Names of Kosovo
The name Kosovo (as referred to in this spelling) is the most frequently used form in English when discussing the region in question.Script error: No such module "Unsubst". The Albanian spelling Kosova has lesser currency.Script error: No such module "Unsubst". The alternative spellings Cossovo and Kossovo were frequently used until the early 20th century.[1]
Terminology
The toponym Kosovo in contemporary times refers to entire territory of Kosovo. Kosovo originally referred to plain of Kosovo, which forms part of eastern Kosovo.Script error: No such module "Unsubst". Regions which are today considered parts of Kosovo include Dukagjin/Metohija, Llapusha, Llap and other areas. Kosovo was used as the name of the entire territory for the first time in 1877 when the Kosovo Vilayet was created by the Ottoman administration.[2]
In antiquity
Dardania
There is a theory within linguistics that the name Dardania used in ancient times for the area of Kosovo is derived from the Albanian word dardhë, meaning "pear".[3][4]
Due to its Slavic (Serbian) character, Kosovo Albanian leader Ibrahim Rugova supported a name change to "Dardania", in reference to the ancient kingdom and later-turned Roman province.[5] It, however, did not enter into general usage.
Medieval and contemporary
Kosovo
Kosovo (Template:Lang-sr-Cyrl) is the Serbian neuter possessive adjective of kos (Script error: No such module "Lang".), meaning "blackbird"; -ovo being an adjectival suffix – it is short for the region named the "field of the blackbird" (Template:Lang-sr-Latn), the Kosovo Field, the site of the 1389 battle between a coalition led by Serbian Prince Lazar and the Ottoman army, which resulted in depletion of Serbian available manpower in future campaigns.[6] The name Kosovo Kos- is found in hundreds of Slavic locations.[7] The cognate of Proto-Slavic kosь is Ancient Greek κόσσυφος.[8][7]
Linguistic and historical research have shown that the medieval Serb state expanded into the region during the twelfth century.[9][10][11] Many toponyms in Kosovo appear to be South Slavic.[11] The name Kosovo appears in Bulgaria as Kosovo, Plovdiv Province.
Script error: No such module "Labelled list hatnote". Kosovo was part of the Ottoman state for 457 years.
Ottoman traveller Evliya Çelebi, who went to the area in 1660 referred to central Kosovo as Arnavud (آرناوود) and noted that in Vučitrn its inhabitants were speakers of Albanian or Turkish and few spoke "Boşnakca".[12] The highlands around the Tetovo, Peja and Prizren areas Çelebi considered as being the "mountains of Arnavudluk".[12] Çelebi referred to the "mountains of Peja" as being in Arnavudluk and considered the Ibar river that converged in Mitrovica as forming Kosovo's border with Bosnia.[12] He viewed the "Kılab" or Llapi river as having its source in Arnavudluk and by extension the Sitnica as being part of that river.[12] Çelebi also included the central mountains of Kosovo within Arnavudluk.[12]
During Ottoman rule the area of Kosovo was referred to as Arnavudluk (آرناوودلق) meaning Albania by the empire in its documents such as those dating from the eighteenth century.[13][14][15]
Gegalik (Gegënia)
In the late Ottoman period Albanians claimed the sancaks of Yeni Pazar (Novi Pazar), Ipek (Peja), Prizren, Priștine (Pristina) and Üsküp (Skopje) which were all within Kosovo Vilayet as forming part of Gegalık or Land of the Gegs, a term named after Gheg Albanians who inhabited the area.[16]
Kosovo and Metohija
Script error: No such module "Labelled list hatnote". The name "Kosovo and Metohija" was used for the autonomous province in Yugoslav Serbia since its creation in 1945 until 1968, when the term "Metohija" was dropped.[17][18] In 1990, the name was reversed to "Kosovo and Metohija".Script error: No such module "Unsubst". After the Kosovo War, the United Nations mission used only "Kosovo" as the name of the province.
See also
References
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- ↑ Template:Cite EB1911
- ↑ Script error: No such module "Footnotes".
- ↑ Albanian Etymological Dictionary, V.Orel, Koninklijke Brill, Leiden Boston Köln 1998, p.56
- ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1". "Names of individuals peoples may have been formed in a similar fashion, Taulantii from ‘swallow’ (cf. the Albanian tallandushe) or Erchelei the ‘eel-men’ and Chelidoni the ‘snail-men’. The name of the Delmatae appears connected with the Albanian word for ‘sheep’ delmë) and the Dardanians with for ‘pear’ (dardhë)."
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- ↑ a b Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
- ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
- ↑ Van Wijk, 'Taalkunde gegevens', p. 71.
- ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
- ↑ a b Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
- ↑ a b c d e Script error: No such module "Footnotes".
- ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1". p.88, 107 "In light of the recent violent troubles in Kosovo and Macedonia and the strong emotions tied to them, readers are urged most emphatically not to draw either of two unwarranted conclusions from this article: that Albanians are somehow inherently inclined to banditry, or that the extent of Ottoman "Albania" or Arnavudluk (which included parts of present-day northern Greece, western Macedonia, southern Montenegro, Kosovo, and southern Serbia) gives any historical "justification" for the creation of a "Greater Albania" today."
- ↑ Script error: No such module "Citation/CS1". p.772.
- ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1". p. 41. "Anscombe (ibid., 107 n. 3) notes that Ottoman "Albania" or Arnavudluk... included parts of present-day northern Greece, western Macedonia, southern Montenegro, Kosovo, and southern Serbia"; see also El2. s.v. "Arnawutluk. 6. History" (H. İnalcık) and Arsh, He Alvania. 31.33, 39–40. For the Byzantine period. see Psimouli, Souli. 28."
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- ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
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Sources
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