ABSTRACT
The institutionalization of the humanities in the second half of the nineteenth century occurred simultaneously with the general drive towards the "nationalization of sciences." External scholarly interest in the region was compartmentalized in a similar way: even regional surveys featuring "the Balkans" or "the Balkan peninsula" in their titles treated the subject in national denominations which were rarely seen in interaction beyond mutual contestations. In most of the newly created Balkan states the institutionalization of Balkan studies and the idea of Balkan solidarity were preceded by, and, after the wars of 1912–1913, evolved in competition with, the burgeoning field of Slavic studies and the propagation of "Slavic reciprocity." The genesis of the plot about the dead brother was found to be in ancient Asia Minor, from where it had spread among the Balkan populations south of the Danube; that folkloric theme was missing in the lands of the Romanian kingdom but its Romanian variants could be encountered in Bukovina.
