Dalmatian Italians
Dalmatian Italians are an Italian national minority in the region of Dalmatia (within Croatia and Montenegro) that is mostly historical. After the 1840s the ethnic group suffered from a trend of decreasing numbers and only around 1,000 of the grouping remain.
History
Roman Dalmatia and the Middle ages
Roman Dalmatia was fully latinized by 476 AD when the Western Roman Empire disappeared, according to scholar Theodor Mommsen in his book "The Provinces of the Roman Empire".
During the Barbarian Invasions Avars allied with certain Slavic tribes, invaded and plundered Byzantine Illyria. This eventually led to the settlement of different Slavic tribes in the Balkans. The original Roman population endured within the coastal cities and in the inhospitable Dinaric Alps (the latter were later known as "Morlachs" or Vlachs).
The Dalmatian cities retained their Romanic culture and language in cities such as Jadera (Zadar, Zara), Spalatum (Split, Spalato) and Ragusa (Dubrovnik). Their own vulgar Latin, developed in the Dalmatian language, a now extinct Romance language.
These coastal cities (politically part of the Byzantine Empire) maintained political, cultural and economic links with Italy, through the Adriatic sea. On the other side communications with the mainland were difficult because of the Dinaric Alps. Due to the sharp orography of Dalmatia, even communications between the different Dalmatian cities, occurred mainly trough the sea.
This helped Dalmatian cities to develop a unique Romance culture, despite the mostly Slavicized mainland.
References
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