Petar Pop-Arsov
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Petar Pop-Arsov (1868, Bogomila, present day Republic of Macedonia - 1941, Sofia, Bulgaria) was a Macedonian (according the official statement in Republic of Macedonia) or Bulgarian (according the official statement in Bulgaria) revolutionary, one of the founders of "The Committee for Obtaining the Political Rights Given to Macedonia by the Congress of Berlin" from which, as Petar Pop Arsov says in his writings, later developed the IMRO known prior to 1902 as Bulgarian Macedonian-Adrianople Revolutionary Committees (BMARC) ^ ^ . His last name is sometimes rendered 'Poparsov' or 'Pop Arsov'.
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[edit] Early life
He was born in 1868 in the village Bogomila, Veles, in a priest family. He was one of the leaders of the student protest in Exarchate school in Thessaloniki in 1887/1888 where the main objective was to replace the East Bulgarian dialect with a Macedonian dialect in the lecturing. As a consequence, he was expelled along with 38 other students. He managed to enroll in the philology studies program at Belgrade University in 1888, but because his resistance to Serbianisation, he was once more evicted in 1890.
[edit] Young Macedonian Literary Society
In 1891 he is one of the founder of Young Macedonian Literary Society in Sofia and its magazine Loza (The Vine). The purpose of the society was two-fold: the official one was primarily scholarly and literary; the second, secret one was national-revolutionary in character[citation needed]. One of the purposes of the magazine of Young Macedonian Literary Society was to defend the idea the dailects from Macedonia to be more represented in Bulgarian literature language. The articles where historical, cultural and ethnographic. The authors of this magazine clearly considered tham as Macedonian Bulgarians, but the Bulgarian government suspected them of the lack of loyality and some separatism and magazine was promptly banned by the Bulgarian authorities after several issues.
[edit] Stambolovism and its Representatives in Macedonia
Towards the end of 1893 , IMRO was established in Salonica (Thessalonica). We can learn about it in a brochure by Vardarski (Petar Pop Arsov) called "Stambolovism and its Representatives in Macedonia", which was written in accordance with a resolution of the committee and published in 1894. The brochure was addressed to the "former minister" Sarafov who was then in charge of the Bulgarian grammar school in Salonica (Thessalonica):
"…It is hard, is it not, Mr. Sarafov, when a man once falls morally in the eyes of the people?... And we promise you that such will continue to be the fate of any of your compatriots who come to Macedonia with pretensions to ‘creating Bulgars’, to ‘cultivating the land’ and to ‘taking over everything’ as you wish to do in Salonica with the Sunday School, with your ‘presidency’ and your ignoring of the rights of the Council — the representatives of the people: even worse will be the position of your chief, let him be who he may, if he goes on giving you similar instructions. The Bulgarian ideal will never triumph if you go on in this mind. Why have we Macedonians got nothing at all? We have gained nothing thanks to our blind trust in our so-called brothers and so we have nothing to lose. It is sad, but what can we do when the majority of our intellectuals have been corrupted by your gold? Once upon a time the gold of our countryman Philip bought the prudent Athenian intellectuals and he conquered Greece. Other days, other ways, conditions are just the reverse now — Brother has sold brother…"[citation needed]
[edit] IMRO
The best proof of the aims and tasks of the Young Macedonian Literary Society was provided during the following year when its members became either founders of or active participants in "The Committee for Obtaining the Political Rights Given to Macedonia by the Congress of Berlin" from which, as Petar Pop Arsov says, there later developed the so-called IMRO. These were the Macedonian intellectuals who were "the witnesses to the hellish condition of Macedonia and took account of the geographical, ethnographic, economic and other characteristics of the country". From 1896-7 he works in Shtip as a Bulgarian teacher and president of regional IMARO section. In 1897 he was arrested by Ottoman authorities on charges of inciting rebellion, and sentenced to 101 years in prison. Fortunately he was pardoned in August 1902. After his release he encountered changed political climate in Macedonia. He remained passive during the Ilinden-Preobrazhenie Uprising of 1903. However, after the failure of the uprising, he was admitted to the Central Committee of IMARO. At the Rila Congress in November 1905, he was elected in the representative body of IMRO. He championed the idea of Macedonian autonomy. Allegedly because of his ideas, he was subsequently arrested in Bulgaria on two occasions.
During the First Balkan War he and Dimitrija Čupovski organized an all-Macedonian congress that authorized them to represent the Macedonian question in the Peace Conference. His ideal of United Macedonia was buried by the Treaty of Bucharest, 1913. In 1920 he fully withdrew from politics and after brief illness died in Sofia in 1941.
[edit] Notes
- ^ IMRO is the most commonly used name for the organization in which Petar Pop-Arsov participated, although it is certain that in some his active days, the organization had a different name. What that name was is a matter of considerable dispute between historians from Bulgaria and the Republic of Macedonia. According to Bulgarian historians the name of the organization from 1896 to 1902 was Bulgarian Macedonian-Adrianople Revolutionary Committees (BMARC), and it was meant only for Bulgarians, while according to ethic Macedonian historians the name of the organization was Secret Macedonian-Adrianople Revolutionary Organization (SMARO) from 1896 to 1905, and it was meant for all ethnic Macedonians. See IMRO for more details.
- ^ Fikret Adanir – Die Makedonische Frage, Wiessbaden 1979
- ^ Константин Пандев (“Национално-освободителното движение в Македония и Одринско” на София 1979, с. 129-130)
