Albanian (
endonym: or ) is an
Indo-European language and an independent branch of that family of languages. It is spoken by the
Albanians in the
Balkans
The Balkans ( ), also known as the Balkan Peninsula, is a geographical area in southeastern Europe with various geographical and historical definitions. The region takes its name from the Balkan Mountains that stretch throughout the who ...
and by the
Albanian diaspora
The Albanian diaspora ( sq, Mërgata Shqiptare or Diaspora Shqiptare) are the ethnic Albanians and their descendants living outside of Albania, Kosovo, southeastern Montenegro, western North Macedonia, southeastern Serbia, northwestern Greece a ...
, which is generally concentrated in the
Americas
The Americas, which are sometimes collectively called America, are a landmass comprising the totality of North and South America. The Americas make up most of the land in Earth's Western Hemisphere and comprise the New World.
Along with th ...
,
Europe
Europe is a large peninsula conventionally considered a continent in its own right because of its great physical size and the weight of its history and traditions. Europe is also considered a subcontinent of Eurasia and it is located entirel ...
and
Oceania
Oceania (, , ) is a geographical region that includes Australasia, Melanesia, Micronesia, and Polynesia. Spanning the Eastern and Western hemispheres, Oceania is estimated to have a land area of and a population of around 44.5 million ...
.
With about 7.5 million speakers,
it comprises an independent branch within the Indo-European languages and is not closely related to any other modern Indo-European language.
Albanian was first
attested in the 15th century and it is a descendant of one of the
Paleo-Balkan languages of antiquity. For historical and geographical reasons,
[: "It is often thought (for obvious geographic reasons) that Albanian descends from ancient Illyrian (see above), but this cannot be ascertained as we know next to nothing about Illyrian itself."] the prevailing opinion among modern historians and linguists is that the Albanian language is a descendant of a southern
Illyrian dialect spoken in much the same region in
classical times
Classical antiquity (also the classical era, classical period or classical age) is the period of cultural history between the 8th century BC and the 5th century AD centred on the Mediterranean Sea, comprising the interlocking civilizations of ...
. Alternative hypotheses hold that Albanian may have descended from
Thracian
The Thracians (; grc, Θρᾷκες ''Thrāikes''; la, Thraci) were an Indo-European speaking people who inhabited large parts of Eastern and Southeastern Europe in ancient history.. "The Thracians were an Indo-European people who occupied ...
or
Daco-Moesian, other ancient languages spoken farther east than Illyrian.
Too little is known of these languages to completely prove or disprove the various hypotheses.
The two main
Albanian dialect groups (or
varieties
Variety may refer to:
Arts and entertainment Entertainment formats
* Variety (radio)
* Variety show, in theater and television
Films
* ''Variety'' (1925 film), a German silent film directed by Ewald Andre Dupont
* ''Variety'' (1935 film), ...
),
Gheg
Gheg (also spelled Geg; Gheg Albanian: ''gegnishtja'', Standard sq, gegërishtja) is one of the two major varieties of Albanian, the other being Tosk. The geographic dividing line between the two varieties is the Shkumbin River, which winds ...
and
Tosk
Tosk ( sq-definite, toskërishtja) is the southern group of dialects of the Albanian language, spoken by the ethnographic group known as Tosks. The line of demarcation between Tosk and Gheg (the northern variety) is the Shkumbin River. Tosk is t ...
, are primarily distinguished by
phonological
Phonology is the branch of linguistics that studies how languages or dialects systematically organize their sounds or, for sign languages, their constituent parts of signs. The term can also refer specifically to the sound or sign system of a ...
differences and are
mutually intelligible in their standard varieties, with Gheg spoken to the north and Tosk spoken to the south of the
Shkumbin river. Their characteristics in the treatment of both native words and loanwords provide evidence that the split into the northern and the southern dialects occurred after
Christianisation
Christianization ( or Christianisation) is to make Christian; to imbue with Christian principles; to become Christian. It can apply to the conversion of an individual, a practice, a place or a whole society. It began in the Roman Empire, conti ...
of the region (4th century AD),
[: "The dialectal split into Geg and Tosk happened sometime after the region became Christianized in the fourth century AD: Christian Latin loanwords show Tosk rhotacism, such as Tosk ''murgu'' 'monk' (Geg ''mungu'') from Lat. ''monachus''."] and most likely not later than the 5th–6th centuries AD, hence possibly occupying roughly their present area divided by the Shkumbin river since the Post-Roman and Pre-Slavic period, straddling the
Jireček Line
The Jireček Line is a conceptual boundary through the ancient Balkans that divides the influence of the Latin (in the north) and Greek (in the south) languages in the Roman Empire from antiquity until the 4th century. The border has been repeate ...
.
Centuries-old communities speaking Albanian dialects can be found scattered in
Greece
Greece,, or , romanized: ', officially the Hellenic Republic, is a country in Southeast Europe. It is situated on the southern tip of the Balkans, and is located at the crossroads of Europe, Asia, and Africa. Greece shares land borders ...
(the
Arvanites
Arvanites (; Arvanitika: , or , ; Greek: , ) are a bilingual population group in Greece of Albanian origin. They traditionally speak Arvanitika, an Albanian language variety, along with Greek. Their ancestors were first recorded as settl ...
and some communities in
Epirus
sq, Epiri rup, Epiru
, native_name_lang =
, settlement_type = Historical region
, image_map = Epirus antiquus tabula.jpg
, map_alt =
, map_caption = Map of ancient Epirus by Heinri ...
,
Western Macedonia
Western Macedonia ( el, Δυτική Μακεδονία, translit=Ditikí Makedonía, ) is one of the thirteen regions of Greece, consisting of the western part of Macedonia. Located in north-western Greece, it is divided into the regional uni ...
and
Western Thrace
Western Thrace or West Thrace ( el, υτικήΘράκη, '' ytikíThráki'' ; tr, Batı Trakya; bg, Западна/Беломорска Тракия, ''Zapadna/Belomorska Trakiya''), also known as Greek Thrace, is a geographic and histori ...
),
Croatia
, image_flag = Flag of Croatia.svg
, image_coat = Coat of arms of Croatia.svg
, anthem = "Lijepa naša domovino"("Our Beautiful Homeland")
, image_map =
, map_caption =
, capit ...
(the
Arbanasi),
Italy
Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical ...
(the
Arbëreshë Arbën/Arbër, from which derived Arbënesh/Arbëresh originally meant all Albanians, until the 18th century. Today it is used for different groups of Albanian origin, including:
* Arbër (given name), an Albanian masculine given name
* Arbëresh ...
) as well as in
Romania
Romania ( ; ro, România ) is a country located at the crossroads of Central, Eastern, and Southeastern Europe. It borders Bulgaria to the south, Ukraine to the north, Hungary to the west, Serbia to the southwest, Moldova to the east, and ...
,
Turkey
Turkey ( tr, Türkiye ), officially the Republic of Türkiye ( tr, Türkiye Cumhuriyeti, links=no ), is a transcontinental country located mainly on the Anatolian Peninsula in Western Asia, with a small portion on the Balkan Peninsula in ...
and
Ukraine
Ukraine ( uk, Україна, Ukraïna, ) is a country in Eastern Europe. It is the second-largest European country after Russia, which it borders to the east and northeast. Ukraine covers approximately . Prior to the ongoing Russian inv ...
. Two varieties of the Tosk dialect,
Arvanitika
Arvanitika (; Arvanitika: , ; Greek: , ), also known as Arvanitic, is the variety of Albanian traditionally spoken by the Arvanites, a population group in Greece. Arvanitika is today endangered, as its speakers have been shifting to the u ...
in Greece and
Arbëresh in southern Italy, have preserved archaic elements of the language.
Ethnic Albanians
The Albanians (; sq, Shqiptarët ) are an ethnic group and nation native to the Balkan Peninsula who share a common Albanian ancestry, culture, history and language. They primarily live in Albania, Kosovo, North Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbi ...
constitute a large
diaspora, with many having long assimilated in different cultures and communities. Consequently, Albanian-speakers do not correspond to the total ethnic Albanian population, as many ethnic Albanians may identify as Albanian but are unable to speak the language.
Standard Albanian is a standardised form of spoken Albanian based on
Tosk
Tosk ( sq-definite, toskërishtja) is the southern group of dialects of the Albanian language, spoken by the ethnographic group known as Tosks. The line of demarcation between Tosk and Gheg (the northern variety) is the Shkumbin River. Tosk is t ...
. It is the
official language
An official language is a language given supreme status in a particular country, state, or other jurisdiction. Typically the term "official language" does not refer to the language used by a people or country, but by its government (e.g. judiciary, ...
of
Albania
Albania ( ; sq, Shqipëri or ), or , also or . officially the Republic of Albania ( sq, Republika e Shqipërisë), is a country in Southeastern Europe. It is located on the Adriatic and Ionian Seas within the Mediterranean Sea and shares ...
and
Kosovo
Kosovo ( sq, Kosova or ; sr-Cyrl, Косово ), officially the Republic of Kosovo ( sq, Republika e Kosovës, links=no; sr, Република Косово, Republika Kosovo, links=no), is a partially recognised state in Southeast Euro ...
, a co-official language in
North Macedonia
North Macedonia, ; sq, Maqedonia e Veriut, (Macedonia before February 2019), officially the Republic of North Macedonia,, is a country in Southeast Europe. It gained independence in 1991 as one of the successor states of Yugoslavia. It ...
and
Montenegro
)
, image_map = Europe-Montenegro.svg
, map_caption =
, image_map2 =
, capital = Podgorica
, coordinates =
, largest_city = capital
, official_languages = M ...
, as well as a
minority language
A minority language is a language spoken by a minority of the population of a territory. Such people are termed linguistic minorities or language minorities. With a total number of 196 sovereign states recognized internationally (as of 2019) a ...
of
Italy
Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical ...
,
Croatia
, image_flag = Flag of Croatia.svg
, image_coat = Coat of arms of Croatia.svg
, anthem = "Lijepa naša domovino"("Our Beautiful Homeland")
, image_map =
, map_caption =
, capit ...
,
Romania
Romania ( ; ro, România ) is a country located at the crossroads of Central, Eastern, and Southeastern Europe. It borders Bulgaria to the south, Ukraine to the north, Hungary to the west, Serbia to the southwest, Moldova to the east, and ...
and
Serbia
Serbia (, ; Serbian: , , ), officially the Republic of Serbia (Serbian: , , ), is a landlocked country in Southeastern and Central Europe, situated at the crossroads of the Pannonian Basin and the Balkans. It shares land borders with Hungar ...
.
Geographic distribution
The language is spoken by approximately 6 million people in the Balkans, primarily in Albania,
Kosovo
Kosovo ( sq, Kosova or ; sr-Cyrl, Косово ), officially the Republic of Kosovo ( sq, Republika e Kosovës, links=no; sr, Република Косово, Republika Kosovo, links=no), is a partially recognised state in Southeast Euro ...
,
North Macedonia
North Macedonia, ; sq, Maqedonia e Veriut, (Macedonia before February 2019), officially the Republic of North Macedonia,, is a country in Southeast Europe. It gained independence in 1991 as one of the successor states of Yugoslavia. It ...
,
Serbia
Serbia (, ; Serbian: , , ), officially the Republic of Serbia (Serbian: , , ), is a landlocked country in Southeastern and Central Europe, situated at the crossroads of the Pannonian Basin and the Balkans. It shares land borders with Hungar ...
,
Montenegro
)
, image_map = Europe-Montenegro.svg
, map_caption =
, image_map2 =
, capital = Podgorica
, coordinates =
, largest_city = capital
, official_languages = M ...
and
Greece
Greece,, or , romanized: ', officially the Hellenic Republic, is a country in Southeast Europe. It is situated on the southern tip of the Balkans, and is located at the crossroads of Europe, Asia, and Africa. Greece shares land borders ...
. However, due to old communities in
Italy
Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical ...
and the large
Albanian diaspora
The Albanian diaspora ( sq, Mërgata Shqiptare or Diaspora Shqiptare) are the ethnic Albanians and their descendants living outside of Albania, Kosovo, southeastern Montenegro, western North Macedonia, southeastern Serbia, northwestern Greece a ...
, the worldwide total of speakers is much higher than in
Southern Europe
Southern Europe is the southern region of Europe. It is also known as Mediterranean Europe, as its geography is essentially marked by the Mediterranean Sea. Definitions of Southern Europe include some or all of these countries and regions: Alba ...
and numbers approximately 7.5 million.
Europe
![Recognized Albanian Language Map](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/5a/Recognized_Albanian_Language_Map.png)
The Albanian language is the official language of
Albania
Albania ( ; sq, Shqipëri or ), or , also or . officially the Republic of Albania ( sq, Republika e Shqipërisë), is a country in Southeastern Europe. It is located on the Adriatic and Ionian Seas within the Mediterranean Sea and shares ...
and
Kosovo
Kosovo ( sq, Kosova or ; sr-Cyrl, Косово ), officially the Republic of Kosovo ( sq, Republika e Kosovës, links=no; sr, Република Косово, Republika Kosovo, links=no), is a partially recognised state in Southeast Euro ...
and co-official in
North Macedonia
North Macedonia, ; sq, Maqedonia e Veriut, (Macedonia before February 2019), officially the Republic of North Macedonia,, is a country in Southeast Europe. It gained independence in 1991 as one of the successor states of Yugoslavia. It ...
and
Montenegro
)
, image_map = Europe-Montenegro.svg
, map_caption =
, image_map2 =
, capital = Podgorica
, coordinates =
, largest_city = capital
, official_languages = M ...
. Albanian is a recognised minority language in
Croatia
, image_flag = Flag of Croatia.svg
, image_coat = Coat of arms of Croatia.svg
, anthem = "Lijepa naša domovino"("Our Beautiful Homeland")
, image_map =
, map_caption =
, capit ...
,
Italy
Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical ...
,
Romania
Romania ( ; ro, România ) is a country located at the crossroads of Central, Eastern, and Southeastern Europe. It borders Bulgaria to the south, Ukraine to the north, Hungary to the west, Serbia to the southwest, Moldova to the east, and ...
and in
Serbia
Serbia (, ; Serbian: , , ), officially the Republic of Serbia (Serbian: , , ), is a landlocked country in Southeastern and Central Europe, situated at the crossroads of the Pannonian Basin and the Balkans. It shares land borders with Hungar ...
. Albanian is also spoken by a
minority in Greece, specifically in the
Thesprotia
Thesprotia (; el, Θεσπρωτία, ) is one of the regional units of Greece. It is part of the Epirus region. Its capital and largest town is Igoumenitsa. Thesprotia is named after the Thesprotians, an ancient Greek tribe that inhabited the ...
and
Preveza
Preveza ( el, Πρέβεζα, ) is a city in the region of Epirus, northwestern Greece, located on the northern peninsula at the mouth of the Ambracian Gulf. It is the capital of the regional unit of Preveza, which is part of the region of Epiru ...
regional units and in a few villages in
Ioannina and
Florina
Florina ( el, Φλώρινα, ''Flórina''; known also by some alternative names) is a town and municipality in the mountainous northwestern Macedonia, Greece. Its motto is, 'Where Greece begins'.
The town of Florina is the capital of the F ...
regional units in Greece.
It is also spoken by 450,000 Albanian immigrants in Greece.
Albanian is the third most common mother tongue among foreign residents in
Italy
Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical ...
. This is due to a substantial Albanian immigration to Italy. Italy has a historical Albanian minority of about 500,000, scattered across southern Italy, known as
Arbëreshë Arbën/Arbër, from which derived Arbënesh/Arbëresh originally meant all Albanians, until the 18th century. Today it is used for different groups of Albanian origin, including:
* Arbër (given name), an Albanian masculine given name
* Arbëresh ...
. Approximately 1 million Albanians from Kosovo are dispersed throughout
Germany
Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...
,
Switzerland and
Austria
Austria, , bar, Östareich officially the Republic of Austria, is a country in the southern part of Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine states, one of which is the capital, Vienna, the most populous ...
. These are mainly immigrants from Kosovo who migrated during the 1990s. In
Switzerland, the Albanian language is the
sixth most spoken language with 176,293 native speakers.
Albanian became an official language in North Macedonia on 15 January 2019.
Americas
There are large numbers of Albanian speakers in the United States, Argentina, Chile, Uruguay, and
Canada
Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...
. Some of the first ethnic Albanians to arrive in the United States were the Arbëreshë. The Arbëreshë have a strong sense of identity and are unique in that they speak an archaic dialect of
Tosk Albanian
Tosk ( sq-definite, toskërishtja) is the southern group of dialects of the Albanian language, spoken by the ethnographic group known as Tosks. The line of demarcation between Tosk and Gheg (the northern variety) is the Shkumbin River. Tosk is ...
called
Arbëresh.
In the United States and Canada, there are approximately 250,000
Albanian speakers. It is primarily spoken on the East Coast of the United States, in cities like New York City, Boston, Chicago, Philadelphia, and Detroit, as well as in parts of the states of New Jersey, Ohio, and Connecticut.
In Argentina, there are nearly
40,000 Albanian speakers, mostly in Buenos Aires.
Asia and Africa
Approximately 1.3 million people of Albanian ancestry live in
Turkey
Turkey ( tr, Türkiye ), officially the Republic of Türkiye ( tr, Türkiye Cumhuriyeti, links=no ), is a transcontinental country located mainly on the Anatolian Peninsula in Western Asia, with a small portion on the Balkan Peninsula in ...
, with more than 500,000 recognising their ancestry, language and
culture
Culture () is an umbrella term which encompasses the social behavior, institutions, and norms found in human societies, as well as the knowledge, beliefs, arts, laws, customs, capabilities, and habits of the individuals in these groups ...
. There are other estimates, however, that place the number of people in Turkey with Albanian ancestry and or background upward to 5 million. However, the vast majority of this population is
assimilated and no longer possesses fluency in the Albanian language, though a vibrant Albanian community maintains its distinct identity in
Istanbul
)
, postal_code_type = Postal code
, postal_code = 34000 to 34990
, area_code = +90 212 (European side) +90 216 (Asian side)
, registration_plate = 34
, blank_name_sec2 = GeoTLD
, blank_i ...
to this day.
In
Egypt
Egypt ( ar, مصر , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a transcontinental country spanning the northeast corner of Africa and southwest corner of Asia via a land bridge formed by the Sinai Peninsula. It is bordered by the Medit ...
, there are around 18,000 Albanians, mostly
Tosk
Tosk ( sq-definite, toskërishtja) is the southern group of dialects of the Albanian language, spoken by the ethnographic group known as Tosks. The line of demarcation between Tosk and Gheg (the northern variety) is the Shkumbin River. Tosk is t ...
speakers.
Many are descendants of the
Janissary
A Janissary ( ota, یڭیچری, yeŋiçeri, , ) was a member of the elite infantry units that formed the Ottoman Sultan's household troops and the first modern standing army in Europe. The corps was most likely established under sultan Orhan ...
of
Muhammad Ali Pasha
Muhammad Ali Pasha al-Mas'ud ibn Agha, also known as Muhammad Ali of Egypt and the Sudan ( sq, Mehmet Ali Pasha, ar, محمد علي باشا, ; ota, محمد علی پاشا المسعود بن آغا; ; 4 March 1769 – 2 August 1849), was ...
, an Albanian who became
Wāli, and self-declared
Khedive of Egypt and
Sudan. In addition to the
dynasty
A dynasty is a sequence of rulers from the same family,''Oxford English Dictionary'', "dynasty, ''n''." Oxford University Press (Oxford), 1897. usually in the context of a monarchical system, but sometimes also appearing in republics. A ...
that he established, a large part of the former Egyptian and Sudanese
aristocracy was of Albanian origin. In addition to the recent emigrants, there are older diasporic communities around the world.
Oceania
Albanian is also spoken by Albanian diaspora communities residing in
Australia and
New Zealand
New Zealand ( mi, Aotearoa ) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and over 700 smaller islands. It is the sixth-largest island count ...
.
Dialects
![Albanian-dialects](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/3c/Albanian-dialects.svg)
The Albanian language has two distinct dialects,
Tosk
Tosk ( sq-definite, toskërishtja) is the southern group of dialects of the Albanian language, spoken by the ethnographic group known as Tosks. The line of demarcation between Tosk and Gheg (the northern variety) is the Shkumbin River. Tosk is t ...
which is spoken in the south, and
Gheg
Gheg (also spelled Geg; Gheg Albanian: ''gegnishtja'', Standard sq, gegërishtja) is one of the two major varieties of Albanian, the other being Tosk. The geographic dividing line between the two varieties is the Shkumbin River, which winds ...
spoken in the north. Standard Albanian is based on the Tosk dialect. The
Shkumbin River is the rough dividing line between the two dialects.
[''The river Shkumbin in central Albania historically forms the boundary between those two dialects, with the population on the north speaking varieties of Geg and the population on the south varieties of Tosk.'' (page 23]
Concise Encyclopedia of Languages of the World
By Keith Brown, Sarah Ogilvie Contributor Keith Brown, Sarah Ogilvie Edition: illustrated Published by Elsevier,2008 ,
Gheg
Gheg (also spelled Geg; Gheg Albanian: ''gegnishtja'', Standard sq, gegërishtja) is one of the two major varieties of Albanian, the other being Tosk. The geographic dividing line between the two varieties is the Shkumbin River, which winds ...
is divided into four sub-dialects, in Northwest Gheg, Northeast Gheg, Central Gheg, and Southern Gheg. It is primarily spoken in northern Albania,
Kosovo
Kosovo ( sq, Kosova or ; sr-Cyrl, Косово ), officially the Republic of Kosovo ( sq, Republika e Kosovës, links=no; sr, Република Косово, Republika Kosovo, links=no), is a partially recognised state in Southeast Euro ...
, and throughout
Montenegro
)
, image_map = Europe-Montenegro.svg
, map_caption =
, image_map2 =
, capital = Podgorica
, coordinates =
, largest_city = capital
, official_languages = M ...
and northwestern
North Macedonia
North Macedonia, ; sq, Maqedonia e Veriut, (Macedonia before February 2019), officially the Republic of North Macedonia,, is a country in Southeast Europe. It gained independence in 1991 as one of the successor states of Yugoslavia. It ...
. One fairly divergent dialect is the
Upper Reka dialect
The Upper Reka Albanian dialect is a member of the wider northern Albanian Gheg dialect subgroup of the Albanian language spoken by northern Albanians. Speakers of the dialect are mainly located within the territory of the sub-region of Upper Re ...
, which is however classified as Central Gheg. There is also a diaspora dialect in
Croatia
, image_flag = Flag of Croatia.svg
, image_coat = Coat of arms of Croatia.svg
, anthem = "Lijepa naša domovino"("Our Beautiful Homeland")
, image_map =
, map_caption =
, capit ...
, the
Arbanasi dialect.
Tosk
Tosk ( sq-definite, toskërishtja) is the southern group of dialects of the Albanian language, spoken by the ethnographic group known as Tosks. The line of demarcation between Tosk and Gheg (the northern variety) is the Shkumbin River. Tosk is t ...
is divided into five sub-dialects, including Northern Tosk (the most numerous in speakers),
Labërisht,
Cham
Cham or CHAM may refer to:
Ethnicities and languages
*Chams, people in Vietnam and Cambodia
**Cham language, the language of the Cham people
***Cham script
*** Cham (Unicode block), a block of Unicode characters of the Cham script
*Cham Albania ...
,
Arvanitika
Arvanitika (; Arvanitika: , ; Greek: , ), also known as Arvanitic, is the variety of Albanian traditionally spoken by the Arvanites, a population group in Greece. Arvanitika is today endangered, as its speakers have been shifting to the u ...
, and
Arbëresh. Tosk is spoken in southern Albania, southwestern North Macedonia and northern and southern Greece. Cham Albanian is spoken in North-western Greece, while
Arvanitika
Arvanitika (; Arvanitika: , ; Greek: , ), also known as Arvanitic, is the variety of Albanian traditionally spoken by the Arvanites, a population group in Greece. Arvanitika is today endangered, as its speakers have been shifting to the u ...
is spoken by the
Arvanites
Arvanites (; Arvanitika: , or , ; Greek: , ) are a bilingual population group in Greece of Albanian origin. They traditionally speak Arvanitika, an Albanian language variety, along with Greek. Their ancestors were first recorded as settl ...
in southern Greece. In addition,
Arbëresh is spoken by the
Arbëreshë Arbën/Arbër, from which derived Arbënesh/Arbëresh originally meant all Albanians, until the 18th century. Today it is used for different groups of Albanian origin, including:
* Arbër (given name), an Albanian masculine given name
* Arbëresh ...
people, descendants of 15th and 16th century migrants who settled in southeastern Italy, in small communities in the regions of
Sicily
(man) it, Siciliana (woman)
, population_note =
, population_blank1_title =
, population_blank1 =
, demographics_type1 = Ethnicity
, demographics1_footnotes =
, demographi ...
and
Calabria. These settlements originated from the (Arvanites) communities probably of Peloponnese known as Morea in the Middle Ages. Among them the Arvanites call themselves Arbëror and sometime Arbëresh. The Arbëresh dialect is closely related to the Arvanites dialect with more Italian vocabulary absorbed during different periods of time.
Orthography
![Albanian keyboard layout](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/ac/Albanian_keyboard_layout.jpg)
The Albanian language has been written using many alphabets since the earliest records from the 15th century. The history of Albanian language orthography is closely related to the cultural orientation and knowledge of certain foreign languages among Albanian writers. The earliest written Albanian records come from the Gheg area in makeshift spellings based on Italian or Greek. Originally, the Tosk dialect was written in the
Greek alphabet
The Greek alphabet has been used to write the Greek language since the late 9th or early 8th century BCE. It is derived from the earlier Phoenician alphabet, and was the earliest known alphabetic script to have distinct letters for vowels as w ...
and the Gheg dialect was written in the
Latin script
The Latin script, also known as Roman script, is an alphabetic writing system based on the letters of the classical Latin alphabet, derived from a form of the Greek alphabet which was in use in the ancient Greek city of Cumae, in southern I ...
. Both dialects had also been written in the
Ottoman Turkish version of the
Arabic script,
Cyrillic, and some local alphabets (
Elbasan
Elbasan ( ; sq-definite, Elbasani ) is the fourth most populous city of Albania and seat of Elbasan County and Elbasan Municipality. It lies to the north of the river Shkumbin between the Skanderbeg Mountains and the Myzeqe Plain in central ...
,
Vithkuqi,
Todhri, Veso Bey, Jan Vellara and others, see
original Albanian alphabets). More specifically, the writers from northern Albania and under the influence of the Catholic Church used Latin letters, those in southern Albania and under the influence of the Greek Orthodox church used Greek letters, while others throughout Albania and under the influence of Islam used Arabic letters. There were initial attempts to create an original Albanian alphabet during the 1750–1850 period. These attempts intensified after the
League of Prizren
The League of Prizren ( sq, Besëlidhja e Prizrenit), officially the League for the Defense of the Rights of the Albanian Nation ( sq, Lidhja për mbrojtjen e të drejtave te kombit Shqiptar), was an Albanian political organization which was offi ...
and culminated with the
Congress of Manastir
The Congress of Manastir ( sq, Kongresi i Manastirit) was an academic conference held in the city of Manastir (now Bitola) from November 14 to 22, 1908, with the goal of standardizing the Albanian alphabet. November 22 is now a commemorative da ...
held by Albanian intellectuals from 14 to 22 November 1908, in Manastir (present day
Bitola), which decided on which alphabet to use, and what the standardised spelling would be for standard Albanian. This is how the literary language remains. The alphabet is the Latin alphabet with the addition of the letters <
ë>, <
ç>, and ten
digraphs: ''dh'', ''th'', ''xh'', ''gj'', ''nj'', ''ng'', ''ll'', ''rr'', ''zh'' and ''sh''.
According to
Robert Elsie
Robert Elsie (June 29, 1950 – October 2, 2017) was a Canadian-born German scholar who specialized in Albanian literature and folklore.
Elsie was a writer, translator, interpreter, and specialist in Albanian studies, being the author of numerou ...
:
[
]The hundred years between 1750 and 1850 were an age of astounding orthographic diversity in Albania. In this period, the Albanian language was put to writing in at least ten different alphabets – most certainly a record for European languages. ... the diverse forms in which this old Balkan language was recorded, from the earliest documents to the beginning of the twentieth century ... consist of adaptations of the Latin, Greek, Arabic, and Cyrillic alphabets and (what is even more interesting) a number of locally invented writing systems. Most of the latter alphabets have now been forgotten and are unknown, even to the Albanians themselves.[Elsie, Robert. (2017). ''Albanian Alphabets: Borrowed and Invented''. London, UK: CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform. .]
Classification
Albanian constitutes one of the eleven major branches of the Indo-European language family
The Indo-European languages are a language family native to the overwhelming majority of Europe, the Iranian plateau, and the northern Indian subcontinent. Some European languages of this family, English, French, Portuguese, Russian, Du ...
, within which it occupies an independent position. In 1854, Albanian was demonstrated to be an Indo-European language by the philologist
Philology () is the study of language in oral and written historical sources; it is the intersection of textual criticism, literary criticism, history, and linguistics (with especially strong ties to etymology). Philology is also defined as th ...
Franz Bopp
Franz Bopp (; 14 September 1791 – 23 October 1867) was a German linguist known for extensive and pioneering comparative work on Indo-European languages.
Early life
Bopp was born in Mainz, but the political disarray in the Republic of Mai ...
. Albanian was formerly compared by a few Indo-European linguists with Germanic and Balto-Slavic
The Balto-Slavic languages form a branch of the Indo-European family of languages, traditionally comprising the Baltic and Slavic languages. Baltic and Slavic languages share several linguistic traits not found in any other Indo-European bran ...
, all of which share a number of isoglosses with Albanian. Other linguists linked the Albanian language with Latin
Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...
, Greek
Greek may refer to:
Greece
Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe:
*Greeks, an ethnic group.
*Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family.
**Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...
and Armenian
Armenian may refer to:
* Something of, from, or related to Armenia, a country in the South Caucasus region of Eurasia
* Armenians, the national people of Armenia, or people of Armenian descent
** Armenian Diaspora, Armenian communities across the ...
, while placing Germanic and Balto-Slavic in another branch of Indo-European.[Google Books]
Mallory, J. P. and Adams, D. Q.: The Oxford Introduction to Proto-Indo-European and the Proto-Indo-European World[JHholm.de]
, Holm, Hans J.: The Distribution of Data in Word Lists and its Impact on the Subgrouping of Languages. In: Christine Preisach, Hans Burkhardt, Lars Schmidt-Thieme, Reinhold Decker (eds.): Data Analysis, Machine Learning, and Applications. Proc. of the 31st Annual Conference of the German Classification Society (GfKl), University of Freiburg, 7–9 March 2007. Springer-Verlag, Heidelberg-Berlin[HJholm.de]
A possible Homeland of the Indo-European Languages And their Migrations in the Light of the Separation Level Recovery (SLRD) Method – Hans J. Holm In current scholarship there is evidence that Albanian is closely related to Greek and Armenian, while the fact that it is a satem
Languages of the Indo-European family are classified as either centum languages or satem languages according to how the dorsal consonants (sounds of "K", "G" and "Y" type) of the reconstructed Proto-Indo-European language (PIE) developed. An ...
language is less significant.
The hypothesis of the " Balkan Indo-European" continuum posits a common period of prehistoric coexistence of several Indo-European dialects in the Balkans
The Balkans ( ), also known as the Balkan Peninsula, is a geographical area in southeastern Europe with various geographical and historical definitions. The region takes its name from the Balkan Mountains that stretch throughout the who ...
prior to 2000 BC. To this group would belong Albanian, Ancient Greek
Ancient Greek includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Dark Ages (), the Archaic p ...
, Armenian
Armenian may refer to:
* Something of, from, or related to Armenia, a country in the South Caucasus region of Eurasia
* Armenians, the national people of Armenia, or people of Armenian descent
** Armenian Diaspora, Armenian communities across the ...
, Phrygian, fragmentary attested languages such as Macedonian, Thracian
The Thracians (; grc, Θρᾷκες ''Thrāikes''; la, Thraci) were an Indo-European speaking people who inhabited large parts of Eastern and Southeastern Europe in ancient history.. "The Thracians were an Indo-European people who occupied ...
, or Illyrian, and the relatively well attested Messapic in Southern Italy. The common features of this group appear at the phonological, morphological, and lexical levels, presumably resulting from the contact between the various languages. The concept of this linguistic group is explained as a kind of language league of the Bronze Age
The Bronze Age is a historic period, lasting approximately from 3300 BC to 1200 BC, characterized by the use of bronze, the presence of writing in some areas, and other early features of urban civilization. The Bronze Age is the second prin ...
(a specific areal-linguistics phenomenon), although it also consisted of languages that were related to each other. A common prestage posterior to PIE comprising Albanian, Greek, and Armenian, is considered as a possible scenario. In this light, due to the larger number of possible shared innovations between Greek and Armenian, it appears reasonable to assume, at least tentatively, that Albanian was the first Balkan IE language to branch off. This split and the following ones were perhaps very close in time, allowing only a narrow time frame for shared innovations.
Albanian represents one of the core languages of the Balkan ''Sprachbund''.
Glottolog and Ethnologue recognize four Albanian languages. They are classified as follows:
* Indo-European
** Paleo-Balkan
*** Albanian
**** Albanian-Tosk
***** Arbëreshë Albanian
***** Arvanitika Albanian
***** Northern Tosk Albanian
**** Gheg Albanian
History
Historical documentation
The first attested written mention of the Albanian language was on 14 July 1284 in Ragusa in modern Croatia
, image_flag = Flag of Croatia.svg
, image_coat = Coat of arms of Croatia.svg
, anthem = "Lijepa naša domovino"("Our Beautiful Homeland")
, image_map =
, map_caption =
, capit ...
(Dubrovnik
Dubrovnik (), historically known as Ragusa (; see notes on naming), is a city on the Adriatic Sea in the region of Dalmatia, in the southeastern semi-exclave of Croatia. It is one of the most prominent tourist destinations in the Mediterran ...
) when a crime witness named Matthew testified: "I heard a voice crying on the mountain in the Albanian language" ( lat, Audivi unam vocem, clamantem in monte in lingua albanesca).
The Albanian language is also mentioned in the Descriptio Europae Orientalis dated in 1308:''Habent enim Albani prefati linguam distinctam a Latinis, Grecis et Sclauis ita quod in nullo se intelligunt cum aliis nationibus.''
(Namely, the above-mentioned Albanians have a language that is different from the languages of Latins, Greeks and Slavs, so that they do not understand each other at all.)
The oldest attested document written in Albanian dates back to 1462, while the first audio recording in the language was made by Norbert Jokl
Norbert Jokl (February 25, 1877 – probably May 1942) was an Austrian Albanologist of Jewish descent who has been called the father of Albanology.
Early life
Jokl was born in Bzenec (then Bisenz), Southern Moravia (now the Czech Republic ...
on 4 April 1914 in Vienna
en, Viennese
, iso_code = AT-9
, registration_plate = W
, postal_code_type = Postal code
, postal_code =
, timezone = CET
, utc_offset = +1
, timezone_DST ...
.
However, as Fortson notes, Albanian written works existed before this point; they have simply been lost. The existence of written Albanian is explicitly mentioned in a letter attested from 1332, and the first preserved books, including both those in Gheg and in Tosk, share orthographic features that indicate that some form of common literary language had developed.
During the five-century period of the Ottoman presence in Albania
Albania ( ; sq, Shqipëri or ), or , also or . officially the Republic of Albania ( sq, Republika e Shqipërisë), is a country in Southeastern Europe. It is located on the Adriatic and Ionian Seas within the Mediterranean Sea and shares ...
, the language was not officially recognised until 1909, when the Congress of Dibra
A congress is a formal meeting of the representatives of different countries, constituent states, organizations, trade unions, political parties, or other groups. The term originated in Late Middle English to denote an encounter (meeting of ad ...
decided that Albanian schools would finally be allowed.
Linguistic affinities
Albanian is considered an isolate
Isolate may refer to:
Arts, entertainment, and media
* ''Isolate'' (film), a 2013 Australian film
* ''Isolate'' (Circus Maximus album), 2007
* ''Isolate'' (Gary Numan album), 1992
Language
* Isolating language, with near-unity morpheme/word ...
within the Indo-European language family; no other language has been conclusively linked to its branch
A branch, sometimes called a ramus in botany, is a woody structural member connected to the central trunk of a tree (or sometimes a shrub). Large branches are known as boughs and small branches are known as twigs. The term ''twig'' usually ...
. The only other languages that are the sole surviving members of a branch of Indo-European are Armenian
Armenian may refer to:
* Something of, from, or related to Armenia, a country in the South Caucasus region of Eurasia
* Armenians, the national people of Armenia, or people of Armenian descent
** Armenian Diaspora, Armenian communities across the ...
and Greek.
The Albanian language is part of the Indo-European
The Indo-European languages are a language family native to the overwhelming majority of Europe, the Iranian plateau, and the northern Indian subcontinent. Some European languages of this family, English, French, Portuguese, Russian, Dutc ...
language group
A language family is a group of languages related through descent from a common ''ancestral language'' or ''parental language'', called the proto-language of that family. The term "family" reflects the tree model of language origination in his ...
and is considered to have evolved from one of the Paleo-Balkan languages of antiquity,[Fine, JA. ''The Early medieval Balkans''. University of Michigan Press, 1991. pp. 10–11]
Google Books
/ref>
although it is still uncertain which particular Paleo-Balkan language represents the ancestor of Albanian, or where in southern Europe that population lived. In general there is insufficient evidence to connect Albanian with one of those languages, whether one of the Illyrian languages or Thracian
The Thracians (; grc, Θρᾷκες ''Thrāikes''; la, Thraci) were an Indo-European speaking people who inhabited large parts of Eastern and Southeastern Europe in ancient history.. "The Thracians were an Indo-European people who occupied ...
and Dacian. Among these possibilities, Illyrian is typically held to be the most probable, though insufficient evidence still clouds the discussion.
Although Albanian shares lexical isoglosses with Greek
Greek may refer to:
Greece
Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe:
*Greeks, an ethnic group.
*Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family.
**Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...
, Germanic, and to a lesser extent Balto-Slavic
The Balto-Slavic languages form a branch of the Indo-European family of languages, traditionally comprising the Baltic and Slavic languages. Baltic and Slavic languages share several linguistic traits not found in any other Indo-European bran ...
, the vocabulary of Albanian is quite distinct. In 1995, Taylor, Ringe and Warnow
The Warnow () is a river in the state of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern in Germany. It flows into the Baltic Sea near the town of Rostock, in its borough Warnemünde.
The source of the Warnow is in Grebbin, a small village north of Parchim, at the wes ...
, using quantitative linguistic techniques, found that Albanian appears to comprise a "subgroup with Germanic". However, they argued that this fact is hardly significant, as Albanian has lost much of its original vocabulary and morphology, and so this "apparently close connection to Germanic rests on only a couple of lexical cognates – hardly any evidence at all".
Historical presence and location
The place and the time that the Albanian language was formed are uncertain. American linguist Eric Hamp
Eric Pratt Hamp (November 16, 1920 – February 17, 2019) was an American linguist widely respected as a leading authority on Indo-European linguistics, with particular interests in Celtic languages and Albanian. Unlike many Indo-Europeanists, wh ...
stated that during an unknown chronological period a pre-Albanian population (termed as "Albanoid" by Hamp) inhabited areas stretching from Poland
Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It is divided into 16 administrative provinces called voivodeships, covering an area of . Poland has a population of over 38 million and is the fifth-most populou ...
to the southwestern Balkans. Further analysis has suggested that it was in a mountainous region rather than on a plain or seacoast. The words for plants and animals characteristic of mountainous regions are entirely original, but the names for fish and for agricultural activities (such as ploughing) are borrowed from other languages.[Tripod.co]
Eric Hamp, "The position of Albanian, Ancient IE dialects, Proceedings of the Conference on IE linguistics held at the University of California, Los Angeles, April 25–27, 1963, ed. By Henrik Birnbaum and Jaan Puhvel. "It is clear that in the Middle Ages the Albanians extended farther north (Jokl, Albaner §2); that there are persuasive arguments which have been advanced against their having extended as far as the Adriatic coast—the fact that Scodra 'Scutari' (Shkodër) shows un-Albanian development (see §6 below), that there is no demonstrated old maritime vocabulary (see above), and that there are few ancient Greek loans (Jokl, Albaner §5; but see §5 below)
A deeper analysis of the vocabulary, however, shows that could be a consequence of a prolonged Latin
Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...
domination of the coastal and plain areas of the country, rather than evidence of the original environment in which the Albanian language was formed. For example, the word for 'fish' is borrowed from Latin, but not the word for 'gills' which is native. Indigenous are also the words for 'ship', 'raft', 'navigation', 'sea shelves' and a few names of fish kinds, but not the words for 'sail', 'row' and 'harbor'; objects pertaining to navigation itself and a large part of sea fauna. This rather shows that Proto-Albanians were pushed away from coastal areas in early times (probably after the Latin conquest of the region) and thus lost a large amount (or the majority) of their sea environment lexicon. A similar phenomenon could be observed with agricultural terms. While the words for 'arable land', 'corn', 'wheat', 'cereals', 'vineyard', 'yoke', 'harvesting', 'cattle breeding', etc. are native, the words for 'ploughing', 'farm' and 'farmer', agricultural practices, and some harvesting tools are foreign. This, again, points to intense contact with other languages and people, rather than providing evidence of a possible linguistic homeland
In historical linguistics, the homeland or ''Urheimat'' (, from German '' ur-'' "original" and '' Heimat'', home) of a proto-language is the region in which it was spoken before splitting into different daughter languages. A proto-language is th ...
(also known as a ''Urheimat'').
The centre of Albanian settlement remained the Mat River. In 1079, the Albanians were recorded farther south in the valley of the Shkumbin
The Shkumbin (; ; la, Genusus, also la, Genessus, label=none or la, Scampis, label=none), also commonly Shkembi, is a river in Southern Europe. It is long and its drainage basin is . Its average discharge is .
Etymology
It derives from La ...
River. The Shkumbin, a seasonal stream that lies near the old Via Egnatia
The Via Egnatia was a road constructed by the Romans in the 2nd century BC. It crossed Illyricum, Macedonia, and Thracia, running through territory that is now part of modern Albania, North Macedonia, Greece, and European Turkey as a continu ...
, is approximately the boundary of the primary dialect division for Albanian, Tosk
Tosk ( sq-definite, toskërishtja) is the southern group of dialects of the Albanian language, spoken by the ethnographic group known as Tosks. The line of demarcation between Tosk and Gheg (the northern variety) is the Shkumbin River. Tosk is t ...
and Gheg
Gheg (also spelled Geg; Gheg Albanian: ''gegnishtja'', Standard sq, gegërishtja) is one of the two major varieties of Albanian, the other being Tosk. The geographic dividing line between the two varieties is the Shkumbin River, which winds ...
. The characteristics of Tosk and Gheg in the treatment of the native words and loanwords from other languages are evidence that the dialectal split preceded the Slavic migration to the Balkans, which means that in that period (the 5th to 6th centuries AD), Albanians were occupying nearly the same area around the Shkumbin river, which straddled the Jireček Line
The Jireček Line is a conceptual boundary through the ancient Balkans that divides the influence of the Latin (in the north) and Greek (in the south) languages in the Roman Empire from antiquity until the 4th century. The border has been repeate ...
.[
References to the existence of Albanian as a distinct language survive from the 14th century, but they failed to cite specific words. The oldest surviving documents written in Albanian are the "]formula e pagëzimit The formula e pagëzimit ( en, baptismal formula) is the oldest written document with a writing in Albanian which has been found. The document is “Codex Ashburnham” dated November 8, 1462, and it contains various notes on Albania written in Lat ...
" (Baptismal formula), ''Un'te paghesont' pr'emenit t'Atit e t'Birit e t'Spertit Senit''. ("I baptize thee in the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit") recorded by Pal Engjelli, Bishop of Durrës in 1462 in the Gheg dialect, and some New Testament
The New Testament grc, Ἡ Καινὴ Διαθήκη, transl. ; la, Novum Testamentum. (NT) is the second division of the Christian biblical canon. It discusses the teachings and person of Jesus, as well as events in first-century Chri ...
verses from that period.
The linguists Stefan Schumacher and Joachim Matzinger (University of Vienna) assert that the first literary records of Albanian date from the 16th century. The oldest known Albanian printed book, ''Meshari
''Meshari'' ( Albanian for "Missal") is the oldest published book in Albanian. The book was written by Gjon Buzuku, a Catholic cleric in 1555. The book contains 188 pages and is written in two columns. ''Meshari'' is the translation of the main ...
'', or "missal", was written in 1555 by Gjon Buzuku
Gjon Buzuku (15 March 1499 – 9 October 1577) was an Albanian Catholic priest who wrote the first known printed book in Albanian.
Gjon Buzuku according to the elders wrote the Missal in the village of Brisk Posht in the Shestan - Krajë region, ...
, a Roman Catholic
Roman or Romans most often refers to:
*Rome, the capital city of Italy
* Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD
* Roman people, the people of ancient Rome
*'' Epistle to the Romans'', shortened to ''Romans'', a let ...
cleric. In 1635, Frang Bardhi
Frang Bardhi (Latin: ''Franciscus Blancus'', it, Francesco Bianchi, 1606–1643) was an Albanian Catholic bishop and writer. Bardhi is best known as an author of the early eras of Albanian literature. He served as Bishop of Sapë (1635–1644 ...
wrote the first Latin–Albanian dictionary. The first Albanian school is believed to have been opened by Franciscans
, image = FrancescoCoA PioM.svg
, image_size = 200px
, caption = A cross, Christ's arm and Saint Francis's arm, a universal symbol of the Franciscans
, abbreviation = OFM
, predecessor =
, ...
in 1638 in Pdhanë.
One of the earliest Albanian dictionaries was written in 1693; it was the Italian
Italian(s) may refer to:
* Anything of, from, or related to the people of Italy over the centuries
** Italians, an ethnic group or simply a citizen of the Italian Republic or Italian Kingdom
** Italian language, a Romance language
*** Regional Ita ...
manuscript ''Pratichae Schrivaneschae'' authored by the Montenegrin sea captain Julije Balović and includes a multilingual dictionary of hundreds of the most frequently used words in everyday life in Italian, Slavic, Greek, Albanian, and Turkish.
Pre-Indo-European substratum
Pre-Indo-European (PreIE) sites are found throughout the territory of Albania. Such PreIE sites existed in Maliq, Vashtëm, Burimas, Barç, Dërsnik in the Korçë District
Korçë District ( sq, Rrethi i Korçës), was one of the 36 districts of Albania, which were dissolved in July 2000 and replaced by 12 counties. It had a population of 143,499 in 2001, and an area of . Its capital was the city of Korçë. Its t ...
, Kamnik in Kolonja, Kolsh in the Kukës District, Rashtan in Librazhd
Librazhd ( sq-definite, Librazhdi) is a town and a municipality in Elbasan County, eastern Albania. The municipality was formed at the 2015 local government reform by the merger of the former municipalities Hotolisht, Librazhd, Lunik, Orenjë, Po ...
, and Nezir in the Mat District
Mat District () was one of the 36 districts of Albania, which were dissolved in July 2000 and replaced by 12 newly created counties. It had a population of 61,906 in 2001, and an area of . It was named after the river Mat, which flows through ...
. As in other parts of Europe, these PreIE people joined the migratory Indo-European tribes that entered the Balkans and contributed to the formation of the historical Paleo-Balkan tribes. In terms of linguistics, the pre-Indo-European substrate language spoken in the southern Balkans probably influenced pre-Proto-Albanian, the ancestor idiom of Albanian. The extent of this linguistic impact cannot be determined with precision due to the uncertain position of Albanian among Paleo-Balkan languages and their scarce attestation. Some loanwords, however, have been proposed, such as ''shegë'' 'pomegranate
The pomegranate (''Punica granatum'') is a fruit-bearing deciduous shrub in the family Lythraceae, subfamily Punicoideae, that grows between tall.
The pomegranate was originally described throughout the Mediterranean Basin, Mediterranean re ...
' or ''lëpjetë'' ' orach'; compare Pre-Greek λάπαθον, ''lápathon'' ' monk's rhubarb').
Proto-IE features
Although Albanian has many words that do not correspond to IE cognates, it has retained many proto-IE features: for example, the demonstrative pronoun *''ḱi-'' is ancestral to Albanian ''ky/kjo'', English ''he'', and Russian ''sej'' but not to English ''this'' or Russian ''etot''.
Albanian is compared to other Indo-European languages below, but note that Albanian has exhibited some notable instances of semantic drift
Semantic change (also semantic shift, semantic progression, semantic development, or semantic drift) is a form of language change regarding the evolution of word usage—usually to the point that the modern meaning is radically different from ...
, such as ''motër'' meaning "sister" rather than "mother".
Albanian–PIE phonological correspondences
Phonologically, Albanian is not so conservative. Like many IE stocks, it has merged the two series of voiced stops (e.g. both *''d'' and *''dʰ'' became ''d''). In addition, voiced stops tend to disappear in between vowels. There is almost complete loss of final syllables and very widespread loss of other unstressed syllables (e.g. ''mik'' 'friend' from Lat. ''amicus''). PIE *''o'' appears as ''a'' (also as ''e'' if a high front vowel ''i'' follows), while *''ē'' and *''ā'' become ''o'', and PIE *''ō'' appears as ''e''.
The palatals, velars, and labiovelars show distinct developments, with Albanian showing the three-way distinction also found in Luwian
The Luwians were a group of Anatolian peoples who lived in central, western, and southern Anatolia, in present-day Turkey, during the Bronze Age and the Iron Age. They spoke the Luwian language, an Indo-European language of the Anatolian sub-fam ...
. Labiovelars are for the most part differentiated from all other Indo-European velar series before front vowels, but they merge with the "pure" (back) velars elsewhere.[ The palatal velar series, consisting of Proto-Indo-European *''ḱ'' and the merged *''ģ'' and ''ģʰ'', usually developed into ''th'' and ''dh'', but were depalatalised to merge with the back velars when in contact with sonorants.][ Because the original Proto-Indo-European tripartite distinction between dorsals is preserved in such reflexes, Albanian is therefore neither centum nor satem, despite having a "satem-like" realization of the palatal dorsals in most cases.] Thus PIE *''ḱ'', *''k'', and *''kʷ'' become ''th'', ''q'', and ''s'', respectively (before back vowels *''ḱ'' becomes ''th'', while *''k'' and *''kʷ'' merge as ''k'').
A minority of scholars reconstruct a fourth laryngeal *''h4'' allegedly surfacing as Alb. ''h'' word-initially, e.g. Alb. ''herdhe'' 'testicles' presumably from PIE *''h4órǵʰi-''[ , ] (rather than the usual reconstruction *''h3erǵʰi-''), but this is generally not followed elsewhere, as ''h-'' has arisen elsewhere idiosyncratically (for example ''hark'' < Latin ''arcus'').
Standard Albanian
Since World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...
, standard Albanian used in Albania has been based on the Tosk dialect. Kosovo and other areas where Albanian is official adopted the Tosk standard in 1969.[Agim Morina, "Udhërrëfyes i shkurtë i historisë së standardizimit të shqipes,]
''DodonaPress'' (2015-02-21)
also i
''Plisi.org'' (2015-02-24)
Elbasan-based standard
Until the early 20th century, Albanian writing developed in three main literary traditions: Gheg
Gheg (also spelled Geg; Gheg Albanian: ''gegnishtja'', Standard sq, gegërishtja) is one of the two major varieties of Albanian, the other being Tosk. The geographic dividing line between the two varieties is the Shkumbin River, which winds ...
, Tosk
Tosk ( sq-definite, toskërishtja) is the southern group of dialects of the Albanian language, spoken by the ethnographic group known as Tosks. The line of demarcation between Tosk and Gheg (the northern variety) is the Shkumbin River. Tosk is t ...
, and Arbëreshë Arbën/Arbër, from which derived Arbënesh/Arbëresh originally meant all Albanians, until the 18th century. Today it is used for different groups of Albanian origin, including:
* Arbër (given name), an Albanian masculine given name
* Arbëresh ...
. Throughout this time, a Geg subdialect spoken around Elbasan
Elbasan ( ; sq-definite, Elbasani ) is the fourth most populous city of Albania and seat of Elbasan County and Elbasan Municipality. It lies to the north of the river Shkumbin between the Skanderbeg Mountains and the Myzeqe Plain in central ...
served as ''lingua franca'' among the Albanians, but was less prevalent in writing. The Congress of Manastir
The Congress of Manastir ( sq, Kongresi i Manastirit) was an academic conference held in the city of Manastir (now Bitola) from November 14 to 22, 1908, with the goal of standardizing the Albanian alphabet. November 22 is now a commemorative da ...
of Albanian writers held in 1908 recommended the use of the Elbasan subdialect for literary purposes and as a basis of a unified national language. While technically classified as a southern Gheg variety, the Elbasan speech is closer to Tosk in phonology and practically a hybrid between other Gheg subdialects and literary Tosk.
Between 1916 and 1918, the Albanian Literary Commission met in Shkodër under the leadership of Luigj Gurakuqi with the purpose of establishing a unified orthography for the language. The commission, made up of representatives from the north and south of Albania, reaffirmed the Elbasan subdialect as the basis of a national tongue. The rules published in 1917 defined spelling for the Elbasan variety for official purposes. The Commission did not, however, discourage publications in one of the dialects, but rather laid a foundation for Gheg and Tosk to gradually converge into one.
When the Congress of Lushnje met in the aftermath of World War I to form a new Albanian government, the 1917 decisions of the Literary Commission were upheld. The Elbasan subdialect remained in use for administrative purposes and many new writers embraced it for creative writing. Gheg and Tosk continued to develop freely and interaction between the two dialects increased.
Tosk standard
At the end of World War II, however, the new communist regime radically imposed the use of the Tosk dialect in all facets of life in Albania: administration, education, and literature. Most Communist leaders were Tosks from the south. Standardisation was directed by the Albanian Institute of Linguistics and Literature
The Academy of Albanological Studies ( sq, Akademia e Studimeve Albanologjike) is the main institution of albanology in Albania.
History
The Academy of Albanological Studies started as part of the reconstruction and modernization of the Albanian ...
of the Academy of Sciences of Albania
The Academy of Sciences of Albania ( sq, Akademia e Shkencave e Shqipërisë), founded in 1972, is the most important scientific institution in Albania. In the 1980s, several research institutes began at the University of Tirana were transferred ...
. Two dictionaries were published in 1954: an Albanian language dictionary and a Russian–Albanian dictionary. New orthography rules were eventually published in 1967 and in 1973 with the ''Drejtshkrimi i gjuhës shqipe'' (Orthography of the Albanian Language).
Until 1968, Kosovo and other Albanian-speaking areas in Yugoslavia followed the 1917 standard based on the Elbasan dialect, though it was gradually infused with Gheg elements in an effort to develop a Kosovan language separate from communist Albania's Tosk-based standard. Albanian intellectuals in the former Yugoslavia consolidated the 1917 standard twice in the 1950s, culminating with a thorough codification of orthographic rules in 1964. The rules already provided for a balanced variety that accounted for both Gheg and Tosk dialects, but only lasted through 1968. Viewing divergences with Albania as a threat to their identity, Kosovars arbitrarily adopted the Tosk project that Tirana had published the year before.[Nëse do të lejohej që kjo aventurë e çmendur e Tiranës zyrtare të kurorëzohej në këtë mënyrë, shqiptarët në Shqipërinë Irredentiste do të largoheshin edhe më shumë, kombi shqiptar do të përçahej ndoshta në mënyrë të pariparueshme. Në mes të një këmbënguljeje për standardin e mëparshëm dhe tëhuajsimit, ata zgjodhën që të mos ndodhte kjo gjë dhe pranunë, pa asnjë vërejtje, Projektin 1967.] Although it was never intended to serve outside of Albania, the project became the "unified literary language" in 1972, when approved by a rubberstamp Orthography Congress. Only about 1 in 9 participants were from Kosovo. The Congress, held at Tirana, authorized the orthography rules that came out the following year, in 1973.
More recent dictionaries from the Albanian government are ''Fjalori Drejtshkrimor i Gjuhës Shqipe'' (1976) (Orthographic Dictionary of the Albanian Language) and ''Dictionary of Today's Albanian language'' (''Fjalori Gjuhës së Sotme Shqipe'') (1980). Prior to World War II, dictionaries consulted by developers of the standard have included ''Lexikon tis Alvanikis glossis'' (Albanian: ''Fjalori i Gjuhës Shqipe'' (Kostandin Kristoforidhi
Kostandin Nelko (22 May 1827 – 7 March 1895), known as Kostandin Kristoforidhi, was an Albanian translator and scholar. He is mostly known for having translated the New Testament into Albanian for the first time in the Gheg Albanian dialect i ...
, 1904), ''Fjalori i Bashkimit'' (1908), and ''Fjalori i Gazullit'' (1941).
Calls for reform
Since the fall of the communist regime, Albanian orthography has stirred heated debate among scholars, writers, and public opinion in Albania and Kosovo, with hardliners opposed to any changes in the orthography, moderates supporting varying degrees of reform, and radicals calling for a return to the Elbasan dialect. Criticism of Standard Albanian has centred on the exclusion of the 'me+' infinitive and the Gheg lexicon. Critics say that Standard Albanian disenfranchises and stigmatises Gheg speakers, affecting the quality of writing and impairing effective public communication. Supporters of the Tosk standard view the 1972 Congress as a milestone achievement in Albanian history and dismiss calls for reform as efforts to "divide the nation" or "create two languages." Moderates, who are especially prevalent in Kosovo, generally stress the need for a unified Albanian language, but believe that the 'me+' infinitive and Gheg words should be included. Proponents of the Elbasan dialect have been vocal, but have gathered little support in the public opinion. In general, those involved in the language debate come from diverse backgrounds and there is no significant correlation between one's political views, geographic origin, and position on Standard Albanian.
Many writers continue to write in the Elbasan dialect but other Gheg variants have found much more limited use in literature. Most publications adhere to a strict policy of not accepting submissions that are not written in Tosk. Some print media even translate direct speech, replacing the 'me+' infinitive with other verb forms and making other changes in grammar and word choice. Even authors who have published in the Elbasan dialect will frequently write in the Tosk standard.
In 2013, a group of academics for Albania and Kosovo proposed minor changes to the orthography. Hardline academics boycotted the initiative, while other reformers have viewed it as well-intentioned but flawed and superficial. Media such as Rrokum and ''Java'' have offered content that is almost exclusively in the Elbasan dialect. Meanwhile, author and linguist Agim Morina Agim is an Albanian language, Albanian masculine given name with the meaning "dawn". People named Agim include:
* Agim Ademi (born 1961), Kosovan footballer and administrator
* Agim Ajdarević (born 1969), Yugoslav footballer
* Agim Bubeqi (born 19 ...
has promoted ''Shqipe e Përbashkët'' or Common Albanian, a neostandard or a reformed version of the Tosk standard that aims at reflecting the natural development of the language among all Albanians. Common Albanian incorporates the 'me+' infinitive, accommodates for Gheg features, provides for dialect-neutral rules that favor simplicity, predictability, and usage trends. Many modern writers have embraced Common Albanian to various extents, especially in less formal writing.
Education
Albanian is the medium of instruction in most Albanian schools. The literacy rate in Albania for the total population, age 9 or older, is about 99%. Elementary education is compulsory (grades 1–9), but most students continue at least until a secondary education. Students must pass graduation exams at the end of the 9th grade and at the end of the 12th grade in order to continue their education.
Phonology
Standard Albanian has seven vowel
A vowel is a syllabic speech sound pronounced without any stricture in the vocal tract. Vowels are one of the two principal classes of speech sounds, the other being the consonant. Vowels vary in quality, in loudness and also in quantity (leng ...
s and 29 consonant
In articulatory phonetics, a consonant is a speech sound that is articulated with complete or partial closure of the vocal tract. Examples are and pronounced with the lips; and pronounced with the front of the tongue; and pronounced wi ...
s. Like English, Albanian has dental fricatives (like the ''th'' in ''thin'') and (like the ''th'' in ''this''), written as and '','' which are rare cross-linguistically.
Gheg
Gheg (also spelled Geg; Gheg Albanian: ''gegnishtja'', Standard sq, gegërishtja) is one of the two major varieties of Albanian, the other being Tosk. The geographic dividing line between the two varieties is the Shkumbin River, which winds ...
uses long
Long may refer to:
Measurement
* Long, characteristic of something of great duration
* Long, characteristic of something of great length
* Longitude (abbreviation: long.), a geographic coordinate
* Longa (music), note value in early music mens ...
and nasal vowels, which are absent in Tosk
Tosk ( sq-definite, toskërishtja) is the southern group of dialects of the Albanian language, spoken by the ethnographic group known as Tosks. The line of demarcation between Tosk and Gheg (the northern variety) is the Shkumbin River. Tosk is t ...
, and the mid-central vowel ''ë'' is lost at the end of the word. The stress is fixed mainly on the last syllable. Gheg ''n'' (''femën'': compare English ''feminine'') changes to ''r'' by rhotacism
Rhotacism () or rhotacization is a sound change that converts one consonant (usually a voiced alveolar consonant: , , , or ) to a rhotic consonant in a certain environment. The most common may be of to . When a dialect or member of a language ...
in Tosk (''femër'').
Consonants
Notes:
* The contrast between flapped ''r'' and trilled ''rr'' is the almost the same as in Spanish or Armenian
Armenian may refer to:
* Something of, from, or related to Armenia, a country in the South Caucasus region of Eurasia
* Armenians, the national people of Armenia, or people of Armenian descent
** Armenian Diaspora, Armenian communities across the ...
. However in most of the dialects, as also in standard Albanian, the single "r" changes from an alveolar flap to an alveolar approximant .
* The palatal nasal corresponds to the Spanish ''ñ'' and the French and Italian ''gn''. It is pronounced as one sound, not a nasal plus a glide.
* The ''ll'' sound is a velarised lateral, close to English dark ''l''.
* The letter ''ç'' is sometimes written ''ch'' due to technical limitations, in analogy to the other digraphs ''xh'', ''sh'', and ''zh''. Usually it is written simply ''c'' or more rarely ''q'' with context resolving any ambiguities.
* The sounds spelled with ''q'' and ''gj'' show variation. They may range between occurring as palatal affricates or as palatal stops among dialects. Many speakers merge them into the palatoalveolar sounds ''ç'' and ''xh''. This is especially common in Northern Gheg, but is increasingly the case in Tosk as well. Other speakers reduced them into in consonant clusters, such as in the word ''fjollë,'' which before standardisation was written as ''fqollë'' ( < Medieval Greek φακιολης).
* The ''ng'' can be pronounced as in final position, otherwise it is an allophone of ''n'' before ''k'' and ''g''.
* Before ''q'' and ''gj,'' ''n'' is always pronounced but this is not reflected in the orthography.
* are interdental.
Vowels
Notes
* ''ë'' can also range to an open-mid sound in the Northern Tosk dialect.
* Mid sounds can also be heard as more open-mid sounds , in free variation.
Schwa
The schwa in Albanian has a great degree of variability from extreme back to extreme front articulation. Although the Indo-European schwa (''ə'' or -''h2''-) was preserved in Albanian, in some cases it was lost, possibly when a stressed syllable
In linguistics, and particularly phonology, stress or accent is the relative emphasis or prominence given to a certain syllable in a word or to a certain word in a phrase or sentence. That emphasis is typically caused by such properties as i ...
preceded it. Until the standardisation of the modern Albanian alphabet
The Albanian alphabet ( sq, alfabeti shqip) is a variant of the Latin alphabet used to write the Albanian language. It consists of 36 letters:
''Note:'' The vowels are shown in bold.
The letters are named simply by their sounds, followed by ë ...
, in which the schwa is spelled as ''ë'', as in the work of Gjon Buzuku
Gjon Buzuku (15 March 1499 – 9 October 1577) was an Albanian Catholic priest who wrote the first known printed book in Albanian.
Gjon Buzuku according to the elders wrote the Missal in the village of Brisk Posht in the Shestan - Krajë region, ...
in the 16th century, various vowels and gliding vowels were employed, including ''ae'' by Lekë Matrënga and ''é'' by Pjetër Bogdani
Pjetër Bogdani (1627 – 6 December 1689), known in Italian as ''Pietro Bogdano'', was the most original writer of early literature in Albania. He was author of the Cuneus Prophetarum (''The Band of the Prophets''), 1685, the first prose work ...
in the late 16th and early 17th century. Within the borders of Albania, the phoneme is pronounced about the same in both the Tosk and the Gheg dialect due to the influence of standard Albanian. However, in the Gheg dialects spoken in the neighbouring Albanian-speaking areas of Kosovo and North Macedonia, the phoneme is still pronounced as back and rounded.
Grammar
Albanian has a canonical word order of SVO (subject–verb–object) like English and many other Indo-European languages. Albanian noun
A noun () is a word that generally functions as the name of a specific object or set of objects, such as living creatures, places, actions, qualities, states of existence, or ideas.Example nouns for:
* Living creatures (including people, alive, ...
s are categorised by gender
Gender is the range of characteristics pertaining to femininity and masculinity and differentiating between them. Depending on the context, this may include sex-based social structures (i.e. gender roles) and gender identity. Most cultures ...
(masculine, feminine and neuter) and inflected
In linguistic morphology, inflection (or inflexion) is a process of word formation in which a word is modified to express different grammatical categories such as tense, case, voice, aspect, person, number, gender, mood, animacy, and defi ...
for number
A number is a mathematical object used to count, measure, and label. The original examples are the natural numbers 1, 2, 3, 4, and so forth. Numbers can be represented in language with number words. More universally, individual numbers c ...
(singular and plural) and case. There are five declension
In linguistics, declension (verb: ''to decline'') is the changing of the form of a word, generally to express its syntactic function in the sentence, by way of some inflection. Declensions may apply to nouns, pronouns, adjectives, adverbs, and ...
s and six cases ( nominative, accusative
The accusative case (abbreviated ) of a noun is the grammatical case used to mark the direct object of a transitive verb.
In the English language, the only words that occur in the accusative case are pronouns: 'me,' 'him,' 'her,' 'us,' and ‘th ...
, genitive, dative, ablative
In grammar, the ablative case (pronounced ; sometimes abbreviated ) is a grammatical case for nouns, pronouns, and adjectives in the grammars of various languages; it is sometimes used to express motion away from something, among other uses. ...
, and vocative
In grammar, the vocative case (abbreviated ) is a grammatical case which is used for a noun that identifies a person (animal, object, etc.) being addressed, or occasionally for the noun modifiers (determiners, adjectives, participles, and numer ...
), although the vocative only occurs with a limited number of words (such as 'bir' ("son"), vocative case: biro, zog ("bird") vocative case: zogo[Breu, W. (2021) Italo-Albanian: Balkan Inheritance and Romance Influence p. 154]), and the forms of the genitive and dative are identical (a genitive construction employs the prepositions ''i/e/të/së'' alongside dative morphemes). Some dialects also retain a locative case, which is not present in standard Albanian (e.g. "në malt" loc.sg.def). The cases apply to both definite and indefinite nouns, and there are numerous cases of syncretism.
The following shows the declension of ''mal'' (mountain), a masculine noun which takes "i" in the definite singular:
The following shows the declension of the masculine noun ''zog'' (bird), a masculine noun which takes "u" in the definite singular:
The following table shows the declension of the feminine noun ''vajzë'' (girl):
The definite article is placed after the noun as in many other Balkan languages
This is a list of languages spoken in regions ruled by Balkan countries. With the exception of several Turkic languages, all of them belong to the Indo-European family. A subset of these languages is notable for forming a well-studied '' sprachb ...
, like in Romanian
Romanian may refer to:
*anything of, from, or related to the country and nation of Romania
**Romanians, an ethnic group
**Romanian language, a Romance language
*** Romanian dialects, variants of the Romanian language
** Romanian cuisine, tradition ...
, Macedonian and Bulgarian
Bulgarian may refer to:
* Something of, from, or related to the country of Bulgaria
* Bulgarians, a South Slavic ethnic group
* Bulgarian language, a Slavic language
* Bulgarian alphabet
* A citizen of Bulgaria, see Demographics of Bulgaria
* Bul ...
.
* The definite article can be in the form of noun suffixes, which vary with gender and case.
** For example, in singular nominative, masculine nouns add ''-i'', or those ending in -g/-k/-h take ''-u'' (to avoid palatalization):
***''mal'' (mountain) / ''mali'' (the mountain);
*** ''libër'' (book) / ''libri'' (the book);
*** ''zog'' (bird) / ''zogu'' (the bird).
** Feminine nouns take the suffix ''-(i/j)a'':
*** ''veturë'' (car) / ''vetura'' (the car);
*** ''shtëpi'' (house) / ''shtëpia'' (the house);
*** ''lule'' (flower) / ''lulja'' (the flower).
* Neuter nouns take ''-t''.
Albanian has developed an analytical verb
A verb () is a word ( part of speech) that in syntax generally conveys an action (''bring'', ''read'', ''walk'', ''run'', ''learn''), an occurrence (''happen'', ''become''), or a state of being (''be'', ''exist'', ''stand''). In the usual descr ...
al structure in place of the earlier synthetic system, inherited from Proto-Indo-European
Proto-Indo-European (PIE) is the reconstructed common ancestor of the Indo-European language family. Its proposed features have been derived by linguistic reconstruction from documented Indo-European languages. No direct record of Proto-Indo- ...
. Its complex system of moods (six types) and tenses (three simple and five complex constructions) is distinctive among Balkan languages
This is a list of languages spoken in regions ruled by Balkan countries. With the exception of several Turkic languages, all of them belong to the Indo-European family. A subset of these languages is notable for forming a well-studied '' sprachb ...
. There are two general types of conjugations.
Albanian verbs, like those of other Balkan languages, have an "admirative
In linguistics, mirativity, initially proposed by Scott DeLancey, is a grammatical category in a language, independent of evidentiality, that encodes the speaker's surprise or the unpreparedness of their mind. Grammatical elements that encode t ...
" mood (''mënyra habitore'') that is used to indicate surprise on the part of the speaker or to imply that an event is known to the speaker by report and not by direct observation. In some contexts, this mood can be translated using English "apparently".
* ''Ti flet shqip.'' "You speak Albanian." (indicative)
* ''Ti folke shqip!'' "You (surprisingly) speak Albanian!" (admirative)
* ''Rruga është e mbyllur.'' "The street is closed." (indicative)
* ''Rruga qenka e mbyllur.'' "(Apparently,) The street is closed." (admirative)
For more information on verb conjugation and on inflection of other parts of speech, see Albanian morphology.
Word order
Albanian word order is relatively free. To say 'Agim ate all the oranges' in Albanian, one may use any of the following orders, with slight pragmatic differences:
* SVO: Agimi i hëngri të gjithë portokallët.
* SOV: Agimi të gjithë portokallët i hëngri.
* OVS: Të gjithë portokallët i hëngri Agimi.
* OSV: Të gjithë portokallët Agimi i hëngri.
* VSO: I hëngri Agimi të gjithë portokallët.
* VOS: I hëngri të gjithë portokallët Agimi.
However, the most common order is subject–verb–object.
The verb can optionally occur in sentence-initial position, especially with verbs in the non-active form (''forma joveprore''):
* ''Parashikohet një ndërprerje'' "An interruption is anticipated".
Negation
Verbal negation in Albanian is mood-dependent, a trait shared with some fellow Indo-European languages
The Indo-European languages are a language family native to the overwhelming majority of Europe, the Iranian plateau, and the northern Indian subcontinent. Some European languages of this family, English, French, Portuguese, Russian, Dutc ...
such as Greek
Greek may refer to:
Greece
Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe:
*Greeks, an ethnic group.
*Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family.
**Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...
.
In indicative, conditional, or admirative sentences, negation is expressed by the particles ''nuk'' or ''s in front of the verb, for example:
* ''Toni nuk flet anglisht'' "Tony does not speak English";
* ''Toni s'flet anglisht'' "Tony doesn't speak English";
* ''Nuk e di'' "I do not know";
* ''S'e di'' "I don't know".
Subjunctive, imperative, optative, or non-finite forms of verbs are negated with the particle ''mos'':
* ''Mos harro'' "do not forget!".
Numerals
Vigesimal system
Beside the Indo-European decimal numeration, there are also remnants of the vigesimal system, as and . The Arbëreshë Arbën/Arbër, from which derived Arbënesh/Arbëresh originally meant all Albanians, until the 18th century. Today it is used for different groups of Albanian origin, including:
* Arbër (given name), an Albanian masculine given name
* Arbëresh ...
in Italy and Arvanites
Arvanites (; Arvanitika: , or , ; Greek: , ) are a bilingual population group in Greece of Albanian origin. They traditionally speak Arvanitika, an Albanian language variety, along with Greek. Their ancestors were first recorded as settl ...
in Greece may still use and . However the system has been lost in the standard language (excluding the dialects
The term dialect (from Latin , , from the Ancient Greek word , 'discourse', from , 'through' and , 'I speak') can refer to either of two distinctly different types of linguistic phenomena:
One usage refers to a variety of a language that is a ...
) due to the long-lasting Latin influence in Antiquity and in the Middle Ages. Albanian is the only Balkan language that has preserved the Pre-Indo-European vigesimal system.
Literary tradition
Earliest undisputed texts
The earliest known texts in Albanian:
* the "formula e pagëzimit The formula e pagëzimit ( en, baptismal formula) is the oldest written document with a writing in Albanian which has been found. The document is “Codex Ashburnham” dated November 8, 1462, and it contains various notes on Albania written in Lat ...
" (Baptismal Formula), which dates back to 1462 and was authored by Pal Engjëlli
Pal Ëngjëlli ( la, Paulus Angelus; 1416 – 1470) was an Albanian Roman Catholic cardinal, clergyman, scholar, and Archbishop of Durrës who in 1462 wrote the first known sentence retrieved so far in Albanian. Pal Ëngjëlli is reported to ...
(or Paulus Angelus) (c. 1417 – 1470), Archbishop of Durrës
Durrës ( , ; sq-definite, Durrësi) is the second most populous city of the Republic of Albania and seat of Durrës County and Durrës Municipality. It is located on a flat plain along the Albanian Adriatic Sea Coast between the mouths of ...
. Engjëlli was a close friend and counsellor of Skanderbeg
, reign = 28 November 1443 – 17 January 1468
, predecessor = Gjon Kastrioti
, successor = Gjon Kastrioti II
, spouse = Donika Arianiti
, issue = Gjon Kastrioti II
, royal house = Kastrioti
, father ...
. It was written in a pastoral letter for a synod at the Holy Trinity in Mat and read in Latin characters as follows: ''Unte paghesont premenit Atit et Birit et Spertit Senit'' (standard Albanian: "Unë të pagëzoj në emër të Atit, të Birit e të Shpirtit të Shenjtë"; English: "I baptise you in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit"). It was discovered and published in 1915 by Nicolae Iorga
Nicolae Iorga (; sometimes Neculai Iorga, Nicolas Jorga, Nicolai Jorga or Nicola Jorga, born Nicu N. Iorga;Iova, p. xxvii. 17 January 1871 – 27 November 1940) was a Romanian historian, politician, literary critic, memoirist, Albanologist, poet ...
.
* the '' Fjalori i Arnold von Harfit'' (Arnold Ritter von Harff's lexicon The Arnold Ritter von Harff's lexicon is the second oldest Albanian language, Albanian-language document ever retrieved, after the Formula e pagëzimit. The lexicon was written by Arnold von Harff, Arnold Ritter von Harff, a Germans, German traveler ...
), a short list of Albanian phrases with German glosses, dated 1496.
* a song, recorded in the Greek alphabet, retrieved from an old codex that was written in Greek. The document is also called "Perikopeja e Ungjillit të Pashkëve" or "Perikopeja e Ungjillit të Shën Mateut" ("The Song of the Easter Gospel, or "The Song of Saint Matthew's Gospel"). Although the codex is dated to during the 14th century, the song, written in Albanian by an anonymous writer, seems to be a 16th-century writing. The document was found by Arbëreshë Arbën/Arbër, from which derived Arbënesh/Arbëresh originally meant all Albanians, until the 18th century. Today it is used for different groups of Albanian origin, including:
* Arbër (given name), an Albanian masculine given name
* Arbëresh ...
people who had emigrated to Italy in the 15th century.
* The first book in Albanian is the Meshari
''Meshari'' ( Albanian for "Missal") is the oldest published book in Albanian. The book was written by Gjon Buzuku, a Catholic cleric in 1555. The book contains 188 pages and is written in two columns. ''Meshari'' is the translation of the main ...
("The Missal"), written by Gjon Buzuku
Gjon Buzuku (15 March 1499 – 9 October 1577) was an Albanian Catholic priest who wrote the first known printed book in Albanian.
Gjon Buzuku according to the elders wrote the Missal in the village of Brisk Posht in the Shestan - Krajë region, ...
between 20 March 1554 and 5 January 1555. The book was written in the Gheg
Gheg (also spelled Geg; Gheg Albanian: ''gegnishtja'', Standard sq, gegërishtja) is one of the two major varieties of Albanian, the other being Tosk. The geographic dividing line between the two varieties is the Shkumbin River, which winds ...
dialect in the Latin script
The Latin script, also known as Roman script, is an alphabetic writing system based on the letters of the classical Latin alphabet, derived from a form of the Greek alphabet which was in use in the ancient Greek city of Cumae, in southern I ...
with some Slavic letters adapted for Albanian vowels. The book was discovered in 1740 by Gjon Nikollë Kazazi
Gjon Nikollë Kazazi (in Latin: Giovanni Battista Nicolovich Casasi) was an Albanian Catholic cleric, who served as Archbishop of the Diocese of Skopje, known for discovering Meshari of Gjon Buzuku.
Biography
''Monsignor'' Gjon Nikollë Kazazi ...
, the Albanian archbishop of Skopje
Skopje ( , , ; mk, Скопје ; sq, Shkup) is the capital and List of cities in North Macedonia by population, largest city of North Macedonia. It is the country's political, cultural, economic, and academic centre.
The territory of Sk ...
. It contains the liturgies of the main holidays. There are also texts of prayers and rituals and catechetical
Catechesis (; from Greek: , "instruction by word of mouth", generally "instruction") is basic Christian religious education of children and adults, often from a catechism book. It started as education of converts to Christianity, but as the re ...
texts. The grammar and the vocabulary are more archaic than those in the Gheg texts from the 17th century. The 188 pages of the book comprise about 154,000 words with a total vocabulary of c. 1,500 different words. The text is archaic yet easily interpreted because it is mainly a translation of known texts, in particular portions of the Bible
The Bible (from Koine Greek , , 'the books') is a collection of religious texts or scriptures that are held to be sacred in Christianity, Judaism, Samaritanism, and many other religions. The Bible is an anthologya compilation of texts ...
. The book also contains passages from the Psalm
The Book of Psalms ( or ; he, תְּהִלִּים, , lit. "praises"), also known as the Psalms, or the Psalter, is the first book of the ("Writings"), the third section of the Tanakh, and a book of the Old Testament. The title is derived f ...
s, the Book of Isaiah, the Book of Jeremiah, the Letters to the Corinthians, and many illustrations. The uniformity of spelling seems to indicate an earlier tradition of writing. The only known copy of the Meshari is held by the Apostolic Library. In 1968 the book was published with transliterations and comments by linguists.
* The first printed work in Tosk Albanian is the ''Mbsuame e krështerë'' (in Italian: ''Dottrina cristiana'') by Lekë Matrënga or (in Italian) Luca Matranga. It was published in 1592 and is written in an early form of the Arbëresh language (also known as Italo-Albanian).
Albanian scripts were produced earlier than the first attested document, "formula e pagëzimit", but none yet have been discovered. We know of their existence by earlier references. For example, a French monk signed as "Broccardus" notes, in 1332, that "Although the Albanians have another language totally different from Latin, ''they still use Latin letters in all their books''".
Disputed earlier texts
In 1967 two scholars claimed to have found a Letter text in Albanian inserted into the Bellifortis
''Bellifortis'' ("Strong in War", "War Fortifications") is the first fully illustrated manual of military technology written by Konrad Kyeser and dating from the start of the 15th century. It summarises material from classical writers on milit ...
text, a book written in Latin dating to 1402–1405.
Dr. Robert Elsie
Robert Elsie (June 29, 1950 – October 2, 2017) was a Canadian-born German scholar who specialized in Albanian literature and folklore.
Elsie was a writer, translator, interpreter, and specialist in Albanian studies, being the author of numerou ...
, a specialist in Albanian studies, considers that "The Todericiu/Polena Romanian translation of the non-Latin lines, although it may offer some clues if the text is indeed Albanian, is fanciful and based, among other things, on a false reading of the manuscript, including the exclusion of a whole line."
Ottoman period
In 1635, Frang Bardhi
Frang Bardhi (Latin: ''Franciscus Blancus'', it, Francesco Bianchi, 1606–1643) was an Albanian Catholic bishop and writer. Bardhi is best known as an author of the early eras of Albanian literature. He served as Bishop of Sapë (1635–1644 ...
(1606–1643) published in Rome
, established_title = Founded
, established_date = 753 BC
, founder = King Romulus (legendary)
, image_map = Map of comune of Rome (metropolitan city of Capital Rome, region Lazio, Italy).svg
, map_caption ...
his ''Dictionarum latinum-epiroticum'', the first known Latin-Albanian dictionary. Other scholars who studied the language during the 17th century include Andrea Bogdani
Andrea Bogdani ( sq, Ndre Bogdani; ca. 1600–1683) was an Ottoman scholar of Albanian origin and prelate of the Roman Catholic Church.
Andrea Bogdani was born in the beginning of the 17th century Gur i Hasit near Prizren, Ottoman Empire (modern ...
(1600–1685), author of the first Latin-Albanian grammar book, Nilo Katalanos (1637–1694) and others.
Lexicon
Albanian is known within historical linguistics as a case of a language which, although surviving through many periods of foreign rule and multilingualism, saw a "disproportionately high" influx of loans
In finance, a loan is the lending of money by one or more individuals, organizations, or other entities to other individuals, organizations, etc. The recipient (i.e., the borrower) incurs a debt and is usually liable to pay interest on that de ...
from other languages augmenting and replacing much of its original vocabulary
A vocabulary is a set of familiar words within a person's language. A vocabulary, usually developed with age, serves as a useful and fundamental tool for communication and acquiring knowledge. Acquiring an extensive vocabulary is one of the la ...
.[ Of all the foreign influences in Albanian, the deepest reaching and most impactful was the absorption of loans from Latin in the Classical period and its Romance successors afterward, with over 60% of Albanian vocabulary consisting of Latin roots, causing Albanian to once have been mistakenly identified as a Romance language.][Sawicka, Irena]
"A Crossroad Between West, East and Orient–The Case of Albanian Culture."
Colloquia Humanistica. No. 2. Instytut Slawistyki Polskiej Akademii Nauk, 2013. Page 97: "Even according to Albanian linguists, Albanian vocabulary is composed in 60 percent of Latin words from different periods... When albanological studies were just emerging, it happened that Albanian was classified as a Romance language. Already there exists the idea of a common origin of both Albanian and Rumanian languages. The Rumanian grammar is almost identical to that of Albanian, but it may be as well the effect of later convergence within the Balkan Sprachbund.."
Major work in reconstructing Proto-Albanian has been done with the help of knowledge of the original forms of loans from Ancient Greek, Latin and Slavic, while Ancient Greek loanwords are scarce the Latin loanwords are of extreme importance in phonology
Phonology is the branch of linguistics that studies how languages or dialects systematically organize their sounds or, for sign languages, their constituent parts of signs. The term can also refer specifically to the sound or sign system of a ...
. The presence of loanwords from more well-studied languages from time periods before Albanian was attested, reaching deep back into the Classical Era, has been of great use in phonological reconstructions for earlier ancient and medieval forms of Albanian.[Matasovic, Ranko (2018)]
''A Grammatical Sketch of Albanian for students of Indo-European''
Page 6. Some words in the core vocabulary of Albanian have no known etymology linking them to Proto-Indo-European or any known source language, and as of 2018 are thus tentatively attributed to an unknown, unattested, pre-Indo-European substrate language; some words among these include (heart) and (iron). Some among these putative pre-IE words are thought to be related to putative pre-IE substrate words in neighboring Indo-European languages, such as (flower), which has been tentatively linked to Latin and Greek .
Lexical distance of Albanian to other languages in a lexicostatistical
Lexicostatistics is a method of comparative linguistics that involves comparing the percentage of lexical cognates between languages to determine their relationship. Lexicostatistics is related to the comparative method but does not reconstruct a ...
analysis by Ukrainian linguist Tyshchenko shows the following results (the lower figure, the higher similarity): 49% Slovenian
Slovene or Slovenian may refer to:
* Something of, from, or related to Slovenia, a country in Central Europe
* Slovene language, a South Slavic language mainly spoken in Slovenia
* Slovenes
The Slovenes, also known as Slovenians ( sl, Sloven ...
, 53% Romanian
Romanian may refer to:
*anything of, from, or related to the country and nation of Romania
**Romanians, an ethnic group
**Romanian language, a Romance language
*** Romanian dialects, variants of the Romanian language
** Romanian cuisine, tradition ...
, 56% Greek
Greek may refer to:
Greece
Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe:
*Greeks, an ethnic group.
*Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family.
**Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...
, 82% French, 86% Macedonian, 86% Bulgarian
Bulgarian may refer to:
* Something of, from, or related to the country of Bulgaria
* Bulgarians, a South Slavic ethnic group
* Bulgarian language, a Slavic language
* Bulgarian alphabet
* A citizen of Bulgaria, see Demographics of Bulgaria
* Bul ...
.
Cognates with Illyrian
Early linguistic influences
The earliest loanword
A loanword (also loan word or loan-word) is a word at least partly assimilated from one language (the donor language) into another language. This is in contrast to cognates, which are words in two or more languages that are similar because t ...
s attested in Albanian come from Doric Greek, whereas the strongest influence came from Latin
Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...
. Some scholars argue that Albanian originated from an area located east of its present geographic spread due to the several common lexical items found between the Albanian and Romanian
Romanian may refer to:
*anything of, from, or related to the country and nation of Romania
**Romanians, an ethnic group
**Romanian language, a Romance language
*** Romanian dialects, variants of the Romanian language
** Romanian cuisine, tradition ...
languages. However it does not necessarily define the genealogical history of Albanian language, and it does not exclude the possibility of Proto-Albanian
The Proto-Albanian language is the unattested language from which Albanian later developed. Albanian evolved from an ancient Paleo-Balkan language, traditionally thought to be Illyrian, or otherwise a totally unattested Balkan Indo-European ...
presence in both Illyrian and Thracian
The Thracians (; grc, Θρᾷκες ''Thrāikes''; la, Thraci) were an Indo-European speaking people who inhabited large parts of Eastern and Southeastern Europe in ancient history.. "The Thracians were an Indo-European people who occupied ...
territory.
The period during which Proto-Albanian and Latin interacted was protracted, lasting from the 2nd century BC to the 5th century AD. Over this period, the lexical borrowings can be roughly divided into three layers, the second of which is the largest. The first and smallest occurred at the time of less significant interaction. The final period, probably preceding the Slavic or Germanic invasions, also has a notably smaller number of borrowings. Each layer is characterised by a different treatment of most vowels: the first layer follows the evolution of Early Proto-Albanian into Albanian; while later layers reflect vowel changes endemic to Late Latin (and presumably Proto-Romance
Proto-Romance is the comparatively reconstructed ancestor of all Romance languages. It reflects a late variety of spoken Latin prior to regional fragmentation.
Phonology
Vowels
Monophthongs
Diphthong
The only phonemic diphthong was ...
). Other formative changes include the syncretism of several noun case endings, especially in the plural, as well as a large-scale palatalisation.
A brief period followed, between the 7th and the 9th centuries, that was marked by heavy borrowings from South Slavic, some of which predate the "o-a" shift common to the modern forms of this language group. Starting in the latter 9th century, there was a period characterised by protracted contact with the Proto-Romanians (or "Vlachs
"Vlach" ( or ), also "Wallachian" (and many other variants), is a historical term and exonym used from the Middle Ages until the Modern Era to designate mainly Romanians but also Aromanians, Megleno-Romanians, Istro-Romanians and other E ...
"), though lexical borrowing seems to have been mostly one sided: from Albanian into Romanian. Such borrowing indicates that the Romanians
The Romanians ( ro, români, ; dated exonym '' Vlachs'') are a Romance-speaking ethnic group. Sharing a common Romanian culture and ancestry, and speaking the Romanian language, they live primarily in Romania and Moldova. The 2011 Roman ...
migrated from an area where the majority was Slavic (i.e. Middle Bulgarian) to an area with a majority of Albanian speakers (i.e. Dardania, where Vlachs are recorded in the 10th century). Their movement is presumably related to the expansion of the Bulgarian Empire into Albania around that time.
Early Greek loans
There are some 30 Ancient Greek
Ancient Greek includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Dark Ages (), the Archaic p ...
loanwords in Proto-Albanian
The Proto-Albanian language is the unattested language from which Albanian later developed. Albanian evolved from an ancient Paleo-Balkan language, traditionally thought to be Illyrian, or otherwise a totally unattested Balkan Indo-European ...
. Many of these reflect a dialect which voiced its aspirants, as did the Macedonian dialect. Other loanwords are Doric; these words mainly refer to commodity items and trade goods and probably came through trade with a now-extinct intermediary.
* ; "sickle" < (Northwest Greek
Doric or Dorian ( grc, Δωρισμός, Dōrismós), also known as West Greek, was a group of Ancient Greek dialects; its varieties are divided into the Doric proper and Northwest Doric subgroups. Doric was spoken in a vast area, that includ ...
) [Ancient Indo-European dialects: proceedings, Volume 1963 Ancient Indo-European Dialects: Proceedings, University of California, Los Angeles. Center for Research in Languages and Linguistics Authors Henrik Birnbaum, Jaan Puhvel, University of California, Los Angeles. Center for Research in Languages and Linguistics Editors Henrik Birnbaum, Jaan Puhvel Publisher University of California Press, 1966 p.102]
* ; "hive, bee" < Attic "bee" (vs. Ionic ).
* ; "plum" <
* ; "cabbage, green vegetables" < "green; vegetable"
* ; "orach, dock" <
* ; "to smear, to oil"< Proto-Albanian *elaiwanja < *elaiwa (olive oil) < Greek elaion
* ; "millstone" < (Northwest) "device, instrument"[The Field of Linguistics, Volume 2 Volume 1 of World of linguistics Authors Bernd Kortmann, Johan Van Der Auwera Editors Bernd Kortmann, Johan Van Der Auwera Publisher Walter de Gruyter, 2010 , p.412]
* ; "apple" < "fruit"
* ; "palm of the hand" <
* ; "melon" <
* ; "leek" <
* ; "thyme" < (Northwest) ,
* ; "pond, pool" < "high sea"
According to Huld (1986), the following come from a Greek dialect without any significant attestation called "Makedonian" because it was akin to the native idiom of the Greek-speaking population in the Argead kingdom:
* ; "elbow" < *
* ; "tamarisk" < *
* ; 'mallow' < * (with the reflex of /ɡ/ for Greek <χ> indicating a dialectal voicing of the what came as an aspirate stop from Greek)
* "fennel" < * (cf Romanian , Ionic ; with the Albanian simplification of -dri̯- to -j- reflecting that of earlier * to "water")
Latin influence
In total Latin roots comprise over 60% of the Albanian lexicon.[ They include many frequently used core vocabulary items, including ' ("very", from Latin '), ' ("few", Latin '), ' ("narrow", Latin '), ' ("tree", Latin '), ' ("to come", Latin '), ' ("sand", Latin '), ' ("straight", Latin '), ' ("beast", Latin ', meaning "thing"), and ' ("far away", Latin ').
]Jernej Kopitar
Jernej Kopitar, also known as Bartholomeus Kopitar (21 August 1780 – 11 August 1844), was a Slovene linguist and philologist working in Vienna. He also worked as the Imperial censor for Slovene literature in Vienna. He is perhaps best known ...
(1780–1844) was the first to note Latin's influence on Albanian and claimed "the Latin loanwords in the Albanian language had the pronunciation of the time of Emperor Augustus". Kopitar gave examples such as Albanian ' 'chickpea' from Latin ', ' 'city, town' from ', ' 'fish' from ', and ' 'arrow' from '. The hard pronunciations of Latin and are retained as palatal and velar stops in the Albanian loanwords. Gustav Meyer (1888) and Wilhelm Meyer-Lübke
Wilhelm Meyer-Lübke (; 30 January 1861 – 4 October 1936) was a Swiss philologist of the Neogrammarian school of linguistics.
Biography
Meyer-Lübke, a nephew of Conrad Ferdinand Meyer, was born in Dübendorf, Switzerland. He studied Indo- ...
(1914) later corroborated this. Meyer noted the similarity between the Albanian verbs ' "to speak clearly, enunciate" and ' "to pronounce, articulate" and the Latin word ' (meaning "to welcome"). Therefore, he believed that the word ''Shqiptar'' "Albanian person" was derived from ', which in turn was derived from the Latin word '. Johann Georg von Hahn
Johann Georg von Hahn (11 July 1811 – 23 September 1869) was an Austrian and later Austro-Hungarian diplomat, philologist and specialist in Albanian history, language and culture.
Hahn was born in Frankfurt am Main. In 1847, he was named Aust ...
, an Austrian linguist, had proposed the same hypothesis in 1854.
Eqrem Çabej also noticed, among other things, the archaic Latin elements in Albanian:
# Latin /au/ becomes Albanian /a/ in the earliest loanwords: ' → ' 'gold'; ' → ' 'joy'; ' → ' 'laurel'. Latin /au/ is retained in later loans, but is altered in a way similar to Greek
Greek may refer to:
Greece
Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe:
*Greeks, an ethnic group.
*Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family.
**Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...
: ' 'thing' → ' 'thing; beast, brute'; ' → '.
# Latin /oː/ becomes Albanian /e/ in the oldest Latin loans: ' → ' 'fruit tree'; ' → ' 'time, instance'. An analogous mutation occurred from Proto-Indo-European to Albanian; PIE ' became Albanian ' 'we', PIE ' + suffix ''-ti-'' became Albanian ' 'eight', etc.
# Latin unstressed internal and initial syllables become lost in Albanian: ' → ' 'elbow'; ' → ' 'physician'; ' 'swamp' → Vulgar Latin
Vulgar Latin, also known as Popular or Colloquial Latin, is the range of non-formal registers of Latin spoken from the Late Roman Republic onward. Through time, Vulgar Latin would evolve into numerous Romance languages. Its literary counterpa ...
' → ' 'forest'. An analogous mutation occurred from Proto-Indo-European to Albanian. In contrast, in later Latin loanwords, the internal syllable is retained: ' → '; ' → ' 'wound', etc.
# Latin /tj/, /dj/, /kj/ palatalized to Albanian /s/, /z/, /c/: ' → ' 'vice; worries'; ' → ' 'reason'; ' → ' 'ray; spoke'; ''faciēs'' → ' 'face, cheek'; ' → ' 'mate, comrade', ' 'husband', etc. In turn, Latin /s/ was altered to /ʃ/ in Albanian.
Haralambie Mihăescu demonstrated that:
* Some 85 Latin words have survived in Albanian but not (as inherited) in any Romance language
The Romance languages, sometimes referred to as Latin languages or Neo-Latin languages, are the various modern languages that evolved from Vulgar Latin. They are the only extant subgroup of the Italic languages in the Indo-European language f ...
. A few examples include Late Latin ' → dial. ' → ' 'hydra', ' → ' 'winter pasture', ' 'used for packing, loading' → ' 'forked peg, grapnel, forked hanger', ' 'nightshade', lit. 'sun plant' → ' 'sunny place out of the wind, sunbathed area', ' → ' 'spleen', ' → ' 'pitchfork'.
* 151 Albanian words of Latin origin were not inherited in Romanian. A few examples include Latin ' → Albanian ' 'friend', ' → ' 'foe, enemy', ' → ', ' → ', ' 'ploughman, herdsman' → ', ' 'peasant', ' → ' 'drinking glass', ' → ' 'castle', ' → ' 'hundred', ' → ' 'rooster', ' → ' 'limb; joint', ' → ' 'doctor', ' → ' 'net', ' → dial. ', ' 'to hope', ' 'to await', ' (') → ' 'will; volunteer'.
* Some Albanian church terminology has phonetic features which demonstrate their very early borrowing from Latin. A few examples include Albanian ' 'to bless' from ', ' 'angel' from ', ' 'church' from ', ' 'Christian' from ', ' 'cross' from ' ('), (obsolete) ' 'altar' from Latin ', ' 'to curse' from ', ' 'mass' from ', ' 'monk' from ', ' 'bishop' from ', and ' 'gospel' from '.
Other authors have detected Latin loanwords in Albanian with an ancient sound pattern from the 1st century BC, for example, Albanian ' 'saddle girth; dwarf elder' from Latin ' and Albanian ' 'old, aged; former' from ' but influenced by Latin '. The Romance languages
The Romance languages, sometimes referred to as Latin languages or Neo-Latin languages, are the various modern languages that evolved from Vulgar Latin. They are the only extant subgroup of the Italic languages in the Indo-European language ...
inherited these words from Vulgar Latin: ' became Romanian ' 'girdle; saddle girth', and Vulgar Latin '' veterānus'' became Romanian ' 'old'.
Albanian, Basque
Basque may refer to:
* Basques, an ethnic group of Spain and France
* Basque language, their language
Places
* Basque Country (greater region), the homeland of the Basque people with parts in both Spain and France
* Basque Country (autonomous co ...
, and the surviving Celtic languages
The Celtic languages ( usually , but sometimes ) are a group of related languages descended from Proto-Celtic. They form a branch of the Indo-European language family. The term "Celtic" was first used to describe this language group by Edwar ...
such as Breton
Breton most often refers to:
*anything associated with Brittany, and generally
** Breton people
** Breton language, a Southwestern Brittonic Celtic language of the Indo-European language family, spoken in Brittany
** Breton (horse), a breed
**Ga ...
and Welsh
Welsh may refer to:
Related to Wales
* Welsh, referring or related to Wales
* Welsh language, a Brittonic Celtic language spoken in Wales
* Welsh people
People
* Welsh (surname)
* Sometimes used as a synonym for the ancient Britons (Celtic peop ...
are the non-Romance languages today that have this sort of extensive Latin element dating from ancient Roman times, which has undergone the sound changes associated with the languages. Other languages in or near the former Roman area either came on the scene later (Turkish, the Slavic languages, Arabic) or borrowed little from Latin despite coexisting with it (Greek, German), although German does have a few such ancient Latin loanwords (' 'window', ' 'cheese').
Romanian scholars such as Vatasescu and Mihaescu, using lexical analysis of the Albanian language, have concluded that Albanian was heavily influenced by an extinct Romance language that was distinct from both Romanian and Dalmatian. Because the Latin words common to only Romanian and Albanian are significantly fewer in number than those that are common to only Albanian and Western Romance, Mihaescu argues that the Albanian language evolved in a region with much greater contact with Western Romance regions than with Romanian-speaking regions, and located this region in present-day Albania, Kosovo and Western Macedonia, spanning east to Bitola and Pristina
Pristina, ; sr, / (, ) is the capital and largest city of Kosovo. The city's municipal boundaries in Pristina District form the largest urban center in Kosovo. After Tirana, Pristina has the second largest population of ethnic Albanians an ...
.
Other loans
After the Slavs arrived in the Balkans
The Balkans ( ), also known as the Balkan Peninsula, is a geographical area in southeastern Europe with various geographical and historical definitions. The region takes its name from the Balkan Mountains that stretch throughout the who ...
, the Slavic languages
The Slavic languages, also known as the Slavonic languages, are Indo-European languages spoken primarily by the Slavic peoples and their descendants. They are thought to descend from a proto-language called Proto-Slavic, spoken during the ...
became an additional source of loanwords. The rise of the Ottoman Empire
The Ottoman Empire, * ; is an archaic version. The definite article forms and were synonymous * and el, Оθωμανική Αυτοκρατορία, Othōmanikē Avtokratoria, label=none * info page on book at Martin Luther University) ...
meant an influx of Turkish words; this also entailed the borrowing of Persian and Arabic words through Turkish. Some Turkish personal names, such as ''Altin'', are common. There are some loanwords from Modern Greek, especially in the south of Albania. Many borrowed words have been replaced by words with Albanian roots or modern Latinised (international) words.
=Gothic
=
Albanian is also known to possess a small set of loans from Gothic
Gothic or Gothics may refer to:
People and languages
*Goths or Gothic people, the ethnonym of a group of East Germanic tribes
**Gothic language, an extinct East Germanic language spoken by the Goths
**Crimean Gothic, the Gothic language spoken b ...
, with early inquiry into the matter done by Norbert Jokl
Norbert Jokl (February 25, 1877 – probably May 1942) was an Austrian Albanologist of Jewish descent who has been called the father of Albanology.
Early life
Jokl was born in Bzenec (then Bisenz), Southern Moravia (now the Czech Republic ...
and Sigmund Feist
Sigmund Feist (Mainz, 12 June 1865 - Copenhagen, 23 March 1943) was a German Jewish pedagogue and historical linguist. He was the author of the Germanic substrate hypothesis as well as a number of important works concerning Jewish ethnic and rac ...
, though such loans had been claimed earlier in the 19th century by early linguists such as Gustav Meyer
Gustav Meyer (25 November 1850 – 28 August 1900) was a German linguist and Indo-European scholar, considered to be one of the most important Albanologists of his time, most importantly by proving that the Albanian language belongs to the Indo-Eu ...
. Many words claimed as Gothic have now been attributed to other origins by later linguists of Albanian (''fat'' and ''tufë'', though used for major claims by Huld in 1994, are now attributed to Latin, for example), or may instead be native to Albanian, inherited from Proto-Indo-European.[Matasovic, Ranko (2019). ]
A Grammatical Sketch of Albanian for Students of Indo-European
'. Zagreb. Page 39 Today, it is accepted that there are a few words from Gothic in Albanian, but for the most part they are scanty because the Goths had few contacts with Balkan peoples.[Curtis, M.C., 2012]
Slavic-Albanian language contact, convergence, and coexistence
Page 19
Martin Huld[Huld, M.E., 1994]
Albanian zverk - Gothic *swairhs
''Historische Sprachforschung/Historical Linguistics'', 107(1. H), pp.165-171. Pages 167-8. defends the significance of the admittedly sparse Gothic loans for Albanian studies, however, arguing that Gothic is the only clearly post-Roman and "pre-Ottoman" language after Latin with a notable influence on the Albanian lexicon (the influence of Slavic languages is both pre-Ottoman and Ottoman).[ He argues that Gothic words in Albanian are attributable to the late fourth and early fifth centuries during the invasions of various Gothic speaking groups of the Balkans under Alaric, Odoacer, and ]Theodoric
Theodoric is a Germanic given name. First attested as a Gothic name in the 5th century, it became widespread in the Germanic-speaking world, not least due to its most famous bearer, Theodoric the Great, king of the Ostrogoths.
Overview
The name ...
. He argues that Albanian Gothicisms bear evidence for the ordering of developments within Proto-Albanian at this time: for example, he argues Proto-Albanian at this stage had already shifted /uː/ to as Gothic words with /uː/ reflect with /u/ in Albanian, not /y/ as seen in most Latin and ancient Greek loans, but had not yet experienced the shift of /t͡s/ to /θ/, since loans from Gothic words with /θ/ replace /θ/ with /t/ or another close sound.[
Notable words that continue to be attributed to Gothic in Albanian by multiple modern sources include:
* ''tirk'' "felt gaiters, white felt" (cf Romanian ''tureac'' "top of boot") < Gothic *θiuh-brōks-][Orel, Vladimir (1998). ''Albanian Etymological Dictionary''. Page 456-7] or *θiuhbrōkeis,[ cf Old High German ''theobrach'' "gaiters"][
* ''shkumë'' "foam"] < Gothic ''*skūm-'',[ perhaps via an intermediary in a Romance *scuma (cf. Romanian ''spumă'')
* ''gardh'' "fence, garden"] is either considered a native Albanian word that was loaned into Romanian as ''gard''
* ''zverk'' "nape, back of neck" < Gothic *''swairhs''; the "difficult" word having various otherwise been attributed (with phonological issues) to Celtic, Greek or native development.
* ''horr'' "villain, scoundrel" and ''horre'' "whore" < Gothic *''hors'' "adulterer, cf Old Norse ''hóra'' "whore"
* ''punjashë'' "purse", diminutive of ''punjë'' < Gothic ''puggs'' "purse"[Orel, Vladimir (1998). ''Albanian Etymological Dictionary''. Page 350] (cf. Romanian ''pungă'')
Patterns in loaning
Although Albanian is characterised by the absorption of many loans, even, in the case of Latin, reaching deep into the core vocabulary, certain semantic field
In linguistics, a semantic field is a lexical set of words grouped semantically (by meaning) that refers to a specific subject.Howard Jackson, Etienne Zé Amvela, ''Words, Meaning, and Vocabulary'', Continuum, 2000, p14. The term is also used in ...
s nevertheless remained more resistant. Terms pertaining to social organisation are often preserved, though not those pertaining to political organisation, while those pertaining to trade are all loaned or innovated.
Hydronyms present a complicated picture; the term for "sea" (''det'') is native and an "Albano-Germanic" innovation referring to the concept of depth, but a large amount of maritime vocabulary is loaned. Words referring to large streams and their banks tend to be loans, but ''lumë'' ("river") is native, as is ''rrymë'' (the flow of water). Words for smaller streams and stagnant pools of water are more often native, but the word for "pond", ''pellg'' is in fact a semantically shifted descendant of the old Greek word for "high sea", suggesting a change in location after Greek contact. Albanian has maintained since Proto-Indo-European a specific term referring to a riverside forest (''gjazë''), as well as its words for marshes. Curiously, Albanian has maintained native terms for "whirlpool", "water pit" and (aquatic) "deep place", leading Orel to speculate that the Albanian Urheimat
In historical linguistics, the homeland or ''Urheimat'' (, from German '' ur-'' "original" and ''Heimat'', home) of a proto-language is the region in which it was spoken before splitting into different daughter languages. A proto-language is the r ...
likely had an excess of dangerous whirlpools and depths.
Regarding forests, words for most conifers and shrubs are native, as are the terms for "alder", "elm", "oak", "beech", and "linden", while "ash", "chestnut", "birch", "maple", "poplar", and "willow" are loans.
The original kinship terminology of Indo-European was radically reshaped; changes included a shift from "mother" to "sister", and were so thorough that only three terms retained their original function, the words for "son-in-law", "mother-in-law" and "father-in-law". All the words for second-degree blood kinship, including "aunt", "uncle", "nephew", "niece", and terms for grandchildren, are ancient loans from Latin.
The Proto-Albanians appear to have been cattle breeders given the vastness of preserved native vocabulary pertaining to cow breeding, milking and so forth, while words pertaining to dogs tend to be loaned. Many words concerning horses are preserved, but the word for horse itself is a Latin loan.
See also
* Abetare
The Abetare is a children's textbook written in the Albanian language. It was created to help teach the basic language to children and young adults throughout Albania and the surrounding region where Albanians live. Abetare has played a significant ...
* Arbëresh language
* Arvanitika
Arvanitika (; Arvanitika: , ; Greek: , ), also known as Arvanitic, is the variety of Albanian traditionally spoken by the Arvanites, a population group in Greece. Arvanitika is today endangered, as its speakers have been shifting to the u ...
* Gheg Albanian
Gheg (also spelled Geg; Gheg Albanian: ''gegnishtja'', Standard sq, gegërishtja) is one of the two major variety (linguistics), varieties of Albanian language, Albanian, the other being Tosk Albanian, Tosk. The geographic dividing line betwee ...
* Illyrian language
* IPA/Albanian
* Messapic language
* Thraco-Illyrian
The term Thraco-Illyrian refers to a hypothesis according to which the Daco-Thracian and Illyrian languages comprise a distinct branch of Indo-European. Thraco-Illyrian is also used as a term merely implying a Thracian- Illyrian interference, m ...
* Tosk Albanian
Tosk ( sq-definite, toskërishtja) is the southern group of dialects of the Albanian language, spoken by the ethnographic group known as Tosks. The line of demarcation between Tosk and Gheg (the northern variety) is the Shkumbin River. Tosk is ...
Notes
References
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Further reading
* Станишић, Вања TANISIC, Vanja
Two types of ancient Indo-European isoglosses in the Albanian language
. In: ''Balcanica'', 1998, 29, pp. 321–338. .
External links
Albanian Online
by Brian Joseph, Angelo Costanzo, and Jonathan Slocum, free online lessons at th
Linguistics Research Center
at the University of Texas at Austin
The University of Texas at Austin (UT Austin, UT, or Texas) is a public research university in Austin, Texas. It was founded in 1883 and is the oldest institution in the University of Texas System. With 40,916 undergraduate students, 11,07 ...
glottothèque - Ancient Indo-European Grammars online
an online collection of introductory videos to Ancient Indo-European languages produced by the University of Göttingen
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