GIORGIO NURIGIANI

"THE MATICA'S BOY"

---

  a thorough account on the "Award" winner's amazing change in his own published historic position after he joined "TEAM TITO"

---

Giorgio Nurigiani has become somewhat a nostalgic figure amongst Macedonists, being one of the first high-profile Western writers willing to "market" the concept of Tito's new Macedonia. His book "Macedonia Yesterday and Today" translated into English in 1967, was extensively promoted by the People's Republic of Macedonia. The Macedonian diaspora was saturated with 1000s of free copies; and on the first page of each we note the sign of the Tito-Kolishevski beast.
Nurigiani was also sent on a whirlwind tour to promote the "New Macedonian" concept in both Canada and the USA. At the 1970 convention of the "United Macedonians of North America" in Toronto, Nurigiani was the most honourable guest. In the main speech written by Spero Vasilef-Tupurkovski (that name sounds familiar), and delivered by Peter Kondoff, we hear the following

"At this very Convention we are honoured with Macedonian educators and historians who are the authors of the Macedonian history written by Macedonians for the Macedonians. We no longer have to depend on people who are guided by foreign and personal interests and try to distort the facts of the history of Macedonia.

We are also fortunate to have people like our great friend, Academician George Nurigiani, from Italy, who is supporting the just cause of the Macedonian people. The United Macedonians of this continent and the Macedonian people as a whole will forever cherish the friendship, sympathy of this great son of the Italian people."

What hypocrisy! So why do they need Nurigiani, when all they need is their "own" narrative history? Why, because no-one believes their fabrications, least of all their own "followers", that's why. Accordingly they desperately sought independent validation through the likes of Nurigiani. Are Kondeff and his United cronies also telling us that the writings of the Miladinov brothers, Grigor Purlichev and Kuzman Shapkarov, all of whom they vigorously claim as "their own" Macedonians, were guided by foreign and or personal interests, when they declared themselves as Bulgarian?

The Matica - Nurigiani ploy was quite obvious to all. It was really all about "internal" rather than "external" validation. Distinguished people like Nurigiani reinforced and nurtured in many Macedonians the initial alien concepts that Tito/Kolishevski and communism had planted. As we have already said "before a people can know who they are, they must know who they were".

Therefore it is not surprising that in his recent PhD dissertation (2005) Gregory Michaelidis states

"To refute critics, Macedonian leaders also cultivated writers friendly to their nation-building project. One key ally in Macedonia's historiographical project was the Italian journalist Giorgio Nurigiani

It is unclear whether Nurigiani was paid by Macedonia for his work, but the employment of historians in Eastern Europe by the state was common at the time."

To further clarify this issue, we note that prior to his "awakening" with respect to the Macedonian people, Nurigiani was a vehement supporter of the Bulgarian ethnicity of the Macedonian people. His sudden change is detailed in the accompanying article. However after all these facts it is somewhat unbelievable that the current official Republic of Macedonia website dedicated to the memory of Krste Misirkov is based on an article by, you guessed it, Giorgio Nurigiani. The truth about Misirkov is provided here on our site and I can assure you it's not at all like the Nurigiani version, so if you're a die-hard Macedonist we suggest you give it a big miss.

Reference

Gregory Michaelidis, Salvation Abroad: Macedonian migration to North America and the Making of Modern Macedonia, 1870-1970
University of Maryland, Dissertation: Doctor of Philosophy 2005