Theories On The Romanians' Ethnogenesis
Romanians (also known as "Vlachs" in the Middle Ages) speak a language descending from the Latin spoken in the Roman provinces of Southeastern Europe. Eastern Romance now has four variants, a common tongue's former dialects which developed into separate languages. "Daco-Romanian", the official language of Romania is the most widespread. Speakers of the Aromanian live in scattered communities in Albania, Bulgaria, Greece, and Macedonia. Further two, by now nearly extinct variants, Megleno-Romanian and Istro-Romanian, are spoken in some villages in Macedonia and Greece and in Croatia, respectively.
Inscriptions from the Roman period prove that a line ("Jireček Line") can be drawn through the Balkan Peninsula which once separated the predominantly Latin-speaking northern provinces (including Dacia, Moesia and Pannonia) from the southern regions where Greek remained the predominant language. All Eastern Romance languages started to develop in the territories north of this line. However, the exact place has for centuries been debated by scholars, because there is "a certain disaccord between the effective process of Roman expansion and Romanization and the present ethnic configuration of Southeastern Europe" (Lucian Boia). Political and ideological considerations, including the dispute over Transylvania between Hungary and Romania, have also colored these scholarly discussions. Accordingly, theories on the Romanian Urheimat ("homeland") can be divided into two or even more major groups.
after the fall of the Balkan provinces, a pastoral Latin–Roman tradition served as the point of departure for a Valachian–Roman ethnogenesis. This kind of virtuality — ethnicity as hidden potential that comes to the fore under certain historical circumstances — is indicative of our new understanding of ethnic processes. In this light, the passionate discussion for or against Roman-Romanian continuity has been misled by a conception of ethnicity that is far too inflexible —Pohl, Walter (1998)Read more about this topic: Origin Of The Romanians
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“We do not talk—we bludgeon one another with facts and theories gleaned from cursory readings of newspapers, magazines and digests.”
—Henry Miller (1891–1980)