Correspondence on the Albanian Language
(Hanover, 28 December 1711)On this occasion, I would beg you, Sir, to send me the Lord's Prayer in the Epirotic (Albanian) language in an interlinear version and would be obliged to you if you could add the Credo, if possible. Please also send me the titles of the two books in this idiom, their size and the date and place of publication, for this language, being little known, is worthy of being investigated. I will endeavour to find these books in Rome. With them, ancient monuments have been dug up from the foundations of Notre Dame in Paris.
(Vienna, 13 January 1714)… The modern European alphabets are derived from Latin, with the exception of the two Slavic ones: Cyrillic and so-called Glagolitic. Some authors later attributed these to Saint Jerome who was of Illyrian origin, but falsely so, as if the ancient Illyrian language were some sort of Slavic. But the Slavs were late to arrive in Illyria, not before the age of Justinian. The ancient Illyrians were of Celtic origin. They used a language closely related to Germanic and Gaulish. It is evident that relics of this are preserved in the modern language, in particular in that of the Epirots, of which I have seen specimens published. Nowadays they generally call the Slavic language Illyrian because the Slavs settled in Illyria. …
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