XXVII – ETHNOGENESIS OF THE TSINTSARI -AROMANI

XXVII – ETHNOGENESIS OF THE TSINTSARI -AROMANI

The study of onomastics, primarily toponyms and antroponyms, is invaluable for understanding the material and spiritual culture of every nation, because hiding in the name (nomen est omen) is the essence of the nation. If antropo-onomastics deal with the study of personal names and surnames, as well as with ethnonyms, then topo-onomastics deal with the study of topographic names: horonyms, oronyms, hydronyms, makronyms and mikronyms. Since toponyms are “living” monuments and guardians of the material and spiritual culture of individual peoples or civilizations, it is only fair that at this point we briefly review the etymological and semantic meaning of the topo-onomastics in the southwestern Balkans, given that they have been passed on from generation to generation.

Latest research in makrotoponomy in the southwestern Peloponnesus, carried out by Georgacus and McDonald (Georgacas, D & McDonal, W.: Place Names of Southwest Peloponnesus / Peloponnesiaka, Vol, VI, Athenai, 1968), suggests that despite great attempts by the Greek state to Hellenize the Slavic place names in Greece, some still exist to this day. For example, ten villages were found to contain the name “Ovors”. In Macedonian “obor” means “stable”. We also have the word “Potoki”, where “potok” in Macedonian means “stream”. Ten more villages were found to contain this name.

The following are places that have names of Slavic origin: There are eight places called “Glina”, which in Macedonian means “clay”; ten places called “Viros”, “vir” in Macedonian means “puddle”; twenty four places called “Koritsa”, “korino” in Macedonian means “dredging”; fifteen places called “Granitsa”, “granitsa” in Macedonian means “border”. These are only a small sample of the number of names that exist in Greece which are of Slavic origin.

According to Lithoksoou, who has cited information from Oikonomu’s (Oikonomu 2, K., Toponymiko tis periohis Zagoriu, Ioannina, 1991) research thesis which has uncovered 3,504 microtoponyms in 42 villages in central-northwestern Greece, of which 444 or 12.7% he discovered were of Slavic origin. From this Lithoksoou concluded that, although Greek authorities had made every attempt to Hellenize the toponomy of Greece, Slavic names still exist. Hellenization of the toponomy first started on April 3, 1833 by a government decree for “territorial division” and continued under successive runs until September 1994 when the Ministry

of the Interior ordered the change of the “varvarofono” name “Neon Liosion” to “Illion”.

Greek cartographers and authors have not made significant changes to the makrotoponymia in Greece. If one examines their maps they will find mostly Slavic place names, particularly along the western and central Pindus Massive. Etymology and semantics for these names have been given by Mpampioniotis (Mpampiniotis, G., Leksiko tis Neas Ellinikis Glossas, 1998). There is a region and a major city in the Ambrakian Bay called “Preveza”, which in Macedonian means transportation between two places. There is also a region and a city in the Pindus locality called “Karpenisi”, a name which in Greek is of unknown origin. “Karpa”, however, in Macedonian means “rock”, “boulder”.

As mentioned earlier we also have “Granitsa” which in Macedonian means “border”; “Topoliana” from “topola” which in Macedonian means “poplar”; “Grevena”, a name belonging to a region and to a city which is also a district capital. “Greben” in Macedonian means “reef”. “Kozani” is the name for a district and a capital city of a region. “Koza” in Macedonian means “goat” and “kozha” means skin. This place is located very close to where Perdicuss’s ancient capital “Aiga” stood, which means “goat”. This shows that over the years the people kept their traditional name. “Livadela” is the name of a capital city in Boeotia. Livadela in Greek is of unknown origin but “livada” in Macedonian means “meadow”, which corresponds to the marshy area where this city is located. “Lamia” is the name of a capital city in Phtiotida. In Greek it is of unknown origin but “lamia” in Macedonian means “dragon”. “Volos” is the name of the capital city of Magnesia, which in Greek is of unknown origin but “vol” in Macedonian means “ox”. “Zagora” is the name of the neighbouring city on the eastern slopes of Mount Pelei. “Zad gora” in Macedonian means “behind a mountain”. “Metsovo” is a city in Ioannina region. The word “Metsovo” in Macedonian means “a place where bears exist” and comes from the word “mechka” meaning “bear”.

We also have the village “Zitsa” where “zhitsa” in Macedonian means “wire, cord”. “Serbiana” is from “Srbianka” which in Macedonian means “woman from Serbia”. “Konitsa” is the name of a city located in Konitsa region. The word “konitsa” in Macedonian means “place of horses” from the word “kon” meaning “horse”.

According to Mpampiniotis (Mpampiniotis, G., Leksiko tis Neas Ellinikis Glossas, 1998), the city “Voden” (meaning “wet” in Macedonian from the word “voda” for water), was renamed to “Edessa” by the Greek state in the XIX century AD. The name Voden existed in medieval times. From this we can conclude that the Scythian Proto-Slav Illyrian tribes were responsible for naming at least some of the toponyms along the Pindos Mountains in modern Greece. In these localities today live the “A rumani” – “Tsintsari”, “Vlachs”,, “Latin speaking Greeks”, “Vlahophone Greeks”, remnants of the Illyrian tribes and the ancient Scythians. Always “Nomen est Omen”.

Ethno genesis of the Western Tsintsars of Epirus

There are numerous hypotheses regarding the ethno genesis of the Balkan Vlachs. According to Popoviħ (Popoviħ, D., O Cincarima, Attachments begging postanka nasheg graђanskog companies, Prometheus, Belgrade, 1998; 16), the “Tsintsars” got their name from the Serbs”. Furthermore, for a number of reasons (they are numerically insignificant, have no ethnic boundary, have no significant military and political history), including having no codified language and being disliked by those who live among them for their properties. They call themselves and are called by outsiders by various names. While living inside the ethnic border of the South Slavic tribes and among the Greeks and the Arvanites, their fate has been crucially influenced by the Greeks. In the encyclopedia (Education, 1969 Belgrade, 2, 889 etc.) they are identified as a people of Romanian origin and their capital is claimed to be Moskopolie, located on the western slopes of the Pindos and Gramos plateaus (2520 m) built in the XVIII century AD. Moskopolie had 50,000 residents and was an important trading centre for the Balkan countries. It was frequently ravaged by neighbouring Albanian tribes, especially in 1788 and 1821, when it was burned down by the Turkish Pasha Ali Pasha of Ioannina.

But despite Ali Pasha’s attempts to destroy the Tsintsar settlements and to push the population out of Epirus, the toponomy of Epirus and the surrounding regions remained more or less unchanged. According to Oikonomou (Oikonomu K., Toponymiko tis periohis Zagoriu, Ioannina, p. 754, 1991), in the Zagorie Region of Epirus in the 3,504 microtoponymies he discovered, 505 or 14.4% belong to the Vlach (Aromanian) language corpus. From this we can conclude that there was a multilingual presence on the territory of Epirus (Greek, Slav, Vlach, etc.) which unconsciously has enriched the Greek language with lexical diversity.

The Latin speaking population of Greece was commonly known as “Kutsovlachs” or “Arumuni”. According to Mpampiniotis (Mpampiriotis, G., Synoptiki istoria tis Ellinikis glossas, MA. 37, Athina, 1986), “the Vlach language belonged to the Latin popular or folk language (demodes latinike) from which the Indo-European group of languages descended, i.e. Italian, French, Spanish, etc. The language of the Tsintsari on Greek soil was a Latin dialect that contained archaic elements of Latin and archaic important elements of ancient Greek that are not preserved in the new Greek language.” This begs the question - if toponyms are archetypal memories of historical events then how did we come by the Latin sounding names? In our previous research we discovered that the first, the oldest, linguistic substrates on the Balkans belonged to the Paleo Balkan Glossology of Pannonia. The next layer belonged to the Scythian-Illyrian glossology. The third layer belonged to the Latin. How then did the Latin substrate come to exist?

The Epiroti belonged to the Scythian-Illyrian tribes known as the Molosini. Tapir was one of the kings of Epirus. Later, during Philip II’s time, Tapir’s son Alket had two sons named Arib and Neoptolemus. Arib had a son named Pir (Pyrrhus), about whom Plutarch (Plutarchus, Vitae parallelae (prev. Usporedni životopisi), II, 39, Zagreb, the 1988) wrote extensively.

Pyrrhus (319-272 BC), king of the Molosini, married Antigona. In 275 BC, Pyrrhus returned to Epirus with 8,000 infantry and 500 cavalry. About 100 years later, in 168 BC, the Romans defeated the Macedonians and their allies in the battle of Pydna. The conditions for peace not only deprived Macedonia of its independence, but also severely punished those who helped the Macedonians, even their sympathizers. Macedonia was then divided into four districts. Each district was declared independent, had its own money and was not allowed to enter into relations with any of the other Macedonian districts. By this, Macedonia had become a vassal state and was obliged to pay taxes to Rome.

The Macedonians and their Balkan allies were severely punished by Consul Lucius Aemilius Paullus, the victor of this war against Perseus. Many cities in Epirus were destroyed and 150,000 people, including women and children, were taken into slavery. About this Plutarch (Plutarchus, Vitae parallelae (prev. Usporedni životopisi), I, 352, 29, Zagreb, 1988) wrote: “… they went with their army to Epirus, the soldiers who fought with him against Perseus had the Senate’s permission to go and get compensation and to rob the local towns. Because he wanted to attack them all simultaneously and unexpectedly, he asked for about ten important people from each town to be sent to him and instructed them all, on a certain date, to bring him all the silver and gold from their houses and temples. With each town representative group he sent a soldier pretending to seek and take gold. But when that certain day came the entire Roman army rushed and, in a matter of hours, robbed all the cities and apprehended one hundred and fifty thousand people who were then turned into slaves; thus devastating seventy cities. At the end, for causing all this destruction, each soldier was paid about eleven drachmas. The entire world shuddered at this act of tearing apart an entire nation for so little profit…”

After Macedonia was conquered the Romans become masters of the Balkans. Their newly conquered region gave them great strategic importance. After that the Romans used Macedonia as a stepping stone to carry out expeditions in the north east. To do that they built the Via Egnatia route that stretched from Durres to Solun which, by Via Appia, linked Italy and Rome in the west to Macedonia, Thrace and Asia Minor to the east. Because of its geographical location, Solun became an important land, maritime, administrative, military, economic and cultural centre. The Balkan transportation route was added to an already existing vertical north-south transportation system, connecting the Danube basin system: Sirmium, Singidunum, Naisus, Skupi, Stobi, Solun, Beroia, Thebes and Athens.

We have been unable to find historic information of any Aromani repatriation in Epirus. However, the Roman occupation of the Balkans has clearly manifested deep gaps between the official slogans of freedom and the practical aims of Roman diplomacy. The ideological official Roman foreign policy program was undoubtedly influenced by II century Stoic philosophy which then was very popular. Freedom (libertas), humanity (humanitas), fairness (iustitia), fidelity (fides) and finally “divide and conquer” (divide et impera) were fundamental principles that governed Roman diplomacy. This shows that Roman policy was egotistical and took into account only its own interests, and therefore favoured only Romano-phile parties which existed in certain regions of the Balkans, which continuously caused tension and stress.

In Greece, the ethnic name “Grekos” (Graikos) and “Helen” (Ellenas) was modified to “Romeos” (Römaios), while the Epiroti received the ethnic name “Aromani” which means “not Romans”. If the Greeks were “Romani” and the Vlachs were “Aromani” then this means that the Vlachs were not Greeks or Romans.

There are other names, synonyms, which describe the Aromani of Epirus, such as “Kutsovlachs”, “Karaguni”, “Karakachani”, “Tsintsari”, “Burzovlasi”, etc. To us the etymology of the word “Tsintsar” is unknown. The “ar” as in the Sanskrit word “Arua” is a title like “Sir” or “Mr”. In the old glossology the word “Areion” means the best, noble, first, bravest. In the Macedonian language the suffix “ar” denotes a particular function, for example “zab-ar” (dentist), “chuv-ar” (guard), “drv-ar” (lumberjack), “volo-ar” (cow herder), etc. And “tzintz-ar” means returning from “five centuries of Roman slavery”? Etymologically, the ethnic name “Vlach” is also of uncertain origin, presumed to have come from the German word “Valah”, “Volcae” (Oualkai) in Latin. This name was given to the Romanized Celts who lived in the Roman Empire. They were originally called “Vlachs” but later, with the German conquests, their ethnic name was restored to Celts. Another assumption is that the word comes from the Arabic word “fellah” meaning farmer, a name that the Romans adopted during the occupation of Egypt.

According to Mpampiniotis (Mpampiniotis, G., Leksiko tis Neas Ellinikis Glossas, p. 377 1998), from an ethnological point of view, the Vlach language in Greece is not of Romanian origin, but the Vlach kinship with Romania is there because the Aromanians and the Romanians share common linguistic roots in the so-called Eastern and Balkan Latin languages. While the Romanian language was influenced by the Getai and the Dachani languages, the Aromani-Tsintsar language was influenced by a Slavic base and by ancient Greek and Latin sub structures.

Language of the Aromani

The tri-linguistic composition of the Tsintsar language is also confirmed by Boiagi in his works “Grammar of the Tsintsar language”. (Michael Boiagi, cincarskog Language Grammar - Gramatikä Aromänä "storms" -Belgrade, 1993, translation Vasilije Barba Pribislav Marinkoviħ). Boiagi was professor of Greek language studies in Vienna and father of the Tsintsari grammar explained in Greek and German. The name of his book is “Gramatike Römanike, etoi Makedonovlahika”. (Michael Boiagi, Gramatike Römantike, etoi Makedonovlahika, en Bienne, 1813.)

Boiaxhiu’s language of “limba armaneaska” is an archaic language which was spoken by his parents in Moskopolie around 1750 and, from a modern Tsintsarski standpoint, its grammar is used very little. However, from his vocabulary it can be determined, above all, that plenty of Latin, Slavic and Greek words were adapted in the spirit and tradition of the Tsintsar language corpus.

Pyrrhus (red like fire), the great military leader and king of Epirus, took 28,500 soldiers with him on his adventurous military campaign in the south of Italy. He fought from 280 to 275 BC and returned to Epirus with only 8,500 soldiers. His army experienced terrible casualties with 13,000 dead and 7,000 missing soldiers, who were probably taken prisoner. If this number is to be added to the 150,000 people from Epirus who were taken as slaves by the Romans and then taken to Italy, by occupier Lucius Aemilius Paullus in 168 BC, we will discover that approximately 157,000 people from Epirus lived in Italy. Living as Roman slaves amongst the Romans, over time, they learned the Latin language, which explains how they became Latin speakers.

After the construction of the Via Egnatia in the Balkans, in order to maintain strict control, the Romans settled Aromani at crucial positions on the route. For example they settled Aromani in the village Klisura in Kostur Region, elevation 1,250 metres. They did the same in the village Neveska, 1,364 metres, and Psoderi 1,400 metres, in Lerin Region. They populated the villages Gorno and Dolno Shel in Negush Region, elevation 1,000 metres. The Villages Giavato in Kozheni Region, Nizepole in Bitola Region and other towns over 1,000 metres above sea level were also populated with Aromani. The first Italian Aromani newcomer settlements in Macedonia were established in the Gramos and Ostrovitsa Mountains in an area called “Kolonia” (Colony), where Moskopolie, their largest and richest city in the Balkans, was established.

During Roman rule in the Balkans, from 168 BC until the arrival of the Ottomans and the fall of Byzantine Constantinople in 1453, for say 1,621 years, the Latin language was the official language of the Roman Empire. However, during Justinian’s I (527-565) reign Alexander’s “Koine” was declared the official state language of the Eastern Roman Empire. From this it follows that bilingualism, i.e. Latin and Alexander’s Macedonian “Koine” language, was dominant in the Balkans for around 1,000 years. All this contributed to the formation of the Tsintsar Aromanian language and it was preserved in the toponomastics of Epirus, indigenous lands of the Tsitsars, despite their exodus.

During Ottoman rule in the Balkans, all inhabitants were turned into Raia and received the epithet “romios”, which referred exclusively to the residents of the Byzantine Eastern Roman Empire who were Greko-phones. (Mpampiniotis, G., Leksiko tis Neas Ellinikis Glossas, p. 1577 1998.) During the XVIII century, the Balkan peoples were introduced to nationalism which gave birth to nations causing internal anarchy, uprisings and movements associated with the “Eastern Question”. Ottoman authority began to break down and governors became independent of the central government. Among them were Pasha Pasvanoglou and Ali Pasha of Ioanina, who in 1788 managed to take Epirus, southern Albania, western Macedonia, Thessaly, the western part of continental Hellada and even the Peloponnesus. Using Great Power antagonisms and help from France and England, they were planning to create their own independent states in the western Balkans.

While attempting to implement his plans, Ali Pasha of Ioanina collided with two autonomous Tsintsari-Epirioti regions; Himara (Heimarras) and Suli (Sylia, Soylion,). Due to stiff resistance, Ali Pasha was unable to take Himara and the associated villages on the Akrokeraunia bank, in 1798. Fighting was severe and long lasting. Suli at the time was allied with many mountainous villages in Epirus. The word “Suli” means “sharp mountain peak”. Ali Pasha fought against the Sulioti again in 1790-1791, 1792 and 1800. Then in 1803 he managed to break the Sulian resistance and introduced unprecedented persecution against the Tsintsari. In 1821 Moskoplie was burned to the ground forcing a large segment of the Tsintsari populations to leave Epirus and seek shelter in other parts of the Balkans and Europe.