Istro-Romanian language

The Istro-Romanian language (Istro Romanian: rumârește) is a Balkan Romance language, spoken in a few villages and hamlets in the peninsula of Istria in Croatia, as well as in diaspora, most notably in Italy, Sweden, Germany, Northern and Southern America, and Australia.

Istro-Romanian
vlășește, rumârește, rumêri-kuvinta (?)
Native toCroatia
RegionIstria
EthnicityIstro-Romanians
Native speakers
300 (2007)[1]
L2 speakers: 1,100 (2007)[1]
Early form
Language codes
ISO 639-3ruo
Glottologistr1245
ELPIstro Romanian[2]
Linguasphere51-AAD-a (varieties: 51-AAD-aa to -ab)

While its speakers call themselves Rumeri, Rumeni, they are also known as Vlachs, Rumunski, Ćići and Ćiribiri. The last one, used by ethnic Croats, originated as a disparaging nickname for the language, rather than its speakers.

Due to the fact that its speakers are estimated to be less than 500, it is listed among languages that are "seriously endangered" in the UNESCO Red Book of Endangered Languages.[3]

It is also considered by some Romanian scholars to be an idiosyncratic offshoot dialect of Romanian.[4]

Recent history

There have been many significant challenges facing Istro-Romanians in preserving their language, culture and ethnic identity, including emigration from communism and migration to nearby cities and towns after World War II, when a peace treaty of February 10, 1947, transferred Istria from Italy (which had held it since World War I) and awarded it to Yugoslavia, the parent country of present-day Croatia and Slovenia, which divided Istria between themselves, while Italy still retained a small portion near Trieste.

Before the 20th century, Istro-Romanian was spoken in a substantially broader part of northeastern Istria surrounding the Ćićarija mountain range (ancient Mons Carusadius). The Istro-Romanians now comprise two groups: the Ćići around Žejane (denoting the people on the north side of Mt. Učka) and the Vlahi around Šušnjevica (denoting the people on the south side of Mt. Učka (Monte Maggiore). However, apart from borrowings from other tongues which vary from village to village, their language is linguistically identical. There are also several hundred native speakers who live in the United States – not only in Queens, New York (as has been mistakenly believed by some),[5] but throughout the five boroughs of New York City, as well as in upstate New York and the neighboring states of New Jersey and Connecticut; there are also still native speakers in California. There are further groups of native speakers in Italy, Canada, Argentina, Bolivia, Chile, Peru, Venezuela, Sweden, and Australia.

The number of Istro-Romanian speakers has been reduced by their assimilation into other linguistic groups that were either already present or introduced by their respective new rulers of Istria: in the 1921 Italian census, there were 1,644 declared Istro-Romanian speakers in the area, while in 1926 Romanian scholar Sextil Pușcariu estimated their number to be closer to 3,000. Studies conducted in Istria in 1998 (?) by the Croatian linguist Kovačec revealed only 170 active speakers (but those counted presumably are only those still in villages where the language is actively spoken, thereby excluding those who moved to larger towns in Istria), most of them being bilingual (or trilingual), except for 27 children.

On the other hand, the major northern village Žejane and nearby hamlets at the Slovenian border are less Italianized and more Slavicized. Many villages in the area have names that are of Romanian origin, such as Jeian, Buzet ("lips"), Katun ("hamlet"), Letaj, Sucodru ("under a forest"), Costirceanu (a Romanian name). Some of these names are official (recognized by Croatia as their only names), while others are used only by Istro-Romanian speakers (ex. Nova Vas|Noselo).

Origin

Some loanwords suggest that before coming to Istria, Istro-Romanians lived for a period of time on the Dalmatian coast near the Dinara and Velebit mountains.[6]

A. Kovačec (1998) hypothesizes that the Istro-Romanians migrated to their present region about 600 years ago from the territory of present-day Romania, after the Bubonic plague depopulated Istria. This hypothesis is based on chronicles of the Frankopan princes that state that in the 15th century they accepted the migrating Vlachs from the nearby mainland and from the northern part of Krk (Veglia) island, and settled them in isolated villages in Poljica and Dubašnica, and in the port of Malinska. The term "Vlach", however, refers to all Eastern-Romance-language speakers and cannot be associated exclusively with Istro-Romanians. In fact, pockets of Romanian-language speakers persisted in Malinska up to the mid-19th century, they gradually assimilated and their language disappeared with the last speaker, Mate Bajčić-Gašparović. Today, few Romance-language toponyms remain in Malinska.[7]

See also

References
  1. Istro-Romanian at Ethnologue (23nd ed., 2020)
  2. Endangered Languages Project data for Istro Romanian.
  3. Salminen, Tapani (1999). "Endangered Languages in Europe: Indexes". www.helsinki.fi. Retrieved 2018-11-24.
  4. "Romanian Language". Encyclopedia Britannica. Retrieved 2018-11-24.
  5. Roberts, Sam (29 April 2010). "The Lost Languages, Found in New York". nytimes.com. Retrieved 2018-11-24.
  6. Filipi, Goran (2002). Istrorumunjski lingvistički atlas/Atlasul lingvistic istroromân/Atlante linguistico istroromeno. Pula: Znanstvena zadruga Mediteran. p. 52.
  7. Tekavčić 1959, Kovačec 1998

Bibliography
  • Wolfgang Dahmen. “Istrorumänisch”, in Lexikon der romanistischen Linguistik, vol. 3. Tübingen: Max Niemeyer, 1989, pp. 448–460
  • Nerina Feresini. Il Comune istro-romeno di Valdarsa. Trieste: Edizioni Italo Svevo, 1996.
  • Vasile Frățilă. “La terminologia del corpo nel dialetto istroromeno”, in Actas del XXIII Congreso internacional de lingüística y filología románica, vol. 3, Sección 4: Semántica léxica, lexicología y onomástica. Ed. by Fernando Sánchez Miret. Tübingen: Max Niemeyer, 2003, pp. 169–80.
  • August Kovačec. Istrorumunjsko-hrvatski rječnik s gramatikom i tekstovima (= Glosar istroroman-croat cu gramatica si texte). Verba moritura vol. I, 378 p. Mediteran, Pula 1998
  • Josif Popovici. Dialectele romîne din Istria. Halle, 1909
  • Pavao Tekavčić. “Due voci romene in un dialetto serbo-croato dell'Isola di Veglia (Krk)”, Studia Romanica 7 (1959): 35-38.
  • Vrzić, Zvjezdana; Doričić, Robert (2014). "Language contact and stability of basic vocabulary: Croatian loanwords for body parts in Vlashki/Zheyanski (Istro-Romanian)". Fluminensia. 26 (2): 105–122.
  • Vrzić, Zvjezdana; Singler, John Victor (2016), "Identity and language shift among Vlashki/Zheyanski speakers in Croatia", in Ferreira, Vera; Bouda, Peter (eds.), Language Documentation and Conservation in Europe, Language Documentation & Conservation Special Publication No. 9, Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press, pp. 51–68, hdl:10125/24659, ISBN 978-0-9856211-5-5
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