Abstract
During the First World War, the Ottoman Empire caused the death of up to 1.5 million Armenians and the creation of a large diaspora scattered around the world, currently counting up to five hundred thousand people. However, it should not be forgotten that the first mass pogroms targeting Armenians took place in the 1890s, events that are much less recognized in the literature of the subject. Also, in this case, the pogroms led to migrations on a large scale—many Armenians took refuge in Russia, but there were also those who ended up in the Balkans at that time. In the last decade of the nineteenth century, Armenian immigrants were coming to Bulgaria for different reasons than fear for their lives—they were preparing an attempt on the life of the sultan who was responsible for the repressions on their nation and were organizing themselves politically against the Ottoman Empire. This article analyzes the Bulgarian authorities’ attitude toward these migrants.
