When I asked Non where she came from she would always smile and say, \u201cI was born in a little village outside of Zagreb in what was then Austria-Hungary but we came there from other places.\u201d\u00a0 Non would go on to say that our family moved about long ago from a land far away, an island south, and before that, a land far to the east.\u00a0 She did not know the name or locations of these places nor the time period that the moves were made.\u00a0 I would push for more; why did the family move to begin with?\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0Non said the first move was because of violence.\u00a0 Due to some long ago forgotten period of unrest the family decided to move west.\u00a0 They were farmers and they were looking for a safe place to raise their crops.\u00a0 After traveling for a long time the family settled on an island somewhere but Non did not know where.\u00a0 Why did they move from the island?\u00a0 Non claimed that due to overpopulation and soil over use, farming was not as prosperous as it once was so the family moved on, searching for another location.\u00a0 Ultimately, they settled in the Zagreb area with other families that chose to leave when they did.\u00a0 The destination was almost heaven to them, clear springs, fertile soil, mountains for protection, and there the family remained for years.<\/p>\n
I wanted to determine if the stories were true and if so, where the location of the island and the land to the east was might have been.\u00a0 Several years ago I took an Ancestry DNA test with the results showing my maternal line belonged to Haplogroup H.\u00a0 \u201cThe Colonists are believed to have arrived in Europe from western Asia about the same time as a culture known as Gravettian. For that reason, it\u2019s probable that the Colonists adopted or even originated the Gravettian technology. \u201c1<\/sup><\/p>\n So Non was correct, the family had moved from the east.\u00a0 A second cousin shared his maternal results with me that he had done by National Geographic.\u00a0 The results confirmed that his mother and my Non, who were sisters, both tested as Haplogroup H and the movement is from east to west. \u00a0See his \u201cEve\u201d line below:<\/p>\n But what about the island story?\u00a0 National Geographic does mention \u201cHaplogroup H is a great example of the effect that population dynamics such as bottleneck events, founder effects, genetic drift, and rapid population growth, have on the genetic diversity of resulting populations.\u201d2<\/sup>\u00a0 Although I can\u2019t prove it, there is oddly a Kos Island in the Dodecanese chain of the Aegean Sea that perhaps was why my family became known as Kos\u2019.\u00a0 Kos as a name\u00a0(Greek<\/a>:\u00a0\u039a\u1ff6\u03c2,\u00a0genitive<\/a>\u00a0\u039a\u1ff6)3 \u00a0<\/sup>has been first documented in Plato\u2019s\u00a0Illiad.\u00a0\u00a0<\/em>In Croatian, it is known as a blackbird or crow and is the 45th<\/sup>\u00a0most \u00a0common name in Croatia today.4<\/sup>\u00a0 The travel route is in line with migration patterns and strangely, these locations are a \u201cas the crow flies\u201d since Kos Island is located in a straight line with Zagreb.<\/p>\n Moreover, the story of farming is further confirmed as historically, the Kos Island was known for its crops of grapes, almonds, figs, olives, wheat, corn and lettuce.5<\/sup>\u00a0 My family loved grapes (and vino!) of which I still grow today and they continued to grow in their new home in Croatia.<\/p>\n With the premise that there is a basis in Non\u2019s stories, I began to research migration pattern timelines to try to determine where my ancestors resided in the past.\u00a0 My Aunt Anne Marie had sent my mom an undated clipping from the Zajednicar<\/em>, a Croatian-American newspaper published by the Croatian Fraternal Union.\u00a0 Entitled, The History of Croatia<\/em>, Lodge 793 member Gordon J. Z. Bobesich wrote that \u201cThere is a theory that the name \u201cHrvati, which is what the Croats call themselves is Persian in origin.\u201d Persia is known as Iran today and does show on the maps above as a possible place of origin.\u00a0 Since the article was undated and I was unable to locate a citation online I decided to further search for more recent research of a Persian-Croatian connection.<\/p>\n I also decided to check out my maternal grandfather\u2019s origin story.\u00a0 Also surnamed Kos and a distant cousin of my grandmother, Non said Gramps\u2019 people were of gypsy heritage.\u00a0 Gramps was dark complected with brown hair and eyes.\u00a0 Non was fair with blue eyes and lighter brown hair.<\/p>\n Gramps\u2019 ancestors, \u201cThe Gypsies, or Romanies, are an ethnic group that arrived in Europe around the 14th century. Scholars argue about when and how they left India, but it is generally accepted that they did emigrate from northern India some time between the 6th and 11th centuries, then crossed the Middle East and came into Europe.\u201d 6 \u00a0<\/sup><\/p>\n SPOLIER ALERT – I was unprepared for what I discovered.<\/p>\n On Non’s side, I first found the following, \u201cHistorical studies indicate that the Croats started migrating from the Iranian homeland to Croatia, Serbia and Bosnia about 3,000 years ago. However, a much larger migration took place about 1,700 years ago. Probably the reason behind this migration was the suppression of the followers of Manichean faith during the Sassanid era.\u201d7<\/sup>\u00a0 This not only supported the DNA evidence but also that the original reason to leave which was due to conflict. \u00a0Now I had a time period of about when the original migration occurred.\u00a0 I then discovered that since the 4th<\/sup> Century BCE, a \u201cpresence of Iranian-speaking\u00a0Iazyges<\/a>\u201d8<\/sup>\u00a0resided along side the Greeks throughout the Aegean region.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0This further confirmed the Kos Island connection.<\/p>\n Further research uncovered that although the Persia to the Dodecanese to the mainland of Croatia most likely was my maternal grandmother\u2019s families\u2019 route, others have a different take on who are the present day Slavs.<\/p>\n I learned that there are several theories as to how today\u2019s Slavs originated.\u00a0 Some believe that the Goths, as noble<\/strong> barbarians, were the original settlers to the region.\u00a0 Others postulate that 5 brothers and 2 sisters of an upper-caste<\/strong> of the Avar-Bulgarians moved into the area.\u00a0 The Slavic view believes groups belonging to the Illyrians, an Indo-European people who always resided<\/strong> in the Balkans, moved from southern Poland and northern Ukraine to settle.\u00a0 At this point my research uncovered extremely racist posts which showed that the area\u2019s tensions have not ceased since the last war.\u00a0 How very sad, after all these years, that people cannot just get along and accept that we are all human.\u00a0 Did anyone stop to think that all 4 emigration theories might be correct?\u00a0 My grandmother\u2019s most likely was the Persian theory and my grandfather\u2019s ancestor\u2019s migration as gypsies is not even considered as a theory, I suppose because after their near extermination during World War II, gypsy lineage is not what many Slavs wish to think about today.<\/p>\n I was so disturbed after reading the many racist posts that demonstrated a Superiority Complex disorder that I had difficulty sleeping.<\/p>\n I strongly believe the roots of racism is the need to feel more superior (upper-caste, noble) and to be first (always resided) which somehow relates to best.\u00a0 I am deeply disappointed that these needs still exist.\u00a0 I was sickened by the many posts of Croats, Serbs, Bosnians and Iranians who seem to think that they are genetically superior.\u00a0 With the recent events in the US and throughout the world, that region is clearly not alone in its racist beliefs. \u00a0I simple can\u2019t understand this mindset!<\/p>\n I am proud to be a mutt \u2013 yep, I am a mix of so many diverse ethnic groups who found love in someone different from themselves but realized that was what was important \u2013 not domination, hatred and narrow mindedness.<\/p>\n We all have prejudices, myself included, but we must work towards understanding and acceptance.<\/p>\n Dionne Warwick sang it best: \u00a0\u00a0What the world needs now is love sweet love, \/ It’s the only thing that there’s just too little of. \/ What the world needs now is love sweet love, \/ No not just for some but for everyone.<\/p>\n 1<\/sup>Ancestry.com Maternal Lineage Test Result<\/p>\n 2<\/sup>National Geographic and IBM Maternal Lineage Test Results, p. 17.<\/p>\n 3<\/sup>Liddell\u00a0et al.<\/em>,\u00a0A Greek\u2013English Lexicon<\/a><\/em>,\u00a0s.v.<\/em><\/p>\n 4<\/sup>“Croatian Names.”\u00a0Croatian Genealogy & Family History<\/em>. N.p., n.d. Web. 27 June 2015.<\/p>\n 5<\/sup>\u00a0“Kos Island.”\u00a0Wikipedia<\/em>. Wikimedia Foundation, n.d. Web. 27 June 2015<\/p>\n 6\u00a0<\/sup>\u00a0Kenrick, Donald (2007).\u00a0Historical Dictionary of the Gypsies (Romanies)<\/em>\u00a0(2nd ed.). Scarecrow Press. p.\u00a0xxxvii.<\/p>\n 7<\/sup>\u00a0“Culture of Iran: Croatians and Cravats Are of Iranian Origin.”\u00a0Culture of Iran: Croatians and Cravats Are of Iranian Origin<\/em>. N.p., n.d. Web. 27 June 2015.<\/p>\n 8<\/sup>Her\u0161ak, Emil; Nik\u0161i\u0107, Boris (2007),\u00a0“Hrvatska etnogeneza: pregled komponentnih etapa i interpretacija (s naglaskom na euroazijske\/nomadske sadr\u017eaje)” [Croatian Ethnogenesis: A Review of Component Stages and Interpretations (with Emphasis on Eurasian\/Nomadic Elements)]<\/a>,\u00a0Migration and Ethnic Themes<\/em>\u00a0(in Croatian)\u00a023\u00a0(3) A FABULOUS FIND of 3 July 2015. Originally published on genealogyatheart.blogspot.com on 2 Jul 2015. Growing up, I would often ask my grandma to tell me stories about the Old Country.*\u00a0 Immigrating to the US with her mother and brother a week before her 13th birthday, my Non preferred to tell the tales she had … Continue reading “Verifying Family Legends – Where did we come from?”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[101,97,99,104,98,79,102,103,100],"class_list":["post-124","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-family-stories","tag-croatia","tag-dna","tag-gravettian","tag-gypsy","tag-haplogroup-h","tag-kos","tag-persia","tag-romanies","tag-zagreb"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogyatheart.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/124","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogyatheart.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogyatheart.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogyatheart.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogyatheart.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=124"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogyatheart.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/124\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":127,"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogyatheart.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/124\/revisions\/127"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogyatheart.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=124"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogyatheart.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=124"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogyatheart.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=124"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![](\"http:\/\/1.bp.blogspot.com\/-Lk1h3cwq48g\/VY7-BvHyNsI\/AAAAAAAAALM\/3mD17RfoV_8\/s1600\/Lori%2BSnip.PNG\")
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\n*Mary Violet Kos Koss, my maternal grandmother, would have been 115 years old on July 18th<\/sup>.\u00a0 I\u2019ll be spending the next few posts on my Croatian ancestors\u2019 stories trying to confirm their accuracy and to learn more about the events that were remembered.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"