Anthim I

Who was Anthim I?

Anthim I was a Bulgarian education figure and clergyman, and a participant in the Bulgarian liberation and church-independence movement. He was the first head of the Bulgarian Exarchate, a post he held from 1872 to 1877. He was also the first Chairman of the National Assembly of Bulgaria, presiding the Constituent Assembly and the 1st Grand National Assembly in 1879.

Anthim I was born in Lozengrad in Eastern Thrace and became a monk in the Hilendar monastery on Mount Athos.

He studied in the Halki seminary, in Odessa as well as in Russia. He graduated from the Moscow Theological Academy in 1856. He was ordained hieromonk by Metropolitan of Moscow Philaret Drozdov.

He was Archbishop of Preslav and then of Vidin.

After he unilaterally declared an independent national church of the Bulgarians on May 11, 1872, he was defrocked by the Patriarchal Synod, under whose canonical jurisdiction he had been consecrated bishop. The condemnation was later affirmed at the Council in Constantinople in September the same year.