Origin of Mijaks

[Mingle]

What is their origin? Some Albanian members here have said that the Mijaks of Macedonia are of Albanian origin. They claimed there used to be many Orthodox Albanians in Macedonia but they got assimilated into the ethnic Macedonian identity whereas Muslim Albanians retained their Albanian ethnic identity. Is there any truth to this? Other sources say that they have Aromanian origins.

This is what I get from their Wikipedia:

Mijaks have been subject to ethnographic studies by Macedonian, Bulgarian and Serbian scholars. According to the 2002 census, in the Municipality of Mavrovo and Rostuša there were 4,349 Macedonians (50.46%), 2,680 Turks (31,10%), 1,483 Albanians (17.21%), and smaller numbers of Bosniaks (0.36%), Roma (0.12%), Serbs (0.07%) and others (0.68%); In the Municipality of Debar there were a total of 19,542 inhabitants, of which 11,348 Albanians, 3,911 Macedonians, 2,684 Turks, 1,080 Roma, 22 Serbs, 3 Bosniaks, 2 Vlachs and 492 others.[26][verification needed]

• Macedonian historians[who?] are still uncertain as to whether the Mijaks were initially Aromanian speaking.[citation needed]

• Serbian authors as Jovan Cvijić classified Mijaks into South Slavs, precisely the 'western Macedonian variety' of the 'central type'. His conclusion about the ethnic origin of Mijaks was that nomadic Aromanians mixed with native Slavs and later with Serbs who moved from Ottoman Albania to avoid process of Albanisation and Islamisation.[27] In views of historical consciousness, he noted that the Mijaks had preserved traces of Serbian history (folklore, art, slava).[23] Milojko Veselinović (1850–1913) and Đoko Slijepčević (1907–1993) also noted their Serbian cultural traditions.[28]

• In their works from the beginning of the 20th century, Bulgarian ethnographers Vasil Kanchov and Dimitar Michev describe the local Mijak population as Bulgarian.[29][30] The researcher Georgi Traychev from Prilep also describes the Miyaks as part of the Bulgarian people, different from the other, neighboring ethnographic Bulgarian groups as the Barsjaks.[31]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mijaks

The Mijak homeland is a region in western Macedonia called Mijachija and shares a border with Albania:



Does anyone have any theories on their origin?

[Kelmendasi]

I believe that a good number of them have Albanian origin, whilst there obviously are Mijaks who aren't of Albanian origin. Their influence from the Albanians is clear, their dances and traditional music is more akin to that of the Albanians as well as their traditional clothing in which the trousers are like those of Albanians, though they do have certain differences. In my opinion a good number of them are of Albanian origin from Reka region which practically is neighboring the Mijak zone. Though I do think that there are Slavic individuals among them. The Serbian DNA project is currently testing Mijaks so will be cool to see their Ydna haplogroups

[Mingle]

In my opinion a good number of them are of Albanian origin from Reka region which practically is neighboring the Mijak zone. Though I do think that there are Slavic individuals among them.

I think the Reka region is the eastern part of the Mijachija region. Mijachija is just a cultural region, not an administrative one. Are there other groups similar to the Mijaks in Macedonia (or even Montenegro) that are claimed to be of Albanian origin? I know that Albanians also claim the Sanjak Bosniaks, and there is said to be legitimacy to those claims by many on here.

The Serbian DNA project is currently testing Mijaks so will be cool to see their Ydna haplogroups

Are they testing other groups? Would be interesting to see what Goranis get for example.

[Vojnik]

Their origins are indigenous to the area they are from.

I hear this theory on this forum alot, where people claim everyone in Macedonia has been assimilated into the Macedonian ethnic group from either Greek, Serb, Bulgarian, Vlach, Albanian. The fact is that we have never had such power to assimilate anyone. The ones doing the assimilating were the stronger powers; Greece, Bulgaria and Serbia.

Anyway. A Macedonian by the name of Georgi Pulevski is a Mijak born in the village of Galicnik. In 1875 he published a book called "Речник од три језика" (dictionary of three languages). Those languages were Macedonian, Albanian and Turkish.

This is one of Pulevski's most famous quotes. And mind you, from a Mijak:

What do we call a nation? – People who are of the same origin and who speak the same words and who live and make friends of each other, who have the same customs and songs and entertainment are what we call a nation, and the place where that people lives is called the people's country. Thus the Macedonians also are a nation and the place which is theirs is called Macedonia.

[Vojnik]

The well known Mijak Galichka svadba festival that takes place in the village of Galicnik once a year.

[Kelmendasi]

I think the Reka region is the eastern part of the Mijachija region. Mijachija is just a cultural region, not an administrative one. Are there other groups similar to the Mijaks in Macedonia (or even Montenegro) that are claimed to be of Albanian origin? I know that Albanians also claim the Sanjak Bosniaks, and there is said to be legitimacy to those claims by many on here.



Are they testing other groups? Would be interesting to see what Goranis get for example.

Yh Mijachija is actually within Reka, I wasn't sure about it at first so I said neighboring. In Montenegro and Serbia there are the Sanxhak muslims who around 70% are of Albanian origin whilst the rest are Montenegrin mainly. The Albanian origin of majority of the Sanxhak muslims is confirmed through ethnographers and genetics, there have been several TV shows in Albania where the film the inhabitants of these regions that speak Albanian though now identify as Bosniaks. Most of them come from the northern Albanian clans of Malsia. I have heard that there is a Croatian community in Kosovo called the Janjevci that in fact are of Albanian origin according to some Serbs here and some sources online, though I haven't looked into it that much so idk what's true. There are also some of the Montenegrin clans or Brda Montenegrins that Albanians believe to be Albanian in origin based on oral tradition and genetics. Yh they are testing the Gorani as well.

[Aspar]

Some toponyms there like "Galicnik" or "Galicica" in the area which the Mijaks occupied are Celtic related through the Gauls.
I once read that after their invasion of the Balkans, some small group of Celts were settled somewhere in Macedonia by a Macedonian king.
Might be their descendants or some older tribe occupying these lands, Paeonians??

[Aspar]

There were some other Celtic tribes like Boii and Arverni who attract my attention.
There was a tribe called Baiounitai or Boinici who settled in modern South Albania and North-West Greece.
This tribe came during the great migration and is believed to have been a sclavinae.
But that's not very certain.
What makes suspicion to me is the name of the tribe and could have been originally a Celtic tribe that have settled somewhere in the Northern Balkans and that has been latinized during Roman times??
Later as the Slavs arrived, they could have mixed with them and together departed to the South??
That's the very area which the Vlachs are inhabiting...

[Mingle]

Some toponyms there like "Galicnik" or "Galicica" in the area which the Mijaks occupied are Celtic related through the Gauls.
I once read that after their invasion of the Balkans, some small group of Celts were settled somewhere in Macedonia by a Macedonian king.
Might be their descendants or some older tribe occupying these lands, Paeonians??

It makes sense that the name relates to the Celts. The Celtic tribe that settled there was probably the Scordisci: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scordisci

I wouldn't say that the name Galichnik relates specifically to Gauls. All Celts had a similar name and in their native Celtic, the word "Gal" would have referred to Celts in general. All words like Gal, Gaul, Cel(t), Gael, etc. come from the Proto-Celtic *galn- and refer to generic Celts.

[Vojnik]

Galicnik is a interesting toponym which i can't figure out. Well the GAL part anyway. The ICHNIK part is a Slavic suffix that goes at the end of place names.