ON THE 'MALGARA ORIGIN' OF THE KAYRAKLIA BULGARIANS IN UKRAINE

Abstract

This article confutes Stanka Bitlieva’s assertion (written in several publications of hers) that the population of the village of Loshtinovka (former Kayraklia) in Ukrainian Bessarabia originates from the Malgara region of Edirne Thracia (in present-day Turkey). The proof for that is the Bulgarian dialect of the Malgara Bulgarians which is quite different from the Bulgarian Kayraklia dialect (in fact, they belong to two different Bulgarian dialectal groups). The latter originates from the village of Malomirovo (Hambarliy) in South-East Bulgaria, as it was shown several years ago. In this article, we will discuss the differences between and the theories about the aforementioned dialects, as well as their history and origins.