A mountain bride from the tribe of Hoti, northern Albania. The clothes are of heavy woolen cloth spun and woven by hand and richly embroidered with colored worsteds and gold and silver thread. The jewelry is mostly silver filigree work, a craft in which the Albanians are especially proficient. The large silver cross is a mark of the Catholic tribes all over the north. Her heavy leather belt studded thickly with lead pin, lead nails, each molded and inserted by hand, is the work of special craftsmen in Scutari. She wears the mountain slippers of goat hide called "opanga". Most of the tribal lands of Hoti were given to Serbia by Turkey in 1912 but the people remain Albanian in language and customs

Women of the Balkans. A typical group of women from the mountain district of Serbia. They are taking a sun bath on the side of the American Red Cross station at Batch while waiting for the distribution of relief supplies. Note their aprons and similarity of dress. The aprons are made of coarse handspun wool with fine red and white stripes. The jackets are the native costume of the village from which they come. They hav ewalked many miles for Red Cross supplies. Several of them are barefoot and none have stockings

Albanian woman goes shopping. What the markets and bazaars of Albania lack in quality and quantity they endeavor to make up for in riotous, gaudy color effects that keep them from sinking into unnoticeable insignificance. The shawls, umbrellas, small household utensils and 'gimcracks', even the people themselves present a variety of crude and bizarre colors that at least cheer the aspect of this lean, hungry land of war devastation and misery. This Albanian woman is wearing a suit of American Red Cross pajamas underneath her scent native costume. American clothing is frequently mingled nowadays with that characteristic of the country for in its relief work there the Red Cross found the people almost destitute of wearing apparel and resorting to rags tied on with strings. They were not only miserable and even grotesque in appearance but of far greater importance were responsible for widespread disease that required intensive fighting

Mountain woman from the tribe of Shala, northern Albania. Clothing, mostly of black woolen cloth hand made with decorations in colored worsted. She wears an apron behind similar to the one she wears in front. Her shoes are of raw hide. Inside them she wears the decorated woolen slipper called a "opanga" and wind this one or two thicknesses of woolen socks or slippers. The women are always spinning or knitting. The belt is decorated with countless lead nails and studded with big brass rivets

Albanian girls want to look like Americans. Albanian girls, member of the Junior Red Cross of America vocational classes in Elbasan learning to make their own clothing after American ideas. With the end of Turkish domination in their country many of the women and girls who have always worn the familiar baggy trousers of the Oriental are now anxious to adopt western styles of clothing and have requested 'Junior' social workers who are instructing them in sewing, cutting and other branches of domestic science to teach them to dress like American children

Albanian girls in Turkish costumes. These young Albanian girls are dressed in the customary costume for women in their country. Baggy trousers and wooden sandals are relics of Moslem rule in Albania during the last 500 years, but fashions of dress for Albania women will undoubtedly change from now on. Turkish dominion and influence ended with the war and the enormous influx of western style clothing distributed by the American Red Cross to the war worn people who were in rags has had a tremendous effect upon them. Education is the next thing to be undertaken there and the Junior Red Cross of America plans to give its encouragement and backing to all attempts on the part of the new government to promote national institutions of learning. Most of the children of this Balkan state have never attended any school. Very few of them can read or write their native language, due to centuries of educational suppression, not to natural illiteracy

Scutari, Albania. Costume of Roman Catholic woman at home. The trousers are black and shinny sic and excessively voluminous. The sleeveless coat is heavily and untricately sic embroidered in black thread on a red ground. The chemise is of cotton cloth woven on the home loon. The hair is always slightly covered as shown here and she must wear more if she want to go on the street

A mountain bride from the tribe of Hoti, northern Albania. The clothes are of heavy woolen cloth spun and woven by hand and richly embroidered with colored worsteds and gold and silver thread. The jewelry is mostly silver filigree work, a craft in which the Albanians are especially proficient. The large silver cross is a mark of the Catholic tribes all over the north. Her heavy leather belt studded thickly with lead pin, lead nails, each molded and inserted by hand, is the work of special craftsmen in Scutari. She wears the mountain slippers of goat hide called "opanga". Most of the tribal lands of Hoti were given to Serbia by Turkey in 1912 but the people remain Albanian in language and customs

description

Summary

Title, date and notes from Red Cross caption card.
Photographer name or source of original from caption card or negative sleeve: Jr. Red Cross.
Data: Jr. Red Cross. Classification: Types.
Gift; American National Red Cross 1944 and 1952.
General information about the American National Red Cross photograph collection is available at http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.pnp/pp.anrc
Temp note: Batch 28

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