Rayko Ivanov (Yoanov) Zhinzifov or Rajko Žinzifov, ( bg, Райко Иванов (Йоанов) Жинзифов, mk, Рајко Жинзифов; 15 February 1839 – 15 February 1877), born Ksenofont Dzindzifi (Ксенофонт Дзиндзифи) was a Bulgarian National Revival

poet A poet is a person who studies and creates poetry. Poets may describe themselves as such or be described as such by others. A poet may simply be the creator ( thinker, songwriter, writer, or author) who creates (composes) poems (oral or w ...

and

translator Translation is the communication of the meaning of a source-language text by means of an equivalent target-language text. The English language draws a terminological distinction (which does not exist in every language) between ''transl ...

from Veles in today's

North Macedonia North Macedonia, ; sq, Maqedonia e Veriut, (Macedonia before February 2019), officially the Republic of North Macedonia,, is a country in Southeast Europe. It gained independence in 1991 as one of the successor states of Socialist Feder ...

, who spent most of his life in the

Russian Empire The Russian Empire was an empire and the final period of the Russian monarchy from 1721 to 1917, ruling across large parts of Eurasia. It succeeded the Tsardom of Russia following the Treaty of Nystad, which ended the Great Northern War ...

Biography

Zhinsifov was born in 1839 into a Graecophile Aromanian family in Veles in the

Ottoman Empire The Ottoman Empire, * ; is an archaic version. The definite article forms and were synonymous * and el, Оθωμανική Αυτοκρατορία, Othōmanikē Avtokratoria, label=none * info page on book at Martin Luther University ...

, today in

. He initially studied

Greek Greek may refer to: Greece Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group. *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family. **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...

Prilep Prilep ( mk, Прилеп ) is the fourth-largest city in North Macedonia. It has a population of 66,246 and is known as "the city under Marko's Towers" because of its proximity to the towers of Prince Marko. Name The name of Prilep appea ...

at his father's school. In 1856, he was already an assistant teacher in Prilep at

Dimitar Miladinov The Miladinov brothers ( bg, Братя Миладинови, ''Bratya Miladinovi'', mk, Браќа Миладиновци, ''Brakja Miladinovci''), Dimitar Miladinov (1810–1862) and Konstantin Miladinov (1830–1862), were Bulgarian poets ...

's school and a teacher in Kukush (modern

Kilkis Kilkis ( el, Κιλκίς) is a city in Central Macedonia, Greece. As of 2011 there were 22,914 people living in the city proper, 28,745 people living in the municipal unit, and 51,926 in the municipality of Kilkis. It is also the capital city o ...

Greece Greece,, or , romanized: ', officially the Hellenic Republic, is a country in Southeast Europe. It is situated on the southern tip of the Balkans, and is located at the crossroads of Europe, Asia, and Africa. Greece shares land borders wi ...

) afterwards. In 1857–1858, Zhinzifov immigrated to

Russia Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and Northern Asia. It is the largest country in the world, with its internationally recognised territory covering , and encompassing one-ei ...

with the aid of Miladinov and enrolled at the Chersonesos high school in

Odessa Odesa (also spelled Odessa) is the third most populous city and municipality in Ukraine and a major seaport and transport hub located in the south-west of the country, on the northwestern shore of the Black Sea. The city is also the administrativ ...

(modern

Ukraine Ukraine ( uk, Україна, Ukraïna, ) is a country in Eastern Europe. It is the second-largest European country after Russia, which it borders to the east and northeast. Ukraine covers approximately . Prior to the ongoing Russian inva ...

). Towards the end of 1858 he moved to

Moscow Moscow ( , US chiefly ; rus, links=no, Москва, r=Moskva, p=mɐskˈva, a=Москва.ogg) is the capital and largest city of Russia. The city stands on the Moskva River in Central Russia, with a population estimated at 13.0 million ...

, where he graduated from the Faculty of History and Philology at the

Moscow University M. V. Lomonosov Moscow State University (MSU; russian: Московский государственный университет имени М. В. Ломоносова) is a public research university in Moscow, Russia and the most prestigious ...

in 1864. Under the strong influence of the Bulgarian national revival ideas as a student he changed his name from his Greek birth name Ksenofont (''Xenophontos'') to the Bulgarian Rayko, advised by Georgi Rakovski; though, his teacher Miladinov had called him Rayko at school. In 1863 he had issued his book ''New Bulgarian Collection'' including own and translated poems. Zhinzifov lived among the young Bulgarian diaspora in Moscow, along with Lyuben Karavelov, Nesho Bonchev,

Konstantin Miladinov The Miladinov brothers ( bg, Братя Миладинови, ''Bratya Miladinovi'', mk, Браќа Миладиновци, ''Brakja Miladinovci''), Dimitar Miladinov (1810–1862) and Konstantin Miladinov (1830–1862), were Bulgarian poets ...

, Vasil Popovich, etc., and issued the ''Brotherly Labour'' magazine. In the Russian press of the time, Zhinzifov was particularly active in the information of the Russian society about the tough fate of the Bulgarian

people A person ( : people) is a being that has certain capacities or attributes such as reason, morality, consciousness or self-consciousness, and being a part of a culturally established form of social relations such as kinship, ownership of prope ...

under Ottoman rule. He co-operated with the Bulgarian newspapers ''Danubian Dawn'', ''Macedonia'', ''Liberty'', ''Bulgarian Bee'', ''Age'' and ''Time'', the magazines ''

Chitalishte A ''chitalishte'' (, . Derives from the verb "чета" - "to read" or "читател" - "reader") is a typical Bulgarian public institution and building that fulfills several functions at once, such as a community centre, library, and a theat ...

'', ''Periodical Magazine'', ''Bulgarian Booklets'', etc., publishing articles, poems, Bulgarian folk songs and a single tale. His poetical heritage has led to him been described as a Romantic poet. Among his notable translations was the first Bulgarian translation of

Old East Slavic Old East Slavic (traditionally also Old Russian; be, старажытнаруская мова; russian: древнерусский язык; uk, давньоруська мова) was a language used during the 9th–15th centuries by East ...

text ''

The Tale of Igor's Campaign ''The Tale of Igor's Campaign'' ( orv, Слово о пълкѹ Игоревѣ, translit=Slovo o pŭlku Igorevě) is an anonymous epic poem written in the Old East Slavic language. The title is occasionally translated as ''The Tale of the Campai ...

''. He died in 1877, on his 38th birthday, in Moscow, roughly a year before the liberation of Bulgaria. In his works, Zhinzifov emphasized the Bulgarian consciousness of the Slavic population of his native Macedonia. In his eyes, "Macedonian" was merely a geographic and ethnographic area of the Bulgarian lands as opposed to a separate ethnic or national term (cf. ''Guslyar v sobor'', ''Karvava koshulya'').

Honour

Rayko Nunatak on

Graham Land Graham Land is the portion of the Antarctic Peninsula that lies north of a line joining Cape Jeremy and Cape Agassiz. This description of Graham Land is consistent with the 1964 agreement between the British Antarctic Place-names Committee an ...

Antarctica Antarctica () is Earth's southernmost and least-populated continent. Situated almost entirely south of the Antarctic Circle and surrounded by the Southern Ocean, it contains the geographic South Pole. Antarctica is the fifth-largest cont ...

is named after Rayko Zhinzifov.

Notable works

* ''Karvava koshulya'' ''(Bloody shirt)'' * ''Guslyar v sobor'' ''(Harper at a fair)'' * ''Ohrid'' * ''Zhalba'' ''(Lament)'' * ''Galab'' ''(Pigeon)'' * ''Vdovitsa'' ''(Widow)'' * ''Do balgarskata mayka'' ''(To the Bulgarian mother)''

References

Sources

* * * * *

External links

Works by Rayko Zhinzifov at Slovoto

{{DEFAULTSORT:Zhinzifov, Rayko 1839 births 1877 deaths People from Veles, North Macedonia Bulgarian writers Bulgarian emigrants to Russia 19th-century Bulgarian people Aromanian writers Romantic poets Aromanians from the Ottoman Empire Emigrants from the Ottoman Empire to the Russian Empire Macedonian Bulgarians 19th-century Bulgarian poets Bulgarian male poets 19th-century male writers Bulgarian people of Aromanian descent