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1 Many boycotted the Census[27] 2 The number of Italy shows only the number of the citizens of Albania in the country. Does not include significant numbers of ethnic Albanian immigrants from Kosovo, from other Balkan countries, the illegal immigrants and the local Arbëreshë Albanians.
Albanians (Albanian: Shqiptarët) are defined as an ethnic group native to Albania and neighboring countries. The term is also used sometimes to refer to the citizens of the Republic of Albania regardless of ethnicity.[28] Ethnic Albanians speak the Albanian language and more than half of ethnic Albanians live in Albania and Kosovo.[1] The Albanian diaspora also exists in a number of other countries.
The ethnonym Albanians is believed to be derived from Albanoi,[29][30][31] an Illyrian tribe mentioned by Ptolemy in the city of Albanopolis. While the exonym Albania for the general region inhabited by the Albanians does hark back to Classical Antiquity, the Albanian language employs a different ethnonym, with modern Albanians referring to themselves as shqipëtarë and to their country as Shqipëria. Two etymologies have been conjectured for this ethnonym: one, associated with Maximilian Lambertz, derives the etymology from the Albanian for eagle (shqipe, var.,shqiponjë), perhaps denoting denizens of a mountainous region. In Albanian folk etymology, this word denotes a bird totem dating from the times of Skanderbeg, as displayed on the Albanian flag.[32] The other suggestion connects it to the verb 'to speak' (me shqiptue).[33][34] If the latter conjecture were correct, the Albanian endonym, like Slav and others, would originally have been a term for "those who speak [intelligibly, the same language]".
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.[35] However a later reference to Albanians from the same Attaliates, regarding the participation of Albanians in a rebellion around 1078, is undisputed.[36] In later Byzantine usage, the terms "Arbanitai" and "Albanoi", with a range of variants, were used interchangeably, while sometimes the same groups were also called by the classicising names Illyrians.[37][38][39] The first reference to the Albanian language dates to the later 13th century (around 1285).[40]
The Albanians are and have been referred to by other terms as well. Some of them are:
Studies in genetic anthropology show that the Albanians share the same ancestry as most other European peoples.[41]
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.[42] 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.[43]
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").[44] However a later reference to Albanians from the same Attaleiates, regarding the participation of Albanians in a rebellion around 1078, is undisputed.[36] At this point, they are already fully Christianized, although Albanian mythology and folklore are part of the Paleo-Balkan pagan mythology,[45] in particular showing Greek influence.[46]
From late 11th century the Albanians were called Arbën/Arbër and their country as Arbanon,[47] a mountainous area to the west of Lake Ochrida and the upper valley of the river Shkumbin.[48] 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.[49] 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,[50] and the other around the region which was known with the name Arbanon.[49]
In 1271 Charles of Anjou after he captured Durrës from Despotate of Epirus, created the Kingdom of Albania. In the 14th century a number of Albanian principalities were created.
Location of Arbanon in the 11th century. According to Ducellier the castle of Petrela was the access point to the region known with this name[1]
Population movements, 14th century.
At the dawn of the establishment of the Ottoman Empire in Southeast Europe, the geopolitical landscape was marked by scattered kingdoms of small principalities. The Ottomans erected their garrisons throughout southern Albania by 1415 and established formal jurisdiction over most of Albania by 1431.[52] However, on 1443 a great and longstanding revolt broke under the lead of the Albanian national hero Skanderbeg, which lasted until 1479, many times defeating major Ottoman armies led by sultans Murad II and Mehmed II. Skanderbeg united initially the Albanian princes and later established a centralized authority over most of the non-conquered territories, becoming Lord of Albania. He also tried relentlessly but rather unsuccessfully to create a European coalition against the Ottomans. He frustrated every attempt by the Turks to regain Albania, which they envisioned as a springboard for the invasion of Italy and western Europe. His unequal fight against the mightiest power of the time won the esteem of Europe as well as some support in the form of money and military aid from Naples, the papacy, Venice, and Ragusa.[53] Finally after decades of resistance, Ottomans captured Shkodër in 1479 and Durrës in 1501.[54] Skanderbeg’s long struggle to keep Albania free became highly significant to the Albanian people, as it strengthened their solidarity, made them more conscious of their national identity, and served later as a great source of inspiration in their struggle for national unity, freedom, and independence.[53][55] The invasion triggered a several waves of migration of Albanians from Albania, Epir and Peoponesse to the south of Italy, constituting an Arbereshe community. Albanians were recruited all over Europe as a light cavalry known as stratioti. The stratioti were pioneers of light cavalry tactics during this era. In the early 16th century heavy cavalry in the European armies was principally remodeled after Albanian stradioti of the Venetian army, Hungarian hussars and German mercenary cavalry units (Schwarzreitern).[56] By the 16th century, Ottoman rule over Southeast Europe was largely secure. The Ottomans proceeded in stages, first appointing a qadi along with governors and then military retainers in the cities. Timar holders, not necessarily converts to Islam, would occasionally rebel, the most famous case of which is Skanderbeg. His figure would be used later in the 19th century as a central component of Albanian national identity. Ottoman control over the Albanian territories was secured in 1571 when Ulcinj, presently in Montenegro, was captured. The most significant impact on the Albanians was the gradual Islamisation process of a large majority of the population- although such a process only became widespread in the 17th century.[57] Mainly Catholics converted in the 17th century, while the Orthodox Albanians became Muslim mainly in the following century. Initially confined to the main city centres of Elbasan and Shkodër, by this time the countryside was also embracing the new religion.[57] In Elbasan Muslims made up just over half the population in 1569–70 whereas in Shkodër this was almost 90% and in Berat closer to 60%. In the 17th century, however, Catholic conversion to Islam increased, even in the countryside. The motives for conversion according to scholars were diverse, depending on the context. The lack of source-material does not help when investigating such issues.[57] Albanians could also be found across the empire, in Egypt, Algeria, and across the Maghreb as vital military and administrative retainers.[58]
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.[59] 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.[60][61] The Treaty of San Stefano was the impetus for the nation-building movement, which was based more on fear of partition than national identity.[61] Even after Albania became independent in 1912, Albanian national identity was fragmented and possible non-existent in much of the new country.[61] The state of disunity and fragmentation would remain until the communist period following World War II, 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.[61]
Albanian warrior in 1913.
Approximately 7 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, Serbia, the Republic of Macedonia, Greece and to a much smaller extent Bosnia, Bulgaria, Croatia, Romania, and Slovenia.
Albania has an estimated 3 million inhabitants, with ethnic Albanians comprising approximately 95% of the total.[62]
An estimated 2.2 million Albanians live in the territory of Former Yugoslavia, the greater part (close to two million) in Kosovo.[1]
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.[63]
An estimated 275,000–600,000 Albanians live in Greece, forming the largest immigrant community in the country.[5][6] 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 Tosks 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 (502,546), 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.[64] 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 descendants 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. Albanian Sunnis, Bektashis and Orthodox Christians were all represented in this diaspora, whose members at some point included major Renaissance figures (Rilindasit), including Fan Noli who lived in Egypt for a time. With the ascension of Gamal Abdel Nasser in Egypt and his ideology of Arab nationalism, the last remnants of Albanian community there were forced to leave.[65]
According to the 2010 American Community Survey, there are 193,813 Albanian Americans (American citizens of full or partial Albanian descent).[24]
In Australia and New Zealand there are a total of 22,000 Albanians. 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 five centuries as a legacy of Ottoman Turkish rule.
The Albanian language forms a separate branch of Indo-European languages family tree. A traditional view, based mainly on the territory where the languages were spoken, links the origin of Albanian with Illyrian. Not enough Illyrian archaeological evidence is left behind however, to come a definite conclusion. Another theory links the Albanian as originating from the Thracian language: however this theory takes exception to the territory, since the Thracian language was spoken in an area distinct from Albania, and no significant population movements have been recorded in the period when the shift from one language to the other is supposed to have occurred.[66]
Albanian in a revised form of the Tosk dialect is the official language of Albania and Kosovo;[1] 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.[67] At this point, they were already fully Christianized. All Albanians were Orthodox Christians until the middle of the 13th century when the Ghegs were converted to Catholicism as a mean to resist the Slavs.[68][69][70] 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 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 Spring festival (Albanian: Dita e Verës) held yearly on March 14 in the city of Elbasan. It is a national holiday.
According to 2011 census, 58.79% of Albania adheres to Islam, making it the largest religion in the country. The majority of Albanian Muslims are Secular Sunni with a significant Bektashi Shia minority. Christianity is practiced by 16.99% of the population, making it the second largest religion in the country. The remaining population is either irreligious or belongs to other religious groups.[71] Before World War II, there was given a distribution of 70% Muslims, 20% Eastern Orthodox, and 10% Roman Catholics.[72] Today, Gallup Global Reports 2010 shows that religion plays a role in the lives of only 39% of Albanians, and ranks Albania the thirteenth least religious country in the world.[73]
The results of the 2011 census, however, have been criticized as questionable on a number of grounds, and have been said to drastically underrepresent the number of Orthodox, Bektashi and irreligious Albanians, with problems including whole communities reporting that they had not been contacted, workers filling out questions without even asking the respondents and a drastic difference between the final results and the preliminary results with regard to religion (which showed over 70% declining to answer the question about religion).[74][75][76][77][78][79][80][81]
The Communist regime that took control of Albania after World War II persecuted and suppressed religious observance and institutions and entirely banned religion to the point where Albania was officially declared to be the world's first atheist state. Religious freedom has returned to Albania since the regime's change in 1992. Albanian Muslim populations (mainly secular and of the Sunni branch) are found throughout the country whereas Albanian Orthodox Christians as well as Bektashis are concentrated in the south; Roman Catholics are found primarily in the north of the country.[82]
For part of its history, Albania has also had a Jewish community. Members of the Jewish community were saved by a group of Albanians during the Nazi occupation.[83] Many left for Israel c. 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.
An Arnaut in Cairo, Egypt
Albanian costumes fustanella of south-central Albania
Albanian custom Catholic woman from Shkodra, Albania
Man and woman from Elbasan, Albania
Shkodra man in traditional dress
Albanian Woman, end of the 19th century
A traditional male folk group from Skrapar, Albania
Albanians in Macedonia
Albanian shepherds of Macedonia
Albanian folk dance from Civita, Calabria, Italy
Albanian traditional costumes from Piana degli Albanesi, Sicily, Italy
The Roman Catholic Ghegs appear to liave abandoned the Eastern for the Western Church in the middle of the 13th century