For the 9th time, Plovdiv is hosting the Days of Thracian culture international festival, which will run until 29 June. The city is the geographical midpoint of Thrace and performs the mission of preserving and studying the material and cultural heritage of the ancient Thracians.

Assoc. Prof. Vesselina Vachkova said, in an interview for the BNR, that the entire territory of Bulgaria is studded with relics of the Thracian past.

“Archaeological data have increasingly been furnishing proof that we are direct descendants, including genetically, of the population that inhabited our lands at least 40 generations ago, and also that the Thracian gene pool is part of our gene pool and culture,” she explained.

The cultural programme of the festival, organized by TRAKART cultural centre, features folklore concerts, exhibitions, literary readings, and the scientific programme - 27 scientific reports by foremost Bulgarian researchers.