The Illyrians: their origins and homes

According to some scholars, the IIlyrians belong to a group of Indo-Europian tribes who came from the north to settle in the Balkans towards the end of the second millennium BC. According to the German archaeologist, Gustav Kossina, whose theories are the most well known, the Illyrians were an ethinic group founded in Lusatia, an area in western Poland. Eventually, carrying with them the Lusatian civilisation from the fields of urns, they made for the south.But this theory was only assumed because of the simple resemblance between the Lusatian civilisation and the Pannonian civilisation of Hungary.

Now in the true Illyrian areas, there are no archaeological remains proving the presence of Lusatian civilization. Some scholars who have studied the Lusatian civilisation have even reached the conclusion that they were Slav origin, while others consider that their origin were Germanic.

A new approach to the Illyrian problem was made possible by recent excavations in the prehistoric of Illyrian centres in Albania. The objects discovered in the necropolis of tumuli at Vajza (in the Vlore region) in south Albania dating from the end of the second millennium and from the beginning of the first millennium BC give us proof of a continuity between the civilisation of the Bronze Age and the Iron Age. Since the bearers of the Vajza civilisation were Illyrians themselves, the hypothesis that the latter equally created the Bronze civilisation has gained more and more consistency. It has been confirmed by relics discovered in the tumuli in the plain Pazhok (Elbasan, central Albania) were the findings date partly from 1900-1700 BC and partly from 1400 BC.The important fact is we are now talking about indigenous Illyrian population.

The typical local ceramics which, in may ways, maintain the traditions of the Aeneolithic ceramics support this thesis. New evidence in favour of the essentially Illyrians character of the Bronze Age civilisation is provided by the archaeological remains found in Maliq and Tren. The relics concerned consist of vase dating from the Copper Age which increase in number during Bronze Age. The shapes of these painted vases and the geometric motifs which one finds later on metallic objects are typically Illyrian character.

We are led to believe from all this that the bearers of the Aeneolithic civilisation continued to populate the Maliq and Tren sites during the Bronze Age. This was the population which was later to form the Illyrian Group. It seems, therefore, that Illyrians are indigenous in this area. The theory of the indigenous nature of Illyrians in Balkan has equally been confirmed by the discoveries made in the formerly Illyrians areas of Zocov and Ptuj in Yugoslavia.

As for the Pelasgi, whom some ancient writers quote as being the very ancient inhabitants of the southern Balkans and whom some modern scholars have consisted as the distant ancestors of Albanians, no serious data have been collected up to now establishing a link between them and the Illyrians, and the Albanians, their descendants. The Illyrians are one of the most numerous of ancient Europe, occupied the western part of Balkan peninsula. The territories which they inhabited were bounded on the north by the Sava and the Danube, on the south bye the Gulf of Ambracia and the northern areas of Greece, on the east by the Morava and the Vardar which seperated them from Thrace, on the west by the Adriatic and the Ionian seas. Within these boundaries, the northern regions were populated, according to the ancient writings, bye various tribes, the most important of which were the Liburnians, the Iapydi, the Dalmatians, the Daesitiati, and the Ardeates. The main tribes who settled on Albania territory itself were the Labeates, the Dardarians, the Paeonians, the Pirustae, the Parthinians, the Penestae, the Taulanti, the Amantes, the Bullini, the Encheliae, the Dassaretae and the Chaonians. The essarpians and the Iapygians from south-east Italy were also Illyrian tribes.

The earliest written information about the Illyrians can be found in Homer. In the fourteenth book of Iliad, the Paeonians are quoted as horsemen who having come from the their fertile regions under the leadership of Asteroups, took part in the Trojan War. Also according to Homer, Ulysses landed on the fertile coasts of the Thesprotians on his return from Troy, and was welcomed by Phaedon, their generous and heroic king.