Sofia

Sofia [София]. The capital of Bulgaria (2017 pop 1,241,675). In 1889–95 Mykhailo Drahomanov lived and worked in Sofia. In 1918–21 the Ukrainian National Republic maintained an embassy there, headed by Oleksander Shulhyn and then F. Shulha. P. Sikora and Yuliian Nalysnyk edited the journal Ukrainsko-bolgarski pregled (1919–20) in Sofia. After the First World War a small Ukrainian colony, consisting mostly of veterans of the Army of the Ukrainian National Republic, sprang up in Sofia. The sculptor Mykhailo Parashchuk worked there from 1921. The head offices of the Ukrainian Hromada in Bulgaria, the Ukrainian Alliance in Bulgaria, and the Union of Ukrainian Organizations in Bulgaria (from 1934) were located in the city. The Bulgarian-Ukrainian Society (headed by Ivan Shishmanov), the small Ukrainian Student Association, and the Sich physical education society were also active between the wars. All Ukrainian associations were dissolved after the Second World War, although an extensive cultural exchange between Kyiv and Sofia (and the Ukrainian SSR and Communist Bulgaria in general) was conducted by official institutions.

[This article originally appeared in the Encyclopedia of Ukraine, vol. 3 (1993).]