Happy National Holiday of Bulgaria! The Day of the Cyrillic Letters and the Culture

Happy national holiday! On May 24 we celebrate the Day of Bulgarian Education and Culture and the Slavonic Scripture. On this day, Bulgaria celebrates the national holiday of education, culture and the creation of the Glagolics by Cyril and Methodius.

The first translations of the holy scriptures by Cyril and Methodius, are recorded in the Glagolics. The first known evidence for the celebration of the holiday are found in an Armenian chronicle from 1813, which mentions the celebration of the holy brothers on 22 May 1803 in Shumen. For the first time on May 11, 1851, a celebration of Cyril and Methodius - creators of the Glagolitic, was organized at the St. Cyril and St. Methodius School in Plovdiv at the initiative of Naiden Gerov. The May 11th is not accidentally chosen by Naiden Gerov - this is the general religious feast of the two saints. In our Bulgarian Renaissance books, the first announcements of the celebration of Cyril and Methodius on May 11 meet in Neofit Rilski's 1852 Slavonic Church Gospel.

In 1857 the day of the "holy brothers" was honored in the Bulgarian church of St. Stephen in Constantinople, together with the service of St. Ivan Rilski. The following year, 1858, this day is also celebrated in Plovdiv with a solemn service in the church of the Virgin Mary, and then the teacher Yoakim Gruev gives an exciting account of the life and work of Cyril and Methodius. The holiday begins regularly to be celebrated in Shumen and Lom, and from 1860 in Skopje. From 1863 on May 11, it was established as a church holiday of the holy apostles Cyril and Methodius. In Sofia, the feast was organized by teacher Sava Filaretov.

During the struggles for church independence from the beginning of the 18th century, the historical work of Cyril and...