“There is an ethnic nationalist movement among Kazan Tatars that stresses descent from the Bulgars and is known as Bulgarism – there have been graffiti on the walls in the streets of Kazan with phrases such as "Bulgaria is alive" (Булгария жива)” – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tatars
Born in Kazan, I never seen or heard of such movement, acts or news. Yeah, 118 people of 0.5M (blind guess) defined themselves as bulgars in 1989. But no one except themselves was aware of this “nationalist movement” since then. And no one tries to understand the real meaning of that graffiti, because our teenagers are often into something strange or schizophrenic-flavoured in their street paintings. But I bet this will hit headlines at the day when some erudite politician will see a good profit from it. And people will “oh no, national extremists among tatars!”
I wonder how much of a history was written that way.
I'd be nice if author list more words than single one (bičiulis). The other example is a bit incorrect - yes we do have different words for dead animal (dvėsti) and dead human (mirti), but each can be used opposite - if your beloved died you'd rather use "miręs" or if you curse at someone you'd tell them to "dvėsk".