Saints Cyril and Methodius Day (24 may)

Also called the Day of the Slavic literature and alphabet.

Saint Cyril and Methodius were born in XI century with Byzantine parents  in the city of Solun (Thessaloniki). They have influenced all of the Slavic culture and traditions, and eastern orthodox church Bible is written in Greek and the original Cyrillic developed by the brothers and their pupils.

Saint Cyril and Methodius have actually created a set of signs called Glagolitsa (Глаголица) and later, their pupils and followers have simplified and evolved this set of letters to the one known in present days. This set is named after Cyril (younger of the two brothers).

 

The word glagol in old slavic language actually means word.  The original Glagolitic alphabet was a bit hard to understand and remember, and too different from Latin and Greek alphabets that were used widely for writing books at this time. For that reason, the Glagolitic alphabet was abandoned after the development of the Cyrillic almost half century later.

The Cyrillic is spread to wide use by the Bulgarian Tzar Boris who wished the Bulgarian church to be independent of the Constantinople. For those reasons he built two academic schools in the cities of Ohrid and Preslav and invited the remaining pupils of Cyril and Methodius to teach and develop books, codex of laws and a Slavic Bible.

From those schools, hundreds of educated pupils spread the books and bibles in the Slavic countries. It was readily adopted by many Slavic monarchs threatened by the heavy presence of western (catholic) and eastern (orthodox) churches of Rome and Constantinople.

The two brothers were finally declared saints by the Catholic church at late 19-th century by  pope Leo XIII.

Every Bulgarian school will have a holiday at this date and it’s the first day of the summer school vacation of the younger kids. There will be a small festivity held in every school with music and verses from various Bulgarian classic authors. The church will praise the saints with small procession holding in front an Icon of the brothers in large flower wreath.