Morlachs
Encyclopedia
Vlachs
Vlach is a blanket term covering several modern Latin peoples descending from the Latinised population in Central, Eastern and Southeastern Europe. English variations on the name include: Walla, Wlachs, Wallachs, Vlahs, Olahs or Ulahs...
"; in Greek: Μαυροβλάχοι, in Italian morlacchi, Serbian
Serbian language
Serbian is a form of Serbo-Croatian, a South Slavic language, spoken by Serbs in Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro, Croatia and neighbouring countries....
and Croatian
Croatian language
Croatian is the collective name for the standard language and dialects spoken by Croats, principally in Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, the Serbian province of Vojvodina and other neighbouring countries...
Morlaci [mor-latsi] or Морлаци) were a population of Vlachs. In another version their name comes from the slavic terms of "morski-Vlasi" or Sea Vlachs. The morlachs were shepherd
Shepherd
A shepherd is a person who tends, feeds or guards flocks of sheep.- Origins :Shepherding is one of the oldest occupations, beginning some 6,000 years ago in Asia Minor. Sheep were kept for their milk, meat and especially their wool...
s that lived in the Dinaric Alps
Dinaric Alps
The Dinaric Alps or Dinarides form a mountain chain in Southern Europe, spanning areas of Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia, Kosovo, Albania and Montenegro....
(western Balkans
Balkans
The Balkans is a geopolitical and cultural region of southeastern Europe...
in modern use), seasonally migrating in search for better pasture
Pasture
Pasture is land used for grazing. Pasture lands in the narrow sense are enclosed tracts of farmland, grazed by domesticated livestock, such as horses, cattle, sheep or swine. The vegetation of tended pasture, forage, consists mainly of grasses, with an interspersion of legumes and other forbs...
s for their sheep flocks (between mountains, in the summertime, and the sea shores, in the wintertime). They were a blend of previously Romanized indigenous peoples and new settled Roman
Roman Empire
The Roman Empire was the post-Republican period of the ancient Roman civilization, characterised by an autocratic form of government and large territorial holdings in Europe and around the Mediterranean....
army veterans and Roman colonists.
The adjective "black" may be used here with the meaning of "northern", this metaphor probably deriving from the Turkish practice of indicating cardinal directions by colors.
Reports from the mid-11th century tell how the Morlachs lived in the mountainous regions of Montenegro
Montenegro
Montenegro Montenegrin: Crna Gora Црна Гора , meaning "Black Mountain") is a country located in Southeastern Europe. It has a coast on the Adriatic Sea to the south-west and is bordered by Croatia to the west, Bosnia and Herzegovina to the northwest, Serbia to the northeast and Albania to the...
, Stari Vlah
Stari Vlah
Stari Vlah is a historic and geographical region in Southwestern Serbia.-Geography:Stari Vlah contains 7 municipalities of Serbia: Priboj, Nova Varoš, Prijepolje, Užice, Ivanjica, Čajetina, and Arilje...
of Serbia
Serbia
Serbia , officially the Republic of Serbia , is a landlocked country located at the crossroads of Central and Southeast Europe, covering the southern part of the Carpathian basin and the central part of the Balkans...
, Bosnia
Bosnia (region)
Bosnia is a eponomous region of Bosnia and Herzegovina. It lies mainly in the Dinaric Alps, ranging to the southern borders of the Pannonian plain, with the rivers Sava and Drina marking its northern and eastern borders. The other eponomous region, the southern, other half of the country is...
, and Herzegovina
Herzegovina
Herzegovina is the southern region of Bosnia and Herzegovina. While there is no official border distinguishing it from the Bosnian region, it is generally accepted that the borders of the region are Croatia to the west, Montenegro to the south, the canton boundaries of the Herzegovina-Neretva...
. In the 14th century, some Morlachs moved northward and settled in present-day Croatia
Croatia
Croatia , officially the Republic of Croatia , is a unitary democratic parliamentary republic in Europe at the crossroads of the Mitteleuropa, the Balkans, and the Mediterranean. Its capital and largest city is Zagreb. The country is divided into 20 counties and the city of Zagreb. Croatia covers ...
where later they would serve as frontier guardians in the Military Frontier
Military Frontier
The Military Frontier was a borderland of Habsburg Austria and later the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy, which acted as the cordon sanitaire against incursions from the Ottoman Empire...
between the Habsburg
Habsburg Monarchy
The Habsburg Monarchy covered the territories ruled by the junior Austrian branch of the House of Habsburg , and then by the successor House of Habsburg-Lorraine , between 1526 and 1867/1918. The Imperial capital was Vienna, except from 1583 to 1611, when it was moved to Prague...
(Croatia) and the Ottoman
Ottoman Empire
The Ottoman EmpireIt was usually referred to as the "Ottoman Empire", the "Turkish Empire", the "Ottoman Caliphate" or more commonly "Turkey" by its contemporaries...
(Bosnia) Empires, an area sometimes known as Morlachia, also see House of Keglević
House of Keglević
The House of Keglević is a Croatian noble family originally from Dalmatia, their members were pointed out in public life, also as soldiers...
. The continuous attempts by the foreign feudal lords to reduce them to serfdom failed. It is not clear as yet exactly how the Morlachs survived, but the slower feudalization of the Western Balkans compared to the west of Europe seem to alleviate their decentralization from the feudal bonds. Greater freedom and easier mobility into the mountains of the Morlachs, continuously attracted the running Slavic serfs asking for protection, and eventually most Morlachs were linguistically assimilated by the local Slavs.
In the 15th century, a first group of Morlachs were invited to settle into the Istrian Peninsula
Istria
Istria , formerly Histria , is the largest peninsula in the Adriatic Sea. The peninsula is located at the head of the Adriatic between the Gulf of Trieste and the Bay of Kvarner...
after the various devastations of the plague between 1500–1600. In 1525, a group settled in the outskirts of then Rovigno (today's Rovinj
Rovinj
Rovinj is a city in Croatia situated on the north Adriatic Sea with a population of 13,562 . It is located on the western coast of the Istrian peninsula and is a popular tourist resort and an active fishing port...
), so their descendants are sometimes confused in error with the Istro-Romanians
Istro-Romanians
Istro-Romanians / Istrorumeni are an ethnic group living in northeastern Istria, currently spanning over a small area of Croatia and a...
who call themselves "cici" and and also "vlahi", but are Romanian immigrants from Transylvania and having a different history from that of the Morlachs .
Another group of "vlahi" reached the island of Krk
Krk
Krk is a Croatian island in the northern Adriatic Sea, located near Rijeka in the Bay of Kvarner and part of the Primorje-Gorski Kotar county....
(it. Veglia) around 1450 and settled in the villages of Dubašnica and Poljica
Poljica
Poljica may refer to:* Poljica , a region of inland Dalmatia, Croatia** Republic of Poljica, an autonomous community which existed in the area between the 13th and early 19th century...
, where until the 19th century the people spoke an Italic language called Vegliot but which is not the same language as Istro-Romanian.
In the 18th century, Alberto Fortis
Alberto Fortis
Abbe Alberto Fortis , was a Venetian writer, naturalist and cartographer.Alberto Fortis was born in Padua on either 9 or 11 of November 1741. He journeyed extensively in Dalmatia...
visited the Morlachs and found that they sang beautiful verses of epic poetry related to the Turkish occupation of Serbian Kosovo
Kosovo
Kosovo is a region in southeastern Europe. Part of the Ottoman Empire for more than five centuries, later the Autonomous Province of Kosovo and Metohija within Serbia...
. They sang the verses along with the traditional single stringed instrument called gusle
Gusle
The Gusle is a single-stringed musical instrument traditionally used in the Dinarides region of the Balkans ....
[goo-slae]. This poetry was collected by the Scottish man-of-letters Lord Bute, who was close to King George III.
Outside Istria, the term Morlach continues to describe the people of Dalmatia
Dalmatia
Dalmatia is a historical region on the eastern coast of the Adriatic Sea. It stretches from the island of Rab in the northwest to the Bay of Kotor in the southeast. The hinterland, the Dalmatian Zagora, ranges from fifty kilometers in width in the north to just a few kilometers in the south....
, Zagora
Zagora (Croatia)
Zagora , sometimes also called Dalmatian Zagora , is the southern inland region of Croatia. The name Zagora means "behind hills", which is a reference to the fact that it is the part of Dalmatia that is not coastal....
and Lika
Lika
Lika is a mountainous region in central Croatia, roughly bound by the Velebit mountain from the southwest and the Plješevica mountain from the northeast. On the north-west end Lika is bounded by Ogulin-Plaški basin, and on the south-east by the Malovan pass...
and the former region known as Morlachia.
According to the 1991 Croatian census, 22 people declared themselves as Morlachs.
There is no data on Morlachs in the 2001 Croatian census, but the number of Morlachs are estimated to grown to over 100 persons since then. For Morlachs in Croatia and the Balkans
Balkans
The Balkans is a geopolitical and cultural region of southeastern Europe...
to reappear as an ethnolinguistic group, they have to organize social groups and make efforts to promote their language and culture.