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Perperikon Excavations Scared the Greeks
Standart Daily, 10.03.2005
'Tourism is not only sea, sun and Shopska salad.' Nevertheless this has been Bulgaria's exact attitude towards tourism for years with the Soviet tourist groups and Balkantourist. The first who realized and proved this truth were the archeologists. And most of all - Professor Nikola Ovcharov and Associated Professor Georgi Kitov. Long before a political crisis hit the headlines, before the minister of culture was replaced and the new ministry for tourism and culture emerged, the archeologists discovered the relation between archeology and tour operators; they bound it to sponsors and harnessed the media to gain publicity. Naturally, now it is namely Prof Nikola Ovcharov who reminds there is need for a state strategy for cultural tourism. What will be the ten sites, which will be given priority development, what share of the funding will be sought through private firms and what will the state allot? Four years ago when Prof Ovcharov and his team headed for Perperikon, they had to literally chop the brushwood to make their way towards the peak. At present about 200,000 people throng every year into the Eastern and Central Rhodope Mountains. During the archeological season, the excavation works are covered on whole pages in the press. Tides of applause and national pride swamp - about the discovery of a Dionysus sanctuary in the stone town of Perperikon near Kardjali (summer 2003), about the sanctuary of Orpheus close the village of Tatul, Momchilgrad region, where the symbolic or real grave of Orpheus was (June 2004), about Utrobata (Womb) cave in Tatul, where the Sun and the Earth make love.... The antique sources witnessed that Orpheus was a figure in the Thracian history and culture. And the ancient Greek authors acknowledge him as such. see source
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