Will respond to interesting comments later- this is really useful stuff, thank you.
For now... whilst the narrative update for Chapter 28 continues, I've started work on this piece- hopefully it'll be of interest and spark some discussion!
An Ethnographic Survey of Rhōmanía in 1330: Part One
Northern Italy: Only ever a “semi-detached” part of Rhōmanía proper since the early twelfth century, identity in northern Italy is largely tied up within one’s own city state, with a limited sense of pan-Italian feeling. Use of the term “Roman” is growing, but very slowly, and is still in the early fourteenth century linked to the aristocracy and those with mercantile links to Constantinople – and of course inhabitants of the city of Rome. Linguistically, the dialects of the city states continue to be spoken at street level, though amongst the educated elites, classic Latin has seen a revival since the early thirteenth century, and Romaic tutors are available in the larger cities.
Religiously, Northern Italy is firmly part of the world of the Uniate Church, and the pretensions of the Patriarch of Paris are generally ignored. There are small Jewish minorities dotted around the cities, with the largest communities resident in Genoua and Pisa, where they maintain close links with their co-religionists in Iberia and north Africa. Ironically, Jews are some of the most pro-imperial residents of northern Italy, given the protections they receive under imperial Roman law.
Aside from the Jews, there are a few small German speaking communities north of the Po, but otherwise different ethnicities are largely comprised of merchants. One final community to note is a well-established Muslim village on the isle of Aegyllion (OTL Capraia), complete with several mosques, that serves as an unofficial hub for Islamic trade and business in Italy.
Southern Italy and Sicily: Considerably more closely integrated into Rhōmanía than the north, parts of this region are becoming very much part of the Roman mainstream- notably Kalabria, which is totally dominated by Romaic speaking Romans. Elsewhere, in Loukania and Apoulia, there are more Latinate speakers, but they are a minority. The language of the church and administration here is Romaic, and Roman law is more or less uniformly imposed, with a few small exceptions.
Sikelia retains Arabic speakers, both Christian and Muslim, though the Muslims are a harassed and dwindling minority, with many opting to retreat to Ifriqiya. By 1330, Muslims probably make up no more than 10% of the total population, concentrated on the western coast of the island. The imperial government has encouraged immigration to Sikelia from the Aegean heartlands, with the result that some cities like Syrakousai are now virtually monoculturally Roman.
As seat of the imperial administration, the remaining ethno-religious diversity in southern Italy is largely provided by the army. The armies of the
Katepánō are often recruited from unassimilated Armenian and Slavic subject peoples, who have brought some culinary innovations to the region- but it should be born in mind that this “multiethnicity” is largely skin-deep. Military service is a powerful integrator into the Romaic speaking mainstream, with even those Armenians and Slavs who choose to settle in Italy generally taking Romaic speaking wives and bringing up their children as Romans.
Illyria: If anything, even less integrated into the imperial mainstream than is northern Italy, the kingdoms of this region are in practice autonomous, though they occasionally pay lip service to the authority of the Emperor. By far the most important local monarch here is the Croat king, who occasionally takes court titles from Constantinople. The influence of Rhōmanía here is largely linguistic- the courts of the Croatian and Serbian monarchs now generally correspond in elegant Attic Greek, and there is growing adoption of Romaic as a common second language in the region.
The exception here are the cities of the Dalmatian coastline, dominated by Rhausin (OTL Dubrovnik). Here, a Latinate speaking population is slowly but surely being converted into a Romaic speaking one. Bilingualism is common, but, as in southern Italy, the language of church and administration is Romaic- though one innovation is a growing use of Romaic language written in the Latin alphabet. There is a strong sense of “Romanness” in the cities of the Dalmatian coast, amongst both Latin and Romaic speakers.
Hellas: There is little to note in the southernmost regions of the Haemic peninsula- this region is utterly dominated by Romaic speaking Romans, with what minor diversity there is provided by Jews and merchants- the region is not heavily militarised. Small mosques exist at Korinthos and Thessaloniki, for the use of the tiny merchant communities. There are also small, mostly semi-nomadic, populations of Latinate herdsmen referred to as “Blakhoi” by the authorities, though these are dwindling. In the north of Hellas, there are a smattering of Sklavenic speaking villages.