Monument of Racho Kovacha (“Racho the Blacksmith”)

Monument of Racho Kovacha (“Racho the Blacksmith”)

The symbol of the enterprising spirit – the monument of Racho Kovacha, was erected on the rock next to the bridge “Igoto” (“The Yoke”) designed by the sculptor Lyubomir Dalchev in 1935.

Racho Kovacha is a mythical figure, a character of one of the legends about the founding of the town of Gabrovo. The Gabenski brothers say that Racho Kovacha was a blacksmith from the village of Bozhentsi, who every morning went down from his village to “Izvora” in the Kamaka area, along the road from North to South Bulgaria. There he had a forge and shoed the horses of the travellers.

Even if it is not a distant echo of the real personality of the first settler, the legend of Racho Kovacha confirms the strong presence of the blacksmith craft in Gabrovo over the past centuries. The blacksmiths also have their own neighbourhood – in the area of today’s Nikolay Palauzov Street.