Skanderbeg - in Literature and Art

In Literature and Art

There are two known works of literature written about Skanderbeg which were produced in 15th century. The first was written at the beginning of 1480 by Serbian writer Martin Segon who was the Catholic Bishop of Ulcinj and one of the most notable 15th-century humanists. A part of the text he wrote under title Martino Segono di Novo Brdo, vescovo di Dulcigno. Un umanista serbo-dalmata del tardo Quattrocento is short but very important biographical sketch on Skanderbeg (Italian: Narrazioni di Giorgio Castriotto, da i Turchi nella lingua loro chiamato Scander beg, cioe Alesandro Magno). Another 15th century literature work with Skanderbeg as one of the main characters was Memoirs of a janissary (Serbian: Успомене јаничара) written in period 1490—1497 by Konstantin Mihailović, a Serb who was a janissary in Ottoman Army.

Skanderbeg gathered quite a posthumous reputation in Western Europe. In the 16th and 17th centuries, most of the Balkans were under the suzerainty of the Ottomans who were at the gates of Vienna in 1683 and narrative of the heroic Christian's resistance to the "Moslem hordes" captivated readers' attention in the West. Books on the Albanian prince began to appear in Western Europe in the early 16th century. One of the earliest was the Historia de vita et gestis Scanderbegi, Epirotarum Principis (Rome, 1508), published a mere four decades after Skanderbeg's death. This History of the life and deeds of Scanderbeg, Prince of the Epirotes was written by the Albanian historian Marinus Barletius Scodrensis, known in Albanian as Marin Barleti, who, after experiencing the Ottoman capture of his native Shkodër firsthand, settled in Padua where he became rector of the parish church of St. Stephan. Barleti dedicated his work to Don Ferrante Kastrioti, Skanderbeg's grandchild, and to posterity. The book was first published in Latin. Barleti is sometimes inaccurate in favour of his hero, for example, according to Gibbon, Barleti claims that the Sultan was killed by disease under the walls of Krujë. Barleti's inaccuracies had also been noticed prior to Gibbon by Laonikos Chalkokondyles. He made up spurious correspondence between Vladislav II of Wallachia and Skanderbeg wrongly assigning it to the year 1443 instead to the year of 1444. Barleti also invented correspondence between Skanderbeg and Sultan Mehmed II to match his interpretations of events.

In the 16th and 17th centuries, Barleti's book was translated into a number of foreign language versions. All these books, written in the panegyric style that would often characterize medieval historians who regarded history mostly as a branch of rhetoric, inspired a wide range of literary and art works.

Franciscus Blancus, a Catholic bishop born in Albania, also wrote Kastrioti's biography. His book "Georgius Castriotus, Epirensis vulgo Scanderbegh, Epirotarum Princeps Fortissimus" was published in Latin in 1636. French philosopher, Voltaire, in his works, held in very high consideration the Albanian hero. Sir William Temple considered Skanderbeg to be one of the seven greatest chiefs without a crown, along with Belisarius, Flavius Aetius, John Hunyadi, Gonzalo Fernández de Córdoba, Alexander Farnese, and William the Silent. Ludvig Holberg, a Danish writer and philosopher, claimed that Skanderbeg was one of the greatest generals in history.

The Italian baroque composer Antonio Vivaldi composed an opera entitled Scanderbeg (first performed 1718), libretto written by Antonio Salvi. Another opera, entitled Scanderbeg, was composed by 18th century French composer François Francœur (first performed 1763). In the 20th century, Albanian composer Prenkë Jakova composed a third opera, entitled Gjergj Kastrioti Skënderbeu, which premiered in 1968 for the 500th anniversary of the hero's death.

Skanderbeg is the protagonist of three 18th-century British tragedies: William Havard's Scanderbeg, A Tragedy (1733), George Lillo's The Christian Hero (1735), and Thomas Whincop's Scanderbeg, Or, Love and Liberty (1747). A number of poets and composers have also drawn inspiration from his military career. The French 16th-century poet Ronsard wrote a poem about him, as did the 19th-century American poet, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. Gibbon, the 18th-century historian, held Skanderbeg in high regard with panegyric expressions.

Giammaria Biemmi, an Italian priest, published a work on Skanderbeg titled Istoria di Giorgio Castrioto Scanderbeg-Begh in Brescia, Italy in 1742. He claimed that he had found a work published in Venice in 1480 and written by an Albanian humanist from Bar, in modern-day Montenegro whose brother was a warrior in Skanderbeg's personal guard. According to Biemmi, the work had lost pages dealing with Skanderbeg's youth, the events from 1443–1449, the Siege of Krujë (1467), and Skanderbeg's death. Biemmi referred to the author of the work as Antivarino, meaning the man from Bar. The "Anonymous of Antivari" was Biemmi's invention that some historians (Fan S. Noli and Athanase Gegaj) had not discovered and used his forgery as source in their works.

Skanderbeg is also mentioned by Prince of Montenegro, Petar II Petrović-Njegoš, one of the greatest poets of Serbian literature in his poem The Mountain Wreath (1847), and in False Tsar Stephen the Little (1851). In 1855, Camille Paganel wrote Histoire de Scanderbeg, inspired by the Crimean War, whereas in the lengthy poetic tale Childe Harold's Pilgrimage (1812–1819), Byron wrote with admiration about Skanderbeg and his warrior nation.

The Great Warrior Skanderbeg (Albanian: Skënderbeu, Russian: Великий воин Албании Скандербег), a 1953 Albanian-Soviet biographical film, earned an International Prize at the 1954 Cannes Film Festival.

Skanderbeg's memory has been engraved in many museums, such as the Skanderbeg Museum next to Krujë Castle. Many monuments are dedicated to his memory in the Albanian cities of Tirana (in Skanderbeg Square by Odhise Paskali), Krujë, and Peshkopi. A palace in Rome in which Skanderbeg resided during his 1466–67 visits to the Vatican is still called Palazzo Skanderbeg and currently houses the Italian museum of pasta: the palace is located between the Fontana di Trevi and the Quirinal Palace. Also in Rome, a statue is dedicated to the Albanian hero in Piazza Albania. Monuments or statues of Skanderbeg have also been erected in the cities of Skopje and Debar, in the Republic of Macedonia; Pristina, in Kosovo; Geneva, in Switzerland; Brussels, in Belgium; and other settlements in southern Italy where there is an Arbëreshë community. In 2006, a statue of Skanderbeg was unveiled on the grounds of St. Paul's Albanian Catholic Community in Rochester Hills, Michigan. It is the first statue of Skanderbeg to be erected in the United States.