Family Lore

My family history and family lore, or in other words our own families’ micro-culture, contains several famous and infamous stories:

A founding myth or a fairytale?

According to the family lore from my father’s side, the Jovanovikj branch of his family was established by two orphans Jovan and Jovana. A trade caravan from the city state of Dubrovnik was passing through a village in Serbia which was completely razed and burned by the Ottomans. All the inhabitants were brutally murdered in cold blood and only one young girl survived hidden under a wooden trough. She was so desperate that she was thinking about committing a suicide. Fortunately, the wise merchants were able to talk her out of it and they convinced the young leader of the military detail of the caravan to marry the girl. He was also an orphan and the only survivor from a village destroyed by the Ottomans somewhere in the harsh mountains of Montenegro. Jovan and Jovana are the legendary progenitors of the family Jovanović from Western Serbia. The story is not corroborated by my genetic ancestry analysis.

Keeping up with the Robevci (The robev family)

One of the most distinguished families of the Macedonian national awakening were the Robev Family from Ohrid and Bitola. According to the family lore, my great-grandma’s family from my father’s side, the Robev family from Skopje are related to the main branch from Ohrid and Bitola. They claim that their branch arrived in Skopje about a century before the Ottoman conquest. Members from this family were active in the movement for the establishment of the schools in local language, aka Macedonian, and churches preaching in Macedonian in 19th century Macedonia. Also, my direct male ancestors were among the founders and key financial supporters of the VMRO. The support for the Macedonian revolutionaries did not stop there. All of my male ancestors from the Robev side of the family married daughters of the members of the military wing of VMRO who actively fought against the Ottomans. The family legend that even the Skopje branch of the Robev family comes from Ohrid and Bitola is most probably correct as the ancestry composition my genes shows strong traits from that specific region of Macedonia.

The wondering Aromanians

According to the family lore, the Aromanian (Vlach) branch of my family, from my mother’s side, originates from the Aromanians of Moscopole, in present day Albania. Moscopole was a prosperous town in the Ottoman Empire populated exclusively by Aromanians who believed they were direct descendants of the ancient Romans (primarily because of their language). Moscopole was not only a prosperous trade hub, but also a center of education and culture. In the late 18th century, the Ottoman central government in Istanbul was losing its grip on the far-flung corners of the Empire. The bustling town of Moscopole was destroyed in 1788 by the troops of the semi-independent Ottoman official Ali Pasha of Ioannina. After the sack of Moscopole, the Pura family, like many other Vlach families, relocated to Kruševo. But then after the Ilinden Uprising they decided to migrate to Romania. However, after reaching the “promised land of the Vlachs” they got disappointed by the reception and returned to Serbia where they settled in the city of Niš. Another branch of the Pura family moved to Greece, in the well-established Aromanian communities in the Aegean Macedonia. Nowadays descendants of the family Pura can be found in Serbia, Macedonia, and Greece. Because the Aromanians were a tight knit community and a tiny minority throughout the Balkans, they chose their brides from distant towns of the Peninsula, but also from the Aromanian communities. My great-great grandmother, Kleonike, comes from Belgrade, but I don’t have any details about her maiden surname and the relatives from that Aromanian branch of my family. This family lore is very true as it is shown by my ancestry traits from Northern Greece, especially the Aegean Macedonia, Aromanian enclaves in Macedonia and the city of Belgrade.

The yellow regions are the distribution of Aromanians in the Balkans.