Concerning the non-Greek origin and history of Asia Minor

[Niko777]

The most interesting thing the Thessalian said - and he doesn't seem to be a Greek nationalist at all - is that he did a lot of digging into his family and village history and found that the village was likely founded by Serbian settlers. The predominant version is that the village was built between the 11th and 13th centuries by farmers who came down from present-day Serbia after the 11th century. No Vlachs or Arvanites in his region of Thessaly but lots of indications that Slavs lived there.

He said that his father called their village Njivoljani (this is eastern Thessaly), which is similar to the Macedonian village of NEVOLJANI. The village is called Megalovryso today and here is the wikipedia link for it:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Megalovryso

He said that his mother is from Karditsa and she also has Slavic roots. He has investigated a lot, because from his dad's side they have Slavic-Serbian ancestors (5-6 generations back and further). Many surnames of this regions have "suspicious" Slavic derivation, for example Kravaritis or Bikas. Velika beach is one of the best beaches of Larisa area. There was one toponym Smokovo.

The memory that these villagers once spoke a Slavonic dialect has been wiped clean off although many traces remain in toponyms and family names to indicate Slavic origins. He said that the state changed the Slavic surnames. At least those that they understood that they were Slavic (his surname was not so obvious that it is Slavic, so they did not change it). We are talking about southeastern Thessaly here. He even emphasized the point which was that Hammond shows a South Slavic majority in regions of eastern Thessaly.

He said most of the villages in his area of southeastern Thessaly appear for the very first time at around 16th-17th century, but he has no clue where they came from (obviously from some place inhabited by Slavs in the Balkans, but where?). Also in some maps it is shown that it is inhabited by Serbs/Croats. Some of the Slavic surnames you may find there are Garavelis (Garavelj), Kravaritis (Kravaric), Zouzoulas (Zuzul), Krikelis (Krkelj), Koutinas (Kutina), Pliatsikas or Pliatskas or Pliaskas (Pljackas/Pljaskas), Bikas, Koukouras, Petsias (pec), Tsaras (Car), Detsikas (Decko) and so on.

He basically said the eastern parts of Thessaly are predominantly Slavic and western parts are predominantly Vlach/Aromanian. In the eastern parts of Thessaly there was a boom of Slavic toponyms a few centuries ago. He admitted that Evrytania is well known for its Vlach population (which is the ethnic base of the region) - also Epirus and especially Pindos mountains.

Thanks for sharing this with us Carlin. I'm not surprised at what you found. Slavic toponyms are common in Thessaly, I first noticed this when looking at old maps of Macedonia and seeing the names of villages on the Thessalian side of the Macedonia-Thessaly border. What surprised me was the individual you met knew about his non-Greek origins and was open in sharing this information with you. But then I realized this issue was never politicized in Thessaly as it was in Aegean Macedonia. So when it comes to discussing these topics people of Thessaly might not feel the same amount of shame, or paranoia, or obligation to adhere to Greek nationalist ideology, like the people in Aegean Macedonia do.

[Carlin]

The most interesting thing the Thessalian said - and he doesn't seem to be a Greek nationalist at all - is that he did a lot of digging into his family and village history and found that the village was likely founded by Serbian settlers. The predominant version is that the village was built between the 11th and 13th centuries by farmers who came down from present-day Serbia after the 11th century. No Vlachs or Arvanites in his region of Thessaly but lots of indications that Slavs lived there.

He said that his father called their village Njivoljani (this is eastern Thessaly), which is similar to the Macedonian village of NEVOLJANI. The village is called Megalovryso today and here is the wikipedia link for it:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Megalovryso

He said that his mother is from Karditsa and she also has Slavic roots. He has investigated a lot, because from his dad's side they have Slavic-Serbian ancestors (5-6 generations back and further). Many surnames of this regions have "suspicious" Slavic derivation, for example Kravaritis or Bikas. Velika beach is one of the best beaches of Larisa area. There was one toponym Smokovo.

The memory that these villagers once spoke a Slavonic dialect has been wiped clean off although many traces remain in toponyms and family names to indicate Slavic origins. He said that the state changed the Slavic surnames. At least those that they understood that they were Slavic (his surname was not so obvious that it is Slavic, so they did not change it). We are talking about southeastern Thessaly here. He even emphasized the point which was that Hammond shows a South Slavic majority in regions of eastern Thessaly.

He said most of the villages in his area of southeastern Thessaly appear for the very first time at around 16th-17th century, but he has no clue where they came from (obviously from some place inhabited by Slavs in the Balkans, but where?). Also in some maps it is shown that it is inhabited by Serbs/Croats. Some of the Slavic surnames you may find there are Garavelis (Garavelj), Kravaritis (Kravaric), Zouzoulas (Zuzul), Krikelis (Krkelj), Koutinas (Kutina), Pliatsikas or Pliatskas or Pliaskas (Pljackas/Pljaskas), Bikas, Koukouras, Petsias (pec), Tsaras (Car), Detsikas (Decko) and so on.

He basically said the eastern parts of Thessaly are predominantly Slavic and western parts are predominantly Vlach/Aromanian. In the eastern parts of Thessaly there was a boom of Slavic toponyms a few centuries ago. He admitted that Evrytania is well known for its Vlach population (which is the ethnic base of the region) - also Epirus and especially Pindos mountains.

[Carlin]

I recently asked a Thessalian man if there there were any Pontian refugees that settled in the region where his family lives. I also asked him what was his opinion in terms of the ethnic ancestry and heritage of the Pontians.

He replied that in his region, no. No refugees from Anatolia. In other parts of Thessaly there were some, but mostly people from western Anatolia and not Pontos.

He also said:

"Pontians were known as Lazi, which is the name Byzantines used for the nation today known as Georgians. But they are not exactly the same as Georgians. They are a mixture of many different tribes of Caucasus and Anatolia + Armenians."

[Carlin]

1) Samos is an island in the eastern Aegean Sea.

1204: During the fourth crusade Samos is granted to Venetians until 1247.
1346: Genoese come to Samos.
1476: Because of pirates Samians immigrated to Chios and Asia Minor - Samos remained deserted of residents.
1549: Recolonization of the island with the aid of Kilic Ali Pasha.

Occhiali (Giovanni Dionigi Galeni or Giovan Dionigi Galeni, also Uluj Ali, Turkish: Uluç Ali Reis, later Uluç Ali Paşa and finally Kılıç Ali Paşa; 1519 – 21 June 1587) was an Italian farmer, then Ottoman privateer and admiral, who later became beylerbey of the Regency of Algiers, and finally Grand Admiral (Kapudan Pasha) of the Ottoman fleet in the 16th century.

Born Giovanni Dionigi Galeni, he was also known by several other names in the Christian countries of the Mediterranean and in the literature also appears under various names. Miguel de Cervantes called him Uchali in chapter XXXIX of his Don Quixote de la Mancha. Elsewhere he was simply called Ali Pasha. John Wolf, in his The Barbary Coast, refers to him as Euldj Ali.

URL:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Occhiali

2) "Dad, are we Laz or Turkish?":

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xG9pAnjquT0

[tchaiku]

Link:

http://www.freeinquiry.gr/pro.php?id=2889

In this article, focusing on the situation prevailing in the islands of the Aegean in the Middle Ages, listed unknown and rare testimonies of numerous travelers, which in the timespan of hundreds of years describe many islands as uninhabited, completely deserted.

Large scourges were wars, frequent deadly epidemics and piracy, due to which thousands of residents of the islands dragged as slaves in the bazaars of the East. Population gaps replenished from time to time various groups of people from other places, such as North Africa, the East and in many cases, as we shall see, poor Albanians.

The article is based on excerpts translated from the works of the English historian and archaeologist Frederick William Hasluck (1878-1920): «Depopulation in the Aegean Islands and the Turkish Conquest» (The Annual of the British School at Athens, Vol. 17, 1910 / 1911, pp. 151-181) and «Albanian Settlements in the Aegean islands» (The Annual of the British School at Athens, Vol. 15, 1908/1909, pp. 223-228).


The table below (which I translated from Greek using Google Translate) is a summary of research on desolation and the restocking of the islands in the period before the Cretan War (and, apparently this is historical data only for a period from roughly 14th century to 17th century. What happened in antiquity? What happened in the all the centuries preceding the 14th c.?).



Conclusion from the article:

"… in three similar periods of unrest in the Aegean region there are significant population movements: During the Cretan War (1645-1669), during the Orloff revolt (1770-1774) and the period of '21 (1821-1830).

Yet, until now we thought that the population of the islands has never changed since ancient times and that even the dialects are directly related to ancient dialects.

But historical data can’t be denied that although the islanders boast that they are purebred descendants of the ancient Greeks (though in ancient times the intermarriage was not something unknown), the island populations have undergone significant racial changes even a few centuries ago."

You should make a thread about Greek islands alone.

[Carlin]

From Romanland: Ethnicity and Empire in Byzantium, by Anthony Kaldellis

[Carlin]

Assimilation and Revolt in the Territory of Isauria, from the First Century BC to the Sixth Century AD, Noel Lenski




URL:

https://www.academia.edu/2490104/Assimilation_and_Revolt_in_the_Territory_of_Isauria_from_the_First_Century_BC_to_the_Sixth_Century_AD

Report from PHILOSTORGIUS:

"Besides these calamities, the tribe of the Isaurians inflicted several disasters on the Romans. For in the East they overran Cilicia and the neighbouring parts of Syria, and not only what is called Coele-Syria, but all that tract which stretches on till it joins Persia. But towards the north and north-west they invaded Pamphylia and laid waste Lycia. They also devastated the island of Cyprus, and likewise carried off the Lycaonians and Pisidians into slavery; and having driven the Cappadocians out of their settlements, and taken them captive, they pushed on as far as Pontus, and treated their captives far more savagely than was customary among the other barbarians."

From the EPITOME OF THE ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY OF PHILOSTORGIUS:

http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/philostorgius.htm

PS:

Isauria History

Around 320 BCE: Isaura Palaia is besieged by the Macedonians. The Isaurians chose to burn the town instead of surrendering.
76-75: Isauria is conquered by the Romans.
Around 66: Pompey merges Isauria with Cilicia.
Around 0: Becomes part of the Roman province of Galatia.
Early 4th century CE: Isauria is reshaped as its own province, eventually incorporating the eastern part of Pamphylia.
Early 5th century: Tarasicodissa is born in Isauria; he would become Byzantine emperor 474-491 under the name of Zeno, bringing with him Isaurian notables into the imperial administration.
492-496: Revolt against new emperor, Anastasius 1, led by Zeno's brother, Cardala. The war is known as Isaurian War.
6th century: Isauria is effectively incorporated into the Byzantine Empire, by actions of Justinian 1.
695-698: Leontius of Isaurian origin is Byzantine emperor.
717-741: Another Leo, said to be of Isaurian origin, becomes emperor.
11th century: Seljuq Turks manage to take control of Isauria, and through intermarriage, Turks and Isaurians become a mixed people.
1901: The site of Isaura Vetus is identified.

URL:

http://i-cias.com/e.o/isauria.htm

[Carlin]

[Carlin]

- One of the oldest peoples in the Middle East and the largest nation in the world without a state. Kurdistan - the country of Kurds - is the name for the mountainous end of the undisturbed borders between the mountains of Ararat, Taurus and Zagros in southeastern Turkey, northeastern Iraq, northwestern Iran and northeastern Syria. Important cities are: Diyarbakir, Bitlis, Van, Mosul, Kirkuk, Kermanshah. Due to its rich reserves of water and oil (with copper, iron, chromite), this once-forgotten region has become economically and strategically important today.

- The very word Kurdistan appears for the first time in Islamic texts of the 12th century. The origin of Kurds is unexplored. They appear under other names in the Bible and the Quran. They are considered descendants of the Medes. Before the expansion of Islam, Kurds were Zoroastrians, and minority Christians. The Islamization of Kurdistan, about 630 AD, signified a major change in the history of this people.

- In the 18th century, the liberation movement began, with the rise of local emirs. In the next century, the Kurds responded with uprisings to the Centralist reforms of Turkey.

- In 1898, the first Kurdish newspapers came out, which further contributed to the development of Kurdish national consciousness. The political program of the new elite was very moderate.

- During the First World War, the Kurdish League assumed the task of establishing an autonomous national state of Kurdistan in the Diyarbakir-Bitlis area. But, the dream of the Kurdish homeland remained unfulfilled. In the newly established Republic of Turkey, they became Turkish citizens along with numerous Circassians and Lazes. Kurds were classifed as "Mountain Turks" in this time period, which led to an uprising in the 1930s.

[Carlin]

Stunning testimony from Saint Jerome (331-420 AD) demonstrates that, 1) Celtic was still spoken in Asia Minor by the Galatians in his lifetime, 2) and that Galatians also spoke Greek, "language that everyone speaks in the east".



URL:

http://www.academia.edu/28555947/ON_THE_GAULISH_INFLUENCE_ON_BRETON

Greek was a language that "EVERYONE" spoke in the east which actually confirms the Multilingualism in the East/Asia Minor as all historical ethnic groups there spoke it: Armenians, Persians, Galatians, Phrygians, Isaurians, Lazes, etc.

[Carlin]

"Here and there in W. Anatolia are villages of Albanians, Pomaks, refugees from E. Rumelia, and in E. Anatolia there are some Persian settlements."

[Carlin]

Ruler Cult and Colonial Identity: The Imperial Sanctuary at Pisidian Antioch, Benjamin Rubin

URL:

http://www.academia.edu/5010582/Ruler_Cult_and_Colonial_Identity_The_Imperial_Sanctuary_at_Pisidian_Antioch

[Carlin]

1) Tracing the presence of the Rum Orthodox Population in Cappadocia, by E. Balta

URL:

https://www.evangeliabalta.com/kitap/21_cha.pdf

2) The intermixture of races in Asia Minor: some of its causes and effects, by Sir William Mitchell Ramsay, 1851-1939

URL:

https://archive.org/details/intermixtureofra00ramsuoft

[tchaiku]

Interesting. Curious to know how you came across these stories? Do you have more information?

Sorry, I missed this one. Well I heard it from a trusted guy on Quora. There are also story about Karamanlides being pro Turkish politically compared to Cappodocian Greeks (or Greek speakers to say better) who were on the side of Greece. When I have free time I might search/post about this.

[Carlin]

Variorum Reprints. Collected Studies series
Byzantium: its internal history and relations with the Muslim World
Collected Studies. Preface by Milton V. Anastos
Professor Speros Vryonis Jr.
Variorum reprints, London 1971

IV. ST. IOANNICIUS THE GREAT (754-846) AND THE «SLAVS» OF BITHYNIA

There seems to be some reason to suggest, though the evidence is not complete, that St. Ioannicius was possibly a descendent of the Bulgars transplanted in Bithynia during the seventh century by the Byzantines. In the early part of the Vita written by his contemporary and associate, Sabas, occurs an interview between Ioannicius and the emperor Constantine VI. The occasion is a remarkable feat of arms which Ioannicius accomplished in a severe battle with the Bulgarians.

Ὅθεν δὴ τότε θαυμάσας ὁ βασιλεὺς τὸ ἀνδρεῖον τοῦ στρατιώτου · ὦ παῖ καλέ, φησί, ποιας χώρας καὶ στρατίας εἶ σύ, καὶ τί σου ὑπάρχει, λέγει, τὸ ὄνομα ; Ὁ δὲ εἰρηκὼς ὡς χώρας μέν ἐστι Βιθυνῶν ἐπαρχίας, κώμης δὲ τῶν Μαρυκάτου καὶ γἐνους τῶν Βοϊλάδων, τήν τε κλῆσιν πέλει Ἰωαννίκιος, καὶ τὴν στρατείαν ἐξσκουβίτωρ (1).

The family name, given here in the plural, Βοϊλάδων (Βοϊλάς in the singular), is the main reason for suggesting that perhaps St. Ioannicius might have been a descendent of the Bithynian ‛Slavs’. The name is a Bulgarian word used to denote a noble or high dignitary. It appears with this meaning in the Orhon inscriptions of Mongolia and also in the early Bulgarian inscriptions in the Balkans in the ninth century (1).

(1) Vita Ioannicii, Acta Sanctorum Novembris II (Bruxellis, 1894), pp. 337-38. Summaries of the life are also to be found in P. Van den Gheyn, Un moine grec au neuvième siècle, S. Joannice Le Grand, in Études religieuses, philosophiques, historiques et littéraires, L (1890), 407-34. C. Loparev, Vizantijskija žitija svjatyh VII-IX vĕkov, in Vizant. Vrem. 9 XVIII (1911), 72-92.

The word is used by Theophanes and Constantine Porphyrogenitus when they speak of certain Bulgarian nobles. Thus Theophanes speaks of the βοϊλάδων (nobles) who accompanied their king to an audience with Constantine V in 748 (2). The family name Boilas, which became prominent in Byzantium, is most probably related to this Bulgarian word signifying a high dignitary or noble, and which seems even to have been used as a proper name. Ioannicius is the earliest person to appear bearing this name in the Byzantine sources (3).

The saint came from the village of Marykatos in Bithynia (Βιθννῶν ἐπαρχίας) located on the north shore of Lake Apollonias near the town of Miletopolis (4). In 773, at the age of nineteen, he was enrolled in the eighteenth bandon of the imperial excubitores and remained in the army until some time around 795, when he sought refuge in the monastic life of Mt. Olympus (1).

(1) This fact is noted by the editor of the Vita Io., p. 339 ; « Genus Boiladum apud Bulgaros désignât duces et optimates ». And he further comments ; « At quomodo S. Ioannicio, humili loco nato, haec appellatio conveniat non liquet. Forsan familiam quandam designare voluerit Sabas ». On this word see

· G. Moravcsik, Byzantinoturcica, II2 (1958), 93-4 ;
· W. Radloff, Die alttürkischen Inschriften der Mongolei (St. Petersburg, 1894), p. 140 ;
· F. Miklosich, Lexicon Palaeoslovenico-Graeco-Latinum (Vienna, 1862), 50 ;
· W. Thomsen, Alttürkische Inschriften aus der Mongolei in Zeitschrift der deutschen Morgenländischen Gesellschaft, LXXVIII (1924), 171.

See also the long book review of Papademetriou, in Vizant. Vrem., V (1898), 717, who noted its non-Greek origin. [Voir aussi Beševliev-Grégoire, Les inscriptions protobulgares, dans Byzantion, XXVIII (1958), pp. 307 sq. N.d.l.R.].

(2) Theophanes, Chronographia, ed. C. de Boor, I (Leipzig, 1883), 436, 447. Constantine Porphyrogenitus, De Ceremoniis Aulae Byzantinae, ed. J. Reiske and I. Bekker (Bonn, 1829), 681, mentions the six great βολιάδες at the Bulgarian court, and the ἔσω and ἔξω βολιάδες below them. In De Administrando Imperio, ed. G. Moravcsik (Budapest, 1949), p. 154, he mentions the twelve great βοϊλάδων. There are various spellings of the name ; Βόϊλας, Βοΐλας, Βόηλας ; Moravcsik, Byzantinoturcica, II2, 94.

(3) For later members of the Boilas family, or at least bearers of this name, see S. Vryonis, The Will of a Provincial Magnate, Eustathius Boilas (1059), in Dumbarton Oaks Papers, XI (1957), 273.

(4) Vita Io., p. 335. See the map in W. Ramsay, The Historical Geography of Asia Minor (London, 1890), opposite p. 178.

As is well known, Justinian II, after his campaign of 688/9 in the Balkans, transplanted Bulgars from the Balkans into Asia Minor. They were transported via the town of Abydos and then settled in the Opsikion theme as soldiers (2).

The information furnished by the Vita, in combination with what little we know about the settlement of ‛Slavs’ in Bithynia, would suggest that St. Ioannicius was a descendent of the Bulgars settled as soldiers in the Opsikion theme by the Byzantines during the seventh century, possibly by Justinian shortly after 688/9. His family name, Boilas, is Bulgarian. His village, Marykatos, located in Bithynia near Lake Apollonias, was in the general area of Slav settlement. As a matter of fact it was directly in the line of march for the Bulgars brought over by Justinian II through Abydos. And his profession, that of soldier for twenty-four years, is consonant with the fact that the emperor intended to use these Bulgars in the armies.

If we can accept the above conclusion, that St. Ioannicius was a descendent of the Bulgars brought into Asia Minor in the seventh century, then we have an interesting example of a ‛Slav’ who had been Byzantinized. His parents were already Christians, as their names, Anastaso and Myritzikos (diminutive of myrh), testify, and Ioannicius became the very picture of the pious Byzantine monk (3).