AHC: Earlier Albanian state (Middle Ages)

The challenge is to have Albanians create their own state sooner than IOTL(late 12th century), potentially even during the 9th to 10th centuries. How would one go about it and where would this state be located geographically? In other words where were Albanians present during this period?
 
The main obstacle there would be the relative obscurity of Albanian before the XIIth : it's more or less assumed population in Epirus really became labelled as Albanian only when some migrations and political takeover from highlander groups came over to repopulate various southern Balkanic regions (hich doesn't mean population in Epirus didn't partially spoke a form of Albanian, of course, but probably didn't indentified as such).
The core of Arberon, but culturally and lingustically, seems to have been roughly centered in dinaric Alps between Shkumbi and Mati basin in the south, maybe up to Morava valley in the East. Meaning that an earlier Arberion (in say, the Xth century) would probably have been undiscernable from sklavenoi chiefdoms, materially and politically wise IMO.
 
The main obstacle there would be the relative obscurity of Albanian before the XIIth : it's more or less assumed population in Epirus really became labelled as Albanian only when some migrations and political takeover from highlander groups came over to repopulate various southern Balkanic regions (hich doesn't mean population in Epirus didn't partially spoke a form of Albanian, of course, but probably didn't indentified as such).
The core of Arberon, but culturally and lingustically, seems to have been roughly centered in dinaric Alps between Shkumbi and Mati basin in the south, maybe up to Morava valley in the East. Meaning that an earlier Arberion (in say, the Xth century) would probably have been undiscernable from sklavenoi chiefdoms, materially and politically wise IMO.
Albanian speaking people were in Epirus that early? It's the first time I've heard that.

When you say they would be indiscernible from Slavic chiefdoms from a political perspective, what do you mean by that? What would their nature be?
 
Albanian speaking people were in Epirus that early? It's the first time I've heard that.
The dialectical division of Albanian language seems to have happened quite early on, and while the coastal regions were probably de-albanized early on, there's no telling how much the language extended south. Giving that proto-Albanian are said to depend from Dyrrachium and indirectly helped Normans incursions in the XIth, there's a fair possibility that at least a part of Epirus was albanophone even if not considering themselves as Albanians. How much, and how far is a mess I won't even want to touch with a spoon to dine with the Devil.

When you say they would be indiscernible from Slavic chiefdoms from a political perspective, what do you mean by that? What would their nature be?
Well, a...chiefdom.
Meaning probably subsmersed by slavic populations, warring bands and elites as Valachs were in the same period, to the point even if they formed or not IOTL their own communities (it's likely IMO they did), in terms of material culture and political differences, you wouldn't have much.
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Anyway a good divergence as any could be a Norman conquest of western Romania, due to a change of priority by the emperors (or an even more declining Romania) which could end considering proto-Albanian as an autonom community when Byzzies come back with a vengence.. Basically an earlier and Norman-based Principalty of Arberon.
 
Well, a...chiefdom.
Meaning probably subsmersed by slavic populations, warring bands and elites as Valachs were in the same period, to the point even if they formed or not IOTL their own communities (it's likely IMO they did), in terms of material culture and political differences, you wouldn't have much.
By submersed you mean they were a minority in their lands or just that were many Slavs around?

Would you say IOTL 12th to 14th century Albania was also indiscernable from the neighbouring Slavs?
 
By submersed you mean they were a minority in their lands or just that were many Slavs around?
it's virtually impossible to say for the first : probably Albanians went trough the same slavicisation that happened even in Greece at this point, tough. The second is definitely more the case IMO.

Would you say IOTL 12th to 14th century Albania was also indiscernable from the neighbouring Slavs?
I don't think so : they were quite clearly distinguishable politically and institutionally : Charles of Anjou claiming being King of the Albanians was certainly evidence that you had Albanians to be king over, politically-wise.
 
it's virtually impossible to say for the first : probably Albanians went trough the same slavicisation that happened even in Greece at this point, tough. The second is definitely more the case IMO.


I don't think so : they were quite clearly distinguishable politically and institutionally : Charles of Anjou claiming being King of the Albanians was certainly evidence that you had Albanians to be king over, politically-wise.
I'm not so sure if it can be compared to Greece in scale, I would think it is strange that somehow the Albanians survived the period as their own distinct linguistic-tribal and later on ethnic community if so many Slavs poured in.

Wouldn't the earlier creation of an Albanian state accelerate the distinction process? Also I'm not so sure you can say there was no distinct Albanian identity during this time, I get that they weren't that different from their Slavic neighbours, but if they somehow emerged during the 11th century as being somewhat distinct to the point where a century later they were important or separated enough to be mentioned as such I imagine that having an earlier state would accelerate whatever process happened IOTL by a lot.
 
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I'm not so sure if it can be compared to Greece in scale
Most of modern Greece was certainly importantly slavicized in the Early Middle-Ages, up to Peloponnese. While rehellenization was certainly helped by a large remaining population, political and institutional incitative did the trick, which didn't existed either for Valachs or Albanians.

I would think it is strange that somehow the Albanians survived the period as their own distinct linguistic-tribal and later on ethnic community if so many Slavs poured in.
I wonder if it's because we're used to cultural monopolism : with early modern states onwards, a political community was always associated with a given culture or even language. Which was not the case before, and certainly not on early state structures. You certainly had a lot of mix, culturally, linguistically and materially; and the places where Albanian seems to have survived best are the highlands. Probably it didn't survived as much in lowlands (as in Morava valley).

Wouldn't the earlier creation of an Albanian state accelerate the distinction process?
Most probably, altough it's not a given this earlier state will be Albanian as we understand it. Bulgaria and Croatia are good exemple on how an entity can "turn" culturally. An earlier Albanian state, by the virtue of ruling over a mixed (culturally wise) land could well end up as a slavicized state.

Also I'm not so sure you can say there was no distinct Albanian identity during this time
Simply said, there is no mention of anything remsembling proto-Albanians before the XIth. Maybe you had a distinct proto-Albanian identity, but without a develloped state that would strikes me as particularily self-evident.
 

althisfan

Banned
Most of modern Greece was certainly importantly slavicized in the Early Middle-Ages, up to Peloponnese. While rehellenization was certainly helped by a large remaining population, political and institutional incitative did the trick, which didn't existed either for Valachs or Albanians.


I wonder if it's because we're used to cultural monopolism : with early modern states onwards, a political community was always associated with a given culture or even language. Which was not the case before, and certainly not on early state structures. You certainly had a lot of mix, culturally, linguistically and materially; and the places where Albanian seems to have survived best are the highlands. Probably it didn't survived as much in lowlands (as in Morava valley).


Most probably, altough it's not a given this earlier state will be Albanian as we understand it. Bulgaria and Croatia are good exemple on how an entity can "turn" culturally. An earlier Albanian state, by the virtue of ruling over a mixed (culturally wise) land could well end up as a slavicized state.


Simply said, there is no mention of anything remsembling proto-Albanians before the XIth. Maybe you had a distinct proto-Albanian identity, but without a develloped state that would strikes me as particularily self-evident.
The magazine Molecular Biology and Evolution has the article "Tracing Past Human Male Movements in Northern/Eastern Africa and Western Eurasia: New Clues from Y-Chromosomal Haplogroups E-M78 and J-M12" which states Albanians have, more than any other European ethnicity, more ancestors within their group than ancestors from other groups that interbred into the group. The leads, at least to many people, that the Albanians are truly more the common descendant of Illyro-Dacians instead of a mishmash group of Illyrians, Slavs, Greeks, etc that were isolated and then migrated out of hills to "recover" the Illyrian lands. Though I agree that the Illyrian language probably did survive more in the hills and then spread out as Albanian later.
 
It's true, but as the saying goes, "languages don't make love". And, eventually, their very distinctive language is one of the things that contextualised the appearance of their identity. Giving Albanian language seems to originate from what we could call a "linguistical redoubt", the point is less that "true" Illyrians ( a concept that, you certainly agree, is obsolete and only survived because Albanian nationalism required anything to make it up for a misplaced sense of inferiority), but that being isolated enough, you had less mix-up to begin with than in Epirus, and less Slavs or other human groups to dominate in first place these relatively isolated communities.
You'll notice, for exemple, that areas with an historically known Albanian presence in Greece doesn't seem to have a significantly greater "genetic Albanianess" than, say, Montenegro (in fast, less).

As for the Illyrian language...While I'm rather agreeing that Albanian have all the chances to be a suceeding branch...We don't know anything about Illyrian language save some possible toponyms and, maybe, if Messapians were linguistically Illyrians, two sentences on which nobody agrees on a same translation.
it's rather probable that, like Ligurian, Iberian and the whole of exonyms Greeks gave to barbarian peoples, Illyrian was a label that was inflated with time to either all the hinterland region, or (in the case of Ligurians for exemple) ultra-speclaized out of tradition rather than evidence. You'll notice that E-M78 haplogroup repartition barely covers the whole of ancient Illyria. and for all we know, what Greeks called Illyrian was an ensemble of more or less related groups on which proto-Albanians and/or Messapians weren't dominant or a specific case (just as Lepontic language for Gaulish, related by coming from distinct cultural horizons).
 
Most of modern Greece was certainly importantly slavicized in the Early Middle-Ages, up to Peloponnese. While rehellenization was certainly helped by a large remaining population, political and institutional incitative did the trick, which didn't existed either for Valachs or Albanians.


I wonder if it's because we're used to cultural monopolism : with early modern states onwards, a political community was always associated with a given culture or even language. Which was not the case before, and certainly not on early state structures. You certainly had a lot of mix, culturally, linguistically and materially; and the places where Albanian seems to have survived best are the highlands. Probably it didn't survived as much in lowlands (as in Morava valley).


Most probably, altough it's not a given this earlier state will be Albanian as we understand it. Bulgaria and Croatia are good exemple on how an entity can "turn" culturally. An earlier Albanian state, by the virtue of ruling over a mixed (culturally wise) land could well end up as a slavicized state.


Simply said, there is no mention of anything remsembling proto-Albanians before the XIth. Maybe you had a distinct proto-Albanian identity, but without a develloped state that would strikes me as particularily self-evident.
I'm not sure if we could call this "most", the article itself mentions the unlikeliness of large re-settlement of Anatolia being the case or the scale of Slavic settlements being overestimated. Ultimately neither the Vlachs nor the Albanians ended up being a Slavic group, so I don't see why the period statelessness between the 7th and 11th century was necessary or more likely for non slavized states to appear.


More than that I don't get why the distinctiveness of the Albanians would just appear like that without any particular reason. At least considering just the Highlands, I'd say that a state coming out of this region would unlikely to become Slavic long-term.


But why did Albania apparently become less mixed by the late 11th century?


I guess what I mean is that things seemed to be directing towards a creation of a separated Albanian group(maybe by virtue of a local dominance of Albanian groups), rather than this mish-mash of Albanian, Slavic and possibly Aromanian groups just ending up with IOTL Albanians, at least that's my idea.
 
IUltimately neither the Vlachs nor the Albanians ended up being a Slavic group, so I don't see why the period statelessness between the 7th and 11th century was necessary or more likely for non slavized states to appear.
I think I see our disagreement there : you look at modern communities of Albanian and Romanians and postulating that, well, they survived so they weren't really in danger to not to. Thing is we know that, @althisfan posted it, that while the modern Albanian population alltogether is rather close genetically to ancient inhabitants, that a good part of Epirus was acculturated. The number of Valach communities that neither made it to being states and were swallowed up and acculturated between Middle-Ages and Modern history is staggering. As it happened with Britain, you have a whole Romania Submersa there.*

At some point, especially for what could be considered chiefdoms and early states, a too great expansion over different (culturally wise) groups is risking certain acculturation even in a dominant position : it's what happened to Bulgars, and probably what would have happened to Avars.

More than that I don't get why the distinctiveness of the Albanians would just appear like that without any particular reason.
As mentionned above, linguistical distinctiveness played a great role : there's a thing having difficulty to separate two close southern slavic communities on this basis alone, especially with a same material culture, than proto-albanian and slavic even sharing the same material culture. Of course, the way-of-life is as well particular enough : highland communties tend to distinguish themselves from lowlads trough conservative and relatively cloisonment as it happened, for exemple, with Kurds, hughland Scotland, to say nothing of the mess Caucasus is.

At least considering just the Highlands, I'd say that a state coming out of this region would unlikely to become Slavic long-term.
Any Albanian state will have to devellop itself outside the highlands to be viable, would it be to gather enough resources to be mobilized in a state creation phenomenon. IOTL, it was quite gradual. Again, there's no thousands of explanation why Valachs managed to form viable chiefdoms and early states essentially in the Danubian basin, and not in the Balkanic highlands. An Albanian state that would be limited to its immediate highlands would be likely to end up lie Byzantine Vallachias, as in autonomous enough but extremely dependent from the primary state for their survival.

I agree that my approach thus far is quite structuralist, but I think that's a model that can really help understanding the state-building process.

But why did Albania apparently become less mixed by the late 11th century?
It didn't? Again, genetical and cultural mix are two different things. Most people using English in Africa aren't much of Anglo-Saxons either.
More to the point, it happens that Albanians lived in a peripherical area of Romania and Bulgaria alike, and seem to have enjoyed an autonomy large enough during the Xth to XIIth century (maybe not fully Christianized until the Xth), and eventually this autonomy may have been "fossilized" in the autonom Principalty of Arbanon (which possibly covered an earlier political ensemble led by Byzantine Albanians, coming from the struggle against Italo-Normans, IMO).

If anything, Albanian probably got more mixed after the late XITh with the growth of Albanian statelets and migrations to southern Epirus and Greece. The key point, there, is that identity comes, in pre-Modern times, more often from political/institutional context than the reverse.

I guess what I mean is that things seemed to be directing towards a creation of a separated Albanian group(maybe by virtue of a local dominance of Albanian groups) rather than this mish-mash of Albanian, Slavic and possibly Aromanian groups just ending up with IOTL Albanians,
I tend to think that the discussion we had with @althisfan points that the distinction is a bit moot. Every community is mixed up to a point, and he was right to point that Albanian seems to have been less mixed up, the difference possibly being between "highland" proto-Albanians and "lowland" post-southern Illyrians IMO, altough the difference is quite artificial, as it's likely that the seconds might have shared linguistical closeness up to a point.
 
I think I see our disagreement there : you look at modern communities of Albanian and Romanians and postulating that, well, they survived so they weren't really in danger to not to. Thing is we know that, @althisfan posted it, that while the modern Albanian population alltogether is rather close genetically to ancient inhabitants, that a good part of Epirus was acculturated. The number of Valach communities that neither made it to being states and were swallowed up and acculturated between Middle-Ages and Modern history is staggering. As it happened with Britain, you have a whole Romania Submersa there.*
My train of thought is more to compare Aromanians to Albanians and Romanians and seeing that one barely survived and the other 2 did makes me think that there should be some sort of demographic or geographical reason for why that was the case and adding on top of that the fact that Slavic states controlled the are for centuries before we even start hearing consitently from both groups makes me think that they weren't indeed that in danger of dying

At some point, especially for what could be considered chiefdoms and early states, a too great expansion over different (culturally wise) groups is risking certain acculturation even in a dominant position : it's what happened to Bulgars, and probably what would have happened to Avars.
Could an Albanian state rise in opposition to Bulgar control? Possibly taking over the central half(coast included) of the Theme of Dhyrrachium(borders in the map below)? Maybe it could arise by proxy with the Byzantine supporting them(IOTL they rebelled after Byzantine reconquest) like they did in Serbia.

As mentionned above, linguistical distinctiveness played a great role : there's a thing having difficulty to separate two close southern slavic communities on this basis alone, especially with a same material culture, than proto-albanian and slavic even sharing the same material culture. Of course, the way-of-life is as well particular enough : highland communties tend to distinguish themselves from lowlads trough conservative and relatively cloisonment as it happened, for exemple, with Kurds, hughland Scotland, to say nothing of the mess Caucasus is.
You say below that identity often was downstream from politics and institutions but if language indeed created some distinctivness and this distinctivness manifested in a state, wouldn't that mean that in some sense linguistics and identity helped creating a state?

Any Albanian state will have to devellop itself outside the highlands to be viable, would it be to gather enough resources to be mobilized in a state creation phenomenon. IOTL, it was quite gradual. Again, there's no thousands of explanation why Valachs managed to form viable chiefdoms and early states essentially in the Danubian basin, and not in the Balkanic highlands. An Albanian state that would be limited to its immediate highlands would be likely to end up lie Byzantine Vallachias, as in autonomous enough but extremely dependent from the primary state for their survival.
Well I wasn't thinking about anything too small or too large, just about IOTL Arbanon borders, possibly barely bigger.

https://i.imgur.com/3AydPsM.jpg

I agree that my approach thus far is quite structuralist, but I think that's a model that can really help understanding the state-building process.
Is that what you would call secondary state formation?

It didn't? Again, genetical and cultural mix are two different things. Most people using English in Africa aren't much of Anglo-Saxons either.
More to the point, it happens that Albanians lived in a peripherical area of Romania and Bulgaria alike, and seem to have enjoyed an autonomy large enough during the Xth to XIIth century (maybe not fully Christianized until the Xth), and eventually this autonomy may have been "fossilized" in the autonom Principalty of Arbanon (which possibly covered an earlier political ensemble led by Byzantine Albanians, coming from the struggle against Italo-Normans, IMO).
I think they rebelled against the Romans in 11th century, I wonder if the state formation could happen earlier if instead of opposing Normans they rebel against the Bulgarians with Byzantine support.

I tend to think that the discussion we had with @althisfan points that the distinction is a bit moot. Every community is mixed up to a point, and he was right to point that Albanian seems to have been less mixed up, the difference possibly being between "highland" proto-Albanians and "lowland" post-southern Illyrians IMO, altough the difference is quite artificial, as it's likely that the seconds might have shared linguistical closeness up to a point.
By highland and lowland, are you talking about the coast vs inland or generally flat areas vs mountainous areas? Where would Kosovo end up being?
 
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