Revolutionary Georgi Tutmanikov

Georgi Dakov Tutmanikov, also called Cherkezina or Sholeto, was a Bulgarian priest and national revolutionary, born in 1844 in the Tutmantsi hamlet of present-day Dzhurovo in the Etropole region. He was educated in Vidrare, Etropole and Lovech.

Tutmanikov married Tsona Panova and was ordained a priest by Metropolitan Hilarion of Lovech in 1867. He became actively involved in organising the national liberation struggle and joined the Vidrare Local Revolutionary Committee of the Internal Revolutionary Organisation (IRO).

He founded and led the Illyrian Local Revolutionary Committee in 1871, acquiring the pseudonym the Illyrian Priest. After the Arabakonak robbery, he was arrested; during his trial before the Sofia Commission of Inquiry, he declared his willingness to fight for justice if the government would not provide it.

During the Sofia trial against the IRO, he was sentenced to ten years of exile in Diyarbakır. Despite attempts to escape, he remained imprisoned until the Treaty of San Stefano was signed, after which he was released.

He returned to Vidrare, where he died of tuberculosis on 27 June 1881. A monument in his honour was erected there in 2002.