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| Albania 2,837,242[1] | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Predominantly Islam (Sunni and Bektashi), with large minorities of Orthodox Christianity and Roman Catholicism |
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| 1 Albanians are not recognized as a minority in Turkey. However approximately 500,000 people are reported to profess an Albanian identity. With the Turkified Albanians in the country the number is about 1,300,000, most of who do not speak Albanian, and some of them have only partial Albanian ancestry. 2 The total number of Albanian immigrants is obscure due to difficulties with identifying them as Albanians from Kosovo or Albania, and because some of them are illegal.[19] |
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| Varieties of Albanian |
| Gheg · Tosk · Arvanitika Arbëresh · Cham |
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| Islam in Albania Albanian Orthodox Church Albanian Byzantine Catholic Church Roman Catholicism Protestantism in Albania Italo-Albanian Catholic Church |
| History |
| Origins · History |
Albanians (Albanian: Shqiptarët) are a nation and ethnic group native to Albania and neighbouring countries. In the context of an ethnicity, they are commonly referred to as ethnic Albanians to distinguish the group from the use of the term Albanians as referring to citizens of Albania. They speak the Albanian language. More than half of all Albanians live in Albania and Kosovo [a]. The Albanian diaspora also exists in a number of other countries.
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While the exonym Albania for the general region inhabited by the Albanians does hark back to Classical Antiquity, and possibly to an Illyrian tribe, the name was lost within the Albanian language, the Albanian endonym being shqiptar, from the term for the Albanian language, shqip, a derivation of the verb shqiptoj "to utilize a correct Albanian pronunciation ". This theory pertains to Hahn and it holds that perhaps the word is ultimately a loan from Latin excipio.[20] Thus, the Albanian endonym, like Slav and others, is in origin a term for "those who speak [intelligibly, the same language]". However another plausible theory has been advanced by Maximilian Lambertz to explain the endonym as derived from the Albanian noun shqype or shqiponjë (eagle), which, according to Albanian folk etymology, denoted a bird totem dating from the times of Skanderbeg, as displayed on the Albanian flag.[21]
In History written in 1079–1080, the Byzantine historian Michael Attaliates referred to the Albanoi as having taken part in a revolt against Constantinople in 1043 and to the Arbanitai as subjects of the duke of Dyrrachium. It is disputed, however, whether that refers to Albanians in an ethnic sense.[22] However a later reference to Albanians from the same Attaliates, regarding the participation of Albanians in a rebellion around 1078, is undisputed.[23] The first reference to the Albanian language dates to the later 13th century (around 1285).[24]
The Albanians are and have been referred to by other terms as well. Some of them are:
What is possibly the earliest written reference to the Albanians is that to be found in an old Bulgarian text compiled around the beginning of the 11th century.[26] It was discovered in a Serbian manuscript dated 1628 and was first published in 1934 by Radoslav Grujic. This fragment of a legend from the time of Tsar Samuel endeavours, in a catechismal 'question and answer' form, to explain the origins of peoples and languages. It divides the world into seventy-two languages and three religious categories: Orthodox, half-believers (i.e. non-Orthodox Christians) and non-believers. The Albanians find their place among the nations of half-believers. If the dating of Grujic is accepted, which is based primarily upon the contents of the text as a whole, this would be the earliest written document referring to the Albanians as a people or language group.[27]
It can be seen that there are various languages on earth. Of them, there are five Orthodox languages: Bulgarian, Greek, Syrian, Iberian (Georgian) and Russian. Three of these have Orthodox alphabets: Greek, Bulgarian and Iberian. There are twelve languages of half-believers: Alamanians, Franks, Magyars (Hungarians), Indians, Jacobites, Armenians, Saxons, Lechs (Poles), Arbanasi (Albanians), Croatians, Hizi, Germans.
The first undisputed mention of Albanians in the historical record is attested in Byzantine source for the first time in 1079-1080, in a work titled History by Byzantine historian Michael Attaliates, who referred to the Albanoi as having taken part in a revolt against Constantinople in 1043 and to the Arbanitai as subjects of the duke of Dyrrachium. It is disputed, however, whether the "Albanoi" of the events of 1043 refers to Albanians in an ethnic sense or whether "Albanoi" is a reference to Normans from Sicily under an archaic name (there was also tribe of Italy by the name of "Albanoi").[28] However a later reference to Albanians from the same Attaliates, regarding the participation of Albanians in a rebellion around 1078, is undisputed.[23] At this point, they are already fully Christianized, although Albanian mythology and folklore are part of the Paleo-Balkan pagan mythology,[29] in particular showing Greek influence.[30]
From late 11th century the Albanians were called Arbën/Arbër and their country as Arbanon,[31] a mountainous area to the west of Lake Ochrida and the upper valley of the river Shkumbin.[32] It was in 1190, when the rulers of Arbanon (local Albanian noble called Progon and his sons Dhimitër and Gjin) created their principality with its capital at Krujë.[33] After the fall of Progon Dynasty in 1216, the principality came under Grigor Kamona and Gulam of Albania. Finally the Principality was dissolved on 1255. Around 1230 the two main centers of Albanian settlements, one around Devoll river in what is now central Albania,[34] and the other around the region which was known with the name Arbanon.[33]
In 1271 Charles of Anjou after he captured Durrës from Despotate of Epirus, created the Kingdom of Albania. In 14th century a number of Albanian principalities were created.
The Ottoman supremacy in the Balkan region began in 1385 with the Battle of Savra but was briefly interrupted in the 15th century, when George Kastrioti, an Albanian warrior known as Skanderbeg, allied with some Albanian chiefs, formed the League of Lezhe and fought-off Turkish rule from 1443–1478 (although Kastrioti died in 1468). Kastrioti's strongholds included Kruja, Shkodra, Durrës, Lezha, Petrela, Koxhaxhik and Berat.
Upon the Ottomans' return, a large number of Albanians fled to Italy, Greece and Egypt and maintained their Arbëresh identity.
By the 1870s, the Sublime Porte's reforms aimed at checking the Ottoman Empire's disintegration had clearly failed. The image of the "Turkish yoke" had become fixed in the nationalist mythologies and psyches of the empire's Balkan peoples, and their march toward independence quickened. The Albanians, because of the higher degree of Islamic influence, their internal social divisions, and the fear that they would lose their Albanian-populated lands to the emerging Balkan states—Serbia, Montenegro, Bulgaria, and Greece—were the last of the Balkan peoples to desire division from the Ottoman Empire.[35] The Albanian national awakening as a coherent political movement began after the Treaty of San Stefano, according to which Albanian-inhabited areas were to be ceded to other states of the Balkans, and focused on preventing that partition.[36][37] The Treaty of San Stefano was the impetus for the nation-building movement, which was based more on fear of partition than national identity.[37] Even after Albania became independent in 1912, Albanian national identity was fragmented and possible non-existent in much of the new country.[37] The state of disunity and fragmentation would remain until the communist period following World War 2, when the communist nation-building project would achieve greater success in nation-building and reach more people than any previous regime, thus creating Albanian national communist identity.[37]
Approximately 6 million Albanians are to be found within the Balkan peninsula with about half this number residing in Albania and the other divided between Kosovo, Montenegro, the Republic of Macedonia, Greece and to a much smaller extent Bosnia, Bulgaria, Croatia, Romania, Serbia and Slovenia.
Albania has an estimated 3 million inhabitants, with ethnic Albanians comprising approximately 95% of the total.[38]
An estimated 2.2 million Albanians live in the territory of Former Yugoslavia, the greater part (close to two million) in Kosovo[a].
Rights to use the Albanian language in education and government were given and guaranteed by the 1974 Constitution of SFRY and were widely utilized in Macedonia and in Montenegro before the Dissolution of Yugoslavia.[39]
An estimated 275,000-600,000 Albanians live in Greece, forming the largest immigrant community in the country.[40][41] They are economic migrants whose migration began in 1991, following the collapse of the Socialist People's Republic of Albania.
The Arvanites and Albanian-speakers of Western Thrace are a group descended from Tosk Albanians who migrated to southern and central Greece between the 13th and 16th centuries. They are Greek Orthodox Christians, and though they traditionally speak a dialect of Tosk Albanian known as Arvanitika, they have fully assimilated into the Greek nation and do not identify as Albanians. Arvanitika is in a state of attrition due to language shift towards Greek and large-scale internal migration to the cities and subsequent intermingling of the population during the 20th century.
The Cham Albanians were a group that formerly inhabited a region of Epirus known as Chameria, nowadays Thesprotia in northwestern Greece. Most Cham Albanians converted to Islam during the Ottoman era. Muslim Chams were expelled from Greece during World War II, by an anti-communist resistance group, as a result of their participation in a communist resistance group and the collaboration with the Axis occupation, while Orthodox Chams have largely assimilated into the Greek nation.
Approximately 1 million are dispersed throughout the rest of Europe, most of these in Italy (438,000), Germany (320,000), Switzerland (200,000), Sweden (60,000), and the UK.
Italy has a historical Albanian minority known as the Arbëreshë (260,000) which are scattered across Southern Italy, but the majority of Albanians in Italy arrived in 1991 and have since surpassed the older populations of Arbëreshë.
According to a 2008 report prepared for the National Security Council of Turkey by academics of three Turkish universities in eastern Anatolia, there were approximately 1,300,000 people of Albanian descent living in Turkey.[42] A part of these people have assimilated to the culture of Turkey, and consider themselves more Turkish than Albanian. Nonetheless, more than 500,000 Albanian descents still recognize their ancestry like their languages, culture and traditions.
In Egypt there are 18,000 Albanians, mostly Tosk speakers. Many are descendants of the Janissary of Muhammad Ali Pasha, an Albanian who became Wāli, and self-declared Khedive of Egypt and Sudan. In addition to the dynasty that he established, a large part of the former Egyptian and Sudanese aristocracy was of Albanian origin.
According to data from the 2008 Census of the United States Government, there are 201,118 Albanian Americans (US citizens of full or partial Albanian descent).[43]
In Australia and New Zealand 22,000 in total. Albanians are also known to reside in China, India, Iran, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, Pakistan and Singapore, but the numbers are generally small. Albanians have been present in Arab countries such as Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon and Syria for about 5 centuries as a legacy of Ottoman Turkish rule.
The Albanian language forms a separate branch of Indo-European languages family tree. A traditional view links the origin of Albanian with Illyrian, though this theory is broadly contested and challenged.[44]
Unattested prior to the second half of the 15th century, the Albanian language is one of the youngest languages of Europe in terms of first written account.
Albanian in a revised form of the Tosk dialect is the official language of Albania and Kosovo[a]; and is official in the municipalities where there are more than 20% ethnic Albanian inhabitants in the Republic of Macedonia. It is also an official language of Montenegro where it is spoken in the municipalities with ethnic Albanian populations.
The Albanians first appear in the historical record in Byzantine sources of the late 11th century.[45] At this point, they were already fully Christianized. Christianity was later overtaken by Islam, which kept the scepter of the major religion during the period of Ottoman Turkish rule from the 15th century until year 1912. Eastern Orthodox Christianity and Roman Catholicism continued to be practiced with less frequency.
During the 20th century the monarchy and later the totalitarian state followed a systematic secularization of the nation and the national culture. This policy was chiefly applied within the borders of the current Albanian state. It produced a secular majority in the population. All forms of Christianity, Islam and other religious practices were prohibited except for old non-institutional Pagan practices in the rural areas, which were seen as identifying with the national culture. The current Albanian state has revived some pagan festivals, such as the lunar Spring festival (Albanian: Dita e Verës) held yearly on March 14 in the city of Elbasan. It is a national holiday.
A recent Pew Research Center demographic study put the percentage of Muslims in Albania at 79.9%.[46]:22 Most of the Muslims in Albania are Sunni Muslims and Bektashi Muslims[47][48] There are also Orthodox Christians, predominantly in Southern Albania, bordering Greece, and Roman Catholicism is the main religion among those Albanians living predominantly in northern Albania, bordering the Republic of Montenegro. After 1992 an influx of foreign missionaries has brought more religious diversity with groups such as Jehovah's Witnesses, Mormons, Hindus, Bahá'í, a variety of Christian denominations and others. This rich blend of religions has however rarely caused religious strife. People of different religions freely intermarry. For part of its history, Albania has also had a Jewish community. Some of the members of the Jewish community were saved by a group of Albanians during the Nazi occupation.[49] Many left for Israel circa 1990-1992 after borders were open due to fall of communist regime in Albania, while in modern times about 200 Albanian Jews still live in Albania.
Albanian music displays a variety of influences. Albanian folk music traditions differ by region, with major stylistic differences between the traditional music of the Ghegs in the north and Tosks in the south. Modern popular music has developed around the centers of Korca, Shkodër and Tirana. Since the 1920s, some composers such as Fan S. Noli have also produced works of Albanian classical music.
| a. | ^ Kosovo is the subject of a territorial dispute between the Republic of Serbia and the self-proclaimed Republic of Kosovo. The latter declared independence on 17 February 2008, while Serbia claims it as part of its own sovereign territory. Its independence is recognised by 86 UN member states. |
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