Visions of Epiros between Greece and Rome. Demetrios Evangelidis and Luigi Ugolini

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A country created almost by chance out of the chaos of the Balkan Wars of 1912–1913 and then the maelstrom of the First and Second World Wars, Albania has had various identities proposed and imposed upon it. Prior to 1945 all archaeology was effectively undertaken by foreign missions with a nascent interest from foreign-trained local Albanian scholars. The archives of these missions illustrate the collision between competing geopolitical philosophies and methodological approaches, particularly relevant in the contested region corresponding with the territory of ancient Epirus. This paper will attempt to reconstruct several and differently aimed appropriations/interpretations of ancient Epirus by focusing on the documents produced by the archaeological missions sponsored by the governments of Athens and Rome in the early part of the twentieth century: the letters written by Demetrios Evangelidis, sent by the Greek state to survey the archaeological remains of southern Albania between the Balkan Wars (from 25 June to 7 August 1913); and the more extensive records produced by Luigi Ugolini’s archaeological mission between 1926 and 1936, under the auspices of the Italian fascist government.