Talk:Stari Vlah

Stari Vlah

See: Athen. 6, p.234; Nat. quaest. 3,11; Plin. 31, 4; Aelian. h.a. 17, 41; cf. Kadlubek I ep. 2 ed. 1711 --> Boguchwal Chron. Polon. ap. Sommersberg, script. rer. Siles. tom. II. p. 19. etc. etc.

Also in reference to Stari Vlah see Karadzic's Serbian dictionary as reference. Please note that Vlah does not have the same meaning anymore in modern Serbian!

--SGS 12:51, 14 Sep 2006 (UTC)

Can you give some examples of these names and words of Celtic origin? There were Celts living in the Balkans at the time the Serbs arrived, so is it possible that modern Serbs are to a significant degree the descendents of Celts? Do you know if there is a Serbian etymological dictionary online? Edrigu 20:19, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

Our estimate is that about more then 600 words in Serbian today have a Celtic root. You can think of names such as Sava, Morava, Sutla, Tamnava etc. Old Serbian tribal customs and organization are very similar if not virtually identical to that of the Celtic Sept. Are Serbs mixed? Yes, but not only with Celts. We are still doing research into this and I believe future DNA research will also give a better view on this. A Serbian etymological dictionary doesn't excists online but questions related to ancestry you can get answered Serbian Genealogical Society

--SGS 08:43, 18 Oct 2006 (UTC)

Perhaps Serbs in Stari Vlah are at some extent descendants of Celts, but not Serbs in general, as the article says that the Serbs after arrival found some Celts particularly in Stari Vlah. Zlatiborian historian Milisav R. Djenic believes that there were no Celts at all in Zlatibor, although there were some of them in Užice and rest of Stari Vlah region (the Celtic name of Užice is known - Capedunum). He also believes (following the estimations of Pavel Safarik and Josef Dobrovsky) that such Užican toponymes as Murtenica (southern part of Zlatibor), Negbina (village at Mount Zlatibor), Čigota (peak of Mt. Zlatibor), and Tara Mountain (mountain northwards Zlatibor and westwards Užice) originate from the Illyrians, who lived here in the prehistory, but it could also be possible that they are of Celtic origin. --Djordje D. Bozovic 20:44, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

IMO there is a too big of time laps between Illyrians and Celts. There are numerous records that when the Celts invaded the area they weren't too kind to the locals virtually annihilating them. Celts also didn't like Slavs in general and were in constant warfare with them. Also the Ostrogoths paid a visit to the region and a bunch of numerous other tribes. In 9-10 cases people refer to Illyrians as 1 group but in reality they were just a group of different tribes with not much relation just named by the Romans and Greeks. The history of the Illyrians is very obscure and a lot of information out there is just hypothetical. We have a history forum at our website where I think its a better place to discuss detailed things like this as I think Wikipedia is not for PoV's.

--SGS 08:47, 18 Oct 2006 (UTC)

According to Professor Djenic, when the Celtic tribes arrived to Stari Vlah (today usually refered to as Užice Region), they have found the Illyrians living here and mixed with them. However, although it is sure that the Celts have settled in Užice, there are no archaelogical discoveries at all to prove their presence in Zlatibor. --Djordje D. Bozovic 21:13, 19 October 2006 (UTC)

Other migrating tribes ravaged the area before the Celts came. Most buildings in those day's were not of stone so finding something is hard. Either way, in Serbia archeology still needs to cath up with other area's due to communism.

--SGS 16:08, 21 Oct 2006 (UTC)

Removed section

According to history when the Serbs entered the Balkans they met with a small pocket of Celts at Stari Vlah where they made an alliance. This can be remembered and seen back in the countless Serbian names with Celtic origin and the fact that Serbian today has more then 600 words of Celtic origin. In old Slavic "Vlah" stands for Celt and doesn't denote the modern day ethnic group of Vlahs.

600 words in Serbian? That's silly. Maybe you mean placenames, but even for that, I think it's way too much.

Anyway, in Old Slavic, "Vlah" meant "Roman/Latin", not Celt, that's why the Poles still call both the Italians and Romanians "Vlachs". bogdan 20:33, 21 October 2006 (UTC)

So because of your opinion you just remove a whole section??? Great, there are numerous sources and books on this item but hell yea go write your own history then. I bet you didnt bother reading the book list on top did you???!!! SGS 13:52, 22 October 2006 (UTC)

Is the language of the Stari Vlachs (if they still exist or if the language was studied in the past) a dialect/variety of Dalmatian language, or it was in fact Istro-Romanian? If it were the first, than they could of have been natives there (celts, illirians or whatever). If they spoke Istro-Romanian, than most probably they were allogene. My guess is they are those "Cici" mentioned in some works, and that they are the remnants of the Vlachs which spread westwords between the 9th and 12th century, and which, after the demographic shrinkage during the Ottoman conquest, had moved more westwards. Afterall, if you look at a map, Stari Vlach is closer to the bord of Romania, than the Megleno-Romanians of Moravian Wallachians are. Also take a look at this [1] Greier 11:52, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

Stari Vlah is a remnant, Celts worked in Tribes all of them with the distinctive dialects. I am not debating that here. What I am debating is what happened in thr 5th century. Stari Vlah is no where near the Romanian border. Also on dialects, you forget the influence of the Venetians in Dalmatia, the Austrians, The Ottomans and even the Germans since Saxons used to live a lot in Medieval Serbia adn a lot of placenames are of German origin as well. So I would say what you are talking about is something different ;-) SGS 18:20, 25 October 2006 (UTC)

Dalmatian language used to be spoken only on the Adriatic coast and it was not found this far inland. bogdan 14:42, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

To SGS: You claim that the research was done by "scientists from the German university in Berlin in cooperation with some Serbian scholars", but you have not given us an exact citation, the exact source. Please see Wikipedia:Citing sources. bogdan 14:42, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

Again, did you read the sources provided in the list at the top of this page?? You can access them at any state and or university library. They are written in Latin, Greek and German. References are included and so is a comprehensive overview. I am sorry if you dont have access to them but in this case that is not my problem. Again, you are keen on removing edits anyting else that appears to be Romanian for that matter. I had a similar disucssion before with someone else. Either read these sources provided which are legit or proof me otherwise. This is really getting tiresome. SGS 18:11, 25 October 2006 (UTC)

Yes, I saw those sources and I have no doubt that they mention that Celts used to live in ancient times in Serbia. But I was not disputing that. I was simply asking about the name of Stari Vlah. All I would like is a recent (let's say in the last 50 years) reliable source which says that "Vlah" meant "Celt" in the middle-ages Serbian context. bogdan 16:20, 25 October 2006 (UTC)

I live in Stari Vlah (it comprises the south-western part of Serbia), and as I believe (according to local tradition), the name 'Vlah' here means 'a cattle-breeder', 'a rancher', or 'a shepherd'. It has nothing and really nothing to do with the ethnic group of the same name, nor with the Celts. --Djordje D. Bozovic 20:29, 25 October 2006 (UTC)

Well, originally, in Old Slavic, "Vlah" meant "Roman" or "Latin". The only Latin people the Serbs met in here were the Romanians and of these, only some small communities of shepherds practicing transhumance who reached Serbia by looking for better pastures. The Slavs assimilated the local populations (probably Illyrians, Thracians, Moesians, Dacians, etc) and not only them, but also these small Vlah communities and "Vlah" lost its ethnic meaning.

In fact, this word has an interesting history throughout Yugoslavia and Southeastern Europe, meaning not only Romanian and shepherd, but a lot of other things, see: History of the term Vlach. :-) bogdan 20:53, 25 October 2006 (UTC)