Grecìa Salentina
   HOME

TheInfoList



Click Here for Items Related To - Grecìa Salentina
OR:
Grecìa Salentina on:   [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Amazon]

Grecìa Salentina (Griko for " Salentine Greece") is an area in the
peninsula A peninsula is a landform that extends from a mainland and is only connected to land on one side. Peninsulas exist on each continent. The largest peninsula in the world is the Arabian Peninsula. Etymology The word ''peninsula'' derives , . T ...
of
Salento Salento (; Salentino dialect, Salentino: ''Salentu''; Griko language, Salento Griko: ) is a Cultural area, cultural, List of historical states of Italy, historical, and geographic region at the southern end of the administrative region of Apuli ...
in southern
Italy Italy, officially the Italian Republic, is a country in Southern Europe, Southern and Western Europe, Western Europe. It consists of Italian Peninsula, a peninsula that extends into the Mediterranean Sea, with the Alps on its northern land b ...
, near the town of
Lecce Lecce (; ) is a city in southern Italy and capital of the province of Lecce. It is on the Salentine Peninsula, at the heel of the Italian Peninsula, and is over two thousand years old. Because of its rich Baroque architecture, Lecce is n ...
which is inhabited by the Griko people, an ethnic
Greek Greek may refer to: 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 of all kno ...
minority in southern Italy who speak
Griko Griko (endonym: /), sometimes spelled Grico, is one of the two dialects of Italiot Greek (the other being Calabrian Greek or ), spoken by Griko people in Salento, province of Lecce, Italy. Some Greek linguists consider it to be a Modern Greek ...
, a variant of
Greek Greek may refer to: 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 of all kno ...
.


Overview

The Union of the Towns of Grecìa Salentina (''Unione dei Comuni della Grecìa Salentina'') consists of eleven towns and forms part of the
province of Lecce The province of Lecce (; Salentino: ) is a province in the Apulia region of Italy. Its capital is the city of Lecce. The province is called the "Heel of Italy". Located on the Salento peninsula, it is the second most-populous province in Ap ...
in the administrative area of
Apulia Apulia ( ), also known by its Italian language, Italian name Puglia (), is a Regions of Italy, region of Italy, located in the Southern Italy, southern peninsular section of the country, bordering the Adriatic Sea to the east, the Strait of Ot ...
(''Puglia''), and was founded by the Griko population in 1966. The purpose of this union was to promote the knowledge of Griko and preserve its culture, by organizing research at the university, teaching the language at schools and publishing books and poetry in the endangered dialect. The following towns are members of the Union: Calimera,
Martano Martano (Griko: , translit. ; Salentino: ) is a town and ''comune'' of 9,573 inhabitants in the province of Lecce in Apulia, Italy, from Lecce and from Otranto. It is the biggest town of Grecìa Salentina, an area where some inhabitants, in ...
, Castrignano dei Greci, Corigliano d'Otranto, Melpignano,
Soleto Soleto ( Griko: ; Salentino: ; ) is a small Griko-speaking city located in the province of Lecce in Apulia, Italy. The town has a total population of 5,542 and is one of the nine towns of Grecìa Salentina where the Greek dialect Griko is spoke ...
, Sternatia, Zollino, Martignano, Carpignano Salentino and Cutrofiano. The towns of Carpignano Salentino and Cutrofiano joined the Union in 2007, though the inhabitants of these two towns have not spoken their original Greek dialect called ''griko'' for two centuries.


Demographics

Source:


Sports

Since 2020, the Grecia Salentina Marathon has been organized every year and the route starts in Piazza del Sole, in the heart of Calimera, while passing through 9 more municipalities of Grecia Salentina. In 2023, the football team AEK CROTONE (formerly Real Fondo Gesù) was founded in Crotone. The name and colors of the team refer to AEK of Athens. In 2014 in Taranto was founded the football club HELLAS TARANTO. https://www.salentosport.net/calcio/eccellenza/hellas-taranto-ennesima-involuzione-squadra-juniores/


See also

* Griko people *
Magna Graecia Magna Graecia refers to the Greek-speaking areas of southern Italy, encompassing the modern Regions of Italy, Italian regions of Calabria, Apulia, Basilicata, Campania, and Sicily. These regions were Greek colonisation, extensively settled by G ...
* Catepanate of Italy


References


External links


Grecia Salentina union website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Grecia Salentina Countries and territories where Greek is an official language