Slavia Friulana

The term Slavia Friulana could possibly be used to refer to all Friulian territories with a Slavic presence, including the municipalities of Lusevera, Taipana, Torreano, Resia, San Pietro al Natisone, San Leonardo, Pulfero, Drenchia, Grimacco, Stregna, Savogna and the mountainous areas of the municipalities of Tarcento, Nimis, Attimis, Faedis, Prepotto and Montenars. == Name ==

Since the beginning of the 8th century AD (c. 720), Slavic people settled in this area and in the Middle Ages they would have been called Sclavons. In the early 16th century, the Venetian authorities dubbed this border region of their Republic as Schiavonia Veneta, meaning "Venetian Slav-land". The Venetian words Schiavoni and Schiavonia were general terms used for all Slavic peoples In Slovene, the traditional term has been Beneška Slovenija, which is a literal translation of Schiavonia Veneta. Until the early 19th century, there was no distinction between the terms "Slav" and "Slovene" in Venetian Slavia. However, from the times of Romantic nationalism onward, the term Slovenija, which had been sporadically used to denote lands inhabited by Slovenes/Slavs, took over a new meaning, denoting the idea of modern Slovenia. The old term Beneška Slovenija was thus assimilated to a new meaning, as its name now meant "Venetian Slovenia". As a more neutral colloquial term, the name Benečija came into usage, which however also means Veneto in Slovene. After World War I, as soon as the Italian kingdom expanded its borders eastwards (including slavophone territories in Istria and in the so-called Habsburgic Illyrian kingdom), the region started to be commonly called Slavia Friulana instead of a generic Slavia Italiana. == History ==

(Stara Gora) has been the most important religious centre of Slavia Veneta since the 11th century. Early periods In the late 6th century Slavic tribes settled the area. They stopped in front of the Lombard defensive line on the edge of Friuli, which today represents the approximate linguistic border between Slovenian and Friulian. The Alpine Slavs western neighbors were the Lombards, with whom they frequently fought between the 7th and 8th centuries. From the 9th century onward, the region belonged first to the Duchy of Friuli and later to the Patriarchate of Aquileia. Under the Venetian Republic In 1420 the Patriarchate of Aquileia was invaded by the Republic of Venice. The Venetian authorities decided to absorb the Natisone Valley "gastaldia di Antro " in the Cividale's one, but at the same time they gave the local Slavs a remarkable autonomy. In fact, the territory was structured in two co-valleys (Antro and Merso) represented by their people's assemblies called arenghi; each co-valley had also the right to elect its own judges and its own tribunals (banche) whose judiciary power extended to the villages that weren't the object of feudal investitures; the whole Schiavonia had important tax benefits and its only military duties were to provide 200 men for the border defense against the neighbouring Habsburg Empire and fortify the nearby city of Cividale and the fortress of Palmanova as well. The ancient and commercial road of the Natisone valley, which connected Carniola to Italy, lost its importance soon after the Habsburgs inherited the county of Gorizia and conquered Upper Isonzo Valley; the Austrians built another road to Gorizia passing along the border and this caused economic damage to the whole area which became poorer than it was before. Napoleonic and Austrian rule In 1797, most of the Venetian Republic was annexed to the Habsburg Empire, including Schiavonia Veneta. The Habsburg authorities abolished the ancient privileges of the local Slav populations, as they had already done with a similar system of autonomy in neighboring Tolmin County in 1717. In 1805, the region was submitted to French rule, which did not restore the privileges, but replaced the old boroughs with French-style townships, led by government-appointed mayors. In 1813, the region fell again under Habsburg domination and in 1815 it was included in the Austrian administrative unit of Lombardy-Venetia. Most of the reforms introduced by the French authorities were kept. Under the rule of the Austrian Empire, the clergy began to teach standard Slovenian to the population. Peter Podreka (1822–1889) gave the young people the Slovene Alphabet (1852) and the Slovene Catechism (1869), with which they began to learn standard Slovenian for the first time in history. During World War II the Slovene partisan resistance, led by the Liberation Front of the Slovenian People, penetrated the region. The Kobarid Republic was established as a temporary administration after the Italian armistice in early September 1943. In early November 1943, Nazi German forces crushed the insurgency, and incorporated the whole area into the Operational Zone Adriatic Coast. In 1944, the Italian resistance movement also became active in the mountains of Slavia Friulana. Tensions between the Yugoslav (Slovene) and Italian resistance movements rose. The Liberation Front of the Slovenian People wanted to annex the region to a Yugoslav Communist federation, while the Italian resistance was split between the Communists who partially supported the Yugoslav claims, and the Liberal-democratic who wanted Slavia Friulana to remain part of Italy. In February 1945, the Porzus massacre occurred, in which the communist and filo-Yugoslav Italian partisans killed several members of the Italian liberal-democratic resistance members. In May 1945 the whole area was invaded by the Yugoslav People's Army, which however withdrew a few weeks later after the British arrival. Liberal-democratic-catholic partisans, members of the Royal Army and the defeated fascist soldiers joined up together to fight the communists and the Yugoslavs. Italian Republic s in Slavia Friulana were erected in the late 1990s. In 1945, Slavia Friulana again became an integral part of Italy. It was included in the region of Friuli-Venezia Giulia. Between 1945 and 1947, Slavia Friulana was a region on the border with the Communist Bloc, and it was listed as a special operational zone of Gladio, a clandestine NATO "stay-behind" operation in Italy after World War II, intended to counter a possible Warsaw Pact invasion of Western Europe. The activists of Gladio were mostly local members of the Alpini troops. After the war, discrimination against Slovenes continued, as the Italians equated Slavs with communism and saw them as potential traitors and spies, even though they were fairly loyal to Italy, unlike the Slovenes in the Gorizia and Trieste regions. In the following decades, the presence of a militarized border didn't allow an economic and infrastructural development and this situation caused a widespread emigration during the same period. Europe's ideological division ignited in this area an ethnic one: local communists continued to support the Yugoslav socialist regime claiming the recognition of a Slovene minority; also a few priests continued to identify the population as Slovene. On the other hand, some locals consider themselves as Italo-slavs or nedižouci (inhabitants of the Natisone valley; singular: nedižovac) and rečanji (inhabitants of the Alberone, Erbezzo and Cosizza valleys; singular: rečanj). They claim to speak nediško, with ethnical differences by the Slovene neighbours. Although Yugoslavia started its dissolution after Josip Broz Tito died in 1980 and the cold war ended in 1989, this ethnic debate hasn't been cleared yet and it's still caged within an ideological contest. Population trends Many of the villages lost more than two thirds of their populations, as Slavs from Friulian Slavia moved to larger urban areas in Northern Italy, Switzerland, Belgium and Germany. In May and September 1976, two earthquakes hit Friuli, causing large scale damages. After 1977 Although the area was largely depopulated after 1977, the political pressure was lifted after the Treaty of Osimo between Italy and Yugoslavia, but with no economic improvement. In the late 1970s, the first elementary and high school with Slovene as a language of instruction was established in San Pietro al Natisone, and in 2001, the Italian state recognized the local population as a Slovene minority living in the area, guaranteeing it full rights but ignoring the claims of those who consider themselves as non-Slovene. After Slovenia's entry into the European Union in 2004, the relations between the Slavia Friulana and the bordering Goriška region have intensified. == Language, culture and religion ==

in the Resia Valley. Most people in Slavia Friulana (considering the whole slavophone area) speak three different Slovene dialects, named after the major valleys that form those territories: first of all the Natisone Valley dialect, the Torre Valley dialect and the Resian dialect. The first two are closely related to each other and to other dialects in the Littoral dialect group. While the Resian dialect is more closely related to the Slovenian Carinthian dialects. Almost all of the inhabitants are fluent in Italian, which is taught in schools and present in the media and in the administration. Friulian is also widespread, especially in the municipalities of Montenars, Tarcento, Nimis, Attimis, Torreano, and Prepotto. Because of the lack of education in Slovene in the Resian and Torre valleys, some of the inhabitants do not master standard Slovene. Many do not understand it either, especially in the areas where the Slovenian TV and radio are not accessible, since standard Slovene is not entirely intelligible with the dialects spoken in the region, due to the large number of Friulian and Italian loanwords. They are however intelligible with the neighbouring Slovene dialects spoken in the Slovenian Littoral, especially the Soča and Brda dialects. The vast majority of the people belong to the Roman Catholic Church and the religion plays an important role in the local culture. The Roman Catholic priests have traditionally been the most important promoters of the Slovene language and culture in Slavia Friulana. Anyway, the linguistic matter hasn't been clarified yet. In the late 19th century, the Polish linguist Jan Baudouin de Courtenay considered the four local languages as different Slavic ones, rich in Slavic archaisms which make them often sound closer to Serbian. He classified the four Friulian Slav groups as those of the Resia Valley, Torre Valleys, Natisone Valleys, and Judrio Valleys. Slavia Friulana is known for its rich folk traditions. Numerous folk and ethno music bands come from the region, and many of them are popular throughout Slovenia and the Friuli-Venezia Giulia. The best-known of these bands are probably the Beneški fantje ("Venetian Lads"), which are considered to be oldest still existing Slovene band. Besides its archaic traditional music and dances, the Resia valley is also known for its folk tales, mainly animal fables; these were edited and translated into standard Slovene by the scholar Milko Matičetov, and published as a children's picture book by Mladinska knjiga in 1976. The book saw eight editions and was adapted into a puppet show ("Beasties from Resia") by RTV Slovenija in 1976, with a huge impact in popularizing the Friulian Slav folk culture in Slovenia. Since the late 1980s, Slavia Friulana has also emerged as one of the major centres of high quality Slovene dialect poetry. The best-known poets from the region are Silvana Paletti, Francesco Bergnach, and Marina Cernetig. Since 1994, the artistic project Stazione di Topolò – Postaja Topolove or "Topolò Station" takes place every summer in the small village of Topolò (, known as Topolove or Topoluove in the local dialect). The project, which is the most important cultural and artistic event in the region, is an attempt to bring together contemporary visual art with and the local folk traditions. == Notable people from the region ==

• Anton Klodič Sabladoski, philologian, linguist and poet • Terezija Dush, Slovenian herder, servant, nanny, and Marian seeress • Jožef Školč, politician (from Breginj), founder and first president of the Liberal Democratic Party • Pietro Fanna, professional soccer player • Lorenzo Crisetig, professional footballer • Roberto Chiacig, professional basketball player == See also ==