This thesis concerns the formation of the Macedonian Scientific and Literary Society by a group of students at the University of St. Petersburg and its involvement in the Macedonian Question. It argues that the emergence of the MSLS was inspired by ideas of a separate Macedonian Slav identity that the students sought to translate into a platform for a prospective independent Macedonian state. This state was initially imagined as an autonomous Ottoman protectorate with provisions for an officially recognized language, nationality, and an autocephalous Orthodox Church. The development and...