Preng Doçi

Life

Preng, son of Prend and Mrí Doçi, was born in Paraspor neighborhood of Bulgër, a village near Lezha, back then Ottoman Empire, and today's Rubik, Mirditë municipality. on 25 February 1846. He finished the high school in Shkodër, in 1859 he entered the recently opened Albanian Pontifical Seminary (Albanian: Kolegjia Papnore Shqyptare), and later studied in Rome in the Propaganda Fide College.
In 1871, he returned to Mirdita region in Albania, where he served as a priest in Korthpulë, Orosh, and, Kalivarja near Spaç. He was among the leaders of the Mirdita uprising against Ottoman rule in 1876–1877 under Prênk Bibë Doda. Doçi had previously traveled to Cetinje, capital of Principality of Montenegro, in order to seek financial and military assistance by the Montenegrins. He returned from Cetinje with a pledge of Montenegrin assistance and, equally important, a promise of noninterference. The rebellion was quelled by the Ottomans in March 1877. Bishop of Lezhe, Francesco Malčinski, an Austrian of Ukrainian origin suspended him from all religious activities. Doçi hid in Vuthaj, near Gusinje but was later captured and exiled to Istanbul. With the intervention of Armenian Patriarch Stefan Azarian, he received a fake name Pére Achile and was sent to Rome with the condition of not returning to Albania.

After staying few months in Antivari, with the intervention of Cardinal Giovanni Simeoni of the Propaganda Fide, he was sent him to the west coast of the Americas, Newsfoundland, Wayne, Pennsylvania, and New Brunswick, where he worked as a missionary until 1881. To Doçi goes the honor, as far as can be ascertained, of being the first known Albanian resident of North America. After his return to Rome, he was sent to India as secretary of the apostolic delegate to India, Cardinal Antonio Agliardi. In 1888, after years of petitioning and with the intercession of the patriarch of Constantinople, Doçi finally received permission from the Ottoman authorities to return to Albania. He arrived on 6 November 1888. In January of the following year, he was consecrated head of the Abbey nullius of St. Alexander of Orosh, Mirdita. In 1890 and later in 1894, several other regions of Lezhe and the Roman Catholic Diocese of Sapë would be joined under the his Abbey jurisdiction.
Doçi did not cease his political efforts; in 1897 he traveled to Vienna to propose the creation of an autonomous Catholic principality in northern Albania under Mirdita leadership. In 1889, he founded an Albanian school in Orosh (Grykë Orosh - Orosh Gorge), one of the earliest.
Doçi died on 22 February 1917.

Literary activity

In 1899, Doçi founded the Shoqnia e bashkimit të gjuhës shqipe (Society for the Unity of the Albanian Language) literary society, usually known as the Shoqnia Bashkimi (The Union Society), or simply Bashkimi (The Union) of Shkodra. Together with him there were Dom Ndoc Nikaj, Luigj Gurakuqi, Dom Gjergj Fishta, Dom Dodë Koleci, Father Pashk Bardhi, Dom Lazër Mjeda, etc. The society came out with the so-called ''Bashkimi'' alphabet, which would become one of the three alphabets considered for the standard Albanian alphabet during the Congress of Monastir in 1908.
He contributed to the Fiamuri Arbërit (Flag of Albanians) newspaper of the Arbereshe scholar Girolamo De Rada. He signed his articles as "Primo Docci", or "Një djalë prej Shqypnije" (A guy from Albania). After the foundation of Bashkimi Society, he published many works, many of them anonymously. Gjergj Fishta mentioned during his speech at the Doçi's funeral that Doçi had created 32 literary works.