Marin Barleti

Marin Barleti (Latin: Marinus Barletius, Italian: Marino Barlezio; c. 1450–1460 – c. 1512-1513) was a historian, humanist and Catholic priest from Shkodër.[1] He is considered the first Albanian historian because of his 1504 eyewitness account of the 1478 siege of Shkodra. Barleti is better known for his second work, a biography on Skanderbeg, translated into many languages in the 16th to the 20th centuries.

Marin Barleti
Marinus Barletius
Bornc. 1450-1460
Scutari, Albania, Republic of Venice (modern Shkodër, Albania)
Diedc. 1512-1513 (age 51–63)
Padua, Republic of Venice (modern Padua, Italy)
NationalityAlbanian
Known forAuthor of Historia de vita et gestis Scanderbegi Epirotarum principis
Scientific career
InstitutionsChurch of St. Stephan

Life

Barleti was born and raised in Scutari (modern Shkodra, Albania), then part of the Republic of Venice. Although there is no debate whether Barleti was a native Shkodran or an Albanian in a geographical sense,[2] and although there is indirect evidence that he considered his mother tongue to be Albanian,[3] alternatively to an Albanian ethnic origin (supported by Zeno, Fallmerayer, Jireček), some scholars have hypothesized an Italian (DuCange, Iorga), or Dalmatian (Giovio, Czwittinger, Fabricius) ethnic origin.[4][2] In his works Barleti repeatedly calls himself Shkodran (Latin: Scodrensis), and then equates being Shkodran with being Epirote, a term used by early Albanian language authors as an equivalent form of the ethnonym "Albanian".[2] In an early version of the Siege of Shkodra which was found in 2018 and published in 2022, Barleti recalls that the local language which in another part he equates with Albanian is the language of his ancestors (attavorum nostrum). This is an indirect reference to Albanian being Barleti's mother tongue.[3]

In 1474, the Ottoman Empire besieged Shkodra and Barleti participated in the successful defense of the town, both in the first siege in 1474 and the second in 1478. When Shkodra finally fell to the Ottomans in 1479, Barleti escaped to Italy where he would become a scholar of history, classical literature and the Latin language.

Soon after Barleti arrived in Venice, he was given a stall at the Rialto meat market as a temporary means of financial aid. In 1494 became a priest after his theological studies in Venice and Padova, and soon was appointed to serve at St. Stephen's Church in Piovene.

Works
A page from De obsidione Scodrensi (1504)
A page from Historia de vita et gestis Scanderbegi Epirotarum principis

The Siege of Shkodra

Barleti's first work was The Siege of Shkodra (Latin: De obsidione Scodrensi, Venice, 1504). It was published several times in Latin and translated into Italian, Polish, French, Albanian, and English. Barleti wrote this work as an eyewitness. Of this work, acclaimed Albanian author Ismail Kadare wrote that "if one were to search for a literary creation wholly worthy of the expression 'monumental work,' it would be hard to find a better example than The Siege of Shkodra."[5] An early version of the final work was found in 2018 and published in 2022.[6]

The History of Scanderbeg

Barleti's second and largest work was The history of the life and deeds of Scanderbeg, the Prince of Epirus, (Latin: Historia de vita et gestis Scanderbegi Epirotarvm principis) was published in 1504 in Venice,[7] and later in Rome between 1508 and 1510; (2nd ed.: Strasbourg, 1537; 3rd ed.: Frankfurt am Main, 1578; 4th ed.: Zagreb, 1743) and translated into German (1533), Italian (1554), Portuguese (1567), Polish (1569), French (1576), Spanish (1588), and English (1596). Unlike The Siege of Shkodra, Barleti relied on the testimonies of others to produce this work.[8] Barleti's books were published and printed by Bernardino Vitali in Venice and Rome.

The History of Scanderbeg is considered an Albanian cultural treasure, vital to the formation of Albanian national self-consciousness. A traduction of this work of Barleti is in slavonic, in the Cetinje chronicle. A note at the end of this manuscript says, according to Martinovic (1962) that the author of the text is "Marin from Shkodër of Slavic origin".[9][10]

Paolo Giovio was the first historian to confound Barletius with another contemporary Marinus Scodrensis, Marino Becichemi (1468-1526), professor of rhetorics and author of commentaries on classic literature. The confusion has been elucidated by Thomas Reinesius and Apostolo Zeno. While Barletius in his works calls himself "sacerdotis Scodrensis" (priest of Scodra), Becichemi professes himself married and a "father of boys", professor of Ragusa, Brescia, and Padua, neither of which applies to Barletius.

A Brief History of Lives of Popes and Emperors (disputed)

Barleti's third work is titled, A Brief History of Lives of Popes and Emperors (Latin: Compendium vitarum pontificum et imperatorum, Venice, 1555).

Criticism

Barletius' work has inspired chroniclers like Giammaria Biemmi and Theodore Spandounes. It is still popular among romanticist and nationalist historians. Modern historical research on Skenderbeg relies more on archival records than on Barletius.[11]

Barleti invented spurious correspondence between Vladislav II of Wallachia and Skanderbeg, wrongly assigning it to the year 1443 instead to the year of 1444.[12] Barleti also invented correspondence between Scanderbeg and Sultan Mehmed II to match his interpretations of events.[12]

The main public library of Shkodra and a publishing house have been named after Marin Barleti. Also, a university in Tirana, Albania has been established under his name.

See also

References
  1. Setton, Kenneth M. (1978). The papacy and the Levant (1204-1571) (null ed.). Philadelphia: Amer.philos.soc. p. 73. ISBN 978-0-87169-127-9. ...perhaps of Italian origin.
  2. Barleti, Marin (2012). David Hosaflook (ed.). The Siege of Shkodra: Albania's Courageous Stand Against Ottoman Conquest, 1478. Translated by David Hosaflook. Onufri Publishing House. pp. xxix, 11. ISBN 978-99956-87-77-9.
  3. Plasari & Nadin 2022, pp. 94–97.
  4. Francesco Pall (1938), Marino Barlezio: uno storico umanista
  5. Kadare, Ismail in Marin Barleti (ed. David Hosaflook), The Siege of Shkodra: Albania's Courageous Stand Against Ottoman Conquest, 1478. Tirana: Onufri, 2012. p. v.
  6. Plasari & Nadin 2022, p. 10.
  7. Noli, Fan Stilian (1924). Storia di Scanderbeg (Giorgio Castriotta) re d'Albania: 1412-1468 (in Italian). Rome: V. Ferri. p. 7.
  8. "The History of the Life and Deeds of Scanderbeg, the Prince of Epirus". www.wdl.org. 1508. Retrieved 2021-06-30.
  9. Martinović 1962
    Rukopis se završava na str. 30a; napomenom da je ovo pisao Marin Skadranin, rodom Sloven, "na u latinskom jeziku velmi učen".
  10. Petrović, Vasilije; Radmilo Marojević (1985) [1754], Istorija o Crnoj Gori [History of Montenegro] (in Serbian), Podgorica: Leksikografski zavod Crne Gore, p. 133, OCLC 439864504, Овом Повијешћу и почиње Љетопис, до стр. 30а, гдје стоји напомеана да је ово написао Марин Скадранин, родом Словен на "на (!) у латинском језику велми учен".
  11. Jeton Omari (2014), Scanderbeg tra storia e storiografia
  12. Setton, Kenneth (1976–1984), The Papacy and the Levant, 1204-1571, vol. four volumes, American Philosophical Society, p. 73, ISBN 978-0-87169-114-9, ... The spurious correspondence of July and August 1443, between Ladislas and Scanderbeg (made up by Barletius, who should assigned it to the year 1444) ... He also invented a correspondence between Scanderbeg and Sultan Mehmed II to fit his interpretations of the events in 1461—1463 ...

Sources
  • Martinović, Niko S. (1962), Cetinjski ljetopis [Cetinje chronicle] (in Serbian), Cetinje: Izd. Centr. nar. biblioteke NR Crne Gore, OCLC 7185102, archived from the original on 4 November 2013
  • Plasari, Aurel; Nadin, Lucia (2022). Barleti i hershëm sipas një dorëshkrimi të panjohur [The early Barleti - according to an unknown text]. Albanian Academy of Sciences/Onufri. ISBN 978-9928-354-88-4.
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