(Part 1 of 2)

There are several points to address to answer this question, which I’ll slightly rephrase to:

• What was the Ottoman Empire’s view on Albanians between the 18th and 20th centuries, and how did this view affect the Ottoman Empire’s treatment of Albanians within the empire?

There are some errors in the original question that need to be resolved to reform it into one that’s more historically accurate:

• An Albanian consciousness throughout Albanian history

• Ottoman support of an ‘Albanian ascendancy’ and/or unconditional sponsorship of the Albanian state

Throughout this document I hope to show that there was no true Albanian consciousness by which the Ottomans could judge the population until the very late Ottoman period, and that the Ottoman never really 'sponsored' the Albanian people to the point of preference, but in fact would end up doing the opposite by the middle 19th-century.

The Albanian Consciousness

I’ve talked briefly about the instigating factors of the Albanian Nationalist Movement before, and how speaking Albanian wouldn’t necessarily impart a feeling of identity to a greater “Albanian family,” and this certainly applies to who we’d consider Albanians as a whole during Ottoman-ruled Albania. The cultural group was extremely varied within the four vilayets of Ottoman rule, and more so with those Albanians found in Greece, Anatolia, or Egypt and the Levant.

To briefly summarize, the Albanian nationalist movement (Albanian Awakening) was not a long-simmering movement but an eruption of nationalistic fervor that emerged in the early 20th century. It was helped along by increased repressions by the Ottoman Empire on the Albanians living in the Albanian vilayets, and by several members of the Albanian learned class trying to push forward a new identity of Albanians centered around a common language [1]. The country’s frontier position, on the border of the Ottoman’s enemies (Austria-Hungary, Serbia) was seen as threatening to the cohesion of the remaining empire [1]. The Albanian-speaking region was divided into four distinct vilayets, with poor transportation and communication infrastructure to keep the peoples separated, and a refusal to acknowledge the Albanian alphabet and culture toward the end of Ottoman rule [1].

The Albanian National Awakening was much later than those of its adjacent Ottoman-ruled peoples. While this was partly due to Ottoman-placed divisions in the traditional homeland of the Albanians, this was also just due to the nature of Albanian - and perhaps western Balkan – civilizations as a whole. The Albanians prior to the early 20th century identified themselves mainly by their religion, language, tribe, and/or village (depending on the context). Those Albanians who would move up through the ranks and becoming prominent in the Ottoman administration may have gone past this and recognized themselves as mainly ‘Ottoman’. Further, those Albanians that would prove difficult in the eyes of the Ottomans – that is, those that would rebel or break-free from Ottoman rule (Muhammad Ali Pasha, Ali Pasha of Tepelene, the Souliot rebellions, Skanderbeg and the League of Lezhe) – did not do so in the name of creating a greater Albanian state. They all had their personal motives for their actions and only in modern histiography do we impose our views on ethnicity and nationality onto their actions. Taking Skanderbeg for example, there are multiple instances where he fought against Albanians as well as the Ottomans, and would reference his rebellion against the Ottomans as one for defending Christendom (to gain the aid of Aragon and the Pope), not as one to create a nation of Albanians. Muhammad Ali Pasha would establish an Albanian dynasty in Egypt not to colonize it with Albanians for a new nation-state, but to ensure his survival in the chaotic environment of Egypt following Napoleon’s retreat. The Souliots would rebel for local autonomy and independence from their Muslim overlords, not for establishing a ‘home base’ of Albanians. Ali Pasha was a man would wanted power for himself, free from the yoke of the sultan. These are all individuals or made up of individuals who have personal ambitions and reasons for their actions, and none of them (without applying our modern senses of nationalism and ethnicity) acted, in my opinion, toward the creation of an Albanian nation state and subsequent identity.

This is all a lengthy way to extend my answer in the previously referenced question, that the question of Albanian ethnicity was only answered in the early 20th Century, and wasn’t even truly asked unti the events surrounding the League of Prizren (although you could argue the first publication of an Albanian alphabet could be an instigator as well). Therefore, it would be erroneous to view all Albanians as like-minded and oriented toward the same goals and ideals. Albanians were present throughout the empire, in various offices, stations, religions, history, and their ambitions, ideals, personal feelings toward the Ottomans, and general nature were all varied. Therefore, the opinion of the Ottoman state of the Albanian populations within its dominion depended on which population of Albanians you are referring to. The Ghegs of the far north, inhabiting modern-day Northern Albania and Kosovo, were seen as “warlike, arrogant, and rough” while the Tosks of modern-day central Albania, northern Epirus, and Western Greece were “friendly and hospitable, yet poor and filthy” [2]. Foreigners viewed these two populations as distinct ‘nations’ [whatever that means in the early 1800s], and the Ottomans viewed the southern Tosks – with their history of rebellion with the Souliotes and Ali Pasha of Tepelene’s constant conflicts – as untrustworthy. This is despite the fact that, going into the War of Greek Independence, the Tosk Albanians were just as active in combating their neighbors. Ottomans would have a history of mistrusting this specific population of Albanians, while not necessarily viewing others in the same light [2].