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The religious distinctions that were once introduced with the Ottoman administration became
visible again. This time these distinctions were not categorised and divided in administrative
units (e.g. millets) but were united under a single label called the nation-state. In the
population census of Albania from the 1930, which was ordered by Zogu and included
questions about religious adherence, it is reported that about 70% of population declared
themselves as Muslims, about 20% as Orthodox Christians and about 10% as Roman
Catholics 80 (see Jacques 1995: 396). Jacques notes that these religious differences gradually
became part of the people’s representations. Thus, those people who proclaimed themselves
as Christians represented “Muslims” as betrayers who “became Turks”; those who declared
themselves as Muslims despised “Christians” as “idol-worshippers”, “pig-eaters” and often
called them kaur or infidels; and finally those who identified themselves as Catholics were
convinced that “all Muslim stink” (see Jacques 1995: 396). Above all, these social
differentiations and stratifications, based upon the religious distinctions and the source of
different administrative powers, became reappropriated and generated through people’s
rhetoric (ibid.).
In his book on the history of Himarë/Himara, Rusha does not discuss the Himarë/Himara
people’s attitudes towards the unification of religious differences. But he comments on the
local government which had to be abolished under Zogu’s centralism. Namely, the latter
forced the people of Himarë/Himara to abolish the venomes, or unwritten laws that were in
place and regulated by elderly chiefs of the soia/fisi or gerundhia, of the particular local
community:
Under the mischevious pretence to establish a modern state he [Ahmed Zogu] declared
unique laws for the entire territory. This forced Himara region to abolish venomes.
Himara region had to be united with the rest of the regions as these were not the times
of Turks anymore (Rusha 2001: 127, translations mine).
The abolition of venomes in Himarë/Himara area resulted in two larger revolts of the local
people who demanded the independency of their area and the declaration of Himarë/Himara
as Prefecture:
During the regime of Ahmed Zogu the people of Himara revolted twice in order to win
the privileges of the prefecture, in 1927 and 1932. Both revolts were suppressed by his
80 In this major division the census also registered a few Jews, Protestants, atheists and very few who identified
with the category “others” (see Jacques 1995: 396).
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