The Birmingham age-herald., 1913-03-16
THE STORY OF ALBANIA

From the London Morning Post
The Albanian question is of such
topical interest, and the history of
that country is so little known, that
1t seems desirable to put forward brief
ly the main vicisstudes of the Alban
ians before they, like the rest of the
Balkan peninsula, with some rare ex-
ceptions, succumbed to the Turkish
conquest. From this summary it will
be seen that this remarkable people
differs from the other Balkan popu-
lations in one important respect-that,
except at one two rare moments,
there has been nothing like an Alban-
ian principality.
For Albania, despite the boast of its
inhabitants that they are the Oldest
race in the Balkan peninsula, has
and the two former principalities which
form the modern Kingdom of Rou-
mania, had a separate existence as a
national state. Its rate has almost
invariably been to form a part of some
other empire, inside of which the vari-
Gus tribes were more or less a law
unto themselves. To the sway of the
Romans, who took Scutari in 16S b. c..
and carried off the 1llyrian Monarch
Gentius and his consort to adorn the
triumph of the victor, succeeded that
of the Byzantine empire. under which
Albania proper, or Praevalitana, formed
separate province from Old and
New" Ispirus--a point of topical as
we'll as historical interest old"
Epirus extended from the Gulf of Arta
far as the Cape (now' called Glossa
in Greek and 1inguetta in Italian),
which is. the last spur of the Acroce-
raunian mountains, While New Epirus
stretched from Cape Glossa as far north
as Durazzo. Indeed, the name of AL
banians does not occur in any au-
thor earlier than 1919. when the liter
airy Princess Anna Comnena, so familiar
to readers of Count Robert of Paris"
mentions them among the auxiliary
troops of the Byzantine governor of
Durazzo. Whenever the Byzantine en-
pire was weak other nations seized
portions of Albanian territory, thus,
the great Bulgarian, Car Samuel, was
for few years at the end of the
tenth century master of Durazzo, in
the middle age the most important
port on the eastern shores of the
Adriantic; thus, too, nearly a century
later, the Normans under Robert Guis-
card took, and temporarily held, that
port. This was one of the few occa-
sions on which our own countrymen
played a part in the history of Albania
for body of English was attached
to the service Of the Byzantine EN-
peror Alexius, and, in the phrase of
Gibbon, painted to regain in Epirus
the glory which they had lost in the
battle of Hastings" At that time so
strong were the now feeble fortlfica-
tions of,Durazzo, taat -four horsemen
could ride abreast on their summit :"
while one of the gates was surmounted
by bronze equestrian statue. BY the
middle of the eleventh century too,
Servian Kingdom had arisen. the capital
OF which was the now ruined city of
Doclea, near Podgoritza, while the
Westminster abbey of the dynasty was
the still partly existing church of SIS
Sergtus and Bacchus, on the river Bo-
Jana, about an hour and half below
Scutari, itself then a Servian possess
sion This kingdom, however, did not
endure, and Albania with Scutari once
more acknowledged Byzantine overload
ship
The rise OF powerful Bulgarian and
ServtFn states at the end of the twelfth
century, and the establishment of a
Latin empire at Constantinople, with
Frankish principaHties all over Greece.
completely revolutionized the map OF
the Balkan peninsula. But at that crisis
no Alabanian movement took place. the
Albanian national conscience was not
stirred. On the contrary, Durazzo be-
came part of the Greek principality,
or ''Desportat," of Epirus, the crea-
ton of the Angeli, from which it sub
sequently passed by marriage to Tthe
Ill fated Manfred, King of Sicily, whose
conqueror Charles of Anjou, claimed
and occupied it in 1872. Thenceforth
Durazzo, or Dratch. as the Serbs called
IT, was alternately Angevin and Ser
Wan for nearly a century. Meanwhile
the inland region was incorporated in
great part with the Servian kingdom,
and Stephen Urosh III. Milutin Tor "the
child of grace'D. who reigned from
1882 to 1921, added the style of King
of Albania" to his other titles. But
the Pope bade the Catholic Albanians
fight against this "schismatic," whose
territory included no less than six
Roman Catholic sees, among them An
tivari, Cattaro, and Scutari, all then
Servian cities. Scutari was one Of the
Servian nints, coins of which are still
extant, and the birthplace and resi-
dence, when he was the Servian heir
apparent, OF the subsequently famous
Emperor Stephen Dushan. But we are
told in 1892 by Friar Brochart, who
had travelled through the country ana
who, as Catholic had natural bias
for his co-religionists. that the n
bahfans had no love for their Servian
rulers. whom they regarded IS oppres-
sors, and against whom, he thought.
they would te ready to rise, If aided
fby foreign troops.
When the Servian empire fell 10
'pieces ON the premature death OF the
great Tsar Stephen Dushan In 15oo'
tho native Albanian chiefs began at