Albania P-76 200 Lekë 2017(2019) Prefix AA Polymer

Naim Frashëri

(1846–1900)

Born in the village of Frashër in the Ottoman Balkans, Naim Frashëri became the quiet architect of Albanian consciousness. A poet, thinker, and civil servant, he wrote not to conquer territory but to summon a people into being.

Naim’s genius lay in choosing language as destiny. At a time when Albanian was fragmented, marginalized, and politically risky, he wrote luminous verse and didactic prose in Albanian itself—treating the language not as a dialect to be apologized for, but as a vessel worthy of philosophy, ethics, and national myth. His poetry blends pastoral tenderness with moral clarity, suffused with a Bektashi humanism that prized tolerance, inner freedom, and spiritual unity over dogma.

As part of the Albanian National Awakening (Rilindja Kombëtare), Naim articulated a vision of nationhood grounded not in empire or blood, but in culture, memory, and shared moral inheritance. His Albania is gentle yet resolute: mountains that teach endurance, fields that reward care, and a people whose dignity survives long subjugation.

He did not live to see independence. But when Albania finally emerged, it did so speaking in the cadence he had given it.

On banknotes and in classrooms, Naim Frashëri endures not as a revolutionary with a sword, but as something rarer: a founder who persuaded rather than commanded, and who believed that a nation begins the moment it learns to speak to itself with beauty and conviction.

Naim Frashëri — Bagëti e Bujqësia (excerpt)

O malet e Shqipërisë,
dhe ju o lisat e gjatë
O mountains of Albania,
and you, tall ancient oaks

Fushat e gjëra me lule,
q’u kam ndër mend ditë e natë
Wide fields full of flowers,
that live in my mind day and night

Ju bjeshkë, ju shkëmbinj,
o male të bukur e të lartë
You highlands, you rocks,
oh beautiful, towering mountains

Ju kam menduar kurdoherë,
ju kam dashur me gjithë shpirt
I have always thought of you,
I have loved you with my whole soul