Gacovic Od romanskog stanovnistva do Rumuna Timocana (VII-XVI vek) knjiga III (1)

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302 Slavoljub Gacović
the Timok area and beyond, where, according to Zvezdana Pavlović,
analysis can determine the „visible Romanian influence“ in the basins of the
South Morava (= Južna Morava), the Western Morava (= Zapadna Morava),
Morava, Mlava, Pek, White (= Svrljiski) Timok, Black (= Krivovirski)
Timok or the basins of the rivers, Timok, Pore¢ and Kolubara.
Even the greatest expansion of the Nemanji¢s government or that of
Despot Stefan Lazarevic „did not reach the Timok basin, and even the area
of upper Nisava“, so how else to explain a strange concentration of
isoglosses separating eastern and western branch of the South Slavs, but by a
certain ethnic wedge „in which lived - as the Dutch Slavist N. van Wijk —a
Romanian population.* In the area of Timok-Osogovo-Sara, and in area
which covers the Prizren - Timok (Torlack) dialect groups, i.e.
Belogradchik-Breznica speech on the Bulgarian state and national territory
or the north Macedonian dialects, we have long recorded toponyms
.Berbatovo, Bukurovac, Bucum, Valuni$, Korbevac, Marzini, Merdzelat,
Svrijig, Surdulica, Tumba, DZepa and many other names of Romanian ...
origin ... for example „Rnjos, Niksor, Midzor ... Bucumet, Valunis, Surdul ...
Mackatica which clearly demonstrate the former presence of Romanians in
these areas.“ After all, on the Bulgarian side of the border, for example,
„around Sofia, a substantial part of the Romanian element is included in
toponymy, for instance, Banaiz, BaniSora, Bov, Vakarel, Gavnos, Pasarel,
Ursul“ etc.
Beside many indicators of the coexistence of Slovenian, Serbian and
Bulgarian tribes with the Romanized native population, and oikonyms,
hydronyms (potamon) and toponyms we mentioned, the coexistence of the
Roman and the barbarians can be also proved by sanctoria (hagionyms) and
the oldest religious buildings, whose names of saints served in the naming of
many places on the Balkan peninsula and which witness many oases of the
Christian, first neo-Latin and later Romanic i.e. Romanian population in the
Slavic crowd. The Roman Christian world certainly had influence on the
barbarians, who gradually accepted Christianity, partly influenced by local
,self-taught preachers®.
On the basis of some sanctoria which may be a substrate, i.e. possible
names that the Slavs found arriving to a specific area, or adstrate, names that
have emerged when most of Illyricum had long been Slavicised with the
survival of certain Roman enclaves of Vlachs or Romanians, with their own
topographic naming, reveals a larger amount of Latin or Roman than the
Greek influence.
Among Christian toponyms can specify Prokopius’ Zafiviipeg,
MiAétng then the name ‘IotoeyAdyye in Basil the Second’s Charter from
1019, which should be dated before 1000. Among the names of those sacred
objects that we consider to be adstrats are the toponym Kundelj in Metohija,
Romanizacija i romansko stanovnistvo Timocke zone (I-XVI vek) 303
mesra Besicince in nahija Polomje and toponym Biserka at the spring of the
Toplica or at Plevlja (Upper Drina), originally from Romanian reflex
bisericd meaning „church“ < lat. basilica. There is an archaic toponym
Smese in the village of Zagrade near Zajecar, where there are remains of a
Catholic church, originating from Latin s(anctus) me(n)sa. Among adstrates
we should primarily take into consideration those toponyms of the Roman
dialects deriving from the Balkan Vulgar Latin, for example toponym
Zpeviépopov, confirmed in 1019 in the charter of Basil the Second, and
also the name of the Church of St. Nicholas Komljag (komamrs in Ravanica
Charter), and the name of the two Kumanica churches lat. communicare „the
communion®, and so on.
To the coexistence of ordinary everyday people, first Romans, then the
Romanians, with the Slavs, Serbs and Slavicised Bulgarians, especially in
the Timok-Osogovo-Sara area, who over the centuries largely drowned in
the Slavic sea, points the Romance vocabulary especially in the Prizren-
Timok dialect, for example albotin, lastar, skoba, skobi se, skara, skube,
vurda, vurka, cuknut, ursula, komonji se, susina, kulastra, kondilat, turta,
cuka, sugare, Serbi se, orata, trandorija, parasina, kormim, vardi, vardiste,
mandra, maren, skopi, brbat, soma, talason, etc.
Based on the legal provisions of the Vlachs in the medieval period in
present-day Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro, Croatia and
Bulgaria, something was said aliout the monastery, gubernatorial, royal,
imperial and independent Vlachs. It has been said to which ethnos the
Vlachs of Bosnia, Serbia and Croatia belong, and also about the prohibition
of marriage between Vlachs and Serbs, and so on. The lower and upper
gentry among the Serbs, Latins, and Albanians, has been documented, but
also among the Viachs, as well as Vlach nobility among Serbian, Bosnian -
Herzegovinian and Croatian feudal lords. Not a small number of Vlach
dukes, judges, cattlemen, leaders and others have been mentioned, on the
basis of which it was possible to talk about the social and economic structure
of the Vlachs.
At the time of the Ottoman Empire, owing to the laws of Branicevo
and Vidin Vlachs, we know a lot about the mandatory imposts as well as
those who were exempt, for example wedding taxes (= mladarine) and cattle
taxes (= ovcarine), i.e. not to pay taxes in money for brides or the bridal
chamber that were paid by all the subjects of the Ottoman Empire when they
married their daughters, and ovéarina which represents tax on cattle, sheep
and goats. It was also stated that ,,carpenters must not enter among them“
and „tar, torch, wood planks or wood must not be brought, i.e. they were
freed from taxes, unlike the medieval Vlachs.
Turkish lawmakers explicitly stated that the Vlachs „must not mow
meadows“ or ,,build a house for the Turkish bey in Valachian villages* and