The "veins and arteries of the country" Imagined and actual exclusion from railway connectivity in Bulgaria, 1878–1908.

The article focuses on the complex role of railway infrastructure in the Bulgarian Principality (established 1878) as both a tool for national integration and a source of social, regional, ethnic, and ideological conflict. While railways were intended to unify diverse regions with Sofia as the central hub and promote economic development, competing local interests, class struggles, and ethnic tensions complicated this goal. The Bulgarian State Railways operated under a state monopoly, contrasting with the foreign-owned Orient Railways, which became a symbol of external control and internal division, fueling nationalist and xenophobic sentiments. Ultimately, the railway network highlighted and sometimes deepened existing societal fault lines rather than fully bridging them, illustrating the challenges of infrastructure politics in newly formed nation-states.