Albania Honor

Near the River Drin, which runs across Albania.

I have to be honest, my entire life I have been confusing Europe’s Roma for Albanians. It was not until I actually entered Albania that I learned who the Albanians were and what they stood for: honor in all things.

This European nation has a predominately Muslim population, a legacy of centuries of Ottoman rule, and due to its communist past it was isolated from the rest of the world until 1991, when the Soviet republic dissolved and the Republic of Albania was established. Scarfs meant many faces were concealed, and there was no language in common due to the division between standard Albanian and various dialects, so people’s behavior told the story instead.

More than two thirds of Albania is mountainous, making it ideal to explore on foot. In northern Albania one discovers the fairy-tale landscapes of the Accursed Mountains. Southern Albanian walking routes run along the crystal waters of the Ionian Sea, up high ridges and panoramic peaks, through pine forests, olive and citrus groves.

However, if you prefer the past to the future, then strike further inland—here you enter a whole new world—a different world—from days long gone by, a world where ancient mountain codes of behavior still prevail. You’ll feel as though you have entered a pre-mechanized time warp—where farmers work the land in much the same way as their ancestors did, the women continue to grow most of their food, and a donkey is still the favored mode of transport.

Driving into the most isolated parts of the country, it wasn’t until my husband and I emerged from the safety of our vehicle that we experienced this nation. Suddenly people are taking you as their responsibility, you have an adopted family, coffee is being provided and cards produced for a game. You don’t want to be a burden or take their time, but it is their honor to look after you. Because for Albanians, Besa e shqptarit si purteka e arit, etj: one’s word—besa—is worth more than gold.

In a land where they have had many cultural influences, Greek, Roman, Byzantine, Venetian, and Norman, it is a real cultural melting pot, archaeological gold mine, and trekker’s paradise. Yet the fiercely independent Albanian people are defined by their geography, with mountainous frontiers on all sides. What is there apart from your word? Besa, a word that first gained prominence in the Kanun of Lekë Dukagjini—an assembly of customary codes and traditions documented by the fifteenth century. And in the Kanun, the besa is described as the highest authority. “One’s word, promise, honor and all the responsibilities it entails” lies so close to the heart of Albanians that is it often referred to as “Albanianism.”

The “man of besa” connotes a man of honor, someone to whom you can trust your life and family. During one of the darkest chapters for the nation, when millions of Jews, gays, communists, and racial minorities were rounded up across Europe, many Albanians put up a fight to save complete strangers. While the Holocaust saw 90 percent of Poland’s Jews killed, and 77 percent of those in Greece, it is estimated that Albania emerged from the Second World War with a population of Jews eleven times greater than at the beginning. According to Yad Vashem, the Israeli museum that holds the world’s largest repository of documents and information related to the Holocaust, there is not a single known case of a Jew being turned over to Nazi authorities in Albania during its occupation. So Albania was recognized as “Righteous Among the Nations” at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C., on February 2, 1995.

Honor may feel like a slightly archaic concept, but it is actually one of the most important things we have. If we don’t honor our word, our responsibilities, our families, then we have lost something essential to our sense of self. Honor is not about some medieval notion of chivalry, so much as the fundamental principle that underpins trust and respect between people. It is about being true to our word, a principle that time and time again underpins trust and respect between people. Your besa says everything about you as a person. It is the last thing we should ever allow ourselves to give up.