Albanian (endonym: , , or ) is an Indo-European language and the only surviving representative of the Albanic branch, which belongs to the Paleo-Balkan group.; ; ; ; It is the native language of the Albanian people. Standard Albanian is the official language of Albania and Kosovo, and a co-official language in North Macedonia and Montenegro, where it is the primary language of significant Albanian minority communities. Albanian is recognized as a minority language in Italy, Croatia, Romania, and Serbia. It is also spoken by long-established communities in Greece, and by the Albanian diaspora, which is generally concentrated in the Americas, Europe, and Oceania. Albanian is estimated to have as many as 7.5 million native speakers.
Albanian and other Paleo-Balkan languages had their formative core in the Balkans after the Indo-European migrations in the region. Albanian in antiquity is often thought to have been an Illyrian language for obvious geographic and historical reasons,: "It is often thought (for obvious geographic reasons) that Albanian descends from ancient Illyrian (see above), but this cannot be ascertained as we know next to nothing about Illyrian itself.": "Albanian forms its own separate branch of Indo-European; it is the last branch to appear in written records. This is one of the reasons why its origins are shrouded in mystery and controversy. The widespread assertion that it is the modern–day descendant of Illyrian, spoken in much the same region during classical times ([...]), makes geographic and historical sense but is linguistically untestable since we know so little about Illyrian." or otherwise an unmentioned Balkan Indo-European language that was closely related to Illyrian and Messapic. The Indo-European subfamily that gave rise to Albanian is called Albanoid in reference to a specific ethnolinguistically pertinent and historically compact language group. Whether descendants or sisters of what was called 'Illyrian' by classical sources, Albanian and Messapic, on the basis of shared features and innovations, are grouped together in a common branch in the current phylogenetic classification of the Indo-European language family.
The first written mention of the Albanian language was in 1284 in a witness testimony from the Republic of Ragusa, while a letter written by Dominican Friar Gulielmus Adea in 1332 mentions the Albanians using the Latin alphabet in their writings. The oldest surviving attestation of modern Albanian is from 1462. The two main Albanian dialect groups (or varieties), Gheg and Tosk, are primarily distinguished by phonological differences and are mutually intelligible in their standard varieties,: : "The two dialects are mutually intelligible in their standard varieties, although numerous subdialects exist that show considerable variation, especially in the north and northeast of the Geg–speaking area." with Gheg spoken to the north and Tosk spoken to the south of the Shkumbin river.: Their characteristics: : in the treatment of both native words and loanwords provide evidence that the split into the northern and the southern dialects occurred after Christianisation of the region (4th century AD),: "The dialectal split into Geg and Tosk happened sometime after the region became Christianized in the fourth century AD: Christian Latin loanwords show Tosk rhotacism, such as Tosk murgu 'monk' (Geg mungu) from Lat. monachus." and most likely not later than the 6th century AD,: hence possibly occupying roughly their present area divided by the Shkumbin river since the Post-Roman and Pre-Slavic period, straddling the Jireček Line.See also Hamp 1963 The isogloss is clear in all dialects I have studied, which embrace nearly all types possible. It must be relatively old, that is, dating back into the post-Roman first millennium. As a guess, it seems possible that this isogloss reflects a spread of the speech area, after the settlement of the Albanians in roughly their present location, so that the speech area straddled the Jireček Line.:
Centuries-old communities speaking Albanian dialects can be found scattered in Greece (the Arvanites and some communities in Epirus, Western Macedonia and Western Thrace), Croatia (the Arbanasi), Italy (the Arbëreshë) as well as in Romania, Turkey and Ukraine. The Malsia e Madhe Gheg Albanian and two varieties of the Tosk dialect, Arvanitika in Greece and Arbëresh in southern Italy, have preserved archaic elements of the language.. Ethnic Albanians constitute a large diaspora, with many having long assimilated in different cultures and communities. Consequently, Albanian-speakers do not correspond to the total ethnic Albanian population, as many ethnic Albanians may identify as Albanian but are unable to speak the language.Mai, Nicola. "The Albanian diaspora-in-the-making: media, migration and social exclusion." Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies 31, no. 3 (2005): 543–561.de Rapper, Gilles. "Albanians facing the Ottoman past: the case of the Albanian diaspora in Turkey." (2005).Gkaintartzi, Anastasia, Aspasia Chatzidaki, and Roula Tsokalidou. "Albanian parents and the Greek educational context: Who is willing to fight for the home language?." International Multilingual Research Journal 8, no. 4 (2014): 291–308.
Standard Albanian is a standardised form of spoken Albanian based mainly on Tosk.
Geographic distribution
The language is spoken by approximately 6 million people in the Balkans, primarily in Albania, Kosovo, North Macedonia, Serbia, Montenegro and Greece. However, due to old communities in Italy (originating from Skanderbeg's times) and the large Albanian diaspora, the worldwide total of speakers is much higher than in Southern Europe and numbers approximately 7.5 million.
Europe The Albanian language is the official language of Albania and Kosovo and a co-official language in North Macedonia and Montenegro. Albanian is a recognised minority language in Croatia, Italy, Romania and in Serbia. Albanian is also spoken by a minority in Greece, specifically in the Thesprotia and Preveza regional units and in a few villages in Ioannina and Florina regional units in Greece. It is also spoken by 450,000 Albanian immigrants in Greece, making it one of the commonly spoken languages in the country after Greek.
Albanian is the third most common mother tongue among foreign residents in Italy. This is due to a substantial Albanian immigration to Italy. Italy has a historical Albanian minority of about 500,000, scattered across southern Italy, known as Arbëreshë. Approximately 1 million Albanians from Kosovo are dispersed throughout Germany, Switzerland and Austria. These are mainly immigrants from Kosovo who migrated during the 1990s. In Switzerland, the Albanian language is the sixth most spoken language with 176,293 native speakers.
Albanian became an official language in North Macedonia on 15 January 2019, due to the large Albanian minority in North Macedonia.
Americas There are large numbers of Albanian speakers in the United States, Argentina, Chile, Uruguay, and Canada. Some of the first ethnic Albanians to arrive in the United States were part of the Arbëreshë community. The Arbëreshë have a strong sense of identity and are unique in that they speak an archaic dialect of Tosk Albanian called Arbëresh.
In the United States and Canada, there are approximately 250,000 Albanian speakers. It is primarily spoken on the East Coast of the United States, in cities like New York City, Boston, Chicago, Philadelphia, and Detroit, as well as in parts of the states of New Jersey, Ohio, and Connecticut.
In Argentina, there are nearly 40,000 Albanian speakers, mostly in Buenos Aires.
Asia and Africa Approximately 1.3 million people of Albanian ancestry live in Turkey, with more than 500,000 recognizing their ancestry, language, and culture. There are other estimates, however, that place the number of people in Turkey with Albanian ancestry and or background upward to 5 million. However, the vast majority of this population is assimilated and no longer possesses fluency in the Albanian language, though a vibrant Albanian community maintains its distinct identity in Istanbul to this day.
Egypt also lays claim to about 18,000 Albanians, mostly Tosk speakers. Many are descendants of the Janissary of Muhammad Ali Pasha, an Albanian who became Wāli, and self-declared Khedive of Egypt and Sudan. In addition to the dynasty that he established, a large part of the former Egyptian and Sudanese aristocracy was of Albanian origin. In addition to the recent emigrants, there are older diasporic communities around the world.
Oceania Albanian is also spoken by Albanian diaspora communities residing in Australia and New Zealand.
Number of native speakers The following table provides data on the number of native Albanian speakers by country, according to the most recent publicly available sources. The number of speakers is presented as an absolute value for the total population, obtained by projecting the valid answers to the total population (thus not taking into account unanswered questionnaires, missing data or excluded age ranges).
CountrySpeakersPercentageSourceDefinitionNotes2,347,70097.7%2023 censusAdult literacy rateThe population aged 15 years and over.11,5100.05%2021 censusLanguage spoken at home28,2120.35%2001 censusColloquial language2,4200.07%2013 censusMother tongue32,3050.09%2021 censusMother tongue13,5760.35%2021 censusMother tongue and 54,0450.09%2021 censusMain languageUsual residents aged 3 years and over.17,7790.32%2023 official surveyMother tongue601,0000.73%2024 microcensusLanguage spoken at home374,9263.57%2021 censusCitizenshipBetter source needed. Used Albanian citizens for a rough estimate.420,9550.71%2011 official surveyMother tongueOnly foreign residents aged 6 and over. Does not include Arbëresh language.1,485,17092.7%2024 censusMother tongueThe census was partly boycotted by Kosovo Serbs.1,3570.24%2021 censusMain language32,7155.25%2023 censusMother tongue13,4660.08%2022 official surveyAncestry from Albania and Kosovo481,80026.23%2023 censusMother tongue69,5701.04%2022 censusMother tongue7,3730.38%2002 censusMother tongue306,5073.39%2023 official surveyMain language186,6210.06%2023 official surveyLanguage spoken at homePopulation 5 years and olderTotal6,489,007
Dialects
Albanian Tosk Northern Tosk Labërisht Cham Arvanitika Arbëresh Gheg Northwest Gheg Northeast Gheg Central Gheg Southern Gheg
The Albanian language has two distinct dialects, Tosk which is spoken in the south, and Gheg spoken in the north.Gjinari, Jorgji. Dialektologjia shqiptare Standard Albanian is based on the Tosk dialect. The Shkumbin River is the rough dividing line between the two dialects.The river Shkumbin in central Albania historically forms the boundary between those two dialects, with the population on the north speaking varieties of Geg and the population on the south varieties of Tosk. (page 23) Concise Encyclopedia of Languages of the World By Keith Brown, Sarah Ogilvie Contributor Keith Brown, Sarah Ogilvie Edition: illustrated Published by Elsevier, 2008 ,
Gheg is divided into four sub-dialects: Northwest Gheg, Northeast Gheg, Central Gheg and Southern Gheg. It is primarily spoken in northern Albania, Kosovo, and throughout Montenegro and northwestern North Macedonia. One fairly divergent dialect is the Upper Reka dialect, which is however classified as Central Gheg. There is also a diaspora dialect in Croatia, the Arbanasi dialect.