Hrvatski
Tidbits about home: Goran Filipi – Istro-romanian linguistic
atlas
Faraguna without a raincoat and Poropat without a bed
The atlas is tri-lingual (Croatian, Romanian and Italian), and Dr. Filipi
was collecting the material for it from 1995 to 2001.
© Novi list
Friday, 25 July 2003
PULA
– The Istro-Romanian Linguistic Atlas by Goran Filipi, which documents the
speech from the villages of Zejane and Cepicko polje, is apparently released
in the edition by Mediterranean Scientific Society. Even though the speakers
of Istro-Romanian language (also called Cici, Vlasi or Ciribirci) are
holding to their speech, it is because of the poverty of the area where they
live - close to extinction. Istro-Romanian is not taught in school not
even as an elected subject, it is not even used in the church, and from the
1500 speakers after WWII, now remain only about 200.
The atlas
is tri-lingual (Croatian, Romanian and Italian), and Dr. Filipi was
collecting the material for it from 1995 to 2001, talking to speakers in
Susnjevica, Nova Vas, Kostrcan, Jasenovik, Miheli, Letaj, Brdo, Skabici,
Trnkovci, Zankovci and Zejane. The questionnaire consisted of 1,898
standardized questions, which encompassed concepts from various semantic
fields, for example, weather conditions, habits, marriage and family, home
and possessions, animals, plants, food, calendar and so on.
For each
village notations were made of the types of words with their corresponding
accents. Where he found complete expressions and sentences, he kept notes of
the ones he found interesting and important. To the speech of these Istrian
villages he also added the speech of the village of Rudna Glava in the
north-eastern Serbia as a comparison with a different Romanian speech on the
other side of the Danube, as well as Chacavian speech from Brgud and Cepici.
The atlas
contains many interesting things: Filipi writes that the first Vlaski
livestock herders in Istria are mentioned in the 12th century, however, the
Istro-Romanians are probably descendants of the Balkan Vlahi who came from
southern Velebit at the end of 15th century and went to Krk (where Vlaski
was spoken until 1819) and from there they moved on to Istria. They consider
themselves Croats
[today],
or regionally as Istrians, and they are bilingual (Istro-Romanian and
Croatian) from the start.
[today]
Istro-Romanian was much more widespread than it is today, which is evident
by names such as Katunaric, Licul, Fararguna (translates to "without a
shepard’s raincoat") or Poropat (translates to "without a bed") and then
topographic names as Katun, Kature and Fecori. “It is conceivable that
Vlaski will last longer in foreign countries (where they immigrated) than at
home” said Prof. Dr. August Kovacec pessimistically, who together with
Dr. Petru Neiescu is the editor of the atlas.
The
Istro-Romanian Linguistic Atlas is important due to its large structure and
it documents radical changes, which each twenty years occur in dialects. The
edition also contains the map with photographs. This atlas is part of the
international scientific project that started with cooperation with the
University of Trieste, and before the Istro-Romanian atlas, they released
the Istriot linguistic atlas, which dealt with the speaking of south-western
Istria before Venetian rule.
Translation by: Pino Golja
See also:
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