Most historians believe that the Albanian people are descended from a non-Slavic, non-Turkic group of tribes known as Illyrians,who, like other Balkan peoples, were subdivided into tribes and clans. Albanians (as one of innumerous Illyrian tribes) were named after their city state Albanopolis near a mountain called Alp 'mountain', Hittite alpa 'white'.However to propagate the connection, the Albanian government in the communist era adopted a policy of artificially naming people with "Illyrian" names. The name Albania is derived from the name of an Illyrian tribe called the Arbër, or Arbëresh, and later Albanoi, that lived near Durrës. The kingdom of Illyria grew from the general area of modern-day Albania and eventually controlled much of the eastern Adriatic coastline.

From the 8th century to the 6th century BC, the Greeks founded a string of colonies on Illyrian soil, two of the most prominent of which were Epidamnus (modern Durrës) and Apollonia (near modern Fier).

The Romans militarily destroyed Illyrian autonomy in 165 BC. Roman Albania was traversed by the Via Egnatia, the Roman road that linked east with west and Rome with the far eastern reaches of its empire. After being conquered by the Roman Empire, Illyria was reorganized as a Roman province. Illyricum was later divided into the provinces of Dalmatia and Pannonia, the lands comprising modern-day Albania.

After the Second Balkan War, the Ottomans were removed from Albania and there was a possibility of some of the lands being absorbed by Serbia and the southern tip by Greece. This decision angered the Italians, who did not want Serbia to have an extended coastline, and it also angered the Austro-Hungarians, who did not want a powerful Serbia on their southern border.