National Geographic in 1992 Who are the Albanians?

Neither beatings with rods, nor weapons, nor cannons, nor exile, nor imprisonment, nor even death itself shakes them from the place<x0.

The speaker was a young Albanian who had done part of the school in the US. He has now returned to his country, where he is working hard for his people. It is one of the few educated people in Albania, but it aims for the next generation not to number Albania's educated men and women by finger.

The above - mentioned words were preceded by these: “At present, from north to south and east to west Albania, all classes of Muslim and Christian people, be they a wish, almost a passion for national education. They all realize that, as in the past the sword was a symbol of power, education today is the goddess of power, and they will be educated despite persecution”.

Albanians have become aware of their need for Western civilisation and progress. But, since the first day of the adoption of the new Ottoman Constitution, young Turks were determined that civilisation should come to Albanians, only after it had passed to a Turkish and Mohamedan site. This programme could not be accepted by Albanians, even if the new Turks had been able to implement it.

The Albanian is European: for more than two thousand years, he has lived where he now lives in the Forts of Epirus and Illyri, across the Adriatic parallel to the Italian heel. At the beginning of the nineteenth century, Albanians mixed with their southern neighbours, Greeks and were the backbone of the war for Greece's independence. Marco Bochar's countrymen emigrated all to Cefalonia on the coast of Greece, but nearly 2 million of the worst Albanians now live under Turkish rule.

During 125 years before America's discovery, the proud republic of Venice had a benevolent primacy over Albanian coastal cities, and therefore delayed it with a century of Turkish domination. With the decline of Squitar in Albania and the expulsion of the Venetians from the Turks in 1748, they began their rule centuries of fraud, broken beliefs, and atrocities. The result of Turkish rule could be summed up by the deeper immersion of Albanians in poverty, superstition, and thirst for blood, due to fertile terrain that guaranteed mountain history and primitive traits. Over the past two millenniums, waves and impulses of progress have not reached the Albanian, or overlooked, leaving it intact.

Revenge Still Practiced

Today, as in the past, it is true that one in five highlanders is sacrificed by terrible retaliation, which only civilization can eradicate from Albanian life. Shooting a person, even sneaky, is a matter of taking blood. Nothing else can return the wounded honor. If the murderer is not killed himself, then one of his relatives must be a victim, thus starting the endless chain. When revenge has gone too far, it can be bought if you have enough money, or it can be stopped through some of the complexities of the Albanian code.

No one should speak for the Albanian as a man without law. He applies scrupulously what he knows and acknowledges: But these are laws given to nature and customs, as well as the nature of his ancestors centuries ago, of “odified” somewhat in the 15th century, even though they have never been on paper to this day. Some of the weird rules that govern his life are: People who descended from a male ancestor through the male line view each other as brothers, or brothers and sisters, and as a result marriage within the tribe is disfellowshipped. Young people may swear by brotherhood, creating a bond that subjects both, along with their descendants of some generations, to the same marital laws that regulate blood connections.

Those who have the same godfather cannot marry, and there are two kinds of divines: baptism and hair. When a child, a girl, or a boy turns 2, his hair, which until then has not been touched by scissors, is received at ceremony. The cut is carried out by the divine, which, if the child is a Christian, leaves a flock of hair for each tip of the compass by creating a cross. If she is a Muslim, three herds to form a triangle. In the case of revenge, a husband should not be touched if accompanied by a child or a woman.

Indestructible Personality

Today, the Albanian is the most picturesque personality in Europe. Yet, as interesting as his traits are, so is his political future. Albanian national consciousness has recently emerged that refuses to be printed. Under the unnatural rule of Turks, the various Christian races of the Empire, such as Ottoman Armenians, Ottoman Bulgarians and Ottoman Greeks, each have their own national existence, a state within the state, though always subject to the will of Turks. Albanians, though in general they have developed a kind of Muslim loyalty that gives them almost solidarity with Turks, are determined to have a national entity as well.

Although cursed with the backlog that has accompanied Mohamedian faith more or less, their leaders realize that they are not an Oriental but a Western race. That their Turkish-Mohamedia features are a scales, and that it will suffice a generation with the proper education to do the grand jump forward and take their place among the civilised races of the Balkan Peninsula.

Not incompatible with the new Albanian nationalism, it may even be his reason, is the fact that Albanian is one of the most individualistic members of the human race. If he hadn't been, he would have lost his identity long ago, melting with different peoples that have been around the Albanian mountains over time. Despite continued Roman, glass, Serbs and Bulgarians attacks and Turkey's 350-year dominance, the Albanian has preserved its invincible individuality. Crisspi, the husband of the Italian state, has been of Albanian descent. He was a member of the vast colony of Albanians in Sicily and southern Italy, whose ancestors, about a hundred thousand, emigrated when Turkey invaded Albania. To this day, Italy's Albanians preserve their descent. The unwillingness or inability of Albanians to change their individuality is dramatically reflected in the continued existence of the Albanian Tribe system and permanent intertribal disputes. As a result, Albania has failed to present a united front against a common enemy.

Only a great national hero has come out for Albanians Skenderbeu. He died in 1467 after winning 21 battles against the Turks. His death left Albania without a leader, and brave Albanians who did not know loyalty or other law beyond that of the family and clan fell to the rule of Mehmet II, the conqueror of Constantinople. Mehmet could print, but not subdue Albanians. Even later sultans have failed to satisfy this craving. The best they could do was to do something for themselves, and until the last day of Abdel Hamit's tyranny, Albanians were treated as a special people. Hamiti bought their loyalty by not taxing them, restraining military recruits, and selecting the best of these highlanders as his personal bodyguards.

Young Turks were ruthless

When after 1908 the new Turks had adopted their Constitution and were trying hard to put order in the Ottoman Empire, Albania's treatment was one of the most delicate problems. It should have been done more carefully. Through a delicate approach, the fulfillment of promises, and the show that a fair sympathy for the aspirations of a very good but ignorant race, young Turks would have been able to establish and strengthen in Albania's province an impervious barrier to European aggression. Instead, they have followed a path that is properly described by the correspondent in Constantinople of “SETimes” of London, such as the steam rule policy. Ignoring the advice of any experienced politician, the young Turks rushed to “treated” Albanians, like ignorant Turkish villagers in Asia Minor. No other strategy would have been more inappropriate and more destined to fail.

Early signs of opposition were given in the fall of 1909, but the spring of 1910 had to come for a revolt to take on serious proportions. On 5 April of that year, Muslim Albanians from the northeast corner of Albania seized weapons against the government. For a few days the rebels held Kacanik, but 50,000 Turkish troops were immediately sent to the region and the movement was suppressed. She had a local character and no organization. Albania as a whole was not its goal.

However, the new Turks thought the time had come to teach disobedient Albanians a lesson. Troops that had gathered to suppress the uprising marched through Albania. A division went west to Shkodra. They crossed mountain roads that for generations had been closed to anyone traveling accompanied by a Turkish soldier, because Albanians did not like the uniform of Turkish authority. But now the mountainmen, caught unawares, would be disarmed. After the oppression they had suffered as their brothers, fewer in number and faced with automatics an unusual horror for ordinary Albanians there was no hope for resistance. Their weapons were taken from their pride and possessions, and Albanians were given a cruel “lesson. Another division of Turkish forces marched south and pantero in Albania's peaceful valleys.

In Elbasan, the intellectual leaders of New Albania had opened a normal school. They were trying to prepare Albanians to become teachers of their ignorant countrymen throughout the country. They used Albanian and, according to the vote of an Albanian convention a year earlier, wrote this language a European language with Latin letters. Under Abdul Hamit, every attempt to write or teach in Albanian had been printed. Only in the schools of Austrian and Italian missions in northern Albania, where Austrian and Italian propaganda were offered, and outside of the Sultan's observation, had it been possible for Albanians to study in their own language.

As for an alphabet, Austrian politicians who support Austrian priests' missionary work and never cease to advance Austrian schemes were suspicious of a future for Albania, whose leaders taught in Italy or Austria would be united by a common language and alphabet. A long alphabet was thus created and offered to children in Austrian mission schools. This would help to create gaps for the future, when Austria hoped to inherit this land and would need to use its cunning tyranny to accommodate the Albanian.

Elbasan's normal school, with its Latin alphabet and freed from foreign propaganda, was a ray of light in Albania's darkness. It had no religious divisions, Muslims, and Christians were brothers indiscriminately. Founders had only one goal, the height of the Albanian race. They were not political revolutionaries. They wanted to co-operate with the government of young Turks, and only demanded that implementation of the new constitution have something in common with its fundamental promises.

But when Turkish soldiers came to Elbasan in the summer of 1910, a state of emergency was declared. All who were seen to be related to normal school or to sympathise with its progress were followed, brought before military authorities, and beaten in a very cruel way to confess. Beatings and whips were applied to most of the ill-fated people in Elbasan. The normal - school finance was flogged beyond imagination. Director and many of the teachers escaped. Military authorities sought and beat the responsible for a telegram sent to Constantinople, demanding that instruction in Albanian schools should be done in Albanian and Latin letters. Next, soldiers marched to do other jobs “after closing that school and teaching Albanians a lesson to remember”.

Albanian Mutinies

With the passage of 1910, trouble began to increase for Turks in European Chancellors, especially the Albania military orgie scandal and the closure of normal school, as well as for the brutal disarmament of Christians in Macedonia. There are always some parties in Europe whose political interests can be brought forward by supporting the oppressed. And although hypocritical motives were those who put many European statesmen in motion who helped openly show these events, the truth of the exploits of young Turks in Albania and Macedonia gradually became known to all.

The young Turk had appeared just like his father's son. The leaders saw that they had made a mistake, but they would not accept it, and subsequent events showed that they did not change their mind. In April 1911, a mountain uprising occurred in the province of Shkodra, northwest of Albania along the border with Montenegro. The revolution was one of the premature and unfortunate efforts of a brave but divided people to hurl themselves against the inlerable yoke. Instead of becoming a general revolt, the uprising remained limited to the northernmost part of Albania.

True Patriots of all Albania reject religious and tribal differences when faced with great facts of a common heritage and a common choice. They, educated members of their race, were struggling hard last year for a joint effort in seeking justice for all of Albania. Unfortunately, these leaders were disorganized, without financing and without experience. They did not receive support from most of the Muslim tribes, many of whom, however, had been so disarmed that they could not think of joining a rebellion. Catholic ministers, a strong tribe in the south of Shkodra, had few rifles, all old and hesitated to come to the aid of the mountain revolt until it was too late.

Montenegro was a pillar of support for the uprising, through the support he and his citizens gave to Albanian refugees who had crossed the border the previous winter and since the spring returned to Albania, ready for war. Thus, “rogpos” knives that for generations had been removed from the sheath between the slaves of Montenegro and the Albanians autokton.

But, Montenegro was found dangerously involved in Albanian issues, in disagreement with European diplomacy, and especially its friend Russia. Thus, Montenegro finally left Albania in the mud. Despite this fact, Turks were forced to make peace with the rebellious masons, making them so many concessions that complaints began to appear from the Muslim population of Shkodra, which had not rebelled.

What? You offer favors to the rebels”, they said. “Yes, who's been loyal to you despite your old wounds”. It was like a padding son's complaint. Unfortunately, the Turk could not tame his faithful children, just as his Jewish father once did. As for the highlanders, it was not known how long it would last.

Schools will only ease them

Albania's future depends not only on the will of Austria, Italy, Montenegro supported by Russia, Greece and Turkey itself, where each is determined to have its own Albanian piece of cake. Albania's future depends greatly on the amount of education that could be implemented before the fate of 2 million people is finally determined. With the exception of Miss Edith Durham, the English woman who has violated Albania's wildest and most dangerous areas herself, no one knows this country better than Mr. James D. Bowchier, who for a whole generation has been a special correspondent of “London Times” in the Balkans. His extraordinary article for Albania in the new edition of the Encyclopedia Britannica, as it speaks of the battles of isolated groups of Albanians concluded: “Rating a stronger patriotic sentiment must depend on the spread of education to the people”.

If education spreads without obstacles in Albania, Albanians will also begin to take care of themselves. Many of the Christian Albanians in the city of Shkodra have been educated and provided prosperity, thanks to the Italians and Austrians. They especially fear the fanaticism of their Muslim brothers, although in the mountains a few miles away, among the families of the ignorant highlanders, both Christian and Muslim religions can take their place under the same roof, and Christian and Muslim rituals can be performed in one building.

Sometimes the author of this article has asked educated Muslim Albanians, interested in the cause of their race, why they have not preached to the Muslims of Shkodra, and elsewhere to the brotherhood between Christians and Muslims. Without hesitation, but with shame and tight lips, the answer has been each time: “is impossible. Muslims are ignorant. First they have to be educated, then they'll understand”.

Shortly before the parliament's distribution, in January 1912, an Albanian MP, one of his race's chief employers and currently rebel leader, declared: “If Turks continue to despise the yurts, they would ruin their country. I say this because I love Turks whose existence is necessary for us”. The Albanian MP spoke for his people.

Albanian Fears Future

The Albanian fears that instead of ensuring the freedom for which he prayed and fought, his precious mountains and fertile valleys will be divided among the warring states, and that it may be absorbed by a foreign race. Austria threatens to come north. Italy cans across the Adriatic coast. These are two enemies that Albanians hate worse than Turks, despite schools, hospitals and churches their representatives have built in northwest Albania. Albanians fear Austria and Italy just as a prophetic Polish may have intimidated three motherland robbers. Albanians fear a European conference for this purpose as well, since Montenegro and Greece are allowed to expand at the expense of Albanians. The ideal alternative he would like is a well-governed Turkey, for which he will be one of the “ents protected”.

However, generations of Turkish rule have taught him that he should not expect justice from Turks. The July 1908 revolution offered a temporary ray of hope, but the darkness of despair returned quickly, worse than before. Tribe, lead and prison cell punishment have been the only reward after searching for “something better”. It is true that Albanians who had been neglected for centuries were unwilling to accept kindly some of the terms of “Constitutism”. The ignorant villager, who has never paid taxes and never registered for military service, did not appreciate the new “barazia”, which manifested itself to him through tax payment, as did all other residents of Turkey, as well as his contribution to martyrs to the distant lands of Yemen.

Albanians have much to learn. Education could already have come through their ill - oiled leaders.

But the stupid Turk did the only thing he could do he marched with armies towards Albania. As a result, instead of exploiting the chances of enthusiastic loyalty, he further instilled his old feelings of distrust and hatred.

Speculations for Albania's future lead only to unpainable mazes, as Albania's problem is closely linked to the East Case, what has plagued Europe for generations. The Crime War was fought to solve it, but in a more complicated form it returned to the Russian-Turkish war of 1877-1878. Europe's envoys to Berlin in 1878 screwed up the Berlin Treaty. Is it too much to hope that the time has come for the appearance of a more sympathetic generation of diplomats? However, the Near East is always hoping for a solution and to end the conditions that, with young and old Turks, are making the Ottoman Empire a mere legend.

Today Albanians, Arabs, Armenians, Bulgarians, Greeks, Serbs and Turks themselves are suffering, as has happened for decades, from the plague of Turkish rule. Of these unfortunate peoples, Albanians are the first to draw the attention of an unselfish world. / Translation: The world..