The town of Dryanovo (Дряново) is situated at the northern foot of the Balkan Mountains in Gabrovo Province, Bulgaria, amphitheatrically along the two banks of Dryanovo River, a tributary to the Yantra River. The town is a centre of the homonymous Dryanovo Municipality, which is composed of 62 villages, hamlets and huts picturesquely spread out of the mountain folds. The population of the town as of December 2009 is 8,043.

Dryanovo has a favourable geographical position, being situated 20 km away from Gabrovo, 24 km from Veliko Tarnovo, 17 km from Tryavna and about 30 km away from Sevlievo. The town lies on the Rousse-Veliko Tarnovo-Gabrovo-Shipka-Kazanlak-Stara Zagora highway and it is a station of the main railway thoroughfare, which links the north and the south part of Bulgaria.

Like all Balkan mountain settlements, Dryanovo reached its bloom at the time of the Bulgarian National Revival. In 1883 it was proclaimed a town. Masons and woodcarvers spread the fame of the town throughout Bulgaria and far away in the Ottoman Empire.

Mehmed I Çelebi (Ottoman: چلبی محمد, Mehmed I or Mehmed Çelebi) (1390, Bursa – May 26, 1421, Edirne, Ottoman Empire) was a Sultan of the Ottoman Empire (Rûm) from 1413 to 1421. He was one of the sons of Bayezid I and Devlet Hatun.

After the Ottoman Interregnum, when Mehmed stood as victor in 1413, he crowned himself sultan in Edirne. He restored the empire, moved the capital from Bursa to Edirne, and conquered parts of Albania, the Jandarid emirate, and the Armenian Kingdom of Cilicia from the Mamelukes. Taking many of his achievements into consideration, Mehmed is widely known as the "second founder" of the Ottoman Empire.

Reign of Mehmed I, as Sultan of the re-united empire, had lasted only eight years. But he had been an independent prince for nearly the whole preceding period of eleven years that passed between his father's captivity at Ankara and his own final victory over his brother Musa Çelebi at Chamurli.

He was buried in Bursa, in a mausoleum erected by himself near the celebrated mosque which he built there, and which, from its decorations of green porcelain, is called the Green Mosque. Mehmed I also completed the mosque at Bursa, which his grandfather Murad I had commenced, but which had been neglected during in reign of Bayezid. Mehmed founded in the vicinity of his own mosque and mausoleum two other characteristic institutions, one a school, and one a refectory for the poor both of which he endowed with royal munificence.

Bacho Kiro (Bulgarian: Бачо Киро) (7 July 1835 – 28 May 1876) was the nickname of Kiro Petrov Zanev (Киро Петров Занев), a Bulgarian teacher, man of letters and revolutionary who took an active part in the April Uprising.

Bacho Kiro was born in what is today Byala Cherkva, Veliko Tarnovo Province (then called Gorni Turcheta), to the family of the herdsman Petar Zanev. After finishing the religious school in his village, he joined the Batoshevo Monastery as a neophyte. From 1852 on, he worked as a teacher in various villages, including Koevtsi, Musina, Mihaltsi, Vishovgrad and his native Byala Cherkva, where he lived and taught from 1857 to 1876 with some interruptions. Bacho Kiro also travelled around the Bulgarian lands by foot, calling for armed resistance against the Ottoman rule, and visited Istanbul, Mount Athos, Belgrade and Bucharest. Bacho Kiro established a number of cultural centres (chitalishta); in February 1872, he became the Byala Cherkva head of Vasil Levski's Internal Revolutionary Organisation.