British Travel Writers about the Albanians in Greece during the. First Half of the 19th Century

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22© LCPJ Publishing Volume 3/2, 2010

Hoxha, Shpresa 2010: British Travel Writers about the Albanians in Greece during theFirst Half of the 19th Century

Article 28 in LCPJ

British Travel Writers about the Albanians in Greece during the FirstHalf of the 19th Century

Abstract

The paper in question, based on the study of British travel writers, briey presentsimportant information relevant to history, topography, language, and above

all, customs and habits in a wide regional context of the Balkans. Those whogave their viewpoints for Epirus in general and for Pachalic of Janina (Ioánnina)in particular were British travelling writers, scientists, writers and diplomats inJanina and its suburbs, whereas the chief protagonist in those entirety of writingsand eective marginal notes was Ali Pasha (Vezir) of Tepeléni, the most powerfulpersonality of that time. Only through him the Albanian ethnicity became asource of inspiration of the historic and literary creativity for the Albanians inthe valuable works of E. Dodwell, the well known topographer and archeologist;Lord Byron, the English poet who dedicated his famous poem to Albanians “Child

Harold’s Pilgrimage”; William Martin Leake with his three works about Albaniaand Albanians: “Researches in Greece”, “Travels in the Morea” and Travelsin Northern Greece”; Smart Hughes, Henry Holland, etc., in the time whenAlbanians had already experienced their armation almost through Greece as itis known that Albania was recognized only in 1912 as an independent country onthe European political level.

Introduction

The number of the English travelling writers who have written passionatelyabout Albania and Albanians in the beginning of the XIX century is considerablefor that time. Their presence cannot be linked only to the rst years of the XIXcentury. On the contrary, their presence shows that such writers must havecome much earlier. I have in mind above all the travels of the monk SymeonSimeonis in the XIV century in Albania, then of the knight John of New Port in

the XV century, Fynes Morison in the XVI century, Doctor E. Brown during 1669and many others after them. The interest for Albania and Albanians continued



23 © LCPJ PublishingVolume 3/2, 2010


also in the next centuries by other following travelling writers, not just Britishbut others as well, like French, German etc.

Earlier British travel writers

Simeonis, in the autumn of 1322 went down to Durrës (Dyrrhachium), andafterwards summarized his impressions from this medieval city in the work titled:“The Itinerarum Symeonis Simeonis at Hygonis”, “Illuminatoris”, “Cantabrigiae”,1778, that was published four centuries and half afterwards. This book containsinteresting evidence about Albanians and Durrës in 1322. In this time, accordingto this traveler, this big city and important port was under the rule of Anzhuins,however, Durrës was the city with prevailing Albanian population where theAlbanian element was playing a great role in its economic, political and sociallife.

In 1596 the Scotsman Fynes Morrison stopped in Corfu. In his work with travelimpressions, he wrote also about “high mountains of Himara, resided byAlbanians”. For these Albanians, for Himariots, this traveler, emphasizing theirmain characteristic features, their warlike and freedom-loving invincible spirit,writes: “They aren’t subjugated neither to the Turks nor to the Venetians andto no one else”. These Albanians have two inseparable friends: rie and song.People “are dressed in white clothes, coarse and clean, and are never separatedfrom their extremely long ries holding it on their shoulders as if they don’t feelat all its weight”. Then he adds: “Their leader sings a harsh but pleasant melody,while the others accompany him in choir”. The Albanians’ love for songs has alsobeen witnessed by Brown in his work (Mema, 1988: 15, 16, 9).

British travel writers of the rst half of XIX century

In the context of this modest contribution I intend to focus on the segment

presentation of the Albanians’ history in Greece, more precisely on theimpressions of the English travel writers at the beginning of the XIX century.I think this presentation is of good interest with regard to Albanians’ historyframework in Greece, because it is described with vivid colors by the Englishtravel writers and dierent distinguished scholars.

The rst in the series of observers appears an English topographer andarchaeologist Edward Dodwell, whose opinions shed light on the history of thewide Epirus, as much as the history of the Greeks, and of the Albanians as well.“There is no doubt that the greatest scientic eciency and eectiveness about





the presence of Albanians in Greece in that time is related to the English coloneland great Balkanologist of that time William Martin Leake. That period of history, for Albanians and for the land of ancient Helada was portrayed throughAli Pasha of Tepeléni. Tracing that the popularity of the “Satrap” of the Pachalicof Janina (Ioánnina) had achieved a very high level proves the fact that he takes

a special place in the European literature of the XIX century, out of the framesof the Ottoman Empire. Ali Pasha became an inspiration source, in the works of Byron, Goethe, Victor Hugo, Alexander Dumas and Balzac. All of them considerhim as a valuable phenomenon in their creativity1.

Studying Leake, as a military and diplomatic gure, he certainly turns out tobe the most fruitful and informed British about the Albanians in the Pachalicof Ali Pasha of Tepeleni. It’s Him, who, naturally, having stayed longer than theothers in Albania and in the Northern Greece, gives complete information on theAlbanian history, language and ethnicity, in general. Finally, as travel writer, he isthe most comprehensive, fully encircling his observations in the courtyard of theJanina ruler and out of it. Many years later, after leaving this part of the BalkanPeninsula, in 1835 he published his work: “Travels in Northern Greece”[2]. On apreliminarily basis this isn’t all. Strong conclusions of his earlier researches didLeake put in his work: “Researches in Greece”[3].

In his observations, Leake doesn’t give exactly the composition of ethnicities

in the percentage of the Pachalic of Janina, considering that “Greek language isuseful for the entire population” (Leake, 1924: 20-21,136), while some sourcesconsider his Pachalic with approximately half a million residents, withoutincluding Moréa [5]. Nevertheless, he considers the Albanian population in hiscreative opus with special values.

Consequently, the central protagonists in his description of the history of thedescendants of the ancient Illyrians in Greece also came up the Suliots at theinsurmountable mountains of Suli, then the Çamis in Çamëria (Tzamuria) and the

Arvanits in Moréa. For these three parts of our ethnic tree at the beginning of the XIX century, Leake considered Albanians, as far as language, origin, customsand habits are concerned, as distinguishable from local Greeks. And certainlyLeake is one of act-writers among 50 diplomats, militaries, counts, aristocrats,recognizers and adventurers of several “faithless” Europeans, who described, invivid or false colors, Ali Pasha himself, as much as the language, habits, customsand the history of the Albanians in Greece. Anyhow, Leake is less subjective withhis contemporaries compared to F. Pouqville.

Perhaps one Englishman, among travel writers, after Leake that has spokenand written about the Albanians in Greece was and remained the English doctor





Henry Holland. In his work “Travel in the Ionian Islands, Albania, Thessaly,Macedonia, etc., during the years 1812 - 1813” Holland gives an enviable spacefor the presence of Albanians in and out of Pachalic of Janina. In Préveza, hemade a picturesque description of the Albanian and his clothes, whereas withvivid colors he described the life of Albanian speakers in Suli and Çamëria. It is

interesting to note that Holland understood a little dierently the geographicalmap of Albania. For him the boundary line of the former Arbëria should be setin the north of Janina, to leave Suli and Çamëria inside it and this boundary lineshould meet with Montenegro. Likewise, Holland made it clear that at leastsince the beginning of the XV century in Attica and Moréa, there were manyvillages, whose population was Albanian, distinguished from the Greeks in termsof language, customs and habits.

There’s no doubt that among the most informed travel writers and the mostabsorbed ones into the history of the Albanian presence in Greece is the Scottishscholar George Finlay. His presence at the beginning of the XIX century, hismovements from Athens to Mesalónghi made him a major gure of the periodbefore the Greek Revolution of 1821 and afterwards. In his study movements,although with philhellenic spirit and heart, he didn’t remain in debt to theprovocative eort of learning a lot from the history of Albanians in Greece.

According to the travel writer, “the Albanian-speaking population had in the

metropolis of Greece, in Athens, and in all its periphery, that is, in Attica, then inBeotia, in the island of Eubea in Salamina not so far from the port of Piraeus of today, even in Andros of Kilkades in Lala and Bardunia, as well as in Hydra andSpetzia, two large islands that Finlay considered Albanians as their owners”(Finlay, 1861: 28).

The English traveler wrote more or less in detail about the character of Albanians,separating them from the Greeks. So, for the people of Hydra he stated: “ThereAlbanian residents dier from Greeks because they love the truth and are honest

and through this feature they meet their duties in everyday life” (Spender, 1920:30). However, about democratic tendencies of that time, Finlay wrote the localadministration of the island Spetzia resided mainly by Albanians was the bestmodel of governance in Greece before the Greek Revolution of 1821.

According to him the Suliots were the branch of the Tzamis, among the threelargest tribal divisions of Toscs. The region where they were located wascharacterized by bare mountains, which were stretched in the length of the riverAheron. Finlay thought that the great power of the Suli was always backed up

with their military potential. “There was to be done dierently, because since1730 the number of Suliot families, which could be ready to get down to the area





of war weapons was approximately 100” (Finlay,1961: 40).

Regarding the social structure, Finlay thought that their community was sharedin seeds, whereas the superiors of each seed made alliance among them in orderto increase impact in the region around, but sometimes the same seeds produced

hostile conicts, not only among themselves but also in the neighborhood.Dealing with robbery, the intrigues of Russian agents were instigating the sultan;according to Finlay, Ali Pasha of Tepeleni was authorized to attack Suli in orderto stop robbery attacks in this part of the Ottoman Empire. Thus, in 1792 began along hostility, almost more than 20 years, resulting in an Albanian-Albanian war,which ceased only in the threshold of the Greek Revolution. According to thisBritish travelling writer, “Ali Pasha of Tepeleni won the war against the peopleof Suli in 1803 when the Metropolit of Arta, Ignacio himself, who was a friend of

the Pasha of Janina through an encyclical ordered the suspension of any kindof help with foodstu to Suljots” (Leake, 1814: 513). Since that time, accordingto Finlay “the only Albanian communities in the Pachalic of Janina, which carriedweapons, were those of rural mountains, among the insurmountable mountainsof Himara” (Finlay, 1861: 47) . In fact it was the social and political position of the Albanian Orthodox Christians of the Pachalic of Janina, when Ali Pasha of Tepeleni was declared as “fermanli” (a person authorized to give orders) bySultan Mehmet.

A special space was devoted by Finlay to the deeds of Ali Pasha of Tepeléni. Hewrote that Ali Pasha was a prominent thinker of the Greek Revolution, and thatwithout him the history of Epirus would be poor. So, as this English travellingwriter stated, it would also be poor the history of the other part of Greece,considering the Great Alexander Illyrian by mother, whereas Illyrian languageas a communication language with a part of his soldiers.

However, Finlay thought with full right that the history of the Greek Revolutionwould be treated very obscurely if not taken into consideration the importanceof the Albanian element in Greece, which was strengthened signicantly by thepresence of its strong military caste within the Ottoman Empire itself. In regardto this, the best example was the gure of Ali Pasha of Tepeléni himself and hisdeeds, Ali Pasha of Tepeléni got denitely the rule on the Pachalic of Janina in1878, Finlay already remained convincingly in the thought that the Albanianelement before the year 1821 was an ethnic potency without which it could alsobe built one part of the history of Greece.

He also speaks with admiration for the presence of Albanians in Attica, in Moréaand in the islands of Hydra and Speca. It is however extremely valuable an





impression of his trip to the Plaka district in the metropolis of Greece. In thisregard, in one case he wrote: “Having spent a ne day near the gate of the RomanEmperor, Adrianos, there opposite to Plaka district in Athens I came across somechildren who had made a rag ball and while playing football, they were talkingin Albanian.”

In the chain of British writers devoted to the Albanians’ true description, withoutdoubt, comes George G Byron, who is the most straightforward gure that inhis creativity speaks for Albanians in general, having always minded the gureof Ali Pasha of Tepeleni in Janina and to whom he devoted large space in thesecond song of the excusable Child Harold. While, J.C Hobhouse, who later tookthe title and the name of Lord Broughton and who had accompanied Lord Byronin Albania conrmed in his impressions: “I had never a map to confess clearly theline that divides the country; obviously the whole province by taking inside theAkarnania as well, can be rightly called Albania.”

However, in his impressions, he gives some negative estimation for the Albanianelement in the present administrative borders of Albania. According to him themedieval Arbri is a very conservative element, by identifying it with the obvioussuperiority of men over women, respectively her less human treatment in theembryo of the Arvanitas community. Hobhouse is probably very regular on thenotes about Albanians in general and for Arbri down Kalamasi in particular. He

wrote passionately for several regions of the Albanians in Greece, collecting arelatively rich lexical fund of their dialect, without hesitating to collect even richfolk songs from them.

Another English traveler draws attention for further information about theAlbanians in Greece. It was Th. S. Hughes, who in 1813 stepped on Janina of Ali Pasha of Tepeléni, while that year he visited Athens, its suburbs and manyvillages and cities resided by Albanians in Greece. However, the string of thispresentation of English travelling writers on the inhabited regions with Albanians

is preferably closed with a powerful testimony of D. Urquhart in his work “Spiritof the East” published in London in 1839, who while writing about the ethnicpotency of the Albanians in Greece, noted that: “If the Turks hadn’t come, thewhole Moréa and Greece would have become a property of Albanians because,until then, they here would have increased and signicantly strengthened”.But before coming to Préveza in Vonica of the Ionian Sea, the English writerwrote: “Before me I have the land of Pyrrhus, of Scéanderbeg and of Ali Pashaof Tepeléni.”




Conclusion

Based on the above information of the British travel writers of the early XIX

century, there is a wide range of opinions about the Albanian people and Albaniaof that period of time. They are presented even in the colours of their socio-economic circumstances in the Pashalik of Ali Pasha of Tepeleni, implying thatthe feudal class in the Southern Albania of the Pashalik of Ioannina was not just being constituted, but it was also being empowered considerably and itplayed an important part in political and economical courses of that territory.The descriptions are reliable sources of information and useful for the modernhistory, topography and culture. In this context, I think that those facts are seriousapproaches and real presentation of the Albanians’ autochthony beyond the

borders of current Albania, especially in the northern part of nowadays Greece.

Endnotes:

1 Naturally G. G. Byron guides in this course with his famous verses “Child

Harold’s Pilgrimage”. Ali Pasha comes out as a tragic gure in front of his daughterHaydee, the personication of the main character in the novel of Alexander

Dumas:”Count of Monte Cristo”. Also Victor Hygo in the introduction of his

poetry collections, among other things describes a part of Ali Pasha’s life, as a“Moslem Napoleon Bonaparte”. H. Spender, Byron and Greece, London 1920,

26, personifying Albanian Pasha as an important gure of Balkans history.

References:

Mema, Shpëtim, (1988).[1] Shqipëria dhe shqiptarët në veprat e udhëtarëve

anglezë të gjysmës së parë të shekullit XIX . Tiranë: Shtëpia botuese “8

Nëntori”.

Leake, W. Martin, (1835).[2] Travels in Northern Greece. London: J. Rodwell.

Leake, W. Martin, (1814).[3] Researches in Greece. London: John Booth.






Leake, W. Martin, (1824).[4] An Historical Outline of the Greek Revolution,

London: John Murray.

PRO,CO 136/425 (Public Record Oce, Correspondence).[5]

Finlay, George, (1861).[6] The History of Greek Revolution, London: Elibron

Classics.

[7] Spender, Harold, Byron and Greece, Folcroft Library Editions, London

1920.

The total number of words is 2897

© LCPJ Publishing 2010 by Shpresa Hoxha

Prof. Dr. Shpresa (Raça) Hoxha (born in Mitrovica in the Republic of Kosova

in 1953), graduated from the Faculty of Philology, Department of English

Language and Literature, University of Prishtina, in 1974. During 2005-2007she was the Vice-Dean of the Faculty of Economy in Prishtina. Actually she

teaches Business English at the Faculty of Economy and English for Specic

Purposes at the Faculty of Philology in Prishtina. Head of “Alb-Shkenca”

Institute in Prishtina. Author of the book “William Martin Leak’s Contribution

in the Field of Albanian Studies”/ “Kontributi i Uilljëm Martin Likut në Fushën

e Studimeve Albanologjike”, Prishtinë 2007. Author of about 40 (fourty)papers published at home and abroad.

Documents

British Travel Writers about the Albanians in Greece during the. First Half of the 19th Century