Oliver Jens Schmitt: I never wrote that Skanderbeg is of pure Serbian origin

In a long interview for "Milosao", the well-known historian Oliver Jens Schmitt shows some of the misunderstandings about his monograph, but also the way in which he saw Skenderbeu. He says that he respects the figure of Skenderbeu, while the goal was to reconstruct the figure of the national hero of the Albanians in the Middle Ages. Once again he explains the motives of the main hero's war and the way he handled it.

To this day, the author dares to say that he does not understand the reaction that the Albanian public and some historians had for his book. Was it worth all that energy to disprove this extraordinary figure?

"I still wonder why so many participants who took part in this debate believed that a historian could deliberately denigrate Skënderbeu and how it can be thought that years of scientific research have been dedicated to the sole purpose of harming Albanian society. I still have the impression that the ideology of the country surrounded by Enver Hoxha, the extreme xenophobia, the hysterical belief in conspiracy theories and the enemies, were the ones who put the Albanian people under siege continuously; this poisonous legacy of Enverist's time had and still retains a strong influence on the reaction of many people. Under Enver Hoxha's regime, historiography was a state enterprise, historians were under close control and fulfilled a political mission with their work. With this experience in mind, many people still cannot imagine that historical research was done elsewhere under completely different conditions." he says.

The author is critical of the way history is made in our country, but here he finds the fault in politics and its introduction today in every aspect of Albanian life. While it sheds light on the fact that his monograph was criticized mostly by those who had not read the book at all, but he understood them because this is a common phenomenon in Albania, according to Schmitt.

Schmitt, who already holds the position of president of the Humanities and Social Sciences Sector and also a member of the Presidency of the Austrian Academy of Sciences, once again tackles the debate regarding Skanderbeg's ethnicity and explains the reason because the nobility of Skanderbeg's time, as a degree of dignity aristocratic, there was also intersection with other ethnicities.

"At the end of the Middle Ages, there was a strong Orthodox network of kinship ties in the Balkans. Politically, Byzantium was weak, but the imperial idea was alive, as was the prestige of Byzantine-Orthodox power. Linguistic or ethnic difference did not play a major role for social elites. As in other parts of Europe, the nobility was of multi-ethnic origin, and the more important to the environment a noble was, the more extensive and multi-ethnic his kinship network would be. The idea of ​​ethnic purity simply did not exist in this environment of the elite...", he says for "Milosao".

Interviewed by: Ben Andoni

In the space of a few years, Albania has made two big commemorations regarding Skënderbeu. Do you think that his figure can still come to our times as a symbol of identity in history?

"It is up to the Albanian society to answer this question. Of course, today's government, like many governments before it since the founding of independent Albania, would give a positive answer. Skenderbeu certainly represents an overview of Albanian debates about the identity and place of Albanians in Europe, the Mediterranean and the Islamic World. Albanian identity has been negotiated and renegotiated almost regularly with the question of what it constitutes

Skanderbeg for him. Even the Islamists who do not accept it as a national symbol indirectly recognize Skanderbeg's decisive position in identity debates.

You have done a very interesting paper about our national hero and the confrontation with the Albanian public was not good. Did you expect this kind of reaction that continues to this day? Have you ever felt threatened?

"The threats came immediately after the publication of the Albanian translation when people were incited by Ismail Kadare, nationalist politicians and journalists, and the insults continued for quite a long time. I did not expect this kind of reaction because I believe that the book emphasizes the importance of Skanderbeg in Balkan and European history and treats him as a major figure of his time.

I still wonder why so many participants who took part in this debate believed that a historian could deliberately denigrate Skënderbeu and how it is possible to think that years of scientific research have been dedicated to the sole purpose of harming Albanian society. I still have the impression that the ideology of the country surrounded by Enver Hoxha, the extreme xenophobia, the hysterical belief in conspiracy theories and the enemies, were the ones who put the Albanian people under siege continuously; this poisonous legacy of Enverist's time had and still retains a strong influence on the reaction of many people. Under Enver Hoxha's regime, historiography was a state enterprise, historians were under close control and fulfilled a political mission with their work. With this experience in mind, many people still cannot imagine that historical research was done elsewhere under completely different conditions.

During these years I had the opportunity to give lectures in Pristina and Tetovo and I discussed with students, colleagues and many people I met during my visits to Kosovo, Albania and Macedonia. We also openly discussed the conspiracy theories that were circulated by politicians and journalists in Albania and the fact that many topics of public debate had no connection or only a vague connection with the content of the book. In these personal meetings, my experience has always been positive – mainly because I could show that my book looks at Skanderbeg as a truly impressive historical figure and traversed him as a major actor in late medieval European history and that he never I wrote that Skanderbeg is of pure Serbian origin. I can repeat once again that this is an invention and not a thesis of my book.

In fact, the debate showed that many people discussed a book they had never read – a phenomenon that is certainly not unique or specific to Albania and can be observed in many other cases. In retrospect, I believe the debate had more to do with political dynamics, party interests and personal interests than a genuine scientific debate about scientific content and interpretations."

Have you had any invitation from the Albanian authorities for the celebrations on Skenderbeu?

"I was invited, unfortunately, just three weeks before the celebration, to participate in the commemoration of Skanderbeg on January 17."

In your book, Skenderbeu is very human and assumes humane proportions, which make him lovable and very touchable as a figure. The introduction talks about the historical reconstruction on the basis of all usable and weighty sources. Was one of the goals to demystify Skanderbeg?

"This is one of the main misunderstandings of the whole debate. The book aims to reconstruct the figure of Skenderbeu in the Middle Ages and does not aim to deconstruct the historical myth, which naturally constitutes an impressive phenomenon of Albanian culture. Of course, readers are free to draw conclusions and make interpretations of the book within the context of the myth debate.

national, even a debate which takes place in many European countries and this is extremely important for the creation of a democratic culture in Albania. The debate in 2008/2009 showed how strong are the authoritarian structures that derive from the totalitarian past that is still felt in Albania. Over the past ten years, unfortunately, there has been no significant improvement in this situation.

Because of the great influence of Enverist historiography and the absence of a non-Enverist tradition of institutionalized scientific system, many people were and still are not aware of the mechanisms of scientific debate in the Western world, but are immediately offended by interpretations that they do not know and which they did not learn in school. The idea that historians are not scholars paid by their universities, but agents paid by governments, is still widespread, and is promoted by those who write entire books on this idea with invented speculation, without any evidence - and there seem to be readers who are more prepared to believe baseless theories than to reflect critically on the mechanisms of public debates in Albania. This is also a legacy of the totalitarian past and partly also a direct consequence of the involvement of historians in political life".

The documents you have brought, but also those who have treated Skenderbeu before you, show a historical figure with many approaches. Do you think that there is still a lot of undiscovered documentation about Skanderbeg and how much they can influence in the future on his reflection?

“As far as I have been able to see, after more than 150 years of systematic research in European archives, it is somewhat impossible to discover major archival units; I cannot judge the situation of the Ottoman archives, but apart from tax registers and chronicles, there are very few specific documents directly addressed to Skanderbeg. This does not exclude the possibility of discoveries, mainly of special documents belonging to the 15th century; but they will be able to come to us mostly by chance. We must not forget that important archives such as those of Rome, Venice (or: Venice) and Naples, which are decisive for Skanderbeg, suffered great losses (in the 16th century, in Naples in 1943), while the archives medieval in Albania and the surrounding area (with the exception of the archive in Dubrovnik) are almost completely disappeared. While new documents related to the shaping of Skanderbeg's life will be rare, research on sources related to the time after his death will continue, this and because of his European fame, as there are many booklets and publications others from the early modern period (XVI-XVIII centuries) and from the XIX waiting to be discovered. But most of them will mainly rely on Barleti as a source and therefore will not be able to provide new evidence".

What segments of his life are most documented?

"It is clear: the period when he came into close contact with the Italian world and when he became an important figure in European politics and not just the son of a regional noble who served in the Ottoman army. This is why we know so much about his last years and why up to 1443 sources are so few."

You value Skenderbeu personally as a figure, while your thesis about the beginning and the motive of his revenge has caused some of the Albanian researchers to look at this thesis as old and unsound. Do you still stand by this thesis?

"Yes. But let me repeat what I explained in my book: namely, that the uprising had several motives that are mainly structural: resistance against the Ottoman fiscal and judicial system, against direct Ottoman rule; in fact, motives that we can also detect in most of the uprisings against the Ottoman rule until 1912. Self-government, not paying taxes, preserving regional legal traditions are the usual classical demands of Albanians under the Ottoman imperial rule. In 1443, the leader of the rebellion also had a personal motive of revenge. But this motive does not explain the entire uprising, although many people who have not read the book still go ahead and claim that it does. So there was a complicated combination of motives."

The name in the Middle Ages did not indicate the ethnic origin at all, but somehow the cultural influence of the time. In Skanderbeg's family, we have marriage ties with Slavic princes and his mother from Polog. How did ethnic groups in the Balkans live and cooperate in the 14th and 15th centuries?

"At the end of the Middle Ages, there was a strong Orthodox network of kinship ties in the Balkans. Politically, Byzantium was weak, but the imperial idea was alive, as was the prestige of Byzantine-Orthodox power. Linguistic or ethnic difference did not play a major role for social elites. As in other parts of Europe, the nobility was of multi-ethnic origin, and the more important to the environment a noble was, the more extensive and multi-ethnic his kinship network would be. The idea of ​​ethnic purity simply did not exist in this elite environment.

Certainly there was no ethnic antagonism between the Slavs (Orthodox and Catholics, Serbs, Bulgarians and Croats/Dalmatians – there was no Slavic bloc either then or later) and the Albanians – who did not even constitute a compact ethnic entity and of course they did not act as such: the Catholic Albanians from Shkodra, the Dukagjins and the Islamicized Albanians fought against Skënderbeu; many Orthodox Albanians in the South did not join his uprising, while South Slavs and Vlachs can be found among his supporters".

Does the grave of Skanderbeg's brother in Hilandër, in the Serbian monastery on Mount Athos, have any significance?

"It shows the family's connection with the Byzantine-Orthodox tradition and its will to express its political and social position in a place that is a symbol of the Orthodox faith. The fact that Kastrioti chose Hilandar is related to their network of connection and power in an area (Diber) that was under the rule of the Serbian crown from the beginning of the 14th century."

If we are going to talk about the same state structure that Skenderbeu achieved, is it possible to talk about the economic mechanism that maintained this structure?

"Skenderbeu's power system was financed by trade, mainly by the export of grain and wood, by subsidies from the Italian powers, by looting and raids in Ottoman territories; Skanderbeg had a bank deposit in Dubrovnik and thus had access to the Mediterranean banking system.

Skenderbeu's activity extends into the 15th century. It is one of the most interesting centuries for civilization. Do you think that including him in this century with more international touch would help the true size of this figure?

"The 15th century was a period of great change in the Balkans and the Ottoman threat of course, a fact that increased the strategic importance of the Balkans for Central and Western Europe. This explains the great interest of the political leaders and opinion of the West of the late medieval period for Skanderbeg, who was considered a political ally and a symbol of Christian resistance against the Ottoman wave. Apart from the Enverist scholars, who stick to an isolating ahistorical paradigm, most researchers have tried to analyze Skenderbeu in a wider framework of European and Mediterranean dimensions".

Biography theory today provides interesting models of narratives with historical analytical insights. Do you think you have achieved this in your historical account of Skanderbeg?

"There is a sophisticated debate about biography as a literary genre and the academic genre with which I myself am very familiar. I do not dwell specifically on these theories in my book, but the reader will find in it a detailed discussion of the methods and sources I have used."

What challenges await the illumination of the image of Skanderbeg in the future?

"If by the word enlightenment you mean new scientific interpretations, I am quite skeptical because many arguments have been presented so far in almost more than 150 years of research.

Skenderbeu, however, will continue to be a reflection of identity debates in Albania, Kosovo, Macedonia and the surrounding countries. Currently, there are several interpretations, Enverist, renaissance nationalist, Europeanist, Christian (Catholic and Orthodox), Muslim and Islamist, all of which have more or less expressed an authoritarian tendency; the second main trend is a critical and liberal interpretation that deconstructs the oppressive ideological models that lie behind the approaches mentioned above.

Unfortunately, liberal voices had a tough approach in 2008, and the debate that seems to be starting again shows that there has not been much change in the meantime, at least at the level of the political and cultural elites. Unfortunately, nothing new is appearing under the sun where we live.

There is still the claim that only professional historians can comment on Skanderbeg, but not high-profile intellectuals. This is also a legacy of the time of Enverism: historians certainly have a professional training, apply a scientific methodology and theory. But they cannot be exclusive administrators or owners of the past and have no right to exclude intellectuals from public debate. This is contrary to the culture of public debate in the democratic world.

Let me be clear: Intellectuals like Fatos Lubonja have done much more for the analysis of Albanian society than almost all professional historians in Albania and Kosovo combined - not to mention his significant contribution to the development of a critical spirit in Albania. Lubonja is an intellectual highly appreciated internationally, while his opponents are almost completely unknown outside of Albania.

I think that the "year of Skanderbeg" will show to what extent Albania is capable of structuring and tolerating a debate, where different voices can be heard - or whether the debate will send a message to Albania and the outside world that authoritarian structures and the totalitarian legacy not only lingers, but still prevails in the minds of opinion makers. The start of the debate unfortunately also shows the direction of the future direction.

One may also ask whether the excessive debate (since most arguments have been exchanged many times, the last time in 2008/09), which has been initiated by the government, does not divert public attention from important questions that Albania needs to address : rule of law, strengthening of institutions, improvement of democratic culture, media freedom, fight against corruption and organized crime, economic development and above all prospects for the new generation in order to stop brain drain and emigration.

Evoking national pride and glorifying the national hero in a way that has nothing to do with scientific research and debate is, in my view, primarily a political agenda – we are witnessing new waves of nationalism in the Balkans, a new authoritarianism that is also appears in Albania. Albanian citizens should also ask why politicians start a debate about Skënderbeu and what this discussion really means for modern Albania".

What is the researcher Oliver Schmitt dealing with nowadays?

"Since July 2017, I am the President of the Humanities and Social Sciences Sector and also a member of the Presidency of the Austrian Academy of Sciences. I am responsible for the recently established department of Balkan studies at the Academy, which focuses on Albanian studies. At the moment I am finishing a publication of the Austro-Hungarian consular reports on the Ottoman vilayet of Kosovo and the first years of the Serbian occupation (1870-1914) in five volumes". /milosao/