After the liberation: a two-hour walk through the Sofia of 1878

In 1878, at the end of the Russo-Turkish War, Sofia was a small Ottoman town that had just become the capital of a new state. Much of the centre visitors now admire was built in the generation that followed, and a lot of it was built to remember that war.

This short walk follows that story through four stops, from a quiet garden memorial to the city's great cathedral, the monument to the tsar who led the war, and an Ottoman mosque the new capital turned into a church. It is a compact first look at Sofia, with time to go inside at the two churches.

Begin in the leafy Doctors' Garden behind the National Library. Its monument, built in 1883–84 to a design by the architect Antoniy Tomishko, remembers the medics who died in the war, most of them from the mission of the Russian Red Cross. Roman stones lie scattered among the trees, a reminder of the much older city underneath.

To the west, the gold domes of the Alexander Nevsky Cathedral fill the sky. It was built in memory of the Russian soldiers who died in the same war: the foundation stone was laid in 1882, but most of it went up between 1904 and 1912, to a design by Alexander Pomerantsev. Step into the dim, candlelit interior. The crypt holds a museum of Orthodox icons that belongs to the National Gallery.

Down the boulevard, the bronze rider of the Monument to the Tsar Liberator faces the National Assembly building. It honours the Russian emperor Alexander II, and was made by the Italian sculptor Arnoldo Zocchi, who won a competition against 31 other artists; it was unveiled in 1907. Look at the main relief: the goddess of victory, sword raised, leads Russian and Bulgarian soldiers.

The last stop shows the other side of the story. Sveti Sedmochislenitsi Church was built around 1547 as the Black Mosque, named for the dark granite of its minaret, and the work is credited to Mimar Sinan. After 1878 it stood empty and served as a military store and a prison, until in 1901–02 the architects Yordan Milanov and Petko Momchilov added a dome, a narthex and a bell tower and made it a church. It is dedicated to the Seven Saints: Cyril and Methodius and their five disciples.

In about two hours you have crossed the years in which Sofia became a capital: a memorial to the dead, a cathedral of thanks, a monument to a tsar and a mosque given a new life. For Roman Serdica, the market halls and Vitosha Boulevard, carry on with our full-day walk through the centre.