What is it like to be Italian on paper but Greek at heart? What is it like to live so close yet so far from the place you call home? There are some villages to the south in our neighboring country, which we have heard about since we were little. The Greek villages… with people who share the same soul. A Greek soul. They say that the traditions keep them from ancient times.

Elli Kasoli and the Prime Time camera found themselves in Lower Italy, in the Greek-speaking villages. In villages, such as Galitsiano and Sternatia, where history meets tradition and the remaining populations of the Greek colonies of antiquity still speak the ancient dialect of the Grecans. (Watch the full episode here)

Greek and Grecans

They are called Grico in Apulia and Grecanus in Calabria. Elli Katsoli and the Prime Time camera met the descendants, the remaining populations of the ancient Greek colonies, in Magna Grecia, Greater Greece, 1200 kilometers away from the heart of Greece. And yet, if you were to close your eyes in front of a mountain village on the continent and open them to the 12 Greek villages, you would, without exaggeration, notice any difference.

Galician

Hidden in the mountains of Lower Italy is the village of Galiciano, the most remote of the Greek-speaking villages of Calabria. The inhabitants in this village maintain customs, traditions and traditions of thousands of years and a walk is a living testimony of its ancient heritage. It is known as the Acropolis of Magna Graecia, and at every point one sees signs with Greek letters as well as many Greek flags.

At the highest point of the village dominates a small orthodox church, small, without electricity, wedged into the mountain, but big enough to embrace all the faithful: the Virgin of Greece.

Father Elias shared a story of brotherhood from World War II, when for the first time the Greeks met their Greek brothers and refused to fight them.

The Greek presence in Calabria dates back to the 8th century BC. Since the 2nd colonization that is. Calabria is part of Greater Greece. And the most impressive thing is that in these places the Greek language and Greek culture survived all these centuries without interruption.

Opposite the straits of Scylla and Charybdis is Messina, one of the oldest cities in Sicily. Messini is the ancient Zagli which was founded in the 8th century and in 2012 the Municipality of Messini was named a Municipality of Greek linguistic minority.

There are approximately 100 members in the Greek community of Messina. They say we are both Greek and Italian. But the soul is definitely only Greek. For Mr. Dimitris Tsiritis, originally from Thessaloniki, the Greek flag is a bridge between the heart and the homeland, regardless of the distance that separates him from it.

Apulia is located 510 kilometers away, in a Greece that lives through the songs, prayers and words of people who speak Greek and not Greek.

In Sternatia, one of the 9 villages of Salento in Lower Italy, the Greek element is more pronounced. Streets and even businesses have Greek names.

Good morning

There is a Greek-speaking village with the most characteristic name, Kalimera, one of the cultural centers of the region. But good morning, according to the residents, does not mean a good day, as we say, but a good place. But there is also a myth, that many years ago a visitor had come to Kalimera, spoke to a Gricano, who did not understand what he said to him and simply said goodbye to him by saying good morning.

This trek brought us in the footsteps of a language that is struggling to survive, despite the difficulties. In the heart of these Greek-speaking communities, Elli Katsoli and Prime Time found people who keep their traditions alive, passing the language from generation to generation. From the footsteps of the elderly remembering the words of their language to the mouths of children singing carols, the Greek dialect remains a symbol of resistance, history and hope. As long as these people struggle to keep it alive, their voice is heard more loudly, like a cry for help, a plea not to lose this cultural treasure. Let’s not forget that languages ​​are not just words, they are the key to understanding who we were, who we are and who we want to be.