Vlach, the Balkan’s “Shared” Language

Back from Greece, my daughter treated me to lunch. She wanted to share her latest adventures with me because she knows that I (as always towards the end of every month) was feverishly casting about for a subject that would interest my readership.

She did not fail me.

In Yannina (a town in the Epirusian region of Greece) she befriended an eighty-something woman who, surprised that my daughter spoke fluent Greek, told her proudly that she was making the world’s best Pita and selling Spanakopita (spinach), Lahanopita (veggie), Prassopita (leak), Kreotopita (meat), Tiropita (cheese) Kotopita (chicken) from her stall in the street and that she has been doing so daily for sixty years because the Pita made in Yannina was world-famous.

My daughter tasted her wares and had to agree. Her Pita was fantastic. Just the right texture – very hard to create.

Next stop was a winery where the owner challenged her with “Have you ever heard about the Vlach language, a language we share with all of the countries around us?”

It turns out that Vlach is an Aromanian or Macedo-Romanian, language – an Eastern Romance language – similar to Romanian and widely spoken in Southeastern Europe. Its speakers are called Aromanians or Vlachs (a broader term and an exonym in widespread use to define Romance communities throughout the Balkans and the diaspora in the Americas and Australia.) (Wikipedia)

In Yannina’s Historical Museum my daughter stumbled on the following exhibit: It reflects one sad aspect of the history of the Yanninan Jewish Community during the Holocaust.

This community, one of the oldest Jewish communities in Greece, was the largest  where the Jews spoke Greek and not Ladino. On the eve of World War II, the community numbered some 5,000 Jews. Many of them were active in the textile industry so the use of sewing machines was widespread.

When the Jews were deported in 1943 the Nazis confiscated their sewing machines  and shipped them to Germany. After the war the Greek Government prevailed on the German Authorities to make a gesture of regret.

After the Holocaust only some 160 Jews returned to Ioannina.

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Impressed by the richness of Yannina’s historic background as presented in the Museum my daughter convinced her husband to stay in Yannina an extra day to be able to revisit the Museum a second time.