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+---
+title: 'Vratsa Is a Picturesque Thracian City'
+date: Mon, 16 May 2016 07:56:02 +0000
+draft: false
+categories: ['Bulgaria']
+tags: ['Stara Planina', 'Thrace', 'Vratsa']
+---
+
+The picturesque little city of Vratsa (Враца) sits at the foothills of the [Balkan Mountains](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Balkan_Mountains) in Northwest Bulgaria. On a recent road trip I was amazed when I saw the city sitting under the craggy cliffs of the "old mountain" (_Стара Планина_ / Stara Planina in Bulgarian). What with the water and all it's kind of like a poor man's [Cape Town](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cape_Town)!
+
+{{< figure src="DSC_0002.jpg" caption="The city of Vratsa below the Balkan mountain" >}}
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+I've never actually _been_ to Vratsa, but after reading Wikipedia for a few hours I am fascinated by the history of the region.
+
+The area would have been inhabited by loosely organized Thracian tribes during the first millennium before Christ. From around 550 [BCE] Thrace was subjugated by the [Persian Empire](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Achaemenid_Empire) until Persia's defeat in the [Greco–Persian Wars](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greco-Persian_Wars) in 449 BCE. After that, there was likely a more organized [Thracian kingdom](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Odrysian_kingdom) for a few centuries until Rome finally turned Thrace into a province in the first century CE. Over the next millennium the Byzantines, Bulgarians, and Ottomans would all take turns dominating this region of the Balkan peninsula.
+
+I'm excited to put more of the puzzle pieces together as I explore the country.