Talk:Ottoman Kosovo

Kosovo article restructuring
The following has been lifted from the Kosovo article, it includes refs that are not found in this article. I plan to eventually add them to this one.

Kosovo was part of the Ottoman Empire from 1455 to 1912, at first as part of the eyalet of Rumelia, and from 1864 as a separate province (vilayet). During this time, Islam was introduced to the population. The Vilayet of Kosovo was an area much larger than today's Kosovo; it included all today's Kosovo territory, sections of the Sandžak region cutting into present-day Central Serbia and Montenegro along with the Kukës municipality, the surrounding region in present-day northern Albania and also parts of north-western Macedonia with the city of Skopje (then Üsküp), as its capital. Between 1881 and 1912 (its final phase), it was internally expanded to include other regions of present-day Republic of Macedonia, including larger urban settlements such as Štip (İştip), Kumanovo (Kumanova) and Kratovo (Kratova).

Ottoman occupation left a lasting demographic effect on Kosovo - with full-scale dislocation of Chistian groups (especially Serbs and Orthodox Vlachs). The Serb population never accepted Ottoman rule and often rose against the foreign regimen. According to Banac, "Ottoman raids, plunder, slaving forays, as well as the general devastation caused by constant wars uprooted large numbers of Serbs even before the 'Great Serb Migration' ". . Kosovo, like Serbia, was occupied by Austrian forces during the Great War of 1683–1699, but the Ottomans re-established their rule of the region. Such acts of assistance by the Austrian Empire (then arch-rivals of the Ottoman Empire), or Russia, were always abortive or temporary at best. . In 1690, the Serbian Patriarch of Peć Arsenije III apparently led some 30,000 to 40,000 predominantly Serbs out of Kosovo and other areas into Austria. More migrations of Orthodox Christians from the Kosovo area preceded and followed throughout the 18th century during the Great Serb Migrations. In 1766, the Ottomans abolished the Patriarchate of Peć and the position of Christians in Kosovo further deteriorated, including full imposition of jizya (taxation of non-Muslims).

Although initially stout opponents of the advancing Turks, Albanian chiefs ultimately came to accept the Ottomans as sovereigns. The resulting alliance facilitated the mass conversion of Albanians to Islam. Given that the Ottoman Empire's subjects were divided along religious (rather than ethnic) lines, Islamicisation greatly elevated the status of Albanian chiefs, who had previously led a simple existence in the highlands of northern Albania (from Kruje to the Sar range). Soon, they expanded into a depopulated Kosovo and Metohia, as well as northwestern Macedonia, although some might have been autochthonous to the region. Many Albanians gained prominent positions in the Ottoman government, no fewer than 42 Grand Viziers of the Empire were Albanian in origin, including Mehmet Afik (1873-1936) an Albanian from Peja who would write the Turkish National Anthem in 1921, "Istiklal Marsi" (The Independence March). As Hupchik states, "Albanians had little cause of unrest" and "if anything, grew important in Ottoman internal affairs", and sometimes persecuted Christians harshly on behalf of their Turkish masters.

In the 19th century, there was an awakening of ethnic nationalism throughout the Balkans. This, unfortunately, systematised the underlying ethnic tensions into a broader struggle of Christian Serbs against Muslim Albanians. The ethnic Albanian nationalism movement was centred in Kosovo. In 1878 the League of Prizren (Lidhja e Prizrenit) was formed. This was a political organisation which aimed to unify all the Albanians of the Ottoman Empire in a common struggle for autonomy and greater cultural rights, although they generally desired the continuation of the Ottoman Empire, given their position as favoured subjects. The League was dis-established in 1881 but nevertheless enabled the awakening of a national identity amongst Albanians. It would be clear that Albanian ambitions were at odds with Serbian aims. The Serbs desired nothing less than the liberation of this 'sacred' Serb land and its re-unification with the newly formed Serbian Kingdom.

Brutal Deluxe (talk) 23:10, 14 August 2009 (UTC)

Synvet map
I removed that map because it isn't an ethnographic map but a map connecting ehtnicity to religion. I don't think that anyone can argue that Mussulmans is an ethnic description of any kind or that there is a nation called Serbo-Croats or Bulgar-Greeks.--ZjarriRrethues (talk) 17:50, 13 March 2010 (UTC)


 * The removal of the map's ref was not a vandalism. I removed the ref about A.Synvet being pro-Greek because what the ref actually says is not at all that: It says that the MAP was favourable to the Greek cause, not the geographers, which is something entirely different. In detail: "Other maps (not other geographers) amongst other ..... were favourable to the Greek cause" meaning that they agreed with the Greeks. That doesn't make (the geographers themselves) pro-Greek. The text is free on line as pdf. --Factuarius (talk) 00:28, 18 March 2010 (UTC)

Move discussion in progress
There is a move discussion in progress on Talk:Ottoman era in the history of Saudi Arabia which affects this page. Please participate on that page and not in this talk page section. Thank you. —RMCD bot 23:31, 14 October 2013 (UTC)