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Albanian Shqip
Pronunciation:	[ʃcip]
Spoken in:	Albania (official), Kosovo (official), Republic of Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbia, Greece, United States, Italy, Germany, United Kingdom, Turkey, Switzerland, Canada, Australia & other countries.
Region:	Southeastern Europe
Total speakers:	6,000,000[1]
Language family:	Indo-European  Albanian
Writing system:	Latin alphabet (Albanian variant)
Official status
Official language in:	Albania  Kosovo and recognised as a minority language in:  Macedonia  Montenegro  Italy  Serbia  Greece  Turkey
Regulated by:	No official regulation
Language codes
ISO 639-1:	sq
ISO 639-2:	alb (B)	sqi (T)
ISO 639-3:	variously: sqi – Albanian (generic) aln – Gheg aae – Arbëreshë aat – Arvanitika als – Tosk
Note: This page may contain IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode.

Albanian (Gjuha shqipe pronounced [ˈɟuha ˈʃcipɛ]) is an Indo-European language spoken by nearly 8 million people,^[1] primarily in Albania and Kosovo but also in other areas of the Balkans in which there is an Albanian population, including the west of the Republic of Macedonia, Montenegro, and southern Serbia. Albanian is also spoken by communities in Greece, along the eastern coast of southern Italy, and on the island of Sicily. Additionally, speakers of Albanian can be found elsewhere throughout the latter two countries resulting from a modern diaspora, originating from the Balkans, that also includes Scandinavia, Switzerland, Germany, United Kingdom, Turkey, Australia, New Zealand, Canada and the United States. An estimated 3 million Albanians are believed to be the total of the diaspora concentrated mostly in Western Europe and North America.

Contents 1 History 1.1 First documents found 1.2 After Ottoman conquest 1.3 The alphabet used by romantics 1.4 History of the alphabet 1.5 Standard Albanian 2 Classification 2.1 Comparison with other Indo-European languages 3 Geographic distribution 3.1 Official status 3.2 Dialects 3.2.1 Notable phonological and lexicological differences between Tosk and Gheg 4 Sounds 4.1 Consonants 4.2 Vowels 5 Grammar 6 Vocabulary 6.1 Cognates with Illyrian 6.2 Early Greek loans 6.3 Gothic loans 7 Writing system 8 History 8.1 Linguistic affinities 8.2 Historical presence and location 8.3 Linguistic influences 8.4 Historical considerations 9 See also 10 References 11 Bibliography 12 External links

[edit] History

Main article: History of Albanian language

[edit] First documents found

In 1967 scholar Dumitru Todericiu studied microfilms of the Bellifortis text, manuscript 663, preserved at the Musée Condé of the Chantilly Castle in France. This work was written by Konrad Kyeser around 1402-1405. The original Latin context is an astrological one, part of an initiation ritual practiced by young boys when becoming men and a vestige of the ancient phallic cult, very common in the Balkan peninsula. On page 153v Todericiu discovered a text insertion in a weird language. Until then, scholars considered it as a text without an actual meaning, written in an artificial language. Believing the words are in Albanian, Todericiu, together with professor Dumitru Polena from Bucharest, after a four months work obtained a modern version of the text^[2]:

A star has fallen in a place in the woods, distinguish the star, distinguish it.
Distinguish the star from the others, they are ours, they are.
Do you see where the great voice has resounded? Stand beside it
That thunder. It did not fall. It did not fall for you, the one which would do it.
...
Like the ears, you should not believe ... that the moon fell when ...
Try to encompass that which spurts far ...
Call the light when the moon falls and no longer exists ...

Dr. Robert Elsie, 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. [...] Certain evidence, both linguistic and non-linguistic, supports an Albanian origin for the Bellifortis text under study. The incantation and taboo character of such a passage involving initiation rites, however, precludes an interlinear translation. If the Bellifortis text is indeed Albanian, which remains to be proved conclusively, it would be the oldest datable text in that language"^[3].

The first certain document in Albanian is "Formula e pagëzimit"(1462) (Baptesimal formula), issued by Pal Engjëlli, Archbishop of Durrës. It was discovered and published in 1915 by Nicolae Iorga^[4]. The second is "Fjalori i Arnold von Harf" in (Arnold von Harf vocabulary) in 1469; the third document "Ungjilli i Pashkëve" or Ungjilli i Shën Mateut is dated in the 15th century. The first book in Albanian was written by Gjon Buzuku of 20 March 1554 to 5 January 1555. The book was written in the Gheg dialect in the Latin alphabet with some Slavic letters adapted for Albanian vowels.

[edit] After Ottoman conquest

In 1635 Frang Bardhi published in Rome his Dictionarum latinum-epiroticum, the fisrt known Latin-Albanian dictionary. the evidence shows,moreover, that "the study of Albanian has a tradition of 350 years" and includes works of Frang Bardhi (1606-1643), Andre Bogdani(1600-1685),Nilo Katalanos(1637-1694) and others.

[edit] The alphabet used by romantics

[edit] History of the alphabet

From November 14 to November 22, 1908, Albanian intellectuals meet in Manastir (Bitolja, Macedonia), at the Congress of Manastir to standardize the Albanian alphabet using the Latin script. Up to now, Latin, Cyrillic and Arabic script had been used.

[edit] Standard Albanian

In 1970's the publications in Tirana, followed by repubication in Pristina of a book of orthographical rules, Drejtëshkrimi i gjuhës shqipe followed by a widely distributed authoritative dictionary in 1976 "Fjalori drejtshkrimor i gjuhës shqipe", created a considerable degreeof phonological normalization as well as spelling reform.

[edit] Classification

Albanian was proven to be an Indo-European language in 1854 by the philologist Franz Bopp. The Albanian language constitutes its own branch of the Indo-European language family.

Some scholars believe that Albanian derives from Illyrian^[5][6] while others^[7] claim that it derives from Daco-Thracian. (Illyrian and Daco-Thracian, however, may have formed a sprachbund; see Thraco-Illyrian.)

Establishing longer relations, Albanian is often compared to Balto-Slavic on the one hand and Germanic on the other, both of which share a number of isoglosses with Albanian. Moreover, Albanian has undergone a vowel shift in which stressed, long o has fallen to a, much like in the former and opposite the latter. Likewise, Albanian has taken the old relative jos and innovatively used it exclusively to qualify adjectives, much in the way Balto-Slavic has used this word to provide the definite ending of adjectives.

Other linguists link Albanian with Greek and Armenian, while placing Germanic and Balto-Slavic in another branch of Indo-European.^[8][9][10]

[edit] Comparison with other Indo-European languages

Albanian	muaj	i ri / e re	nënë/mëmë	motër	natë	hundë	tre	i zi /e zezë	i kuq / e kuqe	i/ e gjelbër/blertë	i/e verdhë	ujk
Other Indo-European languages
Sanskrit	māsa	nava	mātṛ	svasṛ	nakti	nasa	tri	kāla	rudhira	hari	pīta	vṛka
Persian	māh	nou	mādar	xāhar	shab	biní	se	siāh	sorkh	sabz	zard	gorg
Ancient Greek	μήν mēn	νέος néos	μήτηρ mētēr	αδελφή adelphē	νύξ nýx	ῥίς rhís	τρεῖς treïs	μέλας mélas	ἐρυθρός erythrós	χλωρός khlōrós	ξανθός xanthós	λύκος lýkos
Latin	mēnsis	novus	māter	soror	nox	nasus	trēs	āter, niger	ruber	viridis	flāvus, gilvus	lupus
Romanian	lună	nou	mamă	soră	noapte	nas	trei	negru	roşu	verde	galben	lup
Serbian	месец mesec	нов nov	мајка majka	сестра sestra	ноћ noć	нос nos	три tri	црн crn	црвен crven	зелен zelen	жут žut	вук vuk
Latvian	mēnesis	jauns	māte	māsa	nakts	deguns	trīs	melns	sarkans	zaļš	dzeltens	vilks
English	month	new	mother	sister	night	nose	three	black	red	green	yellow	wolf
Irish	mí	nua	máthair	deirfiúr	oiche	srón	trí	dubh	dearg, rua	glas, uaine	buí	mac tíre, faolchú
Armenian	ամիս amis	նոր nor	մայր mayr	քույր k'owyr	գիշեր gišer	քիթ k'it	երեք erek'	սեւ sev	կարմիր karmir	կանաչ kanač	դեղին deġin	գայլ gayl

[edit] Geographic distribution

Albanian is spoken by nearly 8 million people^[1] mainly in Albania, Kosovo, Italy (Arbereshe), Republic of Macedonia, Montenegro, Greece (Arvanites or Arvanitians), Turkey, Bulgaria and Romania; and by immigrant communities in many countries such as Belgium, Egypt, Germany, Greece, Italy, Sweden, Turkey (Europe), Russia, Ukraine, the United Kingdom, Canada, the United States, and Australia.

[edit] Official status

Albanian in a revised form of the Tosk dialect is the official language of Albania and Kosovo; and is official in the municipalities where there are more than 22% ethnic Albanian inhabitants in the Republic of Macedonia. It is also an official language of Montenegro where it is spoken in the municipalities with ethnic Albanian populations.

[edit] Dialects

Albanian can be divided into three dialects: Gheg and Tosk with a transitional dialect zone between them.^[11]

The Shkumbin river is roughly the dividing line, with Gheg spoken north of the Shkumbin and Tosk south of it. The Gheg literary language has been documented since 1462. Until the Communists took power in Albania, the standard was based on Gheg. Although the literary versions of Tosk and Gheg are mutually intelligible, many of the regional dialects are not.

Gheg is divided into four sub-dialects: Northwest Gheg, Northeast Gheg, Central Gheg, and Southern Gheg. Northwest Gheg is spoken in all of Montenegro, Lezhë, Mirditë, Pukë and Shkodër. Northeast Gheg is spoken in all of Kosovo, Has, Kukës and Tropojë. Central Gheg is spoken in Debar, Gostivar, Krujë, Peshkopi, Mat, Struga, and Tetovo. Southern Gheg is spoken in Durrës, Elbasan, Kavajë, and Tirana.

The transitional dialects are spoken in Cërrik, Dumresë, Polisit, Lushnjë, Rajcë, Shpatit, Sulovë, and Vërçës. They have features of both Tosk and Gheg, including the rhotacism of Tosk and the nasal vowels of Gheg.

Tosk is divided into five sub-dialects: Northern Tosk, Labërisht, Çam, Arvanitika and Arbërisht. Northern Tosk is spoken in Berat, Fier, Gramsh, Kolonjë, Korçë, Ohrid, Pogradec, Prespa and northern Vlorë. Labërisht is spoken in southern Vlorë, Dukat, Tepelenë, Himarë, Mallakastër, Përmet, Delvinë, Gjirokastër and Sarandë. Çam is spoken in extreme southern Albania such as Xarrë and northern Greece. Arvanitika is spoken in north-western Greece by the Arvanites in Joanina, Paramithia, Filat, Margarit, Arta, Preveza, Kastoria, Florina, and Parga. Arbërisht is spoken by the Arbëreshë, descendants of 15th and 16th century immigrants in southeastern Italy, in small communities in the regions of Sicily, Calabria, Basilicata, Campania, Molise, Abruzzi, and Puglia. Tosk sub-dialects are spoken by most members of the large Albanian immigrant communities of Egypt, Turkey, and Ukraine.

Gheg and Tosk differ mainly by:

1. rhotacism - Gheg has n where Tosk has r
2. late Proto-Albanian ā + tautosyllabic nasal > Gheg low-central or low-back vowel; > Tosk mid-central, or low-front-to-central vowel
3. Proto-Albanian ō > uo > Gheg vo, Tosk va
4. infinitival use of verbal adjective preceded in Gheg by me and in Tosk by për të
5. difference in lexemes, noun plurals, suppletion of the aorist system of the verb

Subdialects may vary based on:

1. retention or loss of final schwa (-ë)
2. devoicing of final voiced segments
3. treatment of intervocalic and final nj
4. treatment of clusters of nasal + voiced stop
5. development of anaptyctic homorganic stops after nasals that follow a stressed vowel and precede unstressed -ël or -ër
6. treatment of vowel clusters ie, ye, and ua
7. treatment of stressed /e/ before a nasal

[edit] Notable phonological and lexicological differences between Tosk and Gheg

Standard form	Tosk form	Gheg form	Translation
Shqipëri	Shqipëri	Shqypni/ Shipni/ Shqipni	Albania
një	një	nji/njâ/njo	a/one
nëntë	nëntë/nëndë	nândë/nant/non	nine
është	është	âsht/osht/â	is
bëj	bëj	bâj/boj	do
emër	emër	êmën	name
pjekuri	pjekuri	pjekuni	maturity
gjendje	gjëndje	gjêndje	situation
zog	zok	zog	bird
mbret	mbret	mret	king
për të punuar	për të punuar	me punue/me punau	to work
rërë	rërë	rânë/zall	sand
qenë	qënë	kênë / kânë	been (part.)
dëllinjë	enjë	bërshê	juniper
baltë	baltë	bâltë / lloç	mud
cimbidh	mashë	danë	tongs
sy	sy/si	sy/sö	eye

( ˆ ) denotes nasal vowels, which are a common feature of Gheg.

[edit] Sounds

Standard Albanian has 7 vowels and 29 consonants. Gheg uses long and nasal vowels which are absent in Tosk. Another peculiarity is the mid-central vowel "ë" reduced at the end of the word. The stress is fixed mainly on the penultimate syllable.

[edit] Consonants

	Bilabial	Labio- dental	Dental	Alveolar	Post- alveolar	Palatal	Velar	Glottal
Nasal	m			n		ɲ
Plosive	p  b			t  d		c  ɟ	k  ɡ
Affricate				ts  dz	tʃ  dʒ
Fricative		f  v	θ  ð	s  z	ʃ  ʒ			h
Trill				r
Flap				ɾ
Approximant				l  ɫ		j

IPA	Description	Written as	Pronounced as in
p	Voiceless bilabial plosive	p	pen
b	Voiced bilabial plosive	b	bat
t	Voiceless alveolar plosive	t	tan
d	Voiced alveolar plosive	d	debt
c	Voiceless palatal plosive	q	similar to get you
ɟ	Voiced palatal plosive	gj	similar to told you
k	Voiceless velar plosive	k	car
g	Voiced velar plosive	g	go
ts	Voiceless alveolar affricate	c	hats
dz	Voiced alveolar affricate	x	goods
tʃ	Voiceless postalveolar affricate	ç	chin
dʒ	Voiced postalveolar affricate	xh	jet
θ	Voiceless dental fricative	th	thin
ð	Voiced dental fricative	dh	then
f	Voiceless labiodental fricative	f	far
v	Voiced labiodental fricative	v	van
s	Voiceless alveolar fricative	s	son
z	Voiced alveolar fricative	z	zip
ʃ	Voiceless postalveolar fricative	sh	show
ʒ	Voiced postalveolar fricative	zh	vision
h	Voiceless glottal fricative	h	hat
m	Bilabial nasal	m	man
n	Alveolar nasal	n	not
ɲ	Palatal nasal	nj	Spanish señor
j	Palatal approximant	j	yes
l	Alveolar lateral approximant	l	lean
ɫ	Velarized alveolar lateral approximant	ll	ball
r	Alveolar trill	rr	Spanish hierro
ɾ	Alveolar tap	r	Spanish aro

Notes:

• The palatal stops /c/ and /ɟ/ have no English equivalent, so the pronunciation guide is approximate. Palatal stops can be found in other languages, for example, in Hungarian (where these sounds are spelled ty and gy respectively).
• The palatal nasal /ɲ/ corresponds to the sound of the Spanish ñ or the French or Italian digraph gn (as in gnocchi). 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 contrast between flapped r and trilled rr is the same as in Spanish. English does not have either of the two sounds phonemically (but tt in butter is pronounced as a flap r in most American dialects).
• The letter ç can be spelt ch on American English keyboards, both due to its English sound. (Usually, however, it's spelled simply c or more rarely q, which may cause confusion ; however, meanings are usually understood).

[edit] Vowels

IPA	Description	Written as	Pronounced as in
i	Close front unrounded vowel	i	bead
ɛ	Open-mid front unrounded vowel	e	bed
a	Open front unrounded vowel	a	Spanish casa
ə	Schwa	ë	about
ɔ	Open-mid back rounded vowel	o	four
y	Close front rounded vowel	y	French tu, German über
u	Close back rounded vowel	u	boot

[edit] Grammar

Albanian nouns are inflected by gender (masculine, feminine and neuter) and number (singular and plural). There are 5 declensions with 6 cases (nominative, accusative, genitive, dative, ablative and vocative), although the vocative only occurs with a limited number of words. The cases apply to both definite and indefinite nouns and there are numerous cases of syncretism. The equivalent of a genitive is formed by using the prepositions i/e/të/së with the dative.

The following shows the declension of the masculine noun mal (mountain):

	Indefinite Singular	Indefinite Plural	Definite Singular	Definite Plural
Nominative	mal (mountain)	male (mountains)	mali (the mountain)	malet (the mountains)
Accusative	mal	male	malin	malet
Genitive	i/e/të/së mali	i/e/të/së maleve	i/e/të/së malit	i/e/të/së maleve
Dative	mali	maleve	malit	maleve
Ablative	mali	maleve/malesh	malit	maleve

The following table shows the declension of the feminine noun vajzë (girl)

	Indefinite Singular	Indefinite Plural	Definite Singular	Definite Plural
Nominative	vajzë (girl)	vajza (girls)	vajza (the girl)	vajzat (the girls)
Accusative	vajzë	vajza	vajzën	vajzat
Genitive	i/e/të/së vajze	i/e/të/së vajzave	i/e/të/së vajzës	i/e/të/së vajzave
Dative	vajze	vajzave	vajzës	vajzave
Ablative	vajze	vajzave/vajzash	vajzës	vajzave

The definite article is placed after the noun as in many other Balkan languages, for example Romanian and Bulgarian.

• 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, 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 -(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 verbal structure in place of the earlier synthetic system, inherited from Proto-Indo-European. Its complex system of moods (6 types) and tenses (3 simple and 5 complex constructions) is distinctive among Balkan languages. There are two general types of conjugation. In Albanian the constituent order is subject verb object and 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".

In imperative sentences, the particle mos is used :

• Mos harro "do not forget!".

However, with verbs in the non-active form (forma joveprore), the verb is often in sentence-initial position :

• Parashikohet një ndërprerje "An interruption is anticipated".

[edit] Vocabulary

[edit] Cognates with Illyrian

See Illyrian languages

• brisa, "husk of grapes"; cf. Alb bërsí "lees, dregs; mash" (< PA *brutiā)
• loúgeon, "pool"; cf. Alb lag "to wet, soak, bathe, wash" (< PA *lauga), lëgatë "pool" (< PA *leugatâ), lakshte "dew" (< PA *laugista)
• mandos, "small horse"; cf. Alb mëz, mâz "poney", Mess Iuppiter Menzana "supreme deity", Manduria "town in Apulia", Skt mandura "stable for horses", Thrac Mezenai "divine horseman".
• rhinos, "fog, mist"; cf. OAlb ren, mod. Alb re, rê "cloud" (< PA *rina)

[edit] Early Greek loans

Early Greek loandwords borrowed into Albanian were mainly commodity items and trade goods.

• bagëm "oil for anointment" < Gk báptisma "anointment"
• bletë "hive; bee" < Greco-Latin < Gk (Attic) mélitta "honey-bee" (vs. Gk (Ionic) mélissa)^[12].
• brukë "tamarisk" < Gk mourikē
• drapër "sickle" < Gk (NW) drápanon
• keq "bad, evil < Gk kakos
• kopsht "garden" < Gk (NW) kāpos
• kumbull "plum" < Gk kokkumēlon
• lakër "cabbage, green vegetables" < Gk lákhanon "green; vegetable"
• lëpjetë "orach, dock" < Gk lápathon
• lyej "to smear, oil" < *elaiwā < Gk elai(w)on "oil"
• mokër "millstone" < Gk (NW) mākhaná "device, instrument"
• ngjalë "eel" < Gk enchelys
• pjepër "melon" < Gk pépon "melon"
• presh "leek" < Gk práson
• shpellë "cave" < Gk spēlaion "cave"
• trumzë "thyme" < Gk thýmbra, thrýmbē
• udhë "road, way" < Gk odos

[edit] Gothic loans

Some were borrowed through Late Latin, while others came from the Ostrogothic expansion into parts of Praevalitana around Nakšić and the Gulf of Kotor in Montenegro.

• fat "groom, husband" < Goth brūþfaþs "bridegroom"^[13]
• gomar "donkey, ass" < *margë < Goth *marh "horse"
• petk "herder's coat; clothing" < Goth paida; cf. OHG pfeit, OE pād
• shkulkë "branch indicating a pasture is off limits" < Goth skulka "guardian"
• shkumë "foam" < Goth scūma
• tirq "trousers" < Late Latin tubrucus < Goth *þiobroc "knee-britches"; cf. OHG dioh-bruoh

The earliest accepted document in the Albanian language is from the 15th century AD. The earliest reference to a Lingua Albanesca is from a 1285 document of Ragusa. This is a time when Albanian Principalities start to be mentioned and expand inside and outside the Byzantine Empire. It is assumed that Greek and Balkan Latin (which was the ancestor of Romanian and other Balkan Romance languages), would exert a great influence on Albanian. Examples of words borrowed from Latin: qytet < civitas (city), qiell < caelum (sky), mik < amicus (friend).

After the Slavs arrived in the Balkans, another source of Albanian vocabulary were the Slavic languages, especially Bulgarian. The rise of the Ottoman Empire meant an influx of Turkish words; this also entailed the borrowing of Persian and Arabic words through Turkish. Surprisingly the Persian words seem to have been absorbed the most. Some loanwords from Modern Greek also exist especially in the south of Albania. A lot of the loaned words have been resubstituted from Albanian rooted words or modern Latinized (international) words.

[edit] Writing system

Full article: Albanian alphabet

Albanian has been written using many different alphabets since the 15th century. The earliest written Albanian records come from the Gheg area in makeshift spellings based on Italian or Greek and sometimes in Turko-Arabic characters. Originally, the Tosk dialect was written in the Greek alphabet and the Gheg dialect was written in the Latin alphabet. They have both also been written in the Ottoman Turkish version of the Arabic alphabet, the Cyrillic alphabet, and some local alphabets.

In 1908 an official, standardized Albanian spelling was developed, based on a Gheg dialect and using the Latin alphabet with the addition of the letters ë, ç, and nine digraphs. After World War II the official language changed in that it adopted the Tosk dialect as its model.

[edit] History

[edit] Linguistic affinities

The Albanian language is a distinct Indo-European language that does not belong to any other existing branch. Sharing lexical isoglosses with Greek, Balto-Slavic, and Germanic, the word stock of Albanian is quite distinct. Hastily tied to Germanic and Balto-Slavic by the merger of PIE *ǒ and *ǎ into *ǎ in a supposed "northern group",^[14] Albanian has proven to be distinct from the other two groups as this vowel shift is only part of a larger push chain that affected all long vowels.^[15] Albanian does share with Balto-Slavic two features: a lengthening of syllabic consonants before voiced obstruents and a distinct treatment of long syllables ending in a sonorant.^[16] Features of Albanian include the retention of the distinction between active and middle voice, present and aorist, three series of tectal consonants before front vowels (e.g., palatals, velars, and labio-velars), and initial PIE *h₄ as an h.^[17] However, the absorption of a large number of words from Latin, Greek, Turkish, and Slavic have resulted in Albanian being only a minor player in the reconstruction of Proto Indo-European vocabulary.^[18]

Other linguists link Albanian with Greek and Armenian in a southern group.^[8][9][10]

Albanian is considered to have its closest linguistic affinity to and to have evolved from an extinct Paleo-Balkan language, usually taken to be either Illyrian or Dacian. See also Thraco-Illyrian and Messapian language.

[edit] Historical presence and location

The origin of the ethnonym Albanian is of some dispute. It appears for the first time in the 2nd c. AD in Late Greek as Albanoí (later Byz Gk Arbanitai) and thereafter in similar forms, including obsolete Albanian arbër/arbën "Albanian"; however, these last two stem directly from Vulgar Latin *Albanus, most likely borrowed from Greek Albanoí; the adjective too, arbëresh/arbënesh, are derived from Latin albanensis. This same name appears in Slavic and was used to name the town of Labëri "Laberia", from South Slavic labanĭja, from earlier *olbanĭja.

While it is considered established that the Albanians originated in the Balkans, the exact location from which they spread out is hard to pinpoint. Despite varied claims, it seems that the Albanians came from slightly farther north (Kosovo) and inland (Northwest Skopje) than would suggest the present borders of Albania, with a homeland concentrated in the mountains. The purely linguistic reasons are listed below.

• First, Albanian has few early Greek borrowings, most of which are from the Northwest dialect, probably via the islands off the coast of Albania, e.g. WGk (Doric) mākhaná gave Alb mokër "mill" and WGk drápanon gave Alb drapër "sickle".
• Similarly, the Illyrian coast is not a likely source since Albanian has no inherited nautical or indigenous seafaring terminology, and has instead supplemented this absence with subsequent borrowing from Latin or Greek or recent metaphorical lexical creations.
• Third, toponyms along the coast, in contrast with native penultimate accent (ex: mbësë "niece" < PA nepō'tia), often show substratal antepenultimate accent (ex: Durrës < Dúrrhachium; Pojanë < Apóllonia), though there are some exceptions (Vlorë < Aulónā vs. Greek Aúlon).
• Also, some consider Albanian to be the source for a small number of grammatical and lexical similarities shared by otherwise dissimilar languages including Romanian, Bulgarian, Serbo-Croatian, and to some extent Greek. Based on their extent of grammaticalization, these include: the postposition of articles, the presence and grammatical use of schwa, object reduplication, admirative through verbal constructions, and the loss of infinitives.
• Finally, few if any Proto-Albanian place names exist in what was the former Roman province of Illyria.

Instead, given the overwhelming amount of shepherding and mountaineering vocabulary as well as the extensive influence of Latin, it is more likely the Albanians come from north of the Jireček Line, on the Latin-speaking side, perhaps in part from the late Roman province of Dardania from the western Balkans. However, archaeology has more convincingly pointed to the early Byzantine province of Praevitana (modern northern Albania) which shows an area where a primarily shepherding, transhumance population of Illyrians retained their culture. This area was based in the Mat district and the region of high mountains in Northern Albania, as well as in Dukagjin, Mirditë, and the mountains of Drin, from where the population would descend in the summer to the lowlands of western Albania, the Black Drin (Drin i zi) river valley, and into parts of Old Serbia. Indeed, the region's complete lack of Latin place names seems to imply little latinization of any kind and a more likely spot for the early medieval heart of Albanian territory, following the collapse of the Illyrian province.

[edit] Linguistic influences

The period during which Proto-Albanian and Latin interacted was protracted and drawn out over six centuries, 1st c. AD to 6th or 7th c. AD. This is born out into roughly three layers of borrowings, the largest number belonging to the second layer. The first, with the fewest borrowings, was a time of less important interaction. The final period, probably preceding the Slavic or Germanic invasions, also has a notably smaller amount of borrowings. Each layer is characterized by a different treatment of most vowels, the first layer having several that follow the evolution of Early Proto-Albanian into Albanian; later layers reflect vowel changes endemic to Late Latin and presumably Proto-Romance. Other formative changes include the syncretism of several noun case endings, especially in the plural, as well as a large scale palatalization.

A brief period followed, between 7th c. AD and 9th c. AD, that was marked by heavy borrowings from Southern Slavic, some of which predate the "o-a" shift common to the modern forms of this language group. Starting in the latter 9th c. AD, a period followed characterized by protracted contact with the Proto-Romanians, or Vlachs, though lexical borrowing seems to have been mostly one sided - from Albanian into Romanian. Such borrowing indicates that the Romanians 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 c. AD. Their movement is probably related to the expansion of the Bulgarian empire into Albania around that time. This fact places the Albanians at a rather early date in the western or central Balkans.

[edit] Historical considerations

Indeed, the center of the Albanians remained the river Mat, and in 1079 AD they are recorded in the territory between Ohrid and Thessalonika as well as in Epirus.

Furthermore, the major Tosk-Gheg dialect division is based on the course of the Shkumbin River, a seasonal stream that lay near the old Via Egnatia. Since rhotacism postdates the dialect division, it is reasonable that the major dialect division occurred after the Christianization of the Roman Empire (4th c. AD) and before the eclipse of the East-West land-based trade route by Venetian seapower (10th c. AD).

References to the existence of Albanian as a distinct language survive from the 1300s, but without recording any specific words. The oldest surviving documents written in Albanian are the "Formula e Pagëzimit" (Baptismal formula), "Un'te paghesont' pr'emenit t'Atit e t'Birit e t'Spirit 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 verses from that period.

The oldest known Albanian printed book, Meshari or missal, was written by Gjon Buzuku, a Roman Catholic cleric, in 1555. The first Albanian school is believed to have been opened by Franciscans in 1638 in Pdhanë. In 1635, Frang Bardhi wrote the first Latin-Albanian dictionary.

[edit] See also

• Albanian Wikipedia
• Arvanitika

[edit] References

[edit] Bibliography

• Encyclopædia Britannica, edition 15 (1985). Article: Albanian language
• Gjinari, Jordji. Dialektologjia shqiptare. Pristina: Universiteti, 1970.
• Huld, Martin E. Basic Albanian Etymologies. Columbus, OH: Slavica Publishers, 1984.
• Mallory, J.P. and D.Q. Adams, Encyclopedia of Indo-European Culture. London: Fitzroy Dearborn, 1997.
• Martin Camaj, Albanian Grammar, Otto Harrassowitz, Wiesbaden
• Orel, Vladimir. A Concise Historical Grammar of the Albanian Language: Reconstruction of Proto-Albanian. Leiden: Brill, 2000.
• Xhelal Ylli, Andrej N. Sobolev, Albanskii toskskii govor sela Leshnja. Muenchen: Biblion Verlag, 2002. ISBN 3-932331-29-X
• Xhelal Ylli, Andrej N. Sobolev, Albanskii gegskii govor sela Muhurr. Muenchen: Biblion Verlag, 2003. ISBN 3-932331-36-2

[edit] External links

• Learn Albanian
• Albanian Grammar
• Ethnologue report on Albanian
• Modern Greek and Albanian with Japanese translation
• The Albanian language - overview
• Thracian the Albanian language

Samples of various Albanian dialects:

• Scroll down for 3 different Albanian dialects: (Gheg) (Tosk) and (Arbëreshë)
• Albanian (Arvanitika)

Dictionaries:

• English - Albanian 1
• English - Albanian 3

Keyboard layouts:

• Prektora 1 ISO-8859-1 standardized layout for Windows XP (Albanian language)

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