Directory:Zuvela
The Zuvela surname has strong roots originating from the western end of the island of Korcula in Croatia. Its original spelling was Xuvella. In Croatian language the Z is written Ž.
The Zuvela’s arrived on the west end of Korcula in the 1600’s and settled in a small field called Rasohatica. There are still small remnants of stone huts there to this day. At the time Korcula was part of the Republic of Venice (within the Dalmatian province). Where the original Zuvelas migrated from is still a mystery to this editor. The Republic of Venice did accept migrants within her boundaries during her long history. They came from all parts of Europe. Many of them were migrants from Spain as well as Christians from the Ottoman Empire (which ruled the Balkans for centuries).
The Zuvelas abandoned Rasohatica and moved to the village of Blato. From there members of the Zuvela family moved to (and helped to establish) the town of Vela Luka. In more modern times they have migrated to Australia as well as the United States and other parts of the world.
The information concerning the early Zuvela’s of Korcula is taken from a local 19th century historian from Blato called Nikola Ostojic. He wrote a book about the town of Vela Luka in 1852. It was written in Italian with a strong Venetian dialect. Italian was the official language of the Dalmatian province at the time and had been so for centuries. In the 1860s Croatian (then referred to as Illirski) was introduced by the Austrian authorities as a second language. It then slowly replaced Italian altogether. Thus the name Xuvella became Zuvela.
The mother tongue of the majority of the population of the island of Korcula (in particularly the west end) has been Croatian since the 1860’s. The Korcula dialect of Croatian had many other influences that it acquired over the centuries, such as the now extinct Romance language Dalmatian, Venetian and others.
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