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The lands of Batak region have been inhabited since ancient times. Professor Yosif Shopov found in 1958, in Kremenete locality a find dating from the old stone age and only several years later - another find in Slancheva Polyana locality.
These lands either inhabited or passed by Thracians, Romans, Slavs, Proto-Bulgarians, Ottomans and Bulgarians still preserve the heritage of their civilizations. There are 20 Thracian, Thracian-Roman, Byzantium and Slav fortresses as well as more than 10 churches and monasteries and many Thracian tumuli, Roman bridges, mines, mills and other archaeological findings registered in Batak region.
Until the 1st century BC when the Romans conquered the Balkan Peninsular the Northern Thrace and Western Rhodopes were inhabited by the warlike Thracian tribe Bessae. According to the father of history – Herodotus the Bessae possessed the well-known sanctuary of God Dionysus. The holy place of the Bessae became famous when Alexander the Great and the father of the great Roman emperor Octavian Augustus – Gaius Octavianus passed by.
During the Slav invasion Byzantine Empire lost the stable direct control over the Western Rhodopi though the strategic roads in the northern and southern mountain foot (from Salonika through the Aegean Sea to Constantinople) were in its hands.
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"St. Nedelya" Church
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When the Ottoman Empire strengthened its positions, the mountainous villages like Batak attracted many Bulgarians with rebellious temper who settled here in order to preserve their Christian faith. This led to material and spiritual development of the village. The home crafts and especially timbering, wood-processing and trade flourished. About 280 wood-processing workshops were registered here in 1871. The wood was of high quality and the Empire used it for ship building. The merchants from Batak went about all market places. These relations of Batak people with the world bred the freedom loving spirit of its inhabitants.
During the Bulgarian Renaissance many prominent spiritual figures as the abbot archimandrite Yosif who restored the Rila Monastery to its present form; the abbots Kiril and Nikifor, the author of the remarkable Bulgarian ABC Book (printed in 1814), Georgi Busilin and the publisher Dragan Manchov rose here.
During the April Upraising against the Ottomans in 1876 after a two-week unequal battle against the Turkish army of many thousands strong 5000 people died and the town was burned down. About two thousand people who gathered in St. Nedelya Church defended heroically their honour and faith for three days and nights and all of them died after the church was burned. The brightest intellect of mankind raised a voice of protest and indignation in answer to this outrageous occurrence - Viktor Hugo, William Goldstone, Makgahan, Dostoevski, Lev Tolstoy. The world came to know about Bulgaria and its will to be free.
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