ABSTRACT
In the 1930s, life during winter in a Bulgarian village appeared to have remained unchanged since time immemorial. This is how the American ethnologist Irwin Sanders described it: One ordinary day followed another. Yet, the notion that nothing had changed during half a century of existence of the Bulgarian modern state would be misleading. Sanders’ book includes also a chapter on “The National State as Intruder and Reformer” indicating a crucial force of social change also in the countryside: the state and its government. Sometimes seasonal migrants offered highly specialized skills and ultimately became settled: Bulgarian gardeners from the Balkan Mountains first went to places like Constantinople temporarily before discovering a market for their skills in Budapest and Vienna.
