Talk:Vlachs of Serbia

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[edit] Census

  • In Serbia everybody is free to declare what ever nationality he choose in census (or not to declare anything if he want).
  • Vlachs in Timočka Krajina declare themselves in census as ethnic Vlachs and declare their language as Vlach language PANONIAN (talk)
They may have declared but what are really they? Aren't they a latin people? Aren't they speak romanian? Yes, they are romanians.
  • If they declared themselves as Vlachs, they are Vlachs. What if somebody tell you that your name is not your name, but another one. Same thing... PANONIAN (talk) 17:52, 15 April 2006 (UTC)

Man, are magyars and hungarians the same? In Romanian you may say unguri/maghiari and means the same. Are Muntenii not romanians? They are. --Chisinau 18:02, 15 April 2006 (UTC)

We speak about ethnic groups in Serbia where Vlachs and Romanians are not same. PANONIAN (talk) 18:10, 15 April 2006 (UTC)

Why not the same? Are these ethnic groups different? How come? You see, you don't have any reasonable argument. Even your Government recognize it when Prime Minister came to Bucharest. --Chisinau 18:12, 15 April 2006 (UTC)

Very simple: Serbia recognize all of its minorities in the manner how they want to be recognized. If you want to be recognized as Romanian, you will be recognized as Romanian, if you want to be recognized as Vlach, you will be recognized as Vlach. I do not think that prime minister of Serbia said in Bucharest anything different. The fact is that in the past there were no Vlachs who wanted to be recognized as Romanians (that idea appeared among Vlachs very recently). Serbia will recognize that these Vlachs who want to be Romanians as Romanians, but it also will recognize those who want to be Vlachs as Vlachs. That is how things work here. PANONIAN (talk) 21:14, 16 April 2006 (UTC)

  • Vlachs in Timočka Krajina do not consider themselves Romanians. They think about themselves to be a distinct nation, different from both, Serbs and Romanians. PANONIAN (talk)
They do consider Romanians. Have you not seen their papers?
  • There are those Vlachs who do not consider themselves Romanians. Vlach community is divided about this issue. What paper you talk about? PANONIAN (talk) 17:52, 15 April 2006 (UTC)

Man, again they are romanians. Vlachs are romanians. Are you so kind of xenophob?

  • I am not xenophob. Are you? Why you deny that one small autochtonic nation exist? Small nations have same right to exist as the large ones. PANONIAN (talk) 18:10, 15 April 2006 (UTC)
Well you actually look like. Well actually you deny the existence of Romanians in Serbia! You called them differently even if also before romanians were called like that and you say that because the name is different that means that we speak about two nations. --Chisinau 18:19, 15 April 2006 (UTC)
  • Please quote when and where I denied the existence of Romanians in Serbia? Is it you the one who deny the existence of Vlachs? You deny the existence of the entire nation. Is that not xenophobic? And I call them how they call themselves. What is wrong with that? You want to destroy the entire nation only to have 40,000 more Romanians (and there are 20,000,000 Romanians already). Nice goal you have. PANONIAN (talk) 21:14, 16 April 2006 (UTC)
  • Serbia recognize them as such, since that is what they want. PANONIAN (talk)
Serbia recognize them only after Romania and EU pressed Serbia.
  • Serbia recognized all its minorities long time ago which had nothing to do with Romania. PANONIAN (talk) 17:52, 15 April 2006 (UTC)
Only after Romania pressed them to recognize that Vlachs are romanians. Not before.
  • Serbia never recognized them as Romanins. Serbia recognized Vlachs as one autochtonic nation. PANONIAN (talk) 18:10, 15 April 2006 (UTC)
It's not what PM of Serbia told in Bucharest. --Chisinau 18:19, 15 April 2006 (UTC)
  • I do not know what he said, but I presume that he said that Serbia will recognize as Romanians these Vlachs who want to be recognized as Romanians. But that does not mean that Vlachs who want to be recognized as Vlachs will not be recognized as Vlachs. It would be a violation of the human rights for some of the citizens of Serbia. In Serbia you can freely choose any ethnicity, language or religion and nobody have right to force you to change it or to became something else than you want to be. PANONIAN (talk) 21:14, 16 April 2006 (UTC)

There are 2 things which can say who is a nation and who is not:

  • 1.national consciousness
  • 2.census results

Vlachs in Serbia do not have Romanian, but Vlach national consciousness and they do not declare themselves as Romanians, but as Vlachs. No matter how Vlachs of Serbia and Moldovans are culturally and linguistically similar to Romanians, they simply are not Romanians. They are not Romanians because of same reason why Austrians are not Germans or why Montenegrins are not Serbs or why Americans are not English, etc. If somebody do not declare himself as Romanian in census, he is not Romanian. User:PANONIAN

They do have national consciousness as romanians. Look at their publications. --Chisinau 16:41, 15 April 2006 (UTC)

Some of them are, some of them dont. You read only publications of one side. Read another side too. PANONIAN (talk) 17:52, 15 April 2006 (UTC)

I read as it should be: if they have means that they feel like being romanians. What's wrong to have such feelings? --Chisinau 18:26, 15 April 2006 (UTC)
  • Nothing is wrong. I do not deny the right of Vlachs who feel as Romanians to be Romanians. But I also do not deny the right of Vlachs who do not want to be Romanians to be Vlachs. PANONIAN (talk) 21:14, 16 April 2006 (UTC)

The further discussion about this can be seen here: Talk:Romanians of Serbia

[edit] Language

However, this is Wikipedia and we don't have to write only "official" information, as that makes the article POV. All linguists claim they speak "Romanian language" not "Vlach language". Also I really doubt those people don't know they speak Romanian. Even in Moldova, where the propaganda for a "Moldavian language" was rather strong, about 2/3 said they spoke Romanian at the last census. bogdan | Talk 18:03, 15 October 2005 (UTC)

Ok, what about this: "they speak basically same language as Romanian, thought they call their language Vlach"? User:PANONIAN

A muntean or a moldovean or a oltean is not romanian? They all do speak romanian and they are romanians. --Chisinau 16:44, 15 April 2006 (UTC)
  • They declared Vlach language in census, so this name should be used here, no matter is it same as Romanian. PANONIAN (talk) 17:52, 15 April 2006 (UTC)
But actually what kind of language is that? Don't we speak about romanian language? What do you say? If they speak romanian, romanian language will be written. --Chisinau 18:28, 15 April 2006 (UTC)
  • One language can to have more names. Serbian, Croatian, Bosnian and Montenegrin are different names for one language, but somewhere we write one name, and somewhere else another. Same thing with Romanian, Moldovan and Vlach. PANONIAN (talk) 21:14, 16 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Name

Yes, but we called our self Vlachs in Serbian language, in our native mother-language we pronounce Io mis roman, ``Io vorbiesc romaniaste``, at least thats the way my gran-gran mother speaks. User:Xomelander

And how she call Romanians then? PANONIAN (talk) 22:56, 12 March 2006 (UTC)

Stupid question Panonian. A similar question: how does an Alsacian german call the Germans?

It is redundant panonian.

Vlach=rumanian

rumanian=romanian.

Please read books, take informations and don't write those stupidities in Wikipedia.

Vlachs(in eastern Serbia) = Rumanians = Romanians

Romania=Rumania

The science has proven that the Vlachs in easter Serbia are ethnic Romanians(Rumanians) and they should be treated like that. The Article "Vlachs Of Serbia" should be merged with the Article "Romanians of Serbia".

Was already explained above. --Chisinau 16:47, 15 April 2006 (UTC)

Well, I recently read in the newspapers that leader of the Vlach National Council in Serbia claimed that Vlachs are not Romanians, but separate nation. So, tell that to him, not to me, ok? No matter how Vlachs and Romanians are similar, that does not mean that they are same, or you would say that Moldovans are Romanians too? There are also people in Serbia who claim that Montenegrins, Bosniaks, Croats and Macedonians are in fact Serbs, but are they? It is national consciousness what define is somebody a nation or. There are more examples: are Austrians really Austrians or just Germans? Are Wallonians really Wallonians or just French? etc, etc... Among Vlach community in Serbia there are Vlachs who are pro-Romanian, pro-Serb, and pro-Vlach. What I tried is to make an article based on the pro-Vlach view. Also, name "Rumani" was not only designation for Romanians. For example, Aromanians also call themselves "arumani", "ramani", etc. We also known that another Balkan Romance peoples are called "Megleno-Romanians", "Istro-Romanians", etc. But they are not same as Romanians. One more thing, even if we accept the view that Vlachs of Serbia are part of the Romanians of Serbia, that still does not mean that we should to merge this article into "Romanians of Serbia" because of the same reason why article "Romanians of Serbia" is not merged into article "Romanians". Another example is that we have articles about Magyars, about Szekely (part of Magyars), and about Szekely of Bukovina (part of Szekely). PANONIAN (talk) 16:06, 13 April 2006 (UTC)

Moldovans are romanians of course. Don't forget there are moldovans in Romania also in Romanian part of Moldova. --Chisinau 16:48, 15 April 2006 (UTC)
  • Ok, since you seem to be from Moldova, tell me how you declared yourself in census? As Romanian or as Moldovan? Then we will discuss this further. PANONIAN (talk) 17:52, 15 April 2006 (UTC)
Well, romanian. But many people when are saying moldovans that doesn't mean that they didn't meant romanians. Saying Moldovan means automatically also Romanian. You'll see at the next Census how in 5 years will double (or even grow 10 times) the population of romanians in Moldova. --Chisinau 18:39, 15 April 2006 (UTC)
  • This what you said is not logical at all. First you said that all Moldovans are Romanians and then that the population of Romanians (I presume those who declared themselves as such) will grow up in the next census. So, make up your mind, are Moldovans Romanians or not, and if they are why they did not declared themselves as such but as Moldovans? PANONIAN (talk) 21:14, 16 April 2006 (UTC)

One more thing, please see this map from Vlach web site which show where Vlach population live:

Why they did not showed Banat Romanians to be a part of their people on this map? Can you explain that? PANONIAN (talk) 16:52, 13 April 2006 (UTC)

Because they refer to people from Serbia and more exactly from that area. --Chisinau 16:57, 15 April 2006 (UTC)

Banat is also in Serbia, and Kovin (a town is Banat) is also marked on this map as area inhabited by Vlachs, but other towns in Banat inhabited by Romanians (like Vršac or Alibunar) are not marked. Why is that? To which area Kovin belong then? PANONIAN (talk) 17:52, 15 April 2006 (UTC)

Well either you expand a little bit because sincerely you asked in a confuse way. I will answer after you detail more your question. It's not clear to me what you meant exactly. --Chisinau 18:41, 15 April 2006 (UTC)
  • All right, you said that this map showed only one region in Serbia, but this map also show the town of Kovin which is not part of the same region. Kovin is located in Banat (not in eastern Serbia). Since we know that Romanians of Serbia mostly live in Banat, why Kovin is the only town of Banat shown on this map? PANONIAN (talk) 21:14, 16 April 2006 (UTC)

Just to say about my question what is a Vlach name for Romanians. The question is not stupid. I watched some TV show about music in eastern Serbia where Vlach musician talked about differences between Vlach, Serb, and Romanian music. So, that Vlach musician obviously made a difference between Vlachs and Romanians, so I presume that in the language spoken by Vlachs must be also words to designate this difference. PANONIAN (talk) 15:11, 14 April 2006 (UTC)

There are differences from music also in Germany, Italy but they still are germans, italians...--Chisinau 16:57, 15 April 2006 (UTC)
  • But this musician did not spoke about music in different areas, but about music of different ethnic groups. PANONIAN (talk) 17:52, 15 April 2006 (UTC)
They are romanians. And you'd better recognize them like that if you want to join EU soon. Or you can wait. Chisinau 18:57, 15 April 2006 (UTC)
  • You say that Serbia should to violate the rights of its citizens who want to be Vlachs to join EU? Do not worry, Serbia will recognize all Vlachs who want to be Romanians as Romanians, but it will not force these Vlachs who want to be only Vlachs to change their identity. It would be against the law and violation of basic human rights. PANONIAN (talk) 21:14, 16 April 2006 (UTC)

"Well, I recently read in the newspapers that leader of the Vlach National Council in Serbia claimed that Vlachs are not Romanians, but separate nation. So, tell that to him, not to me, ok?"

Panonian, the so-called "Vlachs" in eastern Serbia have a common organization in Serbia, called "The Vlach-Rumanian Association". Attention! It's called "Vlach-Rumanian" and not "Vlach and Rumanian". They might be also many "vlach" organizations, and some "leaders" may say that they aren't rumanians. But how far can you supose that those opinions are representative for all the vlachs? What is the name of that leader? In fact, the vlachs(romanians) in eastern Serbia can't afirm wahr they are. Some serbians don't agree that. see here
  • It is very simple: 40,054 people in Serbia declared themselves in census as Vlachs, not as Romanians or Vlachs-Romanians. Until they declare themselves like this we must respect that. These organizations (like this Vlach-Rumanian Association) represent only its own members, but not all of these 40,054 people. PANONIAN (talk) 22:10, 14 April 2006 (UTC)
That doesn't mean that they are not romanians. Statistics doesn't say the differences, if they are or not.--Chisinau 16:57, 15 April 2006 (UTC)
  • Yes that mean that they are not Romanians. Only the one who declare himself in census as Romanian is Romanian. Nobody else. If they declare themselves as Romanians in the next census I will agree with you that they are Romanians. Until then, I will not. PANONIAN (talk) 17:52, 15 April 2006 (UTC)
Even if they call it like that saying vlach means romanian.--Chisinau 18:57, 15 April 2006 (UTC)

"No matter how Vlachs and Romanians are similar, that does not mean that they are same, or you would say that Moldovans are Romanians too?"

Of course yes! They are romanians, Moldovans are Romanians! President Basescu said that many times: two states one people! --Chisinau 16:59, 15 April 2006 (UTC)

The question: no matter what president said, tell me why most of the citizens of Moldova then declared themselves as Moldovans in census? If they are Romanians, why they did not declared themselves as such? PANONIAN (talk) 17:52, 15 April 2006 (UTC)

Why? Saying Muntean, or Ardelean, or Moldovean (Moldovan) that means automatically that you way romanian. They meant romanian when they say it Moldovean. Everybody knows that are romanians. Answered also above.--Chisinau 18:57, 15 April 2006 (UTC)
  • Here is example that Moldovan does not mean Romanian: one citizen of Moldova of Russian descent may also declare himself in census as Moldovan because his country is Moldova, but he certainly is not an Romanian. PANONIAN (talk) 21:14, 16 April 2006 (UTC)
Why should I believe that moldovans aren't Romanians? 65% of the population in the Republic of Moldova are romanian-speakers. The "others": Russians, Ukrainians, Gagauz ... Since 1989, the childrens are taught here in the "Romanian language"(before 1989, it was the so-called "Moldovan language").
  • Did Moldovans declared themselves as Romanians in census? Most of them did not, so they are not Romanians. It is not important that they speak Romanian language since language and nationality are not same thing. Americans speak English language, but they are Americans, not English (just one similar example). PANONIAN (talk) 22:10, 14 April 2006 (UTC)
So what? that doesn't mean that they are not romanians! what are moldovans, muntenii, ardelenii? aren't they romanians? They are all romanians.--Chisinau 17:11, 15 April 2006 (UTC)
  • All depends how they declare themselves in census. PANONIAN (talk) 17:52, 15 April 2006 (UTC)
A moldovan is romanian you can't be moldovan without being romanian.--Chisinau 18:57, 15 April 2006 (UTC)

"It is national consciousness what define is somebody a nation or."

Well, the langage defines a nation(the ethnicity). That's the scientific point of view. The rest ist Politics.
  • Well, everything is politics. But tell me this then: since Serbs, Montenegrins, Croats and Bosniaks speak same language, to which nation they belong? Also, since Peruans, Argentinians and Colombians also speak same language, to which nation they belong? It is not that simple as you think. :) PANONIAN (talk) 22:10, 14 April 2006 (UTC)
Well finally you'l jump to conclusion that they are serbs after all. No. Panonian they are romanians.--Chisinau 17:16, 15 April 2006 (UTC)

Where I jump to such conclusion? PANONIAN (talk) 18:01, 15 April 2006 (UTC) "So, that Vlach musician obviously made a difference between Vlachs and Romanians, so I presume that in the language spoken by Vlachs must be also words to designate this difference." I'm a Romanian, and I assure you, a understand EACH WORD spoken by a so-called "vlach". The hungarians called until the 19th century the romanians "vlahok". Now, they call them "romananok". What's the difference?

  • Well, that was not the question. I will try to explain: there are two nations with same name: Serbs and Sorbs. Serbs for themselves use name "Srbi" and for Sorbs they use name "Lužički Srbi" (Lusatian Serbs). As I said, the Vlach musician made difference between Vlachs and Romanians, so if one Vlach for himself use name Roumanian, then he certainly have some name to designate Romanians too, even if that name is something like "Roumanians from Romania". The question was about the name, not about the language. PANONIAN (talk) 22:10, 14 April 2006 (UTC)

It's about their ethnicity what you question here, and the answer is that they are romanians.--Chisinau 17:16, 15 April 2006 (UTC)

"Another example is that we have articles about Magyars, about Szekely (part of Magyars), and about Szekely of Bukovina (part of Szekely)."

Panonian, the Szekelys are counted to the Hungarian minority in Rumania(600.000 of the 1,4 mill. Hungarians in Romania are Szekelys). You don't count the "vlachs" to the Romanian minority in Serbia. That's the problem here.
  • Check again the article Romanians of Serbia. Vlachs are counted as part of Romanians of Serbia there and this article is even listed as subarticle of the "Romanians of Serbia". PANONIAN (talk) 22:10, 14 April 2006 (UTC)
Vlachs are romanians.--Chisinau 17:19, 15 April 2006 (UTC)

"There are more examples: are Austrians really Austrians or just Germans?"

98% of the Austrians have a german ethnicity and an austrian citizenship.
  • Well, bad example maybe, but since I did not saw census results in Austria, I cannot say are you right or wrong, but I can tell you another example about Serbs and Montenegrins about which I know a lot. PANONIAN (talk) 22:10, 14 April 2006 (UTC)
In this case is not aplicable. Vlachs are romanians.--Chisinau 17:19, 15 April 2006 (UTC)

"Also, name "Rumani" was not only designation for Romanians. For example, Aromanians also call themselves "arumani", "ramani", etc. We also known that another Balkan Romance peoples are called "Megleno-Romanians", "Istro-Romanians", etc. But they are not same as Romanians."

The "a" put in the front of the word is specific in the aromanian language. Here an example: romanian: ogor, aromanian: aogor.
But the so-called "vlachs in eastern Serbia" don't put the "a" in the from of the word. They are not Aromanians, nore Istoromanians or Meglenoromanians. They are Dacoromanians, like the romanians in Romania or Moldova.
See also on the eliznik-pages about the northern and the southern vlachs:
http://www.eliznik.org.uk/RomaniaHistory/Vlach-north.htm
http://www.eliznik.org.uk/RomaniaHistory/vlach-south.htm
I can understand 100% of that what a "vlach in eastern Serbia" is saying, but only 50-60% of Aromanian.
In the southern Romania, until 1859/1862 it existed the "Principality of Walachia". But the Rumanians never called their country so, but "Ţera Rumânească" (in the modern, actual, romanian language "Ţara Românească").
P.S.: please excuse my very bad english!
  • Well, here is example that there are two different peoples with same name Serbs and Sorbs. Both groups call themselves Serbs in their own languages, no matter that English language use different names Serbs and Sorbs. But point is, they are different peoples with different languages, history, etc... PANONIAN (talk) 22:10, 14 April 2006 (UTC)
That's your problem, in this case as we talked about: vlachs are romanians.--Chisinau 17:19, 15 April 2006 (UTC)
  • And yes, the person who repeat so many time one phrase like you repeated that Vlachs are Romanians obviously have need to convince himself that this phrase is truth. So, if they are Romanians as you said, why you repeated that so many times? If that is a fact why you want to convince somebody in it? PANONIAN (talk)
Why have I repeated so many times? Because I want you to know that when you say Vlachs you actually refer to Romanians, you can't refers to other peopls. Romanians were called vlachs long time before because of their latinity. See the ethimology of the word Vlach. --Chisinau 19:02, 15 April 2006 (UTC)
  • There are people in Serbia who claim that all Montenegrins are Serbs. So, if you want to check are they Serbs or not, go to Montenegro and ask them are they Serbs. Some will say yes, but some other will say no. If you repeat many times the phrase that all Montenegrins are Serbs you will not change the fact that there are many Montenegrins who consider that they are not Serbs but only Montenegrins. Same thing is with Vlachs, same thing with Moldovans. You have right to your opinion about this, but other people have right to their opinion too. And the most important thing is that nobody of us have no right to force somebody to be what he does not want to be. PANONIAN (talk) 21:14, 16 April 2006 (UTC)

Look at the census results in Serbia, and everything will be clear to you:

PANONIAN (talk) 18:01, 15 April 2006 (UTC)

Here the results of the romanian census 2002: http://www.insse.ro/rpl2002rezgen/14.pdf Inside the russian minority, 29.774 have declared "lipovanians" and only 8.914 "russians". But they all are ethnic russians and they speak russian. The romanian authorities puts the lipovans toghether with the russians. The serbian authority separates the Vlachs from the Romanians. Another example: on the romanian census in 1992, 831 persons have declared to be "Szekelys". The authorities put them to the hungarians. 1.843 persons have declared to be "Saxons" (Transylvanian Saxons) and 6.292 "Svabians" (Banat Svabians). The authorities put them to the germans. DO YOU THINK, THEY CAN EXIST A "SZEKELY", "SAXON" AND A "SVABIAN" ETHNICITY ??? Aren't they hungarians and germans? Olahus.
  • I say that Romania deny the right of its citizens to choose their ethnicity according to this what you just said. If your country is trully democratic, then its citizens would have right to be Szekely, Lipovans or Saxons. This is clear violation of their basic rights. PANONIAN (talk) 21:14, 16 April 2006 (UTC)
That Census doesn't say anything new. When you say Vlach it means you say romanian. I hope now is clear for you and I will not have to repeat one more time: Vlachs are romanians as people from Transylvania, Maramures, Oltenia, Muntenia are... --Chisinau 18:57, 15 April 2006 (UTC)
  • You can repeat this how many times you want, but it is only your opinion, nothing more. PANONIAN (talk) 21:14, 16 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] some things on the name

  • the Carani (Ţărani) -- it means "people of the country", "countrymen", also "peasants". probably, it refers to the fat that they are the authocthonic population, as opposed to the "Ungureni", who came from Banat.
  • the Ungurjani (Ungureani / "Ungureni") -- from the Kingdom of Hungary, i.e. Banat.
  • Ungurjani-Munćani (Ungureani-Munceani / "Ungureni-Munteni") -- "Ungureni of the Mountains", in Banatian dialect (te -> če)
  • Bufani -- I'm not sure what it means, presumably it's derived from "bufă", meaning "fold", possibly referring to their clothes.

bogdan 22:34, 14 April 2006 (UTC)

Ţărani could also indicate that they are originally from Valachia, otherwise known as Ţara Românească, i.e., the Romanian Land. C0gnate 18:43, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] POV/inaccurate paragraph

The Vlachs did not pass the same process of forcible Romanization of alphabet or vocabulary as the Romanians in Romania

Forcible? Nobody forced anyone to change the words one uses. There were French borrowings, but this was done also by Bulgarians and Russians, for example. There was an idea in 19th century to eliminate Slavic words from Romanian and it was labeled as absurd.

and they usually say that they are descendants of Romanized Moesians, compared to the Romanized Gheto-Dacians in Romania. The fact is that both Moesians and Gheto-Dacians were the Thracian tribes, so the substrate was not so different.

Yes, most linguists think that Moesians and Geto-Dacians spoke the same language, labeled by some "Daco-Moesian", but that's off-topic here. Linking modern people to ancient peoples is nonsense. It's absurd to say that some are descendants from "Geto-Dacians" and others from the "Moesians".

Anyway, the Romanians of Wallachia and Vlachs of Serbia speak the same language! I mean even the same dialect! The southern "Wallachian" dialect is what became standard Romanian language.

Some Vlachs usually emphasize that the difference between them and Romanians "are the same as the difference between the Serbs and Bulgarians".

So, Serbian language is identical to Bulgarian ? I learnt something new today, then. :-) bogdan 15:29, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

As for that paragraph about Romanization, I do not object that you remove it or change if it is not accurate (I have no idea is that correct or not, I just returned this because it was deleted by person who marked this deletion as "minnor edit" and did not explained reason for deletion). As for language, Serbian is not identical to Bulgarian, but is identical to Croatian, Bosnian, and Montenegrin, and all these four names are used in proper places, so why we should use name Romanian everywhere instead of Moldovan and Vlach? We cannot change census results, and the results say that Vlachs declared Vlach language. Therefor, I created redirect "Vlach language (Serbia)", which redirect to Romanian language. I also do not object that we can write in parenthesis "Romanian" everywhere where we have "Vlach". PANONIAN (talk) 15:45, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] you don't allow them to have their own church in Romanian, human rights in Serbia

You don't allow them to have their own church in Romanian, where is the human rights in Serbia? So much to tell about the tollerance of Serbs.... --Andrei George 09:40, 24 April 2006 (UTC)

I have no idea what you talking about. It is nice that you asked for mediation about me here:
It is also nice that you wrote there that "User:PANONIAN reverts many romanian related pages. Even when are presented sources to him, he continues to revert."
So, because mediation page is not a proper place to give you an answer, here is my answer to you: I do not rever "many romanian related pages", but I only revert 3 articles: "Moldovans", "Vlachs", and "Vlachs of Serbia", and I revert them because you persisently removing official census data from these articles. It seems that you want to impose some kind of censorship here and not to alow to readers of Wikipedia to read that Moldovans and Vlachs declared to speak Moldovan and Vlach language in census. Instead of that you constantly changing these census results and writing that they speak Romanian instead of Moldovan and Vlach. Since you said there that you "presented sources to me" that your changes are correct, I will ask you that if you did presented sources to me (and I say that you did not), to present these sources here on this talk page if you have them. However, I will present the sources to you instead, so here are the official 2002 census results in Serbia:
The document is in Serbian, but the information about languages could be found on page 12, where you can see that 54,818 people declared in census to speak Vlach (Влашки) language and 34,515 declared to speak Romanian (Румунски). Vlach speakers are mostly concentrated in Central Serbia (Централна Србија) - 54,726 Vlach speakers, while Romanian speakers are mostly concentrated in Vojvodina (Војводина) - 29,512 Romanian speakers. PANONIAN (talk) 16:06, 24 April 2006 (UTC)
According to your own sources those 34,515% that declared to speak Romanian (Румунски) have the right to have in this article: Romanian language.
Thank you,
--Andrei George 19:48, 24 April 2006 (UTC)
PS. You make censorship when you don't allow them (35%) to have Romanian language.
Seems that you did not understand my post. It is not "34,515 percent" but "34,515 people" and that number refers to the Romanians from Vojvodina who are mentioned in the Romanians of Serbia article. Vlachs who live in Central Serbia did not declared Romanian but Vlach. PANONIAN (talk) 20:14, 24 April 2006 (UTC)
I'd just like to point out to Andrei the nature of the Serbian census. The state recognises two distinct ethnic groups: Romanians and Vlachs, based on the fact that the people in Central Serbia of Eastern Romance origin declare themselves as "Vlachs" on the blank ethnicity line (this is a matter of choice, not imposition, though it might be influenced by the fact that they are brought up thinking they are Vlachs; that's another issue and is related to that type of inaccuracy in censuses worldwide). Anyway, so these two ethnic groups are recognised separately. The Romanians have a broad of range of rights, similar to what the Serb minority has in Romania. In Vojvodina, Romanian is an official language, and there is schooling, access to public institutions, access to justice, etc, in the Romanian language. In Central Serbia, the situation is different, as the Vlachs don't have many minority rights. In many ways, this is due a greater degree of assimiliation by the Vlachs (many Vlachs declare Serbian ethnicity, while the vast majority of Romanians do not). In any case, just to let you know that the Romanian language and ethnicity is recognised by the Serbian census. And that the Romanian point of view (even that endorsed by the state) on this has been a bit tendentious and Greater-Romanianist at times.
By the way, Panonian - the system used in talk pages nowadays is the indent (produced by :: or however many colons you want). The line (----) makes it hard to follow discussions. Ronline ✉ 01:31, 25 April 2006 (UTC)
All right, I will see not to post lines any more. :) PANONIAN (talk) 01:10, 26 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Vlach language

There isn`t such a language called "Vlach". Hence it was removed. However, the mention of "declared to speak vlach language" was kept. Greier 18:51, 28 April 2006 (UTC)

Romanian language is POV, as it implies that the Vlachs identify themselves with the modern Romanian nation, which clearly they don't. They do speak, linguistically, a Romanian dialect, so the Romanian in brackets should stay, but as other sources refer to that language as a Vlach language [1], [2], [3], [4], then there is no reason to supress that term here. Telex 18:57, 28 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Admins read this

I demand (yes, I DEMAND, because that is why you are here for, correct?) moderators to do their job, to think logically and objective. Read the article, read the talk page, read links, and then take a decision about the article. Until then, please read this [5] greier 09:29, 4 May 2006 (UTC)

Admins, please also read this and this. Thanks! greier 09:33, 4 May 2006 (UTC)
Also please read this. Thanks! greier 09:35, 4 May 2006 (UTC)
What's your point? None of this justifies placing Vlach in quotation marks. Wikipedia is not about what should be - Wikipedia is about what is, and the term used officially for this language is Vlach. If you want to discuss idenitity of the community, feel free to. Telex 09:42, 4 May 2006 (UTC)
Let's not forget that 54,818 (2002 census) described their language as Vlach - respect their right to self identification. Don't try to impose the tag "Romanian", which refers to a specific modern nation and state. Telex 09:45, 4 May 2006 (UTC)
And now I ask you hypocrit, what does "vlach Language mean", you troll greier 11:05, 4 May 2006 (UTC)
I can explain what does Vlach language mean. Vlach is listed as separate language in census results in Serbia. It had its own statistical code. This code means that this language is not same as Romanian from the statistical point of view. Serbia recognize right of its minorities to call their language by the name they choose. For example, Croatian and Bosnian are identical to Serbian, but they are also listed separatelly in the census results because part of the Croat and Bosniak national identity is to call their language by their own name. Same thing is with Vlach. No matter how much Vlach is similar to Romanian, part of the national identity of the Vlach community is to call their language by the name they choose. If the state of Serbia officially recognized their language and listed it in census results (which Vlachs declared by their own choice), we cannot falsify census results here on Wikipedia and wrote that they speak anything else except Vlach. Regarding that link to the Council of Europe page, why you did not said that Council of Europe rejected that memorandum written by Romanian nationalists as false one. PANONIAN (talk) 16:28, 4 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Again about the language

The language on both banks of the Danube (in both Romania and Serbia) is the same, but for political reasons it's named differently. You can see a similar case in Moldova, where it's officially named Moldovan language. The Vlachs did not wanted to be identified with the other Romanians or with the Romanian state and preferred to have a distinct identity, although, as Xomelander says, they refer in their language as "romani" (romɨnʲ) and the language "romaniaste" (romɨnjaʃte). It seems that Serbia and Yugoslavia were very sensitive about ethnic issues and they did not wanted to be seen as "foreigners". "Vlachs" were known to be in the area for centuries, while "Romanians" seemed to the Serbs as something foreign.

I propose writing something like:

The Vlachs speak the Oltenian dialect of Romanian, which they refer to as Vlach language.

If you have a better proposal, please say it. :-) bogdan 10:39, 5 May 2006 (UTC)

No. The best version is The Vlachs speak Romanian language, which the Serbian goverment and some people (vlachs, serbs, wikipedia users, etc) refer to as "Vlach language" (with scare quotes included).
This is if I can see an official Serbian source (not silly internet sites) were "Vlach Language" appears, or the [www.Ethnologue.com Ethnologue] recognistion of this "language". If not one can provide that, the best version would be The Vlachs speak Romanian language, which the some people refer to as "Vlach language". Greier 217.28.208.168 10:55, 5 May 2006 (UTC).
from: http://www.srbija.sr.gov.yu/pages/article.php?id=37 in Serbia there are: "Vlasi 0,53%, Rumuni 0,46%" bogdan 11:04, 5 May 2006 (UTC)
Then is like this: The Vlachs speak Romanian language, which the Serbian goverment and some people refer to as "Vlach language"
Also, the memorandum of the Romanians of Timok Valley shoud be presented. Also, a new chapter regarding the respect of human rights should be made, regarding the Church, education, etc in maternal language (may that be vlach, romanian, oltenian, or whatever you want to call it)
Ok, here is my proposal: you can go to article about Croats and write there that "The Croats speak the Ijekavian dialect of Serbian, which they refer to as Croatian language". If Croats accept that sentence there, then we can also accept this sentence that "The Vlachs speak the Oltenian dialect of Romanian, which they refer to as Vlach language". Name of the language is part of the identity of one ethnic group and naming that language by the name which is not accepted by that ethnic group is not a good thing to do in any article, not in the article about Vlachs, not in the article about Croats, or in any other similar. We cannot have double standards here on Wikipedia: one standard for Croats and another for Vlachs. Only because Vlachs are smaller ethnic group than Croats does not mean that we should disrespect what they declared in census about their language. And to repeat, it is Vlachs who referr to their language as Vlach language, not Serbian government, which only respect what citizens of Serbia declared in census. Regarding that memoradnum, it was not "memorandum of the Romanians of Timok Valley", but memoradnum of the Romanian deputies from Moldova, and since it was rejected by the Council of Europe as false one, why we should present it here? PANONIAN (talk) 16:01, 5 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Bad article title?

If this article is to treat the Vlachs of eastern Serbia and northwestern Bulgaria as a single ethnic group (which they are, I believe), then the article title is inappropriate — it includes only one country, but lists that a significant number of the population (10%) inhabits another one. I'd say Timok Vlachs might be a better name (though possibly not very widely used), but I'd like to hear other suggestions and opinions before moving the page.

Anyway, apart from the mention of Vlachs in northwestern Bulgaria in the Ethnic group template and a brief reference in the body, this subgroup does not seem to be covered. Therefore, another solution may be to entirely remove any reference of them in this article, retain the title and start a new and separate one about the Vlachs of Bulgaria.

I myself would favour expanding the current article to cover Bulgarian Vlachs (and do it well), while being moved to a more suitable title. Todor→Bozhinov 16:16, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

FWIW, I'm not against it. If the number of Bulgarian Vlachs is far smaller than Serbian ones, it moght not be worth the effort though. If you do have the data about Bulgarian Vlachs, I'd say "be bold" and go ahead with it. You might wait for Panonian's (he was the main contributor to this article) and other users' opinion before the move itself though. Duja 16:37, 5 June 2006 (UTC)
Umm, no, I don't have much data about them, only some basic facts, actually, and no book sources (I also doubt there's much info online). Their number is about 1/5 of all Timok Vlachs, don't know if you consider that small, it's a sufficient number for me. I probably would make some changes accordingly, but would wait for some more opinions for a couple of days. Todor→Bozhinov 10:09, 6 June 2006 (UTC)
No, I don't think the number is small, so go ahead with editing. Maybe it would be better to use WP:RM for renaming? Duja 10:27, 6 June 2006 (UTC)
Well, I would not object that article title is changed to something like "Vlachs of Serbia and Bulgaria" (they might be part of same ethnic group divided by state borders), but then we also should add some information about Bulgarian Vlachs. PANONIAN (talk) 19:50, 6 June 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Vlach language

It seems that the only place where you hear of this so called "vlach language" is Wikipedia and wikipedia mirror sites. A google search shows mostly links refered to Aromanians. Not even a google search for term "vlach language" + Serbia + Timok doesn`t provide anything. Please find an official source for this, or read WP:OR and WP:CS. greier 14:38, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

Does the official 2002 census suffice? --Tēlex 14:45, 18 June 2006 (UTC)
Furthermore, when I Googled, I found this [6], and this is just a start. --Tēlex 14:45, 18 June 2006 (UTC)
Greier, are you kidding us? Take a look at this [7]. --Tēlex 14:48, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

No I am not. Read what you are posting, so you wont make a full of your self. A quote from this link you provided: The Vlachs of Timok Kra-jina speak the Munten variant of the Daco-Romanian dialect, which has been adopted as the Romanian standard language. However, it is a modification of the dialect due to the influence of Slavonic and other languages. Neither of these two Romanian variants could be said to be a separate ‘Vlach language’. (commas not mines ;)). The other link proves exaclty my point: it shows links to wikipedia, wikipedia mirrors, and especially sites about Aromanians and Aromanian language. So sorry... even if they were valid, still no official source. greier 15:03, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

Yes, the 2002 official census showing vlach language, not vlach people would do. greier 15:05, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

Still, it proves the term is in use. Furthermore, I can tell you haven't even read the second link. Look at what the US State Department has to say [8] which distinguishes Vlachs from Romanians and speaks of a Vlach language. For the Vlach language and related statistics, see Vlach language (Serbia). --Tēlex 15:06, 18 June 2006 (UTC)
No it proves it`s in use for Aromanians and Aromanian language'.greier 15:10, 18 June 2006 (UTC)
No it doesn't. Did you even read it? --Tēlex 20:06, 18 June 2006 (UTC)
Only one mention of "vlach language": Some members of the Vlach community in Bor complained about the Serbian Orthodox Church's refusal to conduct religious services in the Vlach language rather than in Serbian.... That`s it. Plus that it refers to this episode: in short, the "Vlachs" want Romanian language ;). You posted a governamental source, I`ll post one too. Gues what it says: Urges the Serbian authorities concerned to cease proceedings against church-goers and clergymen freely associated with the Romanian Orthodox Church in Serbia and their communities. Romanian church naturally means Romanian language. If they would of fight for the "Vlach church", than I would of agree. greier 20:14, 18 June 2006 (UTC)
No one denied that Vlach is Romanian. That's why we write it as Vlach (Romanian), and say in the article Vlach language (Serbia) that it is identical to Romanian. The same goes for Moldovan. These people are known (from the census at least) to delcare their language as Vlach and themselves as Vlachs (they don't write Romanians which is a seperate group in Serbia). Respect their right to self-identification. Do you have a doubt that the term is used and when the Vlachs say "Vlachs", the really mean Romanians? That's POV. --Tēlex 20:17, 18 June 2006 (UTC)
I wanted an official source. I don`t care how a site or another site, or another site calls them and theyr language. greier 20:20, 18 June 2006 (UTC)
See PANONIAN's source below. --Tēlex 20:20, 18 June 2006 (UTC)
Greier, it is ridiculous to repeat same thing to you all the time. Official 2002 census results in Serbia: http://webrzs.statserb.sr.gov.yu/axd/Zip/VJN3.pdf The document is in Serbian, but the information about languages could be found on page 12, where you can see that 54,818 people declared in census to speak Vlach (Влашки) language and 34,515 declared to speak Romanian (Румунски). Vlach speakers are mostly concentrated in Central Serbia (Централна Србија) - 54,726 Vlach speakers, while Romanian speakers are mostly concentrated in Vojvodina (Војводина) - 29,512 Romanian speakers. I already wrote that on this talk page (see above), but you was not interested to read my post. PANONIAN (talk) 15:07, 18 June 2006 (UTC)
Ok, thanks, that is what I wanted. I`ll check that... greier 15:10, 18 June 2006 (UTC)
Greier, if some Vlachs want to be a members of the Romanian Orthodox Church that does not mean that ALL of them want that. I can give you example from 2002 census about population of the municipality of Bor, where lived 39,989 Serbs, 10,064 Vlachs and 107 Romanians. You can see there how large part of Vlach population declared themselves as Romanians, but point is, if these 107 people declared themselves as Romanians, you cannot say that rest 10,064 are Romanians too. Same apply to language and religion. PANONIAN (talk) 23:07, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Vlach self designation

Vlach is an exonym. In their language Vlachs never call themselves Vlach. Their self-designation is Rumân, while their language they call rumâneşce. Obviously while speaking Serbian Vlachs do refer themselves using the Serbian term Vlah. This is the same as a German saying he is German (instead of Deutsche) when speaking English or a Greek saying he is Greek (instead of Hellene).C0gnate 20:15, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

Excuse me, but I really do not understand this theory about usage of Vlach name in Serbian. If "while speaking Serbian Vlachs do refer themselves using the Serbian term Vlah", then why they do not use Serbian name "Rumun", which is designation for Romanians? I do not think that Vlachs do not know the difference between Serbian names "Rumun" and "Vlah". Even if "Rumân" is Vlach name for themselves in their language, that does not mean that they with this name mean "Romanian", because in that case they would also use Serbian name "Rumuni" to designate themselves while speaking Serbian. This Vlach web site is also interesting: http://www.timoc.org/indexe.htm While using both names (Roumanians and Vlachs) for themselves in the English version of this site, this map is very interesting: http://www.timoc.org/regione.htm Interesting thing is that ethnic Romanians that live in Banat are not shown there as a part of Vlach/Roumanian population. That show that Vlachs do not consider that they belong to same ethnic group with Banat Romanians. PANONIAN (talk) 20:30, 30 June 2006 (UTC)
Vlachs use the term Vlah when speaking Serbian because that's what they have been told to use since the early 20th century. Prior to that even the Serb government considered them 'nasi Rumuni'. There's a book from that time called 'Kroz nase Rumune'.
Remember that all of the Valch education has been in Serbian since the 1830's. The map you mentioned shows the presence of what are officially recognized as Vlach sites. Since the Serb government doesn't accept (or I should say has stopped accepting) the identity of the Banat Romanians and the Vlachs, the map is consistent with this official view.C0gnate 20:48, 30 June 2006 (UTC)
But problem is that this is not web site of the Serbian government, but Vlach web site. It is where Vlachs present their own views, not the views of the Serbian government. Besides that, the only view of the Serbian government about ethnicity question is to recognize people in the manner how people ask to be recognized. If you want to be recognized as Chinese you will be recognized as Chinese, if you want to be recognized as Vlach, you will be recognized as Vlach, if you want to be recognized as Romanian, you will be recognized as Romanian, etc, etc. Nothing prevent Vlachs to declare themselves as Romanians and to consider themselves Romanians. The "government conspiracy" theories are popular, but far from the truth. PANONIAN (talk) 21:32, 30 June 2006 (UTC)
Who are you kidding? The Serb government, church and society have been applying assimilationist pressure on the Vlachs for two centuries. The attempts of the Vlachs to obtain redress were repeatedly ignored at best or violently supressed by almost every regime since 1830. And don't tell me that a land that has been wracked by nationalist fratricide for most of its history has suddenly become a 21st century free democracy where no one feels intimidated.C0gnate 22:17, 30 June 2006 (UTC)
Regarding the Communist regime, it is simply not true that it offered the Vlachs school and media in their own language and that they refused. It's true that immediately after WWII the newspaper Vorba Noastra (Our Word) and a Vlach radio program in Zajecar were established. However by the mid 1950's the policy changed. The paper and the radio program were discontinued, while access to Romanian media from Banat was strongly discouraged. Those who resisted were subjected to various intimidation, including beating. Thus the sentence about the Communist regime sympathy for Vlachs should be removed. It didn't last.C0gnate 22:38, 30 June 2006 (UTC)
"The Serb government, church and society have been applying assimilationist pressure on the Vlachs for two centuries?" Well, if you try to include logic in this, then you would know how many Serbian governments changed during these two centuries. I speak only about government of present-day democratic Serbia which have no intentions to assimilate anybody. Regarding the church, nobody forcing Vlachs to go to Serbian church, Serbia is not theocratic country, and religious affiliation is free to choose. Whether Serbian society is fully democratic or not is another question, but it certainly does not oppress or trying to assimilate its minorities. PANONIAN (talk) 01:36, 1 July 2006 (UTC)
"Regarding the church, nobody forcing Vlachs to go to Serbian church, Serbia is not theocratic country, and religious affiliation is free to choose." Not exactly true. The Serbian Orthodox Church has (so far) successfully put an end to attempts at establishing non Serb Orthodox churches on its territory south of the Danube. The situation in Vojvodina is different, where non Serb Orthodox believers obtained religious rights during the Austro-Hungarian Empire. But for the Vlachs the establishment of any non Serb church continues to be opposed. Are you not familiar with the case of Bojan Aleksandrovic, the Vlach priest who is trying to maintain a Vlach speaking church against the opposition of the local authorities and the S.O.C.?C0gnate 06:13, 1 July 2006 (UTC)
The question of Orthodox church territory is not a question of human rights but of a church canon. All local Orthodox churches (Serbian, Romanian, Bulgarian, etc) are parts of one single Orthodox church and every local church have its own territory and one local Orthodox church is not allowed to act in the territory of another, only in its own. The point is that nobody forcing Vlachs to be Orthodox. If they do not agree with the canon of Orthodox church nobody stopping them to become Catholics, Protestants, Muslims or Atheists. PANONIAN (talk) 12:29, 1 July 2006 (UTC)
"All local Orthodox churches (Serbian, Romanian, Bulgarian, etc) are parts of one single Orthodox church and every local church have its own territory and one local Orthodox church is not allowed to act in the territory of another, only in its own."
Not quite correct. Despite canonical arguments the Serbian Orthodox Church operates many churches in Romania, and even has its own bishop that reports to the Serbian, not the Romanian patriarch. The Romanian government and the Romanian Orthodox Church allow this in Romania, but the Serbian Orthodox Church (and unfortunately the government as well), do not agree to reciprocate outside of Vojvodina. This is fundamentally unfair to the Vlachs.

http://www.rastko.org.yu/rastko-ro/00ah_ser.htm

C0gnate 12:45, 1 July 2006 (UTC)
But that was my point exactly: The Romanian Orthodox Church allowed to Serbian Orthodox Church to operate within its territory. Local Orthodox Churches have no obligation to allow to another local Orthodox churches to operate within its territory - it is a question of choice of local church and have nothing to do with the government. If the priest of Romanian Orthodox Church want to operate in the territory of Serbian Orthodox Church, but if he does not have permision from the Serbian Orthodox Church, he would violate canons of the Orthodox church. If you want to be Orthodox, you have to respect the canons, and if you do not want to respect canons, you cannot be Orthodox. The freedom of religion is a freedom to choose to which religious group you will belong, not to choose freedom within the your religious group. PANONIAN (talk) 13:01, 1 July 2006 (UTC)
"But that was my point exactly: The Romanian Orthodox Church allowed to Serbian Orthodox Church to operate within its territory. Local Orthodox Churches have no obligation to allow to another local Orthodox churches to operate within its territory - it is a question of choice of local church and have nothing to do with the government."
So the Romanians were stupid and the Serbian Orthodox Church won't make the same mistake? Come on. In the age of separation of church and state the authorities should stay out of religious disputes and not threaten to send bulldozers to demolish a church built without the approval of another church. That would be the 21st century European appraoch.C0gnate 13:33, 1 July 2006 (UTC)
We do not talk here about Romanians and Serbs but about two churches. The authorities do stay out of such religious disputes. Regarding that church you talk about, I think that it was built illegally with no permision from local authorities. There is law about building in Serbia, you know, you cannot just built what ever you want where ever you want. PANONIAN (talk) 14:57, 1 July 2006 (UTC)
Bojan Aleksandrovic first approached the bishop of the Serb Orthodox Church about services in Vlach, but there was no response. He waited and waited, but the request was neither acknowledged nor denied. Just ignored. He then went to the local authorities and asked for permission to build a church on his own property. The local authorities also neither acknowledged nor denied his request. They just ignored it. After a couple of years he built the church on his own property. Then suddenly there was a negative response from both the Serbian bishop and the local authorities, who now insist the church must be demolished. Sadly in Serbia this is still a typical response. Regarding building permits, none of the buildings in the area have them.C0gnate 15:33, 1 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Facts about Vlachs of Serbia

According to the Census of 2002, there are about 40,000 Vlachs in Eastern Serbia. However based on population statistics going back to the turn of the 20th century, the number of Vlachs or people of immediate Vlach ancestry could be some 300,000.C0gnate 19:23, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Vlachs and the Serbian Orthodox Church and the Slava

I removed Pannonian's sentence that said Vlachs belong to the Serbian Orthodox Church because since 1830 they have had no choice in the matter. Prior to 1830 many of them belonged to the Romanian metropolitanate in Craiova, Romania. After that, as Serbia got these territories from the Ottomans, the Serbian Orthodox Church extended its jurisdiction over the Vlachs and sent the Romanian speaking priests back to Romania. Even today in Serbia proper (south of the Danube, i.e., not counting Vojvodina) the Serbian Orthodox Church is the only one legally recognized by the authorities. Thus saying the Vlachs belong to the Serbian Orthodox Church is the same as saying they are citizens of Serbia. Of course they are.

Well, it is not "my" sentence, because some other user added that sentence, and the sentence is quite correct. The sentence claim that Vlachs belong to Serbian Orthodox Church NOW, not to which church they belonged in 1830. For you that might be "of course" issue, but not for most of Wikipedia readers who do not know much about religious questions in Serbia. PANONIAN</ font> (talk)</ font> 20:42, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

I also removed the reference to the Slava celebration of a family saint because 1) it is not uniquely Serbian, 2) since Vlachs have been under an imposed religious regime for a couple of centuries, the origin of the custom among them is uncertain. C0gnate 19:08, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

There is also no reason to remove "slava" celebration. Vlachs have this custom, and if the "origin of the custom among them is uncertain", that does not mean that we should to remove mention of this, but to explain it better. PANONIAN</ font> (talk)</ font> 20:42, 30 June 2006 (UTC)
I asked Paun S Durlic about the Slava among the Vlachs, and he said that it is different from the Serb celebration. Durlic is the Vlach ethnologue that runs the Museum of Majdanpek. I give a link to Durlic's answer (in Serbian)

http://www.members3.boardhost.com/homolje/msg/1151736871.html

http://www.muzej-mpek.org.yu/radovi/slava_u_porecu.htm

He makes a point that scientifically the Slava should not be connected with enthnicity. Thus bringing it up in the present article has no significance. I am therefore removing all references to Slava .C0gnate 08:59, 1 July 2006 (UTC)
Again: the Slava IS a Vlach custom, and therefor there is every reason to mention it in the article. If you want, you can explain problems about origins of slava in the article but you certainly should not to remove it. PANONIAN (talk) 12:33, 1 July 2006 (UTC)
"Again: the Slava IS a Vlach custom, and therefor there is every reason to mention it in the article."
The Slava issue is a red herring. Slava may be a big deal for Serbs, but Vlachs have more important religious rites. Take a look at the Majdanpek site. There are fascinating beliefs and customs related to the unseen world. They are as a rule pre-Christian and many articles have been written on the subject. I suspect the only reason you insist that Slava be included is because you feel Serb readers will then conclude Vlachs are in some intrinsic way Serb. But that's simply misleading. They observe many other unique religious customs that are more important than Slava. If you want to list all those other customs first, then I'll go along with including Slava.C0gnate 13:11, 1 July 2006 (UTC)
It is interesting to point to similar customs of Vlachs and Serbs. Why you want to hide and delete this connection? You can list all other Vlach customs, but I really see no reason to remove reference to slava. PANONIAN (talk) 15:00, 1 July 2006 (UTC)
Starting the articles on Vlachs with their religious orientation is inappropriate. Their main distinguishing characteristic is not religious. They are not a religious group like for instance the Adventists or Jehovah's Witnesses. The article should discuss other aspects first, such as the language, culture, history, population statistics, etc. But these changes are for another time.C0gnate 15:51, 1 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Slavic Serbs?

Pannonian, I took out 'Slavic' in front of Serbs, and you put it back in. What kind of Serbs are there other than Slavic? Are there non Slavic Serbs? Maybe Latin Serbs or Turkish Serbs? C0gnate 21:18, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

Non-Slavic Serbs are those that were Vlachs before that and mixed with Slavic Serbs. :) PANONIAN (talk) 21:36, 30 June 2006 (UTC)
No kidding. Srbija do Tokija? ;)
There's no denying that non Serbs became Serbs, and that modern Serbs have some non Serb ancestry. But that doesn't make the ancestors Serb.
The same comment applies to the Morlachs and the Vlachs of Montenegro, Hercegovina, etc. The historic sources differentiated between these Vlachs and Serbs, but their modern descendants consider themselves Serbs. C0gnate 21:48, 30 June 2006 (UTC)
Problem is that the term "Vlach" was often designation for Slavic Serbs that were not of Vlach origin. Ottomans used term Vlach to designate both, real Vlachs and Serbs. In the beginning term Vlach was only designation for Vlachs, but those Serbs who moved to the mountains (where Vlachs already lived) during the Ottoman rule were also designated as Vlachs by the Ottomans (Similar to this, those Serbs that remained in the valleys and cities and that adopted Islam were designated as Turks). PANONIAN (talk) 22:00, 30 June 2006 (UTC)
The Ottomans distinuished between Serbs and Vlachs, despite the claim that they used 'Vlach' to mean any Christian. Instead, over centuries, the meaning of the word Vlach in Serbo-Croatian changed from an ethnic designation to an occupational one (shepherd) because of the Slavisation of the previously Romance speaking shepherds. The claim that Morlachs and other Vlachs of Montenegro, Bosnia, etc, were simply Serbs should be removed. It is a complicated subject unrelated to the Vlachs of East Serbia. The question of Morlach identity deserves its own wiki topic.C0gnate 22:42, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Timok Vlachs

Shouldnt we rename the article to more common name Timok Vlachs? Luka Jačov 16:38, 10 September 2006 (UTC)

No, renaming the entry was wrong. Timok is too narrow, as the people from the region would attest. The Vlachs of Eastern Serbia might be appropriate. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by C0gnate (talk • contribs) 16:39, September 14, 2006 (UTC).
It won't be appropriate at all if this article is supposed to cover the Vlachs in Bulgaria, on the other bank of the Timok, and not only those in Serbia. The two groups are largely the same. BTW, I don't see why it should be "Timoc" and not "Timok". Romanian spelling has no relation to the river, which is in Serbia and Bulgaria. Todor→Bozhinov 10:02, 23 September 2006 (UTC)


I totally agree. Timok Vlachs is the best name as this article seems to describe the Vlachs living in the Timok valley (which is in both Serbia but also in Bulgaria). The name should obviously be "Timok" since that is the appropiate name in these respective states and in brackets the article could also offer the versions in other languages (including Romanian).Dapiks 20:45, 17 January 2007 (UTC)
I disagree. The Timok valley is much too narrow to describe the distribution of these people. They themselves object to being referred to as 'Timok Vlachs'. I know that 'Timok Romanians' or 'Timok Vlachs' is the common description in Romania, but this page is not written with a Romanian, but an international point of view.C0gnate 02:29, 18 January 2007 (UTC)
Well I disagree with your disagreement :) I don't know where you got the impression that only Romanians reffer to them as "Timok Vlachs". In fact, it makes no sense for Romanians to call them that - if anything Romanians call them "Romanians"(believe me, I know - I am Romanian). Secondly, the Timok valley region is not too narrow to describe their distribution. If you look at their distribution on the map in the article, you will see that they are preponderent in that very region which spans into Bulgaria as well. Dapiks 06:25, 18 January 2007 (UTC)
I see you set up the move request. I have no preference for Timok Vlachs (I'm totally unaware of Serbian tradition), but I know this title is wrong. At least, it should be Vlach (Serbia) (singular, per WP:NC#Prefer_singular_nouns, Jew, etc.), —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Patstuart (talk • contribs) 01:08, 19 January 2007 (UTC).
Hmmm...but how do you know the title is wrong. Can you explain in a few words. I think its pretty right given that the article does not deal only with the vlachs of Serbia but Bulgaria too (or rather the Timok valley region which spans in both states).Dapiks 02:46, 19 January 2007 (UTC)
The article doesn't deal with the Vlachs of Bulgaria that live in the region of Vidin. It's true that the division between those living in Serbia and those living in Bulgaria is somewhat artificial. The Vlachs living along the southern shore of the Danube do form a continuous group which was cut in two with the formation of the modern Bulgar and Serb states in the 19th century. But the present article simply doesn't do justice to those Vlachs that live in Bulgaria. Until some substantial information is added about them, the title should reflect the contents.C0gnate 05:28, 19 January 2007 (UTC)
sure it does justice to them. they are mentioned as part of the same group - the table states Serbia: 40.000 and Bulgaria 10.000. Furthermore, you cannot expect this article to do equal justice to the Vlachs of Bulgaria as they are much more fewer in number and naturally there is less info about them.Dapiks 07:59, 20 January 2007 (UTC)

Here's a suggestion, which might get us past this disagreement over the name of the article. The objection to Vlachs of Serbia is that some of them live in Bulgaria, and the objection to Timok Vlachs is that not all of them live in the Timok valley, so why not name the article Vlachs of Serbia and Bulgaria, and add a bit more information about the ones in Bulgaria? Is that an acceptable compromise? -GTBacchus(talk) 07:35, 3 February 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, it sounds good. Dapiks 15:39, 8 February 2007 (UTC)
But in Bulgaria, there are also other kinds of "Vlachs", more specifically Aromanians, in its southewestern corner. :-) bogdan 15:50, 8 February 2007 (UTC)

It was requested that this article be renamed but the procedure outlined at WP:RM#Requesting potentially controversial moves did not appear to be followed, and consensus could not be determined. Please request a move again with proper procedure if there is still a desire for the page to be moved. Thank you for your time! --Stemonitis 01:39, 4 February 2007 (UTC)

I support the idea to rename the article. I believe Timok Vlachs and Vlachs of Serbia and Bulgaria be about the same good/bad names. If one uses Timok Vlachs it does not automatically mean that they all are in the Timok Valley, but only that the majority is there. If one uses Vlachs of Serbia and Bulgaria, then Timok Vlachs must eb mentioned as a synonim. Anyway, they are a Romanian minority. (I don't like the term "Daco-Romanian", because no person calls him/herself that way.) Aromanians are ethnically and linguistically different from Romanians, despite being the closest other ethnic and linguistic group (and the difference is simmilar to Czech-Slovak, Swidish-Norvegian or Russian-Ukrainian, i.e. clear but quite small if one ignores politics) Yet I see 2 problems arrising if we use Vlachs of Serbia and Bulgaria:
  • Vlach is sometimes a term used for Romanic populations (especially, but not only of Balkans) in general, i.e. includes both this group and Aromanians (and many others). An alternative would be to call this group Romanians of Serbia and Bulgaria
  • Are Romanians from Voevodina not speaking the same language as Timok Vlachs? The differences are regional and can be totally ascribed to isolation from one another. So, then Vlachs of Serbia (and Bulgaria) includes those from Voevodina or not? Voevodina is part of Serbia.
I see the solution in one of two alternatives:
  • Rename this article Romanians of Serbia and Bulgaria, and include those of Voevodina as well. Do not include Armoanians.
  • Rename this article Timok Vlachs, and say that it refers to a population that lives in an area wider than the Timok Valley. Do no include Romanians of Voevodina, nor Aromanians.
 :Dc76 18:50, 15 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Moeso-Romanian language

The is an article Moeso-Romanian language which is being considered for deletion. The article tries to talk about the language of Timok Vlachs, but fails to give any account about its distinction from Romanian other than that people's vocabulary is deminuished. I coppied the content of this page below. If there is anything useful from this text, use it in your article, and delete what is not useful: :Dc76 18:25, 15 February 2007 (UTC)

Moeso-Romanian is a Romance language or more exactly a cluster of Romanian dialects spoken mainly south of the Danube in today's Southern Serbia (the former Moesia Superior) by an important autochthonous population in the region between Požarevac, Kladovo, Zaječar and Paraćin. Although aware of the fact that they use a form of Romanian as their home language, the speakers identify themselves as Serbs because they attend the Serbian Orthodox Church, and their faith, not their language serves as the basis of their national identity (a remnant of the Ottoman concept of national identity).

The number of speakers range between 20.000 and 100.000, and are scattered mainly in mixed villages with Serbian majorities, however no real data are available. They have been neglected by researchers in linguistics and anthropology because of their identity mimicry. As a result they have never been recognized as a national minority or ethnic group, unlike the Aromanians, who were an ethnic group in former Yugoslavia. In addition there is no press or official use of the language – unlike the Romanian speakers of Voivodina who are recognized as such and have enjoyed all minority rights since World War I. The Moeso-Romanian speakers living on the banks of the Danube can receive radio and TV from Romania and understand the language, while those living in the south have great problems understanding standard Romanian.

The very imprecise popular name of "Vlasi" (sg. "Vlah" – literally "foreigner, speaker of Latin or Celtic" < Volox, the name of a Celtic tribe of the Antiquity) is sometimes used in informal speech to refer not only to them, but equally to Voivodina Romanians and Aromanians of Macedonia. A portion of them migrated in the middle Ages to Muntenia (Ţara Românească) and Transylvania and they are likely related to the Bajaši (Boyash) of Croatia and the Beás of Hungary. A similar group, called Karavlax (black Vlasi – name designating initially the Romanians of Muntenia), survived in Bosnia until World War II.

Language

Moeso-Romanian resembles the Romanian dialect of neighboring Banat, and the rare Romanian researchers (all from Yugoslavia) of these dialects consider it a geographical variety of Daco-Romanian. In the phonetic field, Moeso-Romanian shares with the Banat dialect the evolution of [č] and [dž] (written ci, ce and gi, ge in standard Romanian) to soft [šj] and [žj]: ce faci? "what are you doing" being pronounced [šje fašj?] (this evolution is distinctive of the Moldavian evolution into [še faš?]). The distribution of the distinctive words nea/zapadă "snow" and ai/usturoi "garlic" in these dialects is controversial and cannot shed any light to their classification in the Romanian dialectal system.

Origin

As a matter of fact, the first mention of Latin being spoken in this area dates back to 79 B.C., and one may consider Moeso-Romanian as a remnant of a wide wave of latinization which in antiquity covered all the Balkan Peninsula. This position is maintained among others by Pavle Ivić who considers that a sizeable Roman population inhabited the Balkan from west to east across the former Yugoslavia in antiquity. A local form of Vulgar Latin was still spoken in Kosovo in the Middle Ages, as a Hrisolvulje by Czar Dušan evidences and other Romance languages were attested comparatively late on the Dalmatian coast and in Bosnia. Istro-Romanian is still in use near Rijeka and more southwards Aromanian in Greece and Albania are another attestation of a wide extension of Latin in the Balkans. In any case, speakers of Moeso-Romanian are most likely an autochthonous population, who switched very early to Latin and still use the Romance language of their ancestors.

Literature

There is no written literary tradition and the first attempts of collecting oral literature began only in the very last years of the 20 century by the Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts.

[edit] Sources

Write down here through which paragraphs you went, for other editors to not repeat your work:


WARNING The text is from unknown source and cannot be used in wikipedia in any forms without proper reference to reputable published sources according to wikipedia rules. Any attempts to do otherwise will be reverted. `'mikka 19:29, 15 February 2007 (UTC)

this is well-known without your agressive warnings and threats.:Dc76 22:53, 15 February 2007 (UTC)
I doubt this. `'mikka 23:04, 15 February 2007 (UTC)
You are welcome to doubt even what is your name. I am backing off from this, it's ridiculous.:Dc76 13:00, 16 February 2007 (UTC)
Okay, I'll try to remove the unsourced parts (which are very POV, anyway) and to find some actual sources. bogdan (talk) 16:05, 2 February 2008 (UTC)
Just a few comments on the parts deleted:
  • uncited DNA studies (which may or may not exist) are not valid arguments
  • ro.altermedia.info is an extremist website and not a valid source
  • the modern self designation of the Romansh in Switzerland (Rumantsch) -- that's off-topic
  • in fact no one ever used the term “Byzantine Empire” until the 16th century -- even more off-topic
  • Charlemagne arranged to be crowned in Rome, the Germans wanted to be the Holy Roman Empire -- can it get more off-topic than this?
  • Americans often wonder if they are the modern Rome -- yes, it can!
bogdan (talk) 16:14, 2 February 2008 (UTC)
What you call off-topic is inserted there to put in perspective the Vlach self-designation - in their own language - as Romans, even after concrete memory of the Roman Empire was lost. A very significant number of people, if not the majority, in the Slavic and Greek speaking Balkans are of the opinion that "vlach", with lower case v, simply means shepherd, with no ethnic or linguistic connotation whatsoever. This is because of the absence of accurate historic information on this subject in general-education textbooks as well as in the media. The development of the idea that "Vlach" is descriptive of kindred ethnic groups in the Balkans is the reason for the above paragraph. Most Romanians simply are unaware of the level of disinformation regarding Vlachs.C0gnate (talk) 01:47, 7 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] DNA studies

If recent DNA studies[6] [7] are correct, the migrating Slavic speakers were in the minority. The Romanized Balkan population, in other words the Vlachs, were in the majority.

The studies don't have that conclusion. They only have some numbers and statistics about the DNA. Drawing such a conclusion by yourself from those numbers is original research, which should not be used in Wikipedia. bogdan (talk) 19:51, 6 February 2008 (UTC)

The DNA studies show that the majority of the genes have been in these regions since 21,000 to 9,000 years ago. That's many thousands of years older than the arrival of the Slavs in the Balkans, which happened from the 5th to the 8th century of the current era. C0gnate (talk) 22:16, 6 February 2008 (UTC)


[edit] Religion vs. Language

Vlachs are not a distinct ethnic group. Instead, they belong to the dominant Orthodox culture wherever they live. They are Serbs in Serbia and Bosnia and Greeks in Greece and Albania. They would presumably be Bulgarians in Bulgaria except for the fact that Bulgarians are very fixated on language.

Vlachs are not Romanians. In fact, their language has its own ISO code.

In Orthodox countries, it's not a big deal that Vlachs speak a Romance language. People deny that the Vlachs belong to the local culture, but in my experience a Greek will have no particular problem with a Vlach but won't trust a Romanian.

In Muslim and Catholic countries, Vlachs are an ethnic minority, but they're still just a subset of the most prevalent Orthodox minority. Host countries like Albania and Bosnia sometimes take advantage of the Vlachs' confusing identity to isolate them from the Greeks or the Serbs, but their basic identity remains Greek or Serb. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.252.125.237 (talk) 03:29, 15 April 2008 (UTC)