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Ethnologue identifies 4 different languages under the Albanian family so when you say Albanian you are actually talking of 4 different languages. Tosk, Arvanitika, Gheg, and Arvereshe.
Arvanitika is the most similar to Greek of the 4 dialects.
Albanian, Tosk is the official language of Albania. It is also spoken in Greece.
But the Arvanitika dialect of Albania spoken in Greece in particular is heavily influenced by Greek and partially intelligible with Tosk.
Albanian, as Greek is Indo-European. But that is a very broad language category including over 400 languages. The similarities between Arvanitika Albanian and Greek seem to be mostly from the two languages coexisting with each other but linguistically they don't seem as similar. Especially because they are not categorized under the same branch of the Indo-European tree. Greek and Albanian are different enough to be categorized separately. And picture it this way. English and Spanish are also Indo-European. The family is big.
The absolute best source for any and all language information is the Ethnologue. My friends who are linguistics majors love it and turned me on it. You can spend hours browsing it. Have fun! http://www.ethnologue.com
Arvanitika is the most similar to Greek of the 4 dialects.
Albanian, Tosk is the official language of Albania. It is also spoken in Greece.
But the Arvanitika dialect of Albania spoken in Greece in particular is heavily influenced by Greek and partially intelligible with Tosk.
Albanian, as Greek is Indo-European. But that is a very broad language category including over 400 languages. The similarities between Arvanitika Albanian and Greek seem to be mostly from the two languages coexisting with each other but linguistically they don't seem as similar. Especially because they are not categorized under the same branch of the Indo-European tree. Greek and Albanian are different enough to be categorized separately. And picture it this way. English and Spanish are also Indo-European. The family is big.
The absolute best source for any and all language information is the Ethnologue. My friends who are linguistics majors love it and turned me on it. You can spend hours browsing it. Have fun! http://www.ethnologue.com
source(s):
http://www.ethnologue.com/show_language.asp?code=als
http://www.ethnologue.com/show_language.asp?code=aae
http://www.ethnologue.com/show_language.asp?code=aat
http://www.ethnologue.com/show_language.asp?code=aln
http://www.ethnologue.com/show_family.asp?subid=90017
http://www.ethnologue.com/show_language.asp?code=als
http://www.ethnologue.com/show_language.asp?code=aae
http://www.ethnologue.com/show_language.asp?code=aat
http://www.ethnologue.com/show_language.asp?code=aln
http://www.ethnologue.com/show_family.asp?subid=90017
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They are both derived from Proto-Indo-European. They are in different families, Greek and Illyrian (Albanian). This information is from a really good book, The Great Migrations by John Haywood. An excellent book that is selling at Borders for about $5 if you can still find it.
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