From the century of linguistic enlightenment to the century of linguistic nationalism

Disa të dhëna të reja për një riperiodizim të historisë së letërsisë shqipe

Abstract

XVIIIth century was not a century of crisis, but a historic passage towards the ideology which G. Guzzeta would call ’a a s tá. The factors that lead to the birth of linguistic enlightenment and the preparation of national ideology are strongly connected with the apostleship of Pope Clemente XI as the head of Holy See. Some of the fundamental initiatives benefiting the language and the history of the people of Pope C t ’s origin as a direct founder, director and caretaker are: 1. Italian-albanian dictionary of Francesco Maria da Lecce. 2. A Grammar of Albanian language by the same author. 3. The project of publishing the most important complete work of the history of Albanians and ProtoAlbanians, that would testify not only their ecclesiastic history, but their laic life, too. This is known by the title Illyricum Sacrum. 4. The Arbëni Meeting was organized under the direct care of Pope Clemente XI. 5. Establishing of removed Kelmendas from their birthplace to Zara of Arbëresh is connected closely with his authority as a Pope. 6. The encouragement of bazilian monks’ mission in protection of their compatriots in South Albania, was undertaken under the sovereign care of the Holy See (Apostolic See), in the time of his apostleship. 7. Although it was founded 2 years after the death of Pope Clemente XI, the Arbereshi college Corsini of San Benedetto in Ullano, known by them as St. Benethiti: una vera e propria struttura universitaria per la formazione del clero Greco-albanese, was an initiative projected by him. The foundation of this college turned the XVIIIth century as the century of colleges and workshops, which would be the places where was born the first interest for Albanian language and the origin of Albanian people. 8. In the correspondence with archbishop of Tivari, Vincenzo Zmaievich, Pope Clemente XI, during the pastoral visit in all parts of Arbëni, asked to know whether the Albanian people used their own language, the language of arbëresh. 9. Arbëresh missionars who came with eccliastic duties, decided to use in their writings F. Bardhi’s alphabet, because his was the alphabet of the first book in Albanian, officially confirmatur (confirmed) from F a ’s P opaga a. 10. The passing from archaeonyms and xenonyms of that time of Albanians (epirot, maqedonas) to the new ethnonyms (shqiptar and Shqipëri) was a result of the pontifical care for Albanian language. 11. Albanian National Renaissance had the luxury to find ready not only the fundamental myths of romantism: the myth of maternal language, the myth of Autochthony, the myth of great period of anti-othoman resistance, the myth of albanocentrism, but also the new name of the people and the nation. 12. The main products of linguistic enlightenment of XVIIIth century were mainly dictionaries and grammar books that were addressed to the foreigners who wanted to learn Albanian language. In addition, during this century emerged the period of national literature. Linguistic enlightenment prepared the national ideology, which, first of all, was shown like linguistic nationalism, with the cult of maternal language. In the century of linguistic nationalism the Albanian language was used in dictionaries and grammars used for the teaching of Albanian as mother tongue. While this is an essential difference, it is not a Copernican overturn: the Pelasgic myth of the origin of Albanian as the pivot of all the myths of national romanticism was threaded during the period of the linguistic enlightment.