Mihal Grameno
![]() Grameno in revolutionary uniform during the Albanian National Awakening | |
Born | Korçë, Vilayet of Monastir, Ottoman Empire | 13 January 1871
Died | 5 February 1931 Korçë, Albania | (aged 60)
Literary movement | Romanticism, Albanian National Awakening |
Notable awards | ![]() |
Mihal Grameno (13 January 1871 – 5 February 1931) was an Albanian nationalist, politician, writer, freedom fighter, and journalist.
Biography
Mihal Grameno was Albanian.[1] Born in Korçë in a merchant family, he studied there at the local secondary school before emigrating to Romania in 1885. It was in Bucharest that he got involved in the Albanian National Awakening where the movement soon collapsed due to financial reasons in the extended family who were dependent on money.
In 1907, he joined the newly formed Çerçiz Topulli's kachak band, an early guerrilla unit fighting against Turkish troops in Albania.[2] They were considered the Apostles of Albanianism and would go from village to village to discuss the Albanian predicament.[citation needed]
Turkish officials sent out military patrols to capture the bandits. The activity of the band consisted of only one battle in two years, when the 5 people band was surrounded by 150 Turkish units in Mashkullore. Four out of five escaped the encirclement. Other bands of this nature, not having a journalist in their company, such as Grameno have remained unsung heroes.[citation needed]
During the Young Turk Revolution (1908), Adjuntant Major Ahmed Niyazi Bey met with guerilla leaders Topulli and Grameno on July 23 in Resne (modern Resen) where he expressed his gratitude and viewed the declaration of the CUP constitution as advantageous for the Albanian nation.[3] Grameno alongside Topulli and Niyazi appeared in photographs taken by the Manakis brothers during the revolution.[4]
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/e/e6/Cerciz_Topulli_And_Mihal_Grameno.jpg/220px-Cerciz_Topulli_And_Mihal_Grameno.jpg)
In 1909 Grameno founded in Korçë the Orthodox League (or Alliance) (Albanian: Lidhja Ortodokse) and served as editor of its periodical with the same name during 1909–1910. In 1910 the organization proclaimed the establishment of an independent Albanian church, and was unrecognized by the Ottoman Empire.[5] Grameno was arrested in 1910 by Ottoman authorities for his work with the newspaper Bashkimi i Kombit.[6]
During the upheavals of 1911, Grameno traveled as a go between for Albanian revolutionaries in Albanian inhabited lands and leaders of the Albanian national movement in Istanbul to coordinate armed activities against the Ottoman Empire.[7]
He also served as the editor of the weekly Koha (Time), initially published in Korçë and later in Jamestown, New York where he lived from 1915 to 1919. He traveled back to Europe to represent Albania through the Albanian-American community at the Paris Peace Conference in 1919 and in the following year he returned in Albania.
In the 1920s he carried out his journalistic and literary activities until he retired from public life due to ill health. Resigned and seriously ill, he died on February 5, 1931 in Korçë.
Works
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/8/80/Bust_of_Mihal_Grameno.jpg/150px-Bust_of_Mihal_Grameno.jpg)
Mihal Grameno's published works include:[8]
- Vdekja (The Death), a patriotic poem published in 1903;
- Mallkimi i gjuhës shqipe, (The curse upon the Albanian language), a comedy published in Bucharest 1905,
- Vdekja e Piros (The Death of Pyrrhus), a historical tragedy published in Sofia, 1906.
- Oxhaku (The Hearth), E puthura (The Kiss), and Varr' i pagëzimit (The Tomb of the Baptism), Korçë 1909, short stories.
- Plagët (The wounds) Manastir 1912, a volume of poetry;
- Kryengritja shqiptare, Korçë 1925 (The Albanian Uprising), memoirs of his experiences as a guerrilla fighter against the Turkish and Greek troops.
References
- ^ Blumi 2011, p. 21.
- ^ Skendi 1967, pp. 207, 210–211, 421.
- ^ Skendi 1967, p. 341.
- ^ Blumi, Isa (2011). Reinstating the Ottomans, Alternative Balkan Modernities: 1800–1912. New York: Palgrave MacMillan. pp. 4, 6. ISBN 9780230119086.
{{cite book}}
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(help) - ^ Blumi 2001, pp. 19.
- ^ Skendi 1967, p. 407.
- ^ Skendi 1967, p. 401.
- ^ Hoerder&Harzig 1987, pp. 474.
Sources
- Lloshi, Xhevat (2008). Rreth Alfabetit te Shqipes [Around the Albanian Alphabet]. Logos.
- Skendi, Stavro (1967). The Albanian national awakening. Princeton: Princeton University Press. ISBN 9781400847761.
{{cite book}}
: Invalid|ref=harv
(help) - Blumi, Isa (2001). "Teaching Loyalty in the Late Ottoman Balkans: Educational Reform in the Vilayets of Manastir and Yanya, 1878–1912". Comparative Studies of South Asia, Africa and the Middle East. 21 (1–2). doi:10.1215/1089201x-21-1-2-15.
- Hoerder, Dirk; Harzig, Christiane (1987). The Immigrant Labor Press in North America, 1840s–1970s: An Annotated Bibliography: Volume 2: Migrants from Eastern and Southeastern Europe 031326077X. Retrieved June 3, 2010.
External links
- People from Korçë
- People from Manastir Vilayet
- Albanian politicians
- Albanian journalists
- 1872 births
- 1931 deaths
- Albanian emigrants to the United States
- Activists of the Albanian National Awakening
- Members of the Albanian Orthodox Church
- 19th-century Albanian people
- 20th-century Albanian writers
- 20th-century Albanian politicians
- Eastern Orthodox Christians from Albania
- Heroes of Albania