Abagar
book by Filip Stanislavov
Abagar ("Абагар") is a breviary by the Bulgarian Roman Catholic Bishop of Nikopol Filip Stanislavov printed in Rome in 1651. It is regarded as the first printed book in modern Bulgarian. The language of the breviary is a specific blend of modern Bulgarian and Church Slavonic with Serbian Cyrillic influences, that was used in writing by the Catholics from Chiprovtsi, Bulgaria, in the period. Unlike many other works of the Bulgarian Roman Catholics, it was printed in Cyrillic and not Latin.
Naming and reference to Abgar V of Edessa
The book is named after the apocryphal message of King Abgar to Jesus that was included. A total of six copies of the book are preserved, only one of which in Bulgaria, housed in the SS. Cyril and Methodius National Library in Sofia.
Publication history
The first phototype issue of the book was published in 1905 by the Russian Kuzinsky. The first Bulgarian one followed in 1926 by Vasil Pundev and the one by Bozhidar Raykov was printed in 1979. It was not until 2001 that an edition translated to standard modern Bulgarian (by Kiril Kabakchiev) was published.
References
Бакалов, Георги; Куманов, Милен (2003).
The public source identifies “Abagar” as book by Filip Stanislavov. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Abagar, book and Filip.
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Object files, edition statements, performance records and contemporary criticism preserve different stages of the work’s history. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 4, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q1975173. The first chronological checks are 1651, 1905, 1926 and 1979.
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This entry incorporates text from “Abagar” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.