Constantine Of Berat
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Constantine of Berat, known among
Albanians The Albanians are an ethnic group native to the Balkan Peninsula who share a common Albanian ancestry, Albanian culture, culture, Albanian history, history and Albanian language, language. They are the main ethnic group of Albania and Kosovo, ...
as Kostandin Jermonak Berati or shortly Kostë Berati, was an
Albanian Albanian may refer to: *Pertaining to Albania in Southeast Europe; in particular: **Albanians, an ethnic group native to the Balkans **Albanian language **Albanian culture **Demographics of Albania, includes other ethnic groups within the country ...
writer and translator of the 18th century.


Life and work

Not much is known about him, except that he was from
Berat Berat (; sq-definite, Berati) is the List of cities and towns in Albania, ninth most populous city of Albania and the seat of Berat County and Berat Municipality. By air, it is north of Gjirokastër, west of Korçë, south of Tirana, and ea ...
, today's southern part of central
Albania Albania ( ; or ), officially the Republic of Albania (), is a country in Southeast Europe. It is located in the Balkans, on the Adriatic Sea, Adriatic and Ionian Seas within the Mediterranean Sea, and shares land borders with Montenegro to ...
, then Sanjak of Berat in Vilayet of Janina of the
Ottoman Empire The Ottoman Empire (), also called the Turkish Empire, was an empire, imperial realm that controlled much of Southeast Europe, West Asia, and North Africa from the 14th to early 20th centuries; it also controlled parts of southeastern Centr ...
. His lifespan was highly probably between 1745 and 1825. Also, Constantine was quite likely an Orthodox monk. Elsie mentions that some experts doubt his existence, at least as a writer. He has copied a part of the "lexicon" of Theodore Kavalliotis, and is believed to have signed in 1779 a religious document (in Greek) together with Kavallioti and Teodor Haxhifilipi in Moscopole. Constantine of Berat is attributed as the author of a manuscript from 1764 to 1822, originally a 154 or 152-page work. It is preserved in the National Library in Tirana. This so-called Codex of Constantine of Berat or Codex of Berat (but not to be confused with Codex Beratinus I and II), is a simple paper manuscript and must not be envisaged as an illuminated parchment codex in the Western tradition. The Albanian part of the manuscript contains some religious prayers and Bible fragments, a hymn-poetry on Christ's suffering, and a Greek-Albanian dictionary. It was discovered by the Albanian researcher and Rilindas Ilo Mitkë Qafëzezi in 1938. In Qafëzezi's study "Protopapa Theodhor Nastas Kavalioti, Teacher of the
New Academy The Academy (), variously known as Plato's Academy, or the Platonic Academy, was founded in Athens by Plato ''circa'' 387 BC. The academy is regarded as the first institution of higher education in the west, where subjects as diverse as biolog ...
of Voskopojë, 1718–1719" of 1951, he mentions that "from the perspective of the Albanian language, in general, the work of Kosta (Berati) is greater than and superior to the
Albanian Albanian may refer to: *Pertaining to Albania in Southeast Europe; in particular: **Albanians, an ethnic group native to the Balkans **Albanian language **Albanian culture **Demographics of Albania, includes other ethnic groups within the country ...
of all his contemporary writers". Albanian researcher Bedri Dedja considers Constantine's alphabet and writings as influential in the "New Academy" of Voskopojë, and is part of a wider cultural enlightenment of the Berat area. The codex seems to have been the work of at least two hands and was completed around 1798 at the earliest. It contains various texts in Greek and Albanian: biblical and Orthodox liturgical texts in Albanian written in the Greek alphabet, all of them no doubt translated from Greek or strongly influenced by Greek models. His alphabet contained 37 letters. Since the
Greek script The Greek alphabet has been used to write the Greek language since the late 9th or early 8th century BC. It was derived from the earlier Phoenician alphabet, and is the earliest known alphabetic script to systematically write vowels as w ...
does not contain Albanian sounds ë, nj, sh, zh, etc, he used diacritic letters. I.e. the "ë" shows up as a rotated
Latin script The Latin script, also known as the Roman script, is a writing system based on the letters of the classical Latin alphabet, derived from a form of the Greek alphabet which was in use in the ancient Greek city of Cumae in Magna Graecia. The Gree ...
"i" or an "
alpha Alpha (uppercase , lowercase ) is the first letter of the Greek alphabet. In the system of Greek numerals, it has a value of one. Alpha is derived from the Phoenician letter ''aleph'' , whose name comes from the West Semitic word for ' ...
" with an
Iota subscript The iota subscript is a diacritic mark in the Greek alphabet shaped like a small vertical stroke or miniature iota placed below the letter. It can occur with the vowel letters eta , omega , and alpha . It represents the former presence of an ...
, "nj" as "ni", etc. Among the texts in the Codex of Berat is a forty-four-line Albanian poem, with the corresponding Greek text, called "The Virgin Mary before the Cross" (). It is written in so-called fifteen-syllable
political verse Political verse (Greek: ''politikós stíkhos'', πολιτικός στίχος), also known as decapentasyllabic verse (from Greek: ''dekapentasíllavos'', , lit. '15-syllable'), is a common metric form in Medieval and Modern Greek poetry. It i ...
. According to Elsie, the poem seems to be based on a Greek original by Akakios Diakrusis of
Cephalonia Kefalonia or Cephalonia (), formerly also known as Kefallinia or Kephallonia (), is the largest of the Ionian Islands in western Greece and the 6th-largest island in Greece after Crete, Euboea, Lesbos, Rhodes and Chios. It is also a separate regio ...
, published in 1730. Also, the manuscript contains valuable information on Cosmas of Aetolia and his journeys through Albania. Constantine also compiled two Greek-Albanian glossaries comprising a total of 1,710 entries, most of Albanian words belong to the Berat dialect and are commonly used there. He also wrote a short passage containing another original Albanian alphabet which resembles the
Glagolitic The Glagolitic script ( , , ''glagolitsa'') is the oldest known Slavic alphabet. It is generally agreed that it was created in the 9th century for the purpose of translating liturgical texts into Old Church Slavonic by Saints Cyril and Methodi ...
-
Cyrillic script The Cyrillic script ( ) is a writing system used for various languages across Eurasia. It is the designated national script in various Slavic languages, Slavic, Turkic languages, Turkic, Mongolic languages, Mongolic, Uralic languages, Uralic, C ...
. Only two verses are written in this alphabet. The rest of his work consists of various religious notes; and a chronicle of events between 1764 and 1789 written in Greek. The Orthodox communities of central and southern Albania used later some of the religious texts in this manuscript later circulated for teaching purposes. Constantine's work and similar contemporary works of his time aimed at making the Orthodox religion as understandable as possible to the Orthodox Albanians who did not speak Greek, or/and facilitating them to learn the Greek language. Due to its importance, the manuscript is top-listed to be digitized as part of the Albanological Portal, a joint project of the Albanian and
Kosovo Kosovo, officially the Republic of Kosovo, is a landlocked country in Southeast Europe with International recognition of Kosovo, partial diplomatic recognition. It is bordered by Albania to the southwest, Montenegro to the west, Serbia to the ...
National Libraries. A street in Berat is named after him.


Controversy

German Albanologist Armin Hetzer in 1982 was the first scientist to notice that the name Constantinos in the Berat manuscript is not a reference to a person, but to a date (St. Constanties date). Thus, according to Hetzer, there was no Constantine in Berat that authored the manuscript, instead he notices another name in it of a certain Thimi Nuni. More recently (2019), Albanian philologists Bardhyl Demiraj made a claim agreeing with the German, seeing it possible that Constantine of Berat, in fact, never existed. There seems to be a rise in the number of researchers agreeing with this hypothesis.Yll Rugova (2023).
Alfabeti i Kodikut të Beratit, ndërlidhja e mundshme me gravurën e Ardenicës dhe anonimin e Elbasanit
, In: The XLI International Seminar on Albanian Language, Literature and Culture, Revistë / Journal (41), p. 37–52. ISSN 2521-3687.


See also

*
Albanian literature Albanian literature stretches back to the Middle Ages and comprises those literary texts and works written in Albanian language, Albanian. It may also refer to literature written by Albanians in Albania, Kosovo and the Albanian diaspora particul ...
*
Elbasan alphabet The Elbasan alphabet is a mid 18th-century alphabetic script created for the Albanian language ''Elbasan Gospel Manuscript'', also known as the ''Anonimi i Elbasanit'' ("the Anonymous of Elbasan"), which is the only document written in it. The d ...
* Vithkuqi alphabet * Orthodoxy in Albania


References

{{Albanian Literature People from Berat Albanian-language poets Eastern Orthodoxy in Albania 18th-century Albanian people 18th-century Albanian writers 18th-century Albanian poets People from Janina vilayet Creators of writing systems Albanian Christian monks 18th-century Christian monks