Kur ne Oliena flitej shqip

nga  Alberto G. Areddu

 (Përktheu nga italishtja në shqip Brunilda Ternova)

Vëzhgoni periferinë e Sardenjës qëndrore që shihni këtu të fotografuar, e famëshme për verën e saj, për djathërat e saj, për eskursionet malore, për aktivitetet e saja kulturore  dhe  për faktin e të qënit vëndlindja e futbollistit sardenjas më të njohur në botë.

Besoj e keni kuptuar edhe vet (sepse e thot edhe vet titilli), në të kundërt ua them unë: kjo qelizë e vogël sardenjase është Oliena, ose ashtu si shqipërohet në ditët e  sotëme Ulìana.

Ashtu  gati si të gjitha  qëndrat e Sardenjës, mban një emër i cili i shpëton hetimeve të kryera shkencërisht, e dikush mendon se ka të bëje me vajin meqënëse zona është e mbushur me pemë ullinjsh (por ato i kanë sjell Pizanezët kur emri Olian egzistonte prej kohësh). Po në zonat e Sardenjës ku nuk egzistojnë?  Të tjerëve u ka ardhur në mend  Iliens-ët (bijt e …Ilio,  nga ku  thonë se rrjedhin një pjesë e sardenjasve Nuragic).

Hetimi im, që nis pikërisht këtu përpiqet të vëjë në dukje se si prapashtesa –ena, -ana është shumë e dendur në toponimet e substratit pre-romak; dhe pikërisht këtu shkolla mediterraneiste ka kundërshtuar: “punë afrikanësh”, ndërkohë hipoteza orientalizuese, e mbrojtur në Sardenjë vetëm nga Pittau përgjigjet : “punë etruskësh”.

Por le të shohim temën (pjesën e fillimit), e cila është Oli- dhe për momentin  le të ndalemi  këtu.

Duket sikur parardhësit tanë të largët, kanë dashur të na lënë qëllimisht aty këtu ndonjë gjurmë të kalimit të tyre mbi tokë, pasi duke gërmuar në nëntokën e Olienës në mesin e tetëqindës (shek. 19-të) arkeologu Giovanni Spano nxori në dritë  një statujëz të epokës romake, e cila pas ribashkimit të pjesëve të thyera, u përcaktua në fillim se i përkiste Belzebù-s, mbretit të mizave të traditës semite (meqënse dukej i mbuluar nga mizat). Pastaj u përcaktua se i përkiste një figure, për të cilën deri në atë moment dyshohej nëpërmjet burimeve greke, se i përkiste Sardenjës prehistorike:  asaj të Aristeo-s, prurës mitik i teknikave të reja në bujqësi, në vreshtari dhe  sidomos në bletari, i ardhur, kushedi se kur nga Tebe në  Boeci (klasikja dritë e lindjes “ex oriente lux” ¹).  Bletët e skalitura mbi gjoks tregojnë se bëhej fjalë për një statujëz kushtuar këtij shpikësi lindor; Jo vetëm kaq, por edhe vëndi ku u gjet  statujza fliste qartë: lokaliteti  Su medde (ose “sa 'idda de su Medde”), është një variant lokal i gjuhës sarde  “su mele” (mjalti) (dysor  i latinishtes “Mel(l)e”). Por ajo për të cilën askush nuk u thellua në studime ishte fakti se statujza ishte gërmuar brenda në një  fushë  (salto ²) e njohur ndryshe: Dule (edhe sot njihet kështu).

Kjo fjale nuk ka asnjë zbërthim të përshtatshëm në latinisht, ndërsa  lexuesi shqipfolës e di që ajo bashkëtingëllon në mënyrë perfekte me shqipen: dyllë (që eshte fjalë origjinale shqiptare dhe nuk ështe huazim as latin, as turk dhe as sllav)

Atëherë, kjo mund të jetë nje rastësi, bota ështe e mbushur me ngjashmëri të rastësishme: ngjashmëria e famshme anglosaksone me atë persiane e fjalës “bad” që ka të njëjtin kuptim “i keq ”, por që  origjinën etimologjike e ka të ndryshme. Pra mund edhe të jetë rastësi. Por në librin tim gjënden edhe rrethana të tjera rastësore  si këto.  Madje, nëse nga një gjurmë e vogël duhet patjetër të nxirret një element  deduktiv përfundimtar, unë rikthehem sërisht në Oliena për të bër një pyetje retorike: “ Një territor i cili na sjell që nga periudha e lashtesisë një statujëz kushtuar hyjnisë së bletarisë, a mund të ketë në thelb ndonjë arësye për tu përcaktuar si “vend i huallive të mjaltit”?

Përgjigja ime është po, pasi lexuesi shqiptar e njeh mire, sidomos e njeh   mirë edhe ai Arbëresh (shqiptarët e  Italisë), të cilët kanë ruajtur një variant akoma më të pastër të fjalës “huall” që në gjuhën e tyre tingëllon: hol-i !!!

Edhe kjo fjalë (ashtu si mendojnë studjuesit Meyer, Çabej, Demiraj dhe Orel) është  indoeuropjane, e përafërt me latinishten  alveus, me greqishten  aulos,  e mbi të gjitha me sllavishten ulьjь dhe lituanishten  aulys që nënkuptojnë ”huall bletësh”.

Unë e di që në këtë pikë lexuesit skeptik do shtrembërojnë fytyrën, pasi  natyrisht është e vështirë të bindesh; dhe kanë të drejtë duhet më tepër: toponomastika  ka qënë gjithmon një argument i squllët  me të cilën rezikon të rrëshqasësh dhe të mos ngrihesh më në këmbë.   

Dakord o mosbesues, ja ku e keni të servirur.

Atëherë, në territorin e dëftuar (Oliena, Orgosolo dhe Ogliastra), ekziston një fjalë që prej dhjetra vjetësh ka çmendur në fillim Wagner (kontrollo të famëshmen DES në faqe 489), dhe më pas të gjithë gjuhëtarët: “eni”, “enis”  ose “eniu”. Me këtë fjalë misterioze  në këtë krahinë të Sardenjës  dëftohet pema e Bërshenjës (klasifikuar, dhe ështe e rastit ta themi, me emrin taxus bacchata).  Dikush mendonte se kishte lidhje me gjuhën Baske,  e dikush tjetër ka thënë: nuk e di.

Është e kotë që ta them unë, shqipja e njeh tashmë:  pasi për të njëjtën bimë  përdor emërtimin   enjë (që tingëllon si emëri i një këngëtareje irlandeze), e cila është një fjalë misterioze edhe për shqipen, dhe në librin tim kam kërkuar ta interpretoj ( me anë të zbërthimit indoeuropjan).

I dashur lexues, nëse deri këtu nuk kam mundur të të bind atëherë vijo të më ndjekësh: kjo ështe vetëm kopertina, faqe të tjera  do vijnë, e kush e di, ndofta përgjatë  rrugës për në  Damastion ³ do konvertohesh edhe ti në ilirizëm!!!

1)    ex oriente lux, është një frazë që përdoret për të treguar se kultura njerëzore e ka patur origjinën e saj në lindje.

2)    salto, ështe një term  sardo-latin me të cilin nënkuptohej një territor jashtë territorit qytetar. 

3)    Damastion, ishte një qytet antik në rrethinat e liqenit Ohër i banuar nga iliro-dardanët në të cilin mbreteronte në shek. e 4-ët para erës sonë mbreti ilir Bardhyli.

Bibliografia e përdorur:

Angiolillo S., “Aristeo in Sardegna” in Bollettino di Archeologia 5/61(1990), 1-9

CASTIA S., "Aristeo il protos euretes" in La Sardegna e i miti classici, Olbia 1996, 19-22

Çabej E., Studime etimologjike në fushë të shqipes, Tiranë 1982

Demiraj B., Albanische Etymologien, Amsterdam-Atlanta 1997

Meyer G., Etymologisches Wörterbuch der Albanesischen Sprache, Strassburg 1891

Orel V., Albanian Etymological Dictionary, Leiden-Boston-Köln 1998

Pianu G.,  “Il mito di Aristeo in Sardegna” in Zucca 2004, 96-98

Pittau M., I nomi di paesi città regioni monti fiumi della Sardegna significato origine, Cagliari 1997

Sanna S.,  “La figura di Aristeo in Sardegna”, in Zucca 2004, 99-111

Spano G., “Statuetta d’Aristeo in bronzo” in Bullettino Archeologico Sardo I (1855) 65-71 [testo in http://www.comune.oliena.nu.it/conosci_secondo.php?mpos=50&id=20&bar=arch]

Spiggia S., Le api nella tradizione popolare della Sardegna, Sassari, 1997

Wolf H. J, Toponomastica barbaricina, Nuoro (1998)

 “       “    “La toponomastica preromana in Sardegna”, in Max Leopold Wagner. Lingua e cultura sarda, Atti Conv. Int. di ling. sarda (a cura di D. Turchi), Oliena 23-3 2003, 49-58 (2004)

Zucca R, (a cura di) LOGOS PERI THS SARDOUS. Le fonti classiche e la Sardegna, Roma 2004

Per consultare la versione in lingua italiana:http://web.tiscali.it/sardoillirica/sardoillirica/OLIENA.ILLIRICA.htm

Interview with Professor Alberto G. Areddu author of the book "Albanian Origins of Civilization in Sardinia”.

Interview with Professor Alberto G. Areddu author of the book "Albanian Origins of Civilization in Sardinia”.

by Brunilda Ternova

Prof. Alberto G. Areddu has been interested for years in the discipline called "Sardinian language" regarding which he published: Studi Etimologici Logudoresi, Postille e Aggiunte al DES (1996), Launeddas and other greek-italic studies (2004). He published his works in Berkeley Romance Philology, and was reviewed by HJ Wolf in Zeitschrift für Romanische Philologie (2002).
In his latest essay "Albanian Origins of Civilization in Sardinia" the author continues his research back to the original sources of Sardinian language, testifying and highlighting the most compelling paleo-illiric perspective relying upon many elements of topography and several lexemes so far unexplained.

Brunilda Ternova: First, Professor Areddu thank you for the chance you offered us to do this interview, enabling the Albanian readers (in Albania and in diaspora) to know you and your scientific works.

Prof. Alberto G. Areddu: Thank you for giving me the opportunity to talk about my works.


Brunilda Ternova: Since it is hard to conceive the work detached from its creator, let me ask you something about yourself. Who is Professor Alberto G. Areddu, where was he born and where did he grow up?

Prof. Alberto G. Areddu: I was born in Genoa (Italy) from Sardinian parents. There I also graduated, after that I moved to Sardinia island. At the moment I’m a teacher in a public high school.

Brunilda Ternova: Your latest essay "Albanian Origins of Civilization in Sardinia" was published in 2007 and is a book that deals with many interesting arguments in linguistic, ethnographic and historical fields. Can you explain to us what this book represents to you, what drove you to undertake a study of this nature and how these studies emerged and grew developed during the time?

Prof. Alberto G. Areddu: Well, the interest that always got me was to find explanations about what were the origins of the Sardinians, who, being islanders, should definitely have come from somewhere. Till now the various hypotheses that emerged, simply contradicted each other. It’s a long I have been through the etymological research in the field. The difficulty was in being able to procure the proving material so to support from a scientific perspective those that were originally simple insights.

Brunilda Ternova: What are the strengths that you think can support your theory about the Illyrian origins of civilization in Sardinia? And why other scholars hesitate and are afraid to deal with these matching points in antiquity between the Sardinian people and the Illyrians?

Prof. Alberto G. Areddu: This is a crucial question. It should be known, and we can say it without fear at all, that the issue of antiquity, especially the toponymic reconstruction in Sardinia, is contracted only by a few scholars who have no interests in allowing non-academics to express opinions contrary to the hypothesis or their works. So happened that the only review (mostly positive) published, belongs to a non-Sardinian, the well known balkanologist Emanuele Banfi, University of Milan.
There is also a general sentiment that makes my study less interesting: it is years that a certain editorial policy of Sardinian publishing houses, which is focused more on manifesting (rather than proving) that the paleosardinians were ancient Semites, in some cases creators of an extraordinary civilization, originated almost in a abiogenetic way. Besides, the baronial university professors are attracted by these hypotheses and write easy reading books for an uneducated audience. For this reason, many people think that Sardinians descend from the imaginary Lydians (of which we hardly know anything), and therefore the sardinians would be nothing but the connecting link with the Etruscans.As you can imagine, there is no living Babylonian or Lydian who can reply to the inaccuracies of these researchers. Of course the idea is to sell little vials of hope to people who think they need it, and all this is done in detriment of the scientific research.
Sardinians then, without accusing them to be too superficial, like to ride (and be ridden by) strong hypotheses, which sublimate their ancient sense of inferiority (due to the fact that they are not and do not feel Italian). Therefore the Illyrian-Albanian hypothesis is not so attractive being addressed to the imagine of a minority group.
However, recently I read a few articles of some Sardinian magazines which allude to some relationships between the paleosardinian and the Thrace world – obviously with no mentioning me at all – although relating to the imaginary Lydian area. Indeed, the stronger evidences that corroborate my thesis are: the location of some lexemes amongst the most isolated areas of Sardinia, which have no explanations through Latin but could be explained through Albanian, Romanian, some archaic elements of Balto-Slavic or the few we know of Thracian and Illyrian often preserved into greek glosses and words. There are sources of data provided by Greek historiography that tend to characterize the arrival of Illyrian elements in Sardinia - not as an invasion of people - together with Boeotian people (who spoke the Eolic language), marking an important moment of civilization, carried on by people with a superior culture particularly in agriculture and farming.

Brunilda Ternova: This book is your third self-financed publication. It seems natural and "fair" to you that this kind of scientific works face so many difficulties to be published and released by the institutions involved and by the publishing houses?

Prof. Alberto G. Areddu: Unfortunately, I must say that this is a practice more widespread than one would think. Today either you should have a big publisher behind you – even if your target must be over three thousand copies – or you have to choose on-demand publishing disguised as official publisher. That way the author works on a hypothesis that could even be completely wrong, investing time and capital on his own risk. What is unacceptable is the fact the very people who share your interests are those who obstruct the publication, that is hateful and dehumanizing. There is no point to complain too much in hindsight about this continues silent behaviour, because academics are auto-recommended and corporate and if you allow yourself to criticize them in your studies, for you is over.

Brunilda Ternova: Your theories are very revolutionary; have you ever been afraid of your ideas being criticized by academic and scientific circles?

Prof. Alberto G. Areddu: Less revolutionary than might be assumed. The idea of a paleobalkanic element inside the Sardinian language is not a new one. The greatest scholar of Sardinian language, german Max Leopold Wagner, had expressed this idea in his 1933 study published in the journal ‘Revue de Linguistique Romane’ (which anyone can download from the Gallica website). Unfortunately, this idea later fell into the Italian school of so called "mediterranean" supported by those who saw an enormous presence of pre-indoeuropean elements in the Mediterranean area, with fewer indoeuropean elements. However, I repeat, may my observations were criticized, because that would mean admitting they existence. Therefore, taking into account the fact that in two years in Sardinia has not been published any reviews on local newspapers, television, academic magazines, so to highlight my work, I created a personal web site and I write in some blogs.
Journalists (90% of whom do not even know Greek or Latin, not to mention Albanian) use earflaps to hear what university referents say. The latter ones are generally associated to publishing houses, distribution companies and to those newspapers published nowadays (which do not shine).
Is there anything else to add?

Brunilda Ternova: What does Sardinia represent for you and what does it mean to be Sardinian today under the light of this Sardo-Illyrian/Albanian connection?

Prof. Alberto G. Areddu: It means drawing a remote route which brought elements of Bronze Age civilization to people remained backward to the Neolithic Age. It is possible that in the area of Nuoro - genetic investigations are still in the beginning - it will emerge one day genetic relationships with Balkan people of nowadays. This is the reason why I titled one of the chapters paraphrasing Virgil: “On the search for ancient fathers”.

Brunilda Ternova: The presence of the Albanian diaspora in Italy is about the most numerous and steady ever known in history, starting from antique times up to nowadays. Do you think this ancient connection, and the contemporary presence of the Albanians in Italy, may help in creating a climate of mutual brotherhood between our people and future exchanges between our scholars and scientists?

Prof. Alberto G. Areddu: I wish this may happen. Unfortunately we are in such a moment as both Italy and Sardinia are facing some reactions against immigrants ‘Tout Court’, that does not take into account personal qualities of individuals, and all this for reasons of public order and the current economic crisis. Reasoning in ancient terms, the Illyrian existence could be glimpsed in these of ‘sea peoples’ among which included Shardana. The people of Shardana, according to interpretations of scholars as Schachermeyr and Bonfante, were of Illyrian origin driven by necessity to all thrown into the Nile Delta and later to Palestine. There are many details that ensure that this influx has occurred: the city of Sarda (Shudah today), the tribe of Sardeates or Ardiei, the city of Pelastae from which the ethnonym of Pelaestini or Pelasgians, and other things.

Brunilda Ternova: Do you think there could be other initiatives - not just essays, but also academic initiatives - to shed more light on these issues that reveal the mysteries of the past of our peoples?

Prof. Alberto G. Areddu: Undoubtedly. Albanian scholars should deal with the ‘Sardinian things’ to make certain they can identify the nucleus of common civilization. As well, we would expect academics, just curious, or reasonable experimenters - without prejudice and equipped with the light of logic - to deal with the ‘Albanian things’, studying in depth the dialects, traditions and Albanian toponyms. Unfortunately, we are paying for a negative situation: we are numerically small populations and I do not know how many in Albania and Sardinia would be willing to explore these subtle relationships.

Brunilda Ternova: What would your message be to the Albanian reader, and what about the subject of your next work?

Prof. Alberto G. Areddu: One of my cultural wishes would be the development of a trend outside Albania, to revaluate the Illyrian antiquity, as happened to other ancient indoeuropean populations almost forgotten (such as the Celtic saga case). My scientific desire is to work on a forthcoming essay in which I can develop certain aspects of historical and cultural reconstruction not treated inside the “Albanian origin of civilization in Sardinia”. So I will bring not only words but also artefacts, traditions, symbols and reciprocal liaisons. And now, if you allow me, I will take my leave adopting your typical word for greetings: falem, which according to the great Eqrem Çabej derives from latin ‘CHALARE’, preserved in Sardinia and Corsica, however in the isles is used only with original value of ‘get off’: falare. So to you all: Faleminderit/ Thank you!

Brunilda Ternova: Thank you Prof. Areddu for having released this nice interview!



Interviewed and translated from Italian by Brunilda Ternova



For more information see the author's personal blog:
http://web.tiscali.it/sardoillirica/sardoillirica/
http://web.tiscali.it/sardoillirica/sardoillirica/ARCHIVIO ILLIRICO.htm


To contact the author: illirica@tiscali.it