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POMAKS-the people on thecrossroads

Mina Petrova

Bulgaria

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population

There are about 750,000 Pomaks in total : around 100,000 in Albania; around 40,000 to 45,000 in Greece

and Macedonia; and between 250,000 and 300,000 in Bulgaria and around 300,000 in Turkey. Nobody

knows the exact number of Pomaks on the peninsula, so these are just approximate numbers.

The Pomaks in Bulgaria are referred to as Bulgarian Muslims (- blgari-mjusjulmani),

or under the ethnographic names Ahryani, Torbeshi, etc. They mainly inhabit the Rhodope Mountains in

Smolyan Province, Kardzhali Province, Pazardzhik Province and Blagoevgrad Province. There are

Pomaks in other parts of Bulgaria as well. There are a few Pomak villages in Burgas Province, Lovech

Province, Veliko Tarnovo Province and Ruse Province.

The Macedonian Muslims, or Torbe, are occasionally also referred to as Pomaks, especially in historical

context. They are a minority religious group in the Republic of Macedonia, although not all adopt a

Macedonian national identity and are linguistically distinct from the larger Muslim ethnic groups in theRepublic of Macedonia, Albanians and Turks.

Slavic-speaking Muslims, sometimes referred to as "Pomaks", live also in the Albanian region of Golo

Brdo. However these people are also referred to as "Torbe". They speak the Drimkol-Golo Brdo dialect of

the Macedonian language. Part of this people still self identify as Bulgarians.

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The Gorani occasionally are also referred to as Pomaks in historical context. They are people who inhabit the

Gora region, located between Albania, Kosovo and Macedonia. The general view is that they should be treated

as a distinct minority group. Part of these people are already albanised. By the end of 20th century in Yugoslavia

they have declared themselves to be Muslims by nationality.

Today the Pomaks (Greek: ) in Greece inhabit the prefectures of Xanthi, Rhodope and Evros.UntilGreco-Turkish War (19191922) and Population exchange between Greece and Turkey in 1923 Pomaks

inhabited a part of the regions of Moglena, Kostur and some other parts of Macedonia, Greece. The Pomaks of

Thrace were exempted from those exchanges and, together with Muslim Turks and Roma, were granted by the

Lausanne Treaty (1923) the right to primary education in Turkish and Greek. Some Pomaks still transmit their

dialect (called pomatsko in Greece) to their children and also speak Turkish and Greek, but a large part of them

no longer transmit it, having adopted Turkish or Greek as a first language.

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Historically, the Pomaks have been living only in the Eastern Thrace part of modern Turkey as a continuum of the

Pomak people in the Western Thrace. The rest of the Pomak population living in Anatolian part is a result of the

different migration waves since the Balkan Wars. Today, the native Pomaks of Eastern Thrace is mostly mixed with

emigrants from the Western Thrace and Turks living in the region. In Anatolia, the major Pomak populations are

concentrated mostly around the cities such as Eskisehir, Bursa, Izmit where they have been originally resettled upontheir arrival. There are 324.000 Pomaks in Turkey.Their primary language is Turkish but some families are speaking

also Bulgarian and Greek.

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etymologyAside from pomaks as they usually are called, there is a huge variety of other names, depending on the region ofresidence. Since the 1990s, the Muslims of Slavic origin in Bosnia and Herzegovina have officially been termed

Bosniaks. In different parts of the Balkans you will also find Ahtari, Apovtsi, Babechani, Dilsazi, Marvatsi, Torbeshiand Chchentsi (not to be confused with the people of Chechnya).

There are several theories about the etymologyof pomak, but the most popular are:

Pomak derived from pomagach-bulgarian verb pomagam-to help. According to that theory pomaks were a kindof Ottoman local support, they helped the Ottomans during the conquering of the Balkans. Later they took part inthe administration at least on a local level. Another association stands says that after Ottoman settlement theyendeavoured to find two types of the former population, whom later were given some privileges. One of the groupswas consisting of the Turks-earlier settlers and the other one of eretics who did not practice Orthodox or CatholicChristianity, but different varieties. Usually these people had special status among the rest servile population.

The second, very different one says the root was pomachen, or tortured, because Pomaks were victims of theofficial Ottoman policy of Islamisation and chose to live as Muslims rather than die as martyrs. But this theory isconcerned mainly about the religious aspect.

Some Greek researchers claim that Pomak is a derivative of pomax, or a drinker, a term that the ancient Hellenesapplied to the wine-loving Thracians.

The most extravagant theory states that Pomak comes from polyak, or Pole. The Slavic-speaking Muslimsappeared in the 17th Century, when refugees from the area of Podolia settled in the Rhodope, after their nativeland was conquered by the Ottomans. There, for some reason, they adopted Islam.

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origin

While there is no substantial controversy surrounding the roots of the Turks or the Romas, the debateabout the origins and true identity of Pomaks is never ending due to conflicting security and nationalinterests of Bulgaria, Turkey and Greece.

In Bulgaria, the Pomak population is referred to as both Bulgarian Mohammedans, Bulgarian SpeakingMuslims or Pomaks. The name Bulgarian Mohammedans is used in the official and legal terminology.This name is meant to reflect the Bulgarian historical thesis that the Pomaks used to be Slavic Christiansthat were subject to forced Islamization in the past.

In Greece there is not much historical data relating to origins of the Pomaks beyond the historical thesis ofthe coutry which argues that Pomaks are a decedent of Thracian tribes. Most of the existing sources pointto the 12th century for Islamization of this group when there were mass conversions. Yet, unlike Bulgaria,majority of the Greek sources point to voluntary nature of the conversions.

According to the Turkish historical thesis, these people are descendants of the Turkic tribes who havemigrated to region from Central Asia. The argument is that Pomaks are direct descendants of the KumanTribe who came along the Pecenek Turks into the Balkan Peninsula in 11th century. After the defeatagainst Byzantium, Peceneks have been scattered and assimilated and disappeared. Yet, some of theKuman Turks were left in the area and converted to Islam by missionaries from Middle East and West

Africa in 12th century. Thus, Pomaks had established a Muslim existence in the Southern Balkans beforethe latters conquest by the Ottomans. So, Pomaks are the oldest Turkish population in Europe.

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language

Pomaks are those whose mother tongue is Pomakika (name in Greek Pomakci (name intheir language); most linguists call that language Pomak and, sometimes, Bulgarian. ThePomak language belongs to the linguistic family of the Southern Slavic languages, and,within them, to the linguistic group of Bulgaro-Macedonian. There is no information on

Pomak dialects. Although there is no written tradition, the appropriate alphabet to write thelanguage is the Cyrillic. It is generally believed that Pomak is one of the various Bulgaro-Macedonian dialects which existed in the Southern Balkans before the emergence ofmodern nation-states and their corresponding literary languages.

A Bulgarian researcher Tsvetkova mentions Paul Lucas, a celebrated French traveler of18th century, who describes Slavic speaking Muslims in the Rhodope Mountains in 1706in his notes. Crossing the mountains from Plovdiv to Drama, he writes about thecommunities he encounters:

And when we had covered a distance of seven miles in thosesame mountains and along very arduous paths, we passed through the

village called Pashmakli. It is populated by Turks only, but they do not

speak their language. Their dialect is, rather, distorted Slavonic mixed

with Greek and Bulgarian(Tsvetkova, 1963).

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religion

The Pomaks are virtually all Muslim, and their religion makesup an integral part of their ethnic identity. Yet, among most

Pomaks there is an absence of traditional Islamic practices.Their language even lacks many religious words vital to theIslamic faith and traditions. Muslim saints are practicallyunknown to the Pomaks, while the feast days of variousChristian saints continue to be observed. Weddings and otherceremonial occasions often combine Muslim and Christian

traditions. Fasting during Ramadan (the ninth month of theIslamic year) and other Muslim rituals were once observed.However, today, these customs have largely disappeared. Therelative isolation of the Pomaks from other Muslims has allowedthe mixing of beliefs to continue unhindered for centuries.

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history

Pomaks started to become Muslim graduallyafter the Ottoman occupation (14th century) tothe end of the 18th century. But according toOttoman registers from the 15th and 16thcentury 3/4 of the population of Western Thrace

has been of Muslim faith. Further more thedocuments show that not only Islam has beenspread in the area at that time, but that thePomaks have even participated in Ottomanmilitary operation voluntarily as is the case withthe village of Shahin (Echinos). The mass turnto Islam in the Central Rhodope Mountainshappened between the 16th and the 17thcentury and that fact still appear in thememories of the Pomak communities. A lot ofpeople prefered to die instead of becoming

muslim and they used to jump in a precipice.Precipices of Pomak sacrifice are mentioned inmany Pomak towns and villages . But accordingto recent investigations the theory of forcedconversion to Islam, supported mainly by someBulgarian scientists from the era of communismis not historically objective and most of theevidences being faked or misinterpreted.

Besides forced converting there were aneconomic motives for the population to do thisvoluntarily. The sultans imposed an extra tax ontheir non-Muslim subjects and so it was not intheir interest to reduce their takings from this

hara, the main source of income for theirtreasury.

Rather, it was the lower tax rates for Muslimsthat persuaded the people living in the poorerareas of the empire, such as the Rhodope, togive up Christianity, especially bearing in mindthat the Patriarch in Constantinople also taxedthem highly. At the beginning of the Ottomaninvasion, mediaeval Balkan aristocrats hadanother reason to embrace Muhammad. TheOttoman Empire guaranteed social prosperityonly to Muslims.

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In 1881, 19121913 and 1942, three large scalecampaigns were conducted to make Pomaks dothe opposite of what their predecessors haddone: they were forced to convert toChristianity. The Communists brought in a

change of tactics. They began changing Pomaknames for Bulgarian ones. Their policy reachedits culmination with the so-called RevivalProcess, but it actually started in 1956, when itwas decided that Pomaks "had to realize theirBulgarian nationality."

Pomaks responded with self-isolation and thecreation of their own legends about thehardships they had suffered. In 2000, a manfrom a Pomak hamlet in the Rhodope recountedthat during the Revival Process dozens of men

who did not want to change their names weretaken away and executed. No historian hasdocumented such a case.

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lifestyle

The Pomak economy is based on agriculture.Their major crops include rye, barley, corn, flax,potatoes, tobacco, and hemp (a fibrous plantuseful for making ropes or cords). Raisinganimals such as cows, goats, and sheep is also

very important. Pomak women are renownedfor their excellent weaving abilities. ManyPomaks also earn their income as migrantworkers. The Pomak diet primarily consists ofbread, potatoes, and beans. They also enjoyyogurt, various cheeses, and lamb and goatmeat.

The Pomak farmers live in rural villages that aresurrounded by their fields and pastures. Most ofthe people live in two-story dwellings. The upperfloor is used as living quarters, while the lower

floor serves as a stable for the animals. Thehouses were traditionally constructed of stone,wood, and clay, with sloping slate roofs.Recently, however, some Pomaks have begunto build homes out of brick or cinder block, withceramic tile roofs.

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Traditionally, Pomak marriages are

arranged between the families of the

prospective bride and groom. The

wedding occurs when the couplereaches their mid- to late teens. Before

marriage, the bride prepares her own

dowry, which consists of household

items and clothing. Although Islamic law

allows a man to have as many as four

wives, polygamy was never frequent

among the Pomaks, and is currently

prohibited by Greek law.