Why the world calls us ‘Albania’ and the origin of ‘Albania’ – Tirana Times
By Eqrem ej ej abej*
Albanians are one of the few peoples of Europe and even other continents, who are known by two national names, one is used within the country, so the name they call their people, and the other is the name by which the world knows them.
The Albanian calls himself Albanian, his place Albanian, Albanian, but people are known all over the world since ancient times as Albanian, Albanian etc. and place as Albanie, AlbaniaWith This dual designation has its own justifications. It is related to some ethnographic circumstances which are specific to Albania and its historical past.
Given the facts, first of all it can be noted that ALBANIA dominates as a national name in Albania and Albanian, Albanian as the name of the country, but on the other hand in the old Albanian communities in Italy and Greece this name is not used.
The Albanians of southern Italy and Sicily, the descendants of people who migrated from Albania during the first wars with the Ottomans who carried the flag of Gjergj Kastriot (Skanderbeg) in the XV and XVI centuries call themselves and generally their people and the old homeland arbà «resh and this homeland Arbàr, Arbàrwith
These were the names used until recently by the ancestors of those Albanians who moved a little earlier in the XIV and XV centuries from Albania to Greece, who also do not use the currently dominant name in Albania; they also use it regularly arbà «resh ABOUT “Albanian” arbà «rishte for the language “albanian”, arbà «risht for the “Albanian” language.
The data clearly show that the current Albanian, Albanian, Albanian the name, was not yet in use at the time of Skanderbeg, or at least had not yet been generalized, and that this is nevertheless newer than the first name. This means that the old traditional name of the place and people was arbàn, arbàr, arbàreshWith And because this name, as can be seen at first glance, is identical in Albania, Albanese etc., mentioned above, all these show that in the Middle Ages Albanians called themselves the same as other people who are called today.
This ethnographic view is confirmed and supplemented through some data, old and new, from Albania, and on the other hand through the evidence of the languages of the neighboring peoples with the Albanians, and also with the names of Albania and Albanians in various European sources of the Middle Ages.
As noted from the first half of the nineteenth century, the old name of the country, in addition to the Albanian communities already mentioned, was preserved in Albania. An Albanian plain region of Central Western Albania starting from Kurbin on the plateaus of Durrës and Tirana, ie the lowlands between the rivers Mat and Erzen, is also called Arben currently and mal e arben there is thought for “male and field” (mountains and lowlands). A village west of Lake Shkodra is called Arbnesh and Arbenesh is also the name of the Albanian language island found near the town of Zadar, Dalmatia, founded in the first half of the 18th century by people from the village on occasion. Arbanà is also a village near Tirana.
In the southern part of the country, Arbàr AND Arbri «ri are known as different regions of the mountainous region of Labëria between the cities of Vlora, Gjirokastra and Delvina and their inhabitants as arbà «black AND arbà «NorwegianWith In other Albanian regions, the same name in different forms (arbàn, arbàr, arbàresh, arbnuer, arbàor) is used by people in an ethnic sense to distinguish Albanians from Aromanians or members of any other population in the Balkans. As can be seen, the ancient name, over time, was replaced by the new name Albanian, Albanian, but has still survived in various regions of the country.
The fact that it has been used nationwide, throughout the Albanian language territory, is evidenced, among other things, by folk verses such as “Arbënesh ladies from the sides of” Kosovo “come out (Arbnesh ladies go to the regions of Kosovo)With On the other hand, the historical sources of the country complement this picture even for the past. In the literary monuments of Old Albanian, starting from the 16th to the 18th centuries, the place is regularly mentioned as Arbànà, people like arbànesh, arbà ruer and its language as well arbà «nishtwith
Internal data regarding the national name of Albania and its people, match the external sources and evidence of other languages and peoples of the Balkan Peninsula. The presence of this name is also noticed there, and over time it was transmitted from Albania to those peoples.
In the popular Serbo-Croatian language, Albanian is called arbanas, and in its medieval documents as arbanasinIt is called Albanian arbananu even in popular Bulgarian, arbanas in Old Romanian and among the Aromanians of Albania and Macedonia arbines, arbinesi, all derived from the Albanian language arbenesh and its versions. Elaborating the historical sources of the Middle Ages, the Latin documents of the western countries of the pre-Angevin Dynasty which had political relations with some regions of Albania, the Albanians are known as arbanenses, and later as albanenses and their country like Albania, just like today.
Looking at the internal and external evidence, with a summary look, it is understood that the early traditional name of the Albanian people and his country is arbàn, arbàr with its variations and that this name prevailed in Albania until the first centuries of Ottoman rule.
Meanwhile, this name traces its roots to ancient times.
As is already known, the astronomer and geographer Claudius Ptolemy of Alexandria, Egypt, in the second century AD on his new world map marked the name of Albanoi tribe and Albanopolis the city as a central Albanian region near present-day Durrës and Dibra east of Lesh.
Albanian language Arbàn, Arbàr derives regularly from this name, as evidence, among other things, that Albanians are autochthonous, autochthonous in today’s settlements and that there has been a continuity, a linguistic continuity at least since ancient times.
As mentioned, Arbàn is the origin of the name of Albania and Albanians among the peoples of the Balkan Peninsula and other parts of Europe. Historically, this name, based on the common testimony of Ptolemy, the medieval sources of various countries and the current popular spread, it is very likely that he mainly belonged to the region of a central Albanian population; it was later generalized as a national name nationwide from the era before Skanderbeg.
As for the name Albanian, Albanian, Albanian is concerned, as the name of a people and country, as revealed above, it took root during the period of Ottoman rule, after the Albanians moved to Greece and Italy. Its spread as a national name and the disappearance of the old name as such, is likely to be related to the ethnic and social movement of people during the Middle Ages and the first Turkish era with internal movements, the creation of new families in those historical periods, although the concrete driving factors for such a replacement cannot be traced.
One thing that can be said almost certainly, is that Albanian was originally the name of the language. As such, it was probably of older use, probably parallel to the name arbàn n arbà «r as an ethnic name before expanding its use to include both people and country. It can be noticed that the oldest known Albanian writer Gjon Buzuku of 1555, except ndà Arbanit “In Albania”, he mentions Albanian “In Albanian”; also Peter Budi (1621) mentions Albanian and Pjeter Bogdani (1683) in Latin and Albanian grammar. The ethnic use of this name around 1700 was rooted because in the Decisions of the Provincial Council of 1706 except ‘Arbàni’ “Albania” and i Arbà «neshi “Albanian” is also mentioned for Albanian language itself (Albanian language). The idea that the Albanian name existed in northern Albania since the 16th century and was identical to the family name of Schivipudar, Schepuder, Schapudar, Scapuder of a resident of the town of Drisht near Shkodra, mentioned between 1368 – 1402 in the archives of Ragusa, remains a hypothesis that deserves to be traced further.
Regarding the source of the two names arbà «n AND Albanian, it must be borne in mind that many names of peoples, whether old or young, known by history, remain with meaning and source unknown. An important prerequisite in this field of research is the identification of the initial form of the respective name. In this regard, on the old national name of the Albanians, it can certainly be confirmed that from its two forms, arb- AND ALB, the first is the true form, as identified by the local testimony and Balkan folk testimonies mentioned above. This is why the search for ALB the roots with the alleged meaning of “mountain”, the comparison with the topical names Alba- of Italy and other regions, with the name of the Alps, etc., do not have a strong basis. On the other hand, given arb- its form and meaning ‘field, field’ which is stored in ‘mal’ AND arben ‘ mentioned above, we can approximate this name with Latin arvum “agricultural land, field”, ancient Greek aroura “Agricultural land” with the Celtic word of Middle Ireland arbor, plural form Arbane “grain”. Arben’s name may have an ancient connection with Arbe island in Dalmatia.
As for the name Albanian, Albanian, Albanian Albanian has to do, where the verb Albanian, Albanian type (explain) of the vernacular derives from, this name remains of dubious origin.
Thoughts from which it may have flowed English (eagle), with the Albanians who owe the name of this bird since the time of Skanderbeg and who associate this name with the words of Plutarch, who after his victory against the Macedonians, Pirrove was given the nickname “eagle”, are not scientifically based considering the forms of these two names.
In fact, among the old Albanian authors, Albanian, written in this form, is obviously different from the name of the bird, which they regularly write as shqype, discovering that we are dealing with two completely different words. Its proximity to stack the “straw mill” on the assumption of a previous meaning of “gathered, people” is also unconvincing.
There is also doubt about other interpretations of this name as “mountain dweller” and “shooter” from modern Greek skippetto (n) “Rifle” (from the Italian schioppetto), a word that was first identified for Greek in the 16th-17th centuries. Finally, the explanation of the word Albanian from Latin excipient remains unconvincing; the Latin word does not mean “understand”, but take, set aside, exclude, accept. “In this way, the source of Albanian remains an open case.
(Published in the magazine “Shqiperia e Re”, 1972 (Translation Tirana Times)
*Eqrem ‡ ‡ abej, 1908-1980 is probably the most prominent Albanian historian and linguist. Educated in Vienna, in 1972 ej e abey became a founding member of the Academy of Sciences. “Despite the isolation in which he lived during the long years of the Stalinist dictatorship in Albania, he gained fame as a linguist and scholar at home and abroad. Eqrem ‡ ‡ abej is the author of over 200 numerous publications on the Albanian language, but also on literature and folklore. His earliest scientific publications on the substance date back to the mid-1930s. its final etymological, ”says Robert Eslie.