The Macedonian Question

Abstract

Between the Congress of Berlin (1878) and the Balkan Wars (1912–13), nationalist political affairs in the Balkans were dominated by the “Macedonian Question.” It was a conflict among Bulgaria, Greece, and Serbia — three states whose territorial aspirations had been disappointed or ignored by the European Great Powers meeting in Berlin — for possession of the Ottoman province of Macedonia, a region slightly larger than Vermont. At Berlin, the Russian-dictated San Stefano borders of newly recreated Bulgaria, which encompassed Macedonia, were overthrown, and the state was reduced to a fraction of the size Bulgarians considered acceptable. The Serbs had been forced to relinquish some territories won in the 1877–78 Russo-Turkish War and, more important, they were compelled to accept Austro-Hungarian occupation of Bosnia-Hercegovina, a region they adamantly claimed as Serb national territory. (See Map 38.) The Greeks, who had been restrained from participating in the recent war against the Turks, felt insulted by England’s occupation of Cyprus, which they claimed as their own. All three turned toward Macedonia as compensation for their perceived losses at Berlin. (See Map 35.)KeywordsPeriodic DominanceByzantine EmpirePatriarchal ControlRevolutionary OrganizationNational RevivalThese keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.