 24th May is a Day that has no analogue among the other nations - the Day of literature, enlightenment, culture.  It’s a holiday of spiritual rising, perfection striving for scientific and cultural achievements.  This is one of the largest and brightest holidays, respected by all Bulgarians.  It’s the day of St. Cyril and St. Methodius - creators of the Cyrillic alphabet ( azbuka ) and the first translators of liturgical books from Greek into Old-Bulgarian.

Pronunciation Most letters in the Bulgarian alphabet stand for just one specific sound.  Three letters stand for the single expression of combinations of sounds, namely: щ (sht) ю (yu) я (ya)  Two sounds do not correspond to separate letters, but are expressed as the combination of two letters, namely: дж (like j in Jack) and дз (dz)  The letter ь is not pronounced, but it softens (palatalizes) any preceding consonant before the letter о. Ж (zh)

 Nowadays Cyrillic script is used not only by us, Bulgarians, but also by many other Slavic nations, a total of over 200 million people. Peoples of Iranian, Turk, Caucasian and Mongolian origin also use the Cyrillic alphabet as a basis for their script.  The Cyrillic alphabet has been in existence for more than eleven centuries.  With the admission of Bulgaria into the EU on January 1, 2007, the Cyrillic alphabet, among Latin and Greek alphabet, became the third official script of the European Community.

“Ivan Vazov” Primary school Vidin,Bulgaria