Samarina, Greece, 2007

Samarina is the most famous of all the Aromanian villages of the Pindus and the inhabitants are fiercely proud of their heritage and traditions. Every summer on August 15, on the feast of the Dormition of the Virgin, Samarinans from all over the world assemble on their ancestral village to celebrate. There, on the main square outside the Great Church, they perform the “Great Dance”: thousands of people hold hands and form concentric circles, and they walk slowly and ceremonially counterclockwise, while singing their traditional songs in a rousing unison chorus. Photo courtesy of Eleftherios Kostans.