Arnaut

Meaning

Noun

• An inhabitant of Albania and neighboring mountainous regions, especially an Albanian serving in the Turkish army.
• A Greek, Albanian, Bulgarian or Serbian soldier, recruited to serve as body-guard to officials in the 18th-19th c. Wallacia and Moldavia. Greek militia units formed in Crimea, 1769.

Origin

• From Turkish arnavut, from Ottoman Turkish آرناوود ("an Albanian").
• Entered Ottoman Turkish from the Byzantine Greek ethnonym Arvanitis (Αρβανίτης) after the syllable cluster van was rearranged through metathesis to nav giving the final Turkish forms as Arnavut and Arnaut. Meanwhile in Greek the name Arvanitis was derived from the original term Alvanitis (Άλβάνίτης) as a proces of rhotacism Alv- into Arv-. In return Alvanitis stems from the name Alvanos (Άλβάνος) Albanian, from Ancient Greek Ἀλβανοί.