History

The Albanian language has been variously attached to Illyrian and Messapian, both of which were probably related. Only the latter, to a small extent, has left any evidence that may in any way liken it to Albanian. Consider the Messapic words bilia (Alb bijë "daughter"), brendon "deer" (Alb bri, brî "horn", pl. brirë, brinë), hazavathi 'he pours out' (Alb deh "to make drunk"), klaohi 'listen!' (Alb quaj, quej "to call, give a name"), kos (Alb kush "who"), veinan (Alb vehte "self"), venas (Alb uri, û "hunger"), etc. Messapian settlements are known to have existed along the Adriatic in both Italy and Illyria, especially around Durrës. Indeed, Messapian has left several words in Italian or in neighboring Italo-Roman languages, including manzo "ox" (cf. Alb mëz, mâz "poney"), northern bagola, bagula (cf. Alb bajgë "dung"), dialectal musso "ass" (cf. Alb mushk "mule").
Even the name Albanian is of some dispute. Appearing in the 9th c. in Greek as the Arvanoi, and thereafter under similar names, including obsolete Albanian arbër or arbën, it had been presumed to stem from Vulgar Latin Albanus, from the southern Illyrian tribal name Albanoí. However, others like Orel attach it instead to a slight corruption of Labëri "Laberia", from South Slavic labanĭja, from olbanĭja. The name Tosk, Alb toskë, was borrowed from Venetian tosko "rough, crude", literally "Tuscan".
The trouble of a homeland for the Albanians becomes all the more problematic. Despite Albanian nationalist claims to the contrary, the Albanians almost certainly came from farther north and inland than would suggest the present borders of Albania. First, Albanian has few early Greek borrowings, most of which are from the Northwest, e.g. WGk (Doric) mākhaná gave Alb mokër "mill" and WGk drápanon gave Alb drapër "sickle". Indeed, the very word for Greek, gërk, was borrowed from South Slavic; cf. Bulg. grŭk, Serb-Croat gr"k. Similarly, the Illyrian coast is not a likely source since Albanian has no inherited nautical or indigenous sea-faring terminology, and has instead supplemented this absence with subsequent borrowing from Latin or Greek or recent metaphorical lexical creations. Third, toponyms along the coast, in contrast with native penultimate accent (ex: mbësë "niece" < PA nepô'tia), often show substratal antepenultimate accent (ex: Durrës < Dúrrhachium; Pojanë < Apóllonia), though there are some exceptions (Vlorë < Aulónâ vs. Greek Aúlon). Also, Albanian is believed to be the source for a number of grammatical and lexical similarities shared by otherwise dissimilar languages including Romanian, Bulgarian, Serbo-Croatian, and to some extent Greek. Also, there is a lack of Proto-Albanian place names in Illyria. Likewise, the word shqa, from Lat Sclavus "Slav" refers only to Bulgarians.
Instead, given the overwhelming amount of shepherding and mountaineering vocabulary as well as the extensive influence of Latin, it is more likely the Albanians come from north of the Jireček line, on the Latin-speaking side, perhaps from the late Roman province of Dardania from the western Balkans. The Northern Albanian Alps are referred to as Bjeshkët e Namena, and this region's name is believed by some to come from Proto-Albanian beškai tâi, giving Alb bjeshkë "mountain", borrowed ultimately from Vulgar Latin pastica "pasture".
Yet, one area in the late Roman province of Praevitana (modern northern Albania) seems to show an area where a primarily shepherding, transhumance population of Illyrians retained their culture. This area was based in the Mat district and the region of high mountains in Northern Albania, as well as in Dukagjin, Mirditë, and the mountains of Drin, from where the population would descend in the summer to the lowlands of western Albania, the Black Drin (Drin i zi) river valley, and into parts of Old Serbia. Indeed, the region's complete lack of Latin place names seems to imply little latinization of any kind and a more likely spot for the origin of Albanian.
The period in which Proto-Albanian and Latin interacted was protracted and drawn out over six centuries, 1st c. AD to 6th or 7th c. AD. This is born out into roughly three layers of borrowings, the largest number belonging to the second or middle layer. The first, with the fewest borrowings, was a time of less important interaction. The final period, probably preceding the Slavic or Germanic invasions, also has a notably smaller amount of borrowings. Each layer is characterized by a different treatment of most vowels, the first layer having several that follow the evolution of Early Proto-Albanian into Albanian; later layers reflect vowel changes indemic to Late Latin and presumably Proto-Romance. Other formative changes include the syncretism of several noun case endings, especially in the plural, as well as the largescale palatalization.
After this period followed a period, 7th c. AD to 9th c. AD, in which Slavic borrowings were most common, some of which predate the o-a shift in Southern Slavic, though evidently not as much as Romanian had made. Following this period was a stage of protracted contact with the Proto-Romanians, though the borrowing seems to have been mostly one sided - from Albanian into Romanian. This indicates the Romanians interacted longer with the Slavs and then moved into an area with a majority of Albanian speakers, since presumably this would explain the one-way borrowing. This places the Albanians in the Western or Central Balkans, probably in the center and the Romanians further to the East, close perhaps to the Bulgarians. Indeed, the best match for the Slavic cognates borrowed into Romanian is Middle Bulgarian.
Combined with archaeology and history, it seems likely that the core of Albanian territory lay in a quadrilateral with vertices at Bar, Prizren, Ohrid, and Vlorë during the Middle Ages. Indeed, the center of the Albanians remained the river Mat, and in 1079 AD they are recorded in the territory between Ohrid and Thessalonika as well as in Epirus; Albanian place names from a large portion of Macedonia and parts of Serbia indicate former Albanian territories.
Furthermore, the major Tosk-Gheg dialect division is based on the course of the Shkumbin River, a seasonal stream that lay near the old Via Egnatia. Since rhotacism postdates the dialect division, it is reasonable that the major dialect division occurred after the christianization of the Roman Empire (4th c. AD) and before the eclipse of the East-West land-based trade route by Venetian seapower (10th c. AD).
The oldest surviving document written in Albanian is "Formula e Pagëzimit" (Baptismal formula), written in 1462 in the Gheg dialect, and some New Testament verses from that period.
The oldest known Albanian printed book, Meshari or missal, was written by Gjon Buzuku, a Roman Catholic cleric, in 1555. The first Albanian school is believed to have been opened by Franciscans in 1638 in Pdhanë. In 1635, Frang Bardhi wrote the first Latin-Albanian dictionary.

References

Encyclopædia Britannica, edition 15 (1985). Article: Albanian language
Huld, Martin E. Basic Albanian Etymologies. Columbus, OH: Slavica Publishers, 1984.
Martin Camaj, Albanian Grammar, Otto Harrassowitz, Wiesbaden
Orel, Vladimir. A Concise Historical Grammar of the Albanian Language: Reconstruction of Proto-Albanian. Leiden: Brill, 2000.