Vaso Pasha

Pashko Vasa (17 September 1825 – 29 June 1892), known as Vaso Pasha or Wassa Pasha (, ), was an Albanian writer, poet and publicist of the Albanian National Awakening, and Ottoman mutasarrif of Mount Lebanon Mutasarrifate from 1882 until his death.

Biography Vaso Pasha was born in Shkodër on September 17, 1825. He was a Catholic Albanian who held high positions within the Ottoman Empire.

1847-1848: The Italian Year In 1847, he set off for Italy on the eve of turbulent events that were to take place there and elsewhere in Europe in 1848. There are two letters written by him in Bologna in the summer of 1848 in which he expresses openly republican and anti-clerical views. He later went to Venice where he took part in fighting in Marghera in October 1848, part of a Venetian uprising against the Austrians. After the arrival of Austrian troops, Pashko Vasa was obliged to flee to Ancona where, as an Ottoman citizen, he was expelled to Istanbul.

He published an account of his experience in Italy the following year in Italian-language La mia prigionia, episodio storico dell'assedio di Venezia, Istanbul 1850 (My imprisonment, historical episode from the siege of Venice).

1863-1864: In Bosnia-Herzegovina In 1863, thanks to his knowledge of Serbian, he was appointed to serve as a secretary and interpreter to Ahmet Cevdet Pasha, Ottoman statesman and historian, on a fact-finding mission to Bosnia and Herzegovina which lasted for twenty months, from the spring of 1863 to October 1864. The events of this mission were recorded in his La Bosnie et l'Herzégovine pendant la mission de Djevdet Efendi, Constantinople 1865 (Bosnia and Herzegovina during the mission of Jevdet Efendi).

A few years later he published another now rare work of historical interest, Esquisse historique sur le Monténégro d'après les traditions de l'Albanie, Constantinople 1872 (Historical sketch of Montenegro according to Albanian traditions).

Administrator of Edirne vilayet

In 1879, Pashko Vasa worked in Varna on the Black Sea coast in the administration of the vilayet of Edirne with Ismail Qemali. He also acquired the title of Pasha.

Despite his functions on behalf of the Porte, Pashko Vasa never forgot his Albanian homeland. In the autumn of 1877 he became a founding member of the Central Committee for the Defence of the Rights of the Albanian People in Istanbul which was a group of Albanian intelligentsia advocating for the territorial integrity and unity of Albanian inhabited areas in the Ottoman Empire. Through his contacts on the Committee, he also participated in the organization of the League of Prizren in 1878. Vasa favoured the unification of Albanian-inhabited vilayets or provinces into a single vilayet of Albania within the Ottoman empire and having a "compact and strong organisation" with Albanian participation in its public administration.

Creation of the Albanian alphabet Vasa as a member of the Committee for Defending Albanian Rights was appointed along with Sami Frashëri, Jani Vreto and Hasan Tahsini to create an Albanian alphabet which by 19 March 1879 the group approved Frashëri's 36 letter alphabet consisting mostly of Latin characters. He was also a member of the Society for the Publication of Albanian Writings, founded in Constantinople on 12 October 1879, to promote the printing and distribution of the Albanian-language books.

Governor of Lebanon

Sultan Abdulhamid II appointed Vasa as Mutessarıf of Mount Lebanon on 18 June 1882, a post reserved by international treaty for a Catholic of Ottoman nationality after the civil unrest and French occupation of 1860. This earned him accusations of corruption, in association with his son-in-law and deputy Kupelyan Effendi. Nevertheless, he remained in office until his death in Beirut after a long illness on 29 June 1892.

To make the Albanian language better known and to give other Europeans an opportunity to learn it, he published a Grammaire albanaise à l'usage de ceux qui désirent apprendre cette langue sans l'aide d'un maître, Ludgate Hill 1887 (Albanian grammar Vasa overall continued to inform European readers on Albanians and Albania through his French publications, as he had done from the time of the Unionist Societies.

Published works Rose e spine (1873) Études Sur L'Albanie Et Les Albanais (Constantinopol, 1879) Grammaire albanaise à l'usage de ceux qui désirent apprendre cette langue sans l'aide d'un maître, (London, 1887) L'alphabet Latin appliqué à la langue albanaise, (Constantinopol, 1878) Bosnie et Hercegovine pendant la mission de Djevdet Effendi, (Constantinopol, 1865) La vérité sur l'Albanie et les Albanais, (Paris, 1879) Esquisse historique sur le Monténégro d'après les traditions de l'Albanie, (Constantinopol, 1872) O moj Shqypni (1880) Barda de Témal, (Paris, 1890)