ess favourably disposed than it has been towards the Macedonian. Its past resembles horrifying, spine-chilling night-time stories in which the reflections from the fire flicker and dark shadows of horsemen gallop. Campaigns of conquest, slaughter, mass graves, uprisings and defeats, voices lamenting over the slain, tears that burn the hands like melted wax from the slender candles on the graves - this is the bloody outcome of the Balkan cosmogony.
             Balkan historiography is an apologue of endless wars, conquests and conquerors, kings and nobles, conspiracies and murders. What it does not record, what cannot be found in the old manuscripts and parchments, in the documents with blood-red seals, is the constant, unwavering endeavour to endure in the face of conditions undignified for a human being, to leave behind an ineradicable trace in the face of misfortune and suffering.
             Above the din of battle, the rivers of blood and the towns in flames, above the armies radiant in armour and the flying flags, like a rainbow over Macedonia's d
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