Vardar Macedonia was the name given to the territory of the Kingdom of Serbia (1912–1918) and Kingdom of Yugoslavia (1918–1941) roughly corresponding to today's North Macedonia. It covers the northwestern part of geographical Macedonia, whose modern borders came to be defined by the mid-19th century.
Pitu Guli was an Aromanian revolutionary in Ottoman Macedonia, a local leader of what is commonly referred to as the Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization (IMRO).
Vlado Chernozemski was a Bulgarian revolutionary and assassin. Also known as "Vlado the Chauffeur", Chernozemski is considered a hero in Bulgaria today. The official historiography in North Macedonia regards him as a controversial Bulgarian.
Lazar Koliševski was a Macedonian Yugoslav communist political leader in the Socialist Republic of Macedonia and briefly in the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. He was closely allied with Josip Broz Tito.
Metodija Andonov-Čento was a Macedonian statesman, the first president of the Anti-Fascist Assembly of the National Liberation of Macedonia and of the People's Republic of Macedonia in the Federal People's Republic of Yugoslavia after the Second World War. In the Bulgarian historiography he is often considered a Bulgarian. The name of Čento was a taboo in Yugoslav Macedonia, but he was rehabilitated during the 1990s, after the country gained its independence.
Mara Buneva was a Macedonian Bulgarian revolutionary, a member of the Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization, who assassinated Velimir Prelić, a former Serbian Chetnik commander and Yugoslav legal official of the Skopje Oblast. She shot herself in the chest, and subsequently died in a hospital a few hours after the attack, while Prelić died a few days later.
Panko Brashnarov was a revolutionary and member of the left wing of the Internal Macedonian-Adrianople Revolutionary Organization (IMARO) and IMRO (United) later. As with many other IMARO members of the time, historians from North Macedonia consider him an ethnic Macedonian, whereas historians in Bulgaria consider him a Bulgarian. The name of Brashnarov was a taboo in Yugoslav Macedonia, but he was rehabilitated during the 1990s, after the country gained its independence.
World War II in Yugoslav Macedonia started with the Axis invasion of Yugoslavia in April 1941. Under the pressure of the Yugoslav Partisan movement, part of the Macedonian communists began in October 1941 a political and military campaign to resist the occupation of Vardar Macedonia. Officially, the area was called then Vardar Banovina, because the use of very name Macedonia was avoided in the Kingdom of Yugoslavia. It was occupied mostly by Bulgarian, but also by German, Italian, and Albanian forces.
Ivan Naumov, nicknamed Alyabaka or Alyabako was a Bulgarian revolutionary, a member of the Internal Macedonian-Adrianople Revolutionary Organization (IMARO).
Petar Atsev was a Macedonian Bulgarian revolutionary, and a voyvoda of the Internal Macedonian-Adrianople Revolutionary Organization (IMARO) for the region of Prilep. He worked as a Bulgarian teacher.
Illés Spitz ; 2 February 1902 – 1 October 1961) was a Hungarian Jewish international football player and manager, best known for his work in Yugoslav football in the 1940s and 1950s. Spitz is among the few survivors of the Holocaust from Macedonia, after being saved by the Bulgarian authorities.
Metody Patchev was a Bulgarian teacher and revolutionary, voivode of the Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization.
Dimitar Gyuzelov was a Macedonian Bulgarian revolutionary and philosopher. He is the father of Macedonian writer Bogomil Gyuzel and artist Liljana Gyuzelova, who between 1996 and 2006 worked on an art installation titled The Perpetual Return, dedicated to her father, his murder, and the stigma that the children of prominent Bulgarians who had been persecuted by the Yugoslav authorities after 1945 had to endure.
Spiro Kitinchev was a Macedonian Bulgarian writer, activist, and politician during the Second World War in Yugoslav Macedonia.
Day of the Macedonian Uprising is a public holiday in North Macedonia, commemorating what is considered there as the beginning of the communist resistance against fascism during World War II in Yugoslav Macedonia, on October 11.
The Regional Committee of Communists in Macedonia was the provincial communist organization in Vardar Macedonia from 1939 to 1943.
"Gotse Delchev" Brigade was a military unit composed of conscripts and volunteers from the region of Macedonia. The brigade was named after the Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization revolutionary Gotse Delchev.
Vasil Atanasov Ivanovski also known by his pseudonym Bistrishki, was a Bulgarian communist activist, publicist, theoretician of the Macedonian nation within the IMRO (United). According to the historiography in North Macedonia, Ivanovski is its founder and a prominent "fighter for the affirmation of the Macedonian national identity", and according to the Bulgarian historiography, he is known "for his wanderings on the Macedonian question". Per the Macedonian historian Ivan Katardžiev, such activists of the IMRO (United) and the Bulgarian Communist Party never managed to break with their pro-Bulgarian aspirations.
Alekso Martulkov, born as Aleksandar Onchev Martulkov, was a publicist and one of the first socialist revolutionaries from the region of Macedonia. He was a member of the Bulgarian Workers' Social Democratic Party and later the People's Federative Party and the Bulgarian Communist Party. Simultaneously, he was a member of the IMRO and subsequently the IMRO (United). He advocated for the independence of Macedonia. Martulkov was also a member of the Bulgarian Parliament, as well as the Presidium of ASNOM and the parliament of SR Macedonia. He is considered a Macedonian in the Macedonian historiography and a Bulgarian in the Bulgarian historiography.
Emanuel Hristov Čučkov also known as Mane Čučkov was a Macedonian statesman, partisan, author and professor.
