Glottocode: baya1255
The Boyash (also Bayash) or Rudari are archaic subvarieties deriving from the Transilvanian and Muntenian/Wallachian varieties of Romanian Language. They are spoken in eastern Slovakia (around Košice), Ukrainian Transcarpathia (Verhnja Vižnicja, Poroškovo, Mirča), Hungary (the southern Hungarian comitate along the southern border, Baranya), large parts of Romania (southern Romanian plains and southern Transylvania), the Republic of Moldova, Croatia (mainly Slavonia, Međimurje), Serbia (eastern and central Serbia, the Vojvodina, and the Bačka), Bosnia (around Tuzla, Brčko District, Sarajevo), north and northeast Bulgaria (especially Varna, Zlatarica), the Republic of Macedonia (Bitola), Greece (especially Thessaly, Alexandria, Zefyri), and, according to Pettan (2002: 182), also in Kosovo to where they migrated from Serbia. Due to their deportation in World War II they can also be found in Transnistria.
Its speakers are called Boyash in English (Romanian: Băieși, Rudari; Hungarian: Beás; Slovakian: Bojáš etc.). Alternative names are Rudari /Ludari, Lingurari and Zlătari. Both terms Boyash and Rudari can be traced back to their earlier occupations as mineworkers and gold panners. The derivation of the ethnonym Rudari from the Slav word rud (mine, ore pit) can be easily explained, given the fact that this word is very widespread in the Slavic languages. The endonym in most communities is Tsigan, the label Roma being vehemently rejected.
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Boyash/Rudari subvarieties are today highly endangered. If we are to take exemplarily the linguistic panorama of the Baranya region, (southern Hungary) in the year 2000, only 5.6% of the Munĉeni and Arĝeleni Boyash were still speaking their heritage varieties (Kémeny 2000: 112) in restricted domains of use like the family domain and as an affective language (Kahl/Nechiti 2018).
Hungary has emerged as the only country in which Boyash lessons in Hungarian orthography at the Ghandi high school have improved the possibilities for preserving the Boyash subvariety and have had a considerable impact on the prestige and emancipation of the minority language. The Arĝelean-Boyash variety in southern Baranya is the only one for which standardization efforts have been made (since the year 2004). 2005 saw the Boyash subvariety of Croatia published in its own alphabet for the first time in the Catholic Catechism, published by the HBK Glas Koncila in Zagreb.The first written works about the Boyash and Rudari were two reports on the communities of Romanian speakers in Bosnia by Ieșan (1906: 7), and later on by Filipescu (1906: 198) that describe their settlements and occupation (woodworking). Several decades later, Gheție (1968: 501-508) revisited the material collected by Petrovici, identifying the phonetic phenomena specific to the Boyash vernacular of Serbia, such as the palatalization of [n], the passage from [ĉ] and [ĝ] to [ś], [ź], etc. An essential study for understanding the linguistic evolution of the Rudari and Boyash subvarieties is the doctoral thesis of Ion Calotă (1995) that attributes the linguistic particularities of the Boyash subvarieties to areas like south-west Transylvania, south-east Crișana, and the north-east of the Banat. A more recent contribution by Saramandu (1997), who researched the dialect of the Boyash of Međimurje, in northern Croatia, concluded that, the area of origin of the Boyash includes the south-east of Crișana, the north-east extremity of the Banat, and the south-west extremity of Crișana. It is the area where the palatalization of the dentals [t], [d] and the treatment of the palatals [chi], [ghi] yield the same result, i.e. the affricates [ć], [ĉ], [đ], [ĝ] (Saramandu 1997: 109).
Bibliography
Bibliography
- Boretzky, Norbert (2003): Die Vlach-Dialekte des Romani. Strukturen – Sprachgeschichte – Verwandtschaftsverhältnisse – Dialektkarten. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz.
- Calotă, Ion (1971): „Observații asupra graiului unei familii de rudari“, in: Actele celui de-al XII-lea congres internațional de lingvistică și filologie romanică II. București: Editions de l’Academie de la Republique de Roumanie, 343-350.
- Calotă, Ion (1974): Graiul rudarilor din Oltenia. Rezumatul tezei de doctorat. Craiova: Sectorul de reprografie al Centrului de științe sociale.
- Calotă, Ion (1993): „Sinonimie lexicală în graiul rudarilor din Oltenia“, in: Fonetica și Dialectologie XII, 67/71. București.
- Calotă, Ion (1995): Rudarii din Oltenia: Studiu de dialectologie și de geografie lingvistică românească. Craiova: Sibila.
- Filipescu, Teodor (1906): Coloniile romîne în Bosnia. Studiu etnografic, cu 20 ilustrațiuni și o hartă etnografică. București: Academia Romînă, Tipografia Göbl.
- Filipescu, Teodor (1907): „Karavlaška naselja u Bosni. Etnografsko-antropogeografsko proučavanje“, in: Glasnik Zemaljskoh Muzeja 19. Sarajevo: Zemaljska štamparija, 215-241.
- Gheție, Ion (1968): „Contribuții la istoria trecerii lui ea la e. Prezența lui ea în Muntenia la începutul secolului al XVIII-lea", in: Limba Română, XVIII/ 6, 501-508.
- Kahl, Thede (2011): Die Zigeuner und das Rumänische. Zur Sprache und Kultur der Vlach-Roma, Bajeschi und Rudari, in: Doppelbauer, Max; Kremnitz, Georg; Stiehler, Heinrich (ed.), Die Sprachen der Roma in der Romania. Wien: Praesens Verlag, 190-223.
- Kahl, Thede; Nechiti, Ioana (2012): „Aschenputtel bei den Bajeschi und Rudari. Vergleich zweier Märchen anhand von Feldaufnahmen in Ungarn und Griechenland”. In: Dahmen, Wolfgang et al. (Hg.): Südosteuropäische Romania: Siedlungs-/Migrationsgeschichte und Sprachtypologie (Romanistisches Kolloquium XXV), Tübingen: Narr, 191-226.
- Kemény, István (2002): ”Linguistic Groups and Usage Among the Hungarian Gypsies/Roma“, in: Kállai, Ernö (ed.): The Gypsies/The Roma in Hungarian Society. Budapest, 28-34.
- Kovalcsik, Katalin (1996): ”Roma or Boyash Identity. The Music of the Ardelan Boyashes in Hungary“, in: The World of Music, 38/1, 77-93.
- Orsós, Anna; Gábor, Janos; Komáromi, Mária; Majsai, Virág E. (2009): Krák, krák, vergyé. Béas mondókáskönyv. Kaposvár: Centrál Press Nyomda.
- Petrovici, Emil (1938): „Romînii din Serbia occidentală“, in: Dacoromania IX/ 1936-1938, 225-236.
- Pettan, Svanibor (2002): Roma muzsikusok Koszovóban, Kölcsönhatás és kreativitás / Rom Musicians in Kosovo, Interaction and Creativity. Budapest: Magyar Tudományos Akadémia Zenetudományi Intézet (= Európai cigány népzene 5).
- Pott, August F. (1844, 21964): Die Zigeuner in Europa und Asien: ethnographisch-linguistische Untersuchung, vornehmlich ihrer Herkunft und Sprache. Nach gedruckten und ungedruckten Quellen, Vol. 1: Einleitung und Grammatik. Halle, Heynemann. New edition, Leipzig 1964.
- Saramandu, Nicolae (1997): „Cercetări dialectale la un grup necunoscut de vorbitori ai romînei: Băiașii din Nordul Croației", in: Fonetică și dialectologie XVI, 97-130.
- Sikimić, Biljana (2003): ”Banyash Romanians in Serbia – The case of ethnic mimicry or hidden minority?“, in: Соболев, Андрей Н., Русаков, Александр Ю.: Языки и диалекты малых этнических групп на Балканах. Материалы международной научной конференции, Санкт-Петербург, 11-12 июня 2004 г. Санкт-Петербург, München, 258-267.
- Sikimić, Biljana; Ašić, Tijana (ed., 2008): The Romance Balkans. Романски Балкан. Belgrade (= Institute for Balkan Studies, Special Editions 203).
- Sorescu-Marinković, Annemarie (2008): ”The Bayash in Croatia: Romanian vernaculars in Baranja and Medjimurje“, in: Sikimić, Biljana; Ašić, Tijana (ed.): The Romance Balkans. Романски Балкан. Belgrade: Institute for Balkan Studies, Special Editions 203, 173-226.
- Sorescu-Marinković, Annemarie; Kahl, Thede; Sikimić, Biljana (eds., 2021): Boyash Studies: Researching “Our People”. Forum: Rumänien 40. Berlin, Frank & Timme.
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