Maps of Power

Court Register of Sicil 1633

Properties

ID	15478
System Class	Source
Case Study	Ethnonym of the Vlachs
Provenance	Ottoman
Source	Court Register

Description

Document No. 5 of Sicil 3 (page 5a), Document No. 6 of Sicil 3 (page 15b) and Document No. 1 of Sicil 3 (page 16a) of the Bitola Court were composed in the third decade of Jumādá al-ākhirah (between 23 and 31 December 1633). In them, it is indicated that Nicio from the village Gopeš in kaza Ohrid, son of Dimko, declared in front of the court in Bitola: „Walking from our village together with my friends Dimo and Velko, we went down to a garden near the village Kutretino, which is in by God protected kaza of Monastir. At midnight, while we were asleep, we were attacked by armed inhabitants of the village Kutretino. They killed my friends, Dimo and Velko and they dangerously wounded me 3 or 4 times, thinking that they killed me too. They left us by the willows near Tsrna Reka. They robbed us, taking 3 mules, 6,000 akçe (silver coins), 3 loads of wheat and other stuff”. The court in Bitola sent investigators in the village Kutretino, where they found the robbed blankets in the house of Goshe. After hearing the accused and the witnesses, the court in Bitola made the following verdict: “It is true that the mentioned Goshe is an old bandit and road raider. His full time job is to kill passengers who pass by his village and rob them. He is making riot in the Empire. It is necessary for him to disappear from the face of the Earth”.

literature

Capidan 1925 — 62, 125 , Hâciu 1936 — 113-114, 177 , Kančov 1900 — 241 , Koukoudis 2003 — 352, 420,423 , Papahagi 1923 — 113,114,177 , State Statistical Office 2002 — X, 58 , Turski Dokumenti 2 — 29 , Turski izvori za ajdutstvoto I — 22-24 , Zuca 1905 — 196-200

Relations

Places (1)

Name	Class	Begin	End	Description
Gopeš	Place			The village of Gopeš is a pre-Ottoman village in the region of Bitola. Theodor Capidan claims that the first Vlachs in Gopeš came from Moglena/Meglen in the second half of the 13th century. Some researchers claim that the village existed as a Vlach settlement as early as the start of the 14th century, though it may have been confused with another settlement of the same name in the Devol valley in Opar (Albania). G. Zuca thinks that the first Vlach settlers came to Gopeš before the mid-17th century, from Fourka near Konitsa. T. Papahagi states that the first Vlach nucleus in Gopeš came into being in the second half of the 17th century, and that these Vlachs from Moglena soon assimilated the indegenious Slavs. In the Ottoman registers of the sanjak Ohrid from 1583 15 Christian families and 19 male inhabitants are registered in Gopeš, though their names do not solve the dilemma, if these inhabitants were Vlachs or Slavs. G. Zuca writes that the original location of the village was 2-3 km south of its current location, at the place called Curia al Simu. In 1800 Gopeš reportedly had 120 houses, while 800 houses and 4,800 inhabitants were counted in 1870. In 1900 the Bulgarian Vassil Kančov registers 2,460 inhabitants in Gopeš, all Vlachs. In 2002 Gopeš had 53 houses with 0 (zero) inhabitants according to the population census conducted in the (FY) Republic of Macedonia. The village is located in mountainous terrain in the western part of the Municipality of Bitola. Between 23 and 31 December 1633 Nicio from the village of Gopeš accused some inhabitants of the village of Kutretino for robbing him and killing his friends. On 26 December 1734 a plea was sent to Sultan Mahmud I by certain Husein Bacdar to arrest the bandits Cocio Yorgo, Dimo Nano and Papa Kosta, all from Malovište, as well as the bandits Nicio Kiras and Papa Nicio from Gopeš, who robbed and killed his brother Bacdar Mustafa near the town of Prilep.

Actors (2)

Name	Class	Begin	End	Relation Type	Description
Nicio	Person				Nicio, son of Dimko, was a villager from Gopeš, who accused the villagers from Kutretino in the court in Bitola for beating, wounding and robbing him near the village Kutretino.
Vlachs	Group				Romanesque speaking people on the Balkans. Maybe descendents of the ancient Latin-speaking population of the Roman provinces on the Balkans.

Events (1)

Name	Class	Begin	End	Description
Nicio declared that he and his friends were attacked by armed inhabitants of the village of Kutretino	Activity			Nicio from the village of Gopeš in kaza Ohrid, son of Dimko, declared in front of the court in Bitola: „Walking from our village together with my friends Dimo and Velko, we went down to a garden near the village of Kutretino, which is in the by God protected kaza of Monastir. At midnight, while we were asleep, we were attacked by armed inhabitants of the village of Kutretino. They killed my friends, Dimo and Velko, and they dangerously wounded me three or four times, thinking that they killed me, too. They left us by the willows near Crna Reka. They robbed us, taking three mules, 6,000 akçe (silver coins), three loads of wheat and other stuff”. The court in Bitola sent investigators to the village of Kutretino, where they found the robbed blankets in the house of Goshe. After hearing the accused and the witnesses, the court in Bitola made the following verdict: “It is true that the mentioned Goshe is an old bandit and road raider. His full time job is to kill passengers, who pass by his village, and to rob them. He is causing riots in the Empire. It is necessary for him to disappear from the face of the Earth”.