Are South Slavs more Balkan Native than Slavic?

[Wonomyro]

This thread is a disaster for the simple reason that too many people are extrapolating too little genetic data, and then even worse they are tying it to linguistics and ethnic identities across time and space.

We know the rough contours both autosomally and patrilineally in the Balkans and there are shared pools between the various peoples that exist today.

What we don't know is how large the groups of arriving Slavs were when they migrated into the Balkans, and which earlier groups of Slavs assimilated into Serbs and Croats (since those were the only two West Balkan Slavs for centuries and centuries).

And beyond that, one must remember that identities have historically often been fluid.

Who were the "other Slavs"? The History of the Bishops of Salona and Split gives an account of the arrival of the Croats. Thomas the Archdeacon thought that the names such as Croats, Goths and Slavs were synonyms:

From the Polish territories called Lingonia seven or eight tribal clans arrived under Totilo. When they saw that the Croatian land would be suitable for habitation because in it there were few Roman colonies, they sought and obtained for their duke...The people called Croats...Many call them Goths, and likewise Slavs, according to the particular name of those who arrived from Poland and Bohemia.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historia_Salonitana

 

[Wonomyro]

Here we have to add fact that and part of Croats move to Orthodoxy regardless of arrival newly Orthodox population, as well Croats no matter which religion belong also mix with Orthodox Vlachs groups. We also have records of Croatians in "Orthodox" areas so and they probably come as Orthodox people to Bosnia or Croatia. We know who are today Orthodox in Croatia or Bosnia. Also exist and migration from Dinaric Croatian areas to Serbia. That's why genetics is important becouse we can see origin of these peoples. Normally, Vlachs also become and Croats, but that is in smaller percentage.

Exactly, and the autosomal genetics shows that.

 

[Wonomyro]

IMO, more we understand about history and linguistics, more we'll be able to properly interpret genetic data. However, let's get back to genetics again:

https://www.frontiersin.org/files/A...09-00551-HTML/image_m/fgene-09-00551-g003.jpg

FIGURE 3. Unsupervised admixture analysis of Slovenians. Results for K = 5 are showed as it represents the lowest cross-validation error. Slovenian samples show an admixture pattern similar to the neighboring populations such as Croatians and Hungarians. The major ancestral components are: the blue one which is shared with Lithuanians and Russians, followed by the dark green one that is mostly present in Greek samples and the light blue which characterizes Orcadians and English.

Croats, Slovenians, Hungarians and Czechs have similar genetic structure. It doesn’t even recall typical “native Balkan” composition as observed in Greeks and Romanians. It is likely that the dark blue component represents intrinsic Balto-Slavic ancestry. Dark green is “Balkan native”. The puzzle is the origin of the light blue component, not only in South Slavs (Croats, Slovenians) but also in Western Slavs (Czechs).

Source: https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fgene.2018.00551/full

 

[Ygorcs]

Genetic links between Illyrians and northern tribes very likely exist, but after arrival of Slavs to the Balkans, "northern" or not originally Illyrian do not flee to Italy or still flee? Is that genetic visible somewhere? Or you think about some R1b tribes, but as far as I can see that R1b first comes to the Balkans and then goes to Western Europe.

We have problem that we do not know if this similarity is somewhere established by the basic R1b haplotype or based on younger branches, etc. Because I saw some Kosovars partially as Western Europeans autosomaly and it is by my opinion because of this "basic" R1b i.e. I mean on the basis of couple of markers old 4,5 etc thousand years which is in common with Western European R1b?

I doubt the huge majority of all the Illyrians just vanished and fled. Probably many of them did, but the mere fact that Vlachs were still, despite ongoing Slavicization and many incursions of not just Slavs, but also Turks, Germanics and other peoples, very numerous in the Late Middle Ages suggest to me that they did not simply flee to Albania or to Italy. Illyrians, at least northern Illyrians, participated very much in the Hallstatt cultural area, and they also neighbored the Venetic and Liburnian peoples who may have originally come from further north. And we all know these tribes practiced female exogamy and female mobility used to be much higher than male mobility in many places.

As for how this northern ancestry could have been preserved besides the Slavic input, remember that women also contribute to a LOT of a people's ancestry, and in fact Y-DNA haplogroups can rise to huge proportions because of sociocultural factors even without leaving any similar impact in the autosomal DNA, overall ancestry of the population. Even today IIRC Slovenia has a significant amount of Y-DNA haplogroups that do not look "Proto-Slavic", though that could be an artifact of much more recent migrations too.

Some recent historic examples show how that can happen even in a relatively short time, less than 500 years: in Brazil European Y-DNA lineages are estimated to account for nearly 90% of the total, but average Brazilians are just 60-65% European. The difference? Huge contribution from non-European women, and most of those men carrying European haplogroups were soon in fact mixed-race, not 100% European.

 

[LABERIA]

Was there any Serb fighting in that battle?

Well, some Ottoman chronicles call Prince Lazar(was Hrebeljanović his surname?), Son of the Vlach.

 

[Ygorcs]

IMO, more we understand about history and linguistics, more we'll be able to properly interpret genetic data. However, let's get back to genetics again:

https://www.frontiersin.org/files/A...09-00551-HTML/image_m/fgene-09-00551-g003.jpg



Croats, Slovenians, Hungarians and Czechs have similar genetic structure. It doesn’t even recall typical “native Balkan” composition as observed in Greeks and Romanians. It is likely that the dark blue component represents intrinsic Balto-Slavic ancestry. Dark green is “Balkan native”. The puzzle is the origin of the light blue component, not only in South Slavs (Croats, Slovenians) but also in Western Slavs (Czechs).

Source: https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fgene.2018.00551/full

The light blue component could be broadly related to Celtic (Hallstatt was demonstrably influential also east/southeast of the Eastern Alps), Germanic and even - considering the Italic and Celtic affinities of their language - Venetic and perhaps Liburnian peoples, who seem to have been more "Central-Northwest European" genetically. In my opinion it is also likely that northern Illyrians themselves already had that light blue component due to centuries of piecemeal admixture with neighboring populations to their north and west.

 

[LABERIA]

Serbia stole this historical battle from us, who were really there fighting it!

Vuk Karaziz, the biggest thief of history with the creation of modern Serbia.

In 1814 and 1815, Karadžić published two volumes of Serbian Folk Songs, which afterwards increased to four, then to six, and finally to nine tomes. In enlarged editions, these admirable songs drew towards themselves the attention of all literary Europe and America. Goethe characterized some of them as "excellent and worthy of comparison with Solomon's Song of Songs."
In 1824, he sent a copy of his folksong collection to Jacob Grimm, who was enthralled particularly by The Building of Skadar which Karadžić recorded from singing of Old Rashko. Grimm translated it into German and the song was noted and admired for many generations to come.^[1] Grimm compared them with the noblest flowers of Homeric poetry, and of The Building of Skadar he said: "one of the most touching poems of all nations and all times." The founders of the Romantic School in France, Charles Nodier, Prosper Mérimée, Lamartine, Gerard de Nerval, and Claude Fauriel translated a goodly number of them, and they also attracted the attention of Russian Alexander Pushkin, Finnish national poet Johan Ludwig Runeberg, Czech Samuel Roznay, Pole Kazimierz Brodzinski, English writers Walter Scott, Owen Meredith, and John Bowring, among others.

Basically, Karadzic has collected all the legends, folktales, songs, etc, of Balkan folklore and presented them as Serbian folklore. You know for example that the Legend of Rozafa is not Albanian but serbian? They call it the Building of Skadar.
But he was not the only one who dealt with these things.
Just read this:

Bridge of Arta

But there were no greeks in Arta before that this city was invaded by Greece after the Congres of Berlin.

 

[LABERIA]

Remarks for the sake of objectivity:
During Ottoman times the Orthodox Balkan population south of Danube was under the spiritual jurisdiction of three autocephalous bodies- the Patriarchate of Constantinople ; The Patrciarchate of Peć and the Archbishopric of Ohrid(latter two terminated by the Ottomans nearly at the same time in the second half of XVIII c. in favor of Constantinople) . The flock of these three comprised many Orthodox enthnic groups,including non-Slavic speakers.
All these enthic groups kept on using their language and ethnic identifications . They might have been lumped together under the general label of "Rum-millet" by the Ottomans but all parties were quite well aware of their affiliations...from the millet-başı in Φανάρι and the veziers to the local sipahi , qadi and beq. Thankfully these ethnic groups never fused into one . Nor any adopted the ethnic identity of the other en masse (South and Eastern Balkans).

The role of the various Orthodox Churches was decisive in the creation of ethnic identities in the Balkan countries. And there is a hierarchy, the most powerful church has taken the most advantage. Then certainly there are other factors.

 

[Wonomyro]

The light blue component could be broadly related to Celtic (Hallstatt was demonstrably influential also east/southeast of the Eastern Alps), Germanic and even - considering the Italic and Celtic affinities of their language - Venetic and perhaps Liburnian peoples, who seem to have been more "Central-Northwest European" genetically. In my opinion it is also likely that northern Illyrians themselves already had that light blue component due to centuries of piecemeal admixture with neighboring populations to their north and west.

Yes. Then the origin of the light blue component could be the Central European substrate, as the Balkan countries have little of it.

https://www.frontiersin.org/files/A...09-00551-HTML/image_m/fgene-09-00551-g003.jpg

It's a shame that the analysis above doesn’t have Polish and/or Ukrainian samples included, as these countries are possible sources of Slavic expansion.

We should not forget the Chernyakov culture in Ukraine as a possible source of the light blue component in West and South Slavs due to the admixture with East Germanic peoples prior to the Great Migration.

Third explanation would be that the light blue component comes from the remaining Germanic people in Panonnia like Gepids and Ostrogoths.

The fourth explanation would be that the ancestors of Croats and Slovenians brought the light blue component from Poland and Czechia in 8-9th century.

The latter version is supported by the historical records:

1. De Administrando Imperio; Chapter 30; Story of the Province of Dalmatia, 10th century:

“But the Croats at that time were dwelling beyond Bavaria, where the Belocroats are now. From them split off a family of five brothers, Kloukas and Lobelos and Kosentzis and Mouchlo and Chrobatos, and two sisters, Touga and Bouga, who came with their folk to Dalmatia and found the Avars in possession of that land. After they had fought one another for some years, the Croats prevailed and killed some of the Avars and the remainder they compelled to be subject to them. And so from that time this land was possessed by the Croats, and there are still in Croatia some who are of Avar descent and are recognized as Avars. The rest of the Croats stayed over against Francia, and are now called Belocroats, that is, White Croats, and have their own prince; they are subject to Otto, the great king of Francia, or Saxony, and are unbaptized, and intermarry and are friendly with the Turks. From the Croats who came to Dalmatia a part split off and possessed themselves of Illyricum and Pannonia; they too had an independent prince, who used to maintain friendly contact, though through envoys only, with the prince of Croatia.

2. Historia Salonitana, Thomas the Archdeacon; 13th century:

From the Polish territories called Lingonia seven or eight tribal clans arrived under Totilo. When they saw that the Croatian land would be suitable for habitation because in it there were few Roman colonies, they sought and obtained for their duke...The people called Croats...Many call them Goths, and likewise Slavs, according to the particular name of those who arrived from Poland and Bohemia.

It is worth noting that both sources give an account of the Roman (non) presence in Dalmatia:

1. De Administrando Imperio; Chapter 30; Story of the Province of Dalmatia, 10th century:

“And so they [Avars] put to the sword all in the city and thereafter made themselves masters of all the country of Dalmatia and settled down in it. Only the townships on the coast held out against them, and continued to be in the hands of the Romans, because they obtained their livelihood from the sea. The Avars, then, seeing this land to be most fair, settled down in it.””

Chapter 31:

These same Romani having been expelled by the Avars in the days of this same emperor of the Romans Heraclius, their countries were made desolate.

2. Historia Salonitana, Thomas the Archdeacon; 13th century:

From the Polish territories called Lingonia seven or eight tribal clans arrived under Totilo. When they saw that the Croatian land would be suitable for habitation because in it there were few Roman colonies, they sought and obtained for their duke...The people called Croats...

According to F. Curta:

Evidence is rather scarce for the period between the 7th and 8th centuries, CE. Archaeological evidence shows population continuity in coastal Dalmatia and Istria. In contrast, much of the Dinaric hinterland appears to have been depopulated, as virtually all hilltop settlements, from Noricum to Dardania, were abandoned (only few appear destroyed) in the early 7th century.

Archeology generally confirms the historical recods.

 

[Wonomyro]

Basically, Karadzic has collected all the legends, folktales, songs, etc, of Balkan folklore and presented them as Serbian folklore.

That's true. Some contemporary Croatian intelectuals warned about Karadžić's copy-paste activities. Not only that he presented Croatian Shtokavian poetry as Serbian but also presented himself as an author of some.

More on that in this paper (needs translation): http://hrcak.srce.hr/file/68919

 

[Wonomyro]

The role of the various Orthodox Churches was decisive in the creation of ethnic identities in the Balkan countries. And there is a hierarchy, the most powerful church has taken the most advantage. Then certainly there are other factors.

Yes, the language was a factor in later separation of the Romanian Church. However, the idea of a language as an ethnic separator came from the West.

 

[Guido Anselmi]

Who were the "other Slavs"? The History of the Bishops of Salona and Split gives an account of the arrival of the Croats. Thomas the Archdeacon thought that the names such as Croats, Goths and Slavs were synonyms:

From the Polish territories called Lingonia seven or eight tribal clans arrived under Totilo. When they saw that the Croatian land would be suitable for habitation because in it there were few Roman colonies, they sought and obtained for their duke...The people called Croats...Many call them Goths, and likewise Slavs, according to the particular name of those who arrived from Poland and Bohemia.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historia_Salonitana

The Slavic tribes that came in the first wave of settlement prior to the Croatians and Serbians who come in the second wave. You had tribes all the way down to Thessaloniki, some of whom disappeared rather quickly, and others who were assimilated into various other peoples.

You had Slavs settle in places like Pannonia, Roman Dalmatia, Doclea, Moesia, etc. who were neither Croatian or Serb but eventually came under these two. Think about the Branicevci or Timocani.

 

[Guido Anselmi]

Exactly, and the autosomal genetics shows that.

The only documented record we have that gets into specifics is what Krunoslav Draganovic reported about how seven Catholic parishes in Trebinje went over to Orthodoxy during the 17th century. We don't know what ethnicity (if any at all) these people considered themselves to be prior to and after they converted.

We know that there were Catholics elsewhere in Bosnia during the Ottoman era that converted to Orthodoxy due to institutional pressure against the Catholic Church and especially against Franciscans in favour of the Orthodox Church but records of these conversions are hard to find.

We don't know what ethnicity these Catholics considered themselves to be, if any ethnicity at all.

One issue in this thread is that people are trying to project modern concepts backwards into history, particularly ethnicity. This is done by my fellow Croatians referring to any and all Catholics automatically as Croatian prior to the modern era and insisting that all Vlachs were ethnic Vlachs and that none were Serbs. Also by Serbs who negate the Croatian ethnicity of many Stokavian Catholics and who relegate Vlachs to a term denoting class, and by Albanians who often fail to realize that Arvanites had no ethnic Albanian consciousness (even though they spoke Albanian), which made it that much easier for them to assimilate into Greeks.

Ethnicity and ethnogenesis are very complex subjects, so the tendency to engage in reductionism or wholesale negation of others destroys what we should be trying to achieve: an understanding of these various peoples and how they came about.

 

[LABERIA]

The only documented record we have that gets into specifics is what Krunoslav Draganovic reported about how seven Catholic parishes in Trebinje went over to Orthodoxy during the 17th century. We don't know what ethnicity (if any at all) these people considered themselves to be prior to and after they converted.

We know that there were Catholics elsewhere in Bosnia during the Ottoman era that converted to Orthodoxy due to institutional pressure against the Catholic Church and especially against Franciscans in favour of the Orthodox Church but records of these conversions are hard to find.

We don't know what ethnicity these Catholics considered themselves to be, if any ethnicity at all.

One issue in this thread is that people are trying to project modern concepts backwards into history, particularly ethnicity. This is done by my fellow Croatians referring to any and all Catholics automatically as Croatian prior to the modern era and insisting that all Vlachs were ethnic Vlachs and that none were Serbs. Also by Serbs who negate the Croatian ethnicity of many Stokavian Catholics and who relegate Vlachs to a term denoting class, and by Albanians who often fail to realize that Arvanites had no ethnic Albanian consciousness (even though they spoke Albanian), which made it that much easier for them to assimilate into Greeks.

Ethnicity and ethnogenesis are very complex subjects, so the tendency to engage in reductionism or wholesale negation of others destroys what we should be trying to achieve: an understanding of these various peoples and how they came about.

Who talked in this thread about Arvanites?

 

[Wonomyro]

The Slavic tribes that came in the first wave of settlement prior to the Croatians and Serbians who come in the second wave. You had tribes all the way down to Thessaloniki, some of whom disappeared rather quickly, and others who were assimilated into various other peoples.

The "first wave" exsted but obviously remained only in Carpathian Basin where they arrived mostly with Avars and became partially Avarised.

After they had fought one another for some years, the Croats prevailed and killed some of the Avars and the remainder they compelled to be subject to them. And so from that time this land was possessed by the Croats, and there are still in Croatia some who are of Avar descent and are recognized as Avars.
​

It is reasonable to assume that the Slavs from the 1st wave were mentioned under the "Avar" label. But they were obviously a minority. However they represent more or less the same people as the newcomers, only had a different migration path.

You had Slavs settle in places like Pannonia, Roman Dalmatia, Doclea, Moesia, etc. who were neither Croatian or Serb but eventually came under these two. Think about the Branicevci or Timocani.

I do not question presence of Slavs in Moesia, though I believe that these Slavs were ancestors of Bulgarians and Macedonians. Branicevci and Timocani are obviously regional labels, not ethnic. (Tomocani = ones who live near Timok river).

 

[Guido Anselmi]

Who talked in this thread about Arvanites?

No one in this thread but I was just using it as an example since each and every one of us in the region are guilty at times of self-aggrandization at the expense of our neighbours. With you guys it's like the bullshit claims about Albanians coming from the Caucasus during the Middle Ages.

 

[Guido Anselmi]

The "first wave" exsted but obviously remained only in Carpathain Basen

No, they made it all the way down to the outskirts of Thessaloniki.

I do not question presence of Slavs in Moesia, though I believe that these Slavs were ancestors of Bulgarians and Macedonians. Branicevci or Timocani are obviously regional labels, not ethnic. (Tomocani = ones who live near Timok river).

Probably because these tribes of Slavs had not yet achieved ethnogeneis, just like the Slavs, mixed Slavs, or Vlachs, or Proto-Albanians, etc. in Dalmatia, Doclea, etc.

Serbs and Croatians who migrated down to the Balkans did not come with fully formed, compact peoples in the sense of the modern ethnos but rather as tribes. We do not know the composition of these tribes. History tells us that these same Serbs and Croats then managed to bring others, whether Slavic or not, under their names as they took root in the West Balkans.

We have the example of the Sclavinias south of Croatia and west of Raska. Independent principalities that at times came under the rule of Croatians and Serbs. Eventually some were Croatianized, some were Serbianized. For all we know some might have went back and forth. At the same time you had others like the Vlachs in the vicinity who maintained a separate identity but were Slavicized over time. And then the Turks showed up, pushed Croatians to the Adriatic, resulting in a significant loss of Croatian consciousness inland, while new peoples were settled there by the Turks.

It's all very complex.

Take the towns of Ston or Neum for example. You could have an uninterrupted patrilineal line there from when Christ was born to the modern day and they could be considered Illyrian, Roman, Vlach, Narentine, Croatian, Serbian, Croatian, Vlach, Ragusan, Illyrian, Croatian without ever having moved a single inch in all that time.

 

[LABERIA]

No one in this thread but I was just using it as an example since each and every one of us in the region are guilty at times of self-aggrandization at the expense of our neighbours. With you guys it's like the bullshit claims about Albanians coming from the Caucasus during the Middle Ages.

I don`t have any idea of what self-aggrandization are you talking and why you brought Albanians in this discussion.
I think that you are not well informed about the ethnic consciousness of the Albanians in Albania and in diaspora, Greece, Italy, etc and how their assimilation was realised. Anyway, there are othere threads where you can discuss about this topic.
About the Caucasian theory, it was invented and spread by serbs. They have always financed and continue to spend a lot of money trying to give credibilty to this pseudoscientific theory. And this is the reason why the serbs always refute to discuss about their ethnogenesis because the most accepted theory about the origin of the serbs is exactly that they are from Caucasus.

 

[Guido Anselmi]

I don`t have any idea of what self-aggrandization are you talking and why you brought Albanians in this discussion.
I think that you are not well informed about the ethnic consciousness of the Albanians in Albania and in diaspora, Greece, Italy, etc and how their assimilation was realised. Anyway, there are othere threads where you can discuss about this topic.

Rather than insult you I'll let Trojet come to my defense when it comes to the issue of ethnicity over the centuries in Balkans.

Every single one of us in this region is guilty of self-aggrandization whether it be Croatians, Serbs, Bulgarians, Albanians, Greeks, and so on.

About the Caucasian theory, it was invented and spread by serbs.

No shit.

 

[Wonomyro]

The only documented record we have that gets into specifics is what Krunoslav Draganovic reported about how seven Catholic parishes in Trebinje went over to Orthodoxy during the 17th century. We don't know what ethnicity (if any at all) these people considered themselves to be prior to and after they converted.

We know that the said area was a demographic basin of Dubrovnik Republic. That’s the main reason why Dubrovnik became Slavic over time. The fact, that Slavic speakers of Dubrovnik were historically identified as Croats, indicates that they had to be Croats prior they became citizens of Dubrovnik Republic. It is hard to believe that Dubrovnik Romans would have taught Slavs about their ethnic name.

We know that there were Catholics elsewhere in Bosnia during the Ottoman era that converted to Orthodoxy due to institutional pressure against the Catholic Church and especially against Franciscans in favour of the Orthodox Church but records of these conversions are hard to find.

Of course it is hard to find such a potentially “compromising” evidence for the Orthodox Church. The hard fact is that the new churches (Orthodox) were built over the former ones (Catholic). We can only question whether there occurred a demographic shift or only cultural. Well, genetics suggests the latter.

One issue in this thread is that people are trying to project modern concepts backwards into history, particularly ethnicity. This is done by my fellow Croatians referring to any and all Catholics automatically as Croatian prior to the modern era and insisting that all Vlachs were ethnic Vlachs and that none were Serbs. Also by Serbs who negate the Croatian ethnicity of many Stokavian Catholics and who relegate Vlachs to a term denoting class, and by Albanians who often fail to realize that Arvanites had no ethnic Albanian consciousness (even though they spoke Albanian), which made it that much easier for them to assimilate into Greeks.

Catholics are not automatically Croats, of course. They can be Albanians, Italians, Hungarians... Catholic Church is not an “ethnic” church and it does not enforce any specific ethnic identity. That is a huge difference comparing to the Orthodox Churches.

If there had been any other ethnicity among Catholic Slavs, other then Croatian, we would know about it. In that sense, we could speak only about Bosnian identity. However, it seems that one was more regional and political then ethnic, as medieval Bosnians basically shared the same culture and literacy as Croats and nobody know where to pull the line between two.

Moreover, there are so many accounts of the Croatian ethnonym far away from “Croatia proper” e. g. around Bay of Cattaro where the local nobility maintained they Croatian identity throughout centuries. All that indicates that Croatian ethnonym was not just a political nor a regional label.

Ethnicity and ethnogenesis are very complex subjects, so the tendency to engage in reductionism or wholesale negation of others destroys what we should be trying to achieve: an understanding of these various peoples and how they came about.

I agree.