Krǎstyo Asenov

Krastyo Asenov
A photograph of Krastyo Asenov
Born	February 12, 1877 Sliven (İslimiye), Ottoman Empire, today Bulgaria
Died	July 25, 1903 (1903-07-26) (aged 26) Kornishor, today Greece
Organization	IMARO

Krastyo Hadzhipetrov Asenov, nicknamed Mechkata (the Bear), Ogneniot daskal (the Fiery Teacher) and Cherkeza (the Circassian), was a Bulgarian revolutionary figure active in the region of Macedonia, one of the voyvodas of the Internal Macedonian-Adrianople Revolutionary Organization (IMARO) for the Enidzhe Vardar region. He took part in the liberation struggles of the Macedonians at the beginning of the 20th century.

Krastyo Asenov was born in 1877 in Sliven. He was a nephew of the legendary Macedonian voyvoda Hadzhi Dimitar and a brother of the IMARO revolutionary Yordan Asenov. He graduated from the Bulgarian Men's High School of Varna and later from the Sofia University. Afterwards Asenov worked as a Bulgarian Exarchate teacher in Macedonia.

Under the influence of Gotse Delchev, he joined the IMARO and the struggle for the liberation of Macedonia and Odrin from the Turkish yoke. When he was a teacher in the village of Leshko, Asenov met Yane Sandanski. He was one of the organizers and took an active role in the Miss Stone Affair. In 1902, his sister, Doctor Sabka Asenova, preserved a part of the ransom collected from the Miss Stone Affair. Asenov's cousins, Dimitar Asenov and Ivan Asenov were freedom fighters in the revolutionary band of the voyvoda Toma Davidov. During 1902, Asenov's revolutionary activity was concentrated on the right coast of the Struma River.

During the Ilinden-Preobrazhenie Uprising he was a voyvoda of the Kilkis cheta and fought against the Ottomans in the area of the Paiak Mountain.