History History

The prehistoric period in Albania began 42,000 years ago with the settlement of modern man(Homo sapiens) at the same time as in France: the oldest inhabited site is in the Kryegjata Valley, near the ancient site of Apollonia. The settlement was concentrated for thirty millennia in the southern part, close to the coast. Around 6500 BC, the lake area of Maliq, near Korça, is one of the cradles of agriculture in Europe. Traces of many villages have been identified since 2010, in particular the site of Vashtëmi, considered to be one of the first farms in Eastern Europe. The discovery of this rural society called "culture of Maliq" is very recent. In fact, it was not until the fall of the communist regime in 1992 that research on prehistory in Albania really began, in collaboration with French and American scientists

These two little-known peoples gained a foothold in Albania at the end of the Bronze Age, around 1000 BC. The Bryges originated in what is now Turkey. Descendants of the Phrygians, they emigrated to Thrace, Macedonia and then to Albania after the fall of the Hittite Empire. They can be found in southern Albania as well as in northern Greece. As for the Illyrians, who settled in the central part of the country, the Albanians proudly consider them as their "ancestors". The term "Illyrian" is in fact very vague and was given by ancient authors to different Indo-European peoples who have no connection with each other except that they are nomadic farmers who have been present in the Balkans, from the Danube to the Adriatic, since the second millennium BC. Moreover, the Croats too claim kinship with the Illyrians. If the Illyrians have supplanted the Bryges in the collective memory, it is because they have left more traces, such as bronze swords. Experts in metalworking, they were also great horse breeders.

Antiquity in Albania begins with the arrival of the Greeks bringing with them writing, science, etc., and the first people of Albania were the Greeks. From the 8th century BC, the Chaonians, a Greek tribe from Epirus, settled in the southern part and founded the first cities: Antigonia, near Gjirokastra, then Phoenicè and Bouthroton (site of Butrint classified as a UNESCO World Heritage Site), near Saranda. In the 7th century B.C., the movement accelerates. Settlers from Corinth and Corcyria (Corfu) founded Epidamnos, the present Durrës, in 627, then Apollonia, in 588. In the 6th century BC, settlers from Argolide (Peloponnese) founded Aulon, now Vlora, while the Dassaretes, a tribe attached to the Chaonians, gave birth to Antipatreia (Berat). The Greeks of these new cities cohabited then relatively peacefully with the ancient Brygean, Illyrian and Thraco-Ilyrian inhabitants organized in a multitude of tribes.

At the turn of the 4th century BC, King Bardylis (448-358) united several Illyrian tribes within the kingdom of Dardania with the present Shkodra as its capital. Allied to Dionysius the Elder, a Greek tyrant from Syracuse (Sicily), he conquered Epirus. He was finally defeated by the powerful neighbouring kingdom of Macedonia, which was then on the verge of taking over Greece. His successors, however, were a constant threat to the Greeks and Macedonians. Thus, in 335, just before he set out to conquer the Persian Empire, Alexander the Great himself had to come and pacify Albania. But soon the troubles began again. Around 250, the Illyrian king Agron is at the head of a fleet of pirate ships that sow terror in the Adriatic. With the support of Greek dissidents, he formed a kingdom from Dalmatia (coast of Croatia) to Corfu. When he died in 231, his second wife, Queen Teuta, assumed the regency. By having Roman ambassadors assassinated, she triggered the Illyrian Wars in 229. These will end in 168 B.C. with Rome's stranglehold on Albania and the entire Adriatic coast.

As early as 167 B.C., the territory of present-day Albania was split between two immense Roman provinces: north of the river Drin, theIllyricum incorporates Shkodra and stretches along the Adriatic to Croatia; to the south, Macedonia extends south-east to Thessaloniki (Greece). However, the local peoples continue to revolt and it took the Romans a century to impose peace. From then on, the economy prospered with the modernization of the cities founded by the Greeks and the construction of the Via Egnatia, a great trade route linking Rome to Byzantium with the ancient Epidamnos, renamed Dyrrachium, as a port of call to Italy. The city grew and, in the 2nd century AD, the Emperor Trajan endowed it with the largest amphitheatre in the Balkans, with a capacity of 20,000 spectators. In 284, Emperor Diocletian reorganized the provinces. While the region of Shkodra integrates Praevalitana with Montenegro and part of present-day Serbia, the central part constitutes theEpirus Nova (New Epirus) and the southern part is attached to north-western Greece to form theEpirus Vetus (Old Epirus).

At the end of the 4th century, the Roman Empire was threatened by the irruption of new peoples and by Christianity, which challenged the unifying cult dedicated to the emperor. The solution adopted was to split the Empire in two. Thus in 395 the provinces covering present-day Albania became part of the Eastern Roman Empire. While the Western Roman Empire was rapidly disappearing, this so-called "Byzantine" Empire lasted eleven centuries (an absolute record in Europe) and was based on Christianity, Roman law and Greek culture. It owes its name to its capital, Byzantium, located on the Bosphorus and soon renamed Constantinople (now Istanbul) in honour of Constantine, the first Christian emperor in 337. The inhabitants of Albania are also gradually converting. The main change came with the raids of the Visigoths, then of the Huns in 461. Until the 7th century, with the settlement of the Slavs in Albania, the Byzantines had great difficulty in controlling the region. It also escaped them from a religious point of view, since it remained under the control of the Pope of Rome until 732. This would later lead to a deep division between the Albanian Catholics (in the north) and the Albanian Orthodox (in the south) during the schism of the Eastern and Western Churches in 1054. In the 9th century, in the face of the Bulgarian threat, Albania was retaken in hand and organized as a military province: the theme of Dyrrachium, with the present Durrës as its capital. But several revolts broke out in the 11th century. The authority of the Byzantines was also weakened by the invasions of the Normans of Sicily (1040-1189) and the capture of Constantinople by the Crusaders in 1204. This led to the creation of the first feudal entities such as the Principality of Arberia (Kruja region), the Despotat of Epirus (in the south) and the Kingdom of Albania (1272-1368) founded in Dyrrachium by Charles of Anjou, King of Sicily and brother of the French King Saint Louis. After a civil war within the Empire, Albania definitively left the Byzantine bosom to join the short-lived Serbian Empire in 1347

After a short Serbian domination (1347-1355), Albania was divided into a multitude of Albanian, Franco-Albanian, Greco-Albanian, Serbian and Bulgarian lordships. It is to settle a conflict with one of its neighbours that the prince of Durrës, Karl Thopia, descendant of the French dynasty of the Angevins, asked the Ottomans for help in 1385. These Islamized Turks from Central Asia had been conquering the Byzantine Empire since the 12th century. Organized as an empire by Osman I in 1299, the Ottomans extended their possessions from Mecca to Sarajevo, going so far as to occupy Algeria and Hungary in the 16th century. Even before taking Constantinople in 1453, which they made their capital, they established a foothold in the Balkans from 1347 onwards. Karl Thopia's appeal for help was therefore an opportunity for them. With his support, the Ottomans won the Battle of Savra on 18 September 1385, in the central plain of Myzeqeja, against a coalition of Albanian and Slavic lords. Four years later, the decisive battle of Kosovo Polje (in Kosovo) on 15 June 1389 gave them control of the Balkans. In Albania, the Ottoman presence was initially concentrated in the south. Gjirokastra was the first capital of the Albanian Sandjak in 1420. In the northern part, on the other hand, resistance was organised. From 1444, Skanderbeg, lord of Kruja, now a national hero, led the League of Lezha, an uprising of Christian clan chiefs supported by Venice, Montenegro, the Papacy and the kingdom of Naples. The Ottomans had to deploy large troops to retake the strongholds of the rebellion one by one. Kruja finally fell in 1478, ten years after the death of Skanderbeg, while Shkodra, defended by the Venetians, was the last Albanian city to be conquered on 25 April 1479

After 1479, the definitive conquest of Albania by the Ottomans resulted in the conversion of the lords to Islam, imitated by a whole section of the population. However, two Albanian regions remained predominantly Christian: while Shkodra and the North remained partly Catholic, Korça and the South retained a strong Byzantine and Orthodox tradition. The rest of the population will benefit from the advantages offered by conversion, including exemption from taxes for non-Muslims. Cities also became Islamic with the development of Sharia law. An element of Ottoman architecture inherited from the Persians, this urban centre concentrates around a mosque fountains, workshops, a market, a religious school and caravanserais serving as lodgings for merchant caravans. While retaining the use of the Albanian language, the Islamicized population quickly integrated the codes of Turkish culture. The local elite, close to the influential brotherhood of the Bektashis, took advantage of new opportunities in administrative and military posts, right up to the sultan's palace, where for four centuries there were 42 Albanians in the post of grand vizier (prime minister) of the Ottoman Empire. Albania, on the other hand, remained on the sidelines of the modernization movement that accompanied the national awakening of the Greeks, Slavs and Romanians in the 18th century. The Albanians remain attached to an empire which, however, is in decline. Taking advantage of its weaknesses, the pachas (governors) gained in autonomy. In 1820, Ali Pasha of Tepelena, powerful Albanian governor of Ioannina (northern Greece), went so far as to declare independence. He was assassinated two years later, but in the meantime he played a key role in the outbreak of the Greek War of Independence (1821-1829), which marked the beginning of the Ottomans' withdrawal from Europe. In the 19th century, the other Balkan nations rose up and gained their independence. All except Albania, considered by the Turks as the last rampart of the Empire in Europe. The timid Rilindja Kombëtare("National Renaissance") movement began in the 1830s, but it aimed at greater autonomy, not independence. The Albanians, however, took up arms against the Ottomans in 1909 to prevent the annexation of Shkodra and Kosovo to Montenegro and Serbia. In October 1912, all the Orthodox nations of the Balkans unleashed the first Balkan war against the Empire. Assimilated to the Turks, the Albanians feared being invaded by their neighbours and immediately declared their independence, without the Ottomans opposing it, on 12 November 1912.

Albania will long pay its loyalty to the Ottoman Empire. It had no external allies and its independence was not recognised until 1920, the year in which the capital was moved from Vlora to Tirana. Controlled by clan chiefs from the Ottoman elite, the country also has no administration. Schools and hospitals are scarce, and external investment is almost non-existent. The young and poor nation is quickly subjected to the goodwill of the great powers. As early as December 1913, its southern part, Northern Epirus, was cut off and entrusted to Greece. During the First World War, Albania remained neutral, but it became a secondary theatre of operations on the main Serbian and Macedonian front. During the winter of 1915-1916, during the long Serb retreat to the island of Corfu, Albanian snipers massacred tens of thousands of civilians and soldiers passing through their territory. This episode, described as "Albanian Golgotha" by the Serbs, led to the country being treated with suspicion by France and its allies, who seized large cities in the southern part of the country in 1917. The last foreign troops, including Greek ones, left in 1923. Placed in the banner of the nations, Albania became bogged down in crisis. Popular discontent provided the opportunity for Prime Minister Ahmet Zogu to confiscate power from 1925 onwards. Establishing a real dictatorship, this son of a clan leader took the title of king under the name of Zog I in 1928. Although he launched the first modernisation reforms, he also placed Albania in a situation of complete economic dependence on Fascist Italy. Mussolini finally annexed the country on 7 April 1938, forcing Ahmet Zogu into exile in France, where he died in 1961.

From the beginning of the Italian occupation, in 1938, an Albanian fascist regime was created. This puppet state found itself embarked on a catastrophic attempt to invade Greece in 1940. The small Greek army resisted and even managed to seize southern Albania. To save Mussolini, Hitler had to delay the invasion of Russia and launched his armies to seize Yugoslavia and Greece in April 1941. The Albanian fascist state was then entrusted with certain Yugoslav territories where Albanian speakers lived, in Kosovo and Yugoslav Macedonia. The collaborators hunt down opponents and round up Serbian civilians. The majority of the population took a neutral stance, but without much hostility towards the occupier. Everything changes with the dismissal of Mussolini in 1943. Albania came under the control of Nazi Germany. While the most extremist groups soon joined the SS Skanderbeg division, composed mainly of Kosovars, many families came to the aid of the Jewish refugees who had arrived at the beginning of the conflict. The pro-German government itself refuses to provide a list of Jews living in Albania. Some 2,000 people will thus escape deportation. The resistance is divided into two movements: the nationalist Balli Kombëtar ("National Front") and the communist Partia e Punës ("Labour Party"). But on the ground, actions against the Germans were rare. Fighting mainly pitted resistance fighters against each other. Supported by Tito's Yugoslav partisans, the Albanian communists led by Enver Hoxha are gaining ground. Pushed back, the members of the Balli Kombëtar ended up allying themselves with the Nazis, helping them to evacuate the country during the German retreat from the Balkans. Liberated without any real fighting on 28 November 1944, the new communist Albania returned the territories of Kosovo and Yugoslav Macedonia. All citizens suspected of collaboration are mercilessly hunted down. But the country's new strongman, Enver Hoxha, promises a bright future.

The system set up by Enver Hohxa was the toughest communist regime in Europe. It was marked by Marxist orthodoxy, brutal repression of all forms of opposition, economic isolationism, acute paranoia about the supposed threats of invasion by Yugoslavia and NATO and a progressive ban on all religions. The People's Republic of Albania was proclaimed in January 1946, and the bulk of the economy came under state control. Until 1948, Albania was moving closer to socialist Yugoslavia, and a common federation was even envisaged. But in 1948, Tito was banished by Moscow, which marked for Albania the break with Yugoslavia, the total takeover of power by Enver Hoxha, and opened a period of close relations with the USSR. With the death of Stalin in 1953, relations with Moscow will become strained. The break with the USSR in December 1961 followed shortly after Khrushchev came to power, Enver Hoxha sticking to a pure Marxist-Leninist line. This led to the brutal loss of half of the outlets of Albanian foreign trade and major purges to the dictatorship. There is a rapprochement with China. It is not only economic, as certain Maoist practices are also imported: sending white-collar workers to work in production, increased collectivisation of land, abolition of army ranks, prohibition of all religious practice in 1967 and destruction of most of the historical heritage. The end of Maoism and Tito's visit to China (1977) are very badly perceived by Enver Hoxha. Relations deteriorate, and China abruptly ceases its commercial ties. In 1978, it is the rupture with Beijing. Albania then opens up to certain Western countries. After the death of Enver Hoxha, on April 11, 1985, the country breaks with isolationism, reopens diplomatic relations with Greece, Germany, Canada and France. The real break with communism is made under the pressure of students. The authorization of other parties is acquired in December 1990. At the beginning of 1991, fundamental freedoms are restored (freedom of worship, freedom of movement, freedom of the press...). The 1992 elections led to the fall of the regime and the election of Sali Berisha, former cardiologist of Enver Hoxha, to the presidency of the Republic.

Since the return to democracy, the country has been shaken by a civil war in 1997, caused by the bankruptcy of pyramid schemes. The state of insurrection was such that the government lost control of the country. The intervention of a UN force restored calm. Political life remains dominated by two parties, the Socialist Party (from the former Communist Party) and the Democratic Party (founded by Sali Berisha). Both regularly accuse each other of corruption, clientelism and ballot-box stuffing. This situation has given rise to a mafia with growing power. But both parties also share the goal of anchoring their country to Europe. Although Albania succeeded in joining Nato in 2009, it seems doomed to remain outside the European Union for a long time to come. 2019 was a catastrophic year, marked by the country's worst earthquake in a century (some 50 deaths) and French President Emmanuel Macron's categorical refusal to let Albania join the EU. In 2021, elections confirmed the victory of the Socialist Party and outgoing Prime Minister Edi Rama, but with a turnout of only 48%.