Averchie (or Averkios) was born in the
Aromanian village of
Avdella (), then in the
Ottoman Empire and now in
Greece. Born either in 1806 or 1818, his date of birth is controversial among researchers. His secular name was Atanasie Iaciu Buda. Atanasie's father was
celnic Iani Iaciu Buda, who was mayor of Avdella during the times of
Ali Pasha of Ioannina. His mother was Anastasia ("Tasa") and he had two sisters, Marița (born 1803) and Șanea (born 1805). He also had an adoptive sister, Gheorgana, whom his parents adopted at the age of four, before the birth of any of the three other siblings. She was married to a man named Panaioti at a young age. Atanasie's nephew Ioan Șomu Tomescu was a teacher who wrote an account on the life of Averchie published in 1929 by the Aromanian historian
Victor Papacostea. Atanasie was orphaned by his father at a relatively young age, and after completing his education, he became a monk on
Mount Athos, first at the
Agiou Pavlou Monastery and then at the
Monastery of Iviron. Becoming
hegumen and
archimandrite, Averchie was known in Mount Athos as "Averchie the Vlach" (; "
Vlach" being a name of the
Greeks for the Aromanians). In the Iviron Monastery he met the
Romanian general and politician
Christian Tell. When asked by Tell ("Are you a
Romanian, father?"), Averchie answered ("Yes, I am an
Aromanian"). He is also recorded as having exclaimed ("I am an
Aromanian too") in 1862 during a military ceremony in
Bucharest in
Romania which emotionally moved him. In 1860, Averchie was sent to Romania to settle the Iviron Monastery's disputes with the Romanian government regarding the lands of the monastic estates. There, he created contacts with important Romanian intellectual and political figures, including
Cezar Bolliac,
Dimitrie Bolintineanu,
C. A. Rosetti,
Dimitrie Cozacovici and even Prince
Alexandru Ioan Cuza himself. In 1865, 20,000
Romanian lei were allocated for the establishment of a
boarding school in Bucharest for Aromanian children from the Ottoman Empire, which functioned at the monastery of the
Church of the Holy Apostles. Together with
Romanian Aromanian folklorist and translator
Ioan D. Caragiani, Averchie recruited that same year ten children from Aromanian villages of the
Pindus mountains, including some from his native Avdella, and took them to Bucharest to be educated at the school and return later as teachers of the first
Romanian schools for Aromanians. Averchie was the
head teacher of the school for years, and was later accused of misusing money. The school would end up being disestablished, after which Averchie retired to the
Radu Vodă Monastery in Bucharest, where he remained until 1875. He then returned to his home region, retiring to a monastery in the village of
Grizano, where he spent the last moments of his life. Despa I. Șomu Tomescu, daughter of Șomu Tomescu and grandniece of Averchie, gave an account on the death of Averchie based on what she had heard from her father and grandmother. According to her, Averchie would have died poisoned by Greek monks around February (she did not know of which year) after
confessing a dying woman of a Greek family in the monastery in Grizano. Romanian Aromanian biographer and essayist
Sterie Diamandi stated that "we do not know to what extent this version corresponds to reality" and lamented the fact that the date and details of the death of a prominent figure like Averchie were not known. Today, Averchie, together with
Apostol Mărgărit, are seen as some of the first and most important figures of the Aromanian national movement that was supported and promoted by Romania. Romanian researchers Anca Tanașoca and
Nicolae Șerban Tanașoca defined both figures as "the founders and organizers of the network of Romanian schools and
churches of the Balkan Peninsula", which functioned under the tutelage of the Romanian government until the times of
World War II. According to Diamandi, Averchie's arrival in Romania started a new epoch in the
history of the Aromanians, "the epoch of national rebirth". ==References==