The Romanians in Bulgaria ( or ; , ''rumŭntsi'', or , ''vlasi''), are a small ethnic minority in

Bulgaria Bulgaria, officially the Republic of Bulgaria, is a country in Southeast Europe. It is situated on the eastern portion of the Balkans directly south of the Danube river and west of the Black Sea. Bulgaria is bordered by Greece and Turkey t ...

. In the country, Romanians live in several northern regions, mostly along the

Danube The Danube ( ; see also #Names and etymology, other names) is the List of rivers of Europe#Longest rivers, second-longest river in Europe, after the Volga in Russia. It flows through Central and Southeastern Europe, from the Black Forest sou ...

. This includes a region between the city of

Vidin Vidin (, ) is a port city on the southern bank of the Danube in north-western Bulgaria. It is close to the borders with Romania and Serbia, and is also the administrative centre of Vidin Province, as well as of the Metropolitan of Vidin (since ...

and the Timok river; these Romanians form a continuous community with the Romanian community in the Timok Valley of

Serbia , image_flag = Flag of Serbia.svg , national_motto = , image_coat = Coat of arms of Serbia.svg , national_anthem = () , image_map = , map_caption = Location of Serbia (gree ...

. Another region with a high density of Romanians is located between the towns of Oryahovo and

Svishtov Svishtov ( ) List of cities and towns in Bulgaria, is a town in northern Bulgaria, located in Veliko Tarnovo Province on the right bank of the Danube river opposite the Romanian town of Zimnicea. It is the administrative centre of the homonymous S ...

. Another goes from Tutrakan to the Bulgaria–Romania border at

Northern Dobruja Northern Dobruja ( or simply ; , ''Severna Dobrudzha'') is the part of Dobruja within the borders of Romania. It lies between the lower Danube, Danube River and the Black Sea, bordered in the south by Southern Dobruja, which is a part of Bulgaria. ...

. There also are scattered groups of Romanians within the interior of Bulgaria, such as in Pleven or around Vratsa. The Romanians in Bulgaria are not recognized as a national minority, and they lack minority rights such as schools or churches in their own

Romanian language Romanian (obsolete spelling: Roumanian; , or , ) is the official and main language of Romania and Moldova. Romanian is part of the Eastern Romance languages, Eastern Romance sub-branch of Romance languages, a linguistic group that evolved fr ...

. Many are subject to assimilation. In Bulgaria, the local Romanians are commonly referred to as "

Vlachs Vlach ( ), also Wallachian and many other variants, is a term and exonym used from the Middle Ages until the Modern Era to designate speakers of Eastern Romance languages living in Southeast Europe—south of the Danube (the Balkan peninsula ...

". This term is also applied to the

Aromanians The Aromanians () are an Ethnic groups in Europe, ethnic group native to the southern Balkans who speak Aromanian language, Aromanian, an Eastern Romance language. They traditionally live in central and southern Albania, south-western Bulgari ...

of the country, as well as to Romanian-speaking Boyash

Gypsies {{Infobox ethnic group , group = Romani people , image = , image_caption = , flag = Roma flag.svg , flag_caption = Romani flag created in 1933 and accepted at the 1971 World Romani Congress , ...

. The German linguist Gustav Weigand dealt in the most detailed and concrete way with the Vlach population south of the Danube. In 1905 he undertook a special trip through Bulgaria to establish where the Vlach settlements are located and to characterize their language. According to Weigand, the largest group of Vlach population moved to the Bulgarian lands in the 1830s, when the so-called Organic statute (1831), was introduced in Walachia, by virtue of which men were subject to mandatory military service. Using the data from the population census in the Principality of Bulgaria in 1900, he pointed out that, at the end of the 19th century, 86,000 Vlachs were registered in Bulgaria, of which 11,708 (about 15%) were born north of the river, which means that they moved south of the Danube in the second half of the 19th century. The Romanians of Bulgaria have several organizations of their own, one of them being the AVE Union of Romanian Ethnicities of Bulgaria (), presided by Ivo Gheorghiev, which often organizes cultural events. One example are celebrations for the Romanian Language Day organized in

by this organization. According to the

Treaty of Craiova The Treaty of Craiova (; ) was signed on 7 September 1940 and ratified on 13 September 1940 by the Kingdom of Bulgaria and the Kingdom of Romania. Under its terms, Romania had to allow Bulgaria to retake Southern Dobruja, which Romania had gained ...

of 1940, Bulgaria and Romania exchanged a large part of the minorities living on their territory.Deletant, Dennis (2006). Hitler's forgotten ally: Ion Antonescu and his regime, Romania 1940-1944. Palgrave Macmillan. p. 376. . The following are historical census results showing the presence of Romanians in Bulgaria:
Out of 3,598 self-identified Vlachs, 165 declared their mother tongue as Bulgarian, 1,462 as Vlach, 1,964 as Romanian and 4 as "other" in 2011. Out of 866 self-identified Romanians, 37 declared their mother tongue as Bulgarian, 3 as Vlach, and 822 as Romanian in 2011.

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References

{{Romanian diaspora

Ethnic groups in Bulgaria

See also

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