STUDIA ALBANICA 2008/1 Xhevat LLOSHI A CENTURY OF THE ALBANIAN ALPHABET The major part of the European languages long ago and without great difficulties selected their alphabets. Differently from them for the Albanian language to fix a unique alphabet it was needed a long period accompanied with not only technical but also political and cultural complications. This is the reason why the adoption of the modern alphabet is an important page in the history of the Albanian language, and even for the general history of the Albanians. Monastery Congress of the year 1908 is a linguistic event, and at the same time, it is a national memorable event. Only four years later Albania for the first time would declare herself an independent State. The Independence Declaration was written with the alphabet sanctioned by the Monastery Congress. It is a major testimony that the definition of a united alphabet, finally ending the use of a variety of ways in writing the Albanian language was not simply the closure of a stage in the language question; it also was a corner stone in the building of the Albanian State. The Albanian National Renaissance gradually through multiple efforts prepared the way to forming the national consciousness for the establishment of a nation-state like all the European peoples, and like the other Balkan nations appearing on the historical scene alongside with the fall of the centuries old Ottoman Empire. Monastery Congress was one of the greatest achievements of our Renaissance; it was the proof that the Renaissance efforts fulfilled one of their historical goals in implanting the idea of a united nation regardless of the regional and other types of split. It is not by chance that the initiative was taken by the Monastery Club "Bashkimi" (Union), as the other clubs carried the same name, and it was the word of the day in the national program. From this perspective, there is to be found a more complete answer to the question: Why the Albanian alphabet was adopted by a congress? Of course, it was necessary to have a practical solution in writing their language in the same way by Albanians, but all the same remains the question: Why should they write it in the same way? It was because already the real image of building the Albanian State was 2 Xhevat Lloshi crystallized as an immediate task, and not as something belonging to a distant future. What remained unfulfilled by Albanian Prizren League in 1878-1880 now was on the eve of realization. Monastery Congress sanctioned the alphabet, but at the same time, it represented an important step: it was a symbolical act. The Albanians were united; they were prepared as a single body, as a ready factor to gain the sovereignty, as a community to have its place on the international arena. There is no need to ask the help of the rhetoric in underlying that this symbolic realization illuminated the road of other events during the last century. Literary Commission of Shkodra in 1916-17 also directly continued the work of the Monastery Congress not simply as another step in solving the following demands of the Albanian as a State language, but also as an inspiration for a consciousness, for a methodology in putting and solving the tasks on the national level. The same inspiration and the same consciousness were embodied in the Prishtina Language Consultation precisely forty years ago through the lapidary slogan: "One nation – one language", to come up to the Orthography Congress in 1972. The political circumstances in the Albanian lands during the 19th century, the situation of the Albanian writing, and of the cultural developments as the result of these circumstances have been many times addressed by different authors. Meanwhile going deeper back in the history, we have better illuminated significant aspects, which fill the voids on the road of the Albanian culture, and at the same time gain a particular value for the present days, for the actuality of a people in preparations to join the united European family. Just as for the major part of the world languages, for the Albanian too we would say that it started to be written in alphabets taken from foreign languages, which our authors mastered as bilingual cultured people. It is the task of the scientific research to show which were earliest writing traditions on the lands where the Albanian language is spoken, and how among them our predecessors selected, built up, and used various alphabets in writing the mother tongue. Archeology gives testimonies that at least since the third century B. C. the Illyrian names were carved with Greek letters. After the Roman conquest the Latin letters came in use, and in this way arose the presence of two alphabets. From the practical perspective, not mentioning the foreign authors, the Albanian language started to be written by Albanians or their predecessors who mastered the writing of a foreign language, who already used the alphabet of some foreign languages, and adapted them to the writing of the Albanian language. Even in the rare cases when they A century of the Albanian alphabet 3 created something fully original, it meant that they knew the script of a foreign language, and consequently had the experience in writing. It is useful to introduce the notion of the reader in this description in order to exclude from the history of the Albanian alphabet the pure individual uses finding no readers to them. As a result we would accept the notion of the failed alphabets which are not worthwhile mentioning together with really used alphabets. The picture of the situation on the eve of the Monastery Congress would result not so obscure; we would understand that the solution was found because the real alternatives were limited. It is not necessary to mention here in detail how the Albanians were writing before they compiled texts in Albanian language, how they produced works, for example, in Latin, which was the common learned language throughout Europe. All the same I consider it necessary to enlarge the view on the past, because its ignoring was the reason why the interest to the origins of the writing in our lands was excluded. After the Greek and Latin letters there were used Slavonic characters. It is of interest to know this practice from the beginning to its disappearing. There is a pressing need in historiography to study the beginnings of writing the Albanian proper names and afterwards full texts with Ottoman characters. The due attention is to be given to the particularities of the Venetian and Italian alphabets in use up to 20th century regardless of the fact that the alphabet in general was a Latin one. There also are isolated cases of the use of the German alphabet, and even cases of the use of the Albanian alphabet for other languages. I consider necessary such a perspective not only because the presence of various alphabets for the Albanian language becomes fully clear, but especially to demonstrate that in this part of the south-western Balkans the written European culture was present from earliest times, and the predecessors of the Albanians and their modern descendants were e constitutive part of the same culture. We live in lands in which the writing as one of the greatest achievements of human culture was known long ago. After the exemplary work of our old authors beginning with Gjon Buzuku, an important change took place in the 17th century. The use of the respective alphabets is delineated as a cultural orientation not only on the base of the tradition, the territorial vicinity, and the links with other cultures, but also by inspiring them dominant, religious, and assimilatory politics. Ongoing use of the respective alphabets would already depend upon the cultural orientation of the Albanian circles, of course, within a complicated general picture. 4 Xhevat Lloshi Because of the historical circumstances, the process started in a bilingual situation or in close relation to the practice of the other foreign languages. It is not a rare exception; the same phenomenon is observable for other languages. From this point of view, a different evaluation would be applied to the earliest Albanian dictionaries and grammars. Frang Bardhi’s Dictionary (1635) was not a common bilingual dictionary like the one’s at the present day we use. It showed that the Albanian language ranked with the other cultivated European languages, this language could stand the confrontation with a classical language, and I would say that the author manifested with it not only a consciousness but together with it a true audacity. The Albanian grammar by Da Dezio or by Da Lecce was prepared because it was already impossible to work without studying Albanian grammar, i.e. a stable and independent linguistic structure. The interest shown by the German philosopher, mathematician, and logician G. W. Leibnitz (1646- 1716) was an interest to the Albanian language as a value in itself, as a member of the community of the European languages, and if we would develop further the metaphor of the language families, it would be called an interest to a member of the family. As a general conclusion, I would say that the alphabet of the Albanian language now stands up as a separate problem, connected to one or another cultural orientation. From now on, the primary question will not be the decision on the characters for each sound, i.e. not the technical aspect, but the integral solution. Consequently, original alphabets appear as alternative integral solutions. Finally, we find the origins of the struggle for the Albanian alphabet.