Northern Black Sea Region and Thrace in Сorrespondence of Mikhail Rostovtzeff with Bulgarian Historians and Archaeologists

Abstract

Scientific communications of Mikhail Rostovtzeff with Bulgarian scientists were left without the attention of researchers, they are not mentioned in historiographic works and bibliographic descriptions, and in the works of Rostovtzeff himself, we can only find brief references to the works of Bulgarian colleagues. Meanwhile, M. I. Rostovtzeff's correspondence with with his Bulgarian colleagues) сurrently stored in the Library Archive of the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences continued continuously from the 1910s to 1940s. and contains details of the research activities of the famous scientist, his views on the current problems of the history of the ancient world, in particular, Thrace and Scythia, interpretations of new archaeological finds, setting problems that will later be revealed in Rostovtzeff's publications. Based on letters addressed to Bulgarian colleagues, it is possible to present vectors of scientific search by M. I. Rostovtzeff in the 1920s and 1930s, his justification of the theory of comparing two historical ranges — the Northern Black Sea region and Thrace, which became possible thanks to assistance of Bulgarian historians and archaeologists.