ‘[t]he ancient records testify the peculiarity and specificity of the Ancient Macedonians over the other neighboring ethnic groups–Hellenes, Thracians, Illyrians, Mysians’99; that there was a ‘distinctive Macedonian language’, with ‘around 150 Macedonian glosses’ confirming ‘that the Macedonian language is an Indo-European language and it is related to the language of the Bryges’ (who were related to the Phrygians)100; and that, according to Isocrates, ‘Philip, although he was a ruler of “alien people”, he had “Hellenic education” and . . . was familiar to them [to the Greeks] not by gender but by spirituality’.101

The Macedonian national historical narrative 179 Following this relatively mild allegation, Mitko B. Panov, the historian who covers the Middle Ages is more assertive. He claims ‘[t]hat after the fall of the Macedonian Empire (168 BC) the Macedonians continued their existence perceiving their ethnic identity’ and this continued until ‘the settlement of the Slavs in the Balkans’.102 In fact, all the acclaimed non-Balkan historians, even those who regard the Macedonians as non-Greeks or semi-Greeks are of the view that in the course of the Hellenistic period and by the time of the Roman conquest the ‘Macedonians’ had been Hellenized (see Chapter 10). Panov goes even further by claiming that103: The attested continuity of the Macedonians as a major population in Macedonia had an essential reflection on the process of the transfer of the Macedonian traditions to the Slavs that settled on the territory of Macedonia from the 7th century. . . . [T]he Slavic settlement in Macedonia did not represent massive colonization of such capacity that might have completely changed the ethnical constellation in Macedonia,104 although the strong influence of the Slavic ethnos was certain. . . . [I]t was a gradual process that enabled the mutual interaction, coexistence and symbiosis between the ancient Macedonians and the Slavs that settled in Macedonia. Panov concludes that ‘the ancient Macedonians had a strong influence in the process of group self-identification and the creation of the identity of the Slavs settled in Macedonia, which were considered by the Byzantines as Macedonian Slavs’,105 but that ‘with the passing of time the coexistence between the Slavs and the Macedonians resulted in a situation in which the Slavic language imposed its domination as a means of communication’ and ‘lingua franca’.106 Following Greece’s 2008 veto on Macedonia’s candidacy for membership in NATO (see Chapter 6) antiquization entered the scene as never before. As Macedonian journalist Boris Georgievski has put it, after the Bucharest summit, ‘[w]hat began with the rebranding of the country’s main airport, has snowballed into a wider phenomenon’ and this ‘drive to forge a new identity, as heir to the world of Classical Antiquity, creates identity crisis at home and worsens tensions with neighbours’.107 Given Greece’s position, which ‘considers the political use of antiquity a provocation and hence a reason to halt Macedonia’s Euro-Atlantic integration’, it seems that the two countries had entered, as Anastas Vangeli has put it, ‘into a vicious cycle by acting against each other’s interest’.108 The process of antiquization gave rise to various archaeological excavations financed by the Gruevski Government. The sui generis archaeologist Pasko Kuzman, appointed to head a governmental Bureau for the Protection of Cultural Heritage, became an important public figure for several years, ‘adopting the role of Shaman of the Macedonian nation’.109 Kuzman made the point on Macedonian TV (June 2009) that ‘Macedonia can only defend its name, if it proves that the Macedonian nation has Classical Antique and not Slavic roots’.110 Antiquization gradually gained support among the wider public, mainly among nationalist ‘amateur historians and archeologists’,111 some of which have gone

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as far as to claim that the modern-day Macedonians are not Slavs, but ‘direct descendents of the ancient Macedonians’, who ‘were not Greek’.112 Moderate nationalist historians are more subtle: they argue that the Macedonians of today are indeed Slavs, but that the ancient Macedonians were not Greeks, hence both their claim and the Greek one of presumed descent and continuity from the ancient Macedonians is equally invalid.113 For instance, the historian, Hristo Andonovski, who had previously supported the Slavic origins approach, in his 1995 book, titled South Macedonia: From the Ancient to the Modern Macedonians, poses the question: ‘Who actually were the Ancient Macedonians: Illyrians, Thracians, Macedonians or Greeks?’114 He divides history into various periods and concludes that the ancient Macedonians were different from the Greeks and hence their most natural heirs in the Balkans are the present Macedonians.115 The most authoritative Macedonian historians accept that the leadership and elite in ancient Macedonia had been Hellenized and the official language of the Kingdom of Macedonia was indeed Greek. However, they refer to Demosthenes and other contemporaries of Phillip and Alexander the Great, who regarded the Macedonians ‘barbarians’ and not true Greeks (see Chapter 10) but stand clear of claiming any ethnic affinity between the Slav Macedonians and the ancient Macedonians. As was the case during the socialist period, the most that they claim is the intermingling of populations, of the incoming Slavs with the remaining descendants of the ancient Macedonians, Illyrians, Romans, Thracians and others. Another feature which is stressed is the quest for an independent state, as first seen with Samuil’s empire, the constant struggle for liberation from foreign occupiers. Apparently, this element is inserted so as to compensate for the belated development of a Macedonian sense of nationhood.116 According to Kiro Gligorov, ‘We are Slavs who came to this area in the sixth century AD. . . . [W]e are not descendants of the ancient Macedonians’117; ‘We are Macedonians but we are Slav Macedonians. That’s who we are! We have no connection to Alexander the Great and his Macedonia. The ancient Macedonians no longer exist, they had disappeared from history [a] long time ago’.118 Gligorov refers in his memoirs to a meeting he had with diaspora Macedonians from Australia, who insisted that the Macedonians were the descendantsof the ancient Macedonians. His answer was the following: ‘According to historiography we have come to the Balkans in the sixth and seventh century, we have inhabited the territories named Macedonia and have lived there ever since. I am not aware whether in our veins there flows a drop of blood from the ancient Macedonians, but even if this was the case, it is not this which gives our people its identity’.119 Worth referring to is also a revealing extract from an interview by Macedonia’s first foreign minister Denko Maleski to a Greek TV channel120: The idea that Alexander the Great belongs to us, was at the mind of some outsider political groups only! These groups were insignificant the first years of our independence but the big problem is that the old Balkan nations have . . . learned to legitimate themselves through their history. In [the] Balkans, if you want to be recognised as a nation, you need to have history of 2000 or

The Macedonian national historical narrative 181 3000 years old. So since you [the Greeks] made us to invent a history, we invent it! . . . You forced us to the arms of the extreme nationalists who today claim that we are direct descendants of Alexander the Great. According to none other than the founder of VMRO-DPMNE and former prime minister, Ljubco Georgievski, the Gruevski Government was ‘surfing on a wave of populism. . . . Those advocating the thesis of Classical Antiquity in Macedonia are aggressive and vulgar, and now we have a problem of people arguing over who is Antique and who is Slavic Macedonian’.121 According to Zarko Trajanovski, antiquization ‘has become a double-edged sword’, in trying to build ‘a new nation’ it is destroying the existing state.122 Another aspect of antiquization as ‘ethnic continuity since the Ancient Macedonians’ was the monument-building project ‘Skopje 2014’, launched by the Gruevski Government in 2010, which ‘became the vehicle for the vulgarisation’ of this ‘major revision of national history and for the redefinition of ethnic Macedonian identity’.123 The ‘Skopje 2014’ project was Gruevski’s idea as he later acknowledged.124 Within a period of six years the urban landscape of the capital changed drastically with hundreds of statues and other monuments, new public buildings (ministries, museums, culture halls, etc.), as well as ‘numerous fountains, a triumphal arch, four pedestrian bridges decorated with sculpture sand three cement galleons on the river Vardar, while dozens of modernist buildings were covered by fake neoclassical facades’.125 At the central square, a gigantic statue was erected of an aggressive looking Alexander the Great on a horse, with sword drawn (officially called ‘Warrior on a horse’, but commonly known as ‘Aleksandar Makedonski’)126 on top of a heavily ornamented fountain with lions to boot, and across the river on the other side is a huge statue of Philip II standing (officially called ‘Warrior’), both statues visible from afar.127 And between the two statues is another fountain (named ‘Fountain of the Mothers of Macedonia’) with several statues of Alexander’s mother Olympias seated, pregnant and then with him in her arms at various stages of his life from an infant to a toddler. The outcome ‘proved to be extremely controversial’, in particular ‘[t]he extravagant combination of sculptures and monumental objects of different styles and historical periods was severely criticized by domestic commentators and by the foreign media as utterly “kitsch” as nothing less but a mere exhibition of nationalist “megalomania” ’.128 The opposition political parties and civil society organizations ‘denounced the excessive cost of the project (reaching a total 684 million Euros), as well as the lack of transparency both in the decision-making process and in the tenders for the construction of the facilities, accusing the government for abuse of public funds and money-laundering’.129 When the Zaev Government took over power, the project, which had not been wholly completed, was dropped, though it might prove irreversible, given the huge cost of withdrawing the statues that would cost almost as much as their construction.130 An obvious question is why antiquization, which has not earned the Macedonians any international supporters, quite the contrary, leaving ‘Macedonia with few friends and several angry neighbours’.131

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There are no less than six reasons for this trend: (a) the aforementioned challenge to the Greek claim of monopoly and copyright to Macedonia/Macedonians; (b) the great prestige to be gained from being seen as descendants of Phillip and Alexander the Great; (c) a more direct link with Europe since such a heritage and culture is part and parcel of the cradle of European civilization (which is less the case with Slavdom); (d) becoming indigenous to the region, and by the same token equal as autochthonous with the Albanians of Macedonia, who for their part claim descent from the ancient Illyrians and pre-historic Pelasgians; (e) drastically downplaying Tito’s role, Titoist Yugoslavia and the south-Slav past within federal Yugoslavia; and (f) throwing the Ottoman period and its pervasive influence overboard.132 Antiquization and ‘Skopje 2014’ also strained the fragile ethnic relations between Albanians and Macedonians. The Albanians leaders regarded it as outrageous and misleading; the Albanian community saw it as directed against them, implying that they are not indigenous to the region but newcomers (while they in fact regard themselves as more indigenous than the Slav Macedonians, as descendants of the Illyrians, with Alexander of Illyrian origin via his mother).133 The Gruevski Government tried to placate the Albanians by funding Skanderbeg Square built around the 2006 statue of Skanderbeg, the Albanian national hero.134 But let us put aside the antiquization narrative and see how the other areas of the Macedonian national narrative fared from 1992 onwards.

The sequel regarding Samuil, the VM(O)RO and Greece Following the independence of Macedonia, in the 2000 edition of The History of the Macedonian People, Samuil’s empire is dubbed a ‘Macedonian state’. The volume’s editor, historian Branko Panov, claims that under Samuil, one can speak in terms of the ethnogenesis of the Macedonian people. As for Cyril and Methodius, they are characterized as genuine Macedonian Slavs. Ristovski discerns an anti-Bulgarian touch in the attitude of the two monks sent by the Byzantines, as seen, among others, by the fact that they went as far as Moravia to the north, but never set foot on the nearby Bulgarian territory. The Bogomils are characterized as a liberation movement against Bulgarian domination and it is also claimed that the Bogomil struggle contributed to the creation of the Macedonian state of Samuil.135 The fact that Byzantine authors referred to the Macedonian Slavs as ‘Bulgarians’ and to Samuil as ‘Bulgarian’ is attributed to their lack of detailed knowledge of the region and thus they identified the Bulgarian conquerors with the Macedonian Slavs, who had created a separate Old Slavic culture with Ohrid as its centre.136 Branko Panov claims that the designation Bulgar was used by Samuil to create a sense of awe and fear to the Byzantines.137 As was the case during the socialist period, the point is again made by Ristovski and other Macedonian historians, that the language of the Slavic translation of the Bible was an Old Slavic Macedonian language, which renders ‘Macedonian’ in effect the oldest written Slavic/Slavonic language.138

The Macedonian national historical narrative 183 In INI’s 2008 edition of The History of the Macedonian People, Mitko Panov does not claim that Constantine (Cyril) and Methodius, who were born in Thessalonica were Slavs, but that they ‘knew the Slavic language excellently’ and for this reason were selected by the Byzantine Emperor for their important mission.139 After their death, Clement, who ‘had Macedonian origin . . . embraced the tradition of Cyril and Methodius’140 as reflected ‘in the use of the Glagolitic alphabet within the Ohrid Literary School’, while the Bulgarian court in Preslav abandoned the Glagolitic alphabet, adopting the Greek uncial, later known as Cyrillic alphabet. This occurrence, according to Panov, ‘clearly addresses the differentiation of the cultural projects in Macedonia and Bulgaria which were directly correlated with the different needs of the population’.141 As regards Samuil and his empire, Panov rightly points out that the ethnic identity of the rulers was not a key factor in Medieval states and did not reflect the ethnic character of the state and the population,142 but argues that the continued use of the Glagolitic alphabet in the ‘Macedonian state’ and its literature, and the ‘totally different cultural and historical traditions’ made it a ‘Macedonian’ and not a Bulgarian state. Yet the Byzantines continued to use the terms ‘Bulgaria’ and ‘Bulgarians’ for the new state, in order to distinguish between the Byzantine administrative region of Macedonia, with its concomitant Macedonian dynasty, and Samuil’s Macedonian state, in what was a ‘Byzantine political ideology based on the negation of the new Macedonian state legitimacy’.143 Revisionist Macedonian historiography has been prevalent from the mid-1990s onwards, covering and questioning various areas previously taken for granted. Its more prominent representatives are Zoran Todorovski, Stojan Kiselinovski, Violeta Ačkoska and Stojan Risteski, who tend to be ideologically close to the VMRODPMNE.144 They have sought the rehabilitation of various leading Macedonian figures, previously outside the pantheon of national heroes who had been persecuted by Titoist Yugoslavia in the second part of the 1940s. Rehabilitation started with Andonov-Čento, the first President of ASNOM, who was unanimously rehabilitated as the representative of the ‘national-bourgeois orientation’ of the Macedonian national liberation movement.145 After him came the rehabilitation of the so-called informbirovci,146 those who had supported Stalin and the Cominform against Tito in the famous split of 1948 (see Chapter 5), notably Brašnarov and Shatev, followed by the rehabilitation of the pro-Bulgarian Shatorov that was more controversial.147 Sarafov was also rehabilitated,148 though not completely (his role is generally downgraded even with regard to Ilinden even though he was one of the main commanders)149 but not Garvanov. Todorovski through his work has sought to rehabilitate the interwar VMRO leaders Aleksandrov and Protogerov and to a lesser extent Mihailov, by arguing that they may have committed grave errors, yet they remained supporters of an independent Macedonia. The Gruevski Government was even more forthright claiming that they had all toiled for the independence of Macedonia and were against annexation to Bulgaria. Kiselinovski and Risteski have also criticized the standardization of the Macedonian language, including the orthography in the 1944–1945, for being too close to the Serbo-Croatian. Todorovski has published Misirkov’s diaries bringing forward his pro-Bulgarian sentiments.150

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Karardžiev and other authoritative historians have castigated this trend arguing that the ‘historic VMORO’ ceased to exist in substance from 1908 (with the coming of the Young Turk Revolution) and that the VMRO leaders of the interwar were traitors to the Macedonian nation, clearly Bulgarophiles, aiming at the annexation to Bulgaria along the concept of Greater Bulgaria. The nationalists have retorted by accusing Karardžiev and others as Serbophiles. However, contrary to the Bulgarian hopes, the revisionist tendency of the 1990s, which at times seemed to question Macedonian national identity (bringing in the Bulgarian dimension), petered out with the advent of the new century and no longer questions Macedonian identity.151 Both sides do not cast doubt on the existence of the Macedonian nation prior to 1944. The revisionists do not doubt Macedonian national identity, and they do not seek to ‘re-Bulgarianize’ Macedonia’s past, but ‘to forge a new national history that is divorced from both the Yugoslav period and the communist movement’152; while their more orthodox opponents regard the Yugoslav and communist past essential and a positive development. A case in point is Tito, who is (rightly) praised for solidifying the Macedonian nation, with those downplaying or rejecting his role regarded as Bulgarophiles and those against this approach seen as anti-Bulgarian and Serbophile.153 Branko Crvenkovski, the former head of the SDSM (Social Democratic Union of Macedonia), suggested the obvious but ‘provoked considerable controversy’154: that a monument to Tito should be built in the centre of Skopje for his ‘contribution to the Macedonian nation’.155 The conflict with Greece, from 1992 until early 2108, had given rise to another aspect, touched upon occasionally during the Cold War: Greece’s negative role towards the Macedonians living in Greece, especially from 1913 until the 1950s. It is claimed that the various measures taken by Greece to assimilate or eject the Macedonians amount to ‘genocide of the Macedonian people’.156 Kiselonovski, for instance, has pointed out that the Greeks tried to change the ethnic composition of Greek Macedonia, by changing the names of the inhabitants to Greek names (which is accurate), but then goes on to claim that this amounted to ‘a policy of genocide that was without precedence in modern historical practice’!157 And he adds that all the Greek assimilation attempts had been unsuccessful, and that ‘[t]he terror, mass murder and other forms of repression proved ineffective when it came to breaking the spirit of the Macedonians’.158 Moreover, the Communist Party of Greece (ΚΚΕ) is accused of not having supported the Macedonian efforts during the period 1945–1949 in the course of the Greek Civil War.159

Katardžiev and Ristovski I will conclude this section with the views of two of the most respected Macedonian historians and public intellectuals who were active in both the socialist and the independence periods, Ivan Katardžiev and Blaže Ristovski, who both died in late 2018, by a curious coincidence within five days of each other. According to Ivan Katardžiev, the foremost Macedonian specialist on the VM(O)RO (together with Krste Bitoski and Manol Pandevski), who headed the INI

The Macedonian national historical narrative 185 for many years,160 the ‘historical substratum’ of the ‘Macedonian people in Macedonia today’ is the Slavs who ‘started moving to this area at the end of the 6th century’.161 By the seventh century this settlement was complete and ‘[p]ractically the whole area of Macedonia was Slavicized’ and they were later referred to as ‘Macedonian Slavs’.162 As for the name Macedonia, ‘its continuity and popularity’ are ‘due to the ancient Macedonians and their state, Ancient Macedonia, and the role it played in the ancient world, during the rule of Phillip II and his son, Alexander III the Great’.163 Katardžiev is of the view that ‘the completion of the national-political program of the Macedonian national liberation movement’, as he calls it, took place in 1902–1903 with three decisive acts: the Ilinden Uprising, the formation in St. Petersburg of the ‘Macedonian Literary-scientific Student Fellowship’, and Misirkov’s book.164 The ‘national awareness among the Macedonians’ in the three neighbouring states was ‘strengthened’ in the 1930s, with Macedonian literature by Iljovski, Krle and Panov, poetry by Racin, Markovski and others, as well as with the historical works by Dinev and Veselinov, which ‘promulgated the cultural and political heritage of Macedonia, distinct from that of the other Balkan peoples’.165 His conclusion is that during the 1930s, one witnesses ‘a complete affirmation of Macedonian cultural identity’.166 Interestingly he stresses the role played by Ivanovski in the process of Macedonian self-awareness, whom he regards ‘the founder of contemporary Macedonian historiography’,167 pointing out that the Macedonians have not given him his due. He attributes this to the fact that he left for Bulgaria, even though he retained his Macedonian consciousness until his death.168 Katardžiev is convinced that the development and the prevalence of the national characteristics of the Macedonians appeared early on, upon the start of the Second World War and not late in 1943.169 Regarding the VMRO under Aleksandrov and Mihailov, it was a purely Bulgarian affair, and Mihailov in particular was ‘a terrorist and an exponent of Bulgarian revanchism’.170 As for the naming dispute between Greece and Macedonia, the non-recognition of the Macedonian minority in Greece and its harassment from the Metaxas dictatorship onwards are the real reason for Greece’s intransigence and not the existence or not of the Macedonian nation.171 The cultural historian, linguist and folklorist, Blaže Ristovski172 also accepts that the Macedonians are basically Slavs, the descendants of the Slav migration to the Balkans. He explains the need for an ancient Macedonian connection to the attempt of many Macedonian ‘awakeners’ in the later part of the nineteenth century to try to prove, within a spirit of romanticism, the impossible: that the ancient Macedonians were Slavs, the first Slavs to appear in the Balkans and in this way acquiring the glory of the ancient Macedonians (as seen, for instance, in utterances by Dimitar Miladinov, Georgi Pulevski and Dimitar Makedonski). In this respect he refers in detail to the famous article of Slaveykov in which the ancient Macedonian link is mentioned as a belief of the ‘Macedonists’ (see Chapter 4). Ristovski brings up the intermingling of the Slavs with those who lived in the region, who were no doubt the descendants of, among others, the ancient Macedonians. In this regard, he points to Makedonski’s vivid reply to Slaveykov: ‘The [ancient] Macedonians have not disappeared from the face of the earth as some

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people allow themselves to claim, because, as far as we known, they have never sinned so greatly that the earth may have gaped open and swallowed them’.173 Ristovski calls the attempt to identify with the great ancient Macedonians ‘historical consciousness’ and part of ‘Macedonian mythology’, the Macedonian attempt to merge the ancient Macedonian with the Slavonic tradition.174 And he is of the view that the fact that this could not be established slowed the development of Macedonian distinctiveness in the course of the nineteenth century.175 However, as Ristovski points out, the chosen name remained, and since it was different from the names of ‘all the surrounding peoples’, it ‘could secure national unity and win freedom for its people’.176

Notes 1 Anthony D. Smith, National Identity (London: Penguin Books, 1991); Anthony D. Smith, Myths and Memories of the Nation (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000). 2 Ernest Renan, ‘Qu’est qu’une nation?’, Oeuvres completes de Ernest Renan (Paris: Calmann-Lévy, 1947 [1882]), vol. 1, 902. My translation from the French. 3 Smith, Myths and Memories of the Nation, 84. 4 As Brunnbauer has aptly presented Smith’s viewpoint, in Ulf Brunnbauer, ‘Historiography, Myths and the Nation in the Republic of Macedonia’, in Ulf Brunnbauer (ed.), (Re)Writing History-Historiography in Southeast Europe after Socialism (Berlin: LIT, 2004), 165. 5 Denko Maleski, ‘Law, Politics and History in International Relations: Macedonia and Greece’, New Balkan Politics, 12 (2010). 6 Smith, Myths and Memories of the Nation, 5. 7 Iakovos D. Michailidis, ‘What “Macedonia for the Macedonians”? Politics and History in Yugoslav Macedonia’, in Ioannis D. Stefanidis, Vlasis Vlasidis and Evangelos Kofos (eds), Macedonian Identities through Time: Interdisciplinary Approaches (Thessaloniki: Foundation of the Museum for the Macedonian Struggle, Epikentro, 2010) [2008], 213. 8 Stefan Troebst, ‘Historical Politics and Historical “Masterpieces” in Macedonia before and after 1991’, New Balkan Politics, 6–7 (2003), 18. 9 Ibid., 17. 10 Ibid. 11 Brunnbauer, ‘Historiography, Myths and the Nation in the Republic of Macedonia’, 171, 174, 190. 12 John Armstrong, Nations before Nationalism (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1982). 13 Josep R. Llobera, The God of Modernity: The Development of Nationalism in Western Europe (Oxford: Oxford: Berg Publishers, 1994). 14 Adrian Hastings, The Construction of Nationhood: Ethnicity, Religion and Nationalism (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997). 15 Anastas Vangeli, ‘Nation-Building Ancient Macedonian Style: The Origins and the Effects of the So-Called Antiquization in Macedonia’, Nationalities Papers, 39:1 (2011), 17, 24; Tchavdar Marinov, ‘Historiographical Revisionism and Re-Articulation of Memory in the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia’, Sociétés Politiques Comparées, 25 (May 2010a), 5, 18. 16 Maleski, ‘Law, Politics and History in International Relations’. 17 Brunnbauer, ‘Historiography, Myths and the Nation in the Republic of Macedonia’, 170–1. 18 Ulf Brunnbauer, ‘Serving the Nation: Historiography in the Republic of Macedonia (FYROM) after Socialism’, Historein, 4 (2003–2004), 163, 165; Ulf Brunnbauer,

The Macedonian national historical narrative 187

19 20 21

22

23

24

25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46

‘Ancient Nationhood and the Struggle for Statehood: Historiographical Myths in the Republic of Macedonia’, in Pål Kolstø (ed.), Myths and Boundaries in South-Eastern Europe (London: Hurst & Company, 2005), 268–70. Troebst, ‘Historical Politics and Historical “Masterpieces” in Macedonia before and after 1991’, 17. Tchavdar Marinov, La question macédoine de 1944 à no jours: communisme et nationalisme dans les Balkans (Paris: L’Harmattan, 2010b), 179–81. Brunnbauer, ‘Historiography, Myths and the Nation in the Republic of Macedonia’, 174, 177–8; Mirjana Maleska, ‘With the Eyes of the “Others”: About MacedonianBulgarian Relations and the Macedonian National Identity’, New Balkan Politics, 6–7 (2003), 6. Stefan Troebst, ‘IMRO+100=FYROM? The Politics of Macedonian Historiography’, in James Pettifer (ed.), The New Macedonian Question (Basingstoke: Macmillan Press, 1999), 61–70; Brunnbauer, ‘Historiography, Myths and the Nation in the Republic of Macedonia’, 177. Loring M. Danforth, The Macedonian Conflict: Ethnic Nationalism in a Transnational World (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1995); Keith Brown, The Past in Question: Modern Macedonia and the Uncertainties of Nation (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2003); Tchavdar Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander: Macedonian Identity at the Crossroads of Greek, Bulgarian and Serbian Nationalism’, in Roumen Daskalov and Tchavdar Marinov (eds), Entangled Histories of the Balkans, Volume One: National Ideologies and Language Policies (Leiden: Brill, 2013a), 277. Irena Stefoska, ‘Nation, Education and Historiographic Narratives: The Case of the Socialist Republic of Macedonia (1944–1990)’, in Ulf Brunnbauer and Hannes Grandits (eds), The Ambiguous Nation: Case Studies from Southeastern Europe in the 20th Century (Munich: Oldenbourg Verlag München, 2013), 199. Troebst, ‘IMRO+100=FYROM?’, 61–2, 70. Spyridon Sfetas, I diamorfosi tis slavomakedonikis taftotitas: mia epodyni diadikasia [The Formulation of the Slav-Macedonian Identity: A Painful Process] (Thessaloniki: Ekdoseis Vanias, 2003) 204–5. Ibid., 206. Ibid., 206–7. Ibid., 204–8. In Dimitris Livanios, The Macedonian Question: Britain and the Southern Balkans 1939–1949 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008), 199. Cited in Michailidis, ‘What “Macedonia for the Macedonians”?’, 218; Livanios, The Macedonian Question, 198–9. Cited in Michailidis, ‘What “Macedonia for the Macedonians”?’, 218. Cited in ibid. Cited in ibid. Quoted in Stefoska, ‘Nation, Education and Historiographic Narratives’, 216. Livanios, The Macedonian Question, 201. Quoted in Michailidis, ‘What “Macedonia for the Macedonians”?’, 218. Quoted in ibid., 218–9. In ibid., 219. In ibid. In ibid. In ibid. Sfetas, I diamorfosi tis slavomakedonikis taftotitas, 274. Cited in ibid., 275. Cited in ibid. Troebst, ‘IMRO+100=FYROM?’, 61, 63; Michailidis, ‘What “Macedonia for the Macedonians”?’, 214; Brunnbauer, ‘Serving the Nation’, 165; Brunnbauer, ‘Ancient Nationhood and the Struggle for Statehood’, 271.

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47 Evangelos Kofos, ‘O Makedonikos agonas sti yugoslaviki istoriographia’ [The Macedonian Struggle in Yugoslavian Historiography] (Thessaloniki: Institute for Balkan Studies and Museum of the Macedonian Struggle, 1987), 3. 48 Ibid. 49 Mirjana Maleska, ‘With the Eyes of the “Others”, 6. 50 Kofos, ‘O Makedonikos agonas sti yugoslaviki istoriographia’, 3. 51 Ibid., 3–4. 52 Brunnbauer, ‘Historiography, Myths and the Nation in the Republic of Macedonia’, 178. 53 Iakovos D. Michailidis, ‘On the Other Side of the River: The Defeated Slavophones and Greek History’, in Jane K. Cowan (ed.), Macedonia: The Politics of Identity and Difference (London: Pluto Press, 2000), 76–7. 54 As well as general Mihailo Apostolski, Risto Poplazarov, Aleksandar Stoyanovski, Anastas Mitgrev, Giorgi Abatziev, S. Dimevski, and Dančo Zografski. See Kofos, ‘O Makedonikos agonas sti yugoslaviki istoriographia’; Basil C. Gounaris, To Makedoniko Zitima apo ton 19o eos ton 21o aiona: istoriografikes prosengisis [The Macedonian Question from the 19th until the 21st Century: Historiographical Approaches] (Athens: Alexandria, 2010), 73; Michailidis, ‘On the Other Side of the River’, 76–7. 55 Troebst, ‘IMRO+100=FYROM?’, 65; Vemund Aarbakke, ‘Who Can Mend a Broken Heart? Macedonia’s Place in Modern Bulgarian History’, in Ioannis D. Stefanidis, Vlasis Vlasidis and Evangelos Kofos (eds), Macedonian Identities through Time: Interdisciplinary Approaches (Thessaloniki: Foundation of the Museum for the Macedonian Struggle, Epikentro, 2010) [2008], 190; Marinov, La question macédoine de 1944 à no jours, 179. 56 Andrew Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians: A History (Stanford: Hoover Institution Press, 2008), 104. 57 Kofos, ‘O Makedonikos agonas sti yugoslaviki istoriographia’, 22; Michailidis, ‘On the Other Side of the River’, 76–7; Michailidis, ‘What “Macedonia for the Macedonians”?’, 221; Gounaris, To Makedoniko Zitima apo ton 19o eos ton 21o aiona, 73–4. 58 Kofos, ‘O Makedonikos agonas sti yugoslaviki istoriographia’, 15, 17, 19, 22. 59 Ibid., 26. 60 Keith Brown, ‘A Rising to Count On: Ilinden between Politics and History in PostYugoslav Macedonia’, in Victor Roudometof (ed.), The Macedonian Question: Culture, Historiography, Politics (Boulder, CO: East European Monographs, Columbia University Press, 2000), 143–72; Victor Roudometof, ‘Nationalism and Identity Politics in the Balkans: Greece and the Macedonian Question’, Journal of Modern Greek Studies, 14:2 (1996), 264–5; Brunnbauer, Ulf, ‘Historiography, Myths and the Nation in the Republic of Macedonia’, 178. 61 Quoted in Brunnbauer, ‘Ancient Nationhood and the Struggle for Statehood’, 280. See also Blaže Ristovski, Macedonia and the Macedonian People (Vienna and Skopje: SIMAG Holding, 1999), 18, 300–3. 62 Ermis Lafazanovski, ‘The Intellectual as Place of Memory: Krste Petkov Misirkov’s Role in the Macedonian and Moldavian National Movements’, in Ulf Brunnbauer and Hannes Grandits (eds), The Ambiguous Nation: Case Studies from Southeastern Europe in the 20th Century (Munich: Oldenbourg Verlag München, 2013), 180, 184–93. 63 Ibid., 180, 184–93. 64 Michailidis, ‘What “Macedonia for the Macedonians”?’, 219; Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander’, 304–5, 304 fn 85; Gounaris, To Makedoniko Zitima apo ton 19o eos ton 21o aiona, 90. 65 Troebst, ‘IMRO+100=FYROM?’, 63; Michailidis, ‘What “Macedonia for the Macedonians”?’, 221; Gounaris, To Makedoniko Zitima apo ton 19o eos ton 21o aiona, 73–4. Brunnbauer, ‘Ancient Nationhood and the Struggle for Statehood’, 271. 66 Ibid., 272; Brunnbauer, ‘Serving the Nation’, 166; Brunnbauer, ‘Historiography, Myths and the Nation in the Republic of Macedonia’, 177.

The Macedonian national historical narrative 189 67 Roudometof, ‘Nationalism and Identity Politics in the Balkans’, 265; Brunnbauer, ‘Ancient Nationhood and the Struggle for Statehood’, 272–3; Nikola Jordanovsky, ‘Medieval and Modern Macedonia as Part of a National “Grand Narrative’”, in Christina Koulouri (ed.), Clio in the Balkans: The Politics of History Education (Thessaloniki: Center for Democracy and Reconciliation in Southeast Europe, 2002), 109–11. 68 Ristovski, Macedonia and the Macedonian People, 7–8, 10–1. 69 Brunnbauer, ‘Historiography, Myths and the Nation in the Republic of Macedonia’, 179. 70 Roudometof, ‘Nationalism and Identity Politics in the Balkans’, 265; Brunnbauer, ‘Serving the Nation’, 167; Brunnbauer, ‘Ancient Nationhood and the Struggle for Statehood’, 272–3; Troebst, ‘IMRO+100=FYROM?’, 63; Stefoska, ‘Nation, Education and Historiographic Narratives’, 216–8; Kofos, ‘O Makedonikos agonas sti yugoslaviki istoriographia’, 8; Ristovski, Macedonia and the Macedonian People, 7–30, 54–75; Stoyan Pribichevich, Macedonia: Its People and History (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1982), 87–8; Jordanovsky, ‘Medieval and Modern Macedonia as Part of a National “Grand Narrative’”, 112. 71 Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians, XVIII, 20, 30. 72 Ibid., 30. 73 Kofos, ‘O Makedonikos agonas sti yugoslaviki istoriographia’, 8. 74 Ibid., 8–10. 75 Tchavdar Marinov, ‘We, the Macedonians: The Paths of Macedonian Supra-Nationalism (1878–1912)’, in Diana Mishkova (ed.), We, the People: Politics of National Peculiarity in Southeast Europe (Budapest: Central European University Press, 2013c), 120–1. 76 Kofos, ‘O Makedonikos agonas sti yugoslaviki istoriographia’, 11; Gounaris, To Makedoniko Zitima apo ton 19o eos ton 21o aiona, 77. 77 Kofos, ‘O Makedonikos agonas sti yugoslaviki istoriographia’, 12; Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander’, 284, 289, 293, 329; Vangeli, ‘Nation-Building Ancient Macedonian Style’, 15. 78 Michailidis, ‘What “Macedonia for the Macedonians”?’, 222; Gounaris, To Makedoniko Zitima apo ton 19o eos ton 21o aiona, 93); Brunnbauer, ‘Ancient Nationhood and the Struggle for Statehood’, 276; Stefoska, ‘Nation, Education and Historiographic Narratives’, 216; Vangeli, ‘Nation-Building Ancient Macedonian Style’, 17. 79 In Kofos, ‘O Makedonikos agonas sti yugoslaviki istoriographia’, 12. 80 Dragan Tashkovski, The Macedonian Nation (Skopje: Nik. Nasha Kniga, 1976) [1975], 4–20. 81 Ibid., 21–2. 82 Ibid, 49, 60. 83 Ibid., 55–6. 84 Ibid., 51. 85 Vangeli, ‘Nation-Building Ancient Macedonian Style’, 18. 86 Ulf Brunnbauer, ‘ “Pro-Serbians” vs “Pro-Bulgarians”: Revisionism in Post-Socialist Macedonian Historiography’, History Compass, 3 (2005), 8. 87 Keith Brown, ‘In the Realm of the Double-Headed Eagle: Parapolitics in Macedonia, 1994–9’, in Cowan (ed.), Macedonia: The Politics of Identity and Difference, 123–4; Troebst, ‘IMRO+100=FYROM? ‘, 63; Brunnbauer, ‘Serving the Nation’, 167; Brunnbauer, ‘Ancient Nationhood and the Struggle for Statehood’, 274; Vangeli, ‘NationBuilding Ancient Macedonian Style’. 88 Maleski, ‘Law, Politics and History in International Relations’. 89 Brunnbauer, ‘ “Pro-Serbians” vs “Pro-Bulgarians” ’, 8; Brunnbauer, ‘Historiography, Myths and the Nation in the Republic of Macedonia’, 180. 90 See previous note. 91 Žarko Trajanovski, “ ‘National” Flags in the Republic of Macedonia’, in Brunnbauer and Grandits (eds), The Ambiguous Nation; Marinov, ‘Historiographical Revisionism and Re-Articulation of Memory in the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia’, 5.

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92 Eugene N. Borza, ‘Macedonia Redux’, in Frances B. Tichener and Richard F. Moorton, Jr. (eds), The Eye Expanded: Life and the Arts in Greco-Roman Antiquity (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1999), 255; Roudometof, ‘Nationalism and Identity Politics in the Balkans’, 259–60; Brunnbauer, ‘Serving the Nation’, 167; Vangeli, ‘Nation-Building Ancient Macedonian Style’, 16; Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander’, 329. 93 Roudometof, ‘Nationalism and Identity Politics in the Balkans’, 267; Zhidas Daskalovski, ‘Clashing Historical Narratives and the Macedonian Name Dispute – Solving the Unsolvable’, Trames Journal of the Humanities and Social Sciences, 21:4 (2017), 336. 94 Quoted in Brunnbauer, ‘Ancient Nationhood and the Struggle for Statehood’, 275. 95 Troebst, ‘Historical Politics and Historical “Masterpieces” in Macedonia before and after 1991’, 23. 96 Quoted in ibid., 23. See also Daskalovski, ‘Clashing Historical Narratives and the Macedonian Name Dispute – Solving the Unsolvable’, 336. 97 Boris Georgievski, ‘Ghosts of the Past Endanger Macedonia’s Future’, Balkan Insight (27 October 2009). 98 Aneta Shukarova, ‘Macedonia in the Ancient World’, in Todor Chepreganov (ed.), History of the Macedonian People (Skopje: Institute of National History, 2008), 12. 99 Ibid., 13. 100 Ibid., 14. 101 Ibid., 22. 102 Mitko B. Panov, ‘Macedonia and the Slavs (The Middle of the VI Century – The Middle of the IX Century’, in Chepreganov (ed.), History of the Macedonian People, 82. 103 Ibid., 83. 104 Mitko Panov’s father, Branko Panov, who wrote the corresponding chapter in the 2000 edition of History of the Macedonian People, had claimed that the Slavs were more numerous than the indigenous people in the region and that they prevailed. 105 Panov, ‘Macedonia and the Slavs’, 83. 106 Ibid., 84. 107 Georgievski, ‘Ghosts of the Past Endanger Macedonia’s Future’. 108 Vangeli, ‘Nation-Building Ancient Macedonian Style’, 18. 109 Ibid., 19–20. 110 In Georgievski, ‘Ghosts of the Past Endanger Macedonia’s Future’. 111 Troebst, ‘IMRO+100=FYROM?’, 63. 112 Danforth, The Macedonian Conflict, 45. 113 Ibid., 46. 114 Michailidis, ‘What “Macedonia for the Macedonians”?’, 222. 115 Ibid., 222. See also Christo Andonovski, ‘Greek Evidence on the Authenticity of the Macedonians’, Macedonian Review, 1 (1993). 116 Brunnbauer, ‘Serving the Nation’, 167–81; Brunnbauer, ‘Ancient Nationhood and the Struggle for Statehood’, 276–7. 117 Gligorov in Foreign Information Service Daily Report, Eastern Europe, 26 February 1992, 35. See https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Kiro_Gligorov 118 In Toronto Star (15 March 1992). 119 Kiro Gligorov, Apomnimonevmata [Memoirs] (Athens: Courier Ekdotiki, 2001), 259. My translation from the Greek version. 120 Maleski’s interview to the Greek TV channel Mega in November 2006. See www. youtube.com/watch?v=AAf8-Q_gu88 121 Cited in Georgievski, ‘Ghosts of the Past Endanger Macedonia’s Future’. 122 Ibid. 123 Athena Skoulariki, ‘Skopje 2014: Antiquisation, Urban Identity and the Rejection of Balkan Otherness’, in Aikaterini S. Markou and Meglena Zlatkova (eds), Post-Urbanities, Cultural Reconsiderations and Tourism in the Balkans (Athens: Hêrodotos, 2020), 226.

The Macedonian national historical narrative 191 124 125 126 127 128 129 130 131 132

133 134 135 136 137 138 139 140 141 142 143 144 145 146 147

148 149 150

151 152

Skoulariki, ‘Skopje 2014’, 227. Ibid., 228. Ibid., 235. Ibid., 228. Ibid. Ibid. Ibid., 252. Another possibility is for all the statues related to Antiquity to be moved to a distant park. See The Economist (21 March 2020), 24. Georgievski, ‘Ghosts of the Past Endanger Macedonia’s Future’. Brunnbauer, ‘ “Pro-Serbians” vs “Pro-Bulgarians” ’, 165, 167; Brunnbauer, ‘Ancient Nationhood and the Struggle for Statehood’, 274–5; Kristina Balalovska, ‘Between “the Balkans” and “Europe”: A Study of the Contemporary Transformation of Macedonian Identity’, Journal of Contemporary European Studies, 12:2 (2004), 193, 200, 203, 208; Vangeli, ‘Nation-Building Ancient Macedonian Style’; Marinov, ‘Historiographical Revisionism and Re-Articulation of Memory in the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia’, 5–6, 17–8. Georgievski, ‘Ghosts of the Past Endanger Macedonia’s Future’. And it was decided to add statutes of ethnic Albanians, such as Nexhat Agolli, and other smaller ones in the so-called Art Bridge. Brunnbauer, ‘Serving the Nation’, 167; Brunnbauer, ‘Ancient Nationhood and the Struggle for Statehood’, 273–4. Sfetas, ‘Katefthinsis tis sygchronis slavomakedonikis istoriografias’, 301. Ibid. Ibid. Panov, ‘Macedonia and the Slavs’, 85. Ibid., 89–90. Ibid., 90. Ibid., 102. Ibid., 104. Dimitar Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia (Lanham: The Scarecrow Press, 2009), 89–90. Brunnbauer, ‘Historiography, Myths and the Nation in the Republic of Macedonia’, 191–2; Marinov, ‘Historiographical Revisionism and Re-Articulation of Memory in the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia’, 5. Marinov, ‘Historiographical Revisionism and Re-Articulation of Memory in the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia’, 5–6. Brunnbauer, ‘Historiography, Myths and the Nation in the Republic of Macedonia’, 192 and fn 95; Troebst, ‘Historical Politics and Historical “Masterpieces” in Macedonia before and after 1991’; Marinov, ‘Historiographical Revisionism and Re-Articulation of Memory in the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia’, 5–6, 10. Troebst, ‘Historical Politics and Historical “Masterpieces” in Macedonia before and after 1991’. Keith Brown, ‘Villains and Symbolic Pollution in the Narratives of Nations: The Case of Boris Sarafov’, in Maria Todorova (ed.), Balkan Identities: Nation and Memory (London: Hurst & Company, 2003), 241, 243–7. Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, 190; Brunnbauer, ‘Historiography, Myths and the Nation in the Republic of Macedonia’, 192–3; Brunnbauer, ‘ “Pro-Serbians” vs “Pro-Bulgarians” ’, 10; Marinov, ‘Historiographical Revisionism and Re-Articulation of Memory in the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia’, 6–8; Gounaris, To Makedoniko Zitima apo ton 19o eos ton 21o aiona, 93–6, 98. Marinov, ‘Historiographical Revisionism and Re-Articulation of Memory in the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia’, 17. Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, 190.

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153 Brunnbauer, ‘ “Pro-Serbians” vs “Pro-Bulgarians” ’, 12; Brunnbauer, ‘Historiography, Myths and the Nation in the Republic of Macedonia’, 194–5; Marinov, ‘Historiographical Revisionism and Re-Articulation of Memory in the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia’, 16; Gounaris, To Makedoniko Zitima apo ton 19o eos ton 21o aiona, 93–6, 98. 154 Marinov, ‘Historiographical Revisionism and Re-Articulation of Memory in the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia’, 16. 155 Ibid. 156 Roudemetof, ‘Nationalism and Identity Politics in the Balkans’, 267. 157 In Brunnbauer, ‘Ancient Nationhood and the Struggle for Statehood’, 287. 158 In ibid. 159 Ibid., 286–7. Brunnbauer, ‘Serving the Nation’, 168; Sfetas, ‘Katefthinsis tis sygchronis slavomakedonikis istoriografias’, 312–3. 160 Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, 8. 161 Ivan Katardjiev, Macedonia and Its Neighbours: Past, Present, Future (Skopje: Memora, 2001), 18. 162 Ibid., 18–19. 163 Ibid., 18. 164 Ibid., 20. 165 Ibid., 22. 166 Ibid. 167 Ibid., 107–16. 168 Ibid., 84–137. 169 Ibid., 22. 170 Ibid., 35. 171 Ibid., 41–2. Interestingly he agrees with the assessment of Konstantinos Mitsotakis in this regard (see Chapter 6). And this also happens to be the assessment of official Macedonian historiography; see, e.g. Todor Chepreganov, ‘Independent Republic of Macedonia’, in Chepreganov (ed.), History of the Macedonian People, 327. 172 Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia, 190. 173 Ristovski, Macedonia and the Macedonian People, 105. 174 Ibid., 101–2. 175 Ibid., 53, 101–8, 111, 116. 176 Ibid., 53.

10 The charm of Alexander the Great Who were the ancient Macedonians?

To outsiders of the Balkans, the switch of the Macedonians to ‘antiquization’1 and the Greek fixation with ‘archaeologization’,2 with the ancient Macedonians and Alexander the Great as a bone of contention appears absurd, yet it was – and still is – deeply felt among both Macedonians and Greeks. And to the extent that it continued to dominate the scene on either side of the Kajmakčalan mountain peak,3 no common ground could possibly be found for a mutually acceptable settlement of the naming dispute. Obviously, neither side is convincing: the Macedonians because they are culturally and linguistically Slavs; the Greeks because no copyright to the ancient Macedonians can exist even if it was proven, beyond reasonable doubt, that the ancient Macedonians were indeed ‘pure Hellenes’. However, there is ground to claim, though not conclusively, that the ancient Macedonians may not have been ethnic Greeks or wholly Greeks. Thus, when the chips were down and the two parties were at loggerheads from 1992 onwards, this ambiguity tempted the modern Macedonians to fish into the elusive waters of Antiquity. Identity and heritage regarding Antiquity and Alexander the Great and the acute clash thereof, can be seen, as Anastas Vangeli points out, as an expression of ‘symbolic power’ as conceived by Pierre Bourdieu. According to Bourdieu, symbolic power is ‘power that springs from the accumulation of symbolic capital’, which ‘provides honor and prestige to the subject, whose highest form comes in the form of credit and recognition’.4 In Bourdieu, ‘the most powerful thing about symbolic power is that it makes or can be used to make groups . . . where they do not exist, or contributes to achieving higher level of groupness where they do’ exist.5 And as Vangeli points out, within nationalism this ‘symbolic capital is accumulated through the complex of national symbols, myths and rituals’,6 and in the symbolic Greek-Macedonian dispute, ‘the symbol that generates crucial amount of symbolic capital’ is Alexander the Great.7 As a ‘symbolic conflict’ from the anthropological perspective, this aspect of the Greek-Macedonian controversy falls under what is known as a ‘proprietary contest’.8 According to Simon Harrison, examples of proprietary contests are the totemic debates among peoples in New Guinea, ‘in which rival clans dispute the ownership of prestigious totemic ancestors and struggle for the rights to bear their personal names’.9 Another such dispute involves ‘the ownership of the sun; or, more precisely, the ownership, and the rights to the name, of one of several

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ancestors personifying the sun’.10 According to Harrison, a European case of a proprietary contest is the dispute between Greece and Macedonia ‘over the use of the name of Macedonia and of certain other symbols associated with the ancient kingdom of that name. One such symbol is the figure of Alexander the Great, and another the emblem of the sixteen-pointed sun, or Star Vergina’.11 And he points out that ‘in both these cases, Melanesian and European, groups are struggling for intangible but highly valued objects of cultural property’.12

The fascination with Alexander the Great Alexander the Great has enthralled people throughout the ages. Arrian, in his The Anabasis of Alexander (modelled on Xenophon’s Anabasis), the most complete of the five extant historical sources13 of Alexander’s exploits, has the following to say14: I am persuaded that there is no nation, city or people . . . where his name did not reach; for which reasons, whatever origin he might boast of, or claim to himself, there seems to me, to have been some divine hand presiding over both his birth and his actions, inasmuch as no mortal on earth either excelled or equaled him. Arrian is known as a hagiographer of Alexander and has rightly been criticized for this,15 yet even today’s sober scholars of Antiquity have fallen under the spell of Alexander. Robin Lane Fox, for instance, portrays him as ‘homerically heroic’,16 as ‘that rare and complex figure, a hero, and in his own lifetime, he wished to be seen as the rival of his society’s heroic ideal’.17 For Paul Cartledge, Alexander ‘is one of those very few genuinely iconic figures, who have both remade the world they knew and constantly inspire us to remake our own worlds, both personal and more global’,18 and ‘is probably the most famous of the few individuals in human history whose bright light has shot across the firmament to mark the end of one era and the beginning of another’.19 Cartledge is more convincing when he says that ‘By the time he was thirty he had taken his victorious arms to the limits of the known oecumene (inhabited world). Yet, before his thirty-third birthday he was dead. Small surprise, therefore, that he should have become a legend in his own lifetime. That his legend has spread so far and so wide – from Iceland to China – since his death in 323 BCE is due very largely to the so-called Alexander Romance’.20 The Alexander Romance, a work of ‘fabulous fiction’,21 was first written in Greek in Alexandria and translated into over thirty languages and ‘in the course of time ousted all more serious accounts’.22 In the Romance, Alexander appears as ‘a caster of spells, a practitioner of magic’ and achieves ‘fictional travel’ up to heaven and back to earth, to the bottom of the sea!23 But, as Peter Green points out, one of the strengths of the Romance is that despite being fictional and romantic, ‘the uncomfortable fact remains that the Alexander-romance provides us, on occasion, with apparently genuine material found nowhere else’ for the ‘better-authenticated sources, per contra, are all too often riddled with bias, propaganda, rhetorical special pleading, or patent falsification and suppression of the evidence’.24

The charm of Alexander the Great 195 Alexander, however, for all his fame is an enigmatic and controversial figure, and his critics are almost as many as his admirers (the admirers, among military commanders, include Hannibal Barca, Julius Caesar, Charlemagne, Mehmet II and Napoleon). Dante for instance ‘consigned Alexander to the seventh circle of his Inferno, along with (other?) thieves, murderers and tyrants’.25 Brian Bosworth, the author of one of the most authoritative studies of Alexander, states that ‘Alexander spent much of his time killing and directing killing, and, arguably, killing was what he did best’.26 Peter Green, the author of an equally authoritative study of Alexander, is less scathing than Bosworth, but concludes that Alexander ‘was a militarily brilliant obsessional whose obsession was conquest; whose superstitious narcissism easily slid, as unparallel successes accumulated, into megalomania and delusions of godhead’.27 As time went by, with one conquest after another and no defeat in the battlefield (with only a couple of mutinies of his Macedonian soldiers), Alexander’s behaviour worsened, so much so that he conforms to the famous adage of Lord Acton that ‘power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely’.28 Apart from the killing of four of his closest associates (generals Philotas, Parmenion and Cleitos the Black, who had saved his life at the battle of Granicus, and even his historian Callisthenes, the nephew of his teacher Aristotle) he committed a number of senseless destructions of cities and mass murders (Thebes in 335 BC, Tyre in 332 BC, Persepolis in 330 BC, in the Bactrian region in 325 BC and several others). And ‘[i]n Greece and Asia alike, during his lifetime and for several centuries after his death, he was regarded as a tyrannous aggressor, a foreign autocrat who had imposed his will by violence alone’.29 The influence of the Romance apart, why on earth the veneration with Alexander that came centuries later and lasts until today? According to Cartledge, it is ‘above all, or perhaps solely, for his talents and achievements as a commander on the field of battle that he fully deserves the epithet “the Great” ’.30 He may have been, taking into consideration the huge distance he covered under ancient conditions, and was never beaten in the battlefield, ‘the world’s greatest military conqueror ever’.31 Green’s assessment is similar32: Alexander’s true genius was as a field-commander: perhaps, taken all in all, the most incomparable general the world has ever seen. His gift for speed, improvisation, variety of strategy; his cool-headedness in a crisis, his ability to extract himself from the most impossible situations; his mastery of terrain, his psychological ability to penetrate the enemy’s intentions – all these place him as the very head of the Great Captains of history.

Slavic enthrallment with Alexander The legacy of Alexander and the conquests under him of the ancient Macedonians, unfortunately for the modern Greeks, ‘fascinated others as well as themselves’.33 As Dimitar Bechev has put it34: the Alexandrian myth was readily claimed and instrumentalized by more than one Balkan national movement from the early 19th century onward: not only

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The charm of Alexander the Great Greek but also Bulgarian, Vlach, Albanian, and of course, Macedonian. All of them have sought to establish their historical link with Alexander as a way to reconnect with a glorious past. The rivalry over the past has spun multiple controversies, notably on the ethnicity of the ancient Macedonians.

As regards the Slavs, the most widely known claim that the ancient Macedonians were somehow related to the south Slavs appears in Ivan Gundulić, an eminent Baroque poet of the early seventeenth century, in the Republic of Ragusa (an autonomous state under Venice, with Dubrovnik as its capital). In his major work, an epic poem of 20 cantos, titled ‘Osman’, Gundulić declares that Alexander the Great was a Serb. Apparently his intention was to enlist Alexander in the fight against the Ottomans Turks to be headed by the south Slavs, assured of victory by having Alexander (an army commander never vanquished in battle) as their ancestor. The poem was widely known in the Slav world of the Ottoman Balkans (especially following its first printing in Dubrovnik in 1826).35 There are also previous such references. Vinko Pribojević, a Dominican monk who hailed from the Venetian Dalmatian coast, in a speech delivered in Venice (in 1532), titled De origine successibus que Slavorum (On the origins and glory of the Slavs), which was published in many copies in Latin and Italian, praised the Slavs and claimed that the ancient Macedonians, the ancient Illyrians and the Slavs were one people, and that Alexander and Aristotle were Slavs. His utterances, though sheer fantasy, were influential during his lifetime, at a time when there was no stark distinction between myth and scientific writing.36 Seventy years later, the same theme was picked up by a follower of Pribojević, Mavro Orbini, a Ragusan Benedictine chronicler, in a work titled Il Regno degli Slavi (The realm of the Slavs). The work written in 1602 was later influential in Russia, where Alexander and the ancient Macedonians came to be regarded as Slavs.37 In the eighteenth century, Matija Antun Relković, a Habsburg military and writer of the Croatian Renaissance, was more subtle, writing that Alexander the Great admired the bravery of the Slavonci (the Slavophones), not rendering Alexander a Slav, but implying that the ancient Macedonians and south Slavs were contemporaries.38 In the nineteenth century, the Bosnian Verković, who had placed himself in the service of Serbia (see Chapter 1),39 was of the belief that the ‘Macedonian Bulgarians’ had their roots in the ancient Macedonians and Thracians.40 And Bulgarian intellectuals of the Bulgarian Revival had made use of the Ragusan myth about Alexander, to strike at the Greeks and Hellenism with their claims to ancient roots and superiority. A case in point was the otherwise contemplative Petko Slaveykov, who chose to refer to Alexander as a Bulgarian ancestor. But fortunately the Bulgarians had the acumen to drop this unreal narrative.41 The ancient Macedonian heritage was introduced to the population of Ottoman Macedonia in the Greek schools, which were the only Christian schools available in Macedonia in the first half of the nineteenth century (the few Bulgarian schools that appeared from the 1830s onwards, upon the initiative of Vasil Aprilov and Neofit Rilski, were not in Macedonia, but to the east, in future Bulgaria).42 The

The charm of Alexander the Great 197 Slav-speaking pupils were told by their Greek teachers that they were not Slavs, but descendants of the ancient Macedonians and of Alexander the Great.43 In the 1840s, the Russian Slavic scholar Grigorovich, who had toured the region (see Chapter 4), was stricken by the popularity of the myth of Alexander the Great. According to him, ‘unlike the legend of the Slavic hero Marko Kraljević (Krali Marko), which was “truly popular and omnipresent”, the memory of Alexander was inspired by education: those who spoke of him “were not able to explain his personality without referring to the [Greek] daskali (teachers) who have books about him” ’.44 The sophisticated Dimitar Miladinov tried to convince a Greek teacher that Philip, Alexander and the ancient Macedonians were Slavs and that Homer, Demosthenes and Strabo were also Slavs.45 It was in this manner that ‘Macedonia’ and its brave rulers became a Slavic myth in Macedonia, after having been an Albanian myth (based on the Albanian claim of being descendants of the Illyrians, with Alexander’s mother, the redoubtable Olympias being Illyrian46 although she was Molossian Greek), and a ‘Greek myth’.47 Now inevitably we will venture into what is almost the unknown: who were the ancient Macedonians?

Qui erant Macedones? The issue who were the Macedonians cannot be dealt with by a straightforward answer. Doubts linger on and there is no consensus among scholars from the nineteenth century until today.48 Indeed ‘[f]rom antiquity to the present the question has been debated as to whether these early Macedonians were Greeks or barbarians’.49 The ambiguity is reinforced by the views of their Greek contemporaries of the fifth and fourth centuries BC. One can discern three main positions: (a) the Macedonians were non-Greek ‘barbarians’, the view of the Athenian orator Demosthenes, the sophist Thrasymachus and others; (b) the Macedonians were partly Greeks and not fully Greeks, the view of the Athenian historian Thucydides and of the Athenian educationist Isocrates (he regarded the Macedonian rulers Greek but not the majority of their subjects); and (c) the Macedonians were Greeks, the view of the father of history, Herodotus, and of the tragedian Euripides. The Greek historians Strabo, Plutarch and Arrian endorse the third viewpoint, but all three lived under Roman rule, three hundred to five hundred years after Alexander’s death, and they were probably influenced by what occurred in the Hellenistic period, when the Macedonians, whatever their origins, had been completely Hellenized. But at least one Greek scholar under Roman rule, the geographer Pausanias, who lived two hundred years after Alexander, endorses the view of Demosthenes. The overall approach of Balkan historians who do not happen to be engagés in the service of their country (that is a minority) as well as non-Balkan historians is that in ancient Macedonia the ruling elite had been Hellenized on its own volition, and wanted to be seen by others as Greeks, and the official language of their kingdom was Attic Greek koine. Moreover, they used the same alphabet as the Greeks from around the fifth century when written sources are to be found, and ended

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up with the same religion (the twelve Olympian gods) as the Greeks. As for their subjects, they were probably a mixture of Greeks, Molossians (who were Greeks), Thracians, Illyrians and perhaps others as well, such as Paeonians and Dardanians. Another aspect which makes the Macedonians distinct from the Greeks or from the other Greeks is their political system and institutions which differed from that of the Greek city-states, and was much closer to the rule and institutions of neighbouring Molossia in Epirus, Illyria, Paeonia, Thrace and Dardania. Apart from the Greek of the Macedonian aristocracy and monarchs, until the early fourth century BC, there also existed a distinct Macedonian dialect which was not a written language. For this we are certain. But due to fragmentary evidence of words written later with Greek letters, several approaches have been entertained. That it was (1) a northern Greek dialect, related to Aeolic Greek and Thessalian; (2) an unusual form of Greek with borrowings from the Illyrian and Thracian languages; (3) a Greek dialect with influence from non-Indo-European languages; (4) together with Greek, as one of two branches of a Greco-Macedonian or Hellenic subgroup; (5) an Indo-European language that is not only a close relative of Attic Greek but also related to the Thracian and Phrygian languages; and (6) a different language derived from Thracian, Illyrian or other Indo-European languages.50 I will present the views of some key figures in this debate. This presentation is not intended to be comprehensive or limited to the debates among specialists of ancient Macedon, but a presentation that highlights some interesting, often recurring themes as to who were the elusive ancient Macedonians. I will start with the leading British historian, Arnold Toynbee (1889–1975). According to Toynbee, the question that arises is whether the ancient Macedonian people, as distinct from the aristocracy, spoke a dialect of Greek or a form of Illyrian or Thracian, though it is clear that from the fourth century onwards, they gradually adopted Greek, so as to be seen as part of the exalted Greek culture.51 Toynbee, after a scrutiny of the names of the Macedonian kings and aristocracy, concludes that the Macedonians, both the aristocracy and the people, spoke Greek, and the only difference was that the illiterate masses spoke in a Greek dialect that was not understood by the rest of the Greeks.52 In this manner he is able to interpret a number of well-known episodes associated with Alexander the Great, where the Macedonian leader refers to Macedonian as if it is distinct from Greek. And Toynbee makes the following telling point: that if one is not a linguist or philologist, one is not capable of distinguishing the communalities between two dialects, the communalities between a dialect and the literary language, and moreover dialects often contain borrowings from neighbouring dialects or languages.53 As for the fact that Isocrates and others seem to regard the Macedonians as distinct from the Greeks, he attributes this to the Macedonian political system which was different from one of the Greek city-states, hence the Macedonians were seen as ‘barbarians’, yet as ‘Greek barbarians’.54 However, Toynbee entertains an astounding hypothesis that would no doubt thrill recent Macedonian advocates of antiquization. He refers to the Paiones (Paeonians), a people who lived to the north of Macedonia since around 1000

The charm of Alexander the Great 199 BC and were later conquered by Phillip. Toynbee, after examining several of their placenames, finds that ‘[s]ome of these names have a distinctly Slavonic flavour’,55 such as placenames ending in – azora or -azoros. And he wonders (it seems to me somewhat playfully) whether the Paiones ‘may actually have been a Slavonic-speaking people that had been caught up in the Thracian and Illyrian Völkerwanderung into south-eastern Europe some 1,700 or 1,800 years before the massive Völkerwanderung of the Slavs in the sixth and seventh centuries of the Christian era’.56 The acclaimed British historian of ancient Greece, Nicholas G.L. Hammond (1907–2001), who specialized on the history of ancient Macedonia (author of, among others, the three-volume A History of Macedon, The Macedonian State, Philip of Macedon, The Genius of Alexander the Great and others), concludes after an extended examination of the existing evidence, including the views of Herodotus, Isocrates, Thucydides, Strabo and others, that ‘The men of the royal house certainly spoke Greek. They also spoke the language of their people, “Macedonian”, which contained words of early Greek origin but was not intelligible to contemporary Greeks. The Macedonians in general did not consider themselves Greeks, nor were they considered Greeks by their neighbours’.57 The major Greek-Canadian historian of the Balkans, Leften Stavros Stavrianos (1913–2004), points out that the ‘Macedonian rulers claimed to be descendents of Heracles and therefore genuine Greeks, a claim that the orators of the Athenian assembly scoffed at and rejected’.58 However, recent ‘philological and archeological research indicates that the ancient Macedonians were in fact Greeks, whose civilization had not kept up with that of the tribes which had settled further to the south’.59 Their language ‘closely resembled the classical Greek’ but the Macedonians also ruled various ‘non-Greek peoples’.60 The Serbian-American historian of the Balkans, Traian Stoianovich (1921– 2005), maintains that in the course of the fifth century BC, the Macedonian leaders oriented towards the Greeks and used Attic Greek as the official language of public administration. But this did not change the attitude of the Greeks who regarded the Macedonians ‘barbarians’, in the sense of being non-Greeks or the hostility of the Macedonians towards Greek ways. What is not known, due to lack of sufficient evidence, is whether Macedonian was a distinct language or a dialect of Greek that included non-Hellenic traits. What is more than certain is that by the time of the Roman conquest, the Macedonians and the Thraco-Illyrians of the region had been largely Hellenized.61 The distinguished British classical scholar Peter Green (born 1924), noted for his works on Alexander the Great and on the Hellenistic age (author of Alexander of Macedon, Alexander to Actium, Alexander the Great and the Hellenistic Age and others), points out that the Greek city-states treated the Macedonians with ‘genial and sophisticated contempt’, as ‘semi-savages, uncouth of speech and dialect, retrograde in their political institutions’.62 The Macedonian kingdom was split into two parts: the initial kingdom by the Aegean Sea, the centre of the state, and the highlands to the north which were inhabited by Illyrians, Paeonians and Thracians.63 What is beyond doubt is that Alexander I in the fifth century wanted

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to render Macedon part of the Greek world. Hence his bid to participate in the Olympic Games (restricted only to those of Greek origin), from which he was been initially ‘debarred’, ‘until he manufactured a pedigree connecting the Argeads with the ancient Argive kings’.64 Known ‘ironically as “the Philhellene” ’,65 he encouraged Greeks to emigrate to Macedonia and provided shelter to eminent Greeks, such as the lyric poets Pindar and Bacchylides, a policy also followed by his successors, Perdiccas and Archelaus.66 As for Philip II, who participated in the Olympic Games (and won), the idea of him leading a campaign against the Persian Empire in the name of Hellas and Panhellenism was concocted by Isocrates (in his Address to Philip), a concept which hardly inspired Philip, who was keen for a Macedonian campaign. But he bought it as a handy ‘propaganda-line’, namely ‘to clothe his Macedonian ambitions in a suitably Panhellenic dress’.67 According to Green, ‘Philip’s Panhellenism was no more than a convenient placebo to keep his allies quiet, a cloak for further Macedonian aggrandizement’,68 something recognized by most Greek statesmen at the time: ‘To them, their self-styled hegemon was still a semi-barbarian autocrat, whose wishes had been imposed on them by right of conquest; and when Alexander succeeded Philip, he inherited the same bitter legacy of hatred and resentment – which his own policies did little to dispel’.69 The attitude of the Greeks towards the Macedonians remained ‘one of bitter, implacable hatred’.70 And whenever the Greeks ‘saw the slightest chance of throwing off the Macedonian yoke, they took it’.71 Green makes the telling point that when Alexander embarked upon his campaign with 43,000 infantry and 6,000 cavalry, the Greek states provided 7,000 and 600, respectively, and of the Navy’s 160 ships, only 20 were provided by Athens reluctantly, and on the whole ‘far more Greeks fought for the Great [Persian] King – and remained loyal to the bitter end – than were ever conscripted by Alexander’.72 Clearly Alexander did not trust the Greeks in his army and did not use them ‘in crucial battles’, but kept then ‘on garrison and line-of-communications duties’, and also ‘to serve as hostages for the good behaviour of their friends and relatives in Greece’.73 All in all, Greeks and Macedonians ‘despised each other, rightly or wrongly, as foreigners who (they claimed) spoke different languages; their xenophobia was intensified on the Greek side by intellectual contempt mixed with bitter resentment at defeat, on the Macedonian by constant fear of bad faith and rebellion’.74 The Austrian-American Ernst Badian (1925–2011), a major authority on ancient Greek and Roman history, has posited that as far as the Macedonian language is concerned, there can be no secure answer, because prior to Alexander the Great there is no written testimony regarding such a language or its structure, apart from some names and a few words that do not seem to be Greek.75 Of greater significance, according to Badian, is how the Greeks and Macedonians perceived each other. Before the Persian Wars, there is no indication of an association between the Macedonians and the Greeks, with Macedonia a tributary of the Persian Empire. Alexander I was the first to bring about the link, with his wellknown initiatives, including his participation in the Olympic Games (though the

The charm of Alexander the Great 201 evidence he provided was not accepted by the other athletes and he qualified not due to his evidence but as a reward for services rendered in support of the Greeks in the Persian Wars). From then onwards he was called ‘Philhellene’, hardly an attribute if one was a true Hellene.76 Thereafter, according to Badian, no Macedonian (apart from Philip II) risked trying to participate in the games at Olympia, and King Archelaus founded counter-Olympian games for the Macedonians.77 Badian like others refers to three episodes during the campaign of Alexander the Great where it seems that Macedonian is different from the Greek and not understood by the Greeks, thus literary Greek and the Macedonian non-literary language were probably two distinct languages.78 He also refers to the fact that even Isocrates, a warm supporter of the Macedonians, regarded Philip, Greek, but not his subjects. As for Demosthenes’s famous claim that the Macedonians were non-Greeks but ‘barbarians’,79 Badian makes the point that the orator, however harsh and extreme, would not have dared characterize Philip a barbarian to his Athenian audience if they regarded what he was saying sheer nonsense.80 And Badian’s final conclusion is that probably there were two distinct peoples, though the educated Macedonians spoke Greek and had been Hellenized. He also notes that the despotism reigning in Macedonia was yet another factor for the Greeks to regard them as barbarians.81 Eugene Borza, a Romanian-American scholar specializing on the ancient Macedonians (author of The Impact of Alexander the Great, In the Shadow of Olympus: The Emergence of Macedon and other works), points out that ‘[t]here is no doubt that standard Attic Greek was used by the court for personal matters and by the king for official business from the time of Archelaus at the end of the fifth century B.C.’.82 What is unclear, however, is who were the ancient Macedonians: whether they were the same or different from the ruling class and which was the origin of the ruling Argeade dynasty (the descendants of Argeas and not the descendants of Temenus of Argus, a kinsman of Heracles, as claimed by Alexander I for the wellknown reasons).83 Borza, like Badian, regards the ‘Philhellene’ epithet for Alexander I a clear indication that he was not Greek, for ‘it would be odd to call a Greek “a friend of Greece (or Greeks)” ’.84 As for the attempts of Archelaus to import and make use of many Greek symbols and Greek culture, he attributes this to trying to make the Macedonians appear in the eyes of the Greeks as civilized, at a time when Greek civilization was the standard for one to be regarded civilized or not.85 According to Borza, whatever the Macedonians may have been originally, prior to the fifth century, they became Hellenized, especially the ruling class from the reign of Alexander I onwards. As for the tricky problem of the Macedonian language, the main evidence comes from a few latter references in the course of Alexander’s Asian campaign, where it is implied that the Macedonian was distinct from the standard Attic Greek used as the language of the court and diplomacy.86 Borza believes that it is simply impossible to be certain, given the scant latter evidence, ‘whether it was Greek’, perhaps ‘a rude patois that was the dialect of farmers and hillsmen or a style of speaking’.87 They might have been closer to the Illyrian or Thracian which were distinct languages, and it is clear that even during the reign of Alexander the Great, they could not be understood by the

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Greeks, and interpreters were needed. Moreover, according to Borza, culturally, as regards customs and traditions, including burials, art and not least how the state was organized, the ancient Macedonians had little in common with the Greek city-states.88 And he concludes that irrespective of who the Macedonians really were, and despite the attempts of Philip and Alexander the Great to bridge the gap between the two cultures, the Greeks and the Macedonians ‘remained steadfastly antipathetic towards one another (with dislike of a different quality than the mutual long-term hostility shared by some Greek city-states) until well into the Hellenistic period’.89 The British scholar of ancient Greek, R.A. Crossland, asserts that it is impossible to arrive with any degree of certainty as to whether the Macedonian tongue was a Greek dialect or another Indo-European language.90 Prior to the fourth century, no inscriptions have been found to ascertain if it was a dialect or another language. The contemporary Greeks tended to regard the Macedonians a distinct ‘nation’ and ‘barbarians’. However, the term ‘barbarians’was at times used by Greeks for groups that were undeniably Greek. Moreover, since the eighth century the Macedonians, or at least their aristocracy, were seen as more related to the Greeks than the other barbarians.91 As for the references by Plutarch and Arrian, to speaking Macedonian in the course of Alexander’s campaign, it could have meant a Greek dialect not understood by the Greeks and not necessarily a different language (both Plutarch and Arrian regarded Macedonian a Greek dialect). According to Crossland, the only possible evidence of a different language rests on phonetic evidence as regards the sounds of consonants ‘f’ and ‘b’. And it is not clear whether Hellenization was limited only to the ruling class or was broader. He concludes that the whole matter of language is not of such significance, since prior to the fourth century the Macedonians had no worthwhile cultural influence on the Greeks and after that Alexander’s conquests spread the Greek language rendering it an international language.92 The English classicist and ancient historian, Robin Lane Fox (author of Alexander the Great and the Search for Alexander), writes that ‘[t]he Macedonian kings had long claimed to be of Greek descent, but Greeks had not always been convinced by these northerners’ insistence and to his enemies Philip was no better than a foreign outsider’.93 Under Alexander the Great, ‘Macedonians defined themselves sharply as a distinct class against the Greeks, not in terms of race, for the Macedonians claimed to be of Greek ancestry. . . . The distinction was one of status and all the sharper for being so’.94 As for Alexander, he ‘remained Greek by culture in the world of the east’, even though he included Orientals in his administration.95 Lane Fox also refers to the astonishing fact that ‘50,000 Greeks, as many as Alexander’s entire army, are said, with only slight exaggeration, to have fought against Alexander’s crusade, most of them hired for the occasion’.96 He attributes this to the fact that they were mercenaries or liked soldiering, or had no inheritance, but concedes that ‘some had fled to fight the Macedonians whom they hated’.97 The British historian of ancient Greece, Robert Malcolm Errington (author of Geschichte Makedoniens and A History of Macedonia), has made the following

The charm of Alexander the Great 203 apt point (in 1986, prior to the end of the Cold War and the Greek-Macedonian naming dispute): ‘the question of the actual nationality of the ancient Macedonians . . . is scientifically trivial and has acquired importance in modern times only because nationalists of all sorts in the Balkans and elsewhere have laid hold of it, and each according to the answer, has put it in the service of territorial or other claims’.98 And Errington concludes that ‘today it must be considered as certain that the Macedonians and their kings actually spoke a Greek dialect and bore names of Greek type’.99 The British historian of ancient Greek history, Paul Cartledge, points out that ‘many Greeks in Alexander’s day were of the view that the Macedonians were either not very, or not entirely, or not at all Greek. In so far as there was any historical basis for that view, it rested on the perception of the Macedonians’ language, often incomprehensible to standard Greek-speakers’,100 for ‘the local Macedonian dialect was so interlarded with non-Greek (especially Illyrian) linguistic forms’.101 In support of the view that the Macedonians were not Greeks or not very Greek, is the case of Alexander I, an ambivalent figure, initially ‘a vassal’ of the Persians, who later ‘advertised his alleged loyalty to the Greeks as opposed to the Persians’, gaining the nickname ‘the philhellene’, which ‘suggested that he was not himself a Hellene, or not Hellene enough’.102 Of course, he was able to convince the committee to participate in the Olympic Games, with the well-known device (ancestry from Temenos of Argos and from Heracles), but ‘it is noteworthy that only the reigning king of Macedon, and no other Macedonians, was considered sufficiently Greek to be permitted to enter the sacred Olympic Games as a competitor’.103 Cartledge also points to the striking fact that in the course of Alexander’s Persian campaign down to the conclusive battle against the Persians at Gaugamela, far more Greeks fought against Alexander, with the Persians as mercenaries, than with Alexander.104 As he puts it, Alexander ‘mistrusted the Greeks’ loyalty, with good reason’, for after all ‘an awful lot more Greeks disliked or feared Alexander’s Macedonian rule than positively favoured or embraced it’.105 This was the case because for many Greeks, the Macedonians and not just the Persians were ‘barbarians’. For many Greeks ‘it was Macedon, not the Great King [of Persia], which they thought was the real, or at any rate the most immediately present, danger and enemy. For many Macedonians, conversely, Greeks were members of a recently defeated and so despised people who did not know how to conduct their political and military life sensibly’.106 According to Cartledge, in support of the view that the Macedonians, however distinct from the Greeks, were Greeks or had become Greeks on their own free choice, is the appropriation of ‘the symbolic language of shared and accepted myth, which spoke firmly for the inclusion of the Macedonians in the Hellenic family’107; that Mount Olympus, home of the twelve gods, was within Macedonian territory108; and the fact that Alexander the Great seemed convinced that he was Greek culture-wise and ‘advertised the Persian campaign as a (pan)Hellenic crusade’.109 What is beyond doubt is that ‘Philip had deliberately sought to Hellenize at least the nobility and had patronized Greek intellectuals and artists’,110 but according to Cartledge, ‘[t]his process had not trickled down to affect the

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populace as a whole, however, and the antics of the nobility, most conspicuously their crude drinking habits, suggest that even they had not thoroughly absorbed all aspects of Greek culture’.111 The British scholar Simon Hornblower, who specializes in classic Greek historiography, points out that the ‘Hellenism of the Macedonian King Alexander I was disputed by Greeks in the early fifth century, when they disputed his right to enter the Olympic Games on the grounds that the games were not open to barbarians’.112 But even after his participation, the ‘prejudices against the Macedonians continued’ in the fourth century, and he mentions the title ‘Philhellene’ given to Alexander I (actually given later, in the fourth century) as well as to Demosthenes’s well-known characterization.113 In Thucydides (Hornblower specializes on Thucydides; see Thucydides and Thucydides and Pindar), the Macedonians are presented by the Greeks as neither Greeks nor barbarians and at times as Greeks at other times as non-Greeks.114 And Hornblower ponders whether the Macedonian kings promoted the idea of being Greeks to enhance their position vis-à-vis ‘their non-Greek Macedonian subjects’.115 As to whether the Macedonians were Greeks or not, his conclusion is the following: the ‘kings, the elite, and the generality of the Macedonians were Greeks’, judging by their personal names, the language used and their religion. They differed from the other Greeks in their customs, their political system (not a polis) and institutions which had feudal elements. And Hornblower’s ‘crude one-word answer to the question’ is ‘yes’ they were Greeks.116 According to the American scholar of ancient Greek history, Jonathan Μ. Hall, in Hesiod, the Macedonians are not included in the Greek genealogy.117 Hall points out that the Macedonians begin to be included as Dorians, hence as Greeks, from the middle of the fifth century but not previously. This was the result of the various contacts with the Greeks initiated by Alexander I, including his participation in the Olympic Games, even though his credentials as a Greek (the presumed Argive origins) had not convinced many Greeks, as pointed out by Herodotus, who is the first to refer to this episode.118 And Hall’s conclusion is the following119: To ask whether the Macedonians ‘really were’ Greek or not in antiquity is ultimately a redundant question given the shifting semantics of Greekness between the sixth and fourth centuries B.C. What cannot be denied, however, is that the cultural commodification of Hellenic identity that emerged in the fourth century might have remained a provincial artifact, confined to the Balkan peninsula, had it not been for the Macedonians. The views of two Greek scholars of ancient Greek history are also worth mentioning. Miltiades Hatzopoulos, today’s doyen on this question in Greece, points out that recent evidence of ‘longer texts entirely written’ in the Macedonian dialect ‘leave no doubt that Macedonian was a Greek dialect presenting affinities partly with the dialects attested in the inscriptions of Thessaly and partly with those known from documents in north-western Greece’,120 with a phonology that ‘seems to have been influenced to a limited extent by the languages of the conquered

The charm of Alexander the Great 205 peoples, in which the distinction between voiced and unvoiced consonants tended to be blurred’.121 Indeed these documents confirm what Strabo and Plutarch had claimed, namely ‘the affinity between the dialects spoken in Macedonia and in Epirus and also the existence of a distinctive Macedonian “accent” ’.122 And he draws attention to the fact that language alone is one of several elements of group identity and the whole debate about the true identity of the ancient Macedonians presupposes ‘a previous response to the question of the nature of “nationality” in ancient Greece’.123 Be this as it may, by ‘the beginning of the classical [Hellenic] period, the archeological evidence leaves no doubt about the integration of Macedonia in the contemporary Hellenic world’.124 The Macedonians participated in various Greek institutions and events, apart from having the same religion, such as in amfictionies (religious ceremonies), common festivals, common sacrifices, sanctuaries and shrines, in Delphi, in the Thessalian League, in Panhellenic contests, such as the ones in Olympia, and in Panhellenic congresses.125 Hatzopoulos refers to what he calls the ‘Macedonian paradox’, the fact that a group of people speaking a Greek dialect, having Attic Greek as their official language, having the same Greek cults and so on, yet were ‘occasionally distinguished from, and indeed opposed to the Greeks’.126 Their ‘Hellenic quality was repeatedly disputed’, especially when there were ‘political animosities’ between them,127 and when ‘the Macedonians aspired to become major players in Greek politics’.128 And he suggests that their case ‘be studied in connection with that of other peripheral Greek-speaking peoples, such as the Epirotes and the Cypriotes’.129 Nearby Epirus offers a parallel with Macedonia, whose inhabitants were occasionally characterized as ‘barbarians’, from the days of Thucydides until the days of Strabo (in the early first century AD), even though they undoubtedly spoke a Greek dialect. As for Macedonia being a kingdom and hence not very Greek (not a city-state), monarchies reappeared in Greek Sicily and there is also the case of Cyprus, whose Greek credentials (apart from the Phoenician city of Kition) were not in doubt even though it was consistently ruled by kings and treated as ‘an anomaly’ by the other Greeks.130 Hatzopoulos concludes with an interesting parallel between the ancient Greeks as regards the Macedonians, and how the Germans regarded Prussia in the nineteenth century until German unification; Prussia, the eventual unifiers of the Germans, was seen as outside the German world. Note that this ‘Macedonian paradox’ and the comparison with Prussia in the German world did not pass unnoticed by German scholars of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries (at a time when the German historians dominated Macedonian studies131).132 According to ancient historian Ioannis Xydopoulos, the two most authoritative literary sources regarding the Macedonians are Herodotus and Thucydides. In Herodotus, the Macedonians are one of the ‘Greek tribes’, on the same footing as the Ionians, Thessalians, Thesprotians and others, and Herodotus does not oppose the term Hellene to that of Macedonian.133 In Thucydides, things are different. In some instances, he distinguished between the Greeks and Macedonians, the latter as barbarians; in other instances, he calls the Macedonians ‘intermixed people’ or ‘bilingual barbarians’.134 As for Isocrates, even though he was known as a friend

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and supporter of the Macedonians and King Philip in particular, he nevertheless gives the impression, in at least three occasions, that he distinguished the Macedonians from the Greeks.135 Xydopoulos’s conclusion is that perhaps the Macedonian kingdom was multiethnic, given some inscription writing in the Greek alphabet but with words from another language.136 On the other hand, the use of inscriptions in Greek, the participation of the Macedonians in the Olympic Games and other activities, shows that the Macedonians had come to regard themselves as Greeks and wanted to be seen as Greeks by the Greeks, thus most recent historians have reached the conclusion that the Macedonians were not a tribe different from the rest of the Greeks.137 We will conclude with the view of Petar Hristov Ilievski (1920–2013), professor of ancient Greek philology and history at the University of Skopje and academician, and until his death, the doyen on this issue in his country. According to Ilievski, the origin and language of the ancient Macedonians have been discussed for nearly 200 years, but in view of the ‘insufficient number of survivals from ancient Macedonia’, there is ample ground for ‘different interpretations and opinions’.138 He mentions nine reputable scholars who have claimed that they were a separate people speaking a non-Greek language, and eight equally reputable scholars who have claimed that they were a Greek tribe, whose language was close to Greek but due to isolation for a long period their language had developed some specific characteristics.139 Ilievski makes the point that contrary to the modern Greeks, the ‘classical Greeks’, including historians, who happened to have direct contacts with the Macedonians did not regard them as Greeks. They regarded them as ‘barbaroi’ (barbarians) as claimed by Thrasymachus and others.140 This was the case not because they had a lower culture, as claimed by many Greek scholars today, but because they spoke a different language. The Persians and the Egyptians, who were not regarded culturally inferior to the Greeks, were also called barbaroi for the very same reason, while the Dorians, who were ‘at a much lower cultural level than the Achaeans and Ionians, were never called barbaroi’.141 True the Macedonian dynasty, starting with Alexander I the Philhellene ‘led an openly pro-Hellenic policy’ and at their court ‘first in Aigai and later in Pella, educated Greeks (teachers, physicians, artists, etc.) sojourned’, and the ‘Macedonian kings were fond of representing themselves as Greeks’, and in this context one sees Alexander I seeking participation in the Olympic games.142 The ancient Macedonians were gradually included ‘into the sphere of Hellenic culture’ but the ancient Greeks ‘never acknowledged them as compatriots’.143 Even Isocrates, who supported Philip II as a future leader of the Greeks against the Persians, differentiated between the dynasty and the Macedonian people.144 Ilievski is of the view that the numerous Greek inscriptions to be found in the Macedonian capitals is not a proof of their Greekness, but probably due to the fact that ‘in ancient times Greek was a language of literacy and diplomacy; it was used in all Balkan, Mediterranean and Near Eastern countries the same as Latin in medieval West Europe, or English today all over the world’.145 From ancient Macedonian some 100 glosses (brief notations or wordings in a text) have been found,

The charm of Alexander the Great 207 several of which cannot be explained with ‘a Greek etymology’.146 The strongest proof of Greekness is to be found in their personal names, yet ‘some personal names of ancient Macedonians have not relation to Greek ones’.147 Moreover, the names that have survived belong to members of the dynasty and aristocracy and bearing in mind that ‘they intentionally carried out a pro-Hellenic policy’, it is not surprising that they are Greek, but the names of the people are not known.148 Ilievski contests Hammond’s conviction that their language was Greek, for after all he was no linguist so as to make ‘such a far-reaching conclusion’.149 And he attaches himself with the linguists who claim that Greek is not closer to ancient Macedonian than to other Indo-European language, and that Macedonian is to be placed among the Indo-European languages together with Phrygian, Thracian and Dacian.150 Ilievski also refers to some nineteenth-century authors, who, in trying to establish a link with the ancient Macedonians, claimed that Alexander the Great was a Slav, and asserts that ‘this is a romantic attitude which is without a scientific basis’ and adds that ‘[u]nfortunately today there are some extreme patriots who also claim that Makedonski [modern Macedonian] originates from ancient Macedonian’, and he states that this theory ‘will never have a scientific status, because it is not based on real facts’.151 By way of a conclusion, it may be that, as Cartledge has put it, ‘[t]he politicoethnic issue, as to whether or not he [Alexander] counted, wholly or in part, as “Greek” . . . is one of Alexander’s fiercely contested legacies, with an obvious contemporary resonance’.152 In fact, the issue is largely a red herring. What is more than certain is that the Macedonians, whatever their origins and linguistic roots, were eventually Hellenized and later spread the Greek culture and language to the greater part of the then known civilized world (the main exceptions to this spill-over being Rome and Carthage to the west). And as for the Hellenistic civilization that followed Alexander’s death it was, as Arnaldo Momigliano has pointed out, ‘Greek in language, customs and above all in self-consciousness’.153 More crucially for our concerns, no Slavs or Slav Macedonians existed in ancient Macedonia or elsewhere in the Balkans before the mass Slav migration of the sixth and seventh centuries. And if indeed the Macedonians were Greeks and Herodotus was correct after all, which is not unlikely, especially as regards the ruling class, and Hellenized as a result of their own free will, why on earth should this give modern Greeks a copyright (a birthright) to the name Macedonia and Macedonians? As it has been aptly put, ‘[w]hatever the legitimacy of the Hellenic claim to the legacy of Alexander, history and cultural heritage do not grant copyright to names’.154

Notes 1 Anastas Vangeli, ‘Nation-Building Ancient Macedonian Style: The Origins and the Effects of the Socalled Antiquization in Macedonia’, Nationalities Papers, 39:1 (2011). 2 Evangelos Kofos, ‘Greece’s Macedonian Adventure: The Controversy over FYROM’s Independence and Recognition’, in Van Coufoudakis, Harry J. Psomiades and Andre Gerolymatos (eds), Greece and the New Balkans: Challenges and Opportunities (New York: Pella Publishing Company, Inc., 1999), 387.

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3 The imposing 2524-meter Kajmakčalan mountain peak, with snow throughout the year, is the highest point of the Voras/Nitze mountain which spreads in the border between Greece and North Macedonia, and was the venue of a number of battles in the First World War and in the Greek Civil War. 4 Anastas Vangeli, ‘Quest for the Glorious Past Reconsidered: Alexander the Great between Greece, Macedonia and the Liberal-Democratic Perspectives’, 15th Annual ASN World Convention ‘Nation and States: On the Map and in the Mind’, Columbia University, New York (15–17 April 2010), 4. 5 Ibid. 6 Ibid., 4–5 7 Ibid., 5. 8 Simon Harrison, ‘Four Types of Symbolic Conflict’, Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute, 1:2 (1995), 258. 9 Ibid. 10 Ibid. 11 Ibid. 12 Ibid. 13 Peter Green, Alexander the Great and the Hellenistic Age (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 2007), XXIV. 14 Quoted in Paul Cartledge, Alexander the Great: The Hunt for a New Past (London: Pan Books, Macmillan, 2005) [2004], 4–5. 15 Ibid., 259–60; Green, Alexander the Great and the Hellenistic Age, XXVII–XXVIII. 16 According to Cartledge, see Paul Cartledge, Alexander the Great, 197. 17 Robin Lane Fox, Alexander the Great (London: Penguin Books, 2004) [1973], 26. 18 Cartledge, Alexander the Great, IX. 19 Ibid., 4. 20 Ibid., 3. 21 Ibid. 22 Green, Alexander the Great and the Hellenistic Age, XXIV. For more details of the Romance, see Richard Stoneman, The Greek Alexander Romance (London: Penguin Books, 1991). 23 Cartledge, Alexander the Great, 237, 239. See also Lane Fox, Alexander the Great, 26. 24 Peter Green, Alexander of Macedonon, 356–323 B.C.: A Historical Biography (London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 2013) [1972], 479. 25 Cartledge, Alexander the Great, 6. 26 Quoted in Green, Alexander of Macedon, XVII. 27 Ibid., XVI. 28 As pointed out by Cartledge. See Cartledge, Alexander the Great, 211. 29 Green, Alexander of Macedon, 477. 30 Cartledge, Alexander the Great, 16. 31 Ibid. 32 Green, Alexander of Macedon, 487. 33 Basil C. Gounaris, ‘Greek Views of Macedonia: From the Enlightenment to the First World War’, in Ioannis D. Stefanidis, Vlasis Vlasidis and Evangelos Kofos (eds), Macedonian Identities through Time: Interdisciplinary Approaches (Thessaloniki: Foundation of the Museum for the Macedonian Struggle, Epikentro, 2010 [2008], 141. 34 Dimitar Bechev, Historical Dictionary of North Macedonia, Second Edition (Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield, 2019), 5. 35 Tchavdar Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander: Macedonian Identity at the Crossroads of Greek, Bulgarian and Serbian Nationalism’, in Roumen Daskalov and Tchavdar Marinov (eds), Entangled Histories of the Balkans, Volume One: National Ideologies and Language Policies (Leiden: Brill, 2013a), 280; Spyridon Sfetas, I diamorfosi tis slavomakedonikis taftotitas: mia epodyni diadikasia [The Formulation of the Slav-Macedonian Identity: A Painful Process] (Thessaloniki: Ekdoseis Vanias, 2003), 12.

The charm of Alexander the Great 209 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43

44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73

Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander’, 280. Ibid. Ibid. Sfetas, I diamorfosi tis slavomakedonikis taftotitas, 13–14 and 14 fn 5. Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander’, 282–3. Ibid. R.J. Crampton, A Short History of Modern Bulgaria (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987), 12; R.J. Crampton, A Concise History of Modern Bulgaria (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005) [1997], 60, 62. Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander’, 284–5, 289, 293, 329; Kyril Drezov, ‘Macedonian Identity: An Overview of the Major Claims’, in James Pettifer (ed.), The New Macedonian Question (Basingstoke: Macmillan Press, 1999), 50; Douglas Dakin, The Greek Struggle in Macedonia 1897–1913 (Thessaloniki: Institute for Balkan Studies, 1966), 122; Tasos Kostopoulos, ‘I alli opsi tou Makedonikou Agona’ [The Other Aspect of the Macedonian Struggle], in Tassos Kostopoulos, Leonidas Empeirikos and Dimitris Lithoxoou (eds), Ellinikos ethikismos, Makedoniko Zitima: I ideologiki chrisi tis istorias [Greek Nationalism, Macedonian Question: The Ideological Use of History] (Athens: Ekdosi tis kinisis aristeron, 1992), 15–6. Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander’, 285. Ibid. K.S. Brown, ‘In the Realm of the Double-Headed Eagle: Parapolitics in Macedonia’, in Jane K. Cowan (ed.), Macedonia: The Politics of Identity and Difference (London: Pluto Press, 2000), 124–5. Marinov, ‘Famous Macedonia, the Land of Alexander’, 284–5; Drezov, ‘Macedonian Identity’, 50. Stoyan Pribichevich, Macedonia: Its People and History (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1982), 38. L.S. Stavrianos, The Balkans since 1453 (London: Hurst & Company, 2000) [1958], 18. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ancient_Macedonian_language Arnold Toynbee, Some Problems of Greek History (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1969), 57, 64–5. Ibid., 65–6, 69, 78–9. Ibid, 60–1, 74–7. Ibid, 60. Ibid., 99. Ibid. N.G.L. Hammond, A History of Greece to 322 BC (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1967, 2nd edition), 534. Stavrianos, The Balkans since 1453, 18. Ibid. Ibid. Stoianovich in John Shea, Macedonia and Greece: The Struggle to Define a New Balkan Nation (Jefferson: McFarland and Company, 2008) [1997], 26, 63. Green, Alexander of Macedon, 6. Ibid., 4–5. Ibid., 6–7. Ibid., 6. Ibid., 8–9. Ibid., 50. Ibid., 87. Ibid. Green, Alexander the Great and the Hellenistic Age, 10. Green, Alexander of Maced on, 87. Ibid., 157. Ibid., 157–8.

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74 Green, Alexander the Great and the Hellenistic Age, 10. 75 Ernst Badian, ‘Greeks and Macedonians’, Studies in the History of Art, Symposium Series I: Macedonia and Greece in Late Classical and Early Hellenistic Times, 10 (1982), 33. 76 However, it has been pointed out by other scholars that the use of the term ‘philhellene’ was used by the Greeks (for instance by Plato, Xenophon and others) in some instances with regard to Greeks that lived south of the river Aliakmon and were undeniably Greek. See Slavomir Sprawski, ‘When Did Alexander I of Macedon Get the Cognomen “Philhellene’”, Przeglad Humanistyczny, 2 (2013), 47–8. 77 Badian, ‘Greeks and Macedonians’, 34–5, 38. 78 Ibid., 41. 79 Note that Greek scholars have pointed out that the term ‘barbarian’ was also used at times by Greeks with reference to other Greeks, especially if they were seen as less civilized at a particular historical period or acted or spoke in an uncivilized manner. See Christiane Sourvinou-Inwood, ‘Greek Perceptions of Ethnicity and the Ethnicity of the Macedonians’, in Luisa Moscati Castelnuovo (ed.) Identità e Prassi Storica nel Mediterraneo Greco (Milan: Edizioni ET, 2002), 173–203; M.B. Hatzopoulos, ‘Perception of the Self and the Other: The Case of Macedon’, in Ioannis D. Stefanidis, Vlasis Vlasidis and Evangelos Kofos (eds), Macedonian Identities through Time: Interdisciplinary Approaches (Thessaloniki: Foundation of the Museum for the Macedonian Struggle, Epikentro, 2010 [2008], 48. 80 Badian, ‘Greeks and Macedonians’, 42. 81 Ibid., 42–3. 82 Eugene N. Borza, In the Shadow of Olympus: The Emergence of Macedon (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1990), 92. 83 Ibid., 78, 80, 82. 84 Ibid., 113. 85 Eugene Borza, ‘The Philhellenism of Archelaus’, Ancient Macedonia. Fifth International Symposium (Thessaloniki: Idrima Meleton Hersonisou toy Aimou, 1993), vol. 1, 244. 86 Borza, In the Shadow of Olympus, 92. 87 Ibid. 88 Ibid., 88–9, 93, 95–6. 89 Ibid., 96. 90 R.A. Crossland, ‘Linguistic Problems of the Balkan Area in Late Prehistoric and Early Classical Periods’, Cambridge Ancient History, vol. 2, part 1 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1982), 843–4, 847. 91 Ibid., 843. 92 Ibid., 841, 843–4, 846–7. 93 Lane Fox, Alexander the Great, 17. 94 Ibid., 51. 95 Ibid., 55. 96 Ibid, 101. 97 Ibid. 98 Quoted in M.B. Hatzopoulos, ‘Macedonians and Other Greeks’, in Robin J. Lane Fox (ed.), Brill’s Companion to Ancient Macedon: Studies in the Archaeology and History of Macedon, 650 BC – 300 AD (Leiden: Brill, 2015) [2011], 51. 99 Quoted in ibid. 100 Cartledge, Alexander the Great, 11. 101 Ibid., 32. 102 Ibid., 12. 103 Ibid., 33. 104 Ibid., 16, 79, 94. 105 Ibid., 94–5. 106 Ibid., 95.

The charm of Alexander the Great 211 107 108 109 110 111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118 119 120 121 122 123 124 125 126 127 128 129 130 131

132 133

134 135 136 137 138 139 140 141 142 143 144 145

Ibid., 11. Ibid. Ibid., 15. Ibid., 32. Ibid. Simon Hornblower, ‘Greek Identity in the Archaic and Classical Periods’, in Katerina Zacharia (ed.), Hellenisms: Culture, Identity, and Ethnicity from Antiquity to Modernity (Aldershot: Ashgate Variorum, 2008), 55. Ibid. Ibid., 56–7. Ibid., 56. Ibid., 58. Jonathon M. Hall, Ethnic Identity in Greek Antiquity (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997), 64. Ibid. Quoted in Hatzopoulos, ‘Perception of the Self and the Other’, 41. Hatzopoulos, ‘Macedonia and Macedonians’, in Lane Fox (ed.), Brill’s Companion to Ancient Macedon: Studies in the Archaeology and History of Macedon, 650 BC – 300 AD (Leiden: Brill, 2015), 44. Ibid. Hatzopoulos, ‘Macedonians and Other Greeks’, 62. Hatzopoulos, ‘Perception of the Self and the Other’, 39. Hatzopoulos, ‘Macedonians and Other Greeks’, 54. Ibid., 57–61, 63–6; Hatzopoulos, ‘Perception of the Self and the Other’, 43–4, 46–7. Hatzopoulos, ‘Macedonians and Other Greeks’, 71. Ibid., 73. Ibid., 74. Ibid., 71. Ibid., 71–2; Hatzopoulos, ‘Perception of the Self and the Other’, 48. For details on the views of the German historians from the 1880s until the first decade of the twentieth century, see Kyriakos D. Demetriou, ‘Historians on Macedonian Imperialism and Alexander the Great’, Journal of Modern Greek Studies, 19:1 (2001), 51–2. M.B. Hatzopoulos, ‘Macedonian Studies’, in Lane Fox (ed.), Brill’s Companion to Ancient Macedon: Studies in the Archaeology and History of Macedon, 650 BC – 300 AD (Leiden: Brill, 2015), 37; Hatzopoulos, ‘Macedonians and Other Greeks’, 73–4. Ioannis Xydopoulos, ‘Macedonians and Southern Greeks: Sameness and Otherness from the Classical Period to the Roman Conquest’, in Ioannis D. Stefanidis, Vlasis Vlasidis and Evangelos Kofos (eds), Macedonian Identities through Time: Interdisciplinary Approaches (Thessaloniki: Foundation of the Museum for the Macedonian Struggle, Epikentro, 2010 [2008], 56. Ibid., 58–9. Ibid., 62–3. Ibid., 61. Ibid., 63–7. Petar Hristov Ilievski, ‘Position of the Ancient Macedonian Language and the Name of the Contemporary Makedonski’, Studia Minora Facultatis Philosophicae Universitatis Brunensis, E36 (Brown University, 1991), 129. Ibid., 129–30. Ibid., 131. Ibid., 132. Ibid., 131. Ibid. Ibid. Ibid., 132.

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Ibid., 134. Ibid., 136. Ibid. Ibid. Ibid. Ibid., 137. Cartledge, Alexander the Great, 21. Arnaldo Momigliano, Alien Wisdom: The Limits of Hellenization (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1975), 7. 154 International Crisis Group, ‘Macedonia’s Name: Why the Dispute Matters and How to Resolve It’ (Brussels: ICG, 2001), 16.

146 147 148 149 150 151 152 153

11 The crux of the GreekMacedonian dispute The skeletons in the cupboard

The reasons of the Greek anti-Macedonian attitude The reasons for the negative Greek attitude towards the Macedonians, and for Greece’s stance in the Greek-Macedonian conflict from 1991 until 2017, are several and interconnected. And they linger on, as seen by opinion polls in 2018– 2019, which found that more than 70 percent of the Greeks were against the 2018 Prespa Agreement (see Chapter 12), a view that has hardly changed until 2020. I would place the reasons for the negative stance of the Greeks into six categories: (1) reasons derived from misperceptions; (2) the claim of Macedonian irredentism; (3) cultural heritage; (4) hidden and unacknowledged reasons; (5) reasons that are linked with – and are a carry-over from – the Greek national historical narrative-cum-national identity; and (6) reasons associated with the dominant Greek image internationally. Within the first category there are two kinds of misperceptions. One which is genuine for many Greeks (others feign ignorance) is that there is only one Macedonia, ‘Greek Macedonia’ for historical as well as geographical reasons, hence ‘there is no such thing as a (non-Greek) Macedonian’1; they are unaware that there are three Macedonias divided among three states in 1913. As pointed out by Kofos, amateur Greek historians and publicists have claimed that the region of the former Socialist Republic of Macedonia in Yugoslavia was never part of Macedonia and that it arbitrarily got the name Macedonia in the 1944–1945, and once the Greek public swallowed these ‘findings’ of the alleged ‘specialists’, all the political parties and groups lined up.2 More generally, the Greek public is notorious for its lack of knowledge regarding the Macedonian Question and the Macedonians. As many as half of the Greeks, despite their hearty rejection of a composite name (over 70 percent), prior to and after the Prespa Agreement, were unaware of the consistent Greek official policy from the early 2000s onwards in support of a compound name. Moreover, most Greeks believe that the majority of Macedonians are not Christian Orthodox but Muslims!3 A second kind of misperception is Kofos’s ‘theory of mutation’ in extremis, namely that Tito invented, capriciously for Yugoslavia’s ends, a new nation and a new language (which is no more than a Bulgarian dialect) out of the blue, choosing

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to call them arbitrarily, with no reason, Macedonia/ns. The majority of Greeks are unaware that this is not the case; no new nation, new name or new language was created ex nihilo by Tito in 1944 (see Chapters 4 and 8). As regards ‘Macedonian irredentism’, the official Greek claim, and the concomitant threat to Greece’s territorial integrity (see Chapter 6), they may be farfetched, however they are not bogus but deeply felt by the majority and difficult to dislodge. Moreover, in the 1940s and 1950s the People’s Republic of Macedonia did toy with the unification of the whole of Macedonia under its aegis. Now and since 1991, such views are the purview of nationalist fringe groups in Macedonia (now North Macedonia), but most Greeks are convinced that this is the official position of VMRO-DPMNE and its antiquization narrative is seen as a proof of this, in the sense that by claiming Alexander the Great, they also claim the whole of the territory of ancient Macedon. And as it is well known, in all severe protracted conflicts either side takes the most extreme views expressed by the virulent nationalists of the adversary as expressing its genuine position. Irredentism as the real agenda, namely to avail itself of parts of northern Greece, is ‘proven’ according to most Greeks by the use of three malign strategies: (a) the name as the spearhead; (b) the preposterous claim that the ancient Macedonians were not Greeks but the ancestors of the ‘Slav Macedonians’; and (c) the ‘alleged existence’ of a ‘Macedonian minority’ in Greece. And the answer to foreign officials, when they point out that this smacks of paranoia, small landlocked Macedonia, with barely an armed force, could hardly threaten the much bigger and far more powerful Greece,4 the standard Greek response is the following: the recognition of a state named ‘Macedonia’ will plant the roots that will allow it to harbour territorial ambitions in the future and play them out if Greece finds itself in a state of weakness.5 This also applies to recognizing a ‘Slav-Macedonian minority’ in Greek Macedonia, according to recurring Greek Governments from 1944 until today, namely that it will whet the appetite of Skopje and act as a springboard for irredentism. Hence, Greece’s unrealistic but adamant posture that such a minority does not exist, a stance adopted by all shades of political opinion (with few exceptions). As regards cultural heritage and its emotional aspect, however misplaced, it is a tough nut to crack. It is deeply felt that ‘the name is our soul’ as Noble Laureate poet Odysseas Elitis, actress Melina Merkouri and other Greek luminaries had put it from the 1990s onwards; an important part of the glorious Greek heritage is appropriated by ‘cheating usurpers’ by their appropriation of the name Macedonia. Most Greeks regard the name Macedonia their ‘birthright’.6 Hence, the mere use of the name by others ‘denies the existence of the Greek Macedonian identity’7; the use is not merely ‘an insult’, but ‘a denial of their own identity’.8 As Kofos had put it to a foreign reporter: ‘It is as if a robber came to my house and stole my most precious jewels – my history, my culture, my identity’.9 Needless to say, Kofos’s comment may have been convincing if the Greeks were not called ‘Greeks’ or ‘Hellenes’, but identified themselves as ‘Macedonians’ when Greece became independent in 1830 or when it acquired 51 percent of Macedonia in 1913. In fact, these particular ‘jewels’ are there to be shared, and as Kofos

The crux of the Greek-Macedonian dispute 215 himself has put it on other occasions: no one can claim monopoly over the name of Macedonia. But if one party sought the copyright and managed to acquire it, it would almost certainly not have been the Greeks. China cannot deny the name Mongolia to the Mongolians or France the name Britain to the British, due to the existence of Mongolia in China or La Bretagne in France, respectively. And Macedonia (now North Macedonia) was clever enough or gallant or both, not to strive to monopolize the name, as repeatedly pointed out by its astute first president, Kiro Gligorov (see Chapter 6). As for the hidden and unacknowledged reasons, what I have called elsewhere the ‘skeletons in the cupboard’, they involve no less than three forbidding ‘skeletons’, for unconsciously or purposefully forgetting certain key facts associated with Macedonia and the Macedonians and Greece’s role in them. First is the non-recognition of the ‘Slavophones’ living in north-western Greek Macedonia. Their exact number remains a highly guarded state secret, known only to a few pundits in diplomacy, the administration and in the security apparatus. A group of Slavspeakers, whose mother tongue is by today’s standards Macedonian, live mainly in the prefectures of Florina, Kastoria and Pella. A portion of them have chosen to become Greeks and the recognition of such a small minority would not have any negative effect on Greek security and would enhance Greece’s international standing as a tolerant and modern European state. Their non-recognition is, of course, partly due to the aforementioned phobia of irredentism and fear of change of boundaries, but it is also due, I would argue, to the need to forget and conceal what this ethnic group suffered during the interwar years, especially under the Metaxas dictatorship, and in the second part of the 1940s, their eviction and confiscation of their properties, and until today not being allowed to return or claim their citizenship or property. Moreover, from 1949 onwards the Greek authorities decided that they are to be called ‘Slavophones’ or ‘Slavophone Greeks’ and various measures were taken to assimilate them or, alternatively, make them leave the country and many emigrated to Australia and North America.10 And the final repercussion of this non-recognition is more than obvious: a state ‘that has proven unable to accept the existence of a certain minority within its own borders logically has a serious problem recognizing the nation from which that minority derives’.11 Second is the fact that the great majority of the Greek inhabitants of Greek Macedonia are not indigenous to the region, contrary to the Slavspeakers that were exchanged or evicted from 1913 until 1949. They are the descendants of almost 700,000 refugees from Asia Minor.12 The fact that they are not autochthonous makes them psychologically insecure and may explain their craving to identify with the ancient Macedonians, so as to acquire roots in the region, as the descendants of Philip II and Alexander the Great, while in fact if they have any ancient Greek roots from Antiquity (a moot point), these roots would be from the Ionian Greeks and not from the ancient Macedonians. The third awesome skeleton in the cupboard is the following: when 51 percent of geographical Macedonia was secured by Greece in 1913, the Greeks residing in Macedonia, that is the Greeks or Grecophones (and not including the Vlachs,

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Orthodox Albanians or Slavophone Patriarchists) amounted to only 10–11 percent of the whole of geographical Macedonia and to barely a third of the inhabitants of the region of Macedonia acquired by Greece. Thus, in effect, contrary to Greek national mythology, Greece did not ‘liberate’ the region, but won it against the will of the majority of its inhabitants who were mainly Muslims, speaking various languages (Turkish, Albanian, Aromonian, Greek, Bulgarian and Roma), and Slavspeakers, most of whom spoke Bulgarian or Bulgarian vernaculars.13 Had there been, say, a plebiscite at the time in the whole of Macedonia prior to the final partition, a procedure carried out in many instances in Europe, from the 1850s until 1920, it is highly unlikely that Greece would have acquired more than 20 or 25 percent of geographical Macedonia (I arrive at this percentage without taking account the Muslim inhabitants, however unjust and inhuman this may be). Herein lies, I would argue, another major reason for the insecurity of the Greeks. Now as for the fifth category of reasons for the intransigence and negative stance, the Greek national narrative and identity are obviously a contributing factor, hardly a narrative and identity conducive to respect for one’s neighbours. The dominant Greek grand narrative, conceived by historian Paparrigopoulos in the 1850s and 1860s, is the concept of over 3000 years of uninterrupted history and of the existence of a ‘Greek nation’ since the Homeric days (see Chapter 1). Paparrigopoulos incorporated the Macedonian and Byzantine eras to the Greek narrative and thus achieved historical continuity and a synthesis between ancient Hellenism and Christianity-cum-Byzantium, which however contentious,14 happens to be self-evident for the Greeks and to many in the West.15 The present-day Greeks claim to be the descendants of the ancient Greeks, of the ‘original civilizers’, of the ‘cradle of European civilisation’.16 Greece is self-defined as the quintessential country of ‘civilisation and history’. Greek cultural arrogance knows few bounds. Thus, most Greeks jump to the well-known monopoly over the name, to the non-sequitur that something named in Antiquity can never be renamed or its name claimed by others latter. As enlightened Greek scholars had pointed upon the start of the conflict in the early 1990s, here one witnesses ‘an ideological use of history’.17 Greece acted in terms of nineteenth-century national ideology, with the implausible argument that the qualifications of a nation are to be found in its longevity and presumed ancient origins. Thus, an older nation, such as the Greeks, can deny its existence to a nation, such as the Macedonians, whose credentials are more recent, to be found in the last hundred years, even though the great majority of nations are a product of the twentieth century and not of previous centuries.18 The Greek narrative has another related aspect of relevance to the GreekMacedonian conflict, the claim in all seriousness that Greek culture, language and civilization are pure, unblemished and homogeneous throughout the centuries, and have survived ‘since ancient times as a vestibule of high culture in the path to civilization, both for the world in general and for the Balkans in particular’.19 In this context, Macedonia is part and parcel of the Greek nation, and its inhabitants imbued with Greek national consciousness from Antiquity until today. As such, they were ‘able to withstand centuries of Slavic migrations by Hellenizing the

The crux of the Greek-Macedonian dispute 217 intruders’, diffusing ‘Greek High Culture while remaining unaffected by outside forces’.20 Concluding with the last category of reasons, the dominant Greek image internationally is an explosive mix of acute ethnocentrism and paranoia. It runs as follows: the Greeks are alone in the world, ‘a brotherless nation’, even though Greece is in the EU family (this feeling prevailed even in the good days of the EU); most Greeks feel that Greece and ‘Hellenism’ are constantly threatened by malign outside forces, ‘anti-Hellenism’ prevails; there are recurring international conspiracies aimed at harming or fatally injuring Greece and Hellenism (conspiracy theories abound even among highly educated Greeks). The injustice of it all is that the Greeks, instead of being cherished and supported (by virtue of being ‘the descendants’ of the ‘original civilisers’), the opposite is the case. As sociologist Nicos Mouzelis has sarcastically put it, the Greeks are at a loss when they realise that other states follow a foreign policy aimed at safeguarding their own national interests, instead of basing their foreign policy on Greek national interests.21 On the Macedonian issue, the EC/EU, NATO, the United States and others, according to the dominant Greek claim came to the support of ‘Skopje’ instead of Greece (in fact most major actors supported Greek obstructionism on the name issue; see Chapter 6).22 Given all these daunting hurdles, it was a Herculean task for any Greek Government to settle the name dispute and do so via negotiations, which by definition implies an equality of status between the two sides as valid interlocutors (see Chapter 12).

The reasons of the Macedonian anti-Greek attitude The historical reasons for the Macedonian anti-Greek attitude are more than obvious. They include historical grievances, such as their bitterness for the partition of Macedonia in 1913, which is regarded as a ‘national disaster’,23 ‘a tragedy’ and ‘the greatest injustice that Macedonia and its people have ever suffered’.24 Understandably they deeply resent the Hellenization attempts in Greece in the interwar years, especially the forced ones by the Metaxas regime, the efforts in the 1950s and 1960s, their flight or eviction from Greece in 1913–1921 and in the 1940s, the confiscation of property, the ban on returning to Greece, and the non-recognition of the existence of a Macedonian minority and not even of an ethnic-linguistic group in Greece, and more generally, the non-acceptance until the Prespa Agreement of their national identity and language. These reasons by the Macedonians are all understandable and it would have been surprising if they were not seen as major grievances and flagrant injustices. From the Macedonian angle of vision, the main thrust of their quarrel with the Greeks is that in the past ‘they took our land’, now they ‘want to take our name’, ‘our souls’,25 and they maintain that neither the Macedonian people, its language nor culture exists.26 Denying the use of their name ‘necessarily exposes them to the charge that they, their state and their language are an “artificial creation” ’ and can ‘exist only as part of the Bulgarian nation (as Bulgaria implies)’.27 The

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name is not only ‘tied to the Macedonian people’s identity’, it is also a question ‘of existence’, based on the following considerations as aptly summarized by the International Crisis Group in its 2001 Report28: • • •

the name at once identifies the state and the people, and Macedonians have no other ‘kin’ or ‘matrix’ state to secure their identity; their identity is persistently challenged by Bulgaria, which maintains that they are a sub-set of the same nation; the provisional name ‘former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia’ is not only humiliating, but implies a provisional acceptance of the state, as if its present form were merely a precursor to a final status to be decided later.

But there are a number of other reasons, skeletons in the cupboard, as it were, which point to a certain responsibility on the part of the Macedonians themselves as to their fate and uneasy relations with three of their four neighbours. To begin with, even though their Slavs ancestors lived in this region from the sixth and seventh centuries onwards, their collective identity was delayed even when nationalism had swept almost all of the Balkan ethnic or religious groups, starting with the Serbs and Greeks in the early nineteenth century. Nation and nationalism was the name of the game, the inescapable model to emulate for one’s own survival as an independent entity or as a constituent nation within a federation. The third best solution was being recognized and protected as an ethnic or national minority, a poor substitute. When various nations sprung up around them asserting themselves, the Serbs, the Greeks, the Romanians, the Bulgarians, the Armenians and belatedly the Albanians, their collective identity remained unclear or Bulgarian, and a smaller group chose to become Greeks or Serbs, but hardly anyone regarded himself/herself as ethnically or nationally ‘Macedonian’, but at best geographically Macedonian, as Macedonian Orthodox Christians. True most of them were illiterate peasants, which was both a blessing; thus, they avoided Hellenization, Bulgarization or Serbianization via education (see Chapter 4), but also an anathema, in the sense that they did not regard it a prerequisite to enter modernity and to do so equipped with a distinct national identity, an asset for survival in the modern era. However, illiterate peasants were also the vast majority of Serbs in the early nineteenth, yet this did not stop from gaining a sense of national identity (incidentally their case and a few others, such as the Finns, have baffled theorists of nationalism, such as Gellner, wedded to the modernist line, where the role of industrialization, education and ‘high culture’ is crucial for the emergence of nationhood).29 This was also the case with the Bulgarians who were barely more literate than the Slavs of Macedonia (with a literacy of only 3–4 percent as late as 1878)30 and with the Albanians, who were probably even more illiterate at the end of the nineteenth century than the future Macedonians, and it was one reason why their sense of nationhood was delayed (another reason was that the majority were Muslims and could identify themselves with the ruling Ottomans and held high positions in the Ottoman state). But when the Albanian territory was threatened by dismemberment by the

The crux of the Greek-Macedonian dispute 219 Greeks, Serbs and Montenegrins (in 1912), they did not delay their call for statehood on the basis of nationhood any longer.31 In the antagonistic history of international or interethnic relations, there is often a price to pay – however harsh and nonsensical this may be – when you happen to be a ‘late-comer’,32 which here implies being ‘immature’ nationally by comparison to the Serbs, Greeks and Bulgarians prior to their ‘liberations’ from the Ottoman rule.33 This is the fate of the Macedonians, who finally decided to become a nation and follow the calls of Misirkov tardily, not in 1903 when he wrote his famous booklet (see Chapter 4), but in the 1930s and 1940s, thus becoming the penultimate new Balkan nation, followed decades later by the Bosnian Muslims. The Bosnians, contrary to the Macedonians who had before them no less than three options, all three of them worthwhile, becoming Bulgarian, Serb or Greek, had no choice but to become a distinct nation, when being a Yugoslav, following the death of Tito, had lost its appeal, since their neighbours, who spoke exactly the same language as they did, wanted to turn them into Serbs or Croats, by changing their religion to Orthodox or Catholic Christianity, respectively. And the division of Macedonia into three parts may be seen as a national disaster in the Macedonian narrative; however, no Macedonian nation existed in 1912–1913 to make the disaster unbearable. Macedonia was a multiethnic entity, a ‘Switzerland of the Balkans’ as stated by VMRO leaders even in the interwar years. A second factor against the Macedonians is that they bear the stigma of collaboration with Occupiers and Fascists, to some extent in Greek Macedonia34 and to a greater extent, in the case of Yugoslav Macedonia. True the numbers are not overwhelming even in the later case, and they become disillusioned with the Bulgarians within months of the occupation, but they did not join Tito’s Partisans massively (contrary to the claim of their national narrative), and even in 1943, with the advent of Tempo to Vardar Macedonia, his message took several months to be accepted and many Macedonians continued to have a soft spot for the Bulgarian occupiers who were seen as their ethnic kin (see Chapter 5). A third weakness is their chosen national historical identity. In its first rendition by Misirkov, it was down to earth and modest and hardly sought to find confirmation in the Middle Ages or Antiquity. But later on the Macedonians got carried away, maintaining that they are ‘the oldest Slavic nation’, with the oldest Slavic alphabet and written Slavic language, and making claims to Bulgarian history and Bulgarian heritage (Emperor Samuil, Cyril and Methodius, and so on) and of course claiming that the VMORO’s heroic phase, under Delchev, Gruev, Petrov, Sandanski and the others was a ‘Macedonian national struggle’ (see Chapter 9). The Bulgarians for their part miss no opportunity to rub it in how misguided their neighbours are (see Chapter 7). As regards Samuil and Cyril and Methodius, if the Macedonians are right and the Bulgarians (and the rest of the world) are wrong, than, as Kyril Drezov has sarcastically put it, ‘it certainly ranks among the world’s best-kept secrets for the last 15 centuries’.35 That Cyril and Methodius and Samuil ‘and every other significant personality hailing from these lands until the nineteenth century, self-consciously had a Macedonian identity, is something believed only in the Republic of Macedonia, in the Macedonian diaspora, and among the

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more gullible of their Western apologists’.36 More generally, as Denko Maleski has argued, the Macedonians should not ‘lay the foundations’ of their ‘identity on historical grounds which neighbouring countries consider to be their own, and in which they have the majority of world historiography on their side’.37 Having said this, one should not forget that almost all nations, in their national historical narratives, tend to indulge in exaggerated retrospective non-historical claims. To mention another example which is vastly more extreme, Kemal Ataturk’s fantastic Turkish History Thesis, the claim that the Turks are the most ancient civilization in Anatolia (Asia Minor) and Mesopotamia and had arrived in the region in early Antiquity (and not in the start of the first millennium with the Seljuks). Fortunately for the Bulgarians, Rakowski’s preposterous claims that the Bulgarians are the most ancient European people, the first to arrive in Europe from India or that they had become Christians before the ‘Greeks’ by St. Paul himself,38 were not incorporated into the Bulgarian national narrative. As for antiquization (a more appropriate term would probably have been ‘antiquomania’),39 it may be popular to a segment of the Macedonians for obvious reasons (see Chapter 9), but it is not entertained by serious Macedonians historians and other scholars, who regard their ancestors Slavs,40 those who arrived in the Balkans from the sixth century onwards, that upon arrival may have intermingling with the indigenous people who were descendants of various groups.41 Of course, the ancient roots narrative came about as a reaction to the Greek anti-Macedonian campaign and its attempt to monopolize the name as a birthright.42 If Greece had not chosen such a course, antiquization would have been the abode of a marginal grouping in Macedonia and open to ridicule. But once the damage was done, due to the Greek provocations, it gained a life of its own, by appearing useful in a number of ways: countering the Greek copyright to Macedonia, gaining greater prestige, a more direct European pedigree, downplaying the role and influence of the Ottoman and communist period, being seen as indigenous population of the region and so on (see Chapter 9). No doubt the Macedonians went too far, but from 2017 onwards, the sober older approach of Slavic origin seems to be gaining ground as in the days of President Gligorov. But let us not forget what occurred upon the new state’s independence: three of its four neighbours were convinced that the new state was tottering, bound to wobble and disintegrate, and Greece and Serbia in particular did their utmost to bring this about; Bulgaria was waiting with ‘motherly’ anticipation for the errant daughter to embrace its ‘beloved mother’ from which it had been traumatically separated for decades. The contention involved the language (by Bulgaria and Greece), the Church (by Serbia), the flag (by Greece), the nation (by Bulgaria and Greece) and the state by all three of them, as well Albania (though guardedly, given the Albanians in Macedonian who faced discrimination until 2001). I will conclude by a reference to the term Slav(o)-Macedonia and Slav(o)Macedonians, which, had it been adopted, would have saved both parties a lot of trouble and anguish. Remember that this term had been used by Pulevski, Čupovski and some others (see Chapter 4). The non-acceptance of this term by the Macedonians has been made on three grounds: (a) they have chosen the name Macedonians and not Slav-Macedonians

The crux of the Greek-Macedonian dispute 221 and this is part of the elementary right of self-definition by a people, an aspect of the fundamental principle of self-determination; (b) ‘Slav-Macedonians’ do not exist, as there are no Slav-Poles or Slav-Russians, the ‘Slav’ addition is either superfluous (the view of the moderates) or unacceptable; and (c) the designation Macedonia/ ns is acceptable to the Albanians of Macedonia, who reject any Slav-Macedonian notion since they are not Slavs. It may also be that the Macedonians want to distance themselves from Cvijić’s ‘Macedo-Slavs’ and do away with the Bulgarian accusation that ‘Macedonism’ was a Serbian ploy that came to fruition. Moreover, the fact that the term Slav-Macedonians prior to 1991 had been used by Greek officials for decades, and had been in fact suggested by Greece as a compromise (in May 1993 to be exact) may be yet another reason for not wanting this designation. The problem, however, is that the Albanians do not use the term in an ethnic or national sense, as the Macedonians do, but merely as an acceptable geographical term. Can the term Macedonia/ns be two different things depending on the recipient? Can one speak, say, in terms of ‘constructive ambiguity’, as with some agreed bilateral or multilateral diplomatic texts? But here we are dealing with a case of national identity, something of fundamental importance. It seems to me that in order to buttress this case despite its ambivalence, one has to search for other parallels, preferably in the European context. And what comes to mind is the case of Spain as a ‘plurinational state’43 or a ‘nation of nations’. The name ‘Spain’ (Hispania, España), apparently a designation of PhoenicianCarthaginian origin was associated later, in the Renaissance, with the Castilians, with the Spanish as the language derived from the original Castilian vernacular. But Spain as a geographical expression and the name of the state is acceptable and raises no major problem to the other ethnonational groups (nationalities), the Basques, the Catalans, the Galicians and Andalusians, who are not ethnically or nationally Spanish.

Notes 1 International Crisis Group, Macedonia’s Name: Why the Dispute Matters and How to Resolve It (Brussels: ICG, 2001), 15. 2 Evangelos Kofos, ‘Greece’s Macedonian Adventure: The Controversy over FYROM’s Independence and Recognition’, in Van Coufoudakis, Harry J. Psomiades and Andre Gerolymatos (eds), Greece and the New Balkans: Challenges and Opportunities (New York: Pella Publishing Company, Inc., 1999), 387. 3 See Ioannis Armakolas and George Siakas, Research Report: What’s in a Name? Greek Public Attitudes towards the “Name Dispute” and the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia in 2018 (Athens: ELIAMEP, 2018), 15, 22. 4 John Shea, Macedonia and Greece: The Struggle to Define a New Balkan Nation (Jefferson: McFarland and Company, 2008) [1997], 12. 5 Nikolaos Zahariadis, ‘Greek Policy toward the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, 1991–1995’, Journal of Modern Greek Studies, 14:2 (1996), 312. 6 Duncan M. Perry, ‘Macedonia: Balkan Miracle or Balkan Disaster?’, Current History, 95 (1996), 115. 7 International Crisis Group, ‘Macedonia’s Name’, 15. 8 Ibid. 9 Quoted in Loring M. Danforth, The Macedonian Conflict: Ethnic Nationalism in a Transnational World (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1995), 35.

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10 Tasos Kostopoulos, I apagorevmeni glossa: kratiki katastoli ton slavikon dialekton stin elliniki Makedonia [The Forbidden Tongue: State Repression of the Slavic Dialects in Greek Macedonia] (Athens: Mavri Lista, 2000), 73–221; Ivan Katardjiev, Macedonia and Its Neighbours: Past, Present, Future (Skopje: Memora, 2001), 41–2; Hugh Poulton, The Balkans: Minorities and States in Conflict (London: Hurst & Company, 1991), 177–82; Anastasia N. Karakasidou, ‘Politicizing Culture: Negating Ethnic Identity in Greek Macedonia’, Journal of Modern Greek Studies, 11:1 (1993), 1–28; Hristijan Ivanovski, ‘The Macedonia-Greece Dispute/Difference over the Name Issue: Mitigating the Inherently Unsolvable’, New Balkan Politics, 14 (2013), 55. 11 Biljana Vankovska, ‘David vs. Goliath: The Macedonian Position(s) in the Socalled “Name Dispute” with Greece’, Südosteuropa, 58 (2010), 443. 12 Kyril Drezov, ‘Macedonian Identity: An Overview of the Major Claims’, in James Pettifer (ed.), The New Macedonian Question (Basingstoke: Macmillan Press, 1999), 49; Philippos Iliou, Psifides istorias kai politikis tou eikostou aiona [Tiles of History and Politics in the Twentieth Century] (Athens: Polis, 2007), 55; Kostopoulos, I apagorevmeni glossa, 21–2. 13 Drezov, ‘Macedonian Identity’, 49. 14 See, e.g. Tom Nairn, ‘Cyprus and the Theory of Nationalism’, in Peter Worsley and Paschalis Kitromilides (eds), Small States in the Modern World (Nicosia: The New Cyprus Association, 1979), 32, 34. 15 Constantine Tsoukalas, ‘European Modernity and Greek National Identity’, Journal of Southern Europe and the Balkans, 1:1 (1999), 11–3; Antonis Liakos, ‘Hellenism and the Making of Modern Greece’, in Katerina Zacharia (ed.), Hellenisms: Culture, Identity, and Ethnicity from Antiquity to Modernity (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2008), 204–13; Umut Özkιrιmlι and Spyros Sofos, Tormented by History: Nationalism in Greece and Turkey (London: Hurst & Company, 2008), 80–5. 16 Stathis Gourgouris, Dream Nation: Enlightenment, Colonization, and the Institution of Modern Greece (Stanford: Stanford University Press 1996), 268. 17 Iliou, Psifides istorias kai politikis tou eikostou aiona, 53. 18 Antonis Liakos, ‘I Valkaniki krisi kai o ethnikismos’ [The Balkan Crisis and Nationalism], in Antonis Liakos et al. (eds), O Ianos tou ethnikismou kai i elliniki valkaniki politiki [The Janus of Nationalism and the Greek Balkan Politics] (Athens: O Politis, 1993), 10. 19 Anastasia N. Karakasidou, Fields of Wheat, Hills of Blood: Passages to Nationhood in Greek Macedonia, 1870–1990 (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1997), 15. 20 Ibid. 21 Nicos Mouzelis, O ethnikismos stin ysteri anaptixi [Nationalism in Latter Development] (Athens: Themelio, 1994), 44. 22 Ibid.; Angelos Elefantis, ‘Apo tin ethniki exarsi sto perithorio’ [From the National Peak to the Fringe], in Antonis Liakos et al. (eds), O Ianos tou ethniksimou kai i elliniki valkaniki politiki, 31–3; Alexis Heraclides, ‘The Greek-Turkish Antagonism: The Social Construction of Self and Other’, in Alexis Heraclides and Gizem Alioğlu Çakmak (eds), Greece and Turkey in Conflict and Cooperation: From Europeanization to De-Europeanization (Abingdon: Routledge, 2019), 52–3. 23 Victor Roudometof, ‘Nationalism and Identity Politics in the Balkans: Greece and the Macedonian Question’, Journal of Modern Greek Studies, 14:2 (1996), 266. 24 Andrew Rossos, Macedonia and the Macedonians: A History (Stanford: Hoover Institution Press, 2008), 117. 25 Denko Maleski, ‘Law, Politics and History in International Relations: Macedonia and Greece’, New Balkan Politics, 12 (2010); Denko Maleski, ‘On Nationalism, Identity and the Foreign Policy of Macedonia’, New Balkan Politics, 14 (2013), 26. 26 Council for Research into South-Eastern Europe of the Macedonian Academy of Sciences and Arts, ‘Macedonia and its Relations with Greece’, 1. www.gate.net/ Macedonia_and_its_relations_with_Greec . . . 27 International Crisis Group, ‘Macedonia’s Name’, 15.

The crux of the Greek-Macedonian dispute 223 28 Ibid. 29 See Anthony D. Smith, Nationalism and Modernism: A Critical Survey of Recent Theories of Nation and Nationalism (London: Routledge, 1998), 36, 38; Umut Özkιrιmlι, Theories of Nationalism: A Critical Introduction (Basingstoke: Palgrave, 2008), 139–40. 30 Tchavdar Marinov, ‘We, the Macedonians: The Paths of Macedonian Supra-Nationalism (1878–1912)’, in Diana Mishkova (ed.), We, the People: Politics of National Peculiarity in Southeast Europe (Budapest: Central European University Press, 2013c), 109. 31 Stavro Skendi, The Albanian National Awakening, 1878–1912 (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1967). 32 Maleski, ‘Law, Politics and History in International Relations’. 33 Marinov, ‘We, the Macedonians’, 109. 34 See John S. Koliopoulos, Plundered Loyalties: Axis Occupation and Civil Strife in Greek West Macedonia, 1941–1949 (London: Hurst & Company, 1999), 60–2. 35 Drezov, ‘Macedonian Identity’, 55. 36 Ibid. 37 Maleski, ‘On Nationalism, Identity and the Foreign Policy of Macedonia’, 29. 38 For Rakowski’s claims, see Albena Hranova, ‘Historical Myths: The Bulgarian Case of Pride and Prejudice’, in Pål Kolstø (ed.), Myths and Boundaries in South-Eastern Europe (London: Hurst & Company, 2005), 298–300; Mari A. Firkatian, The Forest Traveler: Georgi Stoikov Rakovski and Bulgarian Nationalism (New York: Peter Lang, 1996), 119, 122–3. 39 Vankovska, ‘David vs. Goliath’, 456. 40 Katardjiev, Macedonia and Its Neighbours, 18–19; Maleski, ‘On Nationalism, Identity and the Foreign Policy of Macedonia’, 27. 41 Blaže Ristovski, Macedonia and the Macedonian People (Vienna and Skopje: SIMAG Holding, 1999), 105; Drezov, ‘Macedonian Identity’, 54–5. 42 Eugene N. Borza, ‘Macedonia Redux’, in Frances B. Tichener and Richard F. Moorton, Jr. (eds), The Eye Expanded: Life and the Arts in Greco-Roman Antiquity (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1999), 255; Ulf Brunnbauer, ‘Ancient Nationhood and the Struggle for Statehood: Historiographical Myths in the Republic of Macedonia’, in Kolstø (ed.), Myths and Boundaries in South-Eastern Europe (London: Hurst & Company, 2005), 8; Ivanovski, ‘The Macedonia-Greece Dispute/Difference over the Name Issue’, 55, 59. 43 Michael Keating, ‘Rival Nationalisms in a Plurinational State: Spain, Catalonia and the Basque Country’, in Sujit Choudhry (ed.), Constitutional Design for Divided Societies. Integration or Accommodation? (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008), 316–41.

12 The settlement of the Greek-Macedonian dispute The Prespa Agreement

Geographical naming disputes Geographical naming disputes are not uncommon between and within states; to name but a few, disputes between Britain and Ireland (British Isles naming dispute, the Derry/Londonderry name dispute in Northern Ireland and others), the Sea of Japan naming dispute among Japan, South Korea and North Korea or the Falkland Islands/Malvinas dispute between Argentina and Britain. There is also the far more agonizing case of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) and the Republic of China (ROC), involving the very same identity, being Chinese. Upon the PRC accession to the UN in 1971, it was decided that it was ‘the only legitimate representative of China to the United Nations’ and thus the ROC was removed from the UN. In the ROC there are three main trends in what is, understandably, a highly emotional issue: to cling to the status quo (known as ‘One China Policy’), the traditional view of representing the whole of China, however absurd this may be (this is the majority view); to no longer claim to represent all of China and to seek membership in the UN under the name of ‘Republic of Taiwan’, this has also appeared as a quest for a ‘a unique Taiwanese national identity’ (the view of roughly a fourth to a fifth of the electorate); and eventual (re)unification with mainland China as part of ‘a single Chinese nation’ (10 percent of the electorate).1 Until today nothing has come out of this major controversy over the name2 and regarding Chinese identity, but for one agreement, the Nagoya Resolution: for the ROC to participate in the Olympic Games under the name ‘Chinese Taipei’. The only dispute comparable to the Greek-Macedonian one, which is far more protracted and more real in substance, in the sense that it involves official and widespread irredentism, is the name dispute between Britain and Ireland regarding the latter’s name. Article 4 of the Irish Constitution of 1937 adopted by the government of Éamon de Valera pronounced that ‘Eire’ is the name of the state, which in English is called Ireland (previously it was called ‘Irish Free State’, in Gaelic Saorstát Eireann). Articles 2 and 3 of the 1937 Constitution defined the ‘national territory’ and de jure sovereignty for ‘the whole island of Ireland, its islands and the territorial seas’, but that ‘pending the reintegration of the national territory’, the laws of the Irish Parliament would cover only Ireland, thereby

The settlement of the Greek-Macedonian dispute 225 recognizing the de facto reality of partition.3 Statements by many an Irish prime minister (Taoiseach) specified that the end of partition would only come about peacefully and through consent.4 Britain insisted on the use of ‘Eire’ and refused to accept the name ‘Ireland’. The dispute continued after the Second World War. For instance in the 1948 London Olympic Games, the organisers insisted that the Irish team march under the banner ‘Eire’ even though all the other teams marched according to their English names. The dispute persisted and it ended in 1998, with the Belfast Agreement (Good Friday Agreement), which resolved the Northern Ireland conflict (the Belfast Agreement was ratified by referenda in both parts of Ireland). The Agreement guarantees ‘the status of Northern Ireland as part of the United Kingdom, as reflecting the wishes of the majority’, which, however, could change if the majority so wishes.5 All other cases of the name of a state were settled early on, amicably or by default. One of the most famous cases intertwined with the coming of the Cold War: in 1949, the Federal Republic of Germany and the German Democratic Republic (commonly known as West Germany and East Germany).6 Others were linked to decolonization, with the capital used as the qualifier: Guinea and Guinea-Bissau and the more baffling case of the Republic of the Congo, which was the same name for two neighbouring countries from 1960 until 1964, commonly distinguished as Congo-Léopoldville (later Congo-Kinshasa) and Congo-Brazzaville, from the names of their respective capitals (today they are the Democratic Republic of the Congo and the Republic of the Congo). And there is also Equatorial Guinea, so as to be distinguished from the other two with similar names (Guinea and Guinea-Bissau). More common are similar names existing in the region of another country settled amicably or by default, such as Great Britain and Bretagne in France (Brittany in English), Luxembourg (Grand Duchy of Luxembourg) and the province of Luxembourg in Belgium (in Wallonia), Moldova and Moldova in Romania. And there are the cases of compound names, such Ireland and Northern Ireland, Mongolia (Outer Mongolia) and Inner Mongolia in China, Mexico and New Mexico in the United States, Bangladesh (Bengali-land) and the state of West Bengal in India (incidentally their respective national anthems, which are different, are written by Rabindranath Tagore) or Azerbaijan and East Azerbaijan Province in Iran. In all the compound names, the qualifier is used for the federated state or province of one of the two countries and not for the state as a whole, as it occurred with the adoption of the name North Macedonia. There are few exceptions in this regard. One is the innocuous case of New Zealand (and the faraway Netherlands province of Zeeland). There is also the Sudan and South Sudan, which is hardly comparable with the Greece-Macedonia case (for Greece is not named Macedonia), and Guyana (former British Guiana) and French Guiana (as for former Dutch Guinea it was renamed Suriname). And in the case of the island of Timor, both parts have qualifiers: the state of East Timor (official name Democratic Republic of Timor-Leste) and West Timor in the Indonesian province of East Nusa Tenggara. Another aspect of the Greek-Macedonian naming dispute is whether in the history of interstate relations and diplomacy there have been instances of a state

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changing its name because another state or states insist upon it. It seems that there exists only one such case in contemporary international politics: Austria after the end of the First World War, with the disintegration of the Dual Monarchy of Austria-Hungary. In November 1919, it declared itself a republic under the name Deutsch-Österreich (German-Austria) and in its provisional constitution it stated that ‘German-Austria is an integral part of the German reich’, the aim being a future union with Germany. This name, for obvious reasons, was unacceptable to the victorious Allied Powers at the Paris Peace Conference, and with the Treaty of Saint-Germain-en-Laye, the new country was named ‘Republic of Austria’ and union with Germany was forbidden (by the treaties of Saint-Germain as well as Versailles).7 Clearly this instance is unique and not comparable to our case, having come after a defeat in a world war.8 The dispute between Greece and Macedonia could have been resolved early on, had it not been for Greece’s striking inflexibility for most of the 1990s (see Chapter 6). After all the two states do not happen to have the same name as the Congo in the early 1960s nor are the two states part of a previous single entity, as in the case of the Sudan.9 Thus, simply Macedonia10 or Makedonija should have been acceptable.11

The road to Prespa The breakthrough in the Greek-Macedonian stalemate was put on course by the SDSM (Social Democratic Union of Macedonia)-led government headed by Zoran Zaev, which took over power in Macedonia on 31 May 2017. The return to power of the Social Democrats ‘following a decade in opposition, reinvigorated Macedonia’s bid to join NATO and EU’.12 And within two months, an agreement was clinched with Bulgaria in August 2017 (see Chapter 13). After the Social Democrats won decisively in the municipal elections (October 2017), Zaev’s next move, which in those days was regarded much bolder, was to seek conciliation with Greece on the name issue.13 Athens, after initial hesitation,14 reacted positively to Skopje’s overtures. This ‘rare window of opportunity’ might have been facilitated by the ideological affinity of the two governing parties, SDSM and SYRIZA.15 The two foreign ministers Nikola Dimitrov and Nicos Kotzias met in Thessaloniki in September 2017, stating publicly that they intended to start talks for the solution of the name dispute. In this meeting, they agreed on the following (not reported to the public): that the names of Skopje airport and the highway leading to Greece would change, that the two prime ministers will meet in the near future and that when the talks were to start, Kotzias would set the ball rolling with a first draft agreement.16 In New York, Nimetz, after talks with ambassadors Vassilakis and Naumovski, suggested focusing efforts on five names (17 January 2018): North Macedonia, Upper Macedonia, Macedonia-Skopje, Vardar Macedonia and Nova Macedonia.17 On 24 January 2018, the two prime ministers, Zoran Zaev and Alexis Tsipras (who happen to be of the same age, both born in 1974), met on the sidelines of

The settlement of the Greek-Macedonian dispute 227 the Davos World Economic Forum, and agreed that the talks would be bilateral, between the two foreign ministers under the supervision of the prime ministers. Zaev promised to take initiatives to soothe the Greeks, and delivered by renaming ‘Alexander the Great Airport’, ‘Skopje International Airport’, renaming ‘Alexander the Great Highway’, ‘Friendship Highway’ and others. Moreover, the ‘Skopje 2014 Program’ was dropped in February, and Zaev called it ‘an idiotic project’.18 Tsipras, for his part, took various initiatives aimed at easing the road of Macedonia towards the EU. The Macedonian reasons for wanting a settlement included the following: (a) to do away with Macedonia’s bleak international isolation and achieve its long-standing foreign policy goals of Euro-Atlantic integration; (b) a settlement of the name dispute would render Macedonia at last ‘a normal’19 truly independent country; (c) if EU and NATO accession continues to be blocked, Macedonian-Albanian relations in the country would suffer, with the Albanians becoming restive and assertive, especially if they were to witness Albania – and not Macedonia – joining NATO and the EU; (d) to appear positive and constructive internationally, contrary to the antics of the Gruevski administration and gain economically and otherwise as a result; (e) to do away with Gruevski’s emphasis on Macedonian ethnonationalism which had marred relations with the Albanian community, upsetting ‘the delicate inter-ethnic co-existence’20; (f) to dispense altogether with the idea of ancient Macedonian origins which had damaged Macedonia’s international reputation, a concept which they, as the socialist party rejected, and were advocates of the Slavic origins of the Macedonians; and (g) to discredit the VMRO-DPMNE and its hegemony, and establish the SDSM as the majority party for the years to come that could guarantee a secure and more prosperous future for the country.21 In this push for a settlement, the Albanian community was very helpful with their political parties ‘united in wanting this issue resolved, and the Albanian leadership played an important role behind the scenes, encouraging sensible compromises’.22 The Greek reasons for wanting to clinch a deal were the following: (a) that time was running against Greece, with Macedonia’s 142 recognitions, most of them with the constitutional name and with the foreign press and media calling it ‘Macedonia’23; (b) the new government of Zaev was perceived as sincere in wanting a settlement here and now; (c) the continuation of the Greek veto regarding Macedonia’s accession to NATO and the EU could not persist, in view of Skopje’s genuine switch to moderation; (d) a settlement would establish Greece as a major stabilizing factor, ‘playing a more important role in southeast Europe’24; (e) to mend Greece’s fences with all of its Balkan neighbours (after Macedonia, with Albania), so as to be in a better position to handle its main security concern and sense of threat that comes from Turkey; (f) the non-settlement of the dispute provided an excellent opportunity for Turkey to make inroads in the Balkans, as a friend and supporter of the Macedonians (with investments, military aid and so on)25; (g) Athens felt confident that it was in the position to gain more than the other side, due to its far greater power and the quid pro quo involved, namely

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the fact that Skopje was as keen for entry in the exclusive international clubs of NATO and the EU; and (h) the fear, however far-fetched, that if the dispute continued unresolved, this could lead to the Albanians radicalizing, from their mild nationalism of today to virulent Muslim fundamentalism probably with links to Turkey.26 For a deal to be agreed upon that would be meaningful and viable for both parties, the Macedonians had to indicate beyond reasonable doubt that, contrary to the 1940s or 1950s, they did not, in any way, aspire to irredentism as regards Greek Macedonia (‘Aegean Macedonia’ as they call it); and they no more seek their origins in the ancient Macedonians and Alexander the Great. The Greeks, irrespective of what they held previously, now had to show that they fully accept the existence of the (Slav)Macedonians as a nation, one with a distinct South Slav language and distinct culture (distinct from the Bulgarian language and culture as well as that of the Serbs). The Macedonians, however, were called upon to make greater sacrifices than the Greeks. In order of importance they were first and foremost to change their name, a name officially in use for three generations, from 1944 onwards. For them, even more than for the Greeks, the name is indeed their ‘soul’, their cherished identity27; it is what makes them different from the Serbs and in particular from the encroaching Bulgarians. And, as many a Macedonian has put it, is a nation worthy of itself if it bargains with its very own name and identity? For the Greeks it is not ‘the exclusive signifier of the Greek identity’,28 while for the Macedonians it is not only their identity but also their existence which is tied to the name (see Chapter 11).29 Cognizant of the above, Kotzias made it clear to Dimitrov early on in the negotiations that the name was their call; it was for the Macedonians to decide what compound name suits them best.30 And Nimetz made sure to convey to the Macedonian leaders to ‘relax about the fear’ that their ‘Macedonian identity will be taken away’, but that the name of ‘a state should reflect geographical reality’, hence the need for a ‘modifier to your name to more accurately reflect the geographic reality’, a ‘dignified modifier’ as he put it.31 Second, the Macedonians had to forget, at least for the time being, a legitimate claim on their part, the recognition of the existence of the ethnic (Slav)Macedonians in Greek Macedonia, a logical request which appeared consistently on the part of Skopje from the 1950s onwards. Third was the erga omnes aspect, which for them had been a ‘red line’ since the late 1990s.32 Even Nimetz supported this standard Macedonian line. As he has put it33: As mediator, I had suggested over many years that any new name should be used internationally and that the constitutional name Republic of Macedonia continue to be used internally. Many nations have such a dual name system: Finland/Suomi, Ireland/Eire, Albania/Shqipëria; indeed, Greece itself uses Greece internationally but Hellas (or Ellas) internally (and sometimes Hellenic Republic, a third name). The dual name system would have advantages

The settlement of the Greek-Macedonian dispute 229 in terms of public acceptability in the northern neighbor, and also would probably not require a constitutional amendment, a difficult process. Fourth was to do away for good with the presumed ancient Macedonian heritage. This heritage may have been far-fetched and unfounded (though less so in its more subtle rendition of admixture of the incoming Slavs with the remnants of the decedents of the Macedonians, Romans, Illyrians, Thracians and others; see Chapter 9), but it has caught the fancy of a substantial portion of the Macedonian public, not least given the great prestige accrued by being the descendants of those ‘glorious beings’ (based on the premise that the ancient Macedonians were not Greeks). On the other hand, their presumed ancient Macedonian roots had convinced no one outside Macedonia and no one among the Albanians of the country. As regards NATO and the EU, it is surprising that the Zaev Government ‘did not have the courage or capacity to use the [ICJ] verdict as a bargaining chip’.34 This pusillanimous stance may be explained by the fact that NATO and the EU had not questioned the Greek veto, in spite of the ICJ ruling. And it can also be explained by Skopje’s craving for entry into the Euro-Atlantic structures. As Biljana Vankovska has put it35: Ever since the 1990s, Macedonia’s key strategic goals – i.e., NATO and EU membership – seem to have been not only a beacon of hope but also the glue that has kept its problematic society together. With the state’s compass always pointing to the West, its foreign policy goals have served to provide internal cohesion for the ethnically divided society. . . . NATO and EU membership have turned into a secular religion, a dogma that must not be questioned at all. By comparison the Greek sacrifices were negligible because by the turn of the new century, both the government and the opposition had abandoned the outrageous ‘no’ to the term Macedonia under whatever compound name and the rejection of the Macedonian nationality and language (namely that it amounted to Bulgarian) (see Chapter 6). Moreover, Macedonian Greek identity was only part of the Greek heritage and of lesser importance than the culture, philosophy and democracy associated with ancient Athens and its golden age. Indeed if the Greeks had been more self-confident, without the ‘skeletons in the cupboard’ (see Chapter 11), they should have graciously accepted the appellation ‘Macedonians’ or at least its Slavic version Makedonski. The only real ‘sacrifice’ on the Greek part would have been to accept the obvious: the existence of a (Slav)Macedonian minority or at least an ethnic or linguistic group in Greek Macedonia. But this for Athens was a non-starter. Thus, the ethnic group in question had to remain, at least for the time being, ‘a phantom minority’ as Konstantinos Mitsotakis had famously put it; otherwise, there would been no deal, however absurd this may seem, given the fact that such as linguistic-cultural group does exist even though many of its members have chosen to become Greeks or conceal their identity. At this juncture, it is worth referring to Nimetz’s ultimate strategy, which no doubt influenced the two negotiating sides in the crucial negotiations of 2018

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and bore fruit. Nimetz was inspired by the important psychological finding of economists Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky, known as ‘the principle of loss aversion’,36 namely that people ‘are more sensitive to losing something they already possess than they are to gaining something new’.37 Thus, Nimetz made sure to reframe the question by limiting and/or bypassing the sense of loss aversion that haunted both parties: in the Macedonian case that they are about to lose their national identity as Macedonians; and the Greeks that by accepting the name (even in compound form), they will be losing their heritage and identity linked with the ancient Macedonians. Nimetz’s reframing device to either side was for them to forget and do away with identity which was not threatened, and move on to pragmatism based on sheer geography: that both sides lived in parts of geographical Macedonia, hence the need for ‘a modifier’.38 The Greek-Macedonian talks started in February 2018, following the sending of a first draft agreement concocted by Kotzias, which was not intended as a maximalist Greek approach, but tried to meet the needs of the other party as well.39 The talks lasted for four months, with Kotzias in particular personally drafting ‘many of the provisions of the agreement’.40 Nimetz followed the proceedings closely and was helpful, with useful interventions,41 and also acted as a kind of ‘grammarian-in-chief, rendering his considered opinion on various grammatical alternatives’.42 And contrary to a widely spread belief in both countries, the talks were indeed bilateral, with no foreign intervention or contribution, save for Nimetz’s discrete assistance.43 In the negotiations, the sticking points were the erga omnes, the designation of the citizenship, the changes to be made in the Constitution and less the issue of ancient national heritage since the Zaev Government was not wedded to it. For Kotzias, the main concern was shelving any notion or prospect of Macedonian irredentism; for Dimitrov, it was making sure that their national identity would not be put at risk or somehow abandoned. The main points did not include the most suitable name because both sides understood that it was to be a compound name of Macedonia and that in this crucial matter Skopje had the main say, as readily accepted by Athens.44 On 17 May at a meeting of the two prime ministers, Zaev suggested a name not previously on the table: ‘Republika Ilidenska Makedonija’ (Republic of Ilinden Macedonia), which Tsipras seemed to accept but then backed down, for he was told by his advisers that Ilinden was linked with the idea of a reunited Macedonia, and Skopje for its part did not insist. It seems that the puzzling Ilinden idea had come from the Bulgarian side.45 At the final stage of the talks, two compound names were left on the table: ‘New Macedonia’ and ‘North Macedonia’. Dimitrov had difficulty with the first name for as he confided to Kotzias many Macedonians were emotionally associated with socialist Macedonia and ‘new’ seemed to imply abandoning it. So they both settled for North Macedonia as the most appropriate term so as to meet the Macedonian main desideratum, not jeopardizing their identity, and the Greek main desideratum, of banning irredentism for good.46 Towards the end of May and early June 2018, difficulties arose, in particular regarding the erga omnes and constitutional changes, and Zaev had to personally

The settlement of the Greek-Macedonian dispute 231 intervene to smooth things out.47 By and large on the Macedonian side it was Zaev who was more compliant than Dimitrov,48 while on the Greek side it was Kotzias and his team that was running the show. In general, the whole negotiation process, from January to June 2018, was ‘wearisome, politically exhausting and at times highly controversial; but ultimately it was a process that proved successful, despite encountering opposition or even hostility on both sides’.49 What is clear is that mutual understanding and respect had developed between the two foreign ministers and that the Prespa Agreement was a historical achievement for which the two foreign ministers bear the main credit.

The provisions of the Prespa Agreement On 12 June 2018, Tsipras announced that Greece had reached an agreement with fYROM, which covers all the preconditions set by the Greek side. The Prespa Agreement was signed on 17 June 2018, in the border between the two countries, in a high-level ceremony at the Greek village of Psarades by Lake Prespa, by the architects of the agreement, Kotzias and Dimitrov, in the presence of the two prime ministers and high officials from the EU and the United States, as well as Nimetz. With the Prespa Agreement the Interim Agreement of 1995 was terminated and the two parties agreed to establish a ‘strategic partnership’. According to the Prespa Agreement, the name is to be ‘Republic of North Macedonia’ (‘North Macedonia’), to be used erga omnes; its nationality (in the sense of citizenship) is to be ‘Macedonian/citizen of the Republic of North Macedonia’; and its language the ‘Macedonian language’, with the proviso that ‘the Macedonian language, is within the group of South Slavic languages’ and ‘not related to the ancient Hellenic civilization, history, culture and heritage’. A crucial and unique provision is Article 7, which ‘puts all this in historical context’.50 It specifies that the citizens (of North Macedonia) are not related to the ancient Macedonians because the terms ‘Macedonia’ and ‘Macedonian’ refer ‘to a different historical context and cultural heritage’; the language and other attributes of North Macedonia are ‘not related to the ancient Hellenic civilization, history, culture, and heritage of the northern region’ (Article 7, 4). There is an array of provisions regarding international law principles, such as sovereignty and independence, territorial integrity, inviolability of frontiers, nonintervention in internal affairs, not tolerating activities of a non-friendly character, and repeated references to a ban on all manifestations of irredentism. These references, most of them aimed at placating the Greeks, are superfluous (being well-established fundamental norms of international law), with the exception of the ban on irredentism, and would have been more appropriate if the far more powerful party was North Macedonia, realistically threatening Greece. Moreover, it is stated that if either party ‘believes one or more symbols constituting part of its historic or cultural patrimony is being used by the other’, it will bring it to the attention of the other party that ‘shall take appropriate corrective action to effectively address the issue and ensure respect for the said patrimony’, again aimed to satisfy the mistrustful Greeks.

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Furthermore, ‘The Parties shall establish a High-level Cooperation Council (“HLCC”) of their Governments, jointly headed by their Prime Ministers’ (Article 12, 2), which ‘shall convene at least annually and shall be the competent body as regards the proper and effective implementation of this Agreement and the ensuing Action Plan’. One of the trickiest provisions which are likely to become a headache and a cause of misunderstandings in the near future is the one on school textbooks (although not as much as the corresponding Macedonian-Bulgarian Committee; see Chapter 13) to the effect that a ‘Joint InterDisciplinary Committee of Experts’ will ‘consider the objective, scientific interpretation of historical events based on authentic, evidence-based and scientifically sound historical sources and archaeological findings’ and on this basis ‘revise any school textbooks and school auxiliary material such as maps, historical atlases, teaching guides, in use in each of the Parties, in accordance with the principles and aims of UNESCO and the Council of Europe’ (Article 8, 5).51 As regards procedure, various steps were agreed upon, including a referendum, if Skopje decided to hold one, the changes in the Constitution, ratification by North Macedonia and prompt ratification by Greece.

The day after: the hurdles From the signing in Prespa until the ratification by Greece, there were a number of major hurdles that had to be overcome for the agreement to win the day. The ratification process ‘in both countries was difficult. Opposition was intense. The entire population of each country was engaged’.52 The hindrances that raised the temperature in both countries were the following: opposition on the part of the main opposition party in Macedonia as well as Greece, though more outspoken – and I would add more genuine and more convincing – in the Macedonian case, with the VMRO-DPMNE calling the Prespa Agreement ‘a disgrace’ and amounting to ‘national treason’ (with President Gjorge Ivanov, previously known as a moderate, only barely more restrained); a non-binding referendum in Macedonia (on 30 September 2018 with the following question, whose formulation many questioned: ‘Are you in favour of European Union and NATO membership by accepting the agreement between the Republic of Macedonia and the Republic of Greece?’) with 91.46 percent voters in favour but with only 36.91 percent turnout, which did not meet the constitutional requirement for a 50 percent turnout, with abstention implying rejection (as suggested by President Ivanov); the constitutional reforms and the renaming of the country required 80 votes in the 120 Parliament (two-thirds of the votes), which meant that the government needed eight votes from the opposition VMRO-DPMNE, but at the end both were clinched from the votes of VMRO-DPMNE members (though with the use of arm-twisting, including bribes, intimidation, threats of imprisonment, and other undemocratic means and violations of the rule of law, with President Ivanov for his part not accepting the constitutional changes53).54

The settlement of the Greek-Macedonian dispute 233 As far as the Macedonians are concerned, there was lack of enthusiasm regarding the agreement. They were prepared to go along largely ‘because of the sentiment of being in a deadlock due to the frustrating lack of alternatives’ and in the hope that ‘the future will be brighter than the post-Yugoslav decades’.55 Moreover, Prespa needs to be seen in association with the 2017 Friendship Agreement with Bulgaria (see Chapter 13), ‘both portrayed to the [Macedonian] public as a necessary evil that would enable North Macedonia to adhere to NATO and the EU’, and also aimed at a necessary and inevitable rapprochement with their two bigger neighbours.56 On the Greek side, Premier Tsipras, in the first part of 2018, had not adequately informed the Greek public on the progress in the ongoing talks. He appeared to antagonize the main opposition party, New Democracy, under its new leader Kyriakos Mitsotakis, apparently with the aim of splitting the opposition party,57 given the existing deep division in the party between the liberals under Dora Bakoyiannis and the nationalists under Andonis Samaras. In 2018 and in January 2019, various rallies took place in Athens and Thessaloniki against the Agreement and its ratification (with some 100,000 participants, which, though impressive, could not be compared with those in the early 1990s). Following the signing of the Prespa Agreement, Tsipras sacrificed Kotzias in order to retain the defence minister Panos Kammenos and his ultra-nationalist Independent Greeks party in the coalition government. But a little later Kammenos quit the ruling coalition over the Prespa Agreement, leaving SYRIZA without a majority in parliament. In Greece, opinion polls in 2018 and until the eve of ratification by the Greek Parliament indicate that over 70 percent were against the Prespa Agreement and its ratification, and there were calls for a referendum (clearly had it taken place, the Agreement would have been ditched).58 On the other hand, most Greek political parties, including several which voted against the agreement, such as New Democracy, have for years voiced their support for a compromise solution. How can this discrepancy between public and political parties be explained?59 On the surface there are at least three explanations for this (for more substantial reasons, see Chapter 11). One is that even though the Macedonian name dispute has been on the agenda for a long time, recurring Greek governments had done very little to convince the Greek people what is at stake,60 thus emotional arguments dominated the scene.61 Second is sheer lack of information or knowledge by the great majority of Greeks, hence the hostility to any solution to the name dispute.62 Third is the role played by the political parties (in this case especially by New Democracy), which ‘used the resolution of the name dispute as an opportunity to adjust their electoral tactics and score points in view of the coming parliamentary elections’, the disheartening outcome being ‘the extreme polarisation of politics around the articulation of false “patriots-traitors” and “pragmatists-ultranationalists” dichotomies’.63 However, at the end the Prespa Agreement survived the shrill cries of the nationalists in both countries, though many non-nationalists (mainly leftists) in both cases were also against the deal as amounting to a Western diktat by the United States and NATO, toying also with various conspiracy theories.64

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On 11 January 2019, the Macedonian Parliament completed the legal implementation of the Prespa Agreement by approving the constitutional changes for renaming the country to North Macedonia with a two-thirds parliamentary majority (81 MPs). And on 25 January 2019, Greece’s Parliament approved it with 153 votes in favor and 146 votes against (a simple majority was needed), with one abstention. The international community praised the agreement, including all the Balkan states, the UN, NATO and the EU. Only Russia (and Hungary) voiced its disapproval, based on its ongoing vendetta with NATO and the prospect of North Macedonia joining NATO.65 On 6 February 2019, NATO’s 29 member states signed the document for North Macedonia’s accession to the Alliance.66 Several days after the signing of the Prespa Agreement, the EU foreign ministers gave the green light for the commencement of membership negotiations with North Macedonia in 2019, on the condition that the country would implement a package of rule of law reforms (this condition was intended to appease the opposition by France and others which were sceptical about EU’s enlargement).67 But at the European Council of 18 October 2019, the EU enlargement plans were left stalled following French President Emmanuel Macron’s opposition to opening accession negotiations with North Macedonia and Albania (the two had been put together instead of being decoupled, with the Netherlands and Denmark joining in due to their opposition to Albania, in view of its corruption and other inadequacies). Senior officials of the EU and the leaders of several EU governments, including Germany, characterized it as a ‘historic mistake’ that ‘risks destabilizing the Balkans’,68 and fellow Europeans ‘roundly condemned this as exactly the sort of failure of geostrategic thinking’ for the EU that Macron has accused others of.69 The Zaev Government, in a state of shock, proposed a snap election to take place on 12 April 2020 but in March it was postponed due to the Covid-19 pandemic. The VMRO-DPMNE took a tough stance against the Prespa Agreement which it continues to regard as a disgrace and treacherous and refrains from using the new name, North Macedonia, but the weakness of its position was the lack of any realistic alternative, the bleak prospect of remaining in a state of insecurity outside the fold of NATO and the EU. However, a new agreement on opening accession talks was reached by the EU in March 2020, which raised the prospects of the SDSM winning the future elections (according to opinion polls in mid-2020 the two parties were roughly even).70 Note that the new Greek Government of Kyriakos Mitsotakis, for all its previous rhetoric in the opposition (mainly for electoral reasons, to clinch the far right vote), is firmly committed to the Agreement, its smooth implementation and North Macedonia’s accession to the EU and has made this as clear as day to Skopje. Apparently Greece’s New Democracy government has come to realize that ‘in Greece’s turbulent geopolitical environment, the Prespa Agreement is an asset to be protected, not a liability to jettison’.71 The SDSM in its electoral campaign emphasized the party’s role in the country’s Euro-Atlantic integration, securing NATO membership and the start of accession talks with the EU and resolving the vexing dispute with Greece. The

The settlement of the Greek-Macedonian dispute 235 VMRO-DPMNE electoral campaign opposed the name change and various provisions of the Prespa Agreement, and accused the Zaev Government of corruption. The elections took place, smoothly (according to international observers) on 15 July 2020, and the results were the following: the coalition headed by the SDSM, known as ‘We Can’, gained 35.89 percent of the vote and 46 seats; the coalition headed by VMRO-DPMNE, known as ‘Renewal’, gained 34.57 percent and 44 seats; and third came the main Albanian party, Democratic Union for Integration (DUI), headed by Ali Ahmeti with 11.48 percent and 15 seats. On 18 August, a coalition government of the SDSM and DUI was formed, after having agreed that Zaev will be prime minister until 100 days before the next elections, at which point an Albanian prime minister will be appointed, following an agreement of the two coalition parties. In view of this outcome, the prospects for the Prespa Agreement and its implementation seem more promising than ever before.

The Prespa Agreement: an assessment Before scrutinizing the Prespa Agreement, let us start with the official assessments of the two governments responsible for the settlement in 2018, following the signing of the Agreement. According to the Tsipras Government, it was ‘an honourable compromise’, far better than the cost of the ongoing impasse, a compromise with ‘two winners’. Greece achieved its main goal, the change of name, and pocketed the erga omnes, which was no easy matter and had not been set by previous Greek Governments as a clear prerequisite. The issue of Greek national heritage (ancient Macedonia) was also a major achievement and gain for Greece, as well as the many provisions on the sanctity of borders and against irredentism. An unexpected gain was also the alteration of several constitutional provisions, which again had not been among the desiderata of previous Greek Governments (from 2000 onwards), and it is very unusual for a state to change its constitutional provisions at the demand of another state. And no state in the contemporary world has changed its name due to the desire and pressure by another state (the only exception being Austria after a world war). But the Agreement could hardly have been an all-out Greek victory for otherwise there would have been no agreement for the other side would have been humiliated. Thus, Greece, in order to accommodate the needs of the other party, gave in to the following: the nationality (though meaning citizenship and not nationality in the sense of a nation) to be called ‘Macedonian’, as well as the language (in fact this had been conceded by Greece back in 1977 at a UN conference held in Athens),72 and of course lifting the veto to accession to NATO and the EU.73 According to the Zaev Government, an advantageous compromise had been achieved, securing the language, the citizenship and through both the Macedonian nationality and national identity. Entry as soon as possible to NATO and the EU was a major gain that would ensure peace and security as never before for the country. Zaev went as far as to talk of a ‘second independence’ for Macedonia, of a ‘confirmation of the state’s existence once and for all’, and of ‘getting a place

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in the cadastral map’ that would make ‘the Republic of Macedonia a real state for the first time in its history’.74 When pushed hard by his critics, not only from the VMRO-DPMNE nationalists but more convincingly from independent, mainly leftist analysts, Zaev conceded that ‘the price was high but worth it: this was the best possible agreement under the circumstances and that Macedonia had to accept the Greek ultimatum in order to move ahead towards NATO and the EU’.75 Thus, on basis of the official positions, the overall outcome satisfied both parties, with the overall gains more than the losses and sacrifices that were not unbearable. What did the trick for the Macedonian side, which lost more, was the withdrawal of the Greece’s veto to joining the Euro-Atlantic institutions, but more importantly, as Nimetz has put it, ‘was global acceptance of the identity of its people, and this meant that there should be no question anywhere – including by their southern neighbor – that they were Macedonians and that their language was Macedonian’.76 Of course, Greek non-recognition should not have surfaced at all, but it did, thus under the prevailing circumstances since its independence, recognition of its national identity-cum-language is a major achievement and will come in handy in its ongoing agonizing tussle with Bulgaria (see Chapter 13). Criticism of the Agreement on the Greek side, leaving aside the shrill cries of the jingoists (that ‘Macedonia’ can only be a Greek concept and that the Macedonians and their language are non-existent but an artificial Titoist invention, and that the Prespa Agreement is ‘a crime against the nation’ and a ‘treachery’),77 is, according to the hawks, that Skopje gained more than it should have been allowed to gain. In view of the two obvious ‘carrots’, entry into NATO and the EU, Greece should have committed wholesale blackmail, demanding more and not giving in on language and nationality, with the latter also implying nationality in the sense of national identity. At the very least, the term ‘citizenship’ and not ‘nationality’ should have been used. And the conclusion is that Athens paid more than it had to in order to clinch the composite name and ban irredentism.78 On the Macedonian side, putting aside the views of the nationalists (the Prespa Agreement as a betrayal of national interests and of identity, a humiliation and an act of treason),79 the more sophisticated argumentation against the Agreement is that the Prespa Agreement is not ‘a compromise or an agreement between equal parties’; it patently asymmetrical, favouring Greece, the stronger party, with various ‘rights’, with ‘obligations only on the weaker side’, as seen by the following: the erga omnes and the imposed constitutional changes (both of which had been ‘important pillars’ of Macedonia on the name dispute), the intrusion of Greece into the internal affairs of Macedonia, including constitution-making, history, culture, nationality, language and others; censorship or self-censorship when historical research and education (schoolbooks) is concerned; prescribing ‘a total restructuring and redesigning of the internal order of a sovereign state, starting with the constitution, changes to names of the state institutions, symbols, currency, history, culture, trade codes, etc’.80 Macedonian criticism raises a number of other substantial issues, which have also been touched upon by a very small minority of Greek scholars who regard the Agreement lop-sided in favour of Greece.81 Foremost of all is the change of

The settlement of the Greek-Macedonian dispute 237 name itself, to have to accept a different name and identity from their own, which is ‘the only identity they have ever known’.82 Is it possible for ‘a state/nation to have a dispute over its own name and self-identification’?83 This is unprecedented in the history of international relations, with no modern state ‘the object of such an imposition’.84 Things would, of course, have been different if the name ‘Macedonia’ happened to be the main or exclusive signifier of Greek identity and existence, as it is for the Macedonians. Moreover, international law offers no basis for Greece’s imposition of its name on another sovereign independent state; only the recognition of another state can, for whatever reason, be withheld for that is a matter of discretion and a sovereign right and does not imply the non-existence of the other state. Clearly the imposition of a name is counter to a state’s independence, sovereignty and juridical equality between states (which goes back to Jean Bodin), and its right to its own self-definition inherent in the right of peoples to self-determination, which includes the right to one’s name and flag.85 And the original demeaning fYROM designation and the call on the Macedonians for talks so as to change their name implies an unacceptable inequality between states and a form of international discrimination.86 As for the views of outsiders or of those in the two countries with no axe to grind, there are two main viewpoints. One regards the agreement ‘a major positive development in the Balkans, contributing to the consolidation of stability and the advancement of the region’s integration into the Euro-Atlantic structures’,87 and as a pace-setter for the resolution of other conflicts in the Balkans and elsewhere, an innovative agreement and ‘a model international treaty for security, good neighbourly relations and peace’.88 A second approach acknowledges that it is more favourable to Greece, but this does not necessarily make it unworkable for the future. But both lines tend to agree that it is a ‘far-from-perfect agreement’,89 but irrespective of its ambiguities and future difficulties in its implementation and lop-sidedness, it is a worthwhile accord that has at last put an end to the 27 year name dispute, which seemed unsolvable. Nimetz for his part has praised the Agreement, but concludes with a cautious note: that it ‘is a work in progress. Whether it is a success or not, whether Greece and North Macedonia have truly resolved their differences, and whether the Macedonian Question . . . has finally been resolved will be for future generations to determine’.90 According to Armakolas and Petkovski, respectively, a Greek and a Macedonian Balkan expert, the main achievements of the Agreement, apart from the ‘elephant in the room’, the name, was how to tackle identity and heritage, the first crucial for the Macedonians, the latter crucial to the Greeks.91 The outcome had elements of ‘creative ambiguity’, especially as regards identity, with language and nationality (as citizenship) called ‘Macedonian’; as regards heritage it is clear enough, Antiquity (ancient Macedonia) goes to the Greeks. The thrust of the agreement is that we do not agree on everything, but above all there is ‘the willingness to live side by side despite disagreements’.92 The Swiss Balkan expert Stefan Rohdewald has criticized the Agreement for adopting an essentialist, retrospective and ahistorical view of ethnicity, nationhood and cultural heritage, especially concerning the Greeks, and as for the

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reference to Macedonian (as a South Slav language) it forgets to take on board the Albanian language, the second language of North Macedonia.93 I would argue that this criticism, though valid, misses the point. Interstate agreements are not the outcome of a scientific encounter among sophisticated and open-minded historians and other social scientists, but down-to-earth documents that can be understood by the majority on either side, both of which are steeped in the respective national narratives. A more pragmatic line of inquiry is probably the following: (a) whether the agreement is roughly balanced (give and take ‘positive sum’) or decidedly lop-sided favouring one party more than the other; (b) if the latter applies, are its defects insurmountable rendering the agreement self-defeating or harmful to the losing side; and (c) whether the agreement as it stands is viable and manageable even though it is lop-sided. Clearly the agreement tilts in Greece’s favour, for most of its crucial provisions were made to fit the Greek needs and demands: apart from the sacrifice of the change of name by the Macedonians, ergo omnes, the heritage of the ancient Macedonians, changes in the Macedonian Constitution, a clear ban of irredentism and so on.94 It is thus astonishing that the Greek public, in its majority, was against the Agreement, which can mainly be explained by the haughty Greek national self-image and ethnocentrism, and the various skeletons in the cupboard (see Chapter 11). Be this as it may, one hopes that what is to begin with, on paper, asymmetric and hardly ‘win-win’, will in its practical consequences (along the proof of the pudding being in the eating), especially through increased mutually beneficial economical transactions and contacts leading to better mutual knowledge and discarding misunderstandings and prejudice, gradually transform itself into a ‘positive sum’ outcome for both parties and by the same token enhance peace and stability in this volatile region of the Balkans.

Notes 1 Taiwan: Country Study Guide. Volume 1, Strategic Information and Developments (Washington, DC: International Business Publications, 2012), 38–45, 52–4. 2 The ROC has suggested as a compromise formula ‘Republic of China on Taiwan’, more appropriate would have been ‘Chinese Republic of Taiwan’, as in Arab Republic of Egypt or Taiwanese Chinese Republic as in Syrian Arab Republic. 3 John Hutchinson, The Dynamics of Cultural Nationalism: The Gaelic Revival and the Irish Nation State (London: Allen & Unwin, 1987), 322; Brian M. Walker, A Political History of the Two Irelands: From Partition to Peace (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012), 3, 13. 4 Walker, A Political History of the Two Irelands, 14. 5 Ibid., 146. 6 In 1949, when West Germany became an independent state, the Germans called their state ‘Federal Republic Germany’ (Bundesrepublik Deutschland) in German, without the ‘of’ in between which appears in the English version. This was done so as to stress that their Germany was the real Germany in contradistinction to the GDR. 7 Angelos Syrigos and Evanthis Hadjivasiliou, I Symfonia ton Prespon kai to Makedoniko [The Prespa Agreement and the Macedonian Question] (Athens: Ekdoseis Pataki, 2018), 95–6. 8 Note that the Greek foreign minister was aware of this unique case; see Kotzias in Nicos Kotzias and Serafim Kotrotsos, I megali diapragmatefsi: Prespes [The Great Negotiation: Prespes] (Athens: Ekdoseis Pataki, 2019), 204, 242.

The settlement of the Greek-Macedonian dispute 239 9 The Southern Sudanese secessionist movement (1961–1972 and 1983–2005), named itself Southern Sudan, but on two occasions in the late 1960s it toyed with two other names: Azania (Azania Liberation Front) and Nile (Nile Provisional Government). See Alexis Heraclides, ‘Janus or Sisyphus? The Southern Problem of the Sudan’, Journal of Modern African Studies, 25:2(1987), 220. 10 See Alexis Heraclides, To Makedoniko Zitima 1878–2018: apo tis ethnikes diekdikiseis stis syngrousiakes ethnikes taftotites [The Macedonian Question 1878–2018: From National Claims to Conflicting National Identities] (Athens: Themelio, 2018), 317; Zhidas Daskalovski, ‘Clashing Historical Narratives and the Macedonian Name Dispute–Solving the Unsolvable’, Trames Journal of the Humanities and Social Sciences, 21:4 (2017), 339. 11 International Crisis Group, ‘Macedonia’s Name: Why the Dispute Matters and How to Resolve It’ (Brussels: ICG, 2001), III, 19–20; Matthew Nimetz, ‘The Macedonian “Name” Dispute: The Macedonian Question–Resolved?’, Nationalities Papers, 48 (2020), 211. 12 Dimitar Bechev, Historical Dictionary of North Macedonia, Second Edition (Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield, 2019), 26. 13 Ibid., 27, 216. 14 Athens welcomed the new atmosphere of cooperation in Skopje, but stressed that it expected tangible moves that would prove fYROM was ready to seriously engage diplomatically with Greece. See Ioannis Armakolas and Giorgos Triantafyllou, ‘Greece and EU enlargement to the Western Balkans: Understanding an Ambivalent Relationship’, South East European and Black Sea Studies, 17:4 (2017), 9. 15 Stefan Rohdewald, ‘Citizenship, Ethnicity, History, Nation, Region, and the Prespa Agreement of June 2018 between Macedonia and Greece’, Südosteuropa, 66:4 (2018), 578. 16 Kotzias and Kotrotsos, I megali diapragmatefsi, 268–9. 17 Nimetz, ‘The Macedonian “Name” Dispute’, 212. 18 See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skopje_2014. 19 Nimetz, ‘The Macedonian “Name” Dispute’, 210. 20 Jonuz Abdullai, ‘The Political Crisis in Macedonia and the Relations with Its Neighbors’, in Ali Pajaziti et al. (eds), The Balkans in the New Millennium: From Balkanization to Eutopia (Tetovo-Skopje: Balkan Sociological Forum, 2015), 52. 21 Daskalovski, ‘Clashing Historical Narratives and the Macedonian Name Dispute–Solving the Unsolvable’, 339–40; Bojan Maracik, in Bozan Maracik and Ioannis Armakolas, ‘Perspectives on the Skopje-Athens Dialogue’, Political Trends & Dynamics in Southeast Europe, Friedrich Ebert Stiftung (August/September 2018), 5–7; Ioannis Armakolas and Ljupcho Petkovski, ‘Blueprint Prespa? Lessons Learned from the Greece-North Macedonia Agreement’, Friedrich Ebert Stiftung (June 2019), 3–5; Eva Ellereit, ‘Analysis of the Macedonian Referendum: The Majority Clearly Says “Yes” ’, Political Trends & Dynamics in Southeast Europe-Overview, Friedrich Ebert Stiftung (2018), 15. 22 Nimetz, ‘The Macedonian “Name” Dispute’, 210. This is also confirmed by Kotzias on several occasions. 23 Kotzias in Kotzias and Kotrotsos, I megali diapragmatefsi, 83. 24 Nimetz, ‘The Macedonian “Name” Dispute’, 213. 25 This aspect was stressed by the Macedonian Albanian leader Ali Ahmeti to Kotzias. See Nicos Kotzias, ‘Prologos’ [Prologue], in Spyros Sfetas, Oi metalaxeis tou Makedonikou: o makris dromos pros tis Prespes [The Mutations of the Macedonian Question: The Long Road to Prespes] (Athens: I. Sideris, 2018), 9. 26 Ibid., 9–12; Kotzias and Kotrotsos, I megali diapragmatefsi, 83, 163–4, 270. 27 Sotiris Walden, Makedoniko kai Valkania, 1991–1994: i adiexodi poreia tis ellinikis politikis [The Macedonian Question and the Balkans, 1991–1994: The Dead-End Trajectory of Greek Policy] (Athens: Themelio, 1994), 37. 28 International Crisis Group, ‘Macedonia’s Name’, 16. 29 Ibid., 15. 30 Kotzias and Kotrotsos, I megali diapragmatefsi, 178–9.

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31 Nimetz, ‘The Macedonian “Name” Dispute’, 211. 32 Note that Dimitrov was astonished with Kotzias’s instance on erga omnes for he was under the impression that Greece had abandoned the erga omnes concept since the late 1990s. See Kotzias and Kotrotsos, I megali diapragmatefsi, 277. 33 Nimetz, ‘The Macedonian “Name” Dispute’, 212. 34 Biljana Vankovska, ‘Geopolitics of the Prespa Agreement: Background and AfterEffects’, Journal of Balkan and Near Eastern Studies, 22:3 (2020), 10. 35 Ibid., 6. 36 Daniel Kahneman, Thinking, Fast and Slow (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2011), 300–9. 37 Nimetz, ‘The Macedonian “Name” Dispute’, 210–1. 38 Ibid. 39 At least according to Kotzias’s assessment, in Kotzias and Kotrotsos, I megali diapragmatefsi, 269. 40 Nimetz, ‘The Macedonian “Name” Dispute’, 213. Based also on my discussions with people close to Kotzias. 41 According to my discussions with members of the Greek negotiating team. 42 Nimetz, ‘The Macedonian “Name” Dispute’, 212. 43 Based on my discussions with members of the Greek negotiating team and confirmed in Kotzias and Kotrotsos, I megali diapragmatefsi, 163. 44 Kotzias and Kotrotsos, I megali diapragmatefsi, 178, 283. 45 I was informed of this by Macedonian officials in one of my fact-finding trips to Skopje in early 2020. I suspect that the Bulgarians were not as generous as it may appear (‘handing Ilinden’ to the Macedonians) but had ulterior motives, to come up later and say ‘Ilinden was a Bulgarian affair’ hence you are Bulgarians after all. This is also implied by Kotzias, in Kotzias and Kotrotsos, I megali diapragmatefsi, 284. 46 Kotzias and Kotrotsos, I megali diapragmatefsi, 283. 47 Regarding erga omnes, Nimetz’s final switch is worth quoting: ‘I slowly came to agree for three reasons: first, the Greeks would not move on their insistence on erga omnes; second, having two names would lead to years of bickering about whether an application was domestic or international; third, given the aspiration of Skopje to join the European Union, it was obvious that within the EU there is no real distinction between what is domestic and what applies throughout the EU (e.g. drivers licenses, medical records, and academic diplomas, all domestic but also accepted across borders). This was a tough concession for Skopje, but it finally acquiesced to the erga omnes application of the new name, which required extensive constitutional changes that almost killed approval of the Prespa Agreement during the ratification process’. In Nimetz, ‘The Macedonian “Name” Dispute’, 212. 48 Dimitrov’s credentials as a flexible negotiator were in doubt within the SDSM milieu due to the fact that his father, the philosopher and politician Dimitar Dimitrov (a refugee from Greece) was an influential member of the VMRO-DPMNE, having served as ambassador to Russia, and minister of culture and minister of education, and is regarded as a Bulgarophile. On the elder Dimitrov, see Bechev, Historical Dictionary of North Macedonia, 92. 49 Armakolas and Petkovski, ‘Blueprint Prespa?’, 1. 50 Nimetz, ‘The Macedonian “Name” Dispute’, 213. 51 The Committee in question has met only once on 2 November 2018, where it was decided that ancient Macedonia is Greek, as argued by the Greek experts, but the relevant changes in the Macedonian schoolbooks have not yet taken place. 52 Nimetz, ‘The Macedonian “Name” Dispute’, 213. 53 As Ivanov put it, ‘I do not accept the constitutional change aimed at changing the constitutional name [of the country]. I do not accept ideas or proposals which would endanger Macedonia’s national identity, the individuality of the Macedonian nation, the Macedonian language and the Macedonian model of coexistence’. See https:// en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prespa_agreement

The settlement of the Greek-Macedonian dispute 241 54 Bechev, Historical Dictionary of North Macedonia, 27–8; Armakolas and Petkovski, ‘Blueprint Prespa?’, 3, 5–6; Ellereit, ‘Analysis of the Macedonian Referendum’, 15–16; ‘The Show Must Go On’, Political Trends & Dynamics in Southeast EuropeOverview, Friedrich Ebert Stiftung (2018), 9; Biljana Vankovska, ‘A Diplomatic Fairytale or Geopolitics as Usual: A Critical Perspective on the Agreement between Athens and Skopje’, Institute for Peace Research and Security Policy, University of Hamburg, OSCE Yearbook 2018, No. 24 (Baden-Baden: Verlag, 2018), 7, 19–20. 55 Armakolas and Petkovski, ‘Blueprint Prespa?’, 3. 56 Ibid. 57 At least this was how it was interpreted on the part of New Democracy at the time. 58 Ioannis Armakolas and George Siakas, ‘Research Report: What’s in a Name? Greek Public Attitudes towards the “Name Dispute” and the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia in 2018’ (Athens: ELIAMEP, 2018), 15; Armakolas and Petkovski, ‘Blueprint Prespa?’, 3–4, 15. 59 Nicolaos Tzifakis, ‘What the Ratification of the Prespa Agreement Means for Greek Politics’, European Politics and Policy (LSE, 30 January 2019). 60 Ibid.; Ioannis Armakolas, Ljupcho Petkovski and Alexandra Voudouri, ‘The Prespa Agreement One Year after Ratification: From Enthusiasm to Uncertainty?’, EUROTHINK (February 2020), 16. 61 Tzifakis, ‘What the Ratification of the Prespa Agreement Means for Greek Politics’. 62 Ioannis Armakolas and George Siakas, ‘Greek Public Opinion and Attitudes towards the “Name Dispute” and the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia’ (Athens: ELIAMEP, 2016), 8–9; Armakolas and Siakas, ‘Research Report’. 63 Tzifakis, ‘What the Ratification of the Prespa Agreement Means for Greek Politics’. 64 For this later view by the leftists in Macedonia (which has its counterpart in Greece as well), see Vankovska, ‘A Diplomatic Fairytale or Geopolitics as Usual’. 65 Armakolas and Petkovski, ‘Blueprint Prespa?’, 5; Open Society-European Policy Institute, ‘Russia: Playing the Spoiler’, 13–14. 66 Bechev, Historical Dictionary of North Macedonia, 28. 67 Ibid., 27. 68 See The Telegraph and The Independent (18 October 2019). 69 ‘Briefing Macron’s View of the World’, The Economist (9 November 2019), 20. Macron’s angry reaction to this was that enlargement ‘without reform of the EU and of its accession rules’ is ‘absurd’ and that ‘half’ of the EU member states agree with him on Albania, ‘but hide behind France’. In ibid. 70 ‘North Macedonia Parties ‘Almost Level’ before Election: Survey’, Balkan Insight (16 March 2020). 71 Armakolas, Petkovski and Voudouri, ‘The Prespa Agreement One Year after Ratification’, 15. 72 Kotzias in Kotzias and Kotrotsos, I megali diapragmatefsi, 97, 278. 73 Kotzias, ‘Prologos’, 9–12; Kotzias and Kotrotsos, I megali diapragmatefsi, 83–4, 163–4, 167, 204, 242–3. 74 Vankovska, ‘A Diplomatic Fairytale or Geopolitics as Usual’, 8, 13. 75 Ibid., 8. 76 Nimetz, ‘The Macedonian “Name” Dispute’, 212. 77 Armakolas, Petkovski and Voudouri, ‘The Prespa Agreement One Year after Ratification’, 10. 78 Syrigos and Hadjivasiliou, I Symfonia ton Prespon kai to Makedoniko. 79 Armakolas, Petkovski and Voudouri, ‘The Prespa Agreement One Year after Ratification’, 8. 80 Vankovska, ‘A Diplomatic Fairytale or Geopolitics as Usual’, 8, 10–11, 13, 22. 81 Such as this author, see Heraclides, To Makedoniko Zitima 1878–2018, 323–34. 82 Biljana Vankovska, ‘David vs. Goliath: The Macedonian Position(s) in the Socalled “Name Dispute” with Greece’, Südosteuropa, 58 (2010), 440. 83 Ibid.

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84 Ibid., 444. 85 Ibid., 444, 450; Matthew C.R. Craven, ‘What’s in a Name? The Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia and Issues of Statehood’, Australian Yearbook of International Law, 16 (1995), 199–200, 234–5; Daskalovski, ‘Clashing Historical Narratives and the Macedonian Name Dispute–Solving the Unsolvable’, 331–3. 86 Daskalovski, ‘Clashing Historical Narratives and the Macedonian Name Dispute– Solving the Unsolvable’, 333. See also Heraclides, To Makedoniko Zitima 1878–2018, 324–8. 87 Tzifakis, ‘What the Ratification of the Prespa Agreement Means for Greek Politics’. 88 Dimitris Christopoulos and Kostis Karpozilos, 10+1 Questions & Answers on the Macedonian Question (Athens: Rosa Luxemburg Stiftung Office in Greece, 2018), 12. 89 Rohdewald, ‘Citizenship, Ethnicity, History, Nation, Region, and the Prespa Agreement of June 2018 between Macedonia and Greece’, 578. 90 Nimetz, ‘The Macedonian “Name” Dispute’, 214. 91 Armakolas and Petkovski, ‘Blueprint Prespa?’, 3. 92 Ibid. 93 Rohdewald, ‘Citizenship, Ethnicity, History, Nation, Region, and the Prespa Agreement of June 2018 between Macedonia and Greece’, 579–84. 94 See Heraclides, To Makedoniko Zitima 1878–2018, 323–34; and Alexis Heraclides, ‘I Symfonia ton Prespon: mia apotimisi’ [The Prespa Agreement: An Assessment], Sychrona Themata [Current Issues], 143–144 (October-March 2019), 44–7.

13 The ephemeral Macedonian-Bulgarian rapprochement

The first ray of hope in the relationship between Sofia and Skopje appeared in February 1999, which was then seen as a breakthrough: the visit of Macedonian Prime Minister Ljubčo Georgievski to Sofia, in which a joint declaration was issued with Bulgarian Prime Minister Ivan Kostov. It was stated that the two countries had no territorial claims vis-à-vis each other and adopted a compromise formula in order to circumvent the difficult language issue. Instead of referring to ‘Bulgarian’ and ‘Macedonian’, their agreements were to mention to the ‘constitutional languages’ of the two countries.1 But in the years of Gruevski rule in Macedonia (2006–2016) bilateral relations ‘turned frosty’, with Skopje refusing to go ahead with a friendship and cooperation treaty proposed in 2010 by Bulgaria, ‘which envisioned joint celebration of historical personalities and events’.2 In December 2012, Sofia stated that it would not consent for an opening of EU accession negotiations for Macedonia unless Skopje satisfied three preconditions: (a) the signing of a friendship and cooperation agreement, (b) joint government sessions, and (c) an agreement for joint celebrations of notable personalities and events ‘in our common history’.3 The Gruevski Government, with its emphasis on ‘identity politics’, was unwilling to accept the Bulgarian prerequisites, the outcome being stagnation in bilateral relations and the alienation of Bulgarian public opinion.4

The 2017 Treaty of Friendship The real breakthrough between Macedonia and Bulgaria came when the SDSMled government headed by Zoran Zaev took over power (31 May 2017).5 Within two months, on 1 August 2017 (Ilinden day), Macedonia and Bulgaria signed in Skopje what was regarded then as a ‘landmark’ and ‘historic’ agreement,6 a Treaty of Friendship, Good-Neighbourhood, and Cooperation.7 The Treaty was made possible due to the fact that the two parties had reached an understanding on a number of ‘thorny issues’ though mainly as perceived by Bulgaria.8 The Treaty referred to the respect of territorial integrity of both countries and envisaged the establishment of an experts committee to examine ‘educational and historical issues’to be based on ‘authentic and proven historical sources’(Article 8, 2), and for the celebration of ‘common historical events and personalities’ (Article 8, 3),

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while the ‘Republic of Macedonia agrees that nothing in its Constitution can or should be interpreted as providing the basis for interference in the internal affairs of the Republic of Bulgaria, in order to protect the legal status and the rights of persons that are not citizens of the Republic of Macedonia’ (Article 11, 5).9 The Treaty created high expectations and its reception was positive especially in Bulgaria. Bulgarian Prime Minister Boyko Borisov hailed it, stating that even in the turbulent Balkans, ‘problems can be solved through agreement and without foreign mediators’.10 And he vowed to support Macedonia’s accession to the EU and facilitate its dialogue with Greece.11 Even the nationalists in Bulgaria seemed content. Krasimir Karakachanov, the leader of VMRO-BND and Bulgarian defence minister, stated that ‘the treaty ends a period of silly quarrels between two countries that share a common history, language, and culture’.12 Only the proRussian Bulgarian Socialist Party seemed unhappy with the agreement.13 Zaev called the Treaty ‘a historic step forward for Macedonia and Bulgaria that shows that the past can be a basis for future cooperation’.14 But the majority was not content. The VMRO-DPMNE said that it undermined the country’s identity and the Bulgarian hidden agenda was to negate the existence of the Macedonian language and not to allow Macedonia to demand greater rights for the Macedonian minority in Bulgaria15; that it amounted to ‘treason’16 and violated ‘the identity and history of the Macedonian nation’; and that ‘Macedonia has its own history’ and it is dangerous to talk about a ‘common history’, as it generates the impression that the Macedonian people did not have their own past history.17 Critical were also several academics. Historian Alexandar Stoychev argued that ‘the common celebration of St Ilia [Ilinden Uprising] means that we are negating our nation . . . The common celebration of the biggest Macedonian national day together with Bulgaria is an act that is contrary to historical events’,18 while part of the media spoke of ‘surrendering our history to Bulgaria’.19 But other segments of the media called it ‘a landmark agreement that allegedly brought the two countries closer through an EU-oriented partnership’.20 The fact that Bulgaria had not until then ‘explicitly vetoed Macedonia’s association to NATO and EU as Greece used to do’ may have been another reason that the Treaty ‘went below the radars of the national sentiments’.21 In any event at the end ‘the deal was sold to the public with no major disturbances’, even though ‘in identity terms it bears much more burdens for the ethnic Macedonians’ than the Prespa Agreement of the next year (see Chapter 12).22 As accurately predicted by Biljana Vankovska: in ‘terms of the identity entanglement, the Bulgarian demands look more assertive than the Greek ones, which mean even tougher conditions on the path to EU membership’.23

The Treaty in the doldrums: back to square one? The trickiest part of the Treaty as envisaged by the Macedonian opposition was addressing the historical aspects directly linked to Macedonian and Bulgarian identity, which was the task entrusted to the ‘Joint Multidisciplinary Expert Commission on Historical and Educational Issues’. The Commission in its first sessions was able to find an acceptable solution as regards Samuil, with the Macedonians

The ephemeral Macedonian-Bulgarian rapprochement 245 accepting the Bulgarian character of his empire, but thereafter things got stuck as regards Ilinden24 and Gotse Delchev, namely whether Ilinden and Delchev was Bulgarian or Macedonian, for being both seemed contradictory.25 The jingoist Karakachanov, whose VMRO-BND regards itself as the guardian of ‘Bulgarian heritage in Macedonia’, accused Skopje of continuing to ‘play tricks . . . falsif[ying] history and . . . forcing a Macedonian identity and language not only within Macedonia, but also on Bulgarian territory’.26 And he stated that Bulgaria should not give its green light to EU accession until all falsifications of the history of the Bulgarian people in Macedonia are eradicated, threatening that otherwise VMRO-BND would leave the coalition government.27 Others followed suit, allowing the nationalists to play the lead. Borisov stated that ‘the membership of North Macedonia to the EU is important, however it cannot take place at our expense, with a rewritten history’, adding ominously that ‘[w]e have never said that we unconditionally support their entry into the EU’.28 Bulgarian President Rumen Radev pointed out that it is important ‘to draw red lines that will guarantee that North Macedonia’s access to the EU will not take place at the expense of Bulgarian history, language and identity’.29 Foreign minister Ekaterina Zaharieva (who had signed the Treaty) said that the transfer of Delchev’s remains to Skopje is ‘one of the greatest acts of treachery’ in Bulgarian history and that Bulgaria did not recognize ‘the so-called Macedonian language as separate from Bulgarian’, but that at any rate, states do not recognize languages, however the Macedonian ‘anti-Bulgarian rhetoric’ should stop.30 Zaev chose to be as conciliatory as possible, which was no easy matter given the circumstances. He stated that ‘instructions had been given to the Joint Commission not to seek to establish the absolute historical truth, but to agree upon specific facts disputed until now’, adding adroitly that commissions should not seek to establish a definite history as ‘with the passing of time, new historical facts are being established, [however] there are historical facts that are not being challenged by any country. It is true that in the past we have had a common history. . . . It is important that we confirmed that we [also] have a separate history, when we developed separately, as two nations that wish to be brothers’.31 Despite the conciliatory approach on the part of North Macedonia, on 9 October 2019 the Bulgarian Government adopted a so-called ‘Framework Position in Relation to EU Expansion and the Process of Stabilization and Association: Republic North Macedonia and Albania’, whereby Sofia set a number of strict preconditions for the start of North Macedonia’s EU accession negotiations. Its support depends on Skopje addressing, what it sees as the ‘anti-Bulgarian ideological foundations of Macedonianism’ (the national ideology of the ‘Macedonian people’) since 1944.32 The Framework Position states in no uncertain terms that ‘Bulgaria’s support to North Macedonia’s EU accession is tied to the implementation of the Treaty of Friendship . . . and specifically on achieving “real progress in the implementation of the letter and spirit of the Treaty” ’.33 By real progress what is meant is that ‘Sofia expects from Skopje, during the course of the accession negotiations, to address a number of issues relating to the official narrative of “Macedonian

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national identity”, constructed after 1944, dealing with the historical past, attaching special emphasis on the work of the Joint Multidisciplinary Expert Commission on Historical and Educational Issues’.34 Moreover, Sofia ‘demands that North Macedonia terminates any interest and policy of support for recognizing a Macedonian minority in Bulgaria’ and reiterates ‘the official Bulgarian position of not recognizing the Macedonian language, even declaring that “the language norm, declared in the constitutional language of the Republic of North Macedonia is related to the evolution of the Bulgarian language and its dialects” ’.35 In fact, there is some evidence that following the Prespa Agreement and given what the Greeks had gained, the appetite of the Bulgarians was whetted and this is the reason that they become so demanding from late 2019 onwards.36 Clearly this places any government of North Macedonia in a daunting position for it questions core aspects of Macedonian national identity and national history. As seen in Skopje, the Bulgarians are trying to appropriate key aspects of Macedonian history, such as the personality of Delchev and, they ponder, is ‘there any bigger humiliation to negotiate about your history with your neighbours?’ Some Macedonians go even further claiming that ‘the asymmetrical agreements with Bulgaria and Greece’ have put Macedonia ‘into a position of dependency’, which may prove ‘fatal for the survival of the Macedonian people’; and that this is in fact the real aim of Athens and Sofia, ‘to inflict a fatal blow on the Macedonian national identity. They think that the time has come for the final settling of the Macedonian question’.37 The problem is that no Bulgarian Government ‘may easily ignore or abandon these strict conditions’. Indeed ‘Sofia has “bound itself” into a tough diplomatic position, reminiscent of Greek policy vis-à-vis North Macedonia, where dominant perceptions of history-identity and a feeling of diplomatic superiority dictated a strict diplomatic position that no Greek government dared to openly question, let alone abandon’.38 And various statements by Borisov and other Bulgarian officials, when asked by the Macedonians whether they intend to block the start of the accession negotiations with the EU, are far from reassuring. They are of the following kind: let the Expert Commission Expert Commission do its job properly and then there will be no problem. Apparently there is trouble ahead and by comparison the previous Greek-Macedonian dispute would seem a child’s play, should Bulgaria choose to make life a living hell for North Macedonia, which is not unlikely. Note that following President Macron’s demands, in the new ‘EU methodology’, as it is called, each EU member state plays a more significant role in accessing a candidate state’s progress as the negotiations proceed (and in North Macedonia’s case these negotiations will probably take more than ten years). Moreover, the attacks on the Macedonian language (that it is merely a Bulgarian dialect) continue unabated with statements by Bulgarian officials and a publication on the Macedonian language by the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences (see Chapter 8). North Macedonia for its part is so exasperated that President Stevo Pendarovski went as far as to declare (in May 2020) that ‘we don’t need the EU if the price we have to pay is to state that we are not Macedonians or that the language we speak is not Macedonian’.39

The ephemeral Macedonian-Bulgarian rapprochement 247

Towards squaring the circle The Macedonian-Bulgarian controversy or ‘Bulgarophobia vs anti-Macedonianism’ could have been resolved if both sides were concurrent candidates for accession to the EU, but this is not the case, in part due to Greece’s veto. Now Bulgaria is in the position to blackmail and humiliate North Macedonia, even though this is a very bad idea, especially when coming on the part of a neighbour and former ethnic kin (and presumed ‘motherland’). Moreover, it would be damaging to the stability of the region, also putting the other neighbouring states in the unenviable position of having to choose sides. Thus, compromise solutions are of the essence before things get worse and are beyond repair. For the Bulgarians, a number of compromise formulas have been suggested through the years. For instance, to accept that the Macedonians were originally Bulgarians, but due to having lived separately for very long time, they have forgotten their ‘Bulgarianness’, and have been alienated with consequences in terms of language, nationhood and statehood. Another formula aimed at greater flexibility on the part of the Bulgarians is to distinguish between a Macedonian ‘political nation’ and an ‘ethnic nation’, thus ‘making it possible to claim that ‘a “Macedonian nation” does exist but as a political nation, i.e. as a nation pertaining to the independent Macedonian state’.40 Note that for the Bulgarians a ‘Macedonian nation’ which ‘presumably inhabits the three parts of Macedonia, Pirin, Vardar and Aegean Macedonia’ is ‘completely inadmissible’.41 Yet another tack is a quid pro quo: for Bulgaria to recognize or rather to accept the existence of a Macedonian language in exchange for a firm rejection by Macedonia of the existence of a Macedonian minority in Bulgaria. As for the Macedonians, their ‘anti-bulgarianism’ (which disturbs the Bulgarians) or ‘bulgarophobia’, on which ‘the post-war generations grew up “overdosed” ’, with its concomitant negative stereotypes42 has to be replaced by friendship and good-neighbourliness, provided the Bulgarians reciprocate and reject the shrill cries of their nationalists, however difficult it may be to harness them, as seen in the Greek case in 2018–2019 (see Chapter 12). No doubt, Macedonian identity is ‘constructed’, as are most national identities, but it is hardly a Serbian invention or ‘a creation of the Comintern’.43 It is the outcome of ‘a complex process of the building and consolidation of a new nation’ (see Chapter 4).44 Having said this, it is time for the Macedonians to face certain ‘unpleasant, even painful facts’ and ‘begin thinking more soberly’ about themselves and their future. In April 2020, Denko Maleski made a number of crucial remarks, all of them based on the scientific historical truth and not on Macedonian mythologizing: that Ilinden was mainly a Bulgarian uprising and that Delchev and his associates in the early years of the VMORO defined themselves as Macedonian Bulgarians. But that this initial common history led to separate ways later in the 1930s and especially in the 1940s and this process cannot be reversed.45 But such a line is difficult for the Macedonians to swallow as seen by the vicious reaction to Maleski’s astute assertions,46 for it runs counter to the Macedonian foundational myths, even though 120 years ago none other than Misirkov had readily acknowledged the

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Bulgarian origins (and the role played by the Serbs) in his famous 1903 book, as had been done in the 1940s and 1950s by Ivanovski, Vlahov and Koliševski (see Chapters 4 and 9). Let us also remember Poptomov’s point (before leaving for Sofia), that if the Bulgaria of San Stefano had been established, no ‘Macedonian nation’ would have emerged. But to what extent can the Macedonians water down their attachment to Ilinden, Kruševo and the founding fathers of VMORO, in particular Delchev and Sandanski to accommodate the Bulgarians? Note that North Macedonia’s national anthem (officially adopted in August 1992), ‘Denes nad Makedonija’ (Today Over Macedonia), written by Vlado Maleski in 1944, refers to the ‘Kruševo Republic’ and to Delchev, Gruev, Pitu Guli and Sandanski (the original text of the mid1940s included Karev and Vlahov but not Gruev).47 As for the ‘common celebration’ idea, it has not squared the circle as the optimists initially hoped, but has thrown oil on fire: for the Bulgarians what it really means is that these events and figures are in fact Bulgarian, for the Macedonians that they are giving up their distinct identity and history.

Notes 1 Dimitar Bechev, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia (Lanham: The Scarecrow Press, 2009), 32. 2 Dimitar Bechev, Historical Dictionary of North Macedonia, Second Edition (Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield, 2019), 61. 3 Yorgos Christidis, ‘A New Balkan Rapprochement. Skopje Accepts Sofia’s Positions Allowing for Bilateral Relations to Move Forward’, ELIAMEP Briefing Notes, 55/2017, 1–2. 4 Ibid., 1. 5 Bechev, Historical Dictionary of North Macedonia, 61. 6 Balkan Insight (1 August 2017 and 15 January 2018). 7 Bechev, Historical Dictionary of North Macedonia, 26, 61. 8 Christidis, ‘A New Balkan Rapprochement’, 1. 9 Ibid.; Balkan Insight (1 August 2017). 10 Cited in Balkan Insight (1 August 2017). 11 Bechev, Historical Dictionary of North Macedonia, 61. 12 Cited in Christidis, ‘A New Balkan Rapprochement’, 2. 13 Balkan Insight (14 July 2017). 14 Balkan Insight (1 August 2017). 15 Balkan Insight (14 July 2017) 16 Balkan Insight (15 January 2018). 17 Christidis, ‘A New Balkan Rapprochement’, 2. 18 Cited in ibid., 3. 19 Ibid. 20 Biljana Vankovska, ‘Geopolitics of the Prespa Agreement: Background and AfterEffects’, Journal of Balkan and Near Eastern Studies, 22:3 (2020), 11. 21 Ibid. 22 Ibid. 23 Ibid. 24 Balkan Insight (10 August 2018). 25 ‘Long-Dead Hero’s Memory Tests Bulgarian-North Macedonian Reconciliation’, Balkan Insight (25 June 2019).

The ephemeral Macedonian-Bulgarian rapprochement 249 26 Quoted in Yorgos Christidis, ‘Bulgaria Sets Tough Conditions on North Macedonia’s EU Accession Path’, ELIAMEP, Policy Brief No.58/2019, 2. 27 Ibid., 2–3; ‘Bulgarian Minister Touches Raw Nerve in Macedonia’, Balkan Insight (10 December 2018). 28 Quoted in Christidis, ‘Bulgaria Sets Tough Conditions on North Macedonia’s EU Accession Path’, 4. 29 Quoted in ibid. 30 ‘Long-Dead Hero’s Memory Tests Bulgarian-North Macedonian Reconciliation’. And various reports in the Bulgarian press in April and May 2020. 31 Quoted in Christidis, ‘Bulgaria Sets Tough Conditions on North Macedonia’s EU Accession Path’, 4. 32 Ibid., 1. 33 In ibid. 34 Ibid. 35 In ibid. 36 Based on my discussions with officials in Skopje in January 2020. 37 Christidis, ‘Bulgaria Sets Tough Conditions on North Macedonia’s EU Accession Path’, 5. 38 Ibid. 39 Quoted in Yorgos Christidis, ‘Historical Disputes Threaten North Macedonia-Bulgaria Rapprochement’, European Western Balkans (15 May 2020). 40 Marija Bakalova, ‘Bulgarian “Macedonian” Nationalism in the Post 1989 Decade’, New Balkan Politics, 6–7 (2003), 73. 41 Ibid. 42 Mirjana Maleska, ‘With the Eyes of the “Others”: About Macedonian-Bulgarian Relations and the Macedonian National Identity’, New Balkan Politics, 6–7 (2003), 6. 43 Ibid., 7. 44 Ibid. 45 Denko Maleski, ‘The First Foreign Minister of Independent Macedonia: We Were Once a People!’, Factor (28 April 2020). https://plus.google.com/share?url=https:// faktor.bg/bg/articles/mneniya-lacheni-tsarvuli-parviyat-vanshen-ministar-na-nezavi sima-makedoniya-bilisme-nyakoga-edin-narod 46 ‘Macedonia’s first Foreign Minister Maleski continues to denigrate Macedonians, says Delcev and Misirkov were Bulgarians’. https://english.republika.mk/news/macedonia/ macedonias-first-foreign-minister-maleski-continues-to-denigrate-macedonians-saysdelcev-and-misirkov-were-bulgarians/ 29.04.2020 / 47 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denes_nad_Makedonija

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Select bibliography 257 Panov, Mitko B., ‘The Creation of the Medieval State in Macedonia’, in Todor Chepreganov (ed.), History of the Macedonian People (Skopje: Institute of National History, 2008). Papaconstantinou, Mihalis, To imerologio enos politikou: i embloki ton Skopion [The Diary of a Politician: The Skopje Entanglement] (Athens: Estia,1994). Pavlović, Vojislav, ‘Stalinism without Stalin: The Soviet Origins of Tito’s Yugoslavia 1937–1948’, in Vojislav Pavlović (ed.), The Balkans in the Cold War: Balkan Federations, Cominform, Yugoslav-Soviet Conflict (Belgrade: Institute for Balkan Studies of the Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts, 2011). Pavlowitch, Stefan K., Tito: Yugoslavia’s Great Dictator (London: Hurst & Company, 1992). Pavlowitch, Stefan K., A History of the Balkans 1804–1945 (London: Longman, 1999). Pavlowitch, Stefan K., Hitler’s New Disorder: The Second World War in Yugoslavia (London: Hurst & Company, 2008). Peckham, Robert Shannan, ‘Map Mania: Nationalism and the Politics of Place in Greece, 1870–1922’, Political Geography, 19 (2000). Perović, Jeronim, ‘The Tito-Stalin Split: A Reassessment in Light of New Evidence’, Journal of Cold War Studies, 9:2 (2007). Perović, Jeronim, ‘Josip Broz Tito’, in Steven Casey and Jonathan Wright (eds), Mental Maps in the Early Cold War Era, 1945–68 (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011). Perry, Duncan M., The Politics of Terror: The Macedonian Revolutionary Movements, 1893–1903 (Durham: Duke University Press, 1988). Perry, Duncan M., ‘The Macedonian Question: An Update’, in Benjamin Stolz (ed.), Studies in Macedonian Language, Literature and Culture: Proceedings of the First North American-Macedonian Conference on Macedonian Studies, Ann Arbor, 1991 (Ann Arbor: Michigan Slavic Studies, 1995). Pettifer, James, ‘The New Macedonian Question’, in James Pettifer (ed.), The New Macedonian Question (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1999). Politis, Alexis, Romandica chronia: ideologies kai nootropies stin Ellada tou 1830–1880 [Romantic Years: Ideologies and Mentalities in Greece, 1830–1880] (Athens: EMNEMnimon, 1993). Poulton, Hugh, The Balkans: Minorities and States in Conflict (London: Hurst & Co, 1991). Poulton, Hugh, Who Are the Macedonians? (London: Hurst and Company, 1995). Pribichevich, Stoyan, Macedonia: Its People and History (University Park: Pennsylvania State University, 1982). Ristovski, Blaže, Macedonia and the Macedonian People (Vienna and Skopje: SIMAG Holding, 1999). Roberts, Geoffrey, ‘Moscow’s Cold War on the Periphery: Soviet Policy in Greece, Iran, and Turkey, 1943–8’, Journal of Contemporary History, 46:1 (2011). Rohdewald, Stefan, ‘Citizenship, Ethnicity, History, Nation, Region, and the Prespa Agreement of June 2018 between Macedonia and Greece’, Südosteuropa, 66:4 (2018). Rossos, Andrew, ‘The British Foreign Office and Macedonian National Identity, 1918– 1941’, Slavic Review, 53:2 (1994). Rossos, Andrew, ‘Macedonianism and Macedonian Nationalism on the Left’, in Ivo Banac and Katherine Verdery (eds), National Character and National Ideology in Interwar Eastern Europe (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1995). Rossos, Andrew, Macedonia and the Macedonians: A History (Stanford: Hoover Institution Press, 2008). Roudometof, Victor, ‘Nationalism and Identity Politics in the Balkans: Greece and the Macedonian Question’, Journal of Modern Greek Studies, 14:2 (1996).

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Index

Aarbakke, Vemund xii, 55n30, 145 Abdülaziz, Sultan of Ottoman Empire 6 Abdulhamid II, Sultan of Ottoman Empire 2 Abdullai, Jonuz 127 Abecedar 53 Aceva, Vera 88 Ačkoska, Violeta 101, 183 Acton, Lord (John Dalberg-Acton) 195 Adrianople province (Ottoman vilâyet) 38, 42–43, 45–46, 145 Aemilius Paullus Macedonicus 1 Agolli, Nexhat 101, 191n134 Ahmed Muhtar Pasha 28 Ahmeti, Ali 235, 239n25 Albania/Albanian(s) 5, 8, 11–12, 22–23, 25, 28, 39, 45, 64, 75, 86, 88–89, 94, 96–98, 100, 102, 121, 155, 168, 176, 197, 218, 220, 227, 228, 234, 245 Albanians in Macedonia 101, 113–115, 121, 127, 182, 220–221, 227–229, 235, 238 Albanians, Christian 2, 21, 24, 27, 31, 217 Aleksandrov, Todor 48–49, 144, 174, 183; see also VMRO Alexander I, King of Macedon 200–201, 203–204, 206 Alexander II, Tsar of Russian Empire 20, 54n20 Alexander the Great xi, 4, 8, 69, 75, 126–127, 176–178, 180–182, 185, 193–203, 207, 214–215, 227–228 and Chapter 10 (193–207); Alexander Romance 195; criticism of Alexander the Great 195; fascination with Alexander the Great 194–195; Slav enthrallment with Alexander the Great 195–197; see also ancient Macedonia Amadori-Virgilj, Giovanni 24

American/Americans (of the United States) 95–96, 102, 162 ancient Greece, ancient Greek(s) 4, 69–70, 178, 199–200, 202–206, 215–216; see also Hellenes ancient Greek language 69–70, 178, 197–199, 201–202, 205–207 ancient Macedonia (Macedon), ancient Macedonian(s), ancient Macedonian heritage xi, 1, 4–5, 8–9, 14, 31, 69–71, 116, 124, 152, 168–169, 171–172, 176–181, 185–186, 193, 197–207; ancient Macedonians, debate on ethnic origins and language 4, 197–207; ancient Macedonians as Greeks 4–5, 8, 152, 176, 193, 215, 230–231, 235, 237–238, 240n51; ancient Macedonians related to Slavs and to modern Macedonians (Macedonian claim) 69–71, 124, 168–169, 171–172, 176–182, 185–186, 193, 195–197, 214, 219–220; Macedonians abandon clam to ancient Macedonia 227–229, 231 (see also Prespa Agreement); see also Kingdom of Macedonia Anderson, Benedict 66 Andonov-Čento, Metodija 91–93, 106n104, 174, 183 Andonovski, Hristo 168, 180 antikvizacija 126, 177; see also antiquisation Antim (Anthimos), Exarch of Bulgarian Church 6 antiquisation, Macedonian 126–127, 169, 171, 177–179, 181–182, 193, 198, 214, 220, 229; see also ancient Macedonia, ancient Macedonians related to Slavs and to modern Macedonians (Macedonian claim); Gruevski, Nikola; ‘Skopje 2014 project’

262

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Antiquity 1, 127, 167–168, 171, 177–179, 181, 191n130, 193–194, 197, 204, 215–216, 219–220, 237 Antoljak, Stjepan 175; see also Samuil, Samuil’s empire Apostolski, Mihailo 90–93, 144, 157, 174, 188n54 April Uprising, Bulgarian (Aprilsko vǎstanie) (April 1876) 7, 44, 46, 142, 173 Aprilov, Vasil 154, 196 archaeologization, Greek 119, 193 Armakolas, Ioannis xii, 237 Armstrong, John 169 Arrian 194, 197, 202 Asia Minor Catastrophe (Greek) 5 ASNOM (Anti-fascist Assembly for the People’s/National Liberation of Macedonia) 92, 93, 101, 115, 156, 157, 183; see also AVNOJ assimilation: Bulgarians to Greek culture 6; Slavs of Macedonia to Bulgarian culture 7–8, 37–38, 40–42, 64, 66–68, 72, 139–140, 171–172 (see also Bulgarian Macedonians, Macedonian Bulgarians); Slavs of Macedonia to Bulgarian, Greek or Serbian culture 173; Slavs of Macedonia to Bulgarian or Serbian culture 23, 64 (see also Cvijić, Novaković); Slavs of Macedonia to Greek culture 5, 9, 53, 63–64, 184, 215; Slavs of Macedonia to Serbian culture 13–14; see also education and schools in Ottoman Macedonia Atanasov, Filip 46, 48–50 Athens, University of 4–6, 31, 70, 168 Austria 13, 21, 27, 98, 111, 151, 162, 226; dispute over name Deutsch-Österreich 226 Austria-Hungary 3, 12, 26, 30, 95, 151, 226 autonomy for Macedonia see Macedonian autonomy or union with Bulgaria (1893–1940)? autonomy for Pirin Macedonia 95, 96 Averoff, Evangelos 112, 132n49 AVNOJ (Anti-Fascist Council for the People’s/National Liberation of Yugoslavia) 89, 91 awakening see national awakening/ national awakeners Axis powers 85, 89, 94

Badian, Ernest 200–201; view on ancient Macedonians 200–201 Badinter Commission 118; recommendation on recognizing Macedonia 118; rejection of Badinter Commission’s recommendation by Greece 118 Bakoyiannis, Dora 126, 233 Balevski, Angel 143 Balgarianov, Bojan 88 Balkan federation of Yugoslavia and Bulgaria, idea of 94, 96, 98, 100 Balkan federation including Macedonia, idea of 40, 42, 46, 49, 51, 89, 93–94, 96, 98, 100 Balkan Wars (1912–1913) 3, 9, 12, 28–29, 42, 48, 74 (First Balkan War 28; Second Balkan War x, 28); Bulgaria and Balkan Wars (and losses) 28–29 (see also Bulgarian ‘dismemberment’, Bulgarian ‘national catastrophe’); Greece and Balkan Wars (and gains) 28–29, 215– 216 (see also Greater Greece; Greek irredentism; Megali Idea); Ottomans and Balkan Wars (disaster) 28 (see also Ottoman Balkans); Serbia and Balkan Wars (and gains) 28–29 (see also Greater Serbia; Načertanije; Serbian irredentism); unjustified gains of Greece and Serbia (European assessment) 29 Banac, Ivo 52, 73 Barth, Fredrik 73 Basil II, Byzantine Emperor (the ‘Bulgar Slayer’) 175 Batandjiev, Hristo 37 Bauer, Otto 8 Bechev, Dimitar xii, 195 Belgrade University 12–13, 37 Berlin, Congress of (1878) 20–22 Berlin, Treaty of (1878) 7, 10, 21 Bernstein, Samouil 153 Bihač Congress (1942) see AVNOJ Bismarck, Otto von 21 Bitola (Monastir) province (Ottoman vilâyet) 2, 44, 144 Bitola (Monastir), city of 8, 26–27, 86, 100 Bitovski, Krste 47, 173, 184 Blagoev, Dimitar 41, 44 Bled agreements (1947) 96 BMORK (Bŭlgarski Makedono-Odrinski Revoliutsionni Komitet), BMARC (Bulgarian Macedonian-Adrianople Revolutionary Committees) 39–41,

Index 263 55n33; see also Macedonian revolutionary organizations; TMORO; VMRO Bogomils 77, 156, 169, 175, 182; see also Medieval Macedonia (Macedonian narrative) Bokov, Georgi 143 Borisov, Boyko 244–246 Borza, Eugene 201–202; view on ancient Macedonians 201–202 Boris III, King (Tsar) of Bulgaria 104n30 Bosworth, Brian 195 Boué, Amie 20 Bourdieu, Pierre 193 Boutros-Ghali, Boutros 121–122 Brailsford, Henry Noel 25–26, 29, 57n88, 63–64, 152 Brancov 24 Brašnarov, Panko 48, 50, 92–93, 100–101, 158, 174, 183 Brauchitsch, Walther von 84 Britain, British 7, 20–21, 26, 29–30, 83, 94–95, 97–98, 100, 102, 111, 117, 121–123, 125, 215, 224–225 British-Irish naming dispute 224–225; see also Irish irredentism; Northern Ireland Brown, Keith 39, 42, 45, 64–65; ambivalence of VMRO leaders regarding their national identity 39, 42; ambivalence regarding nationhood 64–65; Ilinden Uprising 45 Brunnbauer, Ulf 169, 186n4 Bucharest NATO Summit Meeting (2008) 126–128, 179; Greek veto to Macedonia’s candidacy to NATO 126–127 (see also International Court of Justice; Karamanlis, Kostas) Bucharest, Treaty of (1913), division of Macedonia into three parts x, 28 Bulgaria, Bulgarian(s), Bulgars ix–xi, 3, 6–14, 30–36, 37–41, 44–46, 52–53, 64–65, 67–68, 70–73, 75–77, 83, 97–98, 102, 113, 124, 152, 159–162, 168, 170–173, 175–177, 183–185, 196, 218–221, 226, 228, 230, 233, 236 Bulgaria and Pan-Slavism 7, 12 (Greek and Serbian fear); see also Russian Pan-Slavism Bulgaria in Paris Peace Conference (1919) 30 Bulgaria in two world wars 20, 30, 85–88; Bulgaria in First World War (in Greek

and Serbian Macedonia) 30; Bulgaria in Second World War (in Vardar Macedonian and northern Greece) 85–88; see also Bulgarian occupation; Bulgarian revanchism Bulgaria of San Stefano 7; Bulgarian narrative 7, 10, 20, 68, 141–142 (see also Bulgarian irredentism; Bulgarian revanchism; Greater Bulgaria); Greek and Serbian alarm with San Stefano 11, 20; Macedonians against San Stefano Bulgaria 7, 46; see also San Stefano Treaty Bulgaria undivided or undivided Bulgaria (Tselokupina Bǎlgariya) 10, 48, 86, 87; see also Bulgarian ‘dismemberment’, Bulgarian ‘national catastrophe’ Bulgaria, union of Macedonia with x, 10, 36, 38, 41, 42, 67 Bulgaria’s recognition of Republic of Macedonia (January 1992) 121, 139–140 Bulgaria’s stance-policy towards Macedonia and the Macedonians: 1870–1919 period 3, 5–14, 20–21, 23–24, 27–30; 1920–1940 period 48–49; 1941–1944 period 85–88, 90; 1945–1948 period 91–92, 94–96, 100, 140–141; 1949–1989 period 141–145; 1990–2020 period 139–140, 145–147, 243–248 Bulgarian Academy of Sciences 29, 141, 143–144 Bulgarian ‘awakener(s)’ 68, 69 Bulgarian chauvinism 7, 38, 47, 51, 141 Bulgarian Church/Exarchate 6, 7, 8, 10, 14, 21, 24–27, 37–38, 40, 44, 70, 92, 173; see also Exarchists; Patriarchate of Constantinople, Patriarch; Patriarchists Bulgarian Communist Party (BCP) 49, 50, 51, 76, 77, 88, 91–92, 93, 95, 94–98, 100 Bulgarian communists see Bulgarian Communist Party Bulgarian ‘dismemberment’ (razpokîsvane) 29, 142–143, 145; see also Balkan Wars, Bulgarian ‘national catastrophe’ Bulgarian emigrants from Greece 52 Bulgarian Empire 8, 65, 76, 141–144, 174, 177, 182, 183; First Bulgarian Empire xi, 1–2, 10, 141–142, 144, 175, 183 (see also Medieval Macedonia, Bulgarian or

264

Index

Macedonian heritage?, Samuil, Simeon); Second Bulgarian Empire 2, 10, 144, 175; see also Medieval Macedonia, Bulgarian or Macedonian heritage? Bulgarian ethnographic maps (1900–1905) 24, 30 Bulgarian Historians, Second Conference of 143 Bulgarian irredentism 73, 85, 92, 172, 177; see also Greater Bulgaria Bulgarian language, literary Bulgarian 13, 14, 50, 64, 68, 70–71, 73, 151, 154–155, 156–159, 163, 216 Bulgarian-Macedonian conflict cum clashing narratives see MacedonianBulgarian conflict cum clashing narratives Bulgarian-Macedonian language dispute 139–142, 159–162, 220, 245–246 Bulgarian-Macedonian Treaty of Friendship see Treaty of Friendship, Good-Neighbourhood, and Cooperation between the Republic of Macedonia and the Republic of Bulgaria Bulgarian Macedonians, the Macedonians as 26, 41–42, 70, 144; see also Macedonian Bulgarians Bulgarian ‘national catastrophe’ 29, 30, 141–142; see also Bulgarian ‘dismemberment’ Bulgarian national narrative 7, 29, 30, 65, 67; see also Bulgarian national narrative regarding Macedonia, Bulgarian nationalism Bulgarian national narrative regarding Macedonia (the Macedonians and the VMORO) 36–37, 40, 42, 45, 47, 65, 139–147, 159–161, 245–246; see also Bulgarian-Macedonian language dispute; VMORO, independent or Bulgarian (Macedonian-Bulgarian debate) Bulgarian National Revival (Balgarsko natsionalno vazrazhdane) 6, 70, 76, 144, 196 Bulgarian national struggles, participation of Macedonians 24, 142, 144, 171 Bulgarian nationalism ix, 6–7, 31, 41, 47, 67, 73, 140–143, 145, 160, 168, 218, 244–245, 247; see also Bulgarian chauvinism; Bulgarian irredentism; Bulgarian revanchism; Greater Bulgaria Bulgarian occupations (First World War and Second World War): Greek and

Serbian Macedonia (First World War) 30; northern Greece (Second World War) 86, 102 Bulgarian occupation of Vardar Macedonia (Second World War) 85–89, 95, 156 Bulgarian Pirin Macedonia x, 48, 92, 94–96, 115, 140–141, 146, 147; see also Petrich ditrict Bulgarian preponderance in Macedonia according to non-Bulgarian assessments (1840s–1912) 11, 20–23, 25–26; see also Bulgarian ethnographic maps; ethnographic maps Bulgarian refugees from Greek Macedonia and Thrace 29, 31 Bulgarian revanchism 29, 30, 185 Bulgarian ‘state-yes, nation-no formula’ towards Macedonia 139–140, 145–147; see also Bulgaria’s recognition of Republic of Macedonia Bulgarian Supreme Macedonian Committee see Vŭrhoven Makedonski Komitet Bulgarians as Tatars or Turks 7, 14, 70, 71, 175 Bulgarian-Yugoslav federation idea see Yugoslavia, Yugoslav-Bulgarian federation idea Bulgarian-Yugoslav relations (1944–1948) 87–88, 89, 90, 91, 93, 94, 100, 101, 183, 184; see also Bulgarophile Macedonians Bulgarophile Macedonians (1940s) 86, 88–90, 101, 184 Byzantine Empire (Basileia Rhōmaiōn), Byzantine(s) 1–2, 4–5, 9–10, 65, 132, 142, 150–151, 161, 175–176, 179, 182–183, 216 Capodistrias, Ioannis 3 Cartledge, Paul 194–195, 203–204, 207; view on ancient Macedonians 203–204 centralists, Macedonian VMORO 46–47; see also federalists Chalkidiki Peninsula 7–8, 10, 20, 22, 25, 31; Greeks the great majority during Ottoman period 8, 20, 22, 25, 31 Chaulev, Petar 48–49 Chernopeev, Hristo 37, 43, 46, 48 China, People’s Republic of (PRC) 111, 215, 224–224 China, Republic of (ROC) 111, 224; naming dispute over the name of Taiwan 111, 224 Christowe, Stoyan 42, 57n85, 59–60n150

Index 265 Churchill, Winston 97–98, 109n173 Clement 151, 183; see also Cyrillic alphabet; Naum; Ohrid Literary School; Preslav Literary School Clinton, Bill 122–124 Colocotronis, Vasilios 31 Cominform (Information Bureau of the Communist and Workers’ Parties) x, 99–101, 140, 183 Comintern (Communist International) x, 36, 49–51, 65, 84–85, 88, 139, 247 Congo, Republic of 225; CongoBrazzaville, Congo-Leopoldville 122, 225 Connor, Walker 66, 78 Constantinople, city of 1, 5–6, 12–13, 22, 26–27, 43, 69–70 Constitution of Republic of Macedonia and changes in its provisions 114–115, 121, 124, 128, 230, 232, 234–236, 238, 240n47, 240n53, 244, 246 Copenhagen Meeting, Human Dimension of the CSCE (1990) 112 Country Report on Human Rights Practices (United States) 112–113 Courtenay, Jan Baudouin de 26, 73, 152 CPY (Communist Party of Yugoslavia) 83–85, 87–91, 98–100 Crampton, R.J. 99 Crete 5, 8, 25, 28, 43, 67 Croatia, Croatian(s) 49–50, 72, 84, 91, 95, 114, 117–118, 121, 151, 162, 196, 219 Crossland, R.A. 202; view on ancient Macedonians 202 Crvenkovski, Branco 125, 184 Crvenkovski, Krste 141 Crvenkovski, Stevo 124 CUP (Ottoman Committee of Union and Progress) 27–28 Čupovski, Dimitrija 42, 71, 74–75, 81n111, 153, 155–154, 220; existence of distinct Macedonian nation 198; independent statehood 74; Slavic Medieval roots (Samuil, Cyril and Methodius) 74–75 Cutilleiro, José 119 Cvijić, Jovan 13–14, 24, 26, 30, 69, 142, 145, 221; idea of Macedo-Slavs 23, 26, 30, 221 Cyril and Methodius 37, 74–75, 143, 150, 160–161, 169, 171, 174–175, 182–183, 219; Cyril and Methodius in Bulgarian narrative xi, 143, 160–161, 171, 219 (see also Medieval geographical

Macedonia, Bulgarian heritage); Cyril and Methodius in Macedonian narrative 74–75, 150, 161, 169, 171–172, 174– 175, 182–183, 219 (see also Medieval geographical Macedonia, Bulgarian or Macedonian heritage?, Macedonian heritage (claimed by Macedonians)); see also Clement; Cyrillic alphabet; Glagolitic alphabet; Naum Cyrillic alphabet xi, 53, 150–151, 157, 160–162, 171, 174–175, 183, 219; see also Clement; Cyril and Methodius; Glagolitic alphabet; Naum Czartoryski, Adam 18n94 Danforth, Loring 53 Danov, Hristo 155 Dante Alighieri 195 Daskalov, Georgi 145 Daskalov, Roumen 70 Dedijer, Jefto 12 Dedijer, Vladimir 99 Dedov, Stefan 71, 155 Delchev, Gotse 37, 39–43, 45–46, 55n44, 67, 73, 90, 96, 141, 143–144, 156, 170–173, 219, 245–248 Democratic Army of Greece (DSE) 101–102 Demosthenes 180, 197, 201 Denmark 117, 234 Derić, Vasilije 13 Dimitrov, Anton 37 Dimitrov, Georgi x, 50, 91–92, 94–98, 100, 197n115, 140, 141, 145; autonomous or independent Macedonia 50; Balkan federation 94–96, 100; Macedonians (new nation or multiethnic people?) 91–92; Pirin Macedonia 92, 95–96, 100; see also Djilas, Milovan; Kremlin meeting under Stalin; Stalin; Tito, Josip Broz Dimitrov, Nikola 125, 162, 226, 228, 230–231, 240n32, 240n48; see also Kotzias, Nicos; Prespa Agreement Dimitrov, Philip 139, 147n4 Dinev, Angel 76–77, 185 Disraeli, Benjamin 20 Djilas, Milovan 84–85, 96–98, 100, 107n115, 108n163; Dimitrov and Macedonians 107n115; Stalin and Greek Civil War 97; Tito-Stalin split 100 Đorđević, Vladan 13–14 Dragašević, Jovan 12–14 Draganov, Petar 152

266

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Dragoumis, Ion 9 Drezov, Kyril 219 Droysen, Johann Gustav 4; ancient Macedonians as Greeks Democratic Union for Integration (DUI, Albanian Macedonian Party) 235 Dubrovský, Josef 151 Durham, Mary Edith 25–26 education and schools in Ottoman Macedonia: Bulgarian education and schools 10, 24–25, 64, 72, 87, 154, 157, 173, 175, 196, 218; Greek education and schools 5–6, 8–9, 24–25, 36, 63, 68, 153–154, 168, 175–176, 196–197, 218; Serbian education and schools 12–13, 25, 36, 64, 155, 157, 159, 175, 218 EAM (Greek National Liberation Front), ELAS (Greek People’s Liberation Army) 86, 90–91, 98 Eastern Question ix, 20, 29 EC (European Community), EU (European Union) 111, 113–115, 117–122, 127–128, 217, 226–229, 231–237, 240n47, 241n69, 243–247; EC/EU Council of Foreign Ministers and other EC/EU meetings 117, 119, 234; EU Summit Meetings 120, 122; see also European Council EU accession process for Macedonia 115, 127–128, 226–229, 232–234; Greek veto (2009–2018) 127–128, 229; Greek veto dropped (2019) 234; see also North Macedonia accession process to EU Errington, Robert Malcolm 202–203; view on ancient Macedonians 202–203 ethnographic maps 2–3, 11, 20–31, 86; see also Bulgarian ethnographic maps; Greek ethnographic maps; Serbian ethnographic maps Euripides 197 European Council (of the EC/EU) 118, 122, 127, 234; France’s temporary veto 234 (see also Macron) Evans, Arthur 23, 25, 152 Exarchate see Bulgarian Church Exarchists (Bulgarian or Slavspeakers) 8–9, 21, 37, 42, 44, 51, 64; see also Patriarchists Federal Republic of Germany 225; chosen name by Germans 225, 238n6 Federal Yugoslavia ix, 50, 77, 83, 85, 91–92, 111, 182

federalists, Macedonian VMORO 36, 41, 46–49, 68, 92; see also centralists First World War 30–31, 48, 52, 73, 208n3, 226 Fokas-Kosmetatos, Spyridon 31 former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (fYROM), the 122, 125, 127–128, 218, 237, 239n14 former Yugoslavia 117–118, 121–122 France, French 24, 30, 44, 48, 177, 123, 215, 225, 234, 241n69 Frantz Joseph, Emperor of Austria and King of Hungary, Croatia and Bohemia 54n20 Freeman, Edward Augustus 5 Friedman, Victor 153–154; periodizing Macedonian dialect to language 153–154 fYROM see former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, the Gaj, Ljudevit 151 Garašanin, Ilija 11–12, 18n94, 146, 151 Garvanov, Ivan 37, 43, 46, 173–174, 183 Gemidzhii (Boatmen) 43–44; see also Thessaloniki bombings Gellner, Ernest 66, 218 Gennadios, Ioannis 21 geographical Macedonia x, 1–2; Aegean Macedonia (Serbian and Macedonian designation) 85–86, 91, 95, 126, 228, 247; Pirin Macedonia x, 48, 91–92, 94–96, 100, 140–141, 145, 147; three Macedonian regions 2, 28; Vardar Macedonia 51, 68, 77, 83, 85–87, 91–82, 123, 128, 140, 219, 226, 247 geographical name cases settled amicably or by default (various examples) 225 geographical naming disputes see naming disputes Georgiev, Kimon 93 Georgievski, Boris 179 Georgievski, Ljubčo 113, 125, 181, 243 German invasion of Yugoslavia (April 1941) 84 German language 159, 162 Germany: during nineteenth century 67, 151, 205; during 1914–1918 30; during 1941–1944 49, 83–86, 88–90, 93, 104n30 (see also Nazi Germany); see also Federal Republic of Germany Germany and Greek-Macedonian conflict (1990s) 111, 117, 125; Germany

Index 267 against Macron’s decision 234 (see also Macron) Gibbon, Edward 4 Gladstone, William 40, 55n31 Glagolitic alphabet 150–151, 157, 161–162, 183; see also Cyril and Methodius; Cyrillic alphabet Gligorov, Kiro 113–116, 119, 121–123, 126, 180, 215, 220; against Macedonian irredentism 115 (see also Maleski, Denko); Slavic origins of Macedonians (not ancient Macedonian roots) 180; territorial integrity of states 114–115, 118 (see also Badinter Commission); ‘three-pillar foreign policy’ (EU, NATO, and good neighbourliness) 115 Gopčević, Spiridon 12–14 Gorchakov, Alexander 20 Gorkić, Milan 84 Gotsev, Dimitar 145 Greater Bulgaria 7–8, 11, 12, 20, 23, 26, 40–41, 68, 73, 87, 134n94, 141, 171–172, 177, 184; Macedonians against Greater Bulgaria 40, 41, 46, 67, 73, 172, 184 Greater Greece 5, 40; see also Greek irredentism; Megali Idea Great Idea see Greek irredentism; Megali Idea Greater Serbia 11–12, 40, 87, 134n94, 151; see also Načertanije; Serbian irredentism Greece (1850–1918): acquiring Ottoman Macedonia or ‘historical Macedonia’ (1850s–1913) 3–9, 21–25, 27–29; ancient Macedonians and Greek irredentism 5 (see also Greater Greece; Greek irredentism; Megali Idea); ancient Macedonians as Greeks (1850s–1860s) 4–5; Slav-Macedonians descendents of Greek ancient Macedonians (Greek claim) 8, 152, 176, 197; see also Balkan Wars, Greece and Balkan Wars Greece and Macedonians (1919–1990): Greece (1991–2020) (see GreekMacedonian conflict; GreekMacedonian naming dispute; Prespa Agreement); interwar policy towards Slavspeakers in Greek Macedonia 52–53; Macedonian issue and relations with Yugoslavia (1950–1990) 112 Greek Civil War 94, 96–102; see also Djilas, Milovan; Stalin; Tito, Josip Broz

Greek claims of Macedonian irredentism see Macedonian irredentism-Greek claims Greek embargos against Macedonia: formal embargo (1994) 123–124; informal embargo (1992) 118, 120 Greek ethnographic maps (1870s–1918) 21–24, 29, 31 Greek irredentism 3, 5–6, 8, 24; see also Greater Greece; Megali Idea Greek limited ethnic presence in Ottoman Macedonia 3, 7–9, 20–25, 28–30, 216–217; see also Chalkidiki Peninsula Greek Macedonia, Greek Macedonians 2, 30–31, 52, 77, 86, 98, 102, 116, 119–120, 125, 184, 213–215, 219, 228–229; see also geographical Macedonia, Aegean Macedonia; Greek Macedonian diaspora Greek Macedonia’s drastic population change (1923–1924) 52, 215; see also refugees to Greece from Asia Minor Greek Macedonian diaspora (Australia, North America) 112, 115, 119–120 Greek-Macedonian conflict, the crux of the antagonism xi, 213–221; reasons of the Greek anti-Macedonian attitude 213–217; reasons of the Macedonian anti-Greek attitude 217–221 Greek-Macedonian naming dispute xi, 111, 114–131, 193–194, 225, 227–238; compound name suggestions 119, 121–123, 125–126, 128, 129–130 (Table 6.1), 220–221, 225–226, 230; dispute phases (cooperation and stalemate 125–126; dispute at its peak (1991–1995) 114–125; ‘double formula’ 126 (see also Nimetz, Mathew); final negotiations for a settlement (2018) 226–231 (see also Prespa Agreement); stalemate and worsening of relations (2006–2017) 126–128); Greek approach on naming dispute 114–128 (intransigence (1991– 1999) 114–125 (see also Karamanlis, Konstantine; Samaras); Milošević, Greek alignment with 117–120; relative flexibility (2000–2017) 125–128 (see also Bakoyiannis, Simitis); three Greek preconditions 116–117); Macedonian approach on naming dispute 114–128 (flexibility (1992–2005) 114–126; intransigence (2006–2016) 126–128

268

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(see also antiquisation); ‘red lines’ (2008–2016) 128 (see also Gruevski, Nikola) Greek-Macedonian naming dispute-erga omnes see Prespa Agreement, sticking point erga omnes Greek Macedonian Struggle (1904–1908) 9, 27 Greek national narrative 4–5, 213, 216–217; see also Greek nationalism; Korais, Paparrigopoulos Greek nationalism ix, 3, 5, 8–9, 23, 31, 118–120, 122, 126, 142, 213, 216–217, 233, 236; see also Greater Greece; Greek irredentism; Megali Idea Greek Revolution (1821–1830) 173 Greek ‘small idea’ (1878–1881) 8 Green, Peter 194–195, 199–200; view on ancient Macedonians 199–200 Grekov, Trifon 75, 176 Grigorovich, Victor 69, 197 Grote, George 4; ancient Macedonians as non-Greeks 4 (see also Paparrigopoulos) Gruev, Dame 37, 39, 42–44, 46, 71, 141, 144, 156, 171, 173, 219, 248 Gruevski, Nikola 126–128, 138n193, 169, 177–179, 181–183, 227, 243; see also antikvizacija; antiquisation, Macedonian; VMRO-DPMNE Guli, Pitu 39, 54n27, 248 Gundulić, Ivan 151, 196 Hadjinikolov, Ivan 37, 42, 43 Hadzhidimov, Dimo 37, 41–42, 46–49, 67 Hall, Jonathan Μ. 204; view on ancient Macedonians 204 Hammond, Nicholas G.L. 1999, 207; view on ancient Macedonians Harrison, Simon 193–194; see also symbolic conflict Hastings, Adrian 169 Hatzopoulos, Miltiades 204–205; view on ancient Macedonians 204–205 Hellenes 4–5, 178, 193, 201, 202, 205, 214; see also ancient Greece Hellenization, Hellenized 5, 6, 9, 21, 63, 179–180, 197, 199, 201–202, 207, 216–218 Hellenistic period 179, 197, 202, 207 Helsinki Final Act 114–115 Herodotus 197, 199, 204–2005, 207 Hitler, Adolph 84–86, 93, 104n30 Hobsbawm, Eric 66

Holbrooke, Richard 124 Hornblower, Simon 204; view on ancient Macedonians 204 Hristov, Alexandar 173 Hron, Karl 26, 152 Hüseyin Hilmi Pasha 27, 57n100; see also Macedonia, Ottoman census Ignatiev, Nilolay 7, 20 Ilievski, Petar Hristov 206–207; criticism of modern Macedonians’ alleged ancient Macedonian roots 207; view on ancient Macedonians 206–207 Ilinden Organization 75 Ilinden Uprising (August-September 1903) 9, 25–26, 36, 43–45, 54n27, 58n88, 57n102, 71–72, 75, 90, 92, 141–142, 170, 172–173, 183, 185, 230, 244–245, 247–248; actual events 43–45; against an uprising 43; Bulgarian uprising in Bulgarian narrative 45–46, 141–144, 240n45, 245, 247 (see also IlindenPreobraženie Uprising); Greek fears 9 (see also Greek Macedonian Struggle); major ‘sacred’ myth in Macedonian narrative 45, 57n102, 90, 92, 172–173, 185, 244–245, 247–248; Misirvov’s ambivalent assessment of Ilinden Uprising 72 (see also Misirkov, Krste); in support of an uprising 43 Ilinden-Preobraženie Uprising (Bulgarian narrative) 143–145 Iljovski, Vasil 77, 156, 185 illiteracy of Macedonians (circa 1850–1912) 63–64, 218 Illyrians 4, 76, 168, 171, 176, 178, 180, 182, 197–199, 201, 203, 229 Illyrianism of Croatians 151; see also Gaj, Ljudevit INI (Institut za nacionalna istorija) (Institute of National History) 169–171, 174–176, 178, 183–184 Interim Accord (Greece-Macedonia) (September 1995) 123–125, 231; Greek violation of Interim Accord 127–128; see also International Court of Justice International Court of Justice (ICJ) 125, 128, 229; decision against Greece 128 Ireland 111, 224–225; see also BritishIrish naming dispute; Irish irredentism; Northern Ireland irredentism see Bulgarian irredentism; Greek irredentism; Irish irredentism;

Index 269 Macedonian irredentism; Macedonian irredentism-Greek claims; Serbian irredentism Irish irredentism 224, 225; see also British-Irish naming dispute; Ireland; Northern Ireland Italy, Italians 28, 30, 50, 53, 67, 84, 86, 117, 196 Ishirkov, Anastas 24 Isocrates 197–201, 205–206 Ivanov, Gjorge 127, 232, 240n53 Ivanov, Jordan 30 Ivanovski, Vasil 76–77, 82n126, 93, 158, 168, 171, 185, 248; ancient roots of modern Macedonians irrelevant 171; autonomy true goal of VMORO 171; Medieval Slavic origins and Samuil’s empire 76, 171; national character of Delchev, Gruev and other VMORO leaders unclear 171; separate Macedonian nation 76, 171; see also Katardžiev, Ivan; Macedonian national narratives Jagich, V. 73 Jankov, Anastas 40, 43, 50 Jankov, Hristo 50 Joachim III, Patriarch 7 Kaklikis, George xii, 125 Kanchev, Vasil 24 Karadžić, Vuk 11–12, 69, 151, 156–157, 162 Karakachanov, Krasimir 244–245 Karamanlis, Konstantinos 116, 118, 120, 134n97 Karamanlis, Kostas 126 Karamičiev, Mihail 173 Karev, Nikola 42, 44, 115, 248; see also Kruševo Republic, Kruševo Manifesto Kardelj, Edvard 84, 93, 96, 98 Karić, Vladimir 12 Katardžiev, Ivan 40, 47, 66, 77, 168, 173, 184–185; clash between federalists and centralists 47; interwar maturing of Macedonian nationhood 77; Ivanovski’s contribution 185; Macedonian nation’s recent birth 66, 77, 168, 185; Slavic origins of Macedonians 185; TMORO and Delchev 40; VMORO and VMRO (criticism of VMRO) 117 Kazazis, Neoklis 24–25 Kemal Ataturk 168, 220; see also Turkish History Thesis

Kiepert, Heinrich 20–23; contacts with Paparrigopoulos 22 (see also Paparrigopoulos); ethnographic maps 20–23 Kingdom of Macedonia (or Kingdom of Macedon) 1–2, 180, 194, 199, 205–206; see also ancient Macedonia Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes 30, 48; see also Yugoslavia, Yugoslavia during the interwar Kinkel, Klaus 123 Kirjazovksi, Risto 173 Kiselinovski, Stojan 173, 183–184 Kitanchev, Trayko 40 Kjosev, Dino 140–141 KKE (Communist Party of Greece) 5, 16n37, 51–53, 61n188, 86, 90–91, 99, 101–102, 120; KKE Fifth Plenum of Central Committee, resolution of (1949) 101, 110n222 (see also Greek Civil War; NOF; Zachariadis) Kocev, Venelin 143 Kofos, Evangelos x, xii, 7–9, 94, 102, 112, 114–115, 119, 123–124, 132n34, 137n188, 173, 213–215; Ilinden in Macedonian narrative 173; Macedonian Question x; mutation approach 94, 213; San Stefano Bulgaria 7; scholarly views x, 7–8, 94, 102, 119, 124, 137n188, 173, 213, 214–215; views as adviser to Greek foreign ministry 112, 114–115, 123, 132n34, 214; Vlachs and Greek irredentism in Macedonia 8–9 Kolarov, Vasil 50 Kolettis, Ioannis 5; see also Megali Idea Koliševski, Lazar 78, 77–89, 91, 93, 95, 141, 157, 171–172, 248; Macedonian nation and its recent birth 172 Koneski, Blaže 74, 153, 157–159, 162, 164n28; contribution to literary Macedonian 157–158 Kordatos, Yianis 51 Kostov, Ivan 243 Korais, Adamantios 4; ancient Macedonians as non-Greeks 4; see also Greek national narrative Koromilas, Lambros 9 Kotzias, Nicos 128, 226, 228, 230–231, 233, 238n8, 239n22–23, 239n25, 230n32, 230n39, 230n45; see also Prespa Agreement Kovačević, Ljubomir 13 Kovachev, Slavcho 75 Krčovski, Hadži Joakim 153–154

270

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Kremlin meeting under Stalin (February 1948) 96–98 (see also Dimitrov, Georgi; Djilas, Milovan; Stalin, Tito) Krle, Risto 77, 156, 185 Kronsteiner, Otto 160 Kruševo Republic (August 1903) 44; Kruševo Manifesto 42, 115; major myth in Macedonian narrative 45, 90, 173, 248 Kuzman, Pasko 179 Lane Fox, Robin 194, 202; view on ancient Macedonians 202 languages in Ottoman Macedonia (1800– 1912) 3, 8, 21, 216; Bulgarian language 6, 8, 64, 69, 155–156, 169–162; Greek language 3, 5, 23, 178, 216; Macedonian language (see Bulgarian-Macedonian language dispute; Macedonian language and dialect); Serbian language 11, 69, 151, 156–158 Lausanne Peace Conference (1922–1923) 52 Lavrov, Pyotr 26, 73, 152, 155 Lejean, Guillaume 20–21 Levski, Vasil 37, 144 Llobera, Josep 169 Lozančev, Anastas 44 Lunt, Horace 150, 153, 158–159; on the Macedonian language 150, 153, 158–159 Macedonia, geographical see geographical Macedonia Macedonia, history of (circa 500 BC–1870) 1–2, 197–217; see also ancient Macedonia; Medieval Macedonia Macedonia name dispute see GreekMacedonian naming dispute Macedonia, region of: ethnic composition in nineteenth and early twentieth century 2–3, 27 (see also ethnographic maps); geography and history (from antiquity until Ottoman Macedonia) 1–2 (see also geographical Macedonia; Ottoman Macedonia); Ottoman census (1904) 27 Macedonia, state of, government of (1991– 2020) ix–x, 2, 4, 92–94, 113–122, 125–128, 138n192, 141, 143, 145–147, 161–162, 175, 204, 217, 226–230, 234, 236, 239n14, 240n47, 243, 245–246; see also North Macedonia; Socialist Republic of Macedonia

‘Macedonia to the Macedonians’ (Macedonian slogan) 39–40, 55n31, 72; see also Gladstone Macedonia in Ottoman Empire see Ottoman Macedonia Macedonia naming dispute see GreekMacedonian naming dispute Macedonia ‘Switzerland of the Balkans’ (or ‘Balkan Switzerland’) 41, 46, 48, 75, 219; see also Macedonian supranationalism Macedonian autonomy or union with Bulgaria (1993–1940): the debate 38–39, 42; autonomy for Macedonia (autonomous Macedonia) genuine ix, 26, 36, 38–43, 46–48, 66–67, 72–74, 83, 144, 171, 173; autonomy stepping stone for union with Bulgaria 36, 38, 40, 42, 48, 67, 72, 142 Macedonian-Bulgarian conflict cum clashing narratives 36, 38, 40, 42, 45–46, 47, 65, 67, 139–147, 1251–152, 159–162, 170–175, 182–184, 243–246 Macedonian-Bulgarian Treaty of Friendship see Treaty of Friendship, Good-Neighbourhood, and Cooperation between the Republic of Macedonia and the Republic of Bulgaria Macedonian Bulgarians, the Macedonians as 26, 40–42, 47, 64, 66–68, 72, 74–75, 78, 96, 142, 144–146, 171–173, 196, 247; see also Bulgarian Macedonians Macedonian diaspora (Australia, North America) 112, 177, 180, 219 Macedonian-Greek conflict see GreekMacedonian conflict Macedonian-Greek naming dispute see Greek-Macedonian naming dispute Macedonian historians (1950s onwards) 173, 188n54; see also Macedonian revisionist history Macedonian irredentism (1940s–1950s) 92–3, 228; Macedonia against irredentism 115, 124, 228 (see also Gligorov, Kiro; Maleski, Denko); minority of ultranationalists today xi Macedonian irredentism-Greek claims xi, 115–116, 124, 127, 213–215, 228, 230–231; see also Prespa Agreement, provisions Macedonian language and dialect: between Serbian and Bulgarian 13–14, 25 (see also Belić, Cvijić); Macedonian Bulgarian dialect or

Index 271 language international linguistic debate 26, 152–153, 158–160, 162–163 (see also Friedman, Victor; Lunt, Horace; Marinov, Tchavdar); Macedonian dialects (Macedonian initially as a Bulgarian dialect) 2, 8, 10, 13, 64, 153; Macedonian western-central (zapadnocentralen) dialect of the Veles-Prilep-Bitola region to become Macedonian language 71, 73, 76, 157, 171 (see also Dedov, Stefan; Ivanovski, Vasil;Koneski, Blaže; Misirkov, Krste); Macedonian western-central (zapadnocentralen) dialect to become part of literary Bulgarian, attempts by Macedonians and Bulgarians 71, 154–155); Macedonian language (standardization as a distinct language) 92–94, 153–159, 162–163; Macedonian language non-existent (Bulgarian claim: western Bulgarian dialect(s)) x–xi, 90, 113, 139, 142, 145, 151–152, 159–162, 245–246 (see also BulgarianMacedonian language dispute); main Greek claim (1950–2017) a Bulgarian dialect x, 8, 23, 113, 152, 213–214, 217, 220; other Greek claims (distinct Slavic or Slav-Macedonian dialect (1920–1935)) 52–53, 152; related to ancient Greek Macedonian (1870s–1912) 8, 152, 176, 197; Serbian claims (southern Serbian dialect) 10, 13–14, 51, 83, 152, 159; see also Slav-Macedonian Macedonian language related to Old Church Slavonic of Cyril and Methodius (Macedonian claim) 161, 171, 175, 182–183, 219 Macedonian nation ix–x, 47, 50–51, 63–78, 83, 85, 90, 92–94, 167–186, 228, 230, 246; belated Macedonian nationhood 45, 63–66, 68, 112, 169– 170, 173, 218–219; belatedness, reasons for 64–65, 173; de-bulgarization, need for 172–173, 175, 247; early harbingers (1860s–1900) 68–71; final Greek acceptance of Macedonian nationhood cum language 228, 231–232 (see also Prespa Agreement) Macedonian nation, non existence of: Bulgarian claim xi, 65, 139–147, 245–246; Greek claim (1936–2017) 53, 65, 112–113, 115–116, 118, 120, 160, 213–215, 217; Serbian claim

(1880s–1940) 10, 13–14, 51, 83, 90, 115, 152, 159 Macedonian nation’s origins, ancient Macedonian roots see antikvizacija, antiquisation; Macedonian national narratives, three main narratives Macedonian nation’s origins, Medieval Slavic roots 168–169, 171, 174–175, 180, 182–183, 185–186, 219, 227; see also Gligorov, Kiro; Ivanovski, Vasil; Macedonian national narratives, three main narratives; Ristovski, Taškovski Macedonian national anniversary see Prophet Elijah’s day Macedonian national anthem 39, 157, 248; see also Maleski, Vlado Macedonian national narratives 36, 40, 42, 45, 47, 67, 70–71, 168–186, 219, 247– 248; Medieval (Ivanovski, Ristovski, Taškovski) 168 (see also Ivanovski, Vasil; Ristovski, Taškovski; Macedonian nation, Medieval Slavic roots); modernist (Katardžiev, Misirkov) 168 (see also Katardžiev, Ivan; Misirkov, Krste); see also VMORO, independent or Bulgarian (the Macedonian-Bulgarian debate); Ilinden Uprising, INI, Kruševo Republic; Čupovski, Ivanovksi, Katardjiev; Misirkov, Krste; Ristovski, Taškovski, Vlahov Macedonian nationalism 42, 47, 50, 64–68, 70–71, 74–78, 92–94, 127, 156, 161, 168–186, 217–218, 227, 244–247; see also Macedonian national narratives Macedonian nationalism and the VM(O) RO: ambivalent relationship 66–68; see also VMORO, VMRO Macedonian minority 112, 229; Macedonian minority in Bulgaria, denial of existence by Bulgaria x, 113, 140–142, 146, 244–247; Macedonian minority in Greece, denial of existence by Greece x, 113, 116, 185, 214–215, 217 Macedonian Question ix–x, 4; Macedonian Question lato sensu ix; Macedonian Question stricto sensu (1878–1949) ix–x; ‘New Macedonian Question’ x, 111–112 Macedonian refugees from Greece 102, 173; measures against them by Greece 102 Macedonian revisionist history 101, 169, 177, 181, 183–184; see also Ačkoska, Kiselovski, Risteski, Z. Todorovski

272

Index

Macedonian revolutionary organizations x, 36–50; see also MRO, TMORO, VMORO, VMRO, VMRO (ob), Vŭrhoven Makedonski Komitet Macedonian Revolutionary Organization (MRO) 37, 39 Macedonian Scientific Institute (in Bulgaria) 145–146 Macedonian Scholarly and Literary Society (or Macedonian Literaryscientific Student Fellowship) 71, 155, 185; see also Mišajkov, Dijamadija; Misirkov, Krste; Čupovski, Dimitrija; Young Macedonian Literary Society Macedonian supranationalism 40, 41–42, 47, 75; see also Macedonia ‘Switzerland of the Balkans’; Marinov, Tchavdar Macedonians’ alienation from Bulgaria, reasons for 41, 67–68, 155, 247 Macedonism (Makedonizam), Macedonists 13, 23, 68, 70–71, 146, 176, 185, 221; see also Cvijić, Novaković, Ristovski, Slaveykov Macedonoslavs or Macedono-Slavs (Greek designation) 31, 52; see also SlavMacedonians Macedo-Slavs 23, 26, 30, 83, 221; see also Cvijić Macron, Emmanuel 234, 241n69, 246 Makedonski, Dimitar 185–186 Maleska, Mirjana xii, 172 Maleski, Denko xii, 83–84, 115, 118–119, 121–122, 133n73, 134n82, 135n105, 135n108, 167, 177, 180, 220, 247, 249n46; critique of antiquisation 180–181; critique of Macedonian narrative 220, 247; nationalism and Balkan nationalisms 167, 177; ongoing Macedonian-Bulgarian conflict 247 Maleski, Vlado 157, 248 Makedonski, Dimitar 185–186 MANAPO (Makedonski naroden pokret), Macedonian People’s/National Movement 77 maps see ethnographic map(s) Marinov, Tchavdar xii, 36, 41, 45–47, 53n1, 54n22, 54n28, 55n30, 58n105, 58n123, 67, 70, 74, 77, 82n141, 154, 160, 162–163; Ilinden in Bulgarian and Macedonian narrative 45–46; Macedonian language 154, 162–163; Macedonian separatism and the VMORO 36, 41, 47, 53n1, 67, 74, 77; Macedonian supranationalism 41, 47

Markovski, Venko 77, 93, 101, 156–158, 185 Masing, Leonhard 26 Marko Kraljević 197 Marković, Sima 51, 84 Markovski, Venko 77, 93, 101, 156–158, 185 Matov, Hristo 37, 42–43, 46 May Manifesto (May 1924) 49 Mazon, André 152 Mazzini, Giuseppe 8; see also Renan, Ernest Medieval geographical Macedonia, Bulgarian or Macedonian heritage? (Samuil, Cyril and Methodius) xi, 1–2, 8, 10, 141–145, 150, 160–161, 168–169, 171–172, 174–175, 179, 182–183, 185–186, 219, 244–245 (Bulgarian heritage) xi, 1–2, 8, 10, 141–145, 160–161, 171, 244–245 (see also Cyril and Methodius, Cyril and Methodius in Bulgarian narrative; Samuil, Samuil’s empire as Bulgarian); Macedonian heritage (claimed by Macedonians) xi, 76–77, 150, 161, 168–169, 171–172, 174–175, 179, 182–183, 185–186, 219 (see also ASNOM; Čupovski; Cyril and Methodius, Cyril and Methodius in Macedonian narrative; Dinev, Grekov; Ivanovski, Vasil; B. Panov, M.B. Panov, Ristovski; Samuil, Samuil’s empire as Macedonian; Taškovski, Vlahov) Medieval period, Middle Ages xi, 8–13, 65, 92, 141–144, 167, 171–175, 177, 179, 182–183, 219 Medieval Bulgaria xi, 8–10, 92, 141–144, 177; see also Bulgarian Empire, Samuil, Simeon, Zhivkov Medieval Macedonia (Macedonian narrative) xi, 168–169, 171–175, 179, 182–183, 219; see also Bogomils; Cyril and Methodius; Samuil Medieval Serbia 10–13, 65, 175; see also Serbian Empire; Stefan Dušan Megali Idea (Greek irredentist Great Idea) 3, 5, 10–12, 22, 24; see also Greater Greece; Greek irredentism Meillet, André 153 Meinhard, F. 22 Metaxas, Ioannis 53, 185, 215, 217 Michael III, Byzantine Emperor 150; see also Cyril and Methodius

Index 273 Michev, Dobrin 145–146 Mihailov, Ivan (Vancho) 48–50, 59n135, 59n146, 59n150, 86–89, 93, 183, 185 Miladinov brothers 68–69, 151, 153–154, 171, 173; Dimitar Miladinov 68, 154, 176, 185, 197; Konstantin Miladinov 68, 69, 154 Miletich, Lyubomir 29 Miljovski, Kiro 172 Mill, John Stuart 8 millet system (Ottoman Empire) 22, 175; Bulgarian millet 6; Rum millet 6 Milojević, Miloš 12–14, 23 Milošević, Slobodan ix, x, 115–118, 120; Milošević’s policy against Macedonia ix–x, 115–118, 133n72 Minogue, Kenneth 66 Mirchev, Kiril 159 Mišajkov, Dijamadija 71, 155 Misirkov, Krste 42, 68, 71–75, 83, 142, 153, 155–158, 168, 173–174, 185, 219, 247; Bulgaria as ‘demon’ for the Macedonians 72; creating a Macedonian language 73 (see also Macedonian dialects); creating a Macedonian nation 72–73; Ilinden Uprising 72, 142, 173; Serbian contribution to Macedonian nationhood 72; VMORO and ambivalent link with Bulgaria 72–73; see also Ristovski Mitsotakis, Konstantinos 113, 116–120, 122–123, 192n171, 229 Mitsotakis, Kyriakos 233–234 modernity and nationalism see nationalism and modernity Mojsov, Lazar 173 Molotov, Vyacheslav 96–99 Momigliano, Arnaldo 207 Monastir vilâyet see Bitola (Monastir) province Moscow University (Lomonosov) 12, 68 Mouzelis, Nicos 207 Načertanije (Outline) 11–12; see also Greater Serbia, Garašanin, Serbian irredentism Naceva, Mara 88, 91 naming disputes 111, 224–226; see also Greek-Macedonian naming dispute, geographical name cases settled amicably or by default national awakening/national awakeners 63–64, 66, 167–169; Bulgarian national awakening/national awakener(s)

64, 68–69, 142, 155, 175, 218; Greek national awakening 64, 218; Macedonian belated national awakening 45, 63–64, 72, 77, 169, 172, 176, 185, 218; Serbian national awakening 64, 218 national historical narratives 167–168 nationalism and modernity 6, 64, 66, 168–169, 218 nationalism, theories of 8, 65–66, 78, 167–170, 218 nationalism ix–xi, 6, 28, 64–66, 78, 167, 169–170, 193, 203, 218; see also Bulgarian nationalism; Greek nationalism; Macedonian nationalism; Serbian nationalism nationalities, principle of 7–8 nationalities of Macedonia 31, 42, 46, 48, 50, 72, 78, 85, 221 NATO 111, 115, 120, 121, 126–128, 217, 233–236, 244; Macedonia bid to join NATO 126, 226–229, 232–234; NATO and Greek veto 127–128, 179; North Macedonia accession to NATO (2019) 234 nationalities of Yugoslavia 89 Naum 151; see also Clement; Cyrillic alphabet; Ohrid Literary School; Preslav Literary School Naumovski, Vasko 128, 226 Nazi Germany 49, 83–86, 88–90, 93, 104n30 Nedelkovski, Kole 77, 156 Netherlands 117, 123, 225, 234 Neuilly, Treaty of (1919) 31, 52 New Democracy (Greek party) 120, 123, 233–234, 241n57 Nicolaides, Kleanthis 23, 29 Nikolaev, Danail 40 Nikolajević, Svetomir 13 Nimetz, Mathew 124–126, 128, 226, 228–231, 236–237, 240n47; compound name suggestions 126, 128, 138n193, 226; ‘principle of loss aversion’ 230; see also Greek-Macedonian naming dispute NOF (National Liberation Front), SlavMacedonian 101–102 Northern Ireland 111, 224–225 North Macedonia x, 126, 129 (Table 6.1), 161, 168, 208n3, 214–215, 226, 230– 234, 237–238, 245–248; see also former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia; Macedonia

274

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North Macedonia accession process to EU 234; temporary veto by France, Netherlands and Denmark 234; veto dropped 234 Northern Ireland 111, 224–225 Novaković, Stojan 12–14, 19n107, 23, 146, 177; idea of Macedonism 13, 23 (see also Macedonism) Obolensky, Dimitri 175 Ohrid Literary School 151, 183; see also Clement; Cyrillic alphabet; Naum; Preslav Literary School Old Serbia (Stara Srbija) 10, 12, 24, 51, 83 O’Neil, Robin 121–122 Orbini, Mavro 196 Orthodox Christians in Macedonia 5, 8–9, 21–22, 24, 51, 64, 216, 218 Orthodox Church 6–7, 63 OSCE (Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe) 111, 117, 121 Ostrogorsky, George 175 Ottoman Balkans (Ottomans in Europe) 2, 6, 10, 14, 21, 27–28, 196, 218 Ottoman Empire, Ottomans, Sublime Porte (Ottoman Government) ix, xi, 1–3, 5–7, 9–12, 14, 21–22, 27–29, 30, 40, 48, 214; see also ‘Turks’ for the Ottomans Ottoman Macedonia x, 1–2, 8–9, 24, 27, 36, 38, 40, 43–45, 65, 67, 70–71, 74, 115, 155, 163, 175–176, 182, 196, 220 Ottoman misgovernment/Ottoman misrule 10, 28 Owen, David 121, 123 Paeonia or Paionia, Paeonians/Paionians 2, 198–199 Paisii of Hilandar 144, 160 Pallis, Alexander 52 Pandev, Konstantin 40 Pandevski, Manol 47, 173, 184 Panitsa, Todor 46, 48–49 Panov, Anton 77, 156, 185 Panov, Branko 182, 190n104 Panov, Mitko B. 168, 179, 183 Pan-Slavism, pan-Slavist(s) 7, 12, 20 Papaconstantinou, Mihalis 121–123, 134n97 Papandreou, Andreas 112, 120, 123–124 Papandreou, George 125, 128 Paparrigopoulos, Constantine 4–5, 22, 216; ancient Macedonians as non-Greeks 4; ancient Macedonians as Greeks 4–5; contacts with Kiepert 22 (see also

Kiepert, Heinrich); see also Greek national narrative; Grote, George Papoulias, Karolos 124 Paris Peace Conference (1919–1920) 30–31, 48, 226 Paris Peace Conference (1946) 96, 143 Parlichev, Grigor 78, 70, 153–154 Partisan(s) (National Liberation Army and Partisan Detachments of Yugoslavia) 46, 84, 87, 99, 219 Partisans in Macedonia (Macedonian Partisan Detachments) 87–88, 90, 92, 150, 156, 170, 219 PASOK (Greek party Pan-Hellenic Socialist Movement) 123, 125 Patriarchate and Greek irredentism 6–7 Patriarchate of Constantinople, Patriarch (Ecumenical Patriarchate/Ecumenical Patriarch) 5–10, 14, 24, 27, 63, 171; opposition to Bulgarian Church 6–7 Patriarchists (Bulgarians or Slavspeakers) 8, 9, 44, 64, 216; see also Exarchists Pausanias 197 Pavelić, Ante 49–50, 59n135, 89 Pavlowitch, Stefan 89 Pejčinoviḱ, Hadži Kiril 153–154 Pendarovski, Stevo 247 percentages agreement (October 1944) 97–98, 109n173; see also Churchill, Winston; Stalin Petermann, August Heinrich 20 Petkovski, Ljupcho 237 Perseus, King of Macedon 1 Petrich district (or Petrich region) 48–49, 95; see also Pirin Macedonia Petrov, Gyorche 37, 39–43, 46, 48, 66–67, 144, 156, 173, 219 Petrov, Petar 145–146 Petruševska, Dušica 176 Petruševski, Mihailo 157 Philip II, King of Macedon ix, 5, 31, 176– 178, 181, 197, 199, 200–203, 206, 215 Pineiro, João de Deus 119, 130 Pineiro Package (April 1992) 119, 130 Pirin Macedonia x, 48–49, 77, 91–92, 94–96, 100, 140–141, 145, 147 Plutarch 197, 202, 205 Poparsov, Petar 37, 42, 46, 48, 71, 153 Popov, Antov 76 Popov, Dimitur 113 Popov, Konstantin 160 Popović, K. 112 Poptomov, Vladimir 50, 91, 93, 172, 248 Popyordanov, Yordan 43–44

Index 275 Portugal 111, 119, 134n82, 130 Poulton, Hugh 158 Preobraženie Uprising 44, 143, 145 Preslav Literary School 153, 183; see also Clement; Cyrillic alphabet; Naum; Ohrid Literary School Prespa Agreement (Greek-Macedonian, 2018) x, 213, 217, 226–238; assessment of Greek Government 235; assessment of Macedonian Government 235–236; general assessment-appraisalcriticism 236–238; motives of Greece 227–228; motives of Macedonia 227; negotiations, main issues 226–231; provisions 231–232, 235–236, 238; provisions against irredentism 231, 235–236, 238; sticking point erga omnes 228–231, 235–236, 240n32, 240n47 Pribićević, Svetovar 83 Pribojević, Vinco 196 propaganda in Macedonia (1870–1912): Bulgarian propaganda 10–11, 90, 141, 173; Greek propaganda 9, 36, 173, 175; Serbian propaganda 13–14, 36–37, 54n6, 54n8, 70, 72, 146, 173 Prophet Elijah’s day (2 August, Macedonian National Anniversary) 43, 92; see also ASNOM; Ilinden Uprising Protić, Stojan 13 Protogerov, Aleksandar 48–49, 174, 183 Pulevski, Georgi 68–70, 153, 155–156, 185, 220; existence of Slav-Macedonian language 69; existence of SlavMacedonians as a distinct people 69–70 Pushkarov, Nikola 75 Racin, Kočo 77, 156, 185 Radev, Rumen 161, 245 Rakowski, Georgi 69, 154–155, 220, 223n38 Ranković, Aleksandar 84 Rappoport, Alfred 26 Rastislav, King of Moravia 150; see also Cyril and Methodius; Glagolitic alphabet; Michael III, Byzantine Emperor Reed, John 3 refugees from Greece (Macedonians) 102, 173 refugees to Bulgaria (Bulgarians or Macedonians) 25, 31, 45, 99 refugees to Greece from Asia Minor (Greeks) 52, 215

refugees, Muslim 28 rehabilitation of leading Macedonian figures and controversy 183–184 Reiss, Archibald 30 Relković, Matija Antun 196 Renan, Ernest 8, 65, 167 Rila Congress of VMORO (October 105) 39, 46 Risteski, Stoyan 101, 183 Ristovski, Blaže 71, 80n68, 164n28, 168, 173–174, 182, 184–186; Macedonian historical roots 174–175, 182, 185–186; Macedonian myth regarding ancient Macedonians 185–186; Macedonian name 186; Misirkov 174 Roman Empire, Roman(s) 1, 3, 10, 168, 176–177–180, 197, 199–200, 229 Romania/Romanian(s) 2–3, 5, 9, 51, 64, 67, 85, 96, 145, 161–162, 168, 218, 225 Rossos, Andrew 55n30, 65; reasons for belated nationhood 65 Russia, Russian(s) (Russian Empire) 3, 7, 12, 18n94, 20, 26–27, 54n20, 71, 73, 152, 155, 162, 196; Russian ethnographic maps of Macedonia (1890s–1900s) 26–27; Russo-Ottoman War (1877–1878) 7, 20 Russian Pan-Slavism 7, 12, 20; Greek and Serbian fears of Russian Pan-Slavism 7, 12 (see also Bulgaria and Pan-Slavism) Russia (Russian Federation) 125, 162, 234 Šafárik, Pavel 20, 151 Šahov, Kosta 37, 42, 71, 176 Samaras, Andonis 112–113, 116–120, 123, 233 Samuil, Tsar of First Bulgarian Empire xi, 2, 65, 74, 76–77, 92, 144, 169, 172, 174–175, 177, 180, 182–183, 219, 233, 244–245; Samuil’s empire as Bulgarian (Bulgarian view) xi, 65, 141–142, 144, 219; Samuil’s empire as Bulgarian (independent scholarly views) 142, 219; Samuil’s empire as Bulgarian (Macedonian final acceptance) 244–245; Samuil’s empire as Macedonian (Macedonian view) xi, 74, 76–77, 92, 144, 169, 172, 174–175, 177, 180, 182–183, 219; Samuil’s empire as Macedonian (independent scholarly views) 175 Šandanov, Petŭr 50 Sandanski, Yane 37, 39, 42–43, 46–48, 67, 76, 92, 141, 144, 156, 173, 219, 248

276

Index

San Stefano Treaty (1878) 7, 11; see also Bulgaria of San Stefano Šapkarev, Kuzman 71, 153–154 Sarafov, Boris 37, 40–44, 46–47, 55n47, 67, 156, 174, 183 Sax, Karl 20–21 SDSM (Social Democratic Union of Macedonia) 113, 184, 227, 234–235, 240n48, 243 Second World War x, 20, 29, 46, 51, 68, 78, 83, 84, 94, 144, 152, 156, 185, 225 Serbia, Serbian(s) ix–x, 3–4, 10, 20, 26–27, 64–65, 69, 85, 87–88, 91, 145, 159, 162, 170, 196 Serbia-Montenegro (smaller Yugoslavia of 1990s) 124 Serbian-dominated interwar Yugoslavia ix, 48, 51–52, 83, 88 Serbian ethnographic maps (1880s–1918) 12, 26, 29–30 Serbian Empire 10–11, 12–13, 65, 175; see also Stefan Dušan Serbian irredentism 11–12; see also Greater Serbia; Načertanije Serbian language 11, 14, 152–153, 157, 159; see also Karadžić, Vuk; Štokavian dialect Serbian Macedonia as ‘Old Serbia’ or ‘South Serbia’ 10, 12, 24, 51, 83; see also Serbian Empire; Vardar Macedonia Serbian nationalism 12–14, 23–24, 115, 151, 170, 218; see also Greater Serbia; Načertanije Serbian policy to acquire Ottoman Macedonia (1870s–1912) 10–14, 23–24, 26–31, 36–37, 40, 70, 72 Serbian Revolution 11 Serbs in Ottoman Macedonia 2, 21, 23–25, 27, 64 Seton-Watson, Robert William 26, 30 Shatev, Pavel 43–44, 48, 50, 57n85, 76, 93, 100–101, 158, 174, 183 Shatorov, Metodi (Sharlo) 50, 85, 87–88, 183 Shukarova, Aneta 178 Simeon I the Great, Tsar of First Bulgarian Empire 144, 151 Simitis, Costas 125 Simovski, Todor 173 Skopje (Üsküb or Kosovo) province (Ottoman vilâyet) 2 Skopje, city of 2, 12–13, 24, 26, 74–75, 77, 85–86, 88–89, 93, 96, 101, 121,

123–127, 159, 175, 181–182, 184, 226, 240n45, 243, 249n36 ‘Skopje 2014 project’ 127, 175, 181–182, 227; Macedonians against the project 127, 181, 227 Skopje, Saints Cyril and Methodius University of 77, 158, 169, 172, 206 Slaveykov, Petko 70–71, 80n68, 155, 176–177, 185, 196; see also Macedonism Slavic alphabet, Slavonic alphabet, Old Slavic or Old Slavonic alphabet, Old Church Slavic alphabet or Old Church Slavonic alphabet 150–151 Slavic or Slavonic alphabet 150–151, 161, 163; Bulgarian alphabet (Bulgarian claim) 144, 160–161; Macedonian alphabet (Macedonian claim) 162, 171–172, 182–183, 219 Slavic migration to the Balkans (sixthseventh century) 2, 76, 174, 185, 207, 216 Slav-Macedonian(s) 42, 52, 69–70, 74, 83, 112, 152, 155, 220–221; SlavMacedonians (Slav-Macedonia) (Greek designation) 52, 116, 123, 134n97, 137n190, 152, 214, 221 Slav-Macedonian minority in Greece see Macedonian minority Slavophone Greeks (according to Greece) 30–31, 52, 61n188, 86, 90, 116, 215 Slav-speaking inhabitants of Macedonia (1870–1914) ix, 3, 5, 9, 10, 13, 27, 30, 44, 63–64, 76, 142, 154, 197 Slovenia, Slovene(s) 30, 48, 84, 91–92, 114, 117–118, 151, 163 Smith, Anthony D. 65–66, 78, 167 Smith, Arthur Howden 26 SNOF (Slavo-Macedonian Popular Liberation Front) 90–91; see also NOF Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia ix, 85, 122 Socialist Republic of Macedonia (SRM) ix–x, 92–94, 111, 113, 122, 141, 213, 230 Sofia University 48 Sokolov, Lazar 89, 93, 101 Šoptrajan(ov), Gjorgji 157 Soteriades, Georgios 31 Souliotes-Nikolaidis, Athanasios 8 Southern Serbs/Serbians, Old Serbians, the Macedonians as (Serbian claim) 13, 51, 90, 114–115

Index 277 Spain 122, 221 Srećković, Panta 12–13 Stalin 84, 88, 91–92, 94–102, 109n173, 112, 140, 159, 183; Balkan federation 94–96, 98; fear of Western reaction 97–98; Greek Civil War 97–98; Macedonians 92; percentages agreement 97–98; see also Dimitrov, Georgi; Greek Civil War; Kremlin meeting under Stalin; percentages agreement; Tito, Josip Broz; Tito-Stalin split Stamboliyski, Aleksandar 48 Stanford, Edward 21 Stavrianos. L.S. 63–64, 199; Macedonian illiterary and potential for nationhood 63–64; view on ancient Macedonians 199 Stefan Dušan, Tsar of Serbian Empire 2, 10–12, 65, 175; see also Serbian Empire Stoianovich, Traian 199; view on ancient Macedonians 199 Štokavian dialect 11, 151, 162; see also Gaj, Ljudevit; Karadžić, Vuk Stoyanov, Vasil 155 Stoychev, Alexandar 244 Stoykov, Stoyko 160 Strabo 197, 199, 205 Strandzha Republic 44 Strossmayer, Josip Juraj 151 Supreme Macedonian Committee/Supremists see Vŭrhoven Makedonski Komitet symbolic conflict 193–194; symbolic conflict in New Guinea 193 (see also Harrison, Simon); symbolic conflict over legacy of Alexander the Great 194 (see also Harrison, Simon; Vangeli, Anastas) symbolic power 193; see also Bourdieu, Pierre; Vangeli, Anastas SYRIZA (Greek political party Coalition of the Radical Left) 128, 226, 233 Taiwan see China, Republic of (ROC) Taškovski (or Tashkovski), Dragan 168, 173, 175–177; romantic attachment to ancient Macedonians 176; Samuil’s empire in substance Macedonian 175, 177; Slavic origins of Macedonians 176–177 Tatarchev, Hristo 37–39, 42–43, 46, 48, 144, 156, 173 Tatars, the Bulgarians as (Greek, Macedonian and Serbian claim) 7, 14, 70–71, 175

Thessaloniki bombings 43–44; see also Gemidzhii Thessaloniki, city of (Salonika, Selânik, Solun) 2, 20, 22, 26, 37, 95, 102, 124, 126 Thessaloniki conference of VMORO (January 1903) 43; see also Garvanov, Ivan; Ilinden Uprising Thessaloniki meeting at Çelebi Bakkal Street (October 1893) 37; see also Macedonian Revolutionary Organization (MRO) Thessaloniki, Middle Ages and Slav language 150, 161, 171 Thessaloniki province (Ottoman vilâyet) 2, 27 Thessaloniki rallies (1992, 2018–2019) 192, 233 Thessaly 1, 3, 5, 8, 22, 204 Thrace 1, 24, 27–28, 31, 38, 42, 44, 154, 198; Western Thrace 28, 52, 86, 96 Thrasymachus 197, 206 Thucydides 197, 199, 204–205 Tito, Josip Broz ix, x, 50, 65, 68, 83–85, 87–89, 91, 93–96, 98–102, 112, 118, 141, 152, 159, 182–184, 219; ‘arbitrary creator of Macedonia’ (Bulgarian and Greek claim) 65, 115, 118, 140, 142, 145, 152–153, 162, 213–214, 236; Balkan federation 94–95, 98; claim to Greek Macedonia (1945–1949) 95, 98, 102; contribution to Macedonian nationhood x, 65, 85, 89–91, 92–94, 153, 155, 162, 182, 184 and Chapter 5 (83–102); Greek Civil War (assistance to Greek communists) 98–99, 102; see also Balkan federation of Yugoslavia and Bulgaria; CPY; Greek Civil War; Koliševski, Lazar; Shatorov, Metodi; Stalin; Tito-Stalin split; VukmanovićTempo, Svetozar Tito’s Partisans see Partisans Titoist Yugoslavia or Tito’s Yugoslavia 50, 112, 142, 146, 182–183 Tito-Stalin split x 99–102, 112, 140, 159; reasons 99–100; repercussions 100–102 (Bulgaria regarding Pirin Macedonia 100; Greek Civil War ending 101–102; persecution of pro-Bulgarian ‘Cominformist’ Macedonians 100–101); see also Dedijer, Vladimir; Djilas, Milovan; Stalin; Tito, Josip Broz

278

Index

TMORO (Tayna Makedono-Odrinska Revoliutsionna Organizatsiya) (SMARO: Secret MacedonianAdrianopole Revolutionary Organization 39–40 Todorova, Maria 7 Todorovski, Gligor 173–174 Todorovski, Zoran 183 Toshev, Pere 37, 43, 46 Toynbee, Arnold 26, 152, 198–199; view on ancient Macedonians 198–199 Trajanovski, Zarko 181 Trayanovski, Alexandar 173 Treaty of Friendship, GoodNeighbourhood, and Cooperation between the Republic of Macedonia and the Republic of Bulgaria x, 140, 147, 161, 243–245; Treaty of Friendship in the doldrums 245–246 Troebst, Stefan 115, 170 Tsankov, Aleksandar 49 Tsilas, Lucas 124 Tsipras, Alexis 226–227, 230–231, 233, 235 Tsonchev, Ivan 40, 43–44, 46 Turkey/Turks, Turkish 49, 121, 163, 168, 220, 227–228 ‘Turks’ and ‘Turkey’ (for the Ottomans and the Ottoman Empire) 2–3, 7, 9, 12, 14, 20–22, 27–29, 38, 42, 46–48, 64, 143, 151, 175, 184, 196 Turkish History Thesis 168, 220 Tzounis, Ioannis 120 UN (United Nations) 111, 117, 120–126, 128, 131, 224, 234–235 UN Charter 114 UN General Assembly 111, 122 UN Secretary-General 111, 121, 124 UN Security Council 111, 122 United Nations Preventive Deployment Mission (UNPREDEP) 121 United Nations Protection Force (UNPROFOR) 121 United States 97–98, 100, 102, 111–112, 120–121, 125, 217, 231, 234; see also American/Americans Ustasha 49–50, 59n135 Vafiades, Markos 101 Vaillant, André 153 Vance, Cyrus 121, 123–125 Vance-Owen Package (May 1993) 123 Vangeli, Anastas xii, 179, 193

Vardar (or Vardarska) Banovina or Vardar Banate (Macedonia in interwar Yugoslavia) 83, 114 Vardar Macedonia 51, 68, 77, 83, 85–92, 140, 219, 247 Vankovska, Biljana xii, 229, 244 Vassilakis, Adamantios 125, 128, 226 Vazov, Ivan 161 Veles-Prilep-Bitola Macedonian dialect/ Veles-Pripel-Bitola-Ohrid Macedonian dialect/Prilep-Bitola-Kicevo-Veles Macedonian dialect 71, 73, 155–157 Venizelos, Eleftherios 29, 30–31 Vergina sun or star 124, 177, 194; Vergina sun or star in Macedonian flag 124, 177 Verković, Stjepan 12, 196 Veselinov, Kosta 76, 185 Veselinović, Milojko 12, 13, 14 Vidoeski, Božidar 158 Vlachs, Vlachspeakers, Aromanian, Romanianspeakers in Macedonia 2–3, 5, 8–9, 21, 24–25, 27, 29, 31, 39, 44, 153, 155, 175, 196, 215; Greek narrative (Vlachs as Greeks) 8–9 (see also Greek ethnographic maps) Vlahov, Dimitar 46–51, 77, 91–93, 171– 172, 248; Macedonian nation and its birth 171–172 (see also VMRO (ob.)) VM(O)RO see VMORO; VMRO VMORO (Vŭtreshna Makedono-Odrinska Revoliutsionna Organizatsiya). IMARO (Internal Macedonian-Adrianopolitan Revolutionary Organization (IMARO) 39, 41–48, 66, 68, 72–73, 76, 92, 141–145, 156, 173, 184, 219, 247–248; independent or Bulgarian (MacedonianBulgarian debate) 40–42, 47, 66–68, 72–73, 76, 141–142, 144–146, 156, 173, 184, 219, 245–246 (see also Macedonian nationalism and the VM(O)RO) VMRO (ob.), VMRO (obedinena), Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization (United) 48, 50, 68, 76–78, 85, 92 VMRO Vŭtreshna Makedonska Revoliutsionna Organizatsiya, IMRO: Internal Secret Revolutionary Organization) ix, 36, 39, 48–52, 59n135, 60–61n150, 67, 86–90, 183–185, 219 VMRO-BND (Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization-Bulgarian National Movement) 146, 244–245 VMRO-DPMNE (Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization-Democratic

Index 279 Party of Macedonian National Unity) 113, 126, 168–169, 177, 181, 183, 214, 227, 232, 234–236, 240n48, 244 Vukmanović-Tempo, Svetozar 85, 88–92, 93, 95, 219; successful operation in Vardar Macedonia 88–92 Vŭrhoven Makedonski Komitet (Supreme Macedonian Committee), Vŭrhovist(s)/ Supremist(s) 40–46, 48, 173 Weigand, Gustav 22, 152 Wiener, Myron 85 Xydopoulos, Ioannis 205–206; view on ancient Macedonians 205–206 Yosmaoğlu, İpek K. 42, 54n11, 67 Young Macedonian Literary Society 37, 176; see also Poparsov, Petar Young Turks, Young Turk Revolution 9, 27–28, 46–47, 64, 184; see also CUP Yovkov, Arseniy 75 Yugoslavia ix, x, 13, 30, 48, 50–52, 65, 73, 77, 83–102, 112–115, 118, 140–142, 146–147, 151, 154, 159, 168, 174, 182–184, 213, 219; Yugoslavia during

the interwar 48; Yugoslav-Bulgarian federation idea 94–98, 100; see also Federal Yugoslavia; former Yugoslavia; Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia; Titoist or Tito’s Yugoslavia Yugoslavia (Serbia-Montenegro) under Milošević ix–x, 114–118, 120–121, 124, 133n72 Yugoslavian-Bulgarian relations (1944–1948) 94–96, 98 Yugoslavia as Serbia-Montenegro 115, 118, 124 Zachariadis, Nicos 90, 99, 101–102, 110n222 Zaev, Zoran 226–227, 229–231, 234–236, 243–245; see also Prespa Agreement; SDSM Zaharieva, Ekaterina 161, 245 Zankov, Georgi 50, 75 Zarev, Pantelej 143 Zelev, Zhelyu 139–140 Zhivkov, Todor 140–141, 143–144, 147, 160 Žinzifov, Rajko 154–155 Zografski, Partenij 71, 153–154

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