Henry Skene, Esq., on the Albanians. 311 



that of the Selapitani, a people of Illyria, noticed by Livy.* 

 The modern denomination of Liapides may be derived from 

 this ancient tribe, rather than from the still more ancient 

 Lapithae, as the name becomes almost the same when the 

 first two letters are suppressed, and the termination, which is 

 always variable, altered. A similarity of names, however, is 

 but a feeble indication of the origin of a people or town, es- 

 pecially in a country where so many dialectic changes have 

 taken place, and it often leads into error. For instance, 

 there is a village near Elbassan, which bears the name of 

 Pekin, without the slighest difference from that of the great 

 city of the Celestial Empire ; but it cannot be said, even by 

 the wildest etymologist, to be inhabited by a people in any 

 way kindred to the Chinese. 



Another hypothesis holds that the Albanians derive their 

 origin from Alba, in Italy, and that they are the descendants 

 of a colony of the Praetorian guards, dismissed from Rome, 

 by the Emperor Septimius Severus, for having been accessory 

 to the assassination of Pertinax. Their dress, the words 

 coming from Latin roots, which are to be found in their lan- 

 guage, and a vague tradition prevalent among themselves, 

 support this idea. Chalcocondylas thinks that the Albanians 

 came from the other side of the Adriatic! But, as Justin 

 says, that the Albani of Asia were originally brought by Her- 

 cules from Ita1y,t the Albanians may have been first Italian, 

 and then Asiatic, although their migration, in this case, must 

 have been much anterior to the time of Septimius Severus. 

 The Albans of Asia, mentioned by Tacitus, occupied the mo- 

 dern country of Shirvan. 



Little is known about them, however, previously to their 

 occupation of parts of Macedonia and Epirus, excepting that 

 they entered these provinces from Illyria, and nothing else 

 has hitherto been proved on the subject. They are supposed 

 to have overrun Epirus about the time of the fall of the By- 

 zantine Empire. In advancing towards the south, they also 

 spread over the greatest part of Greece Proper, and many vil- 

 lages of the Morea are Albanian. Indeed, with the exception 



« Lib. xlv., c. 26. t P. 13. \ xlii., p. 3. 



