Archive for April, 2010
Apr
Suliots and their ‘epitome sate of Albania’
April 26th, 2010
With naming of Ali Pasha dervendji an effort to centralize all power into his own hands began. He commenced a series of measures to weaken the influence of Othoman Turks holding property, thus to weaken the power of sultan in Thessaly and parts of Macedonia; Epirus/Lower Albania did not have a Turkish presence. The effect of this was that civil and fiscal business passed into hands of the Greeks, while the Albanians saw an extension of their military authority.
Apr
Epirus/Lower Albania, as 19th Century travelers saw it
Ali Pash Tepelena’s rise brought Albania to the forefront of attention throughout Europe and raised the question with many as to how this area would fit into the great power game. It was an opportune time for the west European philhellenes to further refocus their attention on the European Turkey and many traveled to the area and included Albania in their itinerary.
One can easily see that these travelers admired Greece and marveled with ancient Greek history. During that age of revolution many dreamed of finding the ‘Greeks’ ready to claim their history and continue their great past. But the reality on the ground wasn’t a case for optimism. Baron John Cam Hobhouse Broughton gave a reality check about the Greeks:
“A great proportion of those comprehended under the term Romaioi, or Christians of the Greek Church, and amongst whom would be found the chief supporters of an insurrection, are certainly of a mixed origin, sprung from Scythian colonists. Such arc the Albanians, the Maniotes, the Macedonian, Uulgarian, and Wallachian Greeks. And yet the whole nation, including, I presume, these Christians, has been laid down only at two millions and a half, of all ages and sexes, and consequently there is no part of Continental Greece to which a body of Turks might not be instantly brought, sufficient to quell any revolt: the Mahometans of Albania arc themselves equal to the task, and on a rising of the Giauours, the Infidels, would leave all private dissension, to accomplish such a work. The Greeks taken collectively, cannot, in fact, be so properly called an individual people, as a religious sect dissenting from the established church of the Ottoman Empire.
Any general revolution of the Greeks, independent of foreign aid, is quite impracticable; for notwithstanding the great mass of the people, as is the case in all insurrections, has feeling and spirit enough to make the attempt, yet most of the higher classes, and all the clergy, except as far as the expressions of discontent may operate, are apparently willing to acquiesce in their present condition.”1
