by Nehat Hyseni. Translation Petrit Latifi

Abstract

This study examines the historical presence of Albanians from Bujanovac in Vranje, southern Serbia, highlighting a significant yet often overlooked aspect of urban migration and demographic history. From the 18th to the 19th centuries, Bujanovac Albanians engaged in internal migration, trade, crafts, and family networks within the Ottoman administrative framework, integrating into Vranje’s civic and economic life. Archival records, including Ottoman defters, document their origins and professions. Following the Serbian invasions of 1877–1878, these communities were largely expelled, resulting in the abrupt disruption of a centuries-long Albanian urban presence. Their memory persists through family histories and surnames.

An Important Segment of Urban Migrations

Vranje is a city completely ethnically cleansed of Albanians and is located only about 17 km from Bujanovac and about 47 km from Preševo. Preševo ​​has about 95% Albanian population, while Bujanovac about 65%. Consequently, the presence of Albanians from Bujanovac in Vranje constitutes an important – similar to the case of Preševo ​​– but often overlooked aspect of the demographic and social history of southern Serbia during the Ottoman period and after it.

The connections between Bujanovac and Vranje were early and multidimensional, including internal migrations, economic, marital and administrative relations, especially during the 18th–19th centuries. These movements were not accidental, but part of a functional Albanian urban and rural space, where smaller centers, such as Bujanovac, provided human resources and crafts for larger urban centers, such as Vranje.

Bujanovac and Vranje in the Ottoman framework

During the Ottoman period, Bujanovac was part of the same regional administrative system with Vranje, connected to it through trade routes, weekly markets and a common administration. This created conditions for families from Bujanovac to settle temporarily or permanently in Vranje, as part of internal Albanian migrations.
Ottoman sources, including the nufus defterleri and temettuat defterleri, attest that many families registered in Vranje had origins in Bujanovac. This is reflected in the same anthroponymy, interprovincial kinship ties and, in some cases, in the use of informal epithets indicating their origin.

Social and economic profile

The Albanians of Bujanovac in Vranje were mainly:

urban craftsmen (tailors, tanners – leather workers, shoemakers),

small merchants,

and, less frequently, farmers on the outskirts of the city.
They were mainly located in the urban neighborhoods of the Bazaar and constituted an economically active stratum, integrated into the civic life of Vranje. Their participation in crafts and trade testifies to the integration of the small community of Bujanovac within the broader economic network of the city.

Identification in archival sources

In the Ottoman defter of the 19th century, the Albanians of Bujanovac are not directly marked as “from Bujanovac”, but are identified through:

the name-paternity chain,

family networks that appear in parallel in the defter of Bujanovac,

identical crafts that are repeated in both centers.
A typical archival formulation might be:
“Muslim heads of households in Vranje with anthroponymy and crafts previously documented in Bujanovac.”
This testifies to internal Albanian migration within the Ottoman space, not to foreign colonization.

After 1878 and the impact of the invasions

After the Serbian invasions of the area (1877–1878), the Bujanovac Albanians who had settled in Vranje often shared the fate of other Muslim and Albanian communities: expulsion, loss of urban property and crafts, or return to Bujanovac and the surrounding areas.
Post-war documents often mention:
“Muslim houses were abandoned; property was confiscated.”
This also included families of Bujanovac origin who had been settled in Vranje for decades.

Memory and historical continuity

Today, the memory of the Albanians of Bujanovac in Vranje is preserved through:

family stories (“grandfathers lived in Vranje”),

craft and professional surnames,

documented family ties.
Concrete examples prove their urban integrated presence and connection with the Albanian historical network in the city.

Conclusion

The Albanians of Bujanovac were not a foreign element in Vranje, but an organic part of the Albanian Muslim citizenry. Their disappearance or departure after 1878 was not a natural demographic process, but the result of a violent historical interruption, which interrupted a centuries-old Albanian presence and returned the community mainly to Bujanovac and its surroundings.