From the beginning, the Albanian-speaking Orthodox Christian sailors of Hydra and Speca would form the core of the Greek fleet. The Orthodox Christian Tosks, those who lived “in Greece proper or among the Greeks, especially those in the Peloponnese, descendants of Albanians who migrated there during the 14th century, fought alongside the Greeks for Greek independence, to which, starting in 1822, were added the Orthodox Christian Chams of Epirus, mainly the Suliotes, who were fearless fighters.

However, the Orthodox Albanians “of Albania proper” did not participate” for two reasons: “they were surrounded by Muslims” and any uprising on their part would have been doomed to failure, and “they possessed an Orthodox Christian consciousness, but not a Greek national consciousness.”

To fully understand the mobilization of Albanian speakers for or against the Greeks in the Greek Revolution, it must be emphasized that their collective identity was pre-modern; it was a religious identity and not an ethnic or national one. The latter, for them – as for the Ottomans – were incomprehensible. Characteristically, the Greek-speaking Catholics of the Aegean islands and the Greek-speaking Muslims of Macedonia did not participate as Greeks in the Greek Revolution.

In the southern Balkans, in the region that would become the first Greek state, the Orthodox Albanian Tosks constituted a quarter of the population (Albanian speakers constituted a quarter of the population in independent Greece until 1912). Only a very small minority among them were Muslim Tosks until 1821. The Greeks tended to call the Christian Tosks “Arvanitas”, while the Muslim Albanians “Turk-Albanians” (Turk-Alvanoi).

West of Ioannina, in present-day Thesprotia in Greece, were the four mountain villages (later eleven villages) of Sulis, inhabited by the Suliotes (who were Orthodox Christian Chams), divided into 47 tribes, of which twelve were the most important. Two of them, the most powerful and influential tribes were in conflict with each other: the Boçari tribe and the Xhavella tribe (with various blood feuds existing between them). The contribution of the Suliotes to the Greek War of Independence would be of considerable value.

Albanian Tosks on the Greek side constituted from a quarter to a third of the army and most of the naval forces, as well as about half of the most capable and respected military commanders. It should also be borne in mind that, as one Greek scholar has expressed it, if there was a “military school of war” in Epirus and the south (in what would become independent Greece) during the Greek Revolution, it was based on the “martial customs of the Albanians”; the Greeks were simply “pupils”.

The most prominent fighters in the Greek land forces, who were Albanian Tosks, were the Suliote generals Marko Boçari, his uncle Noti Boçari and Kiço Xhavella, as well as General the Rumeli (i.e. from central Greece) Odise Andruço, and many others. The most prominent naval commanders, who were Albanian Tosks from Hydra, included Admiral Andrea Mjaulli (Voko), Admiral Iakov Tombazi and many others; while from Speca, there was the most famous female fighter, Captain Laskarina Bouboulina (Pinoçi) and others.

Many Arvanites were active as politicians during the Greek Revolution and in the independent Greek state; a concrete example is the shipowner brothers, Lazar Konturiotis and Gjergj Konturiotis from Hydra, the latter leading the Revolutionary Government for almost three years, before the arrival of Yannis Kapodistrias as governor of Greece in January 1828.

There is also the case of Theodore Kollokotron, the most famous general of the war of independence, who may or may not have been of Albanian origin, and who, like most of the fighters, – whether Albanian or Greek, – spoke Albanian fluently. Albanians today are fully convinced that he was Albanian, while the Greeks that he was Greek.

Some Greek commentators believe that he was probably of Albanian origin, which is disputed by some non-nationalist Greek specialists. Another possibility is that his ancestors were early Hellenized, being a branch of the Albanian emigrants of the 14th century, many of whom were fully or partially Hellenized.

Reference

Nationalism, National Identity and Conflict in Southeast Europe: Towards a Comparative Approach. Author: Alexis Heraclides. Publisher: Transnational Press London, 2025