Pazardzhik

The name comes from the word pazar, ultimately from the Persian: bāzār, "market" + the Turkic diminutive suffix -cık, "small". Called Tatar Pazardzhik earlier in the town's history, its title thus signified, "small Tatar market".

Pazardzhik was founded in 1485 by Tatars originating from what is today Bilhorod-Dnistrovskyi. They sited it on the left bank of the river Maritsa, near the market of the region, an important crossroad at the center of this productive region. Thanks to this favourable location, the settlement quickly developed. Very small at the beginning of the 19th century, it became the administrative centre for the region by the end of that century and remained so until the dissolution of Ottoman Empire. During the following centuries the town continued to grow and strengthen its position. Trade in iron, leather and rice prospered.

The old clock tower is one of the landmarks of Pazardzhik.

The town impressed visitors with its beautiful houses and clean streets. In 1718 Gerard Kornelius Drish visited Pazardzhik and wrote "the buildings here according to construction, size and beauty stand higher than those of Niš, Sofia and all other places".

By the mid-19th century Pazardzhik was an important centre of crafts and trade, with a population of about 25,000 people. It hosted two large annual fairs, and a substantial market on Tuesdays and Wednesdays. There was a post office with a telegraph. During this period, it also became an important cultural centre: a school was opened in 1847, a girls' school in 1848, a community centre in 1868, the women's union Prosveta in 1870.

During the Ottoman period Pazardchik had 18 mosques but only Kurshumlu Mosque, built in 1667, survives. In 1837 the Church of the Holy Mother of God, Panagyurishte was built; it is an important national monument, famous for its architecture and woodcarving.

The Russians under Count Nikolay Kamensky took the city after a brief siege in 1810, during the Russo-Turkish War of 1806–1812.

At the close of the Russo-Turkish War of 1877–1878, areas of Bulgaria which had been wrested from Ottoman rule had a continuing Russian Imperial Army presence, commanded by Lt. Gen. Iosif Gurko. The detachment of Zapdniya Russian troops stationed in Pazardzhik were withdrawn on 14 January 1878 (new style). Unlike many other Bulgarian towns, where there were massacres during the course of the war or its aftermath, the unprotected Pazardzhik was spared from planned depredations. Elsewhere along the Maritsa, the Ottoman commander, Süleyman Hüsnü Pasha had burnt multiple settlements, killing or mistreating the inhabitants. The Armenian, Ovanes Sovadzhiyan, prevented the similar destruction of Pazardzhik and its inhabitants.[2]

The railway station in 1928

From the early 20th century, on people built factories, stores and houses, and thus the industrial quarter of the town. The notable British travel writer, Patrick Leigh Fermor, visited Parardjik in the late summer of 1934, as described in his book The Broken Road: From the Iron Gates to Mount Athos (2013). From 1959 to 1987 Pazardzhik was again an administrative centre for the region, and is again since the 1999 administrative division of Bulgaria.

The Pazardzhik theatre named Konstantin Velichkov.

In the 1880s the population of Pazardzhik numbered about 15,000 and it was one of the largest of Bulgaria.[3] Since then it started growing decade by decade, mostly because of the migrants from the rural areas and the surrounding smaller towns, reaching its peak in the period 1985–1992 exceeding 80,000.[4] After this time, the population has started decreasing in consequence of the poor economic situation in the Bulgarian provinces during the 1990s that led to a new migration in the direction of the country capital Sofia and abroad. As of February 2011, the city has a population of 71,979 inhabitants, while the Pazardzhik Municipality of 114,817 inhabitants.[5][4][6]

Pazardzhik History Museum

Videlina cultural centre (chitalishte).

Kurshumlu Mosque from 1667 is one of the oldest mosques in Europe. It is one of the highlights of Pazardzhik.

The Church of the Theotokos preserves the most impressive icons in Bulgaria by master artists of the Debar School, wood-carvings of New and Old Testament scenes, and icons by Stanislav Dospevski. Among the town's landmarks are also the clock tower, the ethnographic and history museums.

As with most Bulgarian cities, Pazardzhik has developed a significant pedestrian center, in which several central squares typify the European coffee house society and pedestrian culture. In Bulgaria the café culture is particularly prominent, with many downtown squares easily providing up to a half dozen cafés, with ample outside seating.

Pazardzhik has a level of pedestrian streets (or network of carfree areas) even above the relatively high Bulgarian standard. There are several longer pedestrian streets, and at one point there is even an intersection where five different pedestrian streets converge. A few of these do not continue for very long, but most do, or are connected to the rest of the pedestrian areas of the city, and thus could be said to form the pedestrian network of the city.

During the warmer seasons, most afternoons of the week and especially weekends find a large number of people strolling about or sitting in cafés.

Pazardzhik Point on Snow Island in the South Shetland Islands, Antarctica is named after Pazardzhik.[13]

Pazardzhik is twinned with:[14][15]

• Stefan Zahariev (1810–1871), revival, educationalist
• Konstantin Velichkov (1855–1905), enlightener, poet, politician
• Zaharina Dimitrova (1873-1940), Bulgarian doctor, Order of Civil Merit recipient, philanthropist.
• Ivan Batakliev (1891–1973), geographer, historian
• Nicolas Digests (1903–1968), poet
• Artine Artinian (1907–2005), scholar of French literature
• Violeta Gindeva (1946–2019), actress, deputy mayor of Pazardzhik in 2003–2007
• Ekaterina Mihaylova (born 1956), politician
• Serafim Todorov (born 1969), boxer
• Ekaterina Zakharieva (born 1975), politician
• Georgi Petkov (born 1976), footballer

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  Old post building
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  Street scene
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  Stanislav Dospevski's house
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  Dormition of the Theotokos Church

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Pazardzhik.

• Pazardzhik municipality
• "Tatar Pazarjik" . Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). 1911.