- Kosti, Bulgaria
Kosti ( _bg. Кости) is a village in southeastern
Bulgaria , part ofTsarevo municipality,Burgas Province . It is located on the banks of theVeleka River in theStrandzha mountains not far from the Turkish border, 20-25 kilometres south of Tsarevo and 91 km southeast ofBurgas . As of June 2008, it has a population of 320 [http://grao.bg/tna/tab02.txt] and the mayor is Iliya Yazov.Traces of ancient metallurgical activity have been discovered in the vicinity of Kosti, as well as a big
necropolis and several independent mounds of Thracian origin. The modern village was first mentioned in an Ottoman tax register of 1498, according to which Kosti's population consisted of 22 Christian families. It also featured in a 17th century tax register, and during theRusso-Turkish War of 1828-1829 it was described as a Greek village "(seeGreeks in Bulgaria )". Statistics of 1898 count 185 Greek and 25 Bulgarian houses, whereas 1897 data only notes 300 Greek houses.Kosti was one of the Greek villages of inland Strandzha, culturally and linguistically very distant from then-Greek-inhabited nearby coastal towns like Tsarevo ("Vassiliko") and
Ahtopol . The local houses differ significantly from the typical village houses of Strandzha and the town houses of the coast. The houses in Kosti typically have two stories of crude stone, with the top floor cased with thickoak boards. They feature an unusually largefireplace on the top floor and the reported lack of any windows (which were later added by the Bulgarians who settled), as the only light to enter the room would come from a small opening in the ceiling called "okno". The population was mainly engaged in agriculture, cattle breeding and logging (wood was in demand by the Ahtopolshipyard ).Kosti is a characteristic
nestinari village, with a hundred of the 400 families being hereditary practitioners of this custom. Besides the old villageEastern Orthodox church, the village had another ritual building housing the eight nestinariicon s, including the main icon, that of feast and regional patron Saint Constantine.Following the
Balkan Wars , the village was ceded to Bulgaria by the Ottoman Empire, and the local Greeks moved toGreece , particularly Greek Macedonia and the villages ofMeliki ,Verie ,Kerkini ,Strimoniko ,Agia Eleni (Serres Prefecture ),Mavrolevki (Drama Prefecture ),Langada (Thessaloniki Prefecture ). After 1914, the deserted village was settled by Bulgarian refugees from Turkish-ruledEastern Thrace , particularly fromPirgoplo (100 families) and the town of Malak Samokov (Demirköy ; 60 families). The new settlers were also deeply engaged in logging, wood and charcoal production. A new church (at the place of the old church damaged in theIlinden-Preobrazhenie Uprising ) of SaintsCyril and Methodius was built in 1909, as were a school and a community centre ("chitalishte ") in 1925. The church features an imposingiconostasis by the woodcarver Pandil, as well as old icons, such as two from 1883 and 1901 by the painter Kosta Polixoido.References
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External links
* [http://kosti.free.bg/ Website about Kosti] bg icon
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