Ethnography of Albanian mountain tribes during WWI in the works of Karel Sellner
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Ethnography of Albanian mountain tribes during WWI in the works of Karel Sellner Robert Dobra ABSTRACT Utilizing both published and archival materials, this paper covers the accounts of Karel Sellner from his stay in northern Albanian mountains during World War I.Primarily, it aims to explore Sellner’s views regarding the local tribal society and to present his respective work, which is connected to both Albanian studies, ethnography and (to alesser extent) Czech historiography, in regards to the engagement of Czech people in the Austro-Hungarian army during the last days of its existence. Since the author’s original work was written exclusively in Czech, this article also emphasizes direct quotes on the topic from his books, personal correspondence and other archival materials. KEYWORDS Albania, kanun, tribal society, blood feud, ethnography, travelogue, World War 1 Amongst those, who historically brought insights into the life of Northern Albanian mountain tribes were several, who stumbled upon this vast treasury of customs and often romanticised tribal identities by arelative coincidence. In this aspect, Karel Sellner (October 23rd 1873— February 24th 1955), to whom this paper is dedicated to, is no exception. Sellner was primarily ateacher, writer and educator, who’s interests also extended into amateur archeology and most prominently the field of literature. Over the years of his activity, he published abroad portfolio of educative works mostly related to his home region of Mladá Boleslav situated in Central Bohemia, where he also collected local folk legends1 and, more importantly for the purpose of this paper, also published two works regarding his experiences from Albania later in his life. The first of these two, Vtajemné zemi (“In amysterious land”), was atravelogue from his stay in northern Albanian mountains in 1916–1918, which was published in Prague in 1925— it was Sellner’s long-term literary affliction, along with the character of his task and the place where he was stationed, that allowed him to extend the usual scope of the accounts provided by most of his fellow soldiers stationed in Albania and bring amuch wider set of information pertaining his experiences (especially in connection to the population living under the influence of the local customary law, kanun). The second work of his which pertains to this country, Pohádky májových večerů (“Fairytales of May evenings”), is acollection of Sellner’s tales which also incorporates several notes regarding his other experiences from the forementioned period.2 Curiously enough, these are not reproduced tales stemming 1 The summary of Karel Sellner’s archival fond in the The Museum of Czech Literature Literary Archive. Available online (in Czech): http://www.badatelna.eu/fond/2802/uvod/6104 2 Most prominently, Sellner thereby describes an Albanian Catholic school in the village of Zejmen in detail (Sellner 1925b). OPEN ACCESS
84 STUDIA ETHNOLOGICA PRAGENSIA 2/2019 from the local oral tradition but his original works, inspired and based partly on actual northern Albanian folklore and customs and partly on his own experiences. Although Sellner’s engagement in this matter could be seen as aone-time effort in the context of his own professional orientation, it is worth considering that he spent atotal of almost ayear and two months in the northern Albanian mountains, collecting aconsiderable amount of material, publishing the two forementioned books on the topic and also organizing lectures about Albania in Bohemia during the years following his return. Notably, his works on Albania remained largely unreflected so far— this is perhaps because the focus of amajority of Sellner’s works was very different to this topic (also, the title of his most comprehensive work relating to Albania does not directly suggest to have any connection to the country, the Balkans or the given era). Sellner’s journey to the northern Albanian mountains began in July 1916, after being drafted to the Austro-Hungarian military and following aseveral months long stay in aofficers’ academy in the Hungarian city of Kecskemét. He first arrived to Albania in April 1917 to serve as amember of amilitary engineering corps, main task of his unit being to build aroad connecting the southern border of today’s Kosovo (by then also occupied by the Austro-Hungarian forces) and the Albanian town of Milot (in adirection almost identical to today’s Rruga eKombit highway). It was the rather slow-paced progress of the task and several changes of his place of stay that opened Fig. 1One of the typical fortified towers (kulla) that Sellner depicted. OPEN ACCESS
RObERT DObRA 85 the door for Sellner to widely interact with the indigenous population, that being mainly in the regions of Mirdita and Mat. Substantial part of Sellner’s comrades, many of whom also served in technical roles, were also of Czech origin— leading to the author calling Northern Albanian mountains during the First World War a“small Czech republic” (Sellner, 1925: 29)— indeed, there are many available surviving accounts of Czech soldiers serving on the Albanian front of World War 1.3 However, in contrary to Sellner’s work, most of them consist of personal correspondence and other literary works that in most cases reflect solely personal experiences pertaining to the war itself (Vinš, 2006). The large number of Czech soldiers, their works and their correspondence sent back to their homeland also served as the first wider chance for the Czechs to gain information about acountry only very little known until then in Czech society (Hradečný, Hladký, Pikal, 2010). As Sellner states: „(In Bohemia) Albania was, until the Austro-Hungarian occupation in 1916, even less known than the hinterlands of Africa, the Australian desert or the mysterious forests of Brasil“.4 Describing his journey to Albania in spring 1917, Sellner stated that: “the train keeps filling up with new victims of war, and as far as Ican tell from the conversations, they are teachers. Inow understand the much needed participation of educators in the war. It is not easy to keep us under control back home. The old ones can be silenced and intimidated easily, but the new generation— the Czech one— is very dangerous to the idea of the Austrian state and the whole course of the conflict“ (Sellner, 1925a: 7). While he perceived the reasons for his involuntarily departure as such, it should be noted that in general, military service in Albania was often not perceived as apunishment by Czech soldiers5— rather than that, they seemingly appreciated that the conditions were not as tense as they were elsewhere on the Balkans front and some of them had even volunteered 3 Several hundreds to several thousands of Czech captives previously serving in the AustroHungarian military also perished during the ill-famed retreat of Serbian army towards the Adriatic sea at the end of 1915. Jan Laška, asoldier of Czech origin later to become alegionnaire in Italy and adiplomat, provided astriking account of the events in his book Pochod hladu Albanií (The March of Hunger Through Albania) published in 1920. Another such account of these events was also provided by Rudolf Procházka in his book Vsrbském zajetí— oživotě vNiši ana útěku Albanií 1914–1915 (In Serbian Captivity— about the life in Niš and escape to Albania 1914–1915). 4 Regarding his own perception of Albania before the war, Sellner mentions reading several romantic novels pertaining to the region from various authors and also news articles published in the Czech media regarding to the Balkan Wars. Other than that, he claims “previously knowing almost nothing at all” (Sellner 1925a: 22). 5 The number of Czechs on the Albanian front is amatter seldom reflected and might also spark another question, pertaining to how Austro-Hungarian military command supposedly did not trust the Czech element— to the extent of showing atendency to station regular soldiers of Czech origin somewhere, where the course of war could not be directly influenced by their nationalist tendencies and brotherly feelings towards the Slavic enemy (that potentially being the Albanian and also Italian front). Nevertheless, the myth pertaining to this phenomenon, which tells of often deserting, sabotaging and cowardous Czech soldier in Austro-Hungarian service has already been largely proved to be largely misleading (Fučík, 2006). OPEN ACCESS
86 STUDIA ETHNOLOGICA PRAGENSIA 2/2019 to be stationed in the country (Vinš, 2006). As Sellner himself later states: „One can live fairly well in Albania. The service is not perilous, but there is still danger. The mountain tribes are wild and still cannot cope with the Austrian occupation. . . . The boys take pleasure in the fact that they can stay out of things. They live the way the want to and they arrange for themselves as if they were at home“. The information that Sellner provides in his accounts from the year and two months spent in northern Albanian mountains is of arelatively wide scope, and pertains not only to local historical and political kind of information, but also both to certain kind of auto-biography (regarding the life of his and his comrades) and to acertain kind of asoldier’s ethnography. While it may not be unusual that an individual participating in aconflict brings information pertaining to the culture and life of the local (indigenous) population, in the case of Albania during the World War I, this seems to be arather rare occurrence, given that not many such sources were brought to light until this day. Regarding the biographic information that Sellner provides, it is clearly influenced by author’s authentic (in case of his 1925 works perhaps even post-war) sentiments and encompases long-time interactions with his family and comrades, the tasks of his fellow soldiers, their interactions with the local population and generally their life during his stay in the mountains. Sellner’s accounts also involve information regarding the material conditions in which the local population lived— he describes several Albanian households in detail and in general points out the striking poverty of many families that he met and the simple level of technologies used by the locals: „(Iam sending you apicture) of an Albanian cart: its wheels have been cut from awhole trunk. Ihave never seen such acart before and also have not seen any regular wagons here in Albania, not even awheelbarrow. The people carry everything on their backs, as do their children. Some local people are asad sight to behold now before the harvest— they are skinny to the bone and the rags they wear barely cover their body. The poor people in these parts live amiserable life “.6 Sellner’s tasks also seldom involved travelling outside of Albania— apart from his return home in April and May of 1918, this also involved ajourney to obtain additional manpower for carrying out the engineering tasks in the Albanian mountains, which comprised of Italian prisoners of war (in this case, they were brought in from aprisoner-of-war camp near the Hungarian village of Csót). Notably, Austro-Hungarian military also made use of local workers, who were recruited amongst regular local population.7 As was mentioned above and even more importantly, Sellner’s work did not reach its boundaries by describing the life of his own and his peers— he also brought back (or rather sent back) arelatively rich amount of information, pertaining to his “soldier’s” ethnography of the local population. Sellner, through his (in Czech context rather rare) direct experience with the tribal regions of northern Albania and their inhabitants thereby provides his insights regarding local customs, society, law, material culture and the reality of everyday life.8 Most prominently, this pertains to the 6 Karel Sellner’s archival fond, The Museum of Czech Literature Literary Archive. No.60/76 and 26/84, 1801–1968. Sellner’s letter to Zdeňka Sellnerová, no.95, July 28th 1917. 7 Ibid.— Sellner’s letter to Zdeňka Sellnerová, no.99, August 3rd 1917. 8 Apart from Czech, Sellner himself spoke German, Serbian and Hungarian (where the first OPEN ACCESS
RObERT DObRA 87 villages of Zejmen and Pllanë, which are situated on the outskirts of Mat and Mirdita regions and were then only recently exposed to more significant traffic and outside influences thanks to the main road headed from the city of Shkodër to Durrës (also built as apart of the Austro-Hungarian development efforts tied to the occupation). The importance of such information is in any case (not only Sellner’s) intensified considering that our only reliable sources regarding the life of people inhabiting these regions during the World War 1 and before it come from travelogues and avery limited amount of professional or semi-professional works, notably from the likes of Edith Durham, Franz Nopsca, Karl Steinmetz and several others. Either way, travelogues and other such works, often also collected and published by engaged amateurs (some of whom later became reputable authorities on the topic) play the role of asignificant source of information on how the local society and culture stood and how it was practiced. To acertain extent, they also help lay down historical context for studies pertaining to contemporary culture and society in the regions of Northern Albania, its roots and development. Regarding Sellner, if we condescend to this approach, the most valuable parts of his testimonies are probably those regarding variations of local customary law (as is the case of the other forementioned authors), other customs, which were (with alarge degree of variability) practised in the region and family relations. Although the information provided by him by far do not constitute the richest addition to this fund, it still stands that every such work contributes to the aggregate mozaic and shows the reality of the time and places in much brighter colours, than asingle written edition of Kanuni iLek Dukagjinit could ever possibly do (which is being said without attempting to cast shadow on Gjeçovi’s respectable work).9 This is even more pronounced by the fact that Sellner also visited the frontier parts of the mountains, which were enough periphery-situated, potentially “civilized” and not nearly as romanticised as the heartlands of the Dinaric Alps mountain range further north. To acertain extent, ethnography carried out before the beginning of the AustroHungarian occupation also arguably left amark on general approach of the occupants in Albania during the war and the stance towards local inhabitants, perhaps including Sellner himself.10 There were several well known and respected figures, who travtwo languages were mostly used by him to acquire information directly in this case, either from the locals themselves, or local priests). 9 Refers to the single most quoted, codified version of the customary law of Lek Dukagjini, which was collected by an Albanian franciscan priest Shtjefën Gjeçovi and later, after his death published by his franciscan colleagues in Shkodër. The edition (the author or the editors respectively) often faced retrospective critique for modifying the laws in order for them to better line up with the Christian principles and norms of life (Nopsca, 1932; Doja, 2006). This single interpretation of the northern Albanian customary law also potentially creates an impression of unity, which it actually never reached in practice. 10 Before the war, the Austro-Hungarian High Command itself put out abooklet entitled Tribal Structure, Norms, and Customs of the Albanians, published in Prague in 1913 (Marchetti, 2010). It was extracted from amanuscript by Croatian missionary Lovro Mihačević, who himself had adirect experience with the northern Albanian regions under the influence of local customary law. Regarding sources in foreign languages, Sellner was openly aware only of German philologist and diplomat Johann Georg von Hahn, who conducted his travels more than OPEN ACCESS
88 STUDIA ETHNOLOGICA PRAGENSIA 2/2019 elled these parts before the war and published significant works in German, which carried important information about the specifics of the Albanian mountain tribes— be it the forementioned Johann Georg von Hahn, or (much later) Franz Nopsca, Karl Steinmetz, Kurt Hassert or Theodor Ippen, who also served as the Austro-Hungarian consul in Scutari (Shkodra) for several years. To this must also be added the longstanding Austro-Hungarian activity in northern Albania, which allowed the state apparatus to gain abetter picture of the local conditions11 (although the insight into local conditions hardly changed the colonial ambitions of Austro-Hungarian military and the general stance of the empire from the political standpoint, as for example Edith Durham vividly recalls in her works). Often wandering out of the camps that were set up along the road, which was being gradually extended by his unit of engineers and workers, Sellner had countless chances to interact with the local population during his almost two years of stay. What he encountered was awide variety of local customs— countless varieties of which were also previously (and afterwards) described by other authors visiting these regions. These regard no only to consanguineal family relations, but also rituals (aburial and awedding), fictive kinship in the form of blood oaths (vëllamëri), the institute of godfather of hair (kumbari flokësh) and other ones, but also common social interactions, which are in context of Albanian ethnography usually reflected only marginally (for example those regarding tobacco and its prime role in social pleasantries) and other details regarding the style of life of the local inhabitants. In asimilar way as Mrs. Durham previously did, Sellner also points out astrong affliction to fatalism and superstitiousness that struck the local population and could even prevent ablood feud under the right circumstances— afairly unique occurence (at least considering available accounts), given the mostly unshakable position of the customary law at that time and personal honor, to which was feuding irrevocably tied. Much information, including the following case told by apriest in the village of Zejmen, was also provided to him by the local franciscans, who made use of this affliction and their own influence combined to settle the feuds in certain cases: „ … Although, there are Albanians so sure-footed in their beliefs that not even sufferings of Hell bring them to forgiveness. If nothing else works, Iheard that the priest excommunicates the person ceremonially, so that he can no longer visit the church and take part in services. That works sometimes— if not , the priest casts aterrible curse upon the individual: „may your relatives perish, may your rifle never fire again…”. From awhole long chain of such strong half acentury before him, and also of information on Albania provided by Spiridon Gopčević in his 1914 book Das Fürstentum Albanien, seine Vergangenheit, ethnographischen Verhältnisse, politische Lage und Aussichten für die Zukunft (MCL LA, 1916–1925). In his letters and notes, Sellner openly refers to only one Czech source, that being anon-specified work by Czech writer Josef Vinař (that probably being his well known published work, Národní zpěvy albánské). 11 There were also other channels through which ethnographic information northern Albania came to Austria-Hungary in the times before Balkan Wars of 1912–1913— these were not only the travellers and experts (linguists and ethnographers), some of whom are mentioned above, but also catholic clergy residing in the tribal regions and consulates in Shkodër, Durrës and Vlorë (Marchetti, 2010). OPEN ACCESS
RObERT DObRA 89 words, the first ones are usually enough to force the Albanian to swear that he will forgive and to entrust the priest to begin the process leading to forgiving the feud. The priest then shows his crucifix again, he blesses the sinner, forgives him in the name of Christ and withdraws the curse” (Sellner 1925a: 347). Local clergy’s involvement in settling the feuds in general was not unusual however, as proved not only by Sellner, but also avariety of other authors referring to the given period and regions. Sellner himself admitted his tendencies to romanticise and often slipped into evaluating the customs he encountered based on the values of his own culture— perhaps quite understandably, taking into account respectively his literary background and the largely ethnocentric discourse of his time. Throughout his works, he calls many of local customs outright “barbaric”— nevertheless, talking about the blood feuds (the most widely and famously reflected custom of the northern Albanian mountaineers, quite often seen by outsiders as the most “barbaric” of them all), he seems to see their role for what it undoubtedly was from the functional social perspective.12 That is, ameans of achieving certain social control and regulation— in his own words: “It had seemed to me that the blood feuds are avery inhumane practice of law, but later, from the stories told by the priest in Zojmeni (Zejmen), Ilearned that it is acustom tested by centuries and the only way to right the wrongs … Back where we live, we have tribunals, paragraphs, strictly formulated penal law, authorities, who seek the guilty, cast him into aprison and then pass ajudgement and punish him. There is no such thing in Albania. The blood feuds are horrendous, often wiping out whole families, but that is the very cruelty that keeps the passions of the Southerners in line. Everybody here is aware that if he kills, he thereby casts his own family into aterrible tragedy and sooner or later will lose his own life also” (Sellner, 1925a: 126). By the beginning of the Austro-Hungarian occupation, the occupants were seemingly well aware of the feuding— ageneral besa13 was proclaimed among the tribes in order to suppress the blood feuds for the time being (Marchetti, 2010) and local population was supposed to hand over all weapons. This however proved to be adeficient precaution, as various feuds still continued and private arsenal often remained in locals’ hands: „Today at night, loud cries and many shots woke us up. Ialmost thought the Albanians came down on us from the mountains, the whole camp below us was on their feet— in the end, we found out that the noises had been caused by ammunition hidden in aburning Albanian house nearby. Even though possession of any weapons and ammunition is strictly prohibited, it seems they actually have enough of both“.14 Sellner, being ateacher himself, was also greatly interested in local schools, which were administered by Franciscan priests and during this time also represented the only educational institutions that were active in the region. Regarding this mat12 Naturally, various other standpoints for interpreting blood feuds surfaced over the time— varying from asymbolic representation of substituting the formerly “given” blood (Boehm, 1984) to attributing religious qualities to it, with the blood revenge itself supposedly being “an offering to the soul of the dead man” (Durham, 1928: 162). 13 Atemporary oath or “holy promise” of truce or alliance, which strongly relied on the principle of personal and family honor; also apotential step to feud reconciliation. 14 Karel Sellner’s archival fond, The Museum of Czech Literature Literary Archive. No.60/76 and 26/84, 1801–1968. Sellner’s letter to Zdeňka Sellnerová, no.122, September 8th 1917. OPEN ACCESS
90 STUDIA ETHNOLOGICA PRAGENSIA 2/2019 ter, Sellner reflected on the educative efforts of the local clergy and their attempts to unite the local tribes and to suppress various feuds in between them— as he noted from his conversation with franciscan priest Rochus Gurashi: “Their goal was to awake their (Albanians’) national sentiment and to unite all the tribes so that they can live together in acommon state that will surely emerge after the war. … (He said that) the education cannot achieve aunited character yet: it has to adapt to mentalities of individual tribes. That being said, one common idea must prevail, and that to settle the feuds in between them, to abandon barbaric relics of the past and to enforce the understanding that they all form asingle nation”. (Sellner 1925a: 362–363). Majority of Sellner’s interactions with the local population were of apeaceful kind— as one would suppose when taking into account the firm laws of hospitality so colourfully described by other travellers visiting these parts.15 They were laws, that local population deeply respected in most cases— nevertheless, several times, it is mentioned by him that certain parts of the mountains are dangerous and not penetrable for aforeigner. However, Sellner and his comrades belonged to avery specific sort of visitors— the northern Albanian malësorë (mountaineers) already had ahistory of attempted foreign interventions behind them and the military presence of AustroHungarian soldiers was certainly not perceived as asign of peaceful intentions by them (that along with their sheer numbers and the perplexities of the given period). Although the catholic tribes often related their hopes for an intervention to AustriaHungary in the years prior to the Balkan wars, its inactivity and broken promises in the last years of this period also have naturally affected their stance towards the empire. On several accounts during Sellner’s stay, the soldiers or gendarmes patrolling or carrying out their tasks were attacked or even killed,16 usually by local groups of robbers or eventually by militia groups called komitë.17 In one of these cases, Sellner states the following: „Four days ago, two of our soldiers with bayonets lead agroup of Albanians somewhere from those mountains, where the wilder tribes live. Approximately half an hour before reaching our camp, they were attacked by agroup of 17–20 other Albanians, who wanted to liberate the captured ones (who had their hands tied behind their backs and were also tied to our soldier on achain). They started shooting, shot through one of our soldier’s cap, other one’s hand, and then agroup of our people working nearby drove them away. Their district must now pay afine of 25000 crowns in silver and 50 cattle“.18 Following the cases of attacks and killings, the Austro-Hungarian military applied various penalties, varying 15 Rules of hospitality (both towards foreigners and in between the local population) and their exertion played akey role in the northern Albanian customary law and as such was one of the prime phenomena reflected in the works of authors visiting the region. 16 Alarge part of the cases mentioned by the author was tied to the tribes living in Lura region, which goes in line with Edith Durham’s experiences from this part of the mountains during her visit in 1908. 17 Aterm which usually refers to rebel bands that fought the Turkish authorities during the last days of Ottoman rule in the region. In Sellner’s intentions, the name describes bands fighting the armies occupying northern Albania during the First World War. 18 Karel Sellner’s archival fond, The Museum of Czech Literature Literary Archive. No.60/76 and 26/84, 1801–1968. Sellner’s letter to Zdeňka Sellnerová, no.140, September 30th 1917. OPEN ACCESS
RObERT DObRA 91 from fines to executions— the latter being often carried out after asoldier’s life has been lost by the hand of alocal inhabitant. In the context of extreme cases of punishments exerted towards the local population, Sellner also mentions the following: “the Albanian is afraid of hanging. Being shot is not bad, but arope!…” (Sellner 1925a:164).19 Arguably, the death by hanging was generally considered dishonest in context of the population under the influence of the local customary law— being also per se something potentially greatly disturbing in asociety, which is firmly built on acode of personal and family (tribal) honor. To this topic also pertains the Austro-Hungarian policy to which the soldiers were supposed to adhere during the occupation and which Sellner describes as follows: “the Albanians had no reasons to complain regarding our occupation. The orders were strict and commanded that we approach the locals kindly, that we help them and our soldiers were not permitted to get hold of their property. … Our behaviour was natural and open. Our soldier did not see the Albanian as an enemy, he would never hurt him without areason and talked to him in afriendly manner. He was happy that the Albanian could understand agreat deal of Czech words” (Sellner 1925a:51).20 According to him, another factor was the particular role that the soldier or his unit played— during the times of his presence, the local people also often learned to differentiate between soldiers carrying out military tasks and those whose task was to build infrastructure. Reflecting on the role of the Austro-Hungarian engineering units before his departure from Albania, Sellner stated the following: “Iexpressed the opinion that the war and the occupation will also have apositive impact on Albanians. The contact with Austro-Hungarian soldiers, especially Czechs, brought them anew perspective of thinking. Being in daily contact with us, they understood what an educated man can achieve, through trade they understood the great importance of education and by being disarmed forcibly, they understood that one can live even without fighting each other constantly and that the feuds can be settled peacefully. Through our farms and gardens, they saw what their fertile soil can produce when the men lend ahelping hand too. What is left of our work will serve as abasis for further economic development of the country. They understood the importance of good roads and their maintenance and we showed them how quickly they can build and maintain anice house. The Albanian already understands the gap between an illiterate and educated man and how advantageous it is to educate oneself.” (Sellner 1925a:363). In regards to the ethnographic information provided by Sellner, it is also fitting to mention that over the course of years before the time of his visit, various authors perceived the identity and origin of local population in the Albanian mountains differently and also often attempted to explore and determine its roots and origin. While Karel Sellner proves to be no exception in this regard, his insights in this matter can hardly be considered comprehensive. Based on loanwords in Albanian taken from the southern Slavic languages, words similar to Czech ones, Slavic toponyms and certain 19 Also “They are afraid, because then, the soul cannot leave the body through the throat— it must escape through the unclean parts“ (Sellner 1925a: 51). 20 Nevertheless, there are accounts of Austro-Hungarian military acting against the general orders and retaliating in large scale on whole communities after individual attacks on military patrols, which involved searching the local villages for weapons, taking hostages and executions. (Marchetti, 2010) OPEN ACCESS