I’ve long believed one of the best reasons to create something is that you believe it should exist. That’s why I created The Bulgarian History Podcast 12 years ago and that’s why I wrote State Builders From the Steppe.
During the years I’ve been researching and writing episodes for that podcast, I was consistently surprised at just how deeply entwined Bulgaria's history was with that of the rest of Europe. Time and time again, the First and Second Bulgarian Empires played major roles in events like the Crusades, the spread of Christianity and literacy to the Slavs of the Balkans, and even the decline of the Byzantine Empire.
At the same time, I found this history full of fascinating dramatic moments, epic victories and losses on the battlefield, familial betrayals, the kind of stuff you wish someone would make a TV show about. And yet, when I consumed historical content about these eras in history I found Bulgaria was rarely mentioned, even when it played an important role. It felt as if historians and makers of history content had collectively decided that Bulgaria was simply not very interesting, important, or worth mentioning unless absolutely necessary.
This even extended to museums overseas. I recall visiting Thessaloniki and after spending hours visiting several museums dedicated to the history of the city found that Bulgaria was almost never mentioned. This despite the major role Bulgaria has played in the city’s history, with numerous battles and sieges between Bulgarians and Greeks occurring in and around the city over centuries.
Yet even within Bulgaria, the depth of the country’s history felt like it was missing. Many museums simply presented items without context and walking around the capital city of Sofia you’ll see dozens of monuments to Russians for every monument or historical marker connected to the country’s medieval history. Even when monuments were put up, like the infamous statue of Tsar Samuil, a lack of context about who Samuil was and what he experienced led to people mocking and dismissing the statue as mere kitsch.
Time and time again it felt like Bulgaria’s incredible history, something that should be a real asset for the country, was neglected. Of course my podcast has been addressing that issue for over a decade, but I felt there was more I could do. No one had written a book covering the history of the First Bulgarian Empire in a way that made it engaging and accessible for a wide audience since Stephen Runciman in 1930.
So I set out to write something that would take into account all we’ve learned since then and help make Bulgaria’s history more accessible than ever before. It was important the book be academically rigorous. I didn’t want to fill it with thinly sourced nationalistic stories. Instead, it would be honest about what we know and what we don’t know. Fortunately, it was clear that there was no need to resort to wishful inflation of mere stories to make this history fascinating.
I wanted to ensure the resulting book could open the eyes of new audiences to the fact that Bulgaria was not a 19th century invention that belonged at the margins of European history. It is a country with well over a millennium of history.
But besides that, I believe the history of the First Bulgarian Empire in particular has real lessons for us today. Its most fundamental struggle was not a military one, but a cultural struggle. The state spent centuries reckoning with whether it should embrace its Slavic population and the intense change that would bring or to remain a small ruling elite of Proto-Bulgarian aristocrats. For countries in the 21st century seeking to balance change with the maintenance of their old cultures, there are real lessons to be had.
All that is to say, I approached writing State Builders from the Steppe with a deep sense that such a book needs to exist. For everyone from tourists wanting to learn more about Bulgaria to history students writing about early medieval Europe, a comprehensive history of the First Bulgarian Empire will enhance their knowledge and, I hope, grab their attention as it has mine. The Bulgarian people deserve nothing less.