which is present in many Slavic languages and is a cognate of French rouge and Latin rusos.
During Ottoman rule, the invaders destroyed the town, reacting to a 1595 unsuccessful liberation attempt by a joint Vlach-Bulgarian army, led by Michael the Brave. After its rebuilding in the following years, Ruse was dubbed Rus�uk (Turkish for "little Ruse") and had again expanded into a large fortress by the 18th century. It later grew into one of the most important Ottoman towns on the Danube and an administrative centre of Tuna Vilayet, which extended from Varna and Tulcea to Sofia and Ni�.
The "Dunav" newspaper appeared � it was the first printed in Bulgaria and ... in Bulgarian. Some Bulgarian schools were founded. The streets are renamed and numbered for the first time in Bulgarian lands. A post-office, hospital, home for the aged were founded. Three empires met here for trading: Austro-Hungary, Russia, British Empire, France and Italy opened consulates in Ruschuk. Imperceptibly, the modern city arose from the shades of the settlement. In 1865 the Obraztsov Chiflik was founded on the place where the English Consul's farm was and it was the first modern farm on the territory of the whole Ottoman Empire of that time.
Ruse developed into a centre of the Bulgarian National Revival and hosted the headquarters of the Bulgarian Revolutionary Central Committee.
Liberated Bulgaria
After it was liberated from the Ottoman Empire on 20 February 1878, Ruse was one of the key cultural and economic centres of the country. Intensive building during the period changed the city's architectural appearance to a typical Central European one. Ruse is famous for the many first innovations in Bulgaria, including:
* 1864 - the first printing office in Bulgaria;
* 1867 - the first railway line linking Ruse and Varna, was launched into operation;
* 1879 - the first agronomical
