Themistokli Germenji High School

PROJECT

Theme:Leader of the past in Albania

Topic: Fan Noli
Group: Hygerta Rrapo Artea Denas
Argita Corbaxhi Eglentina Bemit
Migena Zako

Accepted by :Eva Kane

CONTENTS
Introduction
1)Life and career
2)Origin
o

Hudson incident

3)Political activities
4)Downfall and exile
5)Poems
Conclusions
Bibliography

Introduction
Theofan Stilian Noli, better known as Fan Noli was an Albanian writer, scholar,
diplomat, politician, historian, orator, and founder of the Albanian Orthodox
Church, who served as prime minister and regent of Albania in 1924 during
the June Revolution. In this project is talked about the life of Fan Noli in general
and his career in particular. Is talked about his origin since it is a little special.
An other point worth mentioning is the Hudson incident . Noli had an important
role in political activities. So in his career were some downfalls and
achievements . After his downfall Noli was forced into exile . Then we have
mentioned some poems written by Noli .
The aime of this project its to know who was Fan Noli, his importance in Albania
as a leader. To know what he did for his country . To value his politics, what he did
right and what he did wrong. Nolis downfalls and successes.
Also to know some of his poems .

1)

Life and career

Theofan Stilian Noli, better known as Fan Noli was an Albanian writer, scholar,
diplomat, politician, historian, orator, and founder of the Albanian Orthodox
Church, who served as prime minister and regent of Albania in 1924 during
the June Revolution.
Fan Noli is venerated in Albania as a champion of literature, history, theology,
diplomacy, journalism, music, and national unity. He played an important role in
the consolidation of Albanian as the national language of Albania with numerous
translations of world literature masterpieces. His contributions to English language
literature are also manifold: as a scholar and author of a series of publications
on Skanderbeg, Shakespeare, Beethoven, religious texts and translations. He
produced a translation of the New Testament in English, The New Testament of our
Lord and Savior Jesus Christ from the approved Greek text of the Church of
Constantinople and the Church of Greeze, published in 1961.
He earned degrees at Harvard the New England Conservatory of Musicand finally
his Ph.D. from Boston University He was ordained a priest in 1908, establishing
thereby the Albanian Church and elevating the Albanian language to ecclesiastic
use. He briefly resided in Albania after the 1912 declaration of independence. After
World War I, Noli led the diplomatic efforts for the reunification of Albania and
received the support of US President Woodrow Wilson. Later he pursued a
diplomatic-political career in Albania, successfully leading the Albanian bid for
membership in the League of Nations.
A respected figure who remained critical of corruption and injustice in the
Albanian government, Fan Noli was asked to lead the 1924 June Revolution. He
then served as prime minister until his revolutionary government was overthrown
by Ahmet Zogu. He was exiled to Italy and permanently settled in the United
States in the 1930s, acquiring US citizenship and agreeing to end his political
involvement. He spent the rest of his life as an academician, religious leader and
writer.

2)

Origin

Fan Noli was born in 1882 in the Albanian community of Ibrik Tepe, Eastern
Thrace as Theofanus Stylianos Mavromatis. He was an Albanian of the Eastern
Orthodox faith. As a young man, Noli wandered throughout the Mediterranean
Basin, living in Athens, Greece, Alexandria, Egypt and Odessa, Russia, and
supported himself as an actor and translator. As well as his native Albanian, he
spoke many foreign languages such as Greek, English, French, Turkish, and
ArabicThrough his contacts with the Albanian expatriate movement, he became an
ardent supporter of his country's nationalist movement and moved to the United
States in 1906. He first worked in Buffalo , New York, in a lumber mill and then
moved to Boston, Massachusetts and worked as an operator on a machine which
stamped labels on cans. A Greek source claims that Noli "had not yet discovered
his "Albanian" patriotism when he was still a teacher in the Greek schools of
Alexandria and had the name Theophanis Mavromatis".Fan Noli himself
was Albanian and considered himself as such.
o In Boston, some Albanian Christians were part of the Greek Orthodox
Church, which was vehemently opposed to the Albanian nationalist
cause. When a Greek Orthodox priest refused to perform the burial rites
for Kristaq Dishnica, a member of the Albanian community
from Hudson, Massachusetts, because of his nationalist activities, Noli
and a group of Albanian nationalists in New England created the
independent Albanian Orthodox Church. Noli, the new church's first
clergyman, was ordained as a priest in 1908 by a Russian
Orthodox bishop in the United States under questionable circumstances.
In 1923, Noli was consecrated as a bishop for the Church of Albania.

3)

Political activities

In 1908, Noli began studying at Harvard, completing his degree in 1912. He

returned to Europe to promote Albanian independence, setting foot in Albania
for the first time in 1913. He returned to the United States during World War I,
serving as head of the Vatra organization, which effectively made him leader of
the Albanian diaspora. His diplomatic efforts in the United States
and Geneva won the support of President Woodrow Wilson for an independent
Albania and, in 1920, earned the new nation membership in the fledgling
League of Nations. Though Albania had already declared its independence in
1912, membership in the League of Nations provided the country with the
international recognition it had failed to obtain until then.In 1921, Noli entered
the Albanian parliament as a representative of the liberal pro-British "People's
Party"), the chief liberal movement in the country. The other parties were the
conservative pro-Italian "Progressive Party" founded by Mehdi Frashri and led
by Ahmet Zogu, and "Popular Party" of Xhafer Ypi. The conservatives of Zogu
would dominate the political scene. Noli served briefly as foreign minister in
the government of Xhafer Ypi. This was a period of intense turmoil in the
country between the liberals and the conservatives. After a botched
assassination attempt against Zogu, the conservatives revenged themselves by
assassinating another popular liberal politician, Avni Rustemi. Noli's speech at
Rustemi's funeral was so powerful that liberal supporters rose up against Zogu
and forced him to flee to Yugoslavia Zogu was succeeded briefly by his fatherin-law, Shefqet Vrlaci, and by the liberal politician Iliaz Vrioni; Noli was
named prime minister and regent on July 17, 1924.Noli was consecrated in
1923 as the senior Orthodox bishop of the newly proclaimed Orthodox
Autocephalous Church of Albania out of the Congress of Berat

4)

Downfall and exile

Despite his efforts to reform the country, Noli's "Twenty Point Program" was
unpopular, and his government was overthrown by groups loyal to Zogu
on Christmas Eve of that year. Two weeks later, Zogu returned to Albania, and Noli
fled to Italy under sentence of death. Conscious of his fragile position, Zogu took
drastic measures to consolidate his reassert in power. By the end of winter, two of
the main leaders of the opposition, Bajram Curri and Luigj Gurakuqi, were
assassinated, while others were imprisoned. Noli founded the "National
Revolutionary Committee" also known as KONARE in Vienna. The committee
published the periodical called "National Freedom" Some of the early Albanian
communists as Halim Xhelo or Riza Cerova would start their publishing activities
here. The committee aimed in overthrowing Zogu and his cast and restoring
democracy. Despite the efforts, the committee's access and influence in Albania
would be limited. With the intervention of Kosta Boshnjaku, an old communist and
KONARE member, the organization would receive unconditioned monetary
support from the Comintern. Also Noli and Boshnjaku would make possible for
exile members of the Committee for the National Defence of Kosovo) to get the
same financial support.
In 1928, KONARE changed its name to "Committee of National Liberation"
Meanwhile, in Albania, after three years of republican regime, the "National
Council" declared Albania a Constitutional Monarchy, and Ahmet Zogu became
king. Noli moved back to the United States in 1932 and formed a republican
opposition to Zogu, who had since proclaimed himself "King Zog I". Over the next
years, he continued his education, studying and later teaching Byzantine music,
and continued developing and promoting the autocephalous Albanian Orthodox
Church he had helped to found. While in exile, he briefly allied with King Zog,
who fled Albania before the invading Italians in 1939, but was unable to set a firm
anti-Axis, anti-Communist front.
After the war, Noli established some ties with the communist government of Enver
Hoxha, which seized power in 1944. He unsuccessfully urged the U.S. government
to recognize the regime, but Hoxha's increasing persecution of all religions
prevented Noli's church from maintaining ties with the Orthodox hierarchy in
Albania. Despite the Hoxha regime's anticlerical bent, Noli's ardent Albanian
nationalism brought the bishop to the attention of the U.S. Federal Bureau of
Investigation. The FBI's Boston office kept the bishop under investigation for more
than a decade with no final outcome to the probe.
In 1945, Fan S. Noli received a doctor's degree in history from Boston University,
writing a dissertation on Skanderbeg. In the meantime, he also conducted research

at Boston University Music Department, publishing a biography on Ludvig van

Beethoven. He also composed a one-movement symphony called Scanderbeg in
1947. Toward the end of his life, Noli retired to Fort Lauderdale, Florida, where he
died in 1965. The branch of the Albanian Orthodox Church that he had governed
eventually became the Albanian Archdiocese of the Orthodox Church in America.
Writing in his diary two days after Noli's death, Albanian leader Enver Hoxha gave
his analysis of Noli's work:
As we are informed, Fan S. Noli died from an operation done last week in which,
because of his age, he did not survive. A cerebral hemorrhage caused a quick death.
Noli was one of the prominent political and literary figures of the beginning of this
century. The balance sheet of his life was positive. . . .Fan Noli today enjoys a
great popularity in our country, deserved as a literary translator and music critic.
He was a prominent promoter of the Albanian language. His original works and
translations, especially of Shakespeare, of Omar Khayym and Blasco Ibez, are
immortal. But especially his anti-Zogist, anti-feudal elegies and poems are
beautiful jewels that have inspired and will inspire our youth, especially in
creativity. He was also respected as a realistic politician, as a revolutionary
democrat in ideology and politics. The Party has assessed the figure of Noli. As is
deserved, we have had a patriotic duty to point out the really great merits of his in
literature, the history of the arts, and his merits and weaknesses in politics. I think
we will do our best in bringing his body to Albania, as this distinguished son of the
people, the revolutionary patriot, deserves to bask in his homeland, which he loved
and fought for his entire life.
Fan S. Noli is depicted on the obverse of the Albanian 100 lek banknote issued in
1996 though the banknote itself has ceased being legal tender since December 31,
2008.

5)

Poems

The following poems were written by Fan Noli:

Hymni i Flamurit
Thomsoni dhe Kuedra

Jepni pr Nnn

Moisiu n mal

Marshi i Krishtit

Krishti me kamikun

Shn Pjetrin n Mangall

Marshi i Barabbajt

Marshi i Kryqsmit

Kirenari

Kryqsmi

Knga e Salep-Sulltanit

Syrgjyn-vdekur

Shpell' e Dragobis

Rent, or Marathonomak!

Ans lumejve

Plak, topall dhe ashik

Sofokliu

Tallja prpara Kryqit

Sulltani dhe kabineti

Saga e Sermajes

Lidhje e pakputur

epelitja

Vdekja e Sulltanit

Conclusions:
In the end of this project have been reached these conclusions:
1)

Fan Noli was asked to lead the 1924 June Revolution because he was
a respected figure who remained critical of corruption and injustice in
the Albanian government.

2)

Through his contacts with the Albanian expatriate movement, he

became an ardent supporter of his country's nationalist movement.

3)

Noli returned to Europe to promote Albanian independence.

4)

Despite his efforts to reform the country, Noli's "Twenty Point

Program" was unpopular, and his government was overthrown by
groups loyal to Zogu on Christmas Eve of that year.

5)

Noli is well know even for his poems.

Bibliography
o https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fan_S._Noli
o Hoxha, Enver (1989). "Ditar: 1965"
o http://orthodoxwiki.org/Theophan_(Noli)_of_Durres