PETROVSKI BECAME PETRIDIS, GUSHEVSKI -GUSIDIS

PETROVSKI BECAME PETRIDIS, GUSHEVSKI -GUSIDIS

In a period of one year the Greek Government changed the names of nearly 1,000 cities, towns and villages from Macedonian to Greek

The Greek ministry of internal affairs passed a decree to Hellenize all of Aegean Macedonia even before the 1919 Paris Peace Agreement was signed. With this decree Greece eliminated all Macedonian names of cities, towns and villages. Greece’s intent was to remove everything “that was poisoning and desecrating the look of its beautiful fatherland, and to remove any doubts about the ‘authenticity’ of the Greek nation…”

According to Todor Hristov Simovski, after its establishment as a state in 1832, Greece found itself in a very unpleasant situation because of the many non-Greek and Slavic names found on its territory. Many foreign scientists and historians came to the conclusion that the modern Greeks had no connection to the ancient Greeks. The modern Greeks were a completely different race. In fact the modern Greeks were seen as a mixture of different races and of numerous populations living in these regions. Not only in Macedonia but also in southern Greece, including the Peloponnesus, where Slavic toponyms were found to exist before Greece changed them.

This is what Simovski wrote about that in his book “Populated Places in Aegean Macedonia”, “Besides the numerous historic facts that already existed, foreign scientists also began to research the toponyms in the Greek regions which caused serious arguments to develop...” According to Tashko Georgievski, this precise, clear and comprehensive research showed that the majority of the people, who lived in geographic Macedonia before they were forced out, were Macedonians.

In 1909, even before Macedonia was invaded, occupied and partitioned, Greek King George I prepared a special report in which he stressed the need for creating a special emergency Commission to prepare a plan for changing all the names of populated places and all other toponyms which were not of Greek origin. The problem with the names became even more complex for official Athens after the Balkan Wars ended. It was found that in the newly Greek occupied territories of Macedonia the Greeks were a minority. The majority of the population was mostly Macedonian with some Turks. The toponyms where Macedonians lived were Macedonian and those where the Turks lived were Turkish. According to Simovski, “It was clear that the territories that Greece annexed were not ethnically or geographically or historically Greek…” According to Georgievski’s research, the population in Aegean Macedonia at the time Greece annexed it was only 10 percent Greek.

The Greek government’s plans to change the toponyms in the Macedonian territories began right after the 1913 Bucharest Treaty was signed, which divided Macedonia between Greece, Serbia and Bulgaria. Greece conducted its first census in 1919 and published a manual on how to change place names. However that process was slowed down during the 1919 to 1922 war between Greece and Turkey. As a result by 1925 only 76 place names were changed. Then, in September 1926, the Greek Government issued a new decree according to which, as proposed by the Commission for changing the names, Greece was allowed to change all “foreign and unpleasant city, town and village names….” One year after issuing the decree, 945 place names were changed in the Aegean part of Macedonia.

According to Simovski, the decree for changing place names said nothing about the population using the old names. The Greek authorities said nothing about the Greek state placing sanctions on those who still used the old names. As a result a new law was passed on November 13, 1927 prohibiting people from using the old names and those who violated the law would be penalized. The Greek authorities posted signs with the new names and with the message that anyone using the old name would punished. On top of that anyone punished for using the old names was not allowed to appeal the punishment or complain about it. According article 5 of the

order, “Anyone who questioned the court’s order and used the old name for the place where they are living or for the place where they were born, be it a city, town or village, whose name had already been changed, the judge has the right to punish and issue them a monetary penalty.”

According to Simovski, the Commission responsible for name changes took special care to use ‘ancient names’. For example, “Postol”, the birthplace of Krste Petkov Misirkov, was renamed to “Pela”. The names “Barbes” and “Kutlesh” in Ber Region were renamed to “Vergina”.

This is what Simovski wrote, “We cannot forget that these place name changes were forced upon the people after which came the forced changes of Macedonian surnames and given names. The Macedonian people were deprived of their individuality and were unable to recognize one another. Some people received only Greek suffixes such as “os”, “is” “ou” “poulos”, etc., but those people who had names of Slavic origin were completely changed. As a result Bozhinovski became Mpozinis, Petrovski became Petridis, Gushevski became Gousidis, Bogdanovski became Mpogdanis, Zhelkov became Zalkas, and so on.”

According to Simovski, “In addition to Hellenizing Macedonia, the Greek authorities had other plans for the Macedonian people and for the world... They wanted to deprive the Macedonian people of their individuality and of their special Macedonian ethnical character and to show the world that Macedonia was always and still is a Greek province.”

Simovski’s claims were confirmed by Anastasia Karakasidou, a Greek professor of anthropology, who was teaching in an American college.

Karakasidou did extensive research in the past of a small place called Guvezna, renamed to Asiros by the Greeks. Guvezna is located near Solun, Aegean Macedonia. This is what Karakasidou wrote in her book ‘Fields of Wheat, Hills of Blood’. “According to a Guvezna teacher teaching the Greek language, ‘the newcomer’ named Garoufaldis, the name ‘Guvezna’ was changed to ‘Asiros’

because the local population was told that ‘Asiros’, according to ancient Greek history, was an ancient name which should remind them of Alexander the Great and of the Greek civilization in Macedonia… In fact, since the 1920s, many place names all throughout Greek Macedonia have undergone name changes. This trend became familiar and even procedural during Metaxas’s dictatorship in the 1930s, when a joint effort was carried out to erase all Ottoman symbols, all Slavic culture and everything that was not Greek in the region. Even families had to change their names. The surnames of Slavic origin in Asiros which still existed in the old 1918 family register in Guvezna, were no longer present in the 1950 register.

Even personal women’s names such as ‘Velika’ and ‘Dona’ were changed to Greek names. The local rich people also played an active role in this process. As godfathers during baptisms they gave newborn children Greek names. Because of their wealth they had influence over the poor people, especially over those who worked for them. The rich also sponsored national holidays and local festivals. They participated in church rituals and ceremonies and observed the Greek education of students. In other words the rich from Asiros made sure the local citizens understood that Macedonia belonged to Greece.”

Because of what she wrote in her book, Karakasidou was declared a ‘traitor’ to the Greek cause and an agent of “Skopje” by the Greeks in the regions where she did her research.