is first attested in the 15th century. It is not closely related to any IE language we know in detail. Two main dialects, Gheg and Tosk, can be distinguished (see introduction).
Gheg has nasal vowels, while Tosk shows rhotacism comparable to that of Latin (see sounds).
Old Albanian has a definite article which is postponed like in other Balkan languages. The language encodes the speaker’s surprise through an admirative mood (see words).
Possessive constructions in Old Albanian are head-marked (see structures).
Joseph, Brian & Michiel de Vaan 2020, Old Albanian – Introduction, Part 1: Language and Speakers. In Saverio Dalpedri, Götz Keydana, and Stavros Skopeteas (eds.), Glottothèque: Ancient Indo-European Grammars online (electronic resource). Göttingen: University of Göttingen. DOI: https://doi.org/10.5446/49071.
De Vaan, Michiel 2020, Old Albanian – Introduction, Part 2: Authors and Texts. In Saverio Dalpedri, Götz Keydana, and Stavros Skopeteas (eds.), Glottothèque: Ancient Indo-European Grammars online (electronic resource). Göttingen: University of Göttingen. DOI: https://doi.org/10.5446/49070.
De Vaan, Michiel 2020, Old Albanian – Introduction, Part 3: Dialectology: Geg and Tosk. In Saverio Dalpedri, Götz Keydana, and Stavros Skopeteas (eds.), Glottothèque: Ancient Indo-European Grammars online (electronic resource). Göttingen: University of Göttingen. DOI: https://doi.org/10.5446/49069.
De Vaan, Michiel 2020, Old Albanian – Introduction, Part 4: The Layered Lexicon. In Saverio Dalpedri, Götz Keydana, and Stavros Skopeteas (eds.), Glottothèque: Ancient Indo-European Grammars online (electronic resource). Göttingen: University of Göttingen. DOI: https://doi.org/10.5446/49068.
Joseph, Brian 2020, Old Albanian – Introduction, Part 5: Albanian in its Areal Context. In Saverio Dalpedri, Götz Keydana, and Stavros Skopeteas (eds.), Glottothèque: Ancient Indo-European Grammars online (electronic resource). Göttingen: University of Göttingen. DOI: https://doi.org/10.5446/49080.
De Vaan, Michiel 2020, Old Albanian – Phonology: Segmental Phonology. In Saverio Dalpedri, Götz Keydana, and Stavros Skopeteas (eds.), Glottothèque: Ancient Indo-European Grammars online (electronic resource). Göttingen: University of Göttingen. DOI: https://doi.org/10.5446/49079.
De Vaan, Michiel 2020, Old Albanian – Morphology, Part 1: Stem Formation of the Verb. In Saverio Dalpedri, Götz Keydana, and Stavros Skopeteas (eds.), Glottothèque: Ancient Indo-European Grammars online (electronic resource). Göttingen: University of Göttingen. DOI: https://doi.org/10.5446/49078.
Joseph, Brian 2020, Old Albanian – Morphology, Part 2: The Verb 'to Be'. In Saverio Dalpedri, Götz Keydana, and Stavros Skopeteas (eds.), Glottothèque: Ancient Indo-European Grammars online (electronic resource). Göttingen: University of Göttingen. DOI: https://doi.org/10.5446/49077.
De Vaan, Michiel 2020, Old Albanian – Morphosyntactic structures, Part 1: Semantics of the Verb. In Saverio Dalpedri, Götz Keydana, and Stavros Skopeteas (eds.), Glottothèque: Ancient Indo-European Grammars online (electronic resource). Göttingen: University of Göttingen. DOI: https://doi.org/10.5446/49076.
De Vaan, Michiel 2020, Old Albanian – Morphosyntactic structures, Part 2: The Admirative. In Saverio Dalpedri, Götz Keydana, and Stavros Skopeteas (eds.), Glottothèque: Ancient Indo-European Grammars online (electronic resource). Göttingen: University of Göttingen. DOI: https://doi.org/10.5446/49075.
Joseph, Brian 2020, Old Albanian – Morphosyntactic structures, Part 3: The Verb Phrase. In Saverio Dalpedri, Götz Keydana, and Stavros Skopeteas (eds.), Glottothèque: Ancient Indo-European Grammars online (electronic resource). Göttingen: University of Göttingen. DOI: https://doi.org/10.5446/49074.
Joseph, Brian 2020, Old Albanian – Morphosyntactic structures, Part 4: The Noun Phrase. In Saverio Dalpedri, Götz Keydana, and Stavros Skopeteas (eds.), Glottothèque: Ancient Indo-European Grammars online (electronic resource). Göttingen: University of Göttingen. DOI: https://doi.org/10.5446/49073.
Joseph, Brian 2020, Old Albanian – Morphosyntactic structures, Part 5: Progressive 'po'. In Saverio Dalpedri, Götz Keydana, and Stavros Skopeteas (eds.), Glottothèque: Ancient Indo-European Grammars online (electronic resource). Göttingen: University of Göttingen. DOI: https://doi.org/10.5446/49072.