The Albanian Dialects of Thrace in the Light of Balkan Linguistics: Genetic Relationships and Areal Features

Abstract

The Albanian of Thrace, spoken today mainly in two groups of villages in the province of Evros (Greece), is an almost unknown case. This article presents some of their phonetic / phonological, morphological and syntactic features in comparison with (a) the Albanian of Mandritsa (a related dialect of the area, which is studied fairly well), (b) the southern Tosk dialects (of southern Greece, i.e. Arvanitika, and of southern Albania, i.e. Cham), (c) the eastern Tosk dialect of Devolli. The comparison reveals the preservation of many archaic features of Evros Albanian and shows their genetic connection partly with southern Tosk and partly with the eastern Tosk dialects of Albanian. The presence of many areal features, which should be attributed to the influence of the local northeastern modern Greek, southeastern Bulgarian, and Balkan Turkish dialects, is also revealed and underlines its Balkan character.