Chameria (also spelled Çameria; Albanian: Çamëria; Greek: Τσαμουριά, romanized: Tsamouriá) is a historical region along the coast of the Ionian Sea in southwestern Albania and northwestern Greece, traditionally associated with the Albanian ethnic subgroup of the Chams. For a brief period (1909-1912), three kazas (Filat, Aydonat and Margiliç) were combined by the Ottomans into an administrative district called Çamlik sancak. During the interwar period, the toponym was in common use and the official name of the area above the Acheron river in all Greek state documents. The term is used today mostly by Albanians and it is obsolete in Greek, surviving in some old folk songs. Most of what is called Chameria is divided between parts of the Greek regional units of Thesprotia, Preveza, and Ioannina (some villages at the western side); and the municipality of Konispol at the southernmost extremity of Albania. Apart from geographic and ethnographic usages, in contemporary times within Albania the toponym has also acquired irredentist connotations.
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👉 Chameria in the context of Cham Albanians
Cham Albanians or Chams (also spelled Çam Albanians or Çams; Albanian: Çamët; Greek: Τσάμηδες, romanized: Tsámides), are a subgroup of Albanians who originally resided in a region along the coast of the Ionian Sea in southwestern Albania and northwestern Greece, an area known among Albanians as Chameria. The Chams have their own particular cultural identity within Albanian subgroups. A number of Chams contributed to the Albanian national identity and played an important role in starting the renaissance of the Albanian culture in the 19th century. The Chams speak their own dialect of the Albanian language, the Cham Albanian dialect, which is a Southern Tosk Albanian dialect and one of the two most conservative ones; the other being Arvanitika.
During the late 1930s Chams suffered from intimidation and persecution under the dictatorship of General Metaxas. Following the Italian occupation of Albania in 1939, the Chams became a prominent propaganda tool for the Italians and irredentist elements among them became more vocal. As a result, on the eve of the Greco-Italian War, Greek authorities deported the adult male Cham population to internment camps. After the occupation of Greece, parts of the Muslim Cham population collaborated with Italian and German forces. This fueled resentment among the local Greek population and in the aftermath of World War II, the entire Muslim Cham population were forcefully expelled to Albania.
Chameria in the context of Albanian Kingdom (1939–43)
The Kingdom of Albania was in personal union with the Kingdom of Italy following the Italian invasion of Albania in 1939 and until the German occupation in September 1943. It is also referred to as Italian Albania or Greater Albania, and was a state controlled by Fascist Italy. The monarch was Italian King, Victor Emmanuel III, who was represented in Albania by Italian governors. During this time, Albania ceased to exist as an independent country and became an autonomous part of the Italian Empire. Officials intended to make Albania part of a Greater Italy by assimilating Albanians as Italians and colonizing Albania with Italian settlers from the Italian peninsula to transform it gradually into an Italian land.
In the Treaty of London during World War I, the Triple Entente had promised territories in Albania to Italy as a reward for fighting against the Central Powers. Italian Fascists claimed that Albanians were ethnically linked to Italians through association with the prehistoric populations, and that the major influence exerted by the Roman and Venetian empires over Albania gave Italy the right to possess it. In addition, several hundred thousand ethnic Albanians had already been absorbed into southern Italy, which was used to justify annexation as a measure that would unite all Albanians into one state. Italy supported Albanian irredentism, directed against the predominantly Albanian-populated Kosovo in Yugoslavia, but also against Epirus in Greece, particularly the border area of Chameria, inhabited by the Cham Albanian minority.
Chameria in the context of Albanian irredentism
Greater Albania (Albanian: Shqipëria e Madhe) is an irredentist and nationalist concept that seeks to annex the lands that many Albanians consider to form their national homeland. It is based on claims on the present-day or historical presence of Albanian populations in those areas. In addition to the existing Albania, the term incorporates claims to regions in the neighbouring states, the areas include Kosovo, the Preševo Valley of Serbia, territories in southern Montenegro, northwestern Greece (the Greek regional units of Thesprotia and Preveza, referred by Albanians as Chameria, and other territories that were part of the Vilayet of Yanina during the Ottoman Empire), and a western part of North Macedonia. The combination of the populations of these countries and territories of other countries sustaining large ethnic Albanian communities enumerate to over 4 million people.
The unification of an even larger area into a single territory under Albanian authority had been theoretically conceived by the League of Prizren, an organization of the 19th century whose goal was to unify the Albanian inhabited lands (and other regions, mostly from the regions of Macedonia and Epirus) into a single autonomous Albanian Vilayet within the Ottoman Empire, which was briefly achieved de jure in September 1912. The concept of a Greater Albania, as in greater than Albania within its 1913 borders, was conceived and implemented under the fascist Italian and Nazi German occupation of the Balkans during World War II. The idea of unification has roots in the events of the Treaty of London in 1913, when roughly 50% of the predominantly Albanian territories and 40% of the population were left outside the new country's borders.
Chameria in the context of Cham Albanian dialect
The Cham Albanian dialect (Albanian: Çamërisht or Dialekti çam), also called Cham Tosk or Arvanitika, is the dialect of the Albanian language spoken by the Cham Albanians, an Albanian ethnic sub-group native to the region of Chameria in southern Albania and northwestern Greece.