Origin of Romanians

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The Romanians (also sometimes referred to along with other Balkan Latin peoples as Vlachs) are a nation speaking Romanian, a Romance language, and living in Central and Eastern Europe. The Origin of Romanians has been for a long time disputed and there are two basic theories:

1. Daco-Romanian continuity in Dacia and some adjacent regions.
2. Migration of Romanic peoples from former Roman provinces south of the Danube in the Balkans (The Roessler Theory).

The exact region where the Romanian language and people formed is not only a scientific puzzle, but also a heated political controversy. 19th-century Hungarian historians largely supported the migration theory, which maintained that Transylvania was not inhabited by Romanians at the time of the Magyar arrival in central Europe during the 10th century. Most Romanian historians support the theory of Daco-Romanian continuity, and maintain that Transylvania was continuously inhabited by the ancestors of Romanians. The debate was politically charged in the 19th-20th centuries because of territorial conflicts concerning Transylvania between Romania and Hungary.

Daco-Romanian continuity

After the Romans conquered Dacia in 106, a process of romanization of the Dacians took place. According to this theory, the Roman administration retreated from Dacia around 271, but romanized Dacians stayed on, and have continuously lived in Dacia throughout the Dark Ages. Romanians are their descendants.

Arguments for

• Extensive Roman colonization of Dacia.
• The colonists came from different provinces of the Roman empire. They had no common language except for Latin. In this multiethnic environment, Latin, being the only common language of communication, might have quickly become the dominant language. American history furnishes similar examples.
• Dacian toponyms were kept; examples are the names of some rivers (Samus - Someş, Marisia - Mureş, Porata - Prut) and the names of some cities (Petrodava - Piatra Neamţ, Abruttum - Abrud).
• Some morpho-syntactic, lexical and phonetical regional differences within Romanian indicate that in certain regions of Romania the language preserved more Latin substance than in the rest of the country ^[#endnote_8]. The boundaries of these linguistic areas coincide quite exactly with the borders of the ancient Roman province of Dacia, encompassing modern Transylvania, Banat and Oltenia.

The existence of a stronger Latin heritage in the territories of the ancient Roman Dacia is explained by the intense Romanisation of these territories, which formed core areas of the Romanian. The uninterrupted and isolated existence of a Romanised population living there ensured a conservative transmission of this Latin heritage across generations. From these core areas Romanian spread over the Carpathians, meanwhile losing a little of its Latin substance. The general dissemination into Romanian of words of Magyar origin supports the theory of the Romanian diffusion from Transylvanian core areas across the Carpathian.

The similarity between the current Romanian traditional clothes and the Dacian clothes, as depicted on Trajan's Column.

Constantine the Great assumed the title Dacicus Maximus in 336 just like Trajan did in 106, suggesting the presence of Dacians in Dacia even after the Aurelian withdrawal of 270-275.

Numerous archaeological sites prove the continuity of Latin settlements north of the Danube after the evacuation of 271, including:

* Daco-Roman ceramic artifacts from the 5th-6th centuries, found at: Bratei, Soporu de Câmpie, Verbiţa, Sǎrata Monteoru

* Christian tombs and objects found at: Cluj-Napoca, Alba-Iulia, Biertan, Dej

* Walls erected in the 4th century at Sarmizegetusa

* Many inscriptions in the Latin language: inscriptions on silver ring from Micia, ceramic objects from Porolissum, brick found at Gornea, inscription on bronze object found at Biertan (reading "EGO ZENOVIUS VOTUM POSUI").

A mosaic map found at Magada, Jordan, which, according to some scholars, represents the province of Dacia in the IV and V century AD, and its link to different Middle Eastern trade routes; at present this interpretation is highly controversial.

Contemporary sources

With the beginning of the 11th century, several contemporary sources mention the presence of Vlachs in Transylvania and the surrounding area, while a few other sources — though rather blunt in their nature — mention the Vlach presence in Transylvania as early as 8th century. These sources also mention the Vlach presence in Pannonia at the arrival of the Hungarians and they indicate that some of those Vlachs were pushed from Pannonia by the invading Hungarians and settled in Transylvania.

In 545, Procopius mention "the trick played by an Ant (a Slav or Alan from present-day Moldavia) who is supposed to have passed himself off as a Byzantine General by speaking a form of Latin which he had learned in these regions."A Documented Chronology of Roumanian History p. 22 An ancient letter from one Emmerich of Elwangen to Grimaldus, abbot of St.Gall, written about 860 mention Vlachs living north of Danube together with Germans, Sarmatians, and Alans;The letter reads: "gentes innumeras... "Sunt his Germanique truces et Sarmata bellax-atque Getae nec non Bastarnae semina gentis-Dacorumque manus et Martia pectori Alani." A Documented Chronology of Roumanian History p. 26 and "the Weltchronik of 1277, referring to the ninth century," calls those Dacians for "Wallachen".A Documented Chronology of Roumanian History p. 27 The Weltchronik of Jansen Enikel, written in Vienna in 1277, mentions Charlemagne going on a campaign in the east (around 8th century) and met with Wallachians.The chronicle says: "Dâ mit fuor der wîgant; Hin ze Ungern in daz land; Und begund si Kristen machen; Die Ungern unz in Walachen." A Documented Chronology of Roumanian History p. 39 At the time of Charlemagne, the Hungarians of Arpad have yet not arrived in Pannonia, and the chronicle, when mentioning the Hungarians, refers to the people inhabiting the future Hungary.

Nestor's Chronicle, (Kiev, 1097-1110), relating events from 862 to 1110, mention Wallachians attacking and subduing the Slavs north of Danube and settling among them. In the chronicle of Simon of Keza (1282 to 1290), the Vlachs of Pannonia are mentioned as a settled population after the collapse of the Hunnish Empire.The chronicle reads: ""Blakis, qui ipsorum fuerunt pastores et coloni, remanentes spone in Pannonia"; "Pannonia extitit decem annis sine rege, Sclavis tantummodo, Grecis, Teutonicis, Messianis, et Vlachis advenis remanentibus in eadem, qui vivente Ethela populari servicio ibi serviebant," A Documented Chronology of Roumanian History p. 23 The Anonymous Notary of King Bela II (1131-1141) or Bela III also mention the presence of Vlachs in Pannonia and them mixing with Slavs, but retaining their language and culture.The chronicle reads: "Rex Athila...de terro scithia descendens cum valida manu in terram Pannoniae venitm et fugatis Romanis regnum obninuit.

"Quam terram (Pannoniam) habitabant Sclavi, Bulgarii et Blachii ac pastores Romanorum. Quia post mortem Athilae regis terram Pannoniae Romani dicebant pascua esse, eo quod greges eorum in terra Panoniae pascua Romanorum esse dicebatur, nam et modo Romani pascumtur de bonis Ungariae...

"Et murtuo illo (Athila) preoccupassent Romani principes terram Pannoniae usque ad Danubium, ubi collocassent pastores suos." A Documented Chronology of Roumanian History p. 24 The Descriptio Europæ Orientalis, which was written by a French monk in 1308, discovered in the Paris Library in 1913, mention ten Vlach kings that were defeated by the Hungarians of Arpad.Descriptio Europæ Orientalis, Latin MS. no. 5515, published at Cracow 1916 reads: "Notandum est hic quod inter Machedoniam, Achayan et Thessalonicum est quidam populus valde magnus et spaciosus qui vocantur Blazi, qui et olim fuerunt Romanorum pastores, ac in Ungaria, ubi erant pascua Romanorum, propternimiam terrae viriditatem et fertilitatem olim morabantur. Sed tandem ab Ungaris (the Hungarians of Arpad) inde expulsi" (they had therefore remained in Pannonia after the depature of the Huns) "ac partes illas fugierunt; habundat enim caseis optimis, lacte et carnibus super omnes nationes" And "Pannoni autem, qui inhabitant tunc Pannoniam, omnes erant pastores Romanorum, et habebant super se decem reges potentes in tota Moesia at Pannonia, deficiente autem imperio Romanorum egressi sunt Ungari de Chycia provincia...et pugnaverunt in campo magno." A Documented Chronology of Roumanian History pp. 24, 25 The Chronicon Pictum of Vienna, 1358, also mention the Vlachs remaining in Pannonia after the invasion of Atilla's HunsThe chronicle reads: "...natali soli derelicto" (by the other races) "...Vlachis qui ipsorum coloni existere ac pastores remanentes sponte in Pannonia." A Documented Chronology of Roumanian History p. 25 and both Chronicon Pictum of Vienna and Simon of Kéza note that "three thousand men of the Hunnish people remained in Pannonia ('in campun Csigla'), calling themselves Siculi (Zakuli), who upon the arrival of the Hungarians moved eastwards "cum Vlachis in montibus".Simon de Keza writes: "remanserant quoque de Hunis virorum tria milia...in campo Csiglae usque Arpad permanserunt, qui se ibi non Hunos sed Zaculos vocaverunt...insimulque Pannonia conquestrata...cum Blackis in montibus confinii sortem habuerunt." A Documented Chronology of Roumanian History p. 26 In 1236, the monk Ricardus mention seven Hungarian chiefs that while being in Pannonia, met a Vlach populationRicardus writes: "...tendem venerunt in terram quae nunc Ungariam dicitur, tunc vero dicebatur pascua Romanorum. Quam inhabitandam pre terris ceteris elegerunt, subjectis sibi populis, qui tunc habitabant ibidem." A Documented Chronology of Roumanian History p. 29 while Thomas of Spalato mentioned the same thing.Thomas writes: "Haec regio" (Pannonia) "dicitur antiquitus fuisse pascua Romanorum." A Documented Chronology of Roumanian History p. 30 The poem of the Nibelungs, written between 1140 and 1160, mentions the wedding of Attila and the presence at it of Vlachs. The poem reads: "Der herzoge Ramunc üzer Vlachen land mit sieben hundert mannen komer fûr si gerant." A Documented Chronology of Roumanian History p. 38 and Weltchronik of Rudolph von Ems, written circa 1250, mention Vlachs living in Pannonia.Rudolph writes: "Im vromdin sundir sprachin; Valwen und wilde Vlachin; Ienseit; des sneberges hant; Sint lant du si begant" A Documented Chronology of Roumanian History p. 38

Arguments against

• The short time of occupation, which lasted only about 165 years, not to mention the fact that in the last period the Roman occupation was only formal.
• Romans conquered only about 50% of the territories inhabitated by Romanians (Transylvania, Banat, Oltenia and parts of Muntenia, southern Moldova, eastern Serbia and northern Bulgaria); besides, many Dacians lived in remote mountainous areas, with little contact with the main Roman colonies. However it is possible that the process of Romanization wasn't limited only to major centres.
• After the Roman withdrawal, a Dacian tribe (the Carpians, living in Moldavia) conquered the abandoned areas and could have imposed their language or reverted the romanization process (if there was any romanization process).
• There are very few written documents confirming that Romanic peoples lived in Dacia in the period between the Roman evacuation of Dacia and the 10th century. However, written documents from Dark Ages usually recorded only events relative to the area were they were compiled.
• There are no clear traces of Teutonic influences in Romanian language and it is known that in the 5th and 6th centuries Dacia was inhabited by Germanic tribes.
• A large part of the Hungarian vocabulary related to farming and other activities requiring a settled lifestyle originate in ancient Slavic, whereas no Vlach or Romanian influence can be shown. This hints towards Hungarians having found a mostly Slavic population in the Carpatian basin, and tends to show the lack of Romanian element within the contemporary ethnic composition.
• It is unclear that the term "Vlach", as mentioned in the medieval chronicles, refers to which ethnic group. Taken into account that modern Polish "Wloch" and "Wlochy" mean respectively "Italian" and "Italy", and modern Hungarian "olasz", deriving from "Vlach", means again "Italian", it is arguable that the "Vlach" reference in the chronicles denoted in general Latin speaking population fragments adjacent to early Slavic settlements in the Carpathian basin. The existence of a substantial latinized population in Pannonia, which was held by the Romans from its conquest between 32 BC and 8 BC until the collapse of the Western Roman Empire, is undisputed. In this light, the references in the medieval chronicles to the "Vlach" population in Pannonia do not constitute a conclusive evidence of the presence of romanized Dacians in the Carpathian Basin in the last quarter of the first millenary.
• According to Eutropius (book IX, 15), Aurelian abandoned Dacia Traiana and reorganised a new Dacia Aureliana inside former Moesia Superior in 270-275, settling it with Romans brought from the former Dacia Traiana. In order to increase taxation, Caracalla decrees in 212 that all freemen throughout the Roman Empire become Roman Citizens.

Migration from the south

According to The Roessler Theory, a Romanic population came from the south in the Middle Ages and settled down in present-day Romania.

Arguments for

• Common words in Romanian and Albanian language which may be of Thracian or Illyrian origin (see also Origin of Albanians and List of Dacian words). However, according to a number of thracologists, the Proto-Albanian and Dacian languages were probably related and the common words could have come from the Dacian language. ^[#endnote_6]
• There are Vlachs living south of the Danube and speaking East Romance languages: Aromanians, Megleno-Romanians and Istro-Romanians (in Bulgaria, Greece, Albania, the Republic of Macedonia, Serbia and Croatia). There are mentions of their presence in those areas since the early Middle Ages. However this does not necessarily support migration from the south northwards but rather the other way around.
• There are no traces of Teutonic influence in Romanian and it is known that in the 5th and 6th century Dacia was inhabited by Teutonic tribes. ^[#endnote_6]
• Romanian toponyms in Albania and Bulgaria. ^[#endnote_7]
• Vlach shepherds migrated northwards with their herds in search of better pastures. For example they moved along the Carpathian Mountains to present day Poland and even to the Czech Republic. They influenced very significantly the culture and language of Polish and Ukrainian highlanders.
• Eutropius mentions the resettlement of Roman citizens from Dacia Traiana to the south of the Danube in 270-275. This, however, does not necessarily mean all Roman citizens.
• There are far fewer Slavic words in Aromanian than Romanian. According to linguists proto-Romanian split after the Slavonic settlement in the Balcan peninsula. It supports the theory that the major Slavonic influence on Romanian took place after the migration of Vlachs and their settlement in Slav-populated territories North of the Danube.

Arguments against

• The few Greek loanwords for religious terms in Romanian entered via Vulgar Latin, not directly from Greek (ex: Ro. biserică *basilica basilike). Important religious terms in Romanian came directly from Latin, which suggests the Daco-Romanians were converted to Christianity in the Latin language. Later on, during the Middle Ages, Romanians used Church Slavonic as their liturgical language, so the Eastern Orthodox church organization was probably brought by Bulgarian Slavs. This seems to imply the presence of a Slavic buffer zone between Greeks and Romanians ^{[#endnote_4] [#endnote_3]}. However this argument may support the theory about migration from the south since Old Church Slavonic (the ancestor of the Church Slavonic used in Romania) became a liturgical language in the Balkans no earlier than 890 AD. The Vlach migrants from the south could start using it after arriving to present day Romania, that has been largely inhabited by Slavonic tribes and subdued to Bulgarian Tsars and influenced by Bulgarian Orthodox Church. Besides the conversion to Christianity would be made on the territories of present day Serbia and northern Bulgaria, south of Danube.
• Dacian toponyms were kept; examples are the names of some rivers (Samus - Someş, Marisia - Mureş, Porata - Prut) and the names of some cities (Petrodava - Piatra Neamţ, Abruttum - Abrud). It should be noted, however, that the preservation of toponyms only indicates continuous settlement, and not necessarily continuous settlement by the same people. E.g. both Slavic and Hungarian languages kept the Latin name of Danubia (Dunaj and Duna), none of them being of Latin descent.
• A 13th century Hungarian chronicle, Gesta Hungarorum, claims that when the Magyars arrived in Pannonia, the surrounding areas were inhabited by Vlachs (Romanians), but this chroncile also said, that Hungarian king, Ladislaus I. (1077-1095) fought against Cumanians, but Cumanians didn't live there that time, only from the 13th century. ^[#endnote_1]
• A chronicle by Venerable Nestor (1056 - 1136 AD) mentions Walachians (Romanians) fighting against Magyars north of the Danube in 898. ^[#endnote_5]
• No medieval chronicle mentions any large-scale migrations of Romanic peoples from the Balkans to Romania; contrary to a south to north movement, a chronicle indicates rather a north to south movement: according to Cecaumenos' Strategicon (1066), the Vlachs of Epirus and Thessalia came from north of the Danube and from along the Sava. ^[#endnote_2]
• Regional differences within Romanian language indicate that in certain Romanian areas which coincide quite exactly with the ancient Roman province of Dacia, the language preserved more Latin substance than in the rest of the country^[#endnote_8]. It would be extremely hard to explain why Romanians supposedly coming from remote territories southern of the Danube speak a more Latin Romanian language exactly within the boundaries of what used to be a Roman province 6-7 centuries before their alleged arrival to these areas, while in the Romanian spoken outside the Carpathian Basin those Latin elements were lost.
• Morpho-syntactical, lexical and phonetical differences between Romanian and Aroumanian are considerable, making mutual comprehension impossible. It is therefore extremely difficult to explain how could appear and differentiate two different Romance languages at the same time and in the same area, as implied by the immigration theory.
• If the hypothesis of a single proto-Romanian language is assumed, then the split of the proto-Romanian into Aroumanian and Romanian should have taken place some centuries before the 9th century, since linguists agree that the build up process of both Romanian and Aromanian was completed up to the 9th century. This implies that a northwards Vlach migration should not have been possible later than the 7-8th century and not, as some immigrationists claim, as early as the 11th century.
• The name of the Danube in Romanian has a form which appears to be original (derived from a reconstructed *donaris) and not borrowed from other languages, which shows that the Romanians always lived somewhere near this river and not far south like some theories suggest.

Footnotes

See also

• History of Romania
• Origin of Albanians
• Jireček Line
• Etymology of Romania
• Protochronism
• Paleo-Balkan languages
• Dacian language
• Ethnogenesis

References

1. ↑  Anonymous, ["Gesta Hungarorum"]
2. ↑  Ghyka, Matila, "A Documented Chronology of Roumanian History", Oxford: B. H. Blackwell Ltd. 1941.
3. ↑  Iorga, Nicolae, "History of Romanian Church" (Istoria Bisericii Româneşti), Bucureşti, 1908 - [Online text] (in Romanian)
4. ↑  Jirecek, Konstantin. "The history of the Serbians" (Geschichte der Serben), Gotha, 1911
5. ↑  Nestor of Kyiv, [Chronicles of Venerable Nestor], translated by George Skoryk
6. ↑  Rosetti, Alexandru. "History of the Romanian language" (Istoria limbii române), 2 vols., Bucharest, 1965-1969.
7. ↑  Mellish, Liz and Green, Nick [Eliznik.org.uk: map of the Balkans: places with endings in "-eşti"]
8. ↑  Some examples of a more pronounced Latin linguistic heritage in areas of the ancient Roman Dacia compared to remaining Romania from Atlas Lingvistic Român pe regiuni, vol. I – V, Editura Academiei:

1. Use of the typical Latin tense of simple past

:e.g. fui/fuşi/fu

2. Use of the typical Latin inverted interrogation form

:e.g. “dusu-te-ai ?” vs. “te-ai dus ?”

3. Existence of Latin words not used in the rest of Romania

:e.g. mâneca (Lat.manicare) – to wake up early in the morning

:mănea – (Lat. manere) – to stay overnight

4. Existence of Latin forms in contrast to Slavic forms of the same word

:e.g. snow: nea (Lat. nive) – zăpadă (Common Slavonic zapaditi)

:garlic: aiu (lat. alium) – usturoi (Rom. constr)

:slave: şerb (Lat. servus) – rob (CS robъ)

:sand: arină (Lat. arena) – nisip (Bg. dial. nasip)

5. Existence of lexical forms closer to Latin

:e.g. flour: fărină (Lat. farina) – făină

6. Existence of phonetical forms closer to Latin

:e.g. pronunciation of the Romanian diphthong “oa” like “o”, thus closer to the original Latin “o”, like in “mo(a)rte” (lat. mortis) (death), “so(a)rtă” (Lat. sortis) (fate)

External links

• [Friesian.com: The Vlach Connection]
• [Historical myths in Communist Romania]

Sources

Anna Comnena cap7 http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/basis/AnnaComnena-Alexiad.html (also [part 2])

 

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