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Centralnorth Bulgaria > Elena > History
History of ElenaThe region of the todays town was inhabited even during the late Neolite. There was a settlement there before the Ottoman Rule, but it was mentioned as a deserted village with the names of Mezra Istromena (Sturmena) and Iliyana (Elyana) in a document of 1430. It was known under the name of Gelendzhik, too. At the end of the century it was already registered as a settlement guarding the passes of Stara Planina.
By the 16th century Elena has already grown as a village. It reached prosperity during the 18th and the 19th centuries as a craftsmanship, trade, Revival and revolutionary centre (in 1860 it was proclaimed a town). Crafts were developed manufacturing of aba (coarse homespun woolleen cloth and upper mens garment made of it), ironmongers, production of ropes, silkworm breeding and others. In 1854 there were 1000 houses in Elena, a result of an active construction of public and civil buildings.
In 1843 the citizen of Elena Ivan N. Momchilov (Russian graduate) established the first Teacher Training School (called Daskalolivnitsa moulding of teachers, by Petko R. Slaveikov), preserved up to date. In 1874 Doino Gramatik made the Elena transcript of Paisiis History. The citizens of Elena took part in Velchos Conspiracy (1835), in Captain Dyado Nikolas uprising (1856), in the Turnovo Uprising (1862). Georgi Sava Rakovski stayed in the town several times, and the Apostle Vassil Levski came twice (1868 and 1871), and during his second stay he organised the Elena secret revolutionary committee. During the Russian-Turkish War of Liberation the town and its surrounding areas were an arena of fierce battles. Elena was destroyed by fire, but fortunately not completely.
The town developed as an architectural and historical town-museum whose future was in the development of tourism most of all. It is the birthplace of the plotter Hadzhi Y. Bradata (the Beard), of the great church activist Ilarion Makariopolski, of the writers Stoyan Mihailovski and Petko Yu. Todorov, of Sava Katrafilov, of the Kurshevski Brothers.
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