"Armenia and Bulgaria: an Agreement beyond the ephemera of Diplomacy" by Carlo Coppola
Not all agreements are born in the halls of diplomacy. Some take root in something older and more enduring: in a shared prayer, in a recognized martyrdom, in a cross held high against the same oppressor. Armenia and Bulgaria have known this for centuries. The former adopted Christianity as its state religion in 301 AD, through the mission of Gregory the Illuminator ; the latter, baptized into the Orthodox faith in 864 AD under Prince Boris I of Bulgaria , became a bastion of Christian civilization in the Balkans, preserving it against Ottoman pressure with the same tenacity with which Armenians would defend their ecclesiastical identity in the centuries to come. This fraternity also found concrete expression on the battlefield. In 1912, the Armenian general Garegin Ter-Harutyunyan fought in the Volunteer Corps of the Bulgarian army against the Ottoman Empire for the liberation of Thrace and Macedonia. For his courage, he was awarded the Bulgarian Cross of Valor . Bulgaria was not mere...
