English title: A state project in a Europe of wars. The Aromanian Principality of Pind
Issue: 1/2023
Pages: 197-213
Language: Romanian
Author: Ionuț NISTOR
Abstract:
The independent state of Aromanians in the Balkans was more like a chimera, an ideal, than a reality. He was invoked in the correspondence that some Aromanian leaders in Pindus maintained with the Romanian authorities, but the “proclamation” of the new entity did not follow a classic path in the usances of international law. The “principality of Pindus” was more like a rhetorical artifice of the political propaganda in the period and, partly, of the “romantic” historiography. The project, under this form, existed for some Aromanian leaders, who tried to speculate the uncertain and offering context of the World wars, but not for the authorities in Bucharest or Rome, too. However useful an Aromanian state in the Balkans would have been for Romania and Italy, for strategic, moral, national reasons, the project was not feasible. The new body would have been too small and too hard to maintain. An autonomous canton within extended Albania or within a Macedonian state (or even within a confederation in the area) could be the solution receiving support from Romania and Italy. Except that the evolution of the front in 1917 and 1941 did not allow this possibility to become concrete.
For Alcibiade Diamandi, the “prince without a country”, the idea of an Aromanian state had an aspirational nature; once it had become concrete, it would have served his personal interests. Without real support from the outside and mostly without extended domestic support, without local power and force structures and without a politics-based elite possessing or really aiming for the exercise of power in the algorithm proposed by Diamandi, the mission became impossible. For the Aromanian leaders, this independent state was more of a field for negotiations. Any formula of organisation where they could hold local offices, such as prefectures and city halls, became desirable and acceptable. This was the best to hope for in case of such elite without a political past, without a political life or experience, without parties etc. The state project coagulated to a certain extent the communities of Aromanians. However, the too short time and the context of the wars did not allow them to reflect more on this option. The fear of retaliation by the Greek authorities was a far stronger argument than the ideal of their own state in the coagulation of their identity, while the cultural objectives remained the dominant elements of the reform-focused programs throughout the 20th century.
Keywords: Alcibiade Diamandi, Aromanian state, diplomacy, world war, Principality of Pindus