Summary
This scholarly text refutes the idea that Albanians only reached the Prizren area during Ottoman times. Using medieval Serbian and Venetian documents (especially from Stefan Dušan’s era and 1416 Shkodër), it demonstrates a strong Albanian Christian presence west of Prizren already in the 14th century. Albanian names were typically double (Christian first name + village/tribal surname) and show closer ties to Byzantine Greek and Dalmatian Romance culture than to Slavic.
The Medieval Albanian Presence West of Prizren and the Christian Character of Albanian Personal Names
It can be proven with a hundred pieces of evidence that the widespread view in our time — that the Albanian element only advanced eastward, for example into the region of Prizren, during the Turkish period — is erroneous.
The village of Dobrušta, west of Prizren on the White Drin, in the time of Stefan Dušan, when it belonged to the monastery of Chilandar as a metochion (dependency), provided the monks with 6 vojnici (soldiers), one of whom bore the Albanian name Gin the White (Гинь Белн).
— Florinskij, Monuments of the Legislative Activity of Dušan, p. 50.
In Prizren itself, during the time of the same emperor, there appear a potter named Lješ (Аѣшь грънчарь), a Gjon with his son Malьcь, and a Gin the Crab-Eyed (Гинь Ракошча).
— Glasnik 15, pp. 270–271.
The personal names of medieval Albanians reveal them to have been an old Christian population of relatively urban culture, which stood closer to the Byzantine Greeks and the Dalmatian Romance peoples than to the Slavs.
The Albanian usually carried two names. The first was generally a Christian given name, rarely an old Romance or national one; the second was a family name, in most cases the name of a village or tribe, less often a designation of a personal characteristic.
The richest material comes from Serbian monastery charters, especially that of Dečani (1330) and the Venetian cadastral register of Shkodër (1416).
We see that most Albanians at that time were named:
Alexa (also Ljes), Andreas, Bencho, Benedictus, Constantinus, Dminko, Dominicus, Dmitr, Demetrius, Giergi (or in Greek Calozorzi), Gin or Ghin (Johannes), Gon or Jon (also Johannes), Lazar, Leo, Marin, Marko, Mauricius, Michael, Peter, Paul, Pelegrin, Sergius, Stephan, Zacharias, etc.
National given names include, for example: Barda (bardhi = white), Bitri, Gonoma or Jonima, Lalosius, Lecha, Progon.
Romance names (also known in Dalmatia) are: Tanuš / Tanusius (a Roman name), Calens / Calenda, Masi, Magius, Madius, Menchesi (fem. Mencha), Margaritus.
Slavic influence from the neighborhood is noticeable in names such as Dabiživ, Radomir, Radogost, Bogdan, Vojin, Vlad, Golêm (Church Slavic and Bulgarian for “great” — Γουλάμος, lord of Arbanum in Akropolites; cf. AslPh 21, 87; a Голѣмь in the 1330 Dečani charter).
The second names are mostly known from the geographical nomenclature of the Middle Ages and modern times: e.g. Gin Doclesse and Giergi Doclesse (probably from old Doclea), and similar derivatives.
…Dečani charter, p. 120.
Village Egressi (Starine 14, 36), Nerazi (Непачь), Bušat (Боушать), Bussati near Shkodër, Tuzi (katoūnь Arьbanasь Аѣшь Тоудь).
Village Tusi, where almost all inhabitants bear this surname (Starine 14, 34) — today Tuzi near Podgorica.
Sissi, Petar, Kouch — today the Kuči tribe in Montenegro.
Grouemiri (Alb. “the beautiful woman”), Samarisi, Leporonsi, Spatari, Gasoli, Precali, Malizori, Schirelli (Shkreli), etc.
Non-geographical surnames include, for example, Voglić (or Vogali = small), Sesa (black), Mira (beautiful/good), Bochomiri / Buchemir (“good bread”). Village name Suma (Marko Souma, p. 121). Somma / Summa still appears in the Shkodër cadastre and today in Shkodër. Similarly Burmad. Compare also Bisdos (Бнсьдось) or Busadosa (Pavlь Bousadosa), some Butadossi (1416) near Shkodër, Piserag (Pelegrinь Pnseragь), Jon Pissarago, Marin Pissarache, etc.
The descendants of the ancient Illyrians have been designated in the Middle Ages since the 11th century as Ἀλβανοί, Ἀρβανοί, Ἀλβανῖται, Αρβανίται, Albanenses, Arbanenses, Albanesi, Arbanesi (in the Ragusa archives from 1320 onward), and later in Slavic as Arbanasi.
The name is of ancient origin. Already Ptolemy mentions a tribe of Ἀλβανοί in the mountains northeast of Dyrrhachion with a city called Ἀλβανόπολις. Hahn (Alb. Studien I, 120–121) located this in the ruins now called Skurtéše at the western foot of the mountain of Krujë. Krujë was also the center of the medieval region Ἄρβανον / Ἄλβανον (Arbanum, Slavic Rabana). This region stretched from the Albanian Alps between the Lim and Drin rivers to the mountains south of Elbasan.
Toward the end of the Middle Ages, the name of Albania began to spread from there in all directions. The Albanians themselves (including those in Greece and Southern Italy) know the name in the Tosk dialect as Arber, Arbëresh, Arbenor; the Albanian (Geg: Arbení; Tosk: Arberí); and Albania in general, especially the areas around Durrës and Vlorë.
A younger name, unknown to the Albanians who migrated to Greece and Italy in the 14th–15th centuries, is Shqiptar (Geg: Shqipëní; Tosk: Shqipërí). Gustav Meyer (Etym. Wörterbuch der alb. Sprache, p. 411) derives it from shqipoj “I understand” (from Latin excipio), thus Shqiptar originally meaning “the one who understands.”
A trace of this designation appears in a medieval family name. In Drisht there was a family Schepuder (1368), Scapuder (1370), Schipudar, Schibudar, etc. A certain presbyter Petrus Sch. de Driuasto, canon of the bishopric, who held the revenues of the bishopric in lease and frequently visited Ragusa (where he died in 1399), is mentioned from 1368 onward.
The first mention of the lingua albanesesca that I found is in a 1285 court case in Ragusa concerning a thief who stole in the village of Petrus de Volcio in Belen (now Plat in the Breno valley). The witness Matheus filius Marci de Mençe says he heard “unam vocem clamantem in monte lingua albanesesca” (a voice shouting on the mountain in the Albanian language), after which he saw “unum Albanensem”…
…he saw one carrying grapes and duas scopinas plenas musto (two baskets full of must/grape juice).
Diversa 1284–1285, in the archive of the Imperial-Royal District Court, designated as Div. Canc. 1275.
At the close of the Middle Ages there were very many Albanians in Ragusa — merchants and craftsmen, but especially monks and clergymen from the mountains of northern Albania. This was at a time when, during the flourishing of trade and shipping, theological studies held little attraction for the Ragusans themselves.
Source
Jireček, Konstantin. “Die Albanesen in den Städten und auf dem Lande.” In Geschichte der Serben, vol. 2, oder aus seinen Aufsätzen zur albanischen Geschichte und Philologie.
