Shopi

Shopi or Šopi (South Slavic: Шопи) is a regional term, used by a group of people in the Balkans, self-identifying as Bulgarians, Macedonians and Serbs. The areas traditionally inhabited by the "Shopi" or "Šopi" is called Shopluk or Šopluk (Шоплук), a mesoregion, roughly where Bulgaria, Serbia and North Macedonia meet. In 2011 census in Serbia they are registered as separate ethnicity and 142 persons declared themselves as belonging to this ethnicity.
Name.
According to Institute for Balkan Studies, the "Shopluk" was the mountainous area on the borders of Serbia, Bulgaria and North Macedonia, of which boundaries are quite vague, in Serbia the term "Šop" has always denoted "highlanders".
"Shopluk" was used by Bulgarians to refer to the borderlands of Bulgaria, the inhabitants were called "Shopi". In Bulgaria, the "Shopi" designation is currently attributed to villagers around Sofia.
Classification.
Most of the area traditionally inhabited by the Shopi is in Bulgaria. The majority of the Shopi (those in Bulgaria, as well the territories which were part of Bulgaria before 1919) identify themselves as Bulgarians, while those in the pre-1919 territory of Serbia - as Serbians and those in North Macedonia - as Macedonians.
The noting of "Shopi" as a "group" began in the 19th-century migrational waves of poor workers from the so-called Shopluk, poor areas (villages) beyond Sofia.
The Bulgarian scholars put Shopi as a subgroup of the Bulgarian ethnos. As with every ethnographic group, the Bulgarian Academy notes, the Shopi in Bulgaria consider themselves the true and most pure of the Bulgarians, just as the mountaineers around Turnovo claim their land as true Bulgaria from time immemorial, etc.
Many Yugoslav and Serbian scholars put the Šopi (also known as "Šopovi") as a subgroup of the Serbian ethnos, claiming that the group is closer to Serbs than Bulgarians culturally and linguistically, calling it a Serbian population in a foreign (Bulgarian) area, at the Serbo-Bulgarian border. Serbian ethnographer Jovan Cvijić, presented in 1919 at the Peace Conference in Paris a study in which he had divided the Shopluk into three groups: Serbs, mixed population, and a group closer to Bulgarians. He also claimed that the Serbian tradition of Slava was celebrated in the region, this according to him being an important cultural marker.
According to A. Belitch and T. Georgevitch (1919), the Shopi were a mixed Serbo-Bulgarian people in Western Bulgaria of Serbian origin. This Serbian ethnographical group, according to them, inhabited a region east of the border as far as the line Bregovo-Kula-Belogradchik-Iskrets, thence towards Radomir and to the east of Kyustendil; to the east of that limit the Serbian population, blended with the Bulgarian element, reached the Iskar banks and the line which linked it to Ihtiman.
The French Jérôme-Adolphe Blanqui, when traveling across Bulgaria in 1841, describes the population of the Sanjak of Niš as Bulgarians. Felix Philipp Kanitz recalled that in 1872 (during Ottoman rule), the inhabitants had a Bulgarian national conscience. By the end of the 19th century (when the area was in Serbia), the residents of Pirot were divided on the issue, many in the older generation having a fondness for Bulgarians. Also, in the 19th century the Shopi area was one of the centres of Bulgarian National Revival. It was ceded to the Bulgarian Exarchate.
According to the Czech Jireček the Shopi differed very much from the other Bulgarians in language and habits, and were regarded as a simple folk. He connected their name to the Thracian tribe of Sapsei.
The American Association for South Slavic Studies noted that the Shopi were recognized as a distinct sub-group in Bulgaria.
The rural inhabitants near Sofia were popularly claimed to be descendants of the Pechenegs. The Oxford historian C. A. Macartney studied these Shopi during the 1920s and reported that they were despised by the other inhabitants of Bulgaria for their stupidity and bestiality, and dreaded for their savagery.
Dialects.
Shopi speak a group of related dialects that belong to the "et" (western) group of Bulgarian dialects. The dialects spoken by the Shopi are sometimes collectively referred to as "Shopski" (Шопски), although this is not the accepted term in Bulgarian dialectology. Instead, the Western Bulgarian dialects are divided into South-Western, spoken mostly in Southwestern Bulgaria, except the region around Sofia and parts of the region along the Serbian border; North-Western, spoken mostly in Northwestern Bulgaria and around Sofia and the Transitional dialects (sometimes called Extreme North-western dialects), spoken along the border with Serbia around Tran, Breznik and Belogradchik as well as among Bulgarians around Bosilegrad and Dimitrovgrad in Serbia. The Torlak dialects spoken by Serbs are also classified by Bulgarian linguists as part of the Transitional Bulgarian dialect, although Serbian linguists deny this. The speech that tends to be closely associated with that term and to match the stereotypical idea of "Shopski" speech are the South-Western Bulgarian dialects which are spoken from Rila mountain and the villages around Sofia to Danube towns such as Vidin.
People from Eastern Bulgaria also refer to those who live in Sofia as Shopi, but as a result of migration from the whole of Bulgaria, Shopski is no longer a majority dialect in Sofia. Instead, most Sofia residents speak the standard literary Bulgarian language with some elements of Shopski, which remains a majority dialect in Sofia's villages and throughout western Bulgaria, for example the big towns and cities of: (Sofia and Pleven- transitional speech with literary Bulgarian language), Pernik, Kyustendil, Vratsa, Vidin, Montana, Dupnitsa, Samokov, Lom, Botevgrad.
The exposition below is based on Stoyko Stoykov's Bulgarian dialectology (2002, first ed. 1962), although other examples are used. It describes linguistic features which differ from standard Bulgarian. The Standard Bulgarian words and sentences are given in romanization, with no attempt at scientific transcription apart from stress marking.
Other features.
The /x/-sound is often omitted. Despite being particularly associated with Shopski, this is actually characteristic of most rural Bulgarian dialects. Example: Shopski леб (leb), одиа (odia) vs standard Bulgarian хляб (hljab), ходиха (hodiha) (bread, they went)
Vocabulary.
There are plenty of typical words for the Shop dialect in particular, as well as for other western dialects in general.
Some examples are:
Culture.
The Shopi have a very original and characteristic folklore. The traditional male costume of the Shopi is white, while the female costumes are diverse. White male costumes are spread at the western Shopluk. The hats they wear are also white and tall (called gugla). Traditionally Shopi costume from the Kyustendil region are in black and they are called Chernodreshkovci — Blackcoats. Some Shope women wear a special kind of sukman called a litak, which is black, generally is worn without an apron, and is heavily decorated around the neck and bottom of the skirt in gold, often with great quantities of gold-colored sequins. Embroidery is well developed as an art and is very conservative. Agriculture is the traditional main occupation, with cattle breeding coming second.
The traditional Shop house that has a fireplace in the centre has only survived in some more remote villages, being displaced by the Middle Bulgarian type. The villages in the plains are larger, while those in the higher areas are somewhat straggling and have traditionally been inhabited by single families ("zadruga"). The unusually large share of placenames ending in -ovci, -enci and -jane evidence for the preservation of the zadruga until even after the 19th century.
Artistic culture.
In terms of music, the Shopi have a complex folklore with the heroic epic and humor playing an important part. The Shopi are also known for playing particularly fast and intense versions of Bulgarian dances. The gadulka; the kaval and the gaida are popular instruments; and two-part singing is common. Minor second intervals are common in Shop music and are not considered dissonant.
Two very popular and well-known fоlklore groups are Poduenski Babi and Bistrishki Babi — the Grandmothers of Poduene and Bistritsa villages.
Cuisine.
A famous Bulgarian dish, popular throughout the Balkans and Central Europe is the Shopska salad, named after the ethnographic group.
Social.
In the 19th century, around Vidin, it was not unusual for a woman in her mid 20s and 30s to have a man of 15–16 years.
The Shopi in literature and anecdotes.
The Shopi — especially those from near Sofia — have the widespread (and arguably unjustified) reputation of stubborn and selfish people. They were considered conservative and resistant to change. There are many proverbs and anecdotes about them, more than about all other regional groups in Bulgaria.
A distinguished writer from the region is Elin Pelin who actually wrote some comic short stories and poems in the dialect, and also portrayed life in the Shopluk in much of his literary work.
Honours.
Shopski Cove in Antarctica is named after the Shop region.