Origin of the Romanians

Several theories, in great extent mutually exclusive, address the issue of the origin of the Romanians. The Romanian language descends from the Vulgar Latin dialects spoken in the Roman provinces north of the "Jireček Line" (a proposed notional line separating the predominantly Latin-speaking territories from the Greek-speaking lands in Southeastern Europe) in Late Antiquity. The theory of Daco-Roman continuity argues that the Romanians are mainly descended from the Daco-Romans, a people developing through the cohabitation of the native Dacians and the Roman colonists in the province of Dacia Traiana (primarily in present-day Romania) north of the river Danube. The competing immigrationist theory states that the Romanians' ethnogenesis commenced in the provinces south of the river with Romanized local populations (known as Vlachs in the Middle Ages) spreading through mountain refuges, both south to Greece and north through the Carpathian Mountains. Other theories state that the Romanized local populations were present over a wide area on both sides of the Danube and the river itself did not constitute an obstacle to permanent exchanges in both directions; according to the "admigration" theory, migrations from the Balkan Peninsula to the lands north of the Danube contributed to the survival of the Romance-speaking population in these territories.

Political motivations—the Transylvanian Romanians' efforts to achieve their emancipation, Austro-Hungarian and Romanian expansionism, and Hungarian irredentism—influenced the development of the theories, and "national passions" still color the debates. In 2013, authors of The Cambridge History of the Romance Languages came to the conclusion that the "historical, archaeological and linguistic data available do not seem adequate to give a definitive answer" in the debate. Their view was accepted by scholars contributing to The Oxford Guide to the Romance Languages, published in 2016, which reiterates that "the location and extent of the territory where "Daco-Romance" originated" is uncertain.

Three major ethnic groups – the Dacians, Illyrians and Thracians – inhabited the northern regions of Southeastern Europe in Antiquity. Modern knowledge of their languages is based on limited evidence (primarily on proper names), making all scholarly theories proposing a strong relationship between the three languages or between Thracian and Dacian speculative.

The Illyrians were the first to be conquered by the Romans, who organized their territory into the province of Illyricum around 60 BC. In the lands inhabited by Thracians, the Romans set up the province of Moesia in 6 AD, and Thracia forty years later. The territory between the Lower Danube and the Black Sea (now Dobruja in Romania and Bulgaria) was attached to Moesia in 46.

The Romans annihilated the Dacian kingdom to the north of the Lower Danube under Emperor Trajan in 106. Its western territories were organized into the province of Dacia (or "Dacia Traiana"), but Maramureș and further regions inhabited by the Costoboci, Bastarnae and other tribes remained free of Roman rule. The Romans officially abandoned Dacia under Emperor Aurelian (r. 270–275). Along with the abandonment of Dacia, Aurelian organized a new province bearing the same name ("Dacia Aureliana") south of the Lower Danube. Roman forts were erected north of the river in the 320s, but the river became the boundary between the empire and the Goths in the 360s. Meanwhile, from 313 under the Edict of Milan, the Roman Empire began to transform itself into a Christian state. Roman emperors supported Christian missionaries in the north-Danubian territories which were dominated by the Goths from the 340s.

The Huns destroyed all these territories between 376 and 406, but their empire also collapsed in 453. Thereafter the Gepids exercised control over Banat, Crișana, and Transylvania. The Bulgars, Antes, Sclavenes and other tribes made frequent raids across the Lower Danube against the Balkans in the 6th century. The Roman Empire revived under Emperor Justinian I (r. 527–565), but the Avars, who had subjugated the Gepids, invaded the Balkans from the 580s. In 30 years all Roman troops were withdrawn from the peninsula, where only Dyrrhachium, Thessaloniki and a few other towns remained under Roman rule.

The next arrivals, the Bulgars, established their own state on the Lower Danube in 681. Their territorial expansion accelerated after the collapse of the Avar Khaganate in the 790s. The ruler of the First Bulgarian Empire, Boris I (r. 852–889) converted to Christianity in 864. A synod of the Bulgarian Orthodox Church promoted a liturgy in Old Church Slavonic in 893.

Bulgaria was invaded by the Magyars (or Hungarians) in 894, but a joint counter-attack by the Bulgars and the Pechenegs – a nomadic Turkic people – forced the Magyars to find a new homeland in the Carpathian Basin. Historians still debate whether they encountered a Romanian population in the territory. The Byzantines occupied the greater part of Bulgaria under Emperor John I Tzimiskes (r. 969–976). The Bulgars regained their independence during the reign of Samuel (r. 997–1014), but Emperor Basil II of Byzantium conquered their country around 1018.