Kanaris
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Post by Kanaris on Feb 1, 2008 11:48:21 GMT -5
I know what you're saying.... there's seems to be a void in time where there were less Greeks present, sort of a boomerang migration, they left because of turmoil only to return at a later time and have no memory because of the void... sort of us taking over Smyrna presently and having no memory of what happened in the last 500 years.
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Post by albanesehoney on Feb 1, 2008 13:29:23 GMT -5
[ www.promacedonia.org/en/nm/kosovo.htmlAlbanians may well be descended, in part, from Illyrians, but they are generally held to have become Shqiptars during a period of relative isolation in an upland refugium. This isn't targeted towards you but some simple-minded statement made in the article. What I find interesting about the article you posted is, Albanian scholars think that if they prove the Old Albanian language has words for fish, not borrowed from other languages, that it proves that the Albanians have always lived along the coast. What they simply overlook is that fish also live in rivers, streams and lakes which may exist 100's of miles from any sea or ocean. So what would it prove even if the Old Albanian language had words for fish? [/quote] It proves that your original statement was flawed logic and without merit. Statements like your Serbianna.com parroting simply shows how inane your acceptance of nationalistic propaganda is and how sadly lacking in research abilities and scepticism for an archaeologist.
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Post by Niklianos on Feb 1, 2008 17:13:04 GMT -5
[ www.promacedonia.org/en/nm/kosovo.htmlAlbanians may well be descended, in part, from Illyrians, but they are generally held to have become Shqiptars during a period of relative isolation in an upland refugium. This isn't targeted towards you but some simple-minded statement made in the article. What I find interesting about the article you posted is, Albanian scholars think that if they prove the Old Albanian language has words for fish, not borrowed from other languages, that it proves that the Albanians have always lived along the coast. What they simply overlook is that fish also live in rivers, streams and lakes which may exist 100's of miles from any sea or ocean. So what would it prove even if the Old Albanian language had words for fish? It proves that your original statement was flawed logic and without merit. Statements like your Serbianna.com parroting simply shows how inane your acceptance of nationalistic propaganda is and how sadly lacking in research abilities and scepticism for an archaeologist. [/quote] So what exactly do Nautical and Sea-faring terms have to do with simple fish terms? What about words for ship, waves, seagulls, anchor, sail, oar, peninsula, beech, galley, etc? Fish is not specifically a 'Nautical' or 'sea-faring' term. So my logic is still solid. Linguist and anthropologist often search languages for specific words in order to prove or disprove that a people or language originates in a certain area. They also look beyond nautical terms and search for words of different animals such as bear, deer, elephant, lion, tiger, etc. This is very common. So once again how can a people who have no nautical terms in their old language have originated from a coastal region? Also if the Albanians are entirely descendant from the Illyrians then would the Old Albanian language not have nautical terms? Logic would say 'YES', but we know this is not the case. So what would be the explanation for such an occurrence? It is believed as BibleRiot has pointed out that the Illyrians were not 'one' people but a loosely affiliated/non-affiliated group of tribes that lived in a large geographic region. So do we know wether or not all Illyrians spoke a single language with different dialects or considered themselves to be ONE people? Who really knows! The only thing we have to go on are a handful of words that may be left over from the Illyrians and artifacts. Who knows maybe one day Archaeologist will uncover an unknown Illyrian script? Maybe one using the Greek alphabet(as the Thracians and Etruscans) or an entirely unknown alphabet.
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Post by Niklianos on Feb 1, 2008 17:14:57 GMT -5
Well, yes. Presumably the words they're looking for are things like shark, tuna and mackerel, that you'd be surprised to find in the mountains. Interesting, I wonder if they found any salt water fish words in the language?
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Post by BigBlackBeast on Feb 1, 2008 20:31:02 GMT -5
THANX!!! You seem to know a big deal of stuff regarding Epiros!! I found in Giannena "To chroniko tou Tokou", and i ask you, is this and the "Chroniko twn Iwanninwn" the same book? Now, since i take as granted the lack of massive historical cover of those times (Serbs rarely are named in greek books, but rather some undefined Slavs), i tried to follow a more intuitive approach. My wife is a serb, so in many cases when among friends in Giannena, *she* is *the* person to give explanations about the various toponyms. That means that *no* sufficient scientific research has been done at least on the field of toponyms (which would imply insufficient historical coverage in general). Some of our friends are from Dilofo (old souvoutseli). An older guy is writing a book (the first one), for the history of their village. He suggested that the word "souvoutseli" is turkish. My wife asked, if the village had a shortage of water. He said yes. So the name of the village "souvoutseli" means "Suvo Selo" = Dry Village !!! One side effect of the above is that this toponym is SERB and not e.g. Croatian or Bosnian. Croats would say "Suho Sijelo", and Bosnians "Suvo Sijelo", so the name was given by Serbs speaking the same language as in todays Serbia proper. The facts: a) No greek toponyms were kept from pre Dusan era b) The modern habitants (like me) have zero feeling of this toponyms c) lack of documentation makes me wanna give room to this theory i told you. Ofcourse what you say about massive migrations, etc... seems very rational from a scholar type of view, however the "everyday feeling" is much different. Why did the Turks keep the Serb toponyms? Why are there zero traces of Serb presence in the population? (very few serb words, dobros, glava which are used all over greece anyway) The latter in conjuction with the toponyms make believe we came from somewhere else. Otherwise, there at least should be more evidence of history printed on todays truth. but no. Pyrros, Firstly the Chronicle of Ioannina and the Chronicle of the Toccos are two entirely different ‘books’. I think I see now where you were going before when talking about the ‘emptying of Epirus’ and its later re-population by Greeks from other areas. What threw me off was your apparent conviction that this event occurred some time near the end of Serb rule in Epirus; that is, in the 14th century. In fact, with the obvious exception of the influx of Albanians, there was no major demographic change affecting the Greeks of the region in that period. I am fascinated with your observations but I believe you have inadvertently confused the issue. The ‘Serb’ toponyms you observe in fact are much older than the period of Serb rule in Epirus and, with the exception of possible minor alterations by the Serb dynasts of the 14th century, are unlikely to have any direct Serb affinity. To account for Slavic toponymy of Epirus and of many other areas of Greece (particularly western Greece) we need to be looking at a much earlier period, that of the initial Slav invasion and settlement of those regions which occurred from the late 6th century. This whole matter – the extent of the Slavic settlement in Greek lands - has pre-occupied many a scholar, pseudo-scholar and nationalist historian over the years and you would in fact be able to find enough reading material on this to satisfy your curiosity. Epirus was one of the regions that seems to have received a relatively heavy Slav inflow of Slav settlers during this period – from the very late 6th century – and accordingly there were many Slavic place names there. In his work ‘Die Slaven in Griechenland (the Slavs in Greece)’ the German scholar Max Vasmer identifies and briefly discusses 334 such toponyms in the Ioannina and Thesprotia regions; 44 in the Arta region and 34 in the Preveza region. Contemporary sources give the name of the Slav tribe that settled in Epirus, that of the ‘Vajoneti/Bayuneti’. Evidently this tribe gave its name to the region of Vagenetia about which the author of the Chronicle of Ioannina laments in that it was being cleared of its Greek population by the Albanians. Incidentally relevant experts identify the Slav toponymy of Greece with that of the eastern Balkans (ie areas covered by the ‘Bulgars’) rather than with the Serbs. You ask why there are zero traces of ‘Serb’ presence in the population (I think you will agree that ‘Slav’ is a more accurate term) and you point out that, short of toponymy, there are relatively negligible Slav cultural remnants in Epirus and in Greece in general. The obvious deduction from this is that the Slavs were eventually absorbed into the pre-existing Greek population which must have survived there in sufficient numbers to do the absorbing. No other explanation has ever convinced me. It is truly remarkable, in my opinion, how closely the re-established line of Greek speech (as evident from late 19th – early 20th century ethnography) snapped back to a situation resembling the line prior to the expansion of the ancient Macedonian kingdom – almost as if finding its natural irreducible minimum. I understand that modern genetic studies tend to indicate that the current population in many regions of the Balkans has by and large remained little altered. in my opinion the Albanian situation is a very useful parallel. Clearly the Albanians exist and are a survival of a pre-Slavic Balkan entity. I am certain, as are most authorities in this matter, that the Albanians are essentially of Illyrian origin, although perhaps more specifically of hinterland Illyrian origin (largely Dardanian?) with some Thracian admixture. I don’t think full accuracy in this regard will ever directly be accessible although the situation can be more than reasonably deduced by the experts on the basis of available evidence. Yet historic Albanian lands are very thickly peppered with Slavic toponyms – much more so than Greek lands – and the Albanian language has a relatively high proportion of Slav input; in Greek it is negligible. What does this mean? If we count only on the toponymic evidence we would have to deduce that the Albanians were not anywhere in the Balkan area (in fact we would have to search for an area of wholly Albanian toponymy to account for their whereabouts during the ‘dark age’ following the Slav invasion). The logical deduction is that the Albanians were still inhabiting parts of the old Illyrian area and evidently co-existed there to varying degrees with the Slav newcomers (Vlachs were also somewhere nearby, albeit near ‘invisible’). Kanaris provided the somewhat similar example of the Genoese and Greeks in Chios. This was also the case in Greece – including Epirus – where whole districts were effectively lost to Byzantine administration as a result of the disruption caused by the entry of Slavs into those areas. In most cases the Greek natives – like the Albanians – were able to get the upper hand and re-assert themselves. In the Greek situation this probably marched hand-in-hand (one assisting the other) with the re-establishment of imperial control. Interestingly, in emphasizing his conviction that the native Greeks of Epirus were unlikely to have any size-able Albanian input into their ‘racial’ make up, Hammond stated that in his opinion there was more Slav than Albanian input in that regard. I think this holds true - not counting of-course those areas in Epirus settled by Albanians who have since become hellenised. So in summary, the population of Epirus was Greek in antiquity; it received a relatively heavy Slav influx during the early middle ages; the Slavs of the area were pretty much absorbed by the later middle ages as they are absent in contemporary accounts (compare the existence of the Slav tribesmen in the northern Taygetus mountains in the 15th century); the Albanians and Vlachs entered an essentially Greek-speaking area during the 14th century.
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Post by Albanoi on Feb 1, 2008 23:21:40 GMT -5
Excellent post BigBlackBeast! I enjoyed reading your last reply.
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Kralj Vatra
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Post by Kralj Vatra on Feb 2, 2008 0:21:34 GMT -5
BBB, sorry to say but that is pure crap. I thought that i could find a good source of Info in you but nothing close to it. Toponyms reveal an ORGANIZED state. Serbs (or slavs as it seems for you to prefer) left the lists of towns/villages to the new occupiers (the turks). Simple as that.
Remember that Slavs/Serbs tend to absorb and not to be absorbed. That theory of yours (the official greek one) is full of holes.
I say, ZERO slavs remained in Epirus. We still have 2-3 Serb surnames in Giannena. They know they are Serbs, and the say it. Nothing tricky there.
Absorbing needs a big differnce in numbers, in power, in civilazation. How come, the autochthonous were more numerous, more powerful, more civilized, but the toponyms serb? It does not make any sense, unless you have ZERO ambitions of intuitively verify the historical theories.
Dry in bulgarian is "Suh", just like in Russian. Your theory about bulgars, is easily demolished by the case of "Souvotseli" alone, and remeber that was smth occasional, if we made substantial research a lot of other would be found.
A girlfriend of my sister is from Doliani. My wife is also from another Dolijanj in Bosnia (now occupied by muslim bosniaks). No doliani in Bulgaria! No Grbovo in Bulgaria, etc....
In order to find out the truth it needs, a CLEVER person that has, education, common math logic, love for Epirus, love for truth, the ability to have critic spirit, to know the place very well and its people, and have knowledge of Serb and Turkish language, and access to both Serb and Turkish libraries.
Unfortunately none of us has all the above, (altho i must say i feel a lot closer)
P.S.1 Is it possible the toponyms to be from 600 AD, in a place (according to your theory) outnumbered by greeks and the toponyms to persist untill today? That is a royal contradiction by itself.
P.S.2 That theory, slav invasions, settlement, absorption that supposedly explains the "slav" toponyms, is like future Jamaikans trying to explain the english toponyms in Jamaika, using a theory: "Long time ago some "germanic" tribes arrived, which were absorbed by the local population, bla bla bla"
Just like now we the modern Greeks try to give Greek toponyms to villages, because thats better prounounced,and understood by us, and we can cause *we* rule, the same was done with the previous rulers.
The question is WHY IS THERE NO MEMORY? How can you answer the above question by ultrasimplistic theories of random germans/english/etc???
I dont know the answer, but i know what is NOT the answer.
I am just a poor Software Engineer/Comp Scientist/Sysadm and have limited time for historical research. Its just that i would expect smth better from the "professionals"
PS3, also there is the problem with the Eponyms (surnames). 90% Of gianniotes dont know what their surname mean.
All the above leaves 2 options really:
1) There is a continuity of Greek presence in epirus, but the quality of civilazation, number of words in vocabulary were SEVERELY limited, denoting a people which could not even talk to their childern -> no cummunication, a completely backwards and barbaric situation
or
2) My migration theory.
I would like to bet my money on 2)
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Kanaris
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Post by Kanaris on Feb 2, 2008 1:24:04 GMT -5
You guys outclass me with this stuff..but what I do have to say is I gained a lot knowledge by talking to people,ordinary villagers who live and die in the same area they are born... and I was amazed to find out that most of them are simple shepherds and cow breeders... not even knowing the history of the land they are walking on.... and you tell me about memory.... memory has to be pass down from generation to generation.... sometimes misinformed memory is passed.. . How many people in Greece actually believe that Constantine the great was NOT Greek but in fact a Roman?You go into the heartland of Greece where the simple people are and ask that question. You are talking about an area that went through so much turmoil and peoples that came and went simply because they were chased from area to area.
Like I said before there is a void in the continuity of Epirus.
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Kralj Vatra
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Post by Kralj Vatra on Feb 2, 2008 1:30:04 GMT -5
Canaris, i agree 100%. The question is what void was that? Physical or Spiritual?
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Kanaris
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Post by Kanaris on Feb 2, 2008 1:46:24 GMT -5
I think it had to do a lot with the lack of a metaphysical element in the people that were there... who were too busy struggling with the hardships of life and their attempts to rebuild it.Life must go on at any cost.... sometimes there are reasons we block out certain aspects of events in our lives. We all fall victims to this one way or another.I wish I had a better answer for you..
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Post by Teuta1975 on Feb 2, 2008 2:46:27 GMT -5
Toponyms' changing is not new in history and sometimes it's mysterious, sometimes because of who arrived earlier and sometimes of who arrived late...always in connection to people's memories and statal policy. It deserves another thread, I believe; but now Pirro, how was it? Because "albies just wait by the corner to claim that anything disputable in the balkans is theirs" we should give it to Serbs now??!! lol... Either way, happy birthday and I wish all the best for you and your family.
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Post by Teuta1975 on Feb 2, 2008 3:12:22 GMT -5
Niklianos, The problem is NOT there are NO words, but there are NOT Enough as to think those people have not lived closed to sea recently!! Or a few words compared to pastorial vocabulary as to assume that Alb. have been living mainly inland than close to the sea recently. Therefore the theory of their having had those words but "have forgotten" them cought my attention. However you draw your conclusion whether the followings are Latin or Greek borrowings; Have Albanians possibly ever lived closed to Romans and Greeks? Or maybe never Or they borrowed these words in 14th century??? peshk - fish (in italian is pesce) anije, vapor, tabor - ship. varke - boat spirance - anchor gji - bay rere, kum, - sand zall, zhavorr - little stones typically found in the rivers or sea krap - a fish in sweet water (don't know it in English) koce - a very delicious fish in salt water peshkaqen-shark mol - in greek is liman ? sardele - sardins etc. I have difficulty to find the word in Enlgish of all fish terminology. So again, the point is not Albanians don't have but they do not have ENOUGH.
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Kralj Vatra
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Post by Kralj Vatra on Feb 2, 2008 3:48:36 GMT -5
Teuta thnx.
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Kralj Vatra
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Post by Kralj Vatra on Feb 2, 2008 3:54:17 GMT -5
Canaris, that could be the answer very well. People had to pretend that they forgot till they forgot actually. Anyway I believe Greek dominance in Epiros was *paused* for a very long time.
This generalized "Slav" invasions theory, suits the greek old/short minded propagandists but leads to terrible conclusions regarding the mental state of those greek people. My theory, altho less propaganda-friendly, raises greek spirit higher, and is more compatible with the current truth.
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donnie
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Post by donnie on Feb 2, 2008 10:14:55 GMT -5
Niklianos
Your assumption is that all Illyrians lived along the coast. This is false. Plenty of Illyrian tribes in the hinterland were cut off from the sea and had little contact with it. An example is the Dardanian tribe whose lands encompassed the modern territories of Kosova and surroundings. Another one is the Enchelae tribe, situated in what is now eastern Albania, by Lake Ohrid.
With this in mind, imagine now that some of these tribes, or just one, isolated themselves in a highland refugium somewhere in Albania. Having already had little contact with the sea, this contact became even less frequent with our forefathers entering a stage of relative isolation. You do not have to place our forefathers as far as Thrace -- the Illyrian hinterland was sufficient. Not to mention that there is not a complete absence of maritime terminology, as was made clear by recognized linguists such as E.Çabej.
Teuta
I'm not so sure that peshk is of Italian/Latin origins. It is possible that it is of Indoeuropean origins. The word in English is fish, and in Swedish it is fisk; all obviously related to our peshk, the Italian pesce and Latin piscis.
BBB
Very interesting to follow your arguments about Epirus' demographic history. There is a matter though which caught my eye;
Regarding the presence of Slav toponyms in Albania; how did you conclude that our territory has a larger share of these than Greece? One valuable note here to consider is the fact that in 1935, the Greek parliament initiated a reform which changed the names of non-Greek toponyms into Hellenic ones. This included Slav toponyms, but also Albanian ones which emerged as a result of the Arvanites settling large parts of Morea, Attica, Beotia, Central Greece and the Aegean Isles. Therefore, if one makes a comparison between Albania and Greece when discussing the matter of Slav toponymy, such a comparison must be made with Greece pre-1935.
Furthermore, it is not impossible to find Albanian lands essentially free of Slav toponymy. One example is the mountainous Mirdita district north of Tirana where there is essentially no Slav toponym (all Albanian). Other similiar territories are Mati, Martanesh, Puka, Pulati etc. Slav toponymy follow a certain pattern. Although they penetrated into the highlands as well (to a lesser extent), their main depertation occured in the lowlands, such as south of Shkodër, Vjosa valley and so on. Ironically, there are more Slav toponyms in South Albania than the northern part adjacent to Montenegro. Linguists tend to point out, as you also concluded, that a majority of these toponyms are related to Bulgarian rather than Serbo-Croatian.
The presence of Slav toponymy is not such an enigmatic topic as certain individuals would like to portray. Through linguistic research and contemporary documents, we can conclude that the proto-Albanians and their medieval descendants lived a pastoral life in the highlands. This is why our vocabulary which deals with pastoralism and the flora & fauna of high altitude is relatively pure of foreign borrowings. The Slavs on the other hand settled the plains. Due to some reason, such as over-population, famine or some other factors (or all combined), the Albanians started to expand into the lowlands somewhere around 1,000 AD, regaining lost lands which they had been isolated from ever since Roman times. It is during this time that we learned agriculture from our Slav neighbours; the presence of Slav vocabulary within the field of agriculture indicates this.
But it is here that our language's important Slav influence ends. Many of the Slav loan-words have their own indigenous equivalents, so I would not exaggerate the impact Slav has had on Albanian. The relative absence of Slav loan-words in Greek is more related to the fact that Greek was a very established language with a long litterary tradition. There's no doubt that certain Greek dialects were more largely influenced by Slav than the modern, official language. I am not certain of this, but I am sure modern Greek took its present form through various reforms, which most probably included the filtering of the language from Slavisms.
But back to the Albanians, the theory presented above gives us a picture of pastoral Albanians and farming Slavs. In the Albanian language, we have two words for village; katun and fshat. The former initially meant a pastoral settlement, which in old days (such as 1,000 AD) was equivalent to a temporary nomad settlement. Place-names of such katuns couldn't have been long-lifed, as opposed to the more permanent Slav settlements. Hence, Slav toponymy was also more persistant. This is why I believe that the high number of Slav toponymy was disproportionate to their actual numbers. This is obvious due to the fact that they 'vanished' early on. In his Chronicle about the Muzaka family history, the renegade Albanian prince John Muzaka (Gjon Muzaka in Albanian) wrote about his family estates, which included the very nucleus of Slav toponymy in Albania. John Muzaka mentions only one or two Slav settlements. In other words, the presence of Slavs was very small and its dissapperance was almost finalized in the Middle Age. Today, they're restricted to small isolated pockets; an Orthodox 'Macedonian' population by Lake Ohrid, a Muslim Slav minority in the Gora district in the northeast, and a small community of Montenegrins near Shkodër (they settled there in the 1700s fleeing a blood feud).
Over-population drove the Albanians to re-conquor lost lands. They swept across the plains, either driving away or assimilating the Slav remnants, continuing towards Greece. Plenty were there numbers that they even settled Greece en masse, having a larger impact on Greece as a whole than some Slav immigration ever did; they settled in Acarnania, Aetolia, Beotia, Attica, Peloponessus, Euboea, Hydra, Spetsias, Andros and other isles. The Vlachs, who lived in symbiosis with our ancestors for quite some time, came also in relative numbers, taking over essentially all of Thessaly. The Albanians were known as Arvanites. They were the ones to introduce the speech of Arvanitika (Arbërishte) to Greece, to give names to Albanian toponyms which were erased in 1935, such as Liopesi ('cow-eye'), Kriekuqi ('red-head'), Kokla (from kokë liartë, i.e. 'high head', 'proud'), Skurta ('short') etc.
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Post by BibleRiot on Feb 2, 2008 10:46:10 GMT -5
One of the interesting things about Nicol's writings about the Despotate is that, unlike most historians, he tries to present the viewpoint of the western Greeks. The available primary sources are mainly contemporary Church writers sympathetic to Nicaea, but Nicol tries to see through that.. He was a real pioneer although rather old fashioned in his approach ... I'd guess that BBB has had to read his work closely to extract some social history from Nicol's account, which focuses so much on the doings of rulers. One will search the index of several of his books in vain for useful entries such as 'Plague'.
Pyrros
I believe that Epiros was emptied from (whoever lived there), and we the modern Epirots came to the land from Peloponese? Pontos? Central Greece?(i dont know), and settled there near the end of the Serb rule (before the turks came).
There was a wave of plague and consequent depopulation in mid-14th century Epirus. It enabled Dusan (and his Albanian allies) to conquer northern Greece without a pitched battle, simply laying siege to one city after another.
There was some Serb settlement and I guess that's where any specifically Serb toponyms come from, but their extent doesn't necessarily correspond with the intensity of settlement.
As a parallel, parts of England were briefly settled by Danes during the 11th century. They left a far greater impact on English toponymy ( countless village names ending in -by ) than on the English genetic record, and it has been argued that many places were named in the Scandinavian fashion rather than being actual Scandinavian settlements. Places were also named for the owners of villages rather than for something to do with the inhabitants. Serb retainers and various small fortresses (with associated names) could have become significant during the brief post-Dusan dominance over parts of Epirus of Symeon and his son in law Preljubovic
I find myself disagreeing with Hammond who argues that
“The Albanians themselves spread into Epirus in the fifteenth century and they swept aside some people of Slav origin, who at the time occupied most of the country. These Slavs who had come in the sixth and following centuries probably spoke Greek by the time of the Albanian invasions, but the Slavonic place-names continued in use until the time of Metaxas, except where they had been replaced by Albanian place-names.” Epirus p27 n2
I think Hammond is overemphasizing toponomy here, or there would be far more traces of Slavic in the Greek spoken in the region than has actually been detected by any linguists. Just as Coon wasn't a geneticist, Hammond is beginning to seem a bit ropey on linguistics to me.
During the period between the death of Dusan and a time long after the fall of Ioannina to the Turks, the region's countryside was in chaos, full of Albanians fighting both each other and the local Greeks, many of whom were forced to retreat to the cities. At times, when they had good leaders, the Albanians even held Arta, but they were eventually defeated by Tocco, who ruled, with Greek support, from Ioannina. When the Turks came it took them a long time to impose any kind of stability. New arrivals were often displacing those who had settled during earlier waves of Albanian penetration.
A lot of these Albs became thoroughly Hellenised over the centuries, and most people in Epirus were bilingual. Mostly, the Abanians were in no way united. Only those who were Muslim, or those who remained up in mountain fastnesses, like the Souliots, would have resisted the process of integration - early on much of the countryside remained Greek even when (Christian) Albs or Serbs were the dominant military force and later, Muslim Albs were given privileged land ownership, causing hostility to exist on religious rather than 'ethnic' lines.
I know of no record of migration to such an anarchic province from other parts of Greece during this period. However, plenty of modern Epirots can indeed trace their roots back to Anatolia and Pontos, because so many refugees were settled there after the disaster in 1922.
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Post by c0gnate on Feb 2, 2008 11:02:06 GMT -5
But back to the Albanians, the theory presented above gives us a picture of pastoral Albanians and farming Slavs. In the Albanian language, we have two words for village; katun and fshat. The former initially meant a pastoral settlement, which in old days (such as 1,000 AD) was equivalent to a temporary nomad settlement. Both katun (cătun) and fshat (sat) also exist in Vlach/Romanian. Whereas fshat derives from the Latin fossatum, katun seems to be inherited from the pre-Roman, pre-Slavic Thraco-Illyrian substratum. Fossatum itself comes form the Latin fossa: ditch or moat. You’ll recall that ditches and moats were a common defensive measure around towns and army camps. So fossatum means that with a ditch around it. Katun as descriptive of small mountain settlements, especially associated with shepherds, has penetrated into most Balkan languages.
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Post by c0gnate on Feb 2, 2008 11:18:37 GMT -5
There was a wave of plague and consequent depopulation in mid-14th century Epirus. It enabled Dusan (and his Albanian allies) to conquer northern Greece without a pitched battle, simply laying siege to one city after another. Speaking of the consequences of the plague, I just read the book “Justinian’s flea”, by William Rosen. It tells about the fateful 6th century period from a very modern perspective: climate change, the evolution of the bacterium that causes the plague, the rat and the flea that carry it, how they put an end to Justinian’s attempt to reassemble the Roman Empire, the silk road to China, the rise of individual nations in Europe but not in China, etc. Highly recommended:
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donnie
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Post by donnie on Feb 2, 2008 13:24:48 GMT -5
But back to the Albanians, the theory presented above gives us a picture of pastoral Albanians and farming Slavs. In the Albanian language, we have two words for village; katun and fshat. The former initially meant a pastoral settlement, which in old days (such as 1,000 AD) was equivalent to a temporary nomad settlement. Both katun (cătun) and fshat (sat) also exist in Vlach/Romanian. Whereas fshat derives from the Latin fossatum, katun seems to be inherited from the pre-Roman, pre-Slavic Thraco-Illyrian substratum. Fossatum itself comes form the Latin fossa: ditch or moat. You’ll recall that ditches and moats were a common defensive measure around towns and army camps. So fossatum means that with a ditch around it. Katun as descriptive of small mountain settlements, especially associated with shepherds, has penetrated into most Balkan languages. Most interesting. I did not know this about fshat/fossatum. Does the word katun have a specific meaning in Romanian/Vlach, i.e. a pastoral settlement? Or does it simply mean village? In Albanian, it has lost its original meaning since there no longer exist nomadic settlements. It has also lost ground to the word fshat in the litterary language as the mainstream word for village. Perhaps we're going off-topic, but I was wondering about a special word in Albanian, namely gardh ('dh' being pronounced as 'th', as in they). This is the Albanian word for 'fence'. What's the Romanian equivalent? Also, do you think its root is Indoeuropean, or that we borrowed it from the Slavs i.e. gorod, grad, hrad, which as you know means city or settlement. Old Slav settlements had defensive fences, hence the relation to our gardh. This word also exists in Sweidh as gård, meaning yard (the English word itself is probably also of the same origins as the Swedish one).
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Post by c0gnate on Feb 2, 2008 13:33:52 GMT -5
In Romanian cătun means hamlet, i.e. a small village in an isolated area. It's not now connected to shepherds, as in South-Slavic languages.
As to gardh and its variants, it is clearly an Indo-European, not only Slavic, word. The Romanian grădina (garden) and its Slavic equivalents have similar etymology.
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