Cham Albanians
Sub-group of Albanians / From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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Cham Albanians or Chams (Albanian: Çamë; Greek: Τσάμηδες, Tsámidhes), are a sub-group of Albanians who originally resided in the western part of the region of Epirus in southwestern Albania and northwestern Greece, an area known among Albanians as Chameria. The Chams have their own particular cultural identity within Albanian sub-groups. A number of Chams contributed to the Albanian national identity and played an important role in starting the renaissance of the Albanian culture in the 19th century. The Chams speak their own dialect of the Albanian language, the Cham Albanian dialect, which is a Southern Tosk Albanian dialect and one of the two most conservative ones; the other being Arvanitika.
Total population | |
---|---|
c. 170,000[1]–690,000[2][3] | |
Regions with significant populations | |
Albania | 120,000[4]–250,000[2] |
Greece | 44 Muslim Chams,[5] 40,000 Christian Orthodox Chams[2][6] |
Turkey | 80,000–100,000[7] |
United States | 50,000–70,000[2][7] |
Languages | |
Albaniana (Cham Albanian dialect) | |
Religion | |
Islam (majority) Orthodox Christianity (minority) | |
During the late 1930s Chams suffered from intimidation and persecution under the dictatorship of General Metaxas.[2][8] Following the Italian occupation of Albania in 1939, the Chams became a prominent propaganda tool for the Italians and irredentist elements among them became more vocal. As a result, on the eve of the Greco-Italian War, Greek authorities deported the adult male Cham population to internment camps. After the occupation of Greece, large parts of the Muslim Cham population collaborated with Italian and German forces.[9][10][11][12] This fueled resentment among the local Greek population and in the aftermath of World War II the entire Muslim Cham population had to flee to Albania. Most Chams settled in Albania, while others formed émigré communities in Turkey and the United States, and today their descendants continue to live in these countries. Since the fall of Communism in Albania, Chams in Albania have campaigned for right of return to Greece and restoration of confiscated properties. According to Laurie Hart, the remaining Orthodox Cham communities in Epirus are nowadays assimilated and entirely identify with the Greek nation.[13] On the other hand, Bugajski includes the Orthodox among Cham Albanians.[6] In Albania, the Cham dialect and other traditions have been preserved, while in Greece linguistic rights and Orthodox Cham heritage have been suppressed in public space and been subject to assimilation policies. As such, the use of Albanian has been relegated to private space within the household.[14]
Etymology and definition
The name Cham, together with that of the region, Chameria, is from an extinct local Slavic *čamŭ, itself from the local Greek hydronym Thyamis (Θύαμις in Greek, Kalamas in Albanian). Çabej treats Cham as a direct continuation of Thyamis.[15][16] A folk etymology attributes the name to Turkish cami (Greek tzami), literally, 'mosque-goer, mosque attendee' which presumably was used by Orthodox Christians for the descendants of Muslim converts. However, this is unlikely since the word's broader ethnographic and dialectal sense encompasses the entire Albanian-speaking population of the Thesprotia and Preveza regional units of Greek Epirus, both the Muslim and Christian populations.[17][verification needed]
Chams account for the greatest part of the erstwhile substantial Albanian minority in the wider area of the Epirus region; outside Chameria proper, there are only two Albanian-speaking villages further northeast (near Konitsa in Ioannina regional unit), whose inhabitants belong to a different Albanian sub-group, that of the Labs.[18] Today, in the Greek context the use of the term has become largely associated with the former Muslim minority.[18]
Ethnic appellations
Cham Albanians are known primarily by the Albanian form of the name Chams (Çam or Çamë) and the Greek name Tsamides (Τσάμηδες). It can be found in English sources also as a hybrid form of both names, Tsams.[19] Prior to 1944, Greek sources often referred to Chams as Albanophones (Greek: Αλβανόφωνοι)[20][21] or simply Albanians of Epirus.[20]
In Greece, Muslim Chams were referred to by a number of names by different authors. They were called Albanochams (Αλβανοτσάμηδες, Alvanotsamides),[21] and Turkalbanians (Τουρκαλβανοί, Tourkalvanoi)[22] or Turkochams (Τουρκοτσάμηδες, Tourkotsamides).[23] From the middle of the nineteenth century however, the term Turk and from the late nineteenth century onwards, derivative terms such as Turkalvanoi have been used as a pejorative term, phrase and or expression for Muslim Albanian populations by non-Muslim Balkan Peoples.[24][25][26][27][28][29] Amongst the wider Greek-speaking population until the interwar period, the term Arvanitis (plural: Arvanites) was used to describe an Albanian speaker regardless of their religious affiliations.[30] In Epirus today, the term Arvanitis is still used for an Albanian speaker regardless of their citizenship and religion.[30]
At the same time, the Albanian speaking population in Thesprotia, who is very rarely characterized as Christian Chams,[21] is often referred by Greeks as Arvanites (Αρβανίτες),[18] which primarily refers to the Albanophone Greeks of southern Greece but is commonly used as for all Albanian-speaking Greek citizens. The local Greek population also calls them Graeco-Chams (Ελληνοτσάμηδες, Elinotsamides),[21] while Muslim Albanians sometimes designate them as Kaur, which means "infidel" and refers to their religion.[21] This term was used by Muslim Albanians for the non-Muslims during the Ottoman Empire.[21] The term shqiptar ("he/she who speaks clearly"), the Albanian ethnic endonym which came to prevail after the 18th century, was being used by Christian Albanian-speakers in the region as well, but today is used mostly as a means to differentiate themselves from other groups in the region (Greeks, Vlachs). Greek-speakers use the term "skipetaros" (shqiptar) to refer pejoratively to Orthodox Albanian-speakers in Thesprotia.[31][32]
Some Aromanians living the region also use a regional self appellation Tsamuréńi for themselves derived from the words Chameria and Cham.[33]
Chams in Turkey are known by the name Arnauts (Arnavutlar), which applies to all ethnic Albanians in Turkey.[34]
Cham communities now mostly exist in Albania, the United States and Turkey, as a result of their expulsion from their homeland, Chameria in Greece after World War II. A minority still lives in this region.[2]
Chameria
Chameria is the name applied by the Albanians to the region formerly inhabited by the Chams, along the Ionian coast from Konispol to the north to the Acheron valley south. This area corresponds to a few villages in the southern part of the Saranda district in Albania (the municipalities of Konispol, Xarrë and Markat)[36] and to the regional units of Thesprotia and Preveza in Greece.[36][37] This area is part of the larger region of Epirus.
Much of the region is mountainous. Valley farmlands are located the central, southern and the western part of Thesprotia, while the terrain of the Preveza regional unit is mostly hilly. There are two rivers in the region: the Thyamis and Acheron.
The main settlements in which Chams originally resided were: Paramythia,[38] Filiates,[38] Igoumenitsa,[2] Parapotamos,[39] Syvota,[40] Sagiada,[41] Perdika,[40] and Margariti.[21] Preveza and Ioannina also had significant Cham Albanian communities.[42] The Orthodox Chams originally resided in Fanari,[17] Louros[17] and Thesprotiko.[17]
The Albanian speaking exclave of Chameria, in the beginning of the 20th century, was located along the Ionian coast, and apart from Konispol, its northernmost part, it included the western part of Thesprotia prefecture and the northern part of Preveza.[43] In terms of modern Greek administration, the Albanian exclave included the provinces of Thyamis and Margariti and the westernmost villages of the provinces of Paramythia and Filiates. In Preveza prefecture, it included the northern regions such as the Fanari plain, the surroundings of Parga and villages of the upper Acheron valley, with two settlements of the latter region located in Ioannina prefecture.[37]
Albania
After the expulsion of the Muslim Chams from Greece, they were spread throughout Albania. The majority of Muslim Chams settled in the outskirts of Vlorë, Durrës and Tirana. Several hundred Chams moved into properties along the Himara coast and to existing villages along the coast such as Borshi, or established entirely new villages, such as Vrina, near the Greek border.[2]
Diaspora
Some Chams live in Turkey and the United States. The number of Chams in diaspora was estimated by Miranda Vickers in 2007 at 400,000.[2] The first wave of this diaspora left for Turkey during the Greco-Turkish population exchange of 1923. They have populated the areas of Erenköy and Kartal in Istanbul,[44] as well as a number of towns in the area of Bursa, especially Mudanya.[42] After the Second World War, others settled in İzmir, Gemlik and Aydın.[7] After 1944, another part migrated to the United States of America,[2] where they were mainly concentrated in Chicago, as well as Boston and New York City.[45]