The story
Surva International Festival of Masquerade Games in Pernik
Bulgaria's largest gathering of kukeri mummers, held in Pernik each January since 1966 and recognized by UNESCO as intangible cultural heritage in 2015. Thousands of costumed participants in wooden masks and bell-hung animal-hide costumes process through the town's streets over three days, continuing a winter ritual originally meant to drive off evil spirits before spring.
Choreographer Yordan Nikolov organized the first Surva gathering in Pernik in January 1966, turning a local mummer tradition into what became, by 1985, an internationally recognized festival and, in 2015, an entry on UNESCO's Representative List of Intangible Cultural Heritage.