Origins Various positions exist about the origins of the Upper Reka population within Balkan related scholarship. Some of those by historians and ethnographers were based on ideological or nationalist perspectives, referring either to an Albanisation or Slavisation of the population. Gopčević claimed that Upper Reka inhabitants were “Albanianized Slavs”. In the late 1890s Štilijan Čaparoski and folklorist Panajot Ginoski, both from
Galičnik, Dolna Reka, maintained that Upper Reka inhabitants spoke a corrupted form of Albanian that was understood only by the locals, and contained a mixture of Slavic and Albanians words. Due to some patronymic names of families, Serbian philologist Dušan Nedeljković contended a
Vlach origin for some Upper Reka families in the villages Brodec and Reč, alongside Slavic origins that were Albanianized. Historian Nick Atanasovski, who did fieldwork in Lower Reka contends that the sub-regions of Small, Lower and Upper Reka were subjected to Islamisation, though not colonisation. While anthropologist Mirjana Mirčevska who did field work in Upper Reka during the 2000s, stated that both the Muslim and Orthodox population was mainly of Macedonian Slavic origin, with possible Albanian elements in their
ethnogenesis. Mirčevska recorded local Upper Reka traditions in Bogdevo, Krakornica and Ničpur that attribute the founding of those villages to three brothers: Boge, Krako and Niko who originated from the
Kolašin region located in contemporary
Montenegro. Galaba Palikruševa, examining medieval Ottoman tax registers or
defters of the region in the 1970s regarding personal names, stated that there was a prominent non-Slavic element in Upper Reka of Albanian and/or Vlach origin. whereas historian
Noel Malcolm considers them to be Orthodox Albanians. Albanian philologist Edibe Selimi-Osmani who did fieldwork in Upper Reka during the 1990s and 2000s regarded the population as being of Albanian origin. Linguist Qemal Murati, referring to both the Muslim and Orthodox population as Albanians argued that scholars who suggested the Upper Reka population are Albanianized Slavs have done so due to nationalist reasons so as to deny the historical Albanian element in the region. In the early 2010s, scholar Andrea Pieroni and a team of researchers from various national backgrounds did fieldwork and a comparative study of past and present Upper Reka botanical terminology. In their findings they concluded that the Upper Reka population was one that “had been heavily influenced by the Slavic culture - and not vice versa, as Spiridon Gopčević stated.” Andrea Pieroni and a multinational research team in the early 2020s found Slavic terminology was present in botanical terminology among neighbouring Albanian villages outside Upper Reka whose ancestral origins were from the region.
Medieval Ottoman period During the 14th century Upper Reka was part of the Lordship of Prilep, of the Mrnjavčević family, until 1395, when its territory was subjugated to Bayezid I of the Ottoman Empire. In 1467 Ottoman defters list the region of Reka as a
vilayet and in Upper Reka there were 15 inhabited villages and 3 uninhabited ones. The following villages recorded for the first time were: Štirovica, Ribnica, Vrben, Ničpur, Nistrovo, Volkovija, Žužnje, Brodec, Krakornica, Strezimir, and Ribničica (a former village), with Vrbjani being the largest settlement. Beličica, Kičinica and Leskovo (a former village) were listed as uninhabited. The villages of Nivišta, Bibaj, Grekaj, Reč and Tanuše where not registered as existing at that time. In light of the anthroponymic evidence provided by the archival material, Palikruševa comments that the attested non-Slavic personal names are generally ambiguous and do not necessarily indicate either an Albanian or Vlach origin of the bearer, although undoubtedly attest to an Albanian-speaking element in the region. On the other hand, Murati notes that the vast majority of the recorded non-Slavic anthroponyms (e.g., Gjin, Gjergj, Gjon, Tanush, Progon, Meksha, Bardh, Kola) were Albanian in character. In 1519, a few Muslim households are counted within Ottoman defters in villages like Vrbjani, Sence, Ribničica and Kučuk or Small Ribnica. A few Muslim households began to appear in the villages of: Krakornica, Strezimir, Štirovica and Žužnje.
Middle to Late Ottoman period Intensive conversion to Islam occurred in Upper Reka from the late 18th to early 19th centuries, stemming in part from the closure of the
Peć Patriarchate and demise of its parishes. The village of Štirovica was the last settlement where its 30 remaining Christian households converted to Islam in 1855. Due to Upper Reka's isolation and difficult living conditions, some inhabitants turned to banditry during the 18th and 19th century while others migrated to cities and regions for work. In the late Ottoman period the wider Reka area formed a nahiye or district with its centre in Žirovnica village that had administrative officials and a small army garrison. Orthodox Christian villages of Upper Reka in the late Ottoman period either had a Bulgarian or Serbian village priest. Certain Orthodox individuals from Upper Reka during this time like
Josif Bageri made significant contributions to the Albanian national awakening. In the 19th century, due to the lack of Albanian language schools and books, but also as a result of foreign propaganda, the Albanians of Upper Reka were to prone to being assimilated. In the late 1890s Štilijan Čaparoski and folklorist Panajot Ginoski, both from
Galičnik, Dolna Reka, maintained that Upper Reka inhabitants spoke a corrupted form of Albanian that was understood only by the locals, and contained a mixture of Slavic and Albanians words. Ethnographer
Vasil Kanchov in his demographic study of Ottoman Macedonia (1900) wrote the
Kaza of Reka had a total of 23 Albanian villages with a majority Orthodox population in the region. During World War I, local resistance continued as the region passed to Bulgaria. As such Serbian and Bulgarian forces during 1912-1916 burned down the villages of Trnica, Reč, Dubovo, Štirovica and Strezimir. A number of Serbian authors of this period denied there was an Albanian ethnic identity for the Orthodox populations of Upper Reka. A Serb journalist visited the region and wrote a report (1927) for the newspaper
Vreme about the "Serbs who only speak Albanian". The region later became part of Kingdom of Yugoslavia. In 1941 after Yugoslavia's occupation by Axis powers, Upper Reka was attached to
Albania by Fascist Italy. After World War II, Upper Reka became part of Communist Yugoslavia. The region remained isolated and undeveloped which resulted in migrations to distant urban centres like Belgrade, Skopje and Gostivar, and to Western countries. In the 2000s, among the wider Macedonian population, there was little awareness of the existence of an Orthodox Christian population which used Albanian as a language of everyday communication. In the 2010s, Upper Reka came to national attention when a few prominent Upper Reka Orthodox Christian individuals like
Branko Manoilovski declared an Albanian identity or
Branislav Sinadinovski who called for an Albanian Orthodox Church to be present within the region. These moves have been overwhelmingly opposed and denounced by most Orthodox Upper Reka people who see them as the outcome of politics and propaganda. Orthodox Upper Rekans view their identity as Macedonian, consider Macedonian their mother tongue and religious tradition as historically Slavonic. In the mid 2010s, there was some cultural revival within Upper Reka such as the festival
Takimet e Rekës së Epërme (Upper Reka gathering), first held during August 2014 in Ribnica and the creation of a cultural association named
Josif Bageri by some prominent Muslim and Christian Upper Reka individuals aiming at socio-cultural, historical and linguistic preservation of Upper Reka heritage. Historical village relations and bonds between Muslim and Orthodox Upper Rekans had lapsed and become nonexistent by the 2010s. ==Gallery==