Bulgaria

The country of Bulgaria (Bulgarian: България, Bălgariya,[1] pronounced IPA: [bɤlˈgarijə]), officially the Republic of Bulgaria (Bulgarian: Република България, Republika Bălgariya, pronounced IPA: [rɛˈpubliˌkə bɤlˈgarijə]) lies in Southeastern Europe.

One of the cradles of European civilization,[2] [3] Bulgaria is home to the world's oldest known writing system, which is engraved on the Gradeshnitsa Tablets.[4][7] These have been dated to over 6000 years ago and are currently preserved in the famous Vratsa Museum. [5] The country's proto-modern statehood roots stem from the Thracian civilization, whilst further sculpted by the Greek and later the Roman worlds of antiquity. Indeed Bulgaria's civilized history dates back more than six millennia to a prehistoric time and place within the heart of its territory that marks the birth of Europe's and possibly the world's first literary culture.[8] Though relatively small in terms of territory and population, Bulgaria's continuous historical wealth throughout prominent cyclical eras of growth, decline and medieval renaissance rivals that of the much larger and more populous countries of China, India and Egypt.

Modern Bulgaria borders five countries: Romania to the north mostly along the Danube, Serbia and the Republic of Macedonia to the west, and Greece and Turkey to the south, as well as the Black Sea, which makes up its entire eastern border. Bulgaria is situated in a region once inhabited by the ancient Thracians and later by Greeks and Romans, and is a successor of a powerful European medieval empire, the First Bulgarian Empire, which at times covered most of the Balkans and spread its culture and literature among the Slavic peoples of Eastern Europe. Centuries later, during the decline of the Second Bulgarian Empire, the country fell under five centuries of Ottoman rule. Bulgaria was reestablished as a constitutional monarchy in 1878, also known as the birth of the Third Bulgarian Empire. Part of the Eastern Bloc after World War II, today Bulgaria is a democratic, unitary, constitutional republic, a member of the European Union and NATO.At the end of 1989 the population of Bulgaria was put at 8,990,000.Decline has been going since the early 1990 and the current population is over 7.7 million people which includes large amount of residents that live outside of Bulgarian territory.