Sava Sivriev
Athanasiy Neskovich and his History Of The Slav-Bulgarian People (Budum, 1801)
Summary
This article presents an unsufficiently studied text – History of the Slav-Bulgarian People by Athanasiy Neskovich printed in Budim (Budapest) in 1801. This is the first printed book on Bulgarian history.
The author aims to prove that the History of Neskovich is not a revision of History of Various Slavonic Peoples by Jovan Raich, as is usually thought in literary historiography, but it is an independent work, in which Raich was used as a main source. Neskovich’s History investigates only Bulgarian history in a “simple” (i.e. vernacular) language different from the Latin and Church Slavonic languages, in which historical works were then written.
The paper examines the connections between the History and the novel ideas of the 18th century, the social situation in the Austrian Empire in the late 18th century and the Bulgarian colony established in the empire. The book of Neskovich was written for their intellectual needs and awakened national identity.
