Albanians

Identification. The name "Albanian" derives from the ancient town of Albanopolis, mentioned by Ptolemy in the Second century B.C.

Alsatians

Alsatians are the German-speaking people of the French region of Alsace, located between the Vosges Mountains and the German border in the departments of Bas-Rhin and Haut-Rhin. There are perhaps 1.5 million speakers of German dialects in this region.

Andalusians

Identification. Andalusians are the people of the eight southernmost provinces of Spain: Huelva, Seville, Cadiz, Cordoba, Malaga, Jaen, Granada, and Almería.

Aquitaine

Identification. The southwest of France, or Aquitaine, is geographically and culturally diverse.

Ashkenazic Jews

The term "Ashkenaz" is derived from a geographic designation in the Hebrew Bible. It is an ethnonym that at one time was applied rather precisely to the German-speaking areas, especially the Rhineland.

Austrians

Auvergnats

Identification. The Auvergne is both a historical province in France and one of twenty-two administrative regions created in 1972.

Aveyronnais

Identification. The Aveyron is one of ninety-five departments comprising the French republic.

Azoreans

Identification. Discovery of the uninhabited archipelago of the Azores was a starting point for Portugal's fifteenth-century overseas empire; five centuries later Portuguese Culture continues to dominate its economic, social, and political life.

Balearics

Balearics are residents of the Balearic Isles (in Spanish, Islas Baleares) located about 80 to 300 kilometers off the east coast of Spain. The Balearic Isles are an archipelago composed of an eastern group of islands including Majorca (Mallorca) , Minorca (Menorca), and Cabrera and a western group including Ibiza and Formentera.

Basques

Identification. Basques inhabit the area of southwestern Europe where the western spur of the Pyrenees meets the Cantabrian seacoast.

Bavarians

Identification. The Free State (Freistaat) of Bavaria, the largest state in Germany, is divided into seven regions.

Belgians

Belgians are citizens of Belgium (Kingdom of Belgium). Belgium occupies 30,540 square kilometers and in 1990 had an estimated population of 9,895,000.

Bergamasco

The Bergamasco are a linguistically defined segment of the population of the northern Italian province of Bergamo, concentrated in the provincial capital (also called Bergamo) and its immediate surroundings. The region was territorially incorporated into the Italian state in the early 1800s, and the Bergamasco themselves are highly integrated into the society, culture, and economy of the larger region.

Bosnian Muslims

The Bosnian Muslims of the former Yugoslavia, living in the independent state of Bosnia-Hercegovina, number about 1.8 million, or roughly 8 percent of the total previous Yugoslavian population. They constitute the majority ethnoreligious group in the state (44 percent of its population with Serbs making up 31 percent and Croats 17 percent [1991 census]).

Bretons

Identification. Brittany is the westernmost region (formerly called a province) of France comprising the four departments (large administrative units in France, roughly equivalent to U.S.

Bulgarian Gypsies

Identification. Bulgarian Gypsies are an ethnic group with strong historical ties to other European Gypsy groups.

Bulgarians

Identification. Bulgaria is identified variously on the basis of geographical, cultural, and political factors as part of Eastern Europe, southeastern Europe, the Balkans, the Slavic countries, the South Slavic countries, and, until recently, the Communist bloc.

Burgundians

Identification. More than language, culture, government, or topography, history and economy define Burgundy.

Calabrese

The Calabrese are a geographically and, to a degree, culturally defined people of the classic latifundia Region of southern Italy.

Canarians

Identification. The Canary Islands were known in the past as the Fortunatae Insulae and Hesperis.

Cape Verdeans

Identification. Most Cape Verdeans dwell in their native Cape Verde Islands off the coast of West Africa.

Castillans

Identification. Castilians are the people of Castile, the Interior lands of the Meseta, the central plateau of Spain, traditionally a region of rural smallholdings and the historic seat of what eventually became the Spanish kingdom.

Catalans (Països Catalans)

Identification. Catalans can be defined by participation in the historical polity of Catalonia, which occupies the northwest Mediterranean coast and eastern Pyrenees.

Cornish

Cornwall, the southwesternmost county of England, was so long isolated from the rest of the country by virtue of its geography that its linguistic and cultural traditions developed under a unique set of pressures and influences. The name "Cornwall" refers to the geographic entity, while "Cornish" is the name of the indigenous language—a Brythonic dialect of the Celtic Family, related to Welsh.

Corsicans

Identification. Corsicans are the native inhabitants of the Mediterranean island of Corsica, now part of France.

Cretans

Identification. The Cretans, overwhelmingly Greek Orthodox Christians, speak dialect forms of Modern Greek and inhabit the island of Crete, which is midway between the Greek mainland and Libya.

Croats

Identification. Croatians are a Slavic people.

Cyclades

Identification. The Cyclades are a group of Aegean Islands whose name derives from the fact that they form a circle (kíklos) around the ancient sacred island of Delos.

Cypriots

Identification. Cypriots are the inhabitants of the island of Cyprus, an independent republic since 1960.

Czechs

Dalmatians

Location. Dalmatia lies on the rugged eastern coast of the Adriatic and is the southwesternmost region of Croatia.

Danes

Identification. The Danes live in the country of Denmark and Danish is their national language.

Dutch

English

Identification. England, unlike Scotland, Wales, or Northern Ireland, does not constitutionally exist, and thus it has no separate rights, administration, or official statistics.

Faroe Islanders

Identification. The Faroe Islands are a culturally distinct, monoethnic, internally self-governing dependency of Denmark.

Finns

Flemish

French

The French are citizens of France (the French republic). Including the island of Corsica, France occupies 549,183 square kilometers and in 1990 had an estimated population of 56,184,000.

Frisians

Identification. The Frisians are a linguistic and cultural minority of the Netherlands (with some pockets of Frisian speakers living in Germany as well).

Friuli

Identification. The Friuli are speakers of a Rhaeto-Romance language, Friulan, who live in the north of Italy, on the border of Austria and Slovenia.

Gaels (Irish)

Identification. The Gaelic language (Gaedhilge) is a primary cultural marker of Gaels living on the Atlantic fringe of Ireland, distinguishing them from the English-speaking Irish of Ulster and the Irish republic in general.

Gagauz

The Gagauz are a Greek Orthodox group believed to be descended from the Oghuz tribes. The Gagauz are today found mainly in Moldova, Ukraine, and Kazakhstan (173,000 in 1979); Bulgaria (12,000 estimated in 1982); Greece (Perhaps as many as 30,000); and Romania.

Galicians

Identification. The people of Galicia in Spain (o pobo galego in Galician) inhabit the northwestern corner of the Iberian Peninsula, directly north of Portugal.

Germans

Identification. The Germans are a cultural group united by a common language and a common political heritage.

German Swiss

Identification. The German Swiss are the linguistic majority in nineteen of Switzerland's twenty-six cantons and halfcantons.

Gitanos

Identification. "Gitanos," the term that almost all Gypsies of Spain use to identify themselves, is also the word that non-Gypsy Spaniards use.

Greeks

Greeks constitute an ethnic group of great longevity, tracing their origins to the first appearance of complex society in southeastern Europe. A common sense of Culture, language, and religion signified by the term "Greek" (Hellene) developed in antiquity and has endured, with changes, to the present.

Greek-Speaking Jews of Greece

Identification. The Greek-speaking Jews of Greece are the so-called remnants of Byzantine Jewry.

Gypsies and Caravan Dwellers in the Netherlands

Highland Scots

ETHNONYMS: Celts, Celtic, Highlander, Scots, Scottish, and sometimes Scotch. West coast islanders sometimes refer to themselves and others by island names, such as a Lewis man, a Barra woman.

Hungarians

Identification. Hungarians are the most populous group in the Finno-Ugric Subfamily of the Ural-Altaic people.

Icelanders

Identification. Icelanders speak Icelandic and trace their origins to settlers who came from Norway in the ninth century.

Ionians

Identification and Location. The Ionian Islands lie off the western coast of Greece in the Ionian Sea, a northern branch of the Mediterranean.

Irish

Identification and Location. For the Irish and Ireland, identification and location are inextricably linked aspects of self-definition.

Irish Travellers

Identification. Irish Travellers are an itinerant ethnic group.

Italians

Italians are citizens of Italy (the Republic of Italy). Italy occupies 301,230 square kilometers and in 1990 had an estimated population of 57,657,000.

Jurassians

The Jurassians are a French-speaking linguistic minority who live in the Jura region of the otherwise predominantly German-speaking Swiss canton of Bern. The region consists of the districts of Porrentruy, Delémont, Franches Montagnes, Moutier, Courtelary, and Neuveville.

Kashubians

The people of Kashuby are the westernmost of the Northern Slavs, living today in north central Poland along the left bank of the lower Vistula and along the coast to the west of Gdansk. Their language has two dialects, both heavily Germanized: Kashubian proper, and Slovincian.

Ladin

The Ladin are a predominantly Catholic, linguistic minority of northeastern alpine Italy. They live in the high valleys of Alto Adige and the Dolomites and number approximately 30,000.

Leonese

Leon is a province of northern Spain, bordered on the north by Asturias, on the south by Zamorra, on the east by Patencia, and on the west by Galicia. Its capital, also called Leon, is located roughly at the center of the province, on the Torio and Bernesga rivers at 42°37′ N and 5°30′ W.

Lowland Scots

The Scottish Lowlands are made up of the southern portion of Scotland, the central region, the eastern coast, and most of the northeastern coast. The bulk of Scotland's population (about 80 percent) lives in the Lowlands, particularly in the urban and industrial areas around such major cities as Glasgow and Aberdeen, as well as in the capital city of Edinburgh.

Luxembourgeois

The Luxembourgeois are the citizens of the nation of Luxembourg (Grand Duchy of Luxembourg). Luxembourg is a landlocked nation of 2,586 square kilometers bounded on the south by France, on the west and north by Belgium, and on the east by Germany.

Madeirans

Identification. In about 1419 Portuguese mariners made landfall on the little Atlantic island (42 square kilometers) of Porto Santo (holy haven); 40 kilometers to the southwest they discovered Madeira (isle of timber), the most populous (260,000) and largest (741 square kilometers) island of the Madeiran Archipelago, Portuguese culture, with a strong British overlay, still permeates insular political, economic, and social life.

Maltese

Identification. Malta and her sister islands, Gozo and Comino, together with the uninhabited islets of Filfla and Cominotto, make up the Maltese Archipelago.

Manx

The Isle of Man is located in the Irish Sea and is politically and legally separate from the United Kingdom. The indigenous Manx population shares the island with populations of Irish, Scots, and English, along with seasonal influxes of tourists.

Montenegrins

Identification. Montenegrins live predominantly in the Region currently constituting the Socialist Republic of Montenegro, the smallest republic within modern-day Yugoslavia.

Mount Athos

ETHNONYMS: Athonite Monks, Hagiorites; also terms that designate the monastic brotherhoods to which individual monks belong: e.g., Lavriotes (monks belonging to the Lavra monastery); Philotheites (Philotheou monastery), Vatopedini (Vatopedi monastery), etc.

Northern Irish

ETHNONYMS: British, Scots Irish, Ulster Irish, Ulster Scots.

Norwegians

Identification. The nation of Norway constitutes the Western portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula.

Occitans

Identification. Occitans are people who live in the predominantly agricultural French meridional and speak langue d'oc.

Orcadians

Identification. The Orkney Islands constitute one of the three "Special Island Areas" of Scotland.

Pasiegos

Identification. The Montes de Pas form a high mountain enclave in the Cantabrian range of northern Spain.

Peloponnesians

Identification. The Peloponnesos is a large peninsula linked to the Greek mainland by the narrow isthmus of Corinth, cut through by the Corinth Canal in 1892-1893.

Peripatetics

ETHNONYMS: Gypsies, and all corresponding terms in the various European languages (Bohémiens, Cigani, Cíngaros, Gitanos, Gitans, Mustalainen, Tataren, Tsiganes, Zigeuner, Zingari, etc.). Travelers or Travellers and all corresponding terms in the various European languages (Gens du Voyage, Rasende, Viajeros, Voyageurs, etc.).

Piemontese

The term "Piemonte" refers to both a geographical entity—as an administrative district of the Italian state—and to a linguistic entity, distinct enough from Standard Italian to be treated as a language in its own right. Piemonte is comprised of the districts of Alessandria, Asti, Cuneo, Navarra, Turin, and Vercelli.

Piemontese Sinti

Identification. The Piemontese Sinti of northern Italy are one of a number of related peripatetic or formerly peripatetic groups including the Hungarian Sinti, Sinti Lombardi, the Gaškane Manuš ("German" Manuš), the Valče Manuš ("French" Manuš), and the Prajštike Manuš ("Prussian" or "Alsacian" Manuš).

Poles

Identification. Poles speak Polish and the overwhelming majority are Roman Catholics.

Pomaks

The term "Pomak" refers to Bulgarians who converted to Islam during the Ottoman occupation, beginning in the latter portion of the 1300s. During the Communist period of forced assimilation in Bulgaria (1970s and 1980s), the term disappeared from official use.

Pontic

Pontic refers to speakers of the Pontic language who currently reside in Greece, in the suburbs of Athens and Piraeus. Pontic speakers also live in the United States, Canada, and perhaps on the Black Sea coast of Turkey.

Portuguese

Location. Continental Portugal occupies approximately one-sixth of the Iberian Peninsula in western Europe.

Provencal

Identification. Provence is one of the twenty regions that constitute the Republic of France.

Romanians

Romansch

The Romansch, or Rhaetians, are speakers of the Romansch language who live in the canton of Graubunden (Grisons), in Switzerland. They number approximately 65,000 today, a figure that reflects a reversal of a demographic trend toward depopulation that reached its nadir in the early 1940s.

Rominche

The Rominche, Romanies, or Travelers are the Gypsies of Great Britain. It is estimated that there are well in excess of 20,000 individuals, possibly 8,000 to 9,000 families, of Rominche stock in England and in Wales.

Rom of Czechoslovakia

Identification. Rom is the name applied to people of Indian origin who migrated out of India about 1,000 years ago and today are commonly referred to as Gypsies.

Saami

Identification. Saami speak various dialects of the Saami language, and/or the national languages, within northern Norway, Sweden, Finland, and Russia's Kola Peninsula, and nominally follow the religions of the dominant society.

Sarakatsani

Identification. The Sarakatsani are transhumant sheep- and goatherders of continental Greece.

Sardinians

Identification. Sardinians are the inhabitants of the island of Sardinia, today an autonomous region of Italy.

Scandinavian Peripatetics

People identified as Gypsies began arriving in the Scandinavian countries as early as 1500. Today, peoples traditionally identified as either Gypsies or Travellers are found in Denmark, Finland, Norway, and Sweden.

Sephardic Jews

Strictly speaking, Sephardic Jews (singular, Sephardi; plural, Sephardim) are descendants of Jews who lived in Spain or Portugal before they were expelled from the former in 1492. The name "Sephardim" is derived from "Sephard," the term used by Jews in medieval times to refer to the Iberian Peninsula.

Serbs

Identification. Serbia is the larger of the two remaining Republics that constitute the Federated Republic of Yugoslavia as of 1992.

Shetlanders

Identification. The Shetland Islands constitute a "Special Island Area" of modern Scotland.

Sicilians

Identification. Sicily is the largest island in the Mediterranean Sea.

Silesians

The name "Silesia" refers to a large, lozenge-shaped region in central Europe, mainly in the upper basin of the Oder River, which lies to the northeast of the Sudetic Mountains. The Oder River forms the northeastern border of the territory.

Slav Macedonians

Identification. The name "Macedonia" has been used since 1944 to indicate the Yugoslav republic that has its Capital at Skopje.

Slovaks

Identification. The Slovaks are Western Slavs who speak Slovak and live in Slovakia, the easternmost third of Czechoslovakia, in 1992 renamed the Czech and Slovak Federative Republic.

Slovenes

Identification. Slovenia was the northwesternmost republic of Yugoslavia; it is now an independent state.

Slovensko Roma

Sorbs

Identification. The Sorbs are an officially recognized national minority of Germany.

Spaniards

Spaniards are citizens of Spain (España), which occupies an area of 504,750 square kilometers and in 1990 had an estimated population of 39,623,000. The Castilian form of Spanish is the national language.

Spanish Rom

Identification and Location. The Rom are a Gypsy group of wide distribution in Europe and the Americas.

Swedes

Identification.

Swiss

The Swiss are citizens of the nation of Switzerland (Swiss Confederation). Switzerland is located in central Europe and covers 41,295 square kilometers of territory.

Swiss, Italian

Tiroleans

The Tirol is an alpine province of western Austria, bounded by Germany to the north and Italy to the south. "Tirol" was originally a family name, derived from a castle near Merano in what is now Italy.

Tory Islanders

Identification. Tory Island is a small island off the coast of County Donegal in the extreme northwest of Ireland.

Transylvanian Ethnic Groups

Tsakonians

Tsakonians are a pastoral people of Greece. Their numbers have been estimated at anywhere from 300 to 10,000 and they reside on the eastern coast of the Peloponnesos.

Tuscans

Tuscans are the people of the central Italian region of Tuscany, located on the Tyrrhenian Sea. Tuscany, covering some 22,991 square kilometers, contains the provinces of Massa-Carrara, Lucca, Pistoia, Firenze, Livorno, Pisa, Arezzo, Sienna, and Grosseto.

Vlach Gypsies of Hungary

Vlachs

Identification. The name "Vlachs" refers to the old Balkan ethnic group whose members are descendants of romanized and grecized Paleo-Balkan and Indo-European populations: Illyrians and Thracians.

Walloons

Identification. In the broad sense of the word "Walloon" is the name given to the autochthons of Wallonia inhabiting the Belgian provinces of Hainaut, Namur, Luxembourg, Liège (except for the German cantons in the east), and the district of Nivelles in Brabant.

Welsh

Identification. The principality of Wales is one of the four "countries" constituting the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.

Xoraxané Romá