The first Bulgarian Empire (681-1018) was conquered by the Byzantines, who then ruled for nearly 200 years. The second Bulgarian Empire (1185-1396) was conquered by the Ottomans, who then ruled for nearly 500 years.
In 1877, Bulgaria fought alongside Russia in the Russo-Turkish war and was rewarded when the Treaties of San Stefano and Berlin set up an autonomous Bulgarian principality. However, the new state was much smaller in area than was originally proposed and early Bulgarian history is dominated by the ambition to get all its original territory back.
Ferdinand became Prince in 1878 and his administration set about transforming a backward, agrarian and largely illiterate province into a modern European state. Thirty years later, he
