Buzludzha
In 1868 it was the place of the final battle between Bulgarian rebels led by Hadzhi Dimitar and Stefan Karadzha and forces of the Ottoman Empire. On 31 July Hadji Dimitar and a band of 30 chetniks fought a losing battle against 700 Ottoman troops; only four Bulgarians survived. Their action served as an inspiration for the Liberation of Bulgaria from the Ottomans ten years later; the decisive battle of that conflict was fought a few miles away at the Shipka Pass. The battle of Buzludzha inspired the renown Bulgarian poet and revolutionary Hristo Botev to write the poem "Hadzhi Dimitar":
He who falls while fighting to be free
can never die: for him the sky
and earth, the trees and beasts shall keen,
to him the minstrel's song shall rise…
Dragomir Teterekov, Bulgaria, Peshtera