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Visualization of Policies of Cultural Memory Construction
In the course of the Second World War and in the context of establishing Bul¬
garian administrative authorities in Vardar and Aegean Macedonia, new paintings
describing King Samuel’s victories (and also those of other medieval Bulgarian rul¬
ers) appeared; for example the painting of Boris Angelushev King Samuel Defeats
the Byzantines at the Gates of Trajan (1941) and the painting of Evgenii Poptoshev
King Samuel Defeats the Troops of Byzantine Emperor Basil II at the Gates of Trajan
(1942) (Fig. 3). In times of war victories and partial accomplishment of the Bulgar¬
ian ideal for national unity it is no surprise that the artists resorted to the theme of
King Samuel’s most famous victory (the Battle of the Gates of Trajan). The battle is
also known as Byzantium’s biggest defeat during the reign of Emperor Basil I. This
fact refers to the events of the Second World War (the period between 1941 and
1944) when Bulgaria and Greece were enemies as members of the two belligerent
powers (the Axis and the Allies). Understandably, the theme of the tragic Battle of
Kleidion and King Samuel’s blinded warriors continued to be of no interest for the
painters (Moutafov 2014: 17-18).
Policies of Cultural Memory Construction and Their Visualization: 1944-1950
As early as the years before the Second World War, on the territory of former
Yugoslavia, the so-called Yugo-Macedonism,° which clearly discriminates between
Bulgarian and Macedonian ethnicity, on the one hand, and between Macedonian
° ‘The emergence of the so-called Macedonian question—that is the question of the belonging of the
territory, population, and historical heritage of the geographic region of Macedonia during and after the
disintegration of the Ottoman Empire in the late 19° and early 20" century—laid the beginnings of the
formation of different types of Macedonian identities or forms of Macedonism. The process became par¬
ticularly tangible after the wars of 1912-1918 and the establishment of a border between different parts
of the Macedonia region. Various clearly expressed diachronic forms and stages of Macedonism began to
emerge and develop. In fact, they represented different levels of awareness of the population in the geo¬
graphic region of Macedonia in relation to its specificity and distinction compared to the neighbouring
Balkan countries and people. In the years before World War II on the territory of former Yugoslavia began
the development of Yugo-Macedonism. It stuck to the policy of Comintern for creating a world proletar¬
ian state and laid the stress on the common cause in the struggle for freedom and social justice in which
national specifics were not of primary significance. At the same time however, although as a secondary
idea, this type of Macedonism clearly discriminated between Macedonian and Bulgarian ethnicity, on the
one hand, and Macedonian and Serbian ethnicity, on the other hand. During the 1940s and 1950s the
Bulgarian authorities pursued a policy of purposeful dissemination of Yugo-Macedonism in the territory
of Pirin Macedonia. This was the process of the so-called Macedonisation of the population in Pirin Mac¬
edonia. Studies in “Macedonian language” and the “history of the Macedonian people” were introduced
in the Bulgarian schools in the region and the population was forced to declare “Macedonian nationality”
in the censuses. This policy of socialist Bulgaria was part of the preparations for the annexation of Pirin
Macedonia to Yugoslavia and the subsequent formation of the Yugoslavian-Bulgarian federation. In the
1960s, as a result of the split between Tito and Stalin, Yugo-Macedonism began to shake off the commu¬
nist doctrinality and the ideology of Marxism-Leninism. Thus, the civil (non-communist) Macedonism
gradually began to develop in Yugoslavia. In this type of Macedonism the idea of ethnic and national dif¬
ferentiation of the Macedonian population came to the fore. For more information on the different forms
of Macedonism and Macedonian nationalism, see Gruev 2011 and Maxwell 2007.
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