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Bulgarian culture is a mix mostly of Thracian, Slavic and Bulgar cultures, but there are Byzantine, Turkish, Greek and other influences. Image File history File links Wiki_letter_w. ... The word culture, from the Latin colo, -ere, with its root meaning to cultivate, generally refers to patterns of human activity and the symbolic structures that give such activity significance. ... The Thracians were inhabitants of Thrace and adjacent lands (present-day Bulgaria, Romania, Republic of Moldova, northeastern Greece, European Turkey and northwestern Asiatic Turkey, eastern Serbia and parts of the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia) [1]. They spoke the Thracian language, an Indo-European language. ... The Slavic peoples are defined by their usage of the Slavic languages. ... This article or section is missing references or citation of sources. ... Byzantine Empire (Greek: Βυζαντινή Αυτοκρατορία) is the term conventionally used since the 19th century to describe the Greek-speaking Roman Empire during the Middle Ages, centered at its capital in Constantinople. ...

Social Conventions

Music

Main article: Music of Bulgaria Bulgarian music is part of the Balkan tradition, which stretches across Southeastern Europe, and has its own distinctive sound. ...

Bulgarian folk music is unique in its complex harmonies and highly irregular rhythms. These kinds of rhythms, also called uneven beats or asymmetric measures, were introduced to musicologists only in 1886 when music teacher Anastas Stoyan published Bulgarian folk melodies for the first time. Examples of such beats are 5/8, 7/8, 8/8, 9/8 and 11/8, or composite ones like (5+7)/8, (15+14)/8 and (9+5)/16 - (9+5)/16. Each area of Bulgaria has a characteristic music and dance style. Bulgarian folk music inspired and was used by musicians like Kate Bush and George Harrison. Folk Music, in the original sense of the term, is music by and of the common people. ... 1886 (MDCCCLXXXVI) is a common year starting on Friday (click on link to calendar) // Events January 18 - Modern field hockey is born with the formation of The Hockey Association in England. ... Kate Bush (born Catherine Bush on 30 July 1958 in Bexleyheath, Kent, now part of Greater London). ... George Harrison, MBE (24 February 1943 – 29 November 2001) was a popular British guitarist, singer, songwriter, record producer, and film producer, best known as a member of The Beatles. ...

Bulgarian vocal style has a unique throat quality, while the singers themselves are renowned for their range. (Orpheus is said to be from Thrace, a region partly in Bulgaria.) Diatonic scales predominate but in the Rhodope mountains, for example, pentatonic scales occur, while in Thrace chromatic scales with augmented intervals (similar to the music of Classical Greece). Also, the intonation varies, and is quite different from the modern Western equal temperament. Depending on whether the melody moves up or down, an interval can augment or decrease by a quarter tone. The head of Orpheus, from an 1865 painting by Gustave Moreau. ... A quarter tone is an interval half as wide (aurally, or logarithmically) as a semitone, which is half a whole tone. ...

Musical instruments (also characteristic of the whole Balkan region) include gaida (bagpipe), kaval (rim-blown flute), zurna or zurla (another woodwind), tambura (guitar-like), gadulka (violin-like), and tapan (large two-sided drum). ...

Dances have complex steps matching the rhythm, and are often fast. Most are circle-dances or line dances called horo; but some are done singly or in pairs, like the 7/8 dance Rachenitsa.

Although traditional music and dance are not popular among Bulgarian city youth, they are often performed at weddings, and generally countryside fiests. They are also performed in Bulgaria and abroad by amateur and professional performing artists.

Key figures

Number of museums: 220 (2002)

Number of museum exhibits: 5,766,707 (2002)

Number of museum visits: 3,554,515 (2002)

Number of libraries: 49 (2002)

Number of volumes in libraries: 34,676,995 (2002)

Number of library readers: 319,403 (2002)