Talk:Arvanites/Archive 3

message: Based on the previous discussion, I've drafted the following to document what I think might become a consensus, with a few open questions at the end:
#The article should clearly reflect the self-identification of Arvanites as ethnically Greek.
##It should not label Arvanites as an "ethnic minority" or an "Albanian minority".
##It may describe other views, including that of some Albanians who regard Arvanites as ethnic Albanians, and it shouldn't label such a view as inherently wrong or bad-faithed (though in conflict with the group's self-identification).
##It should not take over the claim that Epirus Arvanites (as opposed to the southern ones) "are regarded" as nationally Albanians, because that claim is poorly sourced and we don't have evidence that it is shared by the group in question.
##It should generally refrain from making absolute statements about people's stances, hedging statements where appropriate ("most Arvanites" etc.)
#The article should clearly reflect the scholarly consensus that linguistic affiliation and ethnic affiliation are different things.
##It should reflect the scholarly consensus that Arvanitic is a "form of Albanian". The formulation may leave open whether that means: 
###"a separate Arvanitic language, side by side with Standard Albanian, within an "Albanian" language family",
###"a separate Arvanitic language, as an emergent Ausbausprache".
###"an Arvanitic dialect group within a single Albanian language".
##It should mention that many Arvanites object to seeing their language linked to Albanian, and it should mention that Arvanites do not regard Standard Albanian as their Dachsprache.
##In the absence of sources to the contrary, the article should mention the self-designation of Epirus Arvanites as "Shqip(-tarë)", but it should not be worded so as to imply the claim that this means national identification with Albania.
#The article should reflect the scholarly consensus about the historical/geographical origins of the Arvanites from territories of Epirus and modern Albania.
##In the absence of reliable sources to the contrary, the only serious theory we can report on is that the ancestors of the Arvanites came out of the same medieval population groups that are also the ancestors of modern Albanians.
##Other hypotheses (Non-Albanian Epirotic origins; separate Thraco-Illyrian origin; autochthonous "Pelasgian" southern Greek origin etc.) may be mentioned, but must be evaluated strictly in light of the Reliable Sources policy; if necessary treating them according to Wikipedia's policies on non-scientific fringe theories.
#The article should reflect the scholarly debate about the etymological origin of the name "Arvanites".
##It should mention that both name stems "Αρβα-(νίτης)" and "Αλβα-(νός)" have been attested since antiquity, and have been used more or less indistinguishably over a long time, with reflexes of "Αρβα-" also being used as an endonym of Albanians.
##In the absence of reliable sources to the contrary, the article should present as a strong majority position in international scholarship that both name forms are cognate.
##Other hypotheses, about "Arvan-" etymologies independent of "Alban-", can be mentioned as a serious minority position insofar as they have been proposed by prominent linguists (Babiniotis, apparently?)
#Not yet determined: Should the group be characterized as a "linguistic minority" in the first sentence? (If not, what else?)
#Not yet determined: Should the first sentence enumerate all the names (including "Shqip" and the Albanian names?) Alternative: Only use "Arvanites (Greek: Αρβανίτες)", and leave the discussion of all the different exonyms and endonyms to a separate paragraph.
#Not yet determined: Should further editing, based on these guidelines, proceed from Zogu's version (closer to the previous versions), or from Lukas' version (rewritten parts), or from Matia's preferred older version from December?
If we can agree on something along these lines, I suggest we archive this talk page, put a version of these guidelines (updated where necessary) in a prominent, permanent place on the new talk page as a document for later editors, and request unprotecting. We should also put a Template:Controversial sign up in the article to point to this discussion.
Lukas (T.|@) 10:20, 10 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Consensus draft? 

message: :Good job Lukas. We could use Template:ActiveDiscussion perhaps that'll save us from the reverts. I'm willing to work towards a better article, that will satisfy some of Zogu's concerns. talk to +MATIA 14:08, 10 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Okay, I'd now say we can safely request unprotecting, then as a first thing (for practical reasons) make it provisionally identical to Zogu's temporal page (which lacks most of the really contentious bits), and then gradually start working in whatever bits are needed from my draft and from the pre-edit-war version, or new material, in the light of the principles above. The remaining editorial issues can be worked out in the process, that's just a question of how to arrange stuff within the article structure. Lukas (T.|@) 14:35, 10 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: There are paragraphs missing from Zogu's version, and he haven't provided reasoning for that (as he didn't provide reasons for the revert-war he participated). I understand that these (long ago before edit war material) won't be cut. talk to +MATIA 14:42, 10 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: If they don't contain anything contrary to the consensus, of course not. If in doubt, I'd say it's sometimes safer to just write a paragraph from scratch than to cut-and-paste old material. Lukas (T.|@) 15:11, 10 February 2006 (UTC)

text: Thanks. In that case, let's wait for input before we ask for unprotection. Lukas (T.|@) 15:11, 10 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I hope so but I must also notice that most of the editors involved didn't participate in the conversation the days the article was protected. talk to +MATIA 15:22, 10 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Comments by MATIA 

message: I am skeptical of unprotection. Somehow I have feeling that revert war start again, when they start revert back to anti Albanian version. Much better agree on one version as soon as possible and then have page unprotected and use that version. Someone should make proposal version and we can amend that until is good. Matia has not yet makbe proposal. She criticice my proposal, but make none herself. Zogu 16:32, 10 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I encourage you to read again all my previous comments, if you believe this is needed, Zogu. talk to +MATIA 16:58, 10 February 2006 (UTC)

text: Try to understand that the current version, which contradicts the books I've mentioned in the article, cannot stay protected forever - the Arvanites are not an ethnic Albanian minority. If you are interested about Arvanites I 'd suggest Biris book for start. I will bring later quotes from books (unless someone else does this first) which show that the language doesn't make someone an Arvanitis - you may want to read what I've written in phara (this paragraph is summaries from Biris and Kollias). I'll also add (when I can) details about the demography from Moraitis, the position of the woman in an Arvanitic society etc. talk to +MATIA 17:14, 10 February 2006 (UTC)

text: Perhaps you should read again the above draft. Can you please tell me how have I written the article if not based on those books? Could you also tell me which books specialised on Arvanites have you read? talk to +MATIA 17:38, 10 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  input from Zogu 

message: Lukas, thank you for your synthesis.  I agree about "the scholarly consensus that linguistic affiliation and ethnic affiliation are different things" but I think you should add "political loyalty".  I believe part of the issue here is that Greece defines itself as a nation-state, fusing the question of ethnic identity with the question of political loyalty.  This is exacerbated by the confusion between the English word "ethnic" and the Greek word "εθνικό" (national).  Clearly, Arvanites who are loyal Greek citizens do not want to be viewed as members of a different "nation" in the political sense, and so the term "ethnic group" becomes unusable. --Macrakis 17:55, 10 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: No, the article will not be written solely based on sources written by Arvanites. It will give prominent and preferential treatment to self-identification of Arvanites, but it will be based also on international scholarly literature where that exists. - That said, I do share Macrakis' concerns that "people" is not a very good choice. Lukas (T.|@) 11:30, 11 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: P.S.: To make that more precise: I'm not sure whether Zogu meant "a people" or just "people" (given the fact his English isn't perfect). "A people" would be wrong, because it would imply separateness in ethnic terms. "People" is of course possible, but useless without some qualifying attribute. Lukas (T.|@) 14:43, 11 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  comments by Macrakis 

message: Well, as I know, Arvanites were always declared themselves as related to Albanians... Bomac 10:40, 11 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Bomac, that statement isn't helpful as long as you can't source it. Question is, as long as the reference situation is as it is, would you accept an article along the lines set out above? Lukas (T.|@) 11:30, 11 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: The question is why on earth did those people edit(war)ed that article without one reliable source. Neither these are a matter of compromise with these editors nor WP:NPOV and the rest WP principles. talk to +MATIA 12:34, 11 February 2006 (UTC)

text: The question is why you two guys keep bickering about past edits instead of discussing the facts. :-) - By the way, for some reason I always thought Matia was a "he". Care to enlighten us? Lukas (T.|@) 14:46, 11 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  input from Bomac 

message: Have we agreed on version yet? I think that my proposal should be used as it is the same as matias (unsourced) version except the unsourced infomation has been taken out and the agreed points above have been used. If matia waznts to propos more changes do it now, please so that we can fix it get the page unlocked and use that version. This is taking so long. Zogu 16:20, 11 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  unlocking? 

message: Just a note about the passage on the "Ancient Greek inscriptions": It's sourced, but it basically falls into the category of Pseudo-science (see point 3.2 above). I'm currently preparing a different article that's going to deal with just those inscriptions, from a different angle. This happens to be not just any odd inscription, which some other people say is Greek. At least one of them is an extremely famous one, being the earliest inscriptions in Greek! Saying that this is Arvanitic is a bit like saying that Beowulf is Chinese. You guys might just want to wait till that new artile, which will be at Dipylon inscription, is ready and then judge how to deal with it. If this stuff is to be included, it might go together with that further down that presents the various writers on Arvanitic and Kolias' claim about Pelasgic. Until we have decided, I vote for provisional exclusion. 
And besides, if you guys now start all over quibbling over details of wording, I'll take the matter in my own hands and write the whole article from scratch. Take that as a threat. :-)  (Seriously, sometimes that makes things easier.) Lukas (T.|@) 18:27, 11 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: P.S.: I've now created a temporary user page at User:LukasPietsch/Inscriptions with a comparison of the accepted Greek readings and the "Arvanitic" readings. That's of course "original research" and not meant to go into the article in this form, just to serve as an internal point of orientation for our discussion. I think it'll be absolutely safe if we treat this stuff as pseudo-science. Lukas (T.|@) 08:53, 13 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  "Ancient Greek inscriptions" 

message: Thanks for your proposals, Lukas. While they go a long way towards addressing the core issues, there are some important points that need to be clarified. No one is disputing the close genetic relationship between Arvanitic and Albanian, but defining Arvanitic as a "form of Albanian" is as problematic as defining Croatian as a "form of Serbian" or Urdu as a "form of Hindi". While they obviously descend from the same parent language, their speakers today identify with separate ethnonations. And, in the case of Arvanitic and Albanian, that parent language was not called Albanian, but rather Arvanitic, according to the contemporary Byzantine Greek sources. Thus, using your proposed wording would constitute an anachronism, as the Arvanites have always called their language Arvanitic, not Albanian. In fact, the wording should be reversed, as it is modern Albanian that is a form of mediaeval Arvanitic, and it is the Albanians who changed their name to Shqiptarët in modern times, in a process of nation-building of which the Arvanites were never a part.
That said, the question of the identity of the language was resolved by consensus months ago, with Arvanitic being clearly included in the family of languages for which modern linguists, in the interests of convenience perhaps, use the simple name Albanian - see Arvanitic language. I believe it unnecessary to disturb this delicate consensus in order to placate every disgruntled nationalist with a bone to pick.--Theathenae 15:20, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks for your comments. I can see your point. This still leaves us with the necessity of finding some formulation that we can use here as a quick characterization (and then point to the main article Arvanitic language. In the light of what you say, do you think the following would be okay: "...who speak Arvanitic, an Albanian language"? That would both imply some kind of separate-language status, express the relation to Albanian, and at the same time be compatible with the idea of treating "Albanian", in this instance, as a name for a language family, not the single language. Lukas (T.|@) 15:32, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Again, predicating it like that is problematic in my view, as Arvanites do not view their language as an "Albanian language", in the same way that Croats would reject calling Croatian a "Serbian language". Why not just use the formulation in Arvanitic language itself: "Arvanitic is on the branch of the Indo-European language family labelled Albanian by most linguists today, although Thraco-Illyrian was formerly the more common name."? Let's not forget that Albanian as the name of the language group only gained currency when the hypothesised link between Thracian and Illyrian was found to be rather weak, necessitating a name change.--Theathenae 15:39, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Problematic. First, it's simply too long for a first paragraph, which must be designed to give the clueless foreign reader a first rough orientation. Second, "Thraco-Illyrian was formerly the more common name" is, to the best of my knowledge, simply wrong (I'm not aware that that term was ever used, at least not internationally and during the last 100 years). Third, with all due respect, it's certainly a matter for Arvanites to decide what their ethnic identity is. But it's not up to them to decide what the classificatory status of their language is. That's up to the scholarly community of linguists. And, as I said above (point 2 above), there's a clear consensus about that in the literature. Lukas (T.|@) 15:55, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: With all due respect, what you are proposing would be equivalent to going through Wikipedia and inserting sentences like "Catalan is a form of Spanish" and "Dutch, a German (rather than Germanic) language".--Theathenae 16:12, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: With all due respect, the difference is that in the case of Dutch and Catalan, the separate-language status is beyond doubt, whereas with Arvanitic it is very weak, and for us to be even as much as implying separate-language status is really not much more than a bow to ethnic feelings, not a reflection of the scholarly literature. 16:56, 12 February 2006 (UTC)

text:  I am aware of no known link between Thracian and Illyrian. In biology, when there were some species of which there was little known, biologists used to put them all in the one genus, a "trash-can genus". The same situation was here: We have Illyrian, Thracian, Dacian, of which little was known, so some linguist had the idea to make a trash-can family, "Thraco-Illyrian", which from what we know now, it seems that it has as much sense as a Persian-English language family. bogdan 16:03, 12 February 2006 (UTC)

text: Sorry, I have to insist that the ethnic identification is a matter separate from the classificatory status of the language, which Theathenae was discussing. As for the ethnic identification, can I ask you to re-read point 1 in the outline above and state whether you think the US sources you quote contradict that? Lukas (T.|@) 16:02, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: They are not as separate as you think. If they were, we would not have a separate "Macedonian" language, and we'd still speak of Serbo-Croatian rather than Bosnian, Croatian, Serbian and even Montenegrin.--Theathenae 16:12, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: That doens't stop a Mexican Spanish, a Canadian French and an Australian English existing, so what's your point? --anon 16:18, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Form of Albanian? 

message: Folks, I hope you do realize that everything we've been quibbling about in the section above only refers to the first introductory sentences. Because that's really the only place where we're more or less forced to give a description/definition of what/who the Arvanites are in our own authorial voice. Everywhere further down, whatever views are expressed will be attributed to others. 
Therefore, for a change: Let's have a constructive competition for a good first sentence. I suggest we do a kind of brainstorming: Not discussing and criticizing, but just making proposals (for the moment). Here's mine:
*Arvanites ([...]) are a population group in Greece whose linguistic heritage is Arvanitic, an Albanian language. Lukas (T.|@) 17:06, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  First sentence? 

message: Shall we ask the article to be locked in the version that doesn't call them an ethnic Albanian minority? The discussions are very good and I would really love to see the light at the end of our tunnel, but... talk to +MATIA 17:40, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes, I'm sure, you are sure. And a few days after we have a consensus (unlock and correct the article) someone will come back and label them again as "ethnic Albanian minority". The same thing is happening since autumn... talk to +MATIA
What happend to WP:AGF? Let's find consinsus now, not worry about what might happen. Why you not like Arvanites/test, it seems fine to me. Zogu 18:01, 12 February 2006 (UTC)

text: Comment: It makes absolutely no sense to unprotect, revert, and reprotect, nor is this supported by the page protection policy. Also, such a course of action would be just an extension of the revert war which led to the most recent protection. The fastest and most productive way forward is for you all to reach a compromise. As I've said before, this should be easy, provided that you realize that Wikipedia's role is not to determine the Absolute Objective Truth, only to report, fairly, on the various views that have been put forward. --MarkSweep (call me collect) 19:58, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks Mark. Let's see it then as part of the discussions. talk to +MATIA 20:31, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Sure, it's fine as a straw poll. I just want to say that I think there's been some good progress. Once you have a workable version of the introduction that you all more or less agree on, please let me know. --MarkSweep (call me collect) 09:26, 13 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  about the lock 

message: I believe that the article should be reverted to one version back and remain locked till the discussions are finalised. Editors may sign below with agree, disagree and four ~. talk to +MATIA 18:09, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Comment: It makes absolutely no sense to unprotect, revert, and reprotect, nor is this supported by the page protection policy. Also, such a course of action would be just an extension of the revert war which led to the most recent protection. The fastest and most productive way forward is for you all to reach a compromise. As I've said before, this should be easy, provided that you realize that Wikipedia's role is not to determine the Absolute Objective Truth, only to report, fairly, on the various views that have been put forward. --MarkSweep (call me collect) 19:58, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks Mark. Let's see it then as part of the discussions. talk to +MATIA 20:31, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Sure, it's fine as a straw poll. I just want to say that I think there's been some good progress. Once you have a workable version of the introduction that you all more or less agree on, please let me know. --MarkSweep (call me collect) 09:26, 13 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  straw poll for provisional reverting and re-locking of the article 

message: Ok I think this is pretty close to Zogu's version. Few things should be worked out, and many more things will be included (as I've mentioned before), so that a clueless reader can learn who are those people. talk to +MATIA 11:20, 14 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Fringe theory??? I highly encourage you to compare Lukas changes and my additions here with your version. talk to +MATIA 11:57, 14 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Do you think it is an unrelated language?! talk to +MATIA 12:51, 14 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  part 2 

message: Since they don't call themselves "Arvanites" but "Shqiptar", then it means that they're not Arvanites but ethnic Albanians. Therefore they don't have any place in the article. Isn't that right? Miskin 11:42, 14 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Not necessarily, by any means. They could, for instance, be calling themselves "Shqiptar" in Arvanitic, but "Arvanites" in Greek. Or they could be calling themselves Albanians but still be subsumed under Arvanites by their Greek fellow countrymen. At the moment, we simply don't know. As I said, let's wait with this until we've got hold of the primary literature.
No, beacause the source which give that information say "the Arvanites of Epirus and Western Macedonia". I don't see why you obdject. I agree we not call them "ethnic Albanians" and say that they identify as Greeks today. We just add the information from the resource that the Arvanites in Epirus and western Macedonia call themselves Shqiptar and not Arberor. It is a regional variation there is no proof that there is any difference. Zogu 11:46, 14 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  part 3 

message: First of all a note to any Albanian editor: I respect your people and if my word is not enough, please see the following edits: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6,
7
(I took Scanderbeg as an example, because I think all of us like him).
I don't think that at http://www.answers.com/Arvanites there's something that offends Albanian people, and we'll see that the new version here become nice for everyone's taste.
I've re-read the current talk page and I've tried this, where I hope I've included everything that can be verifiable. I disagree (with myself) that we have the language first - unlike most other groups the language is not what makes an Arvanitis. They've chosen not to speak Arvanitic at all, in favour of the Greek language, and they still consider themselves Arvanites (read the part about phara - they feel Arvanitis "by birth").
But let's try something different. Let's take this and see if there are some minor changes that should be done. But instead of reverting it, let's talk about it here and leave (for now) the "proposal" as is. talk to +MATIA 15:15, 14 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Yep, my suggestion to start editing on the draft version seems not to have worked out too well, unfortunately. (T.|@)</sup></small> 16:08, 14 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  let's try this 

message: Having delved a bit more into the thorny "Epirote Albanophones" issue, I now propose the following passage for inclusion somewhere in the article. The study quoted, Botsi (2003), is a recent sociolinguistic dissertation on a village in Attica, written by a local (unfortunately in German). 
*Arvanites are distinguished in Greece from Cham Albanians (Greek: "Τσάμηδες"), another group of Albanophones in the northwest of Greece. Unlike the Christian Arvanites, the Chams were predominantly Muslims and identified nationally as Albanians. Most Muslim Chams were expelled from Greece shortly before the end of the Second World War, after violent clashes and atrocities commited during and after Axis occupation.
*There is some disagreement to what extent the term "Arvanites" legitimately also includes the small remaining Christian Albanophone population groups in Northwest Greece (Epirus). Unlike the southern Arvanites, these speakers are reported to use the name Shqiptarë both for themselves and for ethnic Albanians (Banfi 1996, Moraitis 2002). Botsi (2003: 21) reports that the term "Arvanites" in its narrow sense includes only the populations of the compact Arvanitic settlement areas in southern Greece, according to the self-identification of those groups. The Ethnologue () identifies the present-day Albanian/Arvanitic dialects of Northwestern Greece (in Epirus and Lechovo) with those of the Chams. They are therefore classified linguistically together with standard Tosk Albanian, as opposed to "Arvanitika Albanian proper" (i.e. southern Greek Arvanitic). Nevertheless it reports that the Epirus varieties are also often subsumed under "Arvanitika" in a wider sense in Greek. It puts their estimated number of its speakers at 10,000. On the other hand, Arvanitic proper () is said to include the outlying dialects spoken in Thrace. Other sources (GHM 1995) subsume the Epirote Albanophones under the term Arvanites, althogh they note the different linguistic self-designation.
Lukas
:However we treat this issue, it is unnecessary to include Shqiptár as a direct translation of Arvanite in the head of the article. It is not.--Theathenae 11:48, 15 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Yep, I think I'd agree to that now - if only for the sake of brevity and not confusing the reader at that point. Lukas (T.|@) 12:06, 15 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Right. Which only leaves the question of how to treat the language in the head. Do you stand by your "closely akin to Albanian" proposal? I have been workshopping ideas and think we could add a qualifier such as "modern Tosk Albanian" for clarity: while there is disagreement over whether we should directly say Arvanitic = Albanian, everyone agrees that Arvanitic as spoken today is distinct from modern Tosk as spoken in Albania (or even in Greece by recent Albanian immigrants).--Theathenae 12:15, 15 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: While I wouldn't actually agree with your last statement (it's distinct from Standard Tosk Albanian, not from all Tosk Albanian!), I guess  the formula should be okay. Or what about: "...Arvanitic, a group of dialects closely akin to Tosk Albanian" (sidestepping the "language" bit once again) Lukas (T.|@) 12:20, 15 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: No, it is actually distinct from all Tosk as spoken in Albania, mainly due to the Greek influence of the past centuries. Otherwise, recent Tosk immigrants (who are mostly unskilled and uneducated and wouldn't speak standard Albanian as a matter of course) would speak exactly the same language as the native Arvanites in Greece, which simply isn't true. In any case, your latest proposal could work. What does everyone else think?--Theathenae 12:26, 15 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I disagree with Theathenae until he cites a source. Why not "Arvanitic, a group of dialects of varying degrees of intelligibility with each other and Tosk Albanian". The problem, is that UNESCO indicates that Arvanitic is a Tosk dialect, whereas this (and Lukas') approach indictes that it is seperate altogether. Contridiction? --anon 12:32, 15 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: There are people, especially "anonymous" users, who will disagree with anything Theathenae says, even if he happens to be in agreement with an administrator who has gone out of his way to accommodate the Albanians. You just can't win.--Theathenae 12:37, 15 February 2006 (UTC)

text: Gosh, this is getting sophistic. Well, it's certainly "distinct from every single one of the non-standard and standard dialects of Tosk in Albania", but it's not "distinct from Tosk as a whole", because it is a part of that, at least that's what all the linguists say. - And by the way, if by "administrator" you mean me, I'm not, and I don't think I ever implied being one, did I? :-) Lukas (T.|@) 13:10, 15 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Με συγχωρείς. Λάθος.--Theathenae 13:17, 15 February 2006 (UTC)

text: Yer, thanks Rexhep.--Theathenae 12:42, 15 February 2006 (UTC)

text: If by "more elaborate ways" you mean the debate over "form of Albanian" in the first sentence: pure politics, I personally would otherwise go for your short version. If you mean the longish paragraphs about "Shqiptar/Arvanites" proposed for the body of the article: Reporting on actually diverging usages, which create a problem of definition that we cannot simply ignore. I think we all now agree that "Shqiptar" and "Arvanites" are sometimes used to refer to the same group of people. But is it the case that "Shqiptar" in a wider sense is alternatively used for what otherwise clearly falls under "Arvanites", or is it that "Arvanites" in a wider sense is sometimes used for what properly falls under "Shqiptar"? In the first case, it should go in the first paragraph, in the second not. Lukas (T.|@) 13:10, 15 February 2006 (UTC)

text: Could you formulate this as a properly sourced statement that can be integrated in the paragraph above? I think there's no way around this, there are different usages regarding the scope of the term Arvanite, and we have to present them all. That said, "The Arvanites of Epirus are the heart of Arvanites, all the groups of Arvanites origin from Epirus" is a non sequitur (which doesn't mean that both parts of the statement couldn't be true anyway). Lukas (T.|@) 14:58, 15 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Kollias was in the article (and is at the "proposal"). Let's forget for now the "heart of Arvanites". When I return, I'll add Moraitis statement along with Kollias. talk to +MATIA 15:02, 15 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Epirote "Arvanites"/"Chams" again 

message: Perhaps it's time to unprotect and then semiprotect this article and Arvanitic language. talk to +MATIA 14:07, 15 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Yeah, like REX, Zogu, etc.--Theathenae 14:23, 15 February 2006 (UTC)

text: Yes, I think it would be helpful if you had an account. What about: User:--anon? :-)  Lukas (T.|@) 15:00, 15 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  To anon and all 

message: Admin maru dubshinki has removed page protection, a bit surprising to me, as I think our discussion had not yet quite come to a conclusion and we didn't request it, did we? Anyway, in order to prevent a new revert war about those last bits we didn't yet resolve, I've made a rather bold move and replaced the whole article with a completely reworked one, which I had been preparing over the last few days. I had the intention of first making it the object of a straw poll or some other form of discussion, but after maru's move I felt it better to act more quickly.
My suggestion: If anybody finds this proposed version seriously objectionable and sees more conflict ahead over it, let us retract it for the moment, replace it provisionally with the version currently at Arvanites/test, and then agree on another short editing moratorium (or re-protection) until we sort the last issues out.
As for the bits we were discussing, in my version I've gone with Theathenae's and Matia's proposal not to have the Albanian/Arvanitic names in the first sentence, but I've returned to the formula "...a form of Albanian", which I think is simply the one that reflects the scholarly consensus. In general I've been careful to have lots of references, erring rather on the side of over-annotating perhaps. But I think this might be useful to prevent new edit warring.
Hope we can now quickly tweak this into a stable consensus version (and then go on to solve the issues on Arvanitic language.
Lukas (T.|@) 09:41, 18 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Page protection removed, new proposed version 

message: I've read over this article and mainly have on question: Do the Arvanites have any ethnic origin in Albania or ethnic ties to the Albanian people whatsoever ? It appears as though the only thing that distinguishes them from other ethnic Greeks is their language but I wish to have this clarified. Greek nationality/identity is obviously not necessarily the same as Greek ethnicity and this article confuses me as to if the Arvanites are ethnically Greek or not in relation to origins/ancestry or "race"/physical characteristics. If they are ethnically Greek in this sense, what basis is there for them to have any ties to Albanians other than language ? (which is not really a persistent defining factor in ones ethnicity). 69.157.121.76 01:37, 22 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Well, one problem with an answer here is that in Greek there is no conceptual distinction made between "national" and "ethnic". It's the same word for them. So you're going to have a hard time asking an Arvanite whether his "ethnic" identity is different from his "national" or his "lingustic" one. - That said, I think the article makes it pretty clear that the link is mainly on the level of descent from certain medieval population groups. In terms of "race"/physical characteristics there's been so much mixture, obviously, that the question becomes pretty mute. (Well, these guys today certainly don't look differently from their neighbours.) As for the rest, well, if you have the stomach, read the discussion pages, you are coming here right after a huge ideological POV dispute that has lasted more than half a year. So please be careful before you edit the article with anything involving "ethnic" or whatever. Lukas (T.|@) 09:15, 22 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I've read over some of the discussion and I see your point. The only other real question I have is on the number of Arvanites. 1.6 million seems like quite a bit to me and clearly that number must include Arvanites who are of predominantly or complete Greek origin. This would largely dispell or limit any supposed ties to Albanians other than speaking Arvanite language which doesnt necessarily denote any ethnic kinship. 69.157.121.76 17:47, 22 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I would question your implicit assumption that "origin" (i.e. genetic descent) would be the one factor that constitutes "real" ethnic kinship - I sense a biologistic/race-oriented approach to "ethnicity" here, which is quite unwarranted. As for the figures, it's rather the other way round: as far as I understand, the highest figures mentioned are those of how many people would be genetically descendants of originally Arvanitic local communities. But it's really not worth discussing further, in my opinion. Lukas (T.|@) 18:23, 22 February 2006 (UTC)

text: Unfortunately it still exist a large group of Greeks who strongly believe in the myth of Greek ethnic purity. Albanau 19:36, 22 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Well actually its been demonstrated both in population genetics and anthropology how Greeks have largely maintained much of their ethnic homogeneity since Ancient times . Origin does not mean merely genetics or racial/physical characteristics, but also anything else included with descent whether it be cultural, behavioural, or any other traits which are passed down from your ancestors. Although descent/kinship from common origins is the primary factor in ethnicity, I agree it is obviously not the only factor. The large number of Arvanites would imply to me that most would only have partial Albanian ancestry due to centuries of being absorbed into thelarger native Greek population. 69.157.121.76 22:49, 22 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Ethnic origins 

message: A series of trolling comments from  have been removed from here and moved to Talk:Arvanites/Arianitr. Lukas (T.|@) 08:50, 17 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Just left a comment there. What he claims about Kollias etc are 100% unverifiable. talk to +MATIA 11:30, 17 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks. It was you who actually has a copy of the Kollias book, right? Lukas (T.|@) 12:18, 17 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Trolling comments removed

message: The current addition "a language generally regarded as a form of Albanian by linguists and as a separate language by speakers" is imprecise and unsourced and cannot remain like this. It is again presenting "a language" as a fact (which was heavily disputed). Also, we currently have no quotable, verifiable statements from anybody that Arvanitic is not a form of Albanian. Even if we have reasons to believe that part of the population share some kind of view like that, we don't really know what those views are exactly: We don't know what these people believe, why they believe it, what their arguments are, how many of them believe it, what they know about Arvanitic, what they know about Albanian, what they believe the relation between the two to be. For all we know, they might silently acknowledge that Arvanitic is a form of Albanian but nevertheless prefer not to hear the name used for it. They might not have any opinion about the matter at all but simply prefer not to be reminded of it. They might believe that Arvanitic is separate but that it nevertheless isn't a "language" but "only a dialect", without being a dialect of anything. (Such views, though hopelessly incoherent, are well attested in Greek society – in fact, people have been convicted to prison sentences in Greece for saying that Arvanitic, Vlach etc. are "languages"! ). This alleged opinion of the speakers is not a quotable, verifiable POV that we can represent along with others, but just an hypothetical agglomeration of vague anonymous prejudice and resentment. The only thing we can currently say with some confidence is that there are people in Greece who do not like to hear the name "Albanian" used for Arvanitic. That's what the Helsinki report and several other sources confirm, but it's simply not the same thing as "regarding it as a separate language". It makes no sense to treat it as if it was a verifiable judgment about the classificatory status of Arvanitic vis-a-vis Albanian, to be given equal weight with the linguistic descriptions.
I invite re-formulations to address this, but if nothing is forthcoming I'll revert to the previous version. Lukas (T.|@) 06:45, 28 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  "A form of Albanian", again 

message: Just some comments on the recent changes proposed by Miskin:
*"... are a linguistic minority" (introduction): No problem with me. In fact, that had been my own proposal at some time. Avoiding it had been a concession to the Greek/Arvanitic side, because some people in Greece are allergic against the very use of the term minority, even if so qualified.
*Disclaimer about the ancient-inscriptions claim: as Macrakis said, the old wording was chosen specifically to indicate that these hypotheses are so fringy that people have not even bothered to disprove them. I'd suggest we can either leave these claims out completely, or include them but with a rather strong disclaimer, like the one we had. Experience with earlier discussions here suggests it may be better to discuss the issue, because it's attractive to some and its bogusness is not immediately obvious to the layperson. That was the motivation behind relegating it into a footnote. I'd also like to re-introduce the link to the established Greek readings.
*"predominant linguistic minority element": Actually, if I remember correctly what the sources said, they were in fact local majorities in several regions, including Attica.
*"Descend from Albanian-speaking settlers": Again, no problem with me; the rather convoluted formulation was a concession to Theathenae, who doubted that these groups could legitimately be called even Albanian-speaking.
*A single Albanian author: Botsi is Greek/Arvanite, not Albanian, and the passage quoted is a state-of-the-art report quoting multiple other authors.
Lukas (T.|@) 15:00, 30 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Comments on Miskin's changes 

message: Just for a clarification: I very much agree we should consult the Trudgill (2000) study that Miskin referenced. Have you got access to the original, Miskin, or are you quoting it from somewhere else? It's probably more relevant than the 2004 study, as it deals specifically with Greece while the other one mentions the Greek situation only in passing. I only urge to be careful with quoting things out of context, because I know that the theoretical framework used by that author about what it means for something to be a "separate language" is not a straightforward yes-or-no one. I just ordered the book from our library, I'll have it early next week. Same for the Dorian book mentioned by Matia. In fact, if the Trudgill study indeed contains stronger argumentation for a separate-language status than we have seen so far in his other stuff, I'll be happy to modify the text accordingly; personally, I'd accept Trudgill's judgment as a final word of arbitration any time. But see my note above about my reservation that we shouldn't be contrasting (a) "a form of Albanian" and (b) "a separate language" as two mutually exclusive contradictory analyses; in fact, Trudgill's version of (b), if he asserts it, is probably one that is perfectly compatible with (a). 
As for the Macedonian analogy: Macedonian may have little abstand status vis-a-vis Bulgarian but it clearly has ausbau status, and is therefore almost unanimously accepted as a separate language in the recent literature. Arvanitic, for all I've seen, is not usually described as having either the abstand or the ausbau type of separateness from Albanian. It has abstand from Greek, of course, and that may very well be what Trudgill is referring to in the passage quoted by Miskin. Lukas (T.|@) 09:32, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: So the "problem" (ausbau, abstand etc) is that the Arvanites instead of doing what (standardisation) RoM did in the 1940s and Albania in 1910s, choose to speak Greek instead of Arvanitika? talk to +MATIA 10:02, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Roughly, yes. If Arvanites decided today that they are going to print newspapers and create radio programs in Arvanitic, and provide language classes for their non-Arvanite fellow citizens, and if they created a standardized "Common Arvanitic" for that purpose and used their own orthography for it, many linguists would treat that as a strong indicator for a separate "Arvanitic language". I'm not sure if the degree of abstand is comparable in both cases. As we said earlier, the differences between the Arvanitic dialects and the closest Tosk dialects seems to be smaller than the differences within Albanian, between Tosk and Gheg. It may well be also smaller than that between Macedonian and Bulgarian (which, as far as I know, involves some fairly prominent grammatical features.) Lukas (T.|@) 10:51, 31 March 2006 (UTC)

text: You quote "from memory", but first try to pass it off as a literal quote?? And you have the nerve of accusing other people of "lying" about quotes??? - Well anyway, compare it with the authentic Trudgill quote I gave you. As for Macedonian, of course it is mentioned: Macedonian language#Different political views on the language. And the linguistic difference with the Arvanites is not "only" that the latter are not a separate nation; the factual difference lies in what they have been doing with their language. It's not a matter of denying Arvanites their "cultural freedom"; it's a matter of stating the facts. By the way, it's you who keep mixing up ethnicity and language again. I'm the last person to deny that Arvanites should be described as Greeks, in accordance with their self-identification; but that does not mean we shouldn't describe their language as what it is, a form of Albanian. Arvanites can "deny such an ethnic heritage" all they want; as I said earlier, it's up to them to decide what they are, but it's not up to them to decide what their language is. Lukas (T.|@) 12:06, 31 March 2006 (UTC)

text: Yep, that article is actually not very well written. If I find the time I'll try and make it more accessible some day. It should become obligatory reading for anybody discussing languages-and-nations issues on Wikipedia. By the way, it's not "Chinese" either, it's clearly "Czech villages" ("Böhmische Dörfer").  :-) Lukas (T.|@) 12:19, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Glad you agree that "People should be free to identify themselves with any ethnic group they want".  But "as long as they don't offend others" is problematic. If Greek nationalists are offended by the presence of Arvanites or Roma or Vlachs or fill in unmentionables here, then somehow there is a veto? --Macrakis 16:50, 31 March 2006 (UTC)

text: Your memory must be failing you. We had two self-identifying Arvanites here, and they fought over the article for half a year. As for the rest, what parts of the sentence "it's up to them to decide what they are, but it's not up to them to decide what their language is" do you not understand? Lukas (T.|@) 12:56, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: No, they are an ethnic Breton minority of France, related to the Ancient Britons (usually called Brythons) of the island of Great Britain, not the Modern Britons.  Funny, eh, the messy relationships between modern countries, ancient languages, modern languages, modern regions, ancient regions, etc.  Do you think this might happen in other parts of the world? --Macrakis 16:50, 31 March 2006 (UTC)

text: Arvanites exist as descendants of people from an Arvanitochori, like Cretans descend from Crete, Pontioi from Pontos etc. Yet, the categorisation Ethnic Groups in Greece is... unstable. talk to +MATIA 13:09, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Arvanitic was apparently alive and kicking when Botsi looked into it in her own village less than five years ago. Lukas (T.|@) 13:12, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes, wow, it was the official language of an entire community of 10 whole people. Miskin 13:31, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: You didn't even try to read any of it, did you? - Lukas (T.|@) 16:20, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I would but it's in German :( talk to +MATIA 16:34, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Clarification: sources 

message: :Peter Trudgill, International Journal of Applied Linguistics 11:1:114 (2001), review of: Lukas D. Tsitsipis, A Linguistic Anthropology of Praxis and Language Shift: Arvanitika (Albanian) and Greek in Contact (ISBN 019823716).
(Obviously it would not be appropriate to quote such a long extract in the main article, but I am quoting it at length and verbatim here for full clarity.)
Opening paragraph:
:It is not widely known that very many areas of the Attica, Biotia and the Peloponnese regions of modern Greece are, or were until very recently, Albanian-speaking rather than Greek-speaking.  Indeed, many suburbs of Athens itself are or have been inhabited as much by Albanian as by Greek speakers.  These Albanians are not recent arrivals but have been in Greece since mediaeval times. The exact number of Albanian speakers in these areas of Greece is not known with any degree of certainty, but they certainly number tens of thousands.  Almost all Albanian speakers there are now bilingual in Albanian and Greek, and language shift and language death are taking place rather rapidly, with younger people becoming more and more monolingual in Greek.  Interestingly, the normal practice in Greece -- and a practice which is shared even by the Albanian speakers themselves -- is to refer to the language as Arvanítika and to the people as Arvanites /arvanítes/.  The implication of this is, of course, that while the language may be related to Albanian, it is not actually Albanian as such.  It is not Greek, that is, but 'a language of Greece' as opposed to Albania.
In the remainder of the article, he refers to the language as Arvanitika.
I trust this is useful.  --Macrakis 21:37, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: What Trudgill said in 2001

message: Hi again, as promised, I got the two studies we talked about the other day. The Trudgill (2000) article in the Barbour/Carmichael volume contains little news about the Arvanites. The relevant paragraph about the linguistic classification is almost verbatim identical to that in the 2004 article. It's quite clear: Trudgill works on the basis of the abstand/ausbau model; he explicitly asserts dialect-of-Albanian status on grounds of lack of abstand (he actually even calls Arvanites themselves Albanians), and he mentions the naming practice as "implying" perceived separate-language status but not factually constituting it. As for the estimated numbers, Miskin was right in saying that it only contains the 30,000 figure for Attica/Boeotia, as a lower bound; nothing is said about an upper bound - which might still be the 140,000 figure quoted elsewhere. The treatment of the Arvanites is actually not very detailed; however, the article also contains interesting stuff about the other groups (Slavs, Vlachs, Turks, Pomaks etc.) Much of which our Greek friends won't like. In all, the tone of the article is highly critical of Greek stances towards linguistic diversity, sometimes acerbic.
The Dorian (1989) collection mentioned by Matia contains another article by Tsitsipis. It has some data on the relative degrees of fluency across generations in different locations, the situational use of Arvanitic, and linguistic effects of attrition. Nothing of immediate urgency for our discussion here. Only as an aside, Tsitsipis also leaves no doubt that he regards Arvanitic as "a local variety of Albanian".
On Wednesday, I plan to get hold of the original Trudgill/Tzaveras article from 1977, and to another Tsitsipis one from 1982, reported to contain a survey about "folklinguistic ideology through which Arvanítika people reveal their linguistic attitudes" - that might be interesting to assess Theathenae's claim that Arvanites typically insist on seeing Arvanitic as a "separate language" (a claim about which I have some doubts).
Lukas (T.|@) 19:22, 3 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: The point is that Arvanites call it "Αρβανίτικη γλώσσα" or "Αρβανίτικα" not "Αλβανική διάλεκτος". talk to +MATIA 06:37, 4 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Sure, nobody doubts that. But a name is not the same thing as a classificatory description. Using the one doesn't entail having a reasoned opinion against the correctness of the other. Lukas (T.|@) 07:17, 4 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Trudgill and Tsitsipis sources again 

message: The users of the English version of Wikipedia who are pro-Greek, refuses to acknowledge the fundamental facts about the Arvanitis people and the Arvanitic language. They state that the Arvanitis people is an autonomous people and the Arvanitic language an autonomous language, and are incapable of backing up their claims.
The two fundamental facts about the Arvanitis people and the Arvanitic language.
1) Arvanites are the decendants of immigrants of Albanian ancestry.
2) Arvanitic language is an old form of southern Albanian dialect Tosk, influenced by Turkish- and Greek language.
--Albanau 14:38, 5 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Sure. (1) is clearly represented in the article, and was recently made even clearer by no other than Miskin. Do you see a problem with how it's currently treated? - About (2), as you've certainly seen, I quite agree (although I'm not sure about the preciseness of describing it as "old", and about why Turkish should have had a stronger effect on it than on mainstream Albanian). More later, I've now got those two remaining articles we were talking about. Lukas (T.|@) 14:55, 5 April 2006 (UTC)

text: Before this goes back to personal accusations (the above could actually be seen as a "personal attack"), I'd very much recommend we concentrate on the text on the article and not on individual editors' motivations in contributing here. That said, Albanians have every right in the world to take an interest in Arvanites; they even have the right to take national pride in their existence, and to want to see them as representing part of a formerly larger share of Albanians in Balkan population and history. And Albanian wikipedians certainly have every right in the world to participate in the editing of this article, so please don't try to bite them away. Lukas (T.|@) 15:42, 5 April 2006 (UTC)

text: Hm, because he was a Christian and the others were Muslims, perhaps? Lukas (T.|@) 11:15, 6 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Or maybe because he was Arvanitis (aka Greek) and not an Albanian. Spyridon Trikoupis (and other historians of the Greek Revolution) describe that the Suliots couldn't believe the warning by other Greeks that their "fellow" Muslim Albanians would betray their alliance against the Turks. talk to +MATIA 12:44, 6 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  the people and the language 

message: I have already brought this issue up on an earlier occasion, (Talk:Arvanites/Archive 1: dated "02:03, 12 Dec 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I have little intention to get involved in this part of the debate, but as the Arvanitic background of some of these personalities seems not to be immediately plausible to other Greeks these days, it would maybe be good if we could document the sources. Sounds like a lot of work to ask you to do, but since you said you actually did the research already, did you save the titles somewhere and could you add them? (Maybe as hidden comments, Miskin-style, so as not to overload the footnotes section even further.) Otherwise, I see these kinds of objections returning again and again in the future. Lukas (T.|@) 13:00, 6 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks for pointing it out, I'll might do so in the future. talk to +MATIA 18:18, 8 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Famous Arvanites Are NOT All Arvanites? 

message: I know, I know. What I did will definitely lead to revert wars on this so-called "sensitive" topic. However, the historical section on the article only takes into account modern historians and the perceptions mainstream historians have pertaining to the Arvanites.  Granted, their input is important and valuable. Yet, to completely ignore medieval accounts whereby the authors were much closer to the events and peoples they encountered would not necessarily be a good thing. Moreover, though Attaliates and Komnena's accounts may be understood in different ways, Mazaris' account is specifically oriented on the populations existent in the Peloponnese during the 15th century.
Of course, if you disagree and the "neutrality" of the article is jeopardized (so that there will be no more edit wars), then go ahead and delete it. Yet, to only focus on modern accounts of the Arvanites is kind of narrow-minded if you think about it. Anyway, Wikipedia never had an article on Maximus Mazaris and maybe his account may shed light on the truth pertaining to the ethnic origins of the Arvanites. Over and out. - Deucalionite 4/6/06 12:00 P.M. EST
:Personally, I have no problem here, but we might get a problem with WP:NOR: "indicate a pattern" is not just reporting a fact from those sources, but advancing an interpretation of them. That should be attributed, especially since (AFAIR) there are authors who explicitly interpret these sources as not indicating such a distinction. What exactly does Mazaris say? As for Comnena and Attaliates, the only thing I've seen so far is that they sometimes use the one term ("Albanoi") and sometimes the other ("Arbanitai"), both for people from very much the same region (Dyrrachion), so that modern observers have typically concluded they meant the same. The one Fourikis study deals with the issue, has anybody access to it? Lukas (T.|@) 16:17, 6 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: For anybody interested, these are the passages by Attaliates; as for Comnena's Alexiad, here's the full translation.--Aldux 16:44, 6 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks. I'll check which of the two terms Attaleiates is actually using in each of the instances where it's translated as "Albanians" on that webpage. We should also check the following: E. L. Vranousis (1970): "Οι όροι 'Αλβανοί' και 'Αρβανίται' και η πρώτη μνεία του ομωνύμου λαού εις τας πηγάς του ΙΑ' αιώνος." ["The terms 'Albanoi' and 'Arbanitai' and the earliest references to the people of that name in the sources of the 11th century"]. Σuμμεικτα 2: 207-254. Wow, seems they even have it in our library! :-) Lukas (T.|@) 08:54, 7 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Okay, I checked Attaleiates. The two first instances, dealing with uprisings based in Italy, have "Albanoi" in the original. Ioannis Polemis, byzantinologist and translator/editor of the Modern Greek edition of Attaleiates, argues that this term wasn't actually referring to Albanians but to Normans or some other groups, but he notes that this is not necessarily consensus. Probably he's basing that judgment on the Vranousis study above, which we should definitely check. The third reference, dealing with soldiers recruited in the Durres/Dyrrachion area (i.e. in present-day Albania), has "Arbanitai". Thus, it would seem that Deucalionite is right in one sense: at the very beginning, the two terms may have had different meanings. However, that distinction may not correspond to the modern distinction between Arvanites and Albanians; rather, Arvanites referred to Albanians in general, and Albanians to something entirely unrelated. Lukas (T.|@) 09:16, 7 April 2006 (UTC)

text: Checked Anna Comnena too. She has several references to a town or region called Arbanon or Arbana, in present-day Albania, and one reference to "Arbanitai", which is glossed as "Albanians" or "Arbanites" in modern translations, and explained as being connected to that place. This would fit in with my guess above. Lukas (T.|@) 09:42, 7 April 2006 (UTC)

text: Checked Mazaris and Vranousi. Mazaris was a blank, he doesn't seem to be saying what Deucalionite thought (see User talk:Deucalionite and Mazaris for details). Vranousi develops the hypothesis I mentioned above: "Albanians" was originally a term used in Latin/Italian to refer to "foreigners" in general; only "Arbanitai" was the early genuine name of Albanians; and the two terms were later conflated in hypercorrect classicizing Greek, basically because "λβ" sounded like a posh replacement for "ρβ". Lukas (T.|@) 21:01, 11 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Small Paragraph

message: Is the history of Arvanites, both in medieval times (for example Bouas) and in 1821. talk to +MATIA 18:19, 8 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Yep, might be interesting. On the page Deucalionite created the other day, Bartolomeo Minio, there's a link to a dissertation about 15th century Venetian rule and local politics on the Peloponese. I think I've seen the same source mentioned here somewhere (wasn't it by you?) - anyway, it seems to include an account of some Arvanitic insurgencies and similar stuff. - I was also going to ask you to clarify some things on the basis of Biris and Kollias about the supposed medieval identity of the Arvanites and/or the "Pelasgian" origins - you once indicated the summary I had made of some of these hypotheses was inexact. I haven't myself had access to them, so I'd be grateful if somebody could give a corrected summary of what exactly these guys claim. Lukas (T.|@) 18:30, 8 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  what we haven't written yet 

message: I noticed that Theodoros Pangalos (senior) is mentioned twice: both in PMs and Presidents of Greece. In fact, he was neither PM nor President (well, maybe only if we accept the titles he claimed-two self-claimed titles in about the same chronological period). He was a dictator, who later run as a politician. Shouldn't he be in another list? or maybe (cause i am not sure if i am right if we should considered his titles false) it should be better to list him only in Presidents, since this is the highest. for example, in the list of Germans we wouldn't list Gerhard Schröder as both Chancellor and member of the German Bundestag... --Hectorian 20:50, 8 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Pangalos 

message: Nuk duhet me harru që gjuha shqipe është shkrua në tri alfabete gjatë një kohe të shkurtë deri sa kanë vendosur për alfabetin romak. Njerzit mund të thonë se Arvanishtja është gjuhë po ajo nuk është gjuhë dhe nuk është dialekt sa është e folmja vlornjake apo korçare. Problemi është që pas marrveshjes për shkrimin latin në disa pjesë të Epirit gjuha shqipe edhe më tutje është shkruar me shkrimin e vjetë (grekëve të vjetër). Asnjani nuk mund të bëjë kompromis për këtë e vetmja është që në këto troje Kisha Orthodokse edhe më tej ka përdoru shkrimin e vjeter këtë e kanë bërë edhe institucionet fetare me ndikim të fesë islame (shkrimin arab), mirpo ato nuk kanë pasur ndonjë ndikim të madhë. --Hipi Zhdripi 19:22, 21 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Uhmmm, could someone please translate this for the rest of us please? :-) Lukas (T.|@) 19:55, 21 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Po kjo është gjuhë shqipe