Village archive
Kamilski Dol, once Deve Dere.
A stone village in the far ridges of the Eastern Rhodopes, municipality of Ivaylovgrad, Haskovo Province, southern Bulgaria. It sits on a ridge on the left bank of the Arda, now the bowl of Ivaylovgrad Reservoir, north of the dam wall and close to the Greek border. Land area 45 km², about one person per square kilometre.
Until 1934 the name was Deve Dere: Turkish deve (camel) anddere (ravine). Local stories tie the name to camel caravans that carried gold ore or charcoal toward Edirne, or that stopped to water the animals at the stream after crossing the Arda. The first written mention is usually dated 1572, with the neighbouring villages of Gornoseltsi and Siv Kladenets.
What the printed record says
- Municipal plan (2017) cites a 1572 Chirmen vakif boundary deed naming Gornoseltsi, Siv Kladenets and Kamilski Dol. Another local reading dates the same hududname 1562 and says Deve Dere is not yet in it. The Ottoman original is unpublished.
- Settlers from Deve Dere, Huhla and Gornoseltsi founded Kocabunar in Balikesir. In 1914 their descendants were housed in nine villages of the Ivaylovgrad district (483 families, 2,258 people), not back in burned Deve Dere.
- 1879-1881: after hosting a Russian unit, villagers fled to the Burgas region (Draganovo, Pomorie, Karagyozler/Marinka) and returned after a year and a half.
- Miletich: Devedere is a purely Bulgarian village of up to 100 houses. Priest Saranda Kostov (1911-1913) describes torture in the village church, then arson. Two men volunteered for the Macedonian-Adrianople Corps.
- Church of St George: stone three-nave basilica, 1840s, consecrated about 1843. Bell cast in Edirne, 1895.
- Summer 1913: Gumuljina autonomous bands enter Ivaylovgrad on 29 July. The municipality lists nine burned villages; 335 people killed in the district. The 27th infantry regiment, plus the bands of Dimitar Madzharov and Rusi Slavov, stopped a full emptying of the area. A plaque at Kyuchuk Kale, about 3 km away, names 21 men from Devedere.
- Renamed Kamilski Dol in 1934 (Michev & Koledarov). Ortakoy became Ivaylovgrad on 14 August the same year.
- Ivaylovgrad dam, 1964, last step of the Arda cascade: 36 km long, known for catfish below the village.
- Census 1 Feb 2011: 65 people, 64 Bulgarian. Current population 44 (NSI, 31 Dec 2025), not GRAO address-registration. Land area 45 km². Elevation about 360 m. Postal code 6571.
- Medieval fortress on peak Kaleto, 2.73 km east of the centre: citadel and outer town (about 5.6 daa), local stone bonded with clay, remains of a small single-nave church. A late antique / medieval watchtower on peak Naredenite kamani, 1.82 km north-east, gives Kaleto a line of sight. Both sit on the old Mezek-Lyutitsa road. An Ottoman-period bridge 2.78 km west linked Ivaylovgrad with Malko Gradishte.
- Photographs on this site are of the village itself (Wikimedia Commons: Izvora; Krasimir Kosev, 2016), not stock landscapes.
Visit
Take the Lyubimets-Ivaylovgrad road and the short mountain spur north of town. There are no hotels in the village. Bring water, fuel and an offline map. The rest of this site is in Bulgarian.