Folk Songs of the Macedonian Bulgarians

Folk Songs of the Macedonian Bulgarians (Serbian: Народне песме Македонски Бугара) is an ethnographic collection of folk songs collected by Stefan Verkovic, considered to be his most valuable contribution to the field of Bulgarian folklore.[1] It was published in Serbian in 1860, in Belgrade.[2]

The cover of the "Folk songs of the Macedonian Bulgarians".

The book contains 335 folk songs that are lyrical and were therefore called by him female. The songs were collected by Verkovic during the time he worked as a Serbian ethological agent in the then Ottoman city of Serres from 1855 onwards. The title, preface, notes and explanations of the songs are in Serbian, and at the end there is an explanation in Serbian of some unknown Bulgarian words. However, the songs are in the original Bulgarian language, as Verkovic himself called it. In his extensive preface, Verkovic explains that he called the songs Bulgarian, not Slavic, Serbian etc. because if you ask a Macedonian Slav "What are you", he will immediately answer to you: I am Bulgarian and I call my language Bulgarian. In the preface, Verkovic clarified that he was planning to publish a second volume of the collection. Due to his involvement in the Veda Slovena debate, he was unable to make it happen and the materials he collected were published as «Сборникъ Верковича. Ι. Народныя пѣсни македонскихъ болгаръ» (Verkovic's Collection. Folk Songs of the Macedonian Bulgarians) in 1920 in Petrograd.[3]

The book was published for the second time in Bulgarian by Petar Dinekov (Pètre Dinékov) in 1966. In addition to the original text, a translation into Bulgarian of Verkovic's preface was made and an introductory study was added.