1740 by Gjon Nikollë Kazazi, the archbishop of Skopje. In other libraries there are three photocopies from the original, one of them in Tirana. In 1996, the librarians were not able to locate the book, which had been used in 1984 for the last time. Eqrem Çabej wrote a monograph on the book in 1968. The dialect used in Meshari was one of the main subjects of Selman Riza's works. The place the book was printed is thought to be either Venice or Shkodër. Though recent studies by Lucia Nadin give convincing evidence that make Venice as the place where Meshari was printed., According to Nadin, it was at the workshop of Bernardino Bindoni that this might have happened. Another hypothesis is that it was printed at the workshop of the Scotto family in Venice. The book contains the liturgies of the main holidays. There are also texts of prayers and rituals and catechetical texts. Every page contains two columns. The initials are decorated. The grammar and the vocabulary are more archaic than in the Gheg text from the 17th century. The text is very valuable from the viewpoint of the history of language. The vocabulary is quite rich. The archaic text is easily read due to the circumstance that it is mainly a translation of known texts, in particular the Bible. Most of the Gospels of Matthew, Luke and John were translated in the book. It also contains passages from the Psalms, the Book of Isaiah, the Book of Jeremiah, the Letters to the Corinthians, and many illustrations. The orthography is peculiar. The Latin alphabet with some additional letters is used. The consequent character of orthography and grammar seems to indicate an earlier tradition of writing. In Albanian, the book is known as Meshari (The Missal). All we know about the author is from the book's colophon written by Buzuku himself in Albanian. The language used is a pre-runner to the official Gheg dialect of Albanian. However, it is clear that the Gheg dialect was used. Even today one can hear words and expressions from older Malësians that sound as if jumping from the pages of the missal. Sources External links The colophon in English The colophon in Albanian The whole text in Old Albanian A page from the book Latin–Albanian translators 16th-century Albanian Roman Catholic priests Year of birth unknown Year of death unknown People from Bar, Montenegro