Kato Kleines ( el, Κάτω Κλεινές, before 1926: Κάτω Κλέστινα - ''Kato Klestina'';

Bulgarian Bulgarian may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to the country of Bulgaria * Bulgarians, a South Slavic ethnic group * Bulgarian language, a Slavic language * Bulgarian alphabet * A citizen of Bulgaria, see Demographics of Bulgaria * Bul ...

and Macedonian: Долно Клештино, ''Dolno Kleštino'') is a village and a former

municipality A municipality is usually a single administrative division having corporate status and powers of self-government or jurisdiction as granted by national and regional laws to which it is subordinate. The term ''municipality'' may also mean the go ...

in Florina regional unit,

West Macedonia Western Macedonia ( el, Δυτική Μακεδονία, translit=Ditikí Makedonía, ) is one of the thirteen regions of Greece, consisting of the western part of Macedonia. Located in north-western Greece, it is divided into the regional unit ...

Greece Greece,, or , romanized: ', officially the Hellenic Republic, is a country in Southeast Europe. It is situated on the southern tip of the Balkans, and is located at the crossroads of Europe, Asia, and Africa. Greece shares land borders with ...

. Since the 2011 local government reform it is part of the municipality

Florina Florina ( el, Φλώρινα, ''Flórina''; known also by some alternative names) is a town and municipality in the mountainous northwestern Macedonia, Greece. Its motto is, 'Where Greece begins'. The town of Florina is the capital of the F ...

, of which it is a municipal unit. The municipal unit has an area of 188.564 km². It is 7 km north of the city of

. The population was 2,735 in 2011.

History

The village was first mentioned in an Ottoman

defter A ''defter'' (plural: ''defterler'') was a type of tax register and land cadastre in the Ottoman Empire. Description The information collected could vary, but ''tahrir defterleri'' typically included details of villages, dwellings, household ...

of 1468, where it is listed under the name of ''Kleshtino'' and described as having ninety-seven households. In 1481, the village possessed two hundred and thirteen households, a church, mills, and a

kiln A kiln is a thermally insulated chamber, a type of oven, that produces temperatures sufficient to complete some process, such as hardening, drying, or chemical changes. Kilns have been used for millennia to turn objects made from clay int ...

. The Turkish documents suggest a prosperous place, noting the production of vines, walnuts, onions, garlic, cabbage, peas, flax, honey, pigs, and

silkworms The domestic silk moth (''Bombyx mori''), is an insect from the moth family Bombycidae. It is the closest relative of ''Bombyx mandarina'', the wild silk moth. The silkworm is the larva or caterpillar of a silk moth. It is an economically imp ...

. In 1845 the Russian

slavist Slavic (American English) or Slavonic (British English) studies, also known as Slavistics is the academic field of area studies concerned with Slavic peoples, Slavic areas, languages, literature, history, and culture. Originally, a Slavist or Sla ...

Victor Grigorovich recorded ''Kleshtina'' (''Клештина'') as mainly

village.

Johann Georg von Hahn Johann Georg von Hahn (11 July 1811 – 23 September 1869) was an Austrian Empire, Austrian and later Austria-Hungary, Austro-Hungarian diplomat, Philology, philologist and specialist in History of Albania, Albanian history, Albanian language, lan ...

in his map from 1861 marked the village as

, too. Besides Slav-speaking population there were 150

Albanians The Albanians (; sq, Shqiptarët ) are an ethnic group and nation native to the Balkan Peninsula who share a common Albanian ancestry, culture, history and language. They primarily live in Albania, Kosovo, North Macedonia, Montenegro, Se ...

in Kato Kleines in the end of 19th century.Васил Кънчов. „Македония. Етнография и статистика“. София, 1900, стр.249 (Kanchov, Vasil. Macedonia — ethnography and statistics Sofia, 1900, p. 249).
/ref> According to the statistics of Geographers Dimitri Mishev and D. M. Brancoff, the village had a total Christian population of 504 in 1905, all Patriarchist

Bulgarians Bulgarians ( bg, българи, Bǎlgari, ) are a nation and South Slavic ethnic group native to Bulgaria and the rest of Southeast Europe. Etymology Bulgarians derive their ethnonym from the Bulgars. Their name is not completely understo ...

.Dimitri Mishev and D. M. Brancoff
''La Macédoine et sa Population Chrétienne''
p. 176 It also had 1 Greek school. Muslims of Kato Klestina were Albanian speakers. The Greek census (1920) recorded 792 people in the village and in 1923 there were 320 inhabitants (or 49 families) who were Muslim. Following the

Greek-Turkish population exchange The 1923 population exchange between Greece and Turkey ( el, Ἡ Ἀνταλλαγή, I Antallagí, ota, مبادله, Mübâdele, tr, Mübadele) stemmed from the "Convention Concerning the Exchange of Greek and Turkish Populations" signed at ...

, in 1926 within Kato Klestina there were refugee families from

East Thrace East Thrace or Eastern Thrace ( tr, Doğu Trakya or simply ''Trakya''; el, Ανατολική Θράκη, ''Anatoliki Thraki''; bg, Източна Тракия, ''Iztochna Trakiya''), also known as Turkish Thrace or European Turkey, is the pa ...

(2),

Asia Minor Anatolia, tr, Anadolu Yarımadası), and the Anatolian plateau, also known as Asia Minor, is a large peninsula in Western Asia and the westernmost protrusion of the Asian continent. It constitutes the major part of modern-day Turkey. The re ...

(1) and the

Caucasus The Caucasus () or Caucasia (), is a region between the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea, mainly comprising Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, and parts of Southern Russia. The Caucasus Mountains, including the Greater Caucasus range, have historically ...

(74). The Greek census (1928) recorded 817 village inhabitants. In 1928, there were 77 refugee families (288 people). Kato Kleines had 523 inhabitants in 1981. In fieldwork done by Riki Van Boeschoten in late 1993, Kato Kleines was populated by a

Greek Greek may refer to: Greece Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group. *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family. **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...

population descended from Anatolian Greek refugees who arrived during the Greek-Turkish population exchange, and Slavophones. The

Macedonian language Macedonian (; , , ) is an Eastern South Slavic language. It is part of the Indo-European language family, and is one of the Slavic languages, which are part of a larger Balto-Slavic branch. Spoken as a first language by around two million ...

was spoken in the village by people over 30 in public and private settings. Children understood the language, but mostly did not use it.

Pontic Greek Pontic Greek ( pnt, Ποντιακόν λαλίαν, or ; el, Ποντιακή διάλεκτος, ; tr, Rumca) is a variety of Modern Greek indigenous to the Pontus region on the southern shores of the Black Sea, northeastern Anatolia, ...

was spoken by people over 60, mainly in private. Table 1: Réfugiés grecs; Footnote 2: Le terme « réfugié » est utilisé ici pour désigner les Grecs d’Asie Mineure qui se sont établis en Grèce dans les années vingt après l’échange de population entre la Turquie et la Grèce (Traité de Lausanne, 1924). Table 3: Kato Klines, 523; R, S, M2, P3; R = Refugiés, S = Slavophones, M = macédonien, P = dialecte pontique"

Notes

Former municipalities in Western Macedonia Populated places in Florina (regional unit) {{WMacedonia-geo-stub