The Magic of Kovachevitsa

Stroitelstvo Gradat Weekly, 28th May 2007

There is hardly a Bulgarian who hasn’t seen Kovachevitsa, if only on TV… There is no other village where more than 20 Bulgarian movies have been filmed. Kovachevitsa is located along the rived valley of river Kanina (the Blood river) in the south-eastern part of the Rhodopes. The village is declared historical and natural reserve in 1977. The village first came to exist because of the violence used on the Bulgarian population during the forceful conversion to Islam in the period 1623-1625 and later when Bulgarians who were unwilling to convert left their homes and found salvation and asylum in the high mountains. Initially a few neighborhoods came to existence, mainly formed on family basis, consisting of refugees who had come from near and far. In the XVIIIth century refugees from Western Macedonia also settled there. The neighborhoods were grouped around the spring (now called “Tsigantchitsa”) where the blacksmith Marko used to live. After his demise his wife Gina became responsible for the survival of his family. When friends or relatives from the nearby villages traveled to her, they simply used to say “we are going to visit Kovachevitsa” (in Bulgarian “Kovachevitsa” literally means “the wife of the blacksmith”). The legend tells that this is how the name of the village actually originated. For the entire duration of the Turkish jug there was no Turkish administration in the village. During the renaissance the village used to be a center of the education and church activity in the region of Nevrokop.

They call Kovachevitsa a fairy-tale created out of stone and wood. And this fairy-tale should be brought to as many people as possible – that is the aim of the project for “Restoration of the school and creation of new tourist products in the historical and architectural reserve – village of Kovachevitsa”. The project’s fund is 288 773 euro and has been financed by the PHARE program “Development of Bulgarian Cultural Tourism”. The contractor of the project is the association “Historical and Architectural Reserve Kovachevitsa Village”.

The project aims to develop new tourist products, to improve the existing tourist network, to attract more foreign tourists, to improve the qualification of the local people engaged in tourism.

A main focus of the project is the Renaissance church complex “St. Nikola”. The church “St. Nikola” was built in 1847 and is a unique historical monument. It was built by the famous masons of Kovachevitsa with the population of the village voluntarily contributing their time and effort. Because of the restrictions imposed by the Turkish authorities the church was dug into the ground and was situated in the low part of the village.

In 1900 the locals built next to the church a four-storey bell-tower. Both bells, differing only in size were cast on-site by the renowned craftsmen from Gornobrojden, using the small bells donated by the population. In the courtyard of the church the local people built right next to the old bell tower a monastic school, where the children were educated by monks until 1854.

The first non-clerical school in the village was opened in 1854 in the house of the young teacher Nikola Banev – Kovachevsky. The two-storey building of the new school was constructed in 1888 with the donation of the teacher Yordje Dimitrov Djordjev made in memory of three of his four children who died in the flames of his house set on fire by the Turkish. This is the reason why the school remains until this day with the name of “Yordje Djordjev”.

The three-nave domeless basilica of “St. Nikola”, one of the five largest basilicas in Bulgaria has been built in the traditional construction technology and masonry style used in Kovachevitsa – with solid stone walls, and roof covered with stone plates.

The realization of the project “Restoration of the school and creation of new tourist products in the historical and architectural reserve – village of Kovachevitsa” helped preserve for the future generations a building which is a architectural monument of culture – the school “Yordje Dimitrov” and the informational tourist center adapted to provide tourist services and products.

The project includes advertisement materials, training of local hotel owners, guides, marking of tourist routes and local landmarks, popularization of the authentic folklore in the region.

THE ARCHITECTURE OF KOVACHEVITSA

The architecture of Kovachevitsa is distinctive and unique. Over the pre-renaissance houses in the second half of the XVIIIth century locals constructed two and three-storey buildings with their bow-windows overlooking the narrow cobblestone streets. The ground floor along with few semi-levels assumed the function of sheltering the domestic animals, and other agricultural functions and the very residence was located on the upper one or two floors.

The affirmation of this type of house with her construction, technical, functional, size-and-space characteristics and artistic characteristics is proof of the development of the construction-and-architecture school in the South-western Rhodopes, with Kovachevitsa as center, whose architecture is among the highest achievements of the Bulgarian construction genius during the renaissance.

From the stone foundations, up to the stone roof, covered in the famous stone plates “tikli” from Kovachevitsa, all architectural details were elaborated with a sense of measure and endurance. It is not a coincidence that the traditions in the construction, the professional secrets, passed from generation to generation, have shaped a number of generations of talented builders who originated precisely from Kovachevitsa and grew to attain the glory of master craftsmen of the distinctive masonry work of Kovachevitsa, wrote prof. Mihail Enev in “Kovachevitsa – A Return to the History”. One is impressed by the number of skilled craftsmen in the village of Kovachevitsa - 300-450 annually and together with the masons from the villages Leshten, Marchevo, Gurmen, Ribnovo, Ognyanovo, Dolen and others the number could well have reached 1200 people. The numbers of the construction society in Kovachevitsa competes with the Tryavna school considered to be the most numerous, further elaborates the author. According to reports the master craftsmen from Kovachevitsa have been building in more than 70 areas throughout of the country.

View Properties for Sale in the Area.




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