Voivode Bogdan (Yakoruda)

Bogdan Voivode was a Bulgarian hajduk who resisted the imposition of Islam in the Razlog region in the seventeenth century. He was born in the village of Yakoruda in the Razlog region, then part of the Ottoman Empire. Between 1666 and 1670, when the villages of the Razlog region were forcibly compelled to convert to Islam, Bogdan Voivode led a resistance movement and clashed with the Ottoman troops of Pehlivan Mehmed Koprulu Pasha near the village of Ilansko (now Smolevo). This engagement is known as Bogdan's Battlefield. In 1666, a fierce battle broke out. The inhabitants of the villages of Blatsa, Valogo, Krivak, Smolevo and Chista Mogila resisted the Turkish troops. After the battle, the Ottomans set fire to Yakoruda.