Refugees from Pafra of Pontus

The Paphraeans or Bafralides were a group of Turkish-speaking Christian Greeks of Pontus, who fled to Greece as refugees and settled in villages in Eastern, Central, Western Macedonia and Epirus, such as Nea Bafra of Serres, which was founded by 80 refugee families in 1924, and Bafra of Ioannina. They are named after Pafra or Bafra, a settlement southeast of Sinope, almost on the coast of the Black Sea, in the present-day Samsun Province. They resided in the hinterland and on the coast of the Western Pontus and were mainly the administrative provinces (vilayets) of Sebasteia, Kastamon and Chanik. The majority of them belonged to the jurisdiction of the metropolis of Amaseia. Their population lived mostly in rural communities, isolated from the outside world. Nevertheless, they maintained schools for boys and girls in their communities. The use of the Turkish language was not peculiar to the Bafralis, as it was widespread among other Orthodox Christian populations in Asia Minor, such as the Cappadocians. Pictured: Father Charalambos Porphyridis and Despina Katritsaoglou, refugees from Pafra of Pontus, Kalochori, 1930s. ©Folklore Association of Kalochorians of Eastern and Northern Thrace “Kaskarka”.