SHUMEN CITIZENS IN BELGIAN EDUCATIONAL INSTITUTIONS (END OF XIX - EARLY XX CENTURY)

Abstract

The historical narrative depicts young people of Shumen who were educated in Belgian schools in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. They studied in today's cities of Brussels, Liege, Ghent, Gembloux and Antwerp. In the period from 1879 to 1912, 39 young people born in Shumen studied in Belgian schools. Among them were the girls Hristina Velichkova and Elena Vitanova. Several of them studied at two or more universities. For example, Stefan Kurtev studied at the New and Old Universities in Brussels, as well as in Ghent, Boris L. Velev studied in Liege and Brussels. A significant number of these people later worked in various spheres of life – as military, officials, bankers, directors of institutions. Irrespective of the fact that some of them hadn’t graduated from the respective institutions, they returned to their homeland with a good knowledge of European languages and familiarity with the achievements of the Western European civilization. Their large number, as well as the specialties chosen by them, are a vivid testimony to the aspiration of the young people of Shumen to receive better education and to contribute to the modernization of the Third Bulgarian State and their native Shumen.