MACEDONIA (From Antiquity to Our Time)
INTRODUCTION
Ancient Macedonia as the most celebrated kingdom of the time and Macedonia as a political state created at the end of the twenty-first century, besides its name and an encounter in a geographical part, is only linked through the presence of Albanians who are historically the heirs of ancient Macedonians, part of the Pelasgian-Illyrian world where both the Macedonian and Dardanian kingdoms shared their equal bedding. In this regard, Macedonia appears as an historical name of the Albanians, the same as Epirus, Dardania, and the Illyrian Kingdom.
This stance, however, breaks down the stereotypes so far that the ancient Macedonians and the Macedonians were part of ancient Greece, namely Greek and Greek only. The Pelasgian-Illyrian world affiliation and its kingdoms, breaks down also the issue of Hellenism as exclusively Greek for the undeniable fact that all that appears as an ancient culture and civilization, from myth to philosophy, lies in a pre-civilization bed known as Pelasgian, on which a later one attributed to the Greek civilization was raised. This is widely accepted and proven by both ancient and more recent authors.
“Macedonia from antiquity to our time” does not accidentally deal with breaking these taboos. The claim that Macedonia is part of the Pelasgian-Illyrian world and as such opposes the wrong stereotype of the exclusivity of the affiliation of Greek Hellenism created by the political philosophies of the 19th century erected at that time by well-known European intellectuals and scholars, mostly German and Austrian on the concept of returning to the background of European enlightenment, is much closer to the historical truth than its denial or exclusion by a manipulating and distorting Russian, Greek, Serbian, Bulgarian and other political historians for political purposes, who not accidentally leave Macedonia and the Macedonians outside any relation to Albanians also excluding them from history altogether.
With this same pretense the rise of the Macedonian issue is viewed, from geographical aspect, from the Middle Ages and on, to a political one, as was the case with Russia’s insistence since the Eastern Crisis and onwards, meant to deny the ethnicity Albanian population, divided into four vilayets (Shkodra, Kosova, Mansatir, and Janina), where it was artificially designed upon religious grounds (Orthodox Christianity), to destroy the concept of a common Albanian Vilayet in the Ottoman Empire (a form of an Ottoman Albania that would be restored to a European Albania accordingly). The so-called Krusevo Republic, which emerged after the Ilinden uprising in 1903, and other developments undertaken by Serbia, Greece and Bulgaria in the Albanian vilayets, from a violent turned a geographical issue into an historical context, through converting the orthodox Christianity, initially in ethnicity and later, in accordance with the liturgy language: Greek, Bulgarian and Slavic, into a national affiliation, created political issues in accordance with their hegemonic projects on a key point where its historical and ethnic epicenter lay. As such, at the beginning of the 20th century, Macedonia turned into a political arena that fed regional and world crises (Balkan wars and the world’s big war), mostly beneficial to Tito’s Yugoslavia. By introducing it within the federation and its elevation to a republic, among the six, it eventually brought it out of the Bulgarian, Greek and Russian interests to turn it into a Yugoslav issues, which also needed the creation of a Macedonian political nation as well as a Macedonian language with a Cyrillic alphabet (that of Vuk Karadzić), although from a philological point of view – it retains the characteRistićs of a Bulgarian dialect.
The reincarnation of ancient Macedonia into a political state of Macedonian nation beyond historical criteria, as happened in 1991 after the dissolution of Macedonia, from an aspect of European political pragmatism, certainly with the political agreement between Skopje and Athens on the name “North Macedonia” may receive a “conciliatory” epilogue between geography (on the part of Skopje) and an “acquired historical heritage” (on the part of Athens), though it will not rid it of the abomination that the name “North Macedonia” was part of a Bulgarian project from the year 1906. This, however, does not alter the fact that neither the political nations, such as the Macedonian, based on a recently established Bulgarian-Vlach-Slav amalgam, nor the appropriation of the names of states from that of a world kingdom, such as the ancient Macedonia, in a conjunctive Macedonia, can change historical truths, such as those that the Slav-Macedonian population scattered in its part and that of the Dardanian kingdom have never been part of these ancient kingdoms, the same as it is unable to deny either historical facts or the living realities up to the present, dealing with Albanians – legitimate heirs of ancient Macedonia and its civilization, with traces displayed and preserved in their culture.
In this regard, the book “Macedonia from antiquity to our time”, focusing on historical, political and demographic arguments, treats it within the Albanian issue, not excluding other factors in its entirety (Slav Macedonians and others in line with their role and place in it), though without being involved in controversy with the fictional or distorted facts by numerous Serbian, Bulgarian, Russian, Greek, Macedonian, and other historians who, who have been treating historical facts detached from the whole and largely in line with the political realities, even though they are in contradiction to the very historical truth.
Based on historical arguments – Ancient Macedonia is part of the Dardanian-Illyrian ethnicity. Its appearance in the 5th century BC and its rise to a world empire in the 4th century by Alexander the Great retained its character. This is reflected in the times of the Roman Empire and the Byzantine Empire. This is also reflected at the time of both the Roman and Byzantine Empires. There are no Slavic traces of it because of the well-known reason that they appear in Illyricum sometime after the 7th century, at the time of the Byzantine emperor, Heracles, namely nine centuries later, from where, in the 9th and 10th centuries, after having adopted Christianity, with their tribal formations, and always treated as “barbarians” who are allowed authentic tribal organization (initially zhupanies and later despotates), participate in the social and political life of the Empire. Within this expansion, however, the Bulgarian kingdom and its rise to an important factor in the 9th and 9th centuries played a special role, possibly having influenced the political and social circumstances, but not the ethnic ones, in the Central Illyricum. This fact could not be overwhelmed by the references of geographic Macedonia appearing in the 19th century and its efforts to connect it with the Bulgaria of Boris and Samuil for the creation of Greater Bulgaria as the Peace of St. Stephen of March 1878 decided, and it could not change even by the Belgrade’s notorious propaganda for its identification with “medieval Serbia, though with these “arguments” in 1912 during the Balkan Wars, when in the name of “liberation”, was conquered by the Serbian army .
This fact could not be overwhelmed by the references of geographic Macedonia emerging in the 19th century, and its efforts to connect with the Bulgaria of Boris and Samuil for the creation of a Greater Bulgaria as the Peace of St. Stephen of March 1878 stipulated. It could not be changed even by the well-known Belgrade propaganda identifying it as “medieval Serbia”, although using these “arguments” in 1912, during the Balkan Wars, in the name of “liberation”, was invaded by the Serbian army .
The historical arguments presented in the above, showing a continuity of the Macedonian and the Dardanian kingdoms shared geographically their common ethnic bedding in the spaces of the present day Macedonian state, can be added the political ones. They relate to the Ottoman Empire and its end, as various interests of the Great Powers will emerge in these parts. That is where its rise originates into a wretched political crisis with a view of turning prey to Russian-Slavic claims in accordance with Bulgarian, Serbian and Greek hegemonic programs. In this case, Albanians, included in four vilayets (Kosovo, Shkodra, Manastir and Janina), will appear on their request for a joint autonomous vilayet within the Ottoman Empire, some kind of an Ottoman Albania, on its road to turn into a European Albania at the moment the Ottoman Empire would end.
In this regard, the vilayet of Kosovo, as the largest, the kazas of which comprised much of what appeared to be the geographical area of the Macedonia, or Northern Macedonia respectively, ascribed to the Macedonian political state, becomes the center of political Albanianism, emerging from the program of the Albanian League of Prizren of June 1878, with Skopje (Shkup) as the center of the vilayet, from where the entire national movement of 1908-1912 would be directed leading to the declaration of the Albanian state on 28 November 1912. Similarly, the Vilayet of Manastir was the place where Albanian nationalism kept its cultural center and where the Latin alphabet of the Albanian language was also founded.
In addition to the ethnic and political arguments, there are demographic ones, providing legitimacy of the right to life to the historical right, serving as proof of an uninterrupted presence of Albanians in these lands since antiquity. This reality cannot be overlooked, much less violently bent, as it had been done during the 1912 and 1944-45 genocide and with persistent ethnocide, and even by displacement on state agreements with Turkey from 1936 and 1953, with their executive administration infrastructure being seated in Skopje, in the historic capital of Albanians.