 Poem in Arvanitika and Greek honoring the wedding of Grand Duchess Alexandra Georgievna and Archduke Paul (1889). | |
| Total population | |
| c. 150,000 (Arvanite-speakers)[1] | |
| Languages | |
| Albanian (Arvanitika), Greek | |
| Related ethnic groups | |
| Other Albanian-speaking peoples (most notably Tosk Albanians) |
The Arvanites (Arvanitika: Αρbε̱ρεσ̈ε̰, romanized: Arbëreshë, Greek: Αρβανίτες) are a bilingual Greek people speaking both the Greek language and a dialect of the Albanian language called Arvanitika.[2][3][4] They moved from the regions of northern Epirus and central Albania to the Greek peninsula during the Middle Ages.[4] The Arvanites settled as farmers and soldiers (stradioti) getting land as payment for their work.[4] They were organized into clans called fares (Greek: φάρες), or sogia (Arvanitika: σόjτε),[4] and their culture was Byzantine Greek.[5][6] They fought in the Greek revolution of 1821 against the Ottoman Empire and its allies.[7] The name Arvanites, or Arnauts, was also used to describe Greeks from Roumeli, Albanians, Bulgarians and Serbs who all served as bodyguards for royals.[8]
In one of their songs, the Arvanites of Boeotia in central Greece sing of their homeland, Constantinople: "Τρε παμπόρἐ σκούαν ε βάνἐ νἐ Σταμπούλ νἐ βέντἐ τάνἐ" (transliteration: "Tre pampóre skoúan e báne ne Stampoúl ne bénte táne", "Three ships passed and are going to Constantinople to our lands").[9] According to Maria Michael-Dede, the song proves that the Arvanites are of Greek origin.[10]