site.btaBTA Director General: Chintulov Plaque Another Tribute to Bulgarians Linked to Odesa

Bulgarian News Agency (BTA) Director General Kiril Valchev attended the unveiling of a memorial plaque dedicated to Bulgarian poet, composer and educator Dobri Chintulov at the Odessa Theological Seminary on Wednesday. “This is part of BTA’s ‘Bulgarian Places Around the World’ initiative to install memorial signs for prominent Bulgarians at locations outside Bulgaria where they lived and worked. So far, BTA has placed three memorial plaques for journalists, publicists and figures,” he explained.

The plaques installed so far are dedicated to Aleko Konstantinov in Odesa (Ukraine), to the brothers Lyubomir and Atanas Dalchev in Thessaloniki (Greece), and to Lyuben Karavelov in Belgrade (Serbia).

The organization of the installation of the plaque dedicated to Chintulov was carried out by the Consulate General of Bulgaria in Odesa, with the support of the Odessa Theological Seminary and with the blessing and participation of Metropolitan Agatangel of Odesa and Izmail, in the presence of the Kyiv Theological Seminary Rector Archbishop Sylvester Stoychev of Bilhorod, “who is one of at least 150,000 Bessarabian Bulgarians by ethnicity in Odesa Region according to the official census in Ukraine,” Valchev said.

According to him, the memorial plaque to Dobri Chintulov is another sign honouring notable Bulgarians connected with Odesa – a port for Bulgarian settlers since the founding of the Ukrainian Black Sea city in 1794, with the Odesa Bulgarian Board of Trustees established on February 2, 1854.

“The plan is that this year, when 180 years mark the publication in Leipzig (Germany) of the first Bulgarian newspaper, ‘Balgarski Orel’, we will place a memorial plaque in the city for its publisher Ivan Bogorov, and in 2027 – marking 185 years since the first Bulgarian magazine ‘Lyuboslovie’ – for Konstantin Fotinov in Izmir (Turkiye),” the Director General added.

He noted that it would be good for Bulgaria to support memorial signs in Bolhrad as well, including for Bolhrad High School graduates prime minister Aleksandar Malinov (1908-1911;1918), who proclaimed Bulgaria’s Independence in 1908, and Aleksandar Teodorov-Balan, who became the first rector of Sofia University in 1888.

Valchev said that a verse from a poem by Dobri Chintulov is inscribed on the plaque at the Odessa Theological Seminary.

Among the official Bulgarian guests at the event in the Ukrainian Black Sea city of Odesa were also Bulgaria’s Consul General Svetoslav Ivanov, Sofia University Rector Prof. Georgi Valchev, and Musicautor Executive Director Ivan Dimitrov. Among the official Ukrainian guests were Metropolitan Agatangel of Odesa and Izmail, Odessa Theological Seminary Rector Archpriest Dimitry Yakovenko, and Kyiv Theological Seminary Rector Archbishop Sylvester (Stoychev) of Bilhorod.