Geographic predictors of early 20th century northern Albanian tribal demography

As tribal social structures have long been prevalent in our species, understanding the drivers of tribal demography is of great importance. Here, we explore the potential effects of several geographic factors on population size among early 20th century northern Albanian tribes.Through a model compar...

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Main Authors: Elic M Weitzel, Erina Baci, Daniel Plekhov
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: University of Prishtina 2023-12-01
Series:Kosova Anthropologica
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Online Access:https://kosovaanthropologica.com/index.php/Journal/article/view/3/9
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author Elic M Weitzel
Erina Baci
Daniel Plekhov
author_facet Elic M Weitzel
Erina Baci
Daniel Plekhov
author_sort Elic M Weitzel
collection DOAJ
description As tribal social structures have long been prevalent in our species, understanding the drivers of tribal demography is of great importance. Here, we explore the potential effects of several geographic factors on population size among early 20th century northern Albanian tribes.Through a model comparison analysis of population data from forty-six tribes, we investigate how tribal population size was influenced by slope, net primary productivity, water availability, number of neighboring tribes, and distance to urban centers. Our results suggest that while slope and the number of neighboring tribes are the best available predictors, their overall ability to predict Albanian tribal population size in the early 20th century is poor. An unexplored factor such as tribal wealth (in terms of land, livestock, infrastructure, or marriage alliances) could be a more important driver of population size, but it is perhaps most likely that decades of conflict in the late 19th and early 20th centuries reshaped the demographic landscape of northern Albania and obscured any pre-existing geographic influences on tribal demography.
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institution Kabale University
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3027-5024
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spelling doaj-art-34ebcc6f04694e419683a68e64e62e482025-01-16T12:56:07ZengUniversity of PrishtinaKosova Anthropologica3027-51723027-50242023-12-011112110.62303/mhqsjs54Geographic predictors of early 20th century northern Albanian tribal demographyElic M WeitzelErina BaciDaniel PlekhovAs tribal social structures have long been prevalent in our species, understanding the drivers of tribal demography is of great importance. Here, we explore the potential effects of several geographic factors on population size among early 20th century northern Albanian tribes.Through a model comparison analysis of population data from forty-six tribes, we investigate how tribal population size was influenced by slope, net primary productivity, water availability, number of neighboring tribes, and distance to urban centers. Our results suggest that while slope and the number of neighboring tribes are the best available predictors, their overall ability to predict Albanian tribal population size in the early 20th century is poor. An unexplored factor such as tribal wealth (in terms of land, livestock, infrastructure, or marriage alliances) could be a more important driver of population size, but it is perhaps most likely that decades of conflict in the late 19th and early 20th centuries reshaped the demographic landscape of northern Albania and obscured any pre-existing geographic influences on tribal demography.https://kosovaanthropologica.com/index.php/Journal/article/view/3/9historical demographypopulation ecologybalkansfisrobert elsie
spellingShingle Elic M Weitzel
Erina Baci
Daniel Plekhov
Geographic predictors of early 20th century northern Albanian tribal demography
Kosova Anthropologica
historical demography
population ecology
balkans
fis
robert elsie
title Geographic predictors of early 20th century northern Albanian tribal demography
title_full Geographic predictors of early 20th century northern Albanian tribal demography
title_fullStr Geographic predictors of early 20th century northern Albanian tribal demography
title_full_unstemmed Geographic predictors of early 20th century northern Albanian tribal demography
title_short Geographic predictors of early 20th century northern Albanian tribal demography
title_sort geographic predictors of early 20th century northern albanian tribal demography
topic historical demography
population ecology
balkans
fis
robert elsie
url https://kosovaanthropologica.com/index.php/Journal/article/view/3/9
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AT danielplekhov geographicpredictorsofearly20thcenturynorthernalbaniantribaldemography