site.btaRomanian of Bulgarian Descent Delves into Inherited Folk Costumes

Gabriela Mitu-Bularianu, a Romanian of Bulgarian descent, is coming to one of her visits to Bulgaria on January 24 (Tuesday) to present her book on Bulgarian folk costumes in Romania at the National Ethnographic Museum in Sofia. She belongs to the Bulgarian community in Cioplea, today a neighbourhood in Bucharest, she told BTA. She comes from a mixed family, the Bulgarian blood coming from her father.

Curiosity and the desire to learn more about the past and one of the Bulgarian communities in Romania motivated her numerous visits to what she calls her “places of origin” – Belene, Svishtov and Tranchevitsa. The latter was of particular interest to Mitu-Bularianu, for her great-grandfather was surnamed Tancovianu, literally meaning “from Tranchevitsa”, she explained.  

The book, Traditional Costumes from Cioplea and Popesti-Leordeni, features information with photos of folk costumes of three major Bulgarian communities in Romania: the Paulicians in Bucharest’s Cioplea and Popesti-Leordeni, the Banat Bulgarians in Star Bisnov and Vinga, and the Bulgarian Catholics from Northern Bulgaria. They all speak an old Bulgarian dialect and 

Mitu-Bularianu treasures a family heirloom, an authentic embroidered chemise, which she says is quite rare, for people in the past were buried in their best clothes and they are now lost. What are mostly preserved today are the ceremonial kerchiefs used as headgear for weddings, or to adorn domestic icons. They all speak old Bulgarian dialects and were even visited by a top linguist from the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences.

Her other treasure is the photo of her father's aunt in a national costume, taken sometime in the 1940s or 1950s. The photo adorns the cover of Mitu-Bularianu's book.