Middle Ages, Drastar was among Bulgaria's largest and most important cities.
During Ottoman rule, Silistra (Silistre in Ottoman Turkish) was part of Rumelia Province and was the administrative centre of the Silistra district (sanjak). This district was later upgraded to become the Silistra Province that stretched over most of the western Black Sealittoral.
The town was captured by Russian forces numerous times during several Russo-Turkish Wars and was besieged between 14 April and 23 June in 1854 during the Crimean War. Nam?k Kemal wrote his most famous play, Vatan Yahut Silistre ("Fatherland; or, Silistra"), a drama evolving around the siege of Silistra, in which he expounded on the ideas of patriotism and liberalism. It was staged first on 1 April 1873 and led to his exile to Famagusta.
The Ottoman Silistra Province was reduced in size, as the districts of �zi and Hocabey and the region of Bessarabia were ceded to the Russian Empire between the end of the 18th century and the beginning of the 19th century, and the Edirne Province was established from its south regions in 1830. Finally, Silistra Province merged with the provinces of Vidin and Ni� in 1864 and became Danube Provincein 1864. Silistra was downgraded to a kaza centre in Ruse district in this province in the same year.
Between 1819 and 1826, Eliezer Papo � a renowned Jewish scholar � was the rabbi of the community of Silistra, making this town famous among observant Jews. (Up to the present, his grave is a focus of pilgrimage, some pilgrims flying especially from Israel and even from Latin America to Bulgaria for that purpose.)
In 1878, following the Russo-Turkish War of 1877�1878, Silistra was included in the newly autonomous Principality of Bulgaria, which became the Kingdom of Bulgaria in 1908.
In May 1913, after unsuccessful Bulgarian-Romanian negotiations in London, the two countries accepted the mediation of the Great Powers, who awarded Silistra and the
