| HISTORY
> THE
BYZANTINE
EMPIRE
From
Illyria to Albania
When the Roman Empire divided into east and west
in 395, the territories of modern Albania became
part of the Byzantine Empire. As in the Roman
Empire, some Illyrians rose to positions of eminence
in the new empire. Three of the emperors who shaped
the early history of Byzantium (reigning from
491 to 565) were of Illyrian origin: Anastasius
I, Justin I, and--the most celebrated of Byzantine
emperors--Justinian I. In the first decades under
Byzantine rule (until 461), Illyria suffered the
devastation of raids by Visigoths, Huns, and Ostrogoths.
Not long after these barbarian invaders swept
through the Balkans, the Slavs appeared. Between
the 6th and 8th centuries they settled in Illyrian
territories and proceeded to assimilate Illyrian
tribes in much of what is now Slovenia, Croatia,
Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Serbia. The tribes
of southern Illyria, however--including modern
Albania--averted assimilation and preserved their
native tongue. In the course of several centuries,
under the impact of Roman, Byzantine, and Slavic
cultures, the tribes of southern Illyria underwent
a transformation, and a transition occurred from
the old Illyrian population to a new Albanian
one. As a consequence, from the 8th to the 11th
century, the name Illyria gradually gave way to
the name, first mentioned in the 2nd century AD
by the geographer Ptolemy of Alexandria, of the
Albanoi tribe, which inhabited what is now central
Albania. From a single tribe the name spread to
include the rest of the country as Arbri and,
finally, Albania. The genesis of Albanian nationality
apparently occurred at this time as the Albanian
people became aware that they shared a common
territory, name, language, and cultural heritage.
(Scholars have not been able to determine the
origin of Shqip'ria, the Albanians' own name for
their land, which is believed to have supplanted
the name Albania during the 16th and 17th centuries.
It probably was derived from shqipe, or "eagle,"
which, modified into shqipria, became "the land
of the eagle.") Long before that event, Christianity
had become the established religion in Albania,
supplanting pagan polytheism and eclipsing for
the most part the humanistic world outlook and
institutions inherited from the Greek and Roman
civilizations. But, though the country was in
the fold of Byzantium, Albanian Christians remained
under the jurisdiction of the Roman pope until
732. In that year the iconoclast Byzantine emperor
Leo III, angered by Albanian archbishops because
they had supported Rome in the Iconoclastic Controversy,
detached the Albanian church from the Roman pope
and placed it under the patriarch of Constantinople.
When the Christian church split in 1054 between
the East and Rome, southern Albania retained its
tie to Constantinople while northern Albania reverted
to the jurisdiction of Rome. This split in the
Albanian church marked the first significant religious
fragmentation of the country.
Medieval
culture
In the latter part of the Middle Ages, Albanian
urban society reached a high point of development.
Foreign commerce flourished to such an extent
that leading Albanian merchants had their own
agencies in Venice, Ragusa (modern Dubrovnik,
Croatia), and Thessalonica (now Thessaloniki,
Greece). The prosperity of the cities also stimulated
the development of education and the arts. Albanian,
however, was not the language used in schools,
churches, and official government transactions.
Instead, Greek and Latin, which had the powerful
support of the state and the church, were the
official languages of culture and literature.
The new administrative system of the themes, or
military provinces created by the Byzantine Empire,
contributed to the eventual rise of feudalism
in Albania, as peasant soldiers who served military
lords became serfs on their landed estates. Among
the leading families of the Albanian feudal nobility
were the Thopias, Balshas, Shpatas, Muzakas, Aranitis,
Dukagjinis, and Kastriotis. The first three of
these rose to become rulers of principalities
that were practically independent of Byzantium.
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