[b] The earliest manifestations of an incipient Macedonian identity emerged during the second half of the 19th century[46][47][48] among limited circles of Slavic-speaking intellectuals, predominantly outside the region of Macedonia.

[c] The formation of the ethnic Macedonians as a separate community has been shaped by population displacement[54] as well as by language shift,[55][dubious – discuss] both the result of the political developments in the region of Macedonia during the 20th century.

[56] During the late Classical Period, having already developed several sophisticated polis-type settlements and a thriving economy based on mining,[57] Paeonia became a constituent province of the Argead – Macedonian kingdom.

[80] In the 860s, Byzantine missionaries Cyril and Methodius created the Glagolitic alphabet and Slavonic liturgy based on the Slavic dialect around Thessaloniki for a mission to Great Moravia.

[81][82][83] After the demise of the Great Moravian mission in 886, exiled students of the two apostles brought the Glagolitic alphabet to the Bulgarian Empire, where Khan Boris I of Bulgaria (r. 852–889) welcomed them.

[92][full citation needed] This is confirmed from a Sultan's Firman from 1680 which describes the ethnic groups in the Balkan territories of the Empire as follows: Greeks, Albanians, Serbs, Vlachs and Bulgarians.

[93] Throughout the Middle Ages and Ottoman rule up until the early 20th century[52][53][94] the Slavic-speaking population majority in the region of Macedonia were more commonly referred to (both by themselves and outsiders) as Bulgarians.

[104] In September 1872, the Ecumenical Patriarch Anthimus VI declared the Exarchate schismatic and excommunicated its adherents, accusing them of having "surrendered Orthodoxy to ethnic nationalism", i.e., "ethnophyletism" (Greek: εθνοφυλετισμός).

[106] However, in 1874, the Christian population of the bishoprics of Skopje and Ohrid were given the chance to participate in a plebiscite, where they voted overwhelmingly in favour of joining the Exarchate (Skopje by 91%, Ohrid by 97%)[107][108] Referring to the results of the plebiscites, and on the basis of statistical and ethnological indications, the 1876 Conference of Constantinople included all of present-day North Macedonia (except for the Debar region) and parts of present-day Greek Macedonia.

"[118] The activities of these people were also registered by the Serbian politician Stojan Novaković,[119] who promoted the idea to use the Macedonian nationalism in order to oppose the strong pro-Bulgarian sentiments in the area.

[159] The differentiation of ethnographic maps representing rival national views produced to satisfy the curiosity of European audience for the inhabitants of Macedonia, after the Ilinden uprising of 1903, indicated the complexity of the issue.

[162] In a pamphlet translated and circulated in Europe the same year, he elaborated his ostensibly impartial views and described the Slavs living south of the Babuna and Plačkovica mountains as "Macedo-Slavs" arguing that the appellation "Bugari" meant simply "peasant" to them, that they had no national consciousness and could become Serbs or Bulgarians in the future.

[166][167] Envisioning a future agreement with Greece, Cvijic depicted the southern half of the Macedo-Slavs "under Greek unfluence", while leaving the rest to appear as a subset of the Serbo-Croats.

[172] However, in 1913, before the conclusion of the Treaty of Bucharest he published his third ethnographic map distinguishing the Macedo-Slavs between Skopje and Salonica from both Bulgarians and Serbo-Croats, on the basis of the transitional character of their dialect per the linguistic researches of Vatroslav Jagić and Aleksandar Belić, and the Serb features of their customs, such as the zadruga.

[174] Despite arguing that they should be considered neutral, he postulated their division into Serbs and Bulgarians based on dialectical and cultural features in anticipation of Serbian demands regarding the delimitation of frontiers.

[177] Thus, as the Entente approached victory in the First World War, a number other maps and atlases, including those produced by the Allies replicated Cvijić's ideas, especially its depiction of the Macedo-Slavs.

Bulgarian sources claim around 100,000 pro-Bulgarian elements were imprisoned for violations of the special Law for the Protection of Macedonian National Honour, and over 1,200 were allegedly killed.

[209][210] In this way generations of students grew up educated in a strong anti-Bulgarian sentiment which during the times of Communist Yugoslavia, increased to the level of state policy.

[121] Moreover, some historians point out that all modern nations are recent, politically motivated constructs based on creation "myths",[211] that the creation of Macedonian identity is "no more or less artificial than any other identity",[212] and that, contrary to the claims of Romantic nationalists, modern, territorially bound and mutually exclusive nation-states have little in common with their preceding large territorial or dynastic medieval empires, and any connection between them is tenuous at best.

[213] In any event, irrespective of shifting political affiliations, the Macedonian Slavs shared in the fortunes of the Byzantine commonwealth and the Rum millet and they can claim them as their heritage.

[238][239] As a result of the rise of nationalism in the Ottoman Empire, massive Greek religious and school propaganda occurred, and a process of Hellenization was implemented among Slavic-speaking population of the area.

Smaller numbers live in eastern Albania, northern Greece, and southern Serbia, mostly abutting the border areas of the Republic of North Macedonia.

There also exist unrecognised Macedonian populations living in the Golo Brdo region, the "Dolno Pole" area near the town of Peshkopi, around Lake Ohrid and Korce as well as in Gora.

The Macedonian community is located mainly in Michigan, New York, Ohio, Indiana and New Jersey[284] There are an estimated 61,000 citizens of North Macedonia in Germany (mostly in the Ruhrgebiet) (2001).

The rich cultural heritage of the Macedonians is accented in the folklore, the picturesque traditional folk costumes, decorations and ornaments in city and village homes, the architecture, the monasteries and churches, iconostasis, wood-carving and so on.

The stereotype for a traditional Macedonian city house is a two-floor building with white façade, with a forward extended second floor, and black wooden elements around the windows and on the edges.

They were succeeded by an exceptionally talented and fruitful generation, consisting of Borka Lazeski, Dimitar Kondovski, Petar Mazev who are now deceased, and Rodoljub Anastasov and many others who are still active.

In addition to Dimo Todorovski, who is considered to be the founder of modern Macedonian sculpture, the works of Petar Hadzi Boskov, Boro Mitrikeski, Novak Dimitrovski and Tome Serafimovski are also outstanding.

Symbols used by members of the ethnic group include: Anthropologically, Macedonians possess genetic lineages postulated to represent Balkan prehistoric and historic demographic processes.

[g] Y-DNA studies suggest that Macedonians along with neighboring South Slavs are distinct from other Slavic-speaking populations in Europe and near half of their Y-chromosome DNA haplogroups are likely to be inherited from inhabitants of the Balkans that predated sixth-century Slavic migrations.