f Savoy in October 1366. The next year it was ceded to Byzantium.
Ottoman rule
After the Ottoman invasion of the Balkans in the 14th century, Anchialos remained a Byzantine bulwark until submission in 1453 together with Constantinople. Whilst under Ottoman administration, it became the centre of a kaza also encompassing the area around Sozopol as "Ahyolu". It was the centre of an eparchy of the Patriarchate of Constantinople and continued to act as a cultural, religious, economic and administrative centre of the region until the early 19th century, as many noble Byzantine families settled after 1453. Two Patriarchs of Constantinople stem from the city�Michael III of Anchialus (1170�1178) and Jeremias II Tranos (1572�1579, 1580�1584, 1587�1595).
Already before 1819 many prominent locals joined the Greek patriotic organization Filiki Eteria. At the outbreak of the Greek War of Independence (1821) a part of the town's representatives, priests as well as the Orthodox bishop Eugenios were executed by the Ottoman authorities. During the Russo-Turkish War of 1828-1829 Anchialos was captured by the Russian forces on 11 July 1829 and held for a year. At the time it was mainly inhabited by Greeks, with minorities of Bulgarians and Turks, had a population of 5,000-6,000, six Orthodox churches and a mosque. After the Russian forces withdrew the whole of what is today Eastern Bulgaria gradually depopulated, with many people fleeing to the Christian lands to the north. The St George's Monastery was founded in 1856. It was a kaza centre in ?slimye sanjak of Edirne Province before 1878 as "Ahyolu".
Liberated Bulgaria
Anchialos was liberated from Ottoman rule on 27 January 1878 and became part of Eastern Rumelia as a kaza centre in Burgaz sanjak until Bulgaria unified in 1886. At the turn of the 20th century Anchialos was a predominantly Greek town of about 6,000. In the summer of 1906 it was burned down during an anti-Greek pogrom
