Background
Bardhi was born in Kallmet or Nënshat in the northern Albanian Zadrima region near Lezhë.
Bardhi was born in Kallmet or Nënshat in the northern Albanian Zadrima region near Lezhë.
He studied theology in Italy.
In 1636 he was appointed Bishop of Sapa and Sarda. Bardhi is remembered as the author of the first Albanian dictionary Dictionarium latino-epiroticum (Latin-Albanian dictionary) published in Rome in 1635, comprising 5,640 entries. Its appendix contains a list of 113 proverbs, phrases, and idioms, some of which are translations from other languages into Albanian with the vast majority being collected from the Albanian folklore.
He also wrote a biography of George Kastrioti Skanderbeg, published in Venice in 1636.
Bardhi"s work was a polemic against Slavic Catholic priest Ivan Tomko Mrnavić, who claimed that Kastrioti was of Slav origin. Bardhi also complained that the Albanian language "was being lost and degenerating" under the blows of foreign occupiers, and in order to preserve it he saw himself contributing to the missing of rising the national pride between Albanians.