Re: CHAT: Vlach (was: Roumania...)

At 7:02 pm +0100 18/4/99, Raymond A. Brown wrote:
[snip
>
>Whether somewhere, somewhen any Slav speakers also applied the term to
>Romanies, I don't know; but I guess it's not improbable.
>
Now I do know   :-)

I've done a bit of research (and left the darn stuff at College - but no
matter); it seems that Vlach was also applied by Slavs to one group of
Romanies in the Balkan area as well, of course, to the Ramonce-speaking
enclaves. From what I can ascertain, the Romany-Vlachs seem originally to
have come from the Romanian area and are distinct from another Balkan
Romany group from somewhere in the Yugoslav area.

Anyway the Romany-Vlachs subsequently migrated to many parts of central &
western Europe and eventually to the New World both north & south of the
Panamanian isthmus.  One source made the point that the Romany-Vlach is not
to be confused with Romanian-Vlach  ;)

Surprisingly, according to one authority I found, Greeks have even applied
the term Vlach to Slav-speaking minorities in Greece!

Ray.