A sense of place

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Using the unlikely site of Butrint t was on 1 September 1997 contemporary context, meaning or that I accompanied the Director branding. Think only of the role of in Albania as a prime example, of the Butrint Foundation and Heinrich Schliemann (1822–90) in Richard Hodges explains how Ithe British Ambassador to making Mycenae, or the gargantuan Albania to meet the country’s newly excavations of Giacomo Boni the work of archaeologists elected Prime Minister, Fatos Nano. (1859–1925) in the Roman Forum Nano had won a handsome majority to help shape the new capital of defines them as placemakers following a period of civil unrest a unified Italy. Placemaking is created by pyramid scheme specu- not new, although the concept is lation. The Prime Minister greeted borrowed from late 20th-century us, and my colleague pitched the postmodern philosophy. plan for an archaeological park at The French philosopher, Marc Butrint, ancient Buthrotum. Augé defines a place as an‘ invention: Our foundation had a model in it has been discovered by those who mind, taken from innovative Italian claim it as their own’. Foundation sites. We assumed that Nano would narratives, he argues, ‘bring the listen and push back against the spirits of the place together with idea of transforming his country’s the first inhabitants in the common premier Graeco-Roman site into adventure of the group… A place is another institutional entity. After relational, historical and concerned four years of working in post- with identity, whereas a non-place is Communist Albania, it was clear a space which cannot be defined by that change in cultural sectors was these criteria’. not easy. Places are given further value by The Prime Minister listened and complex periodic events. These are nodded and said ‘Good’. How usually removed in some culturally should we proceed? He was laconic, well-defined way from the routines even gnomic. Then, to our aston- of economic life. Temple cults and, ishment, he turned to the British later, the Church, commonly legiti- Ambassador and offered his condo- mised cultural activities at places. lences for the death of Princess Supermodernity, on the other Diana. For the following 15 hand, produces ‘non-place’ that, minutes, scarcely taking a breath, according to Augé, are ‘spaces he held forth on her, as though he which are not themselves anthropo- knew her well. On that September logical places and which… do not day I doubt that as many as 10 integrate the earlier places’ (which visitors came to Butrint. are listed, classified, promoted to Today, 20 years after this meeting the status of ‘places of memory’, with Prime Minister Nano, much and assigned to ‘a circumscribed has changed. When I visited Butrint and specific position’). Airports, last August approximately 3000 shopping malls, cinema complexes, to 5000 tourists were ambling hospitals and hotel resorts are around the site. Now, it is Albania’s fundamentally non-places (although premier destination and, in the there is a new effort to market cultural heritage law before the new them as places). In the concrete 1. An aerial view Albanian parliament, it is about to reality of today’s world, places and of Butrint, on take a new direction, which it claims non-places are intertwined. elevated woodland, will be every bit as revolutionary as Place and non-place are polarities, looking down the was taken in Nano’s office in 1997. together ‘the scrambled game of Vivari Channel This is placemaking in archae- identity and relations’ that is cease- towards the Straits of Corfu. ology: the practice of either creating lessly being rewritten. Place, Augé or lending a place, ancient or concludes, becomes a refuge to the modern, an identity that, with habitué of non-places. The polarity strategic management of the conser- is not new: place and non-place vation and presentation, attracts have existed since prehistory. visitors whose support helps sustain The needs of placemaking change it, ideally to international standards. with each generation: historical Archaeologists (and architects) over interests, visitor demands and the the last century have become aware global market, conservation strat- of their role in making places. egies and administrative strategies Archaeologists discover, excavate alter continuously. Placemaking in selectively and transform the ruins archaeology, by necessity, means of the past, lending them an identity, confronting not only the charac- and, above all, giving them a teristics of the place today, but

Minerva January/February 2018 47 2 involves strategic investment in 2. Excavations in 1928 that are safe and relevant shaping a narrative through excava- of the Hellenistic and 3 to the world today. tions, conservation and interpre- Roman theatre, under Placemaking at Butrint tation of its particular pasts (at Italian archaeologist is a good example. The Luigi Maria Ugolini Butrint the Greek and Roman site sits at the crossroads (1895–1936). have been often favoured over the of the Mediterranean, Medieval and Ottoman) as well 3. A sketch of Ugolini commanding the sea- as the construction of essential by his friend and routes up the Adriatic amenities as different as museums Butrint colleague, Sea to the north, across and loos. The narrative is not fixed Igeno Epicoco. the Mediterranean to the in aspic, nor is it some readily west, and south through definable off-the-shelf asset. It the Ionian islands. cannot be reduced to a formula. The Like ancient Dyrrachium idiosyncracy of past places is why (modern Durrës) some authentic archaeological remains, 300km to the north, viewed from different cultural and it also controlled a historical backgrounds, holdinfinite land-route into the interest for the curious, irrespective mountainous Balkan of education or background. interior. The abandoned Not surprisingly, inhabitants of ancient and medieval non-places are attracted to places as port lies 3km inland if they were engaged in pilgrimage. from the Straits of Corfu UNESCO World Heritage Sites in southern Albania (8). as a brand connote a social and At the south of a narrow spatial separation from a normal plain, formerly a marsh, place of residence or vacation and, it is separated by the invariably, conventional social ties. Vivari Channel (1) from In such a place, out of time, conven- a band of hills further tionality is suspended, and there south, along which runs is an assumed relationship with social status. The UNESCO brand the frontier between the authentic. Such places and the has successfully embraced this Albania and Greece established pilgrimage to them are a rite of rite of passage, marketing its sites in 1913. The channel leads to passage not just to filling a lifetime as globally authentic, essentially Lake Butrint, an inland salt bucket list but also to a certain meaningful as pilgrimage places lagoon, and above it mountains

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court in Rome, Virgil was paying Virgil’s connection with Butrint in personal tribute to the emperor’s favour of his own historical myths. right-hand man, Agrippa (4), whose For most visitors today Butrint first wife, Caecilia Attica, came from conjures up a different experience. Butrint. With such serendipity the It is the Other, a Mediterranean port was forever sealed in aspic, at paradise, a place in a timeless least until our era. Instinctively, the landscape. In a postmodern age post-war Albanian dictator, Enver it is a shrine to historicism within Hoxha, appreciated this to attract an exceptional park environment. hard currency from controlled It is not Disneyesque. Quite the 4 tourism, even though he eschewed contrary, it is a journey through a rise to nearly 1000 metres, effectively 4. A bust of Agrippa 6 creating a basin around the ancient (63–12 BC), Octavian’s city and lake. general, found during The walled city covers an area the excavations of the theatre in Butrint. of about 16 hectares, but surveys on the eastern side of the channel 5. A view of the show that in antiquity Butrint Hellenistic and Roman covered as much as 25 hectares. The theatre today. walled city comprises two parts: the acropolis and the lower city. 6. Archaeologists Amongst the urban monuments is record the acropolis a Hellenistic theatre (5), a Roman fortifications at Butrint in 2006. forum, Roman town houses, a fine cathedral, an exceptional baptistery and a castle, all dotted within thick woodland. The most obvious monument outside the city walls, on the opposite side of the channel, is the well-preserved Triangular Castle, which after 1572 became the nucleus of the early modern settlement. Few places match a range of monuments and natural setting so well. Butrint is eternal. It owes a priceless debt to Virgil who in his epic poem, Aeneid, had his exiled hero from Troy, Aeneas, pause here on the way to found Rome. At a stroke Butrint belonged to a Mediterranean foundation myth. Virgil’s choice of Butrint – ‘a Troy in miniature’ – was no accident. A member of Augustus’s new imperial

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not traces that had any Bronze 7 Age resonance with the world of Virgil’s Trojan wars. Finding neither remains of the Mycenean world, nor great monuments belonging to the epoch of Virgil’s patron, the Emperor Augustus, Ugolini nonetheless spun a narrative, tacitly involving Aeneas. Ugolini and Virgil collaborated, so to speak, to create the identity of an authentic place in a striking landscape setting. No wonder a statue was erected to the Italian archaeologist outside Butrint’s first museum in 1938, two years after his death aged 41. Ugolini marketed his results instinctively, and, with little alteration during 50 years of Communist rule (7), his legacy constituted the place granted UNESCO World Heritage status in 1992. When the Butrint Foundation was established the following year, post-Communist Albania looked natural oasis that challenges the 7. Soviet leader Nikita so he began excavations (2) without set to be overwhelmed by tourist homogenisation (non-places) of Khrushchev visiting any clear expectations. Ugolini hotel developers eager to seize its social space and experience of Butrint with the discovered mostly later Hellenistic, coastline and appropriate interna- modern capitalism. Albanian dictator, Roman and Byzantine remains, tionally known places like Butrint. Enver Hoxha, May 1959. Like Homer and Shakespeare, Virgil has had infinite reach thanks 8. Map showing the 8 to countless others who have location of Butrint and mined his work for one reason or the boundaries of the another. Thanks to Virgil’s stanzas Butrint National Park. (he never ventured to this corner of the Mediterranean), Butrint has prospered out of proportion to its importance. Numerous medieval and modern authors briefly described and visited Butrint because of its associations with the epic. Over the centuries visitors have included Casanova, Edward Lear and Lawrence Durrell. None found it came up to their expec- tions, nor did it impress the Italian archaeologist, Luigi Maria Ugolini (1895–1936) (3). The ruins of later Roman and medieval monuments rather than Greek ones from the age of the Trojan wars were all that could be readily seen in 1924 when Ugolini landed by boat here. He does not record his disappointment, but this can be tacitly gauged because he decided to devote his archaeo- logical ambitions to another site until 1928. That year Ugolini shrewdly recognised that the 2000-year anniversary of Virgil’s birth in 1930 was an opportunity to find Italian government funding for major excavations. He assessed that the promise of funds and Virgil’s description made the risk of digging Butrint worthwhile, and

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oriels bring any visit typically encountered in everyday vividly to life. Butrint life. When we go on vacation, really fits our new global places have to speak to us in ways ideals of an authentic we appreciate, or at least we antic- UNESCO World Heritage ipate that they will do so. Site. Major excavations Recognising the huge economic by the Foundation (6) significance of the global tourist between 1998 and 2008 industry puts a new responsi- re-defined the archaeo- bility on archaeologists as place- logical narrative of Butrint. makers. My generation was trained Privileged to operate on a in the humanities, not business or large scale, we were able management. We had to pick up to chart and document management skills on our excava- every rich chapter in the tions. In this new age, archaeolo- city’s history since the gists are trying to re-define the Bronze Age. Much of this profession, caught between discov- story is now published. ering and writing world history We put as much effort and the thrust of tourism econo- into creating a national mists. We are active agents in one park supported by the of the largest industries in the government and UNESCO world, accounting for 9.4 per cent and regulated through of world GDP and 8.2 per cent of a management plan. A all employment (in 2010). We bear a new museum, signage, twin responsibility as archaeologists capacity building in to reflect on our role as researchers modern conservation who create development. practices, a tourist strategy Undeniably we were grand and many other elements tourists of a kind in 1993. Our were also put in place to initial experiences – our first bring international and ‘gaze’ – shaped the (neo-liberal) national tourists to this far purposes of the Butrint Foundation. corner of Albania. Furthermore, we were visitors to the The modern tourist Other – Balkan and exommunist in industry is very different culture – carrying our European idea from the Virgilian cruise of heritage, with its elitist roots. For 9 of 1930. Today’s tourism sure we were burdened with a kind begs some fundamental of colonialism, and yet we created a For five years this threat menaced 9. Butrint’s architect, questions. Do modern park that now functions so success- the Virgil-Ugolini legacy. The Telemark Llakana (left) tourists care about ancient texts, fully – bringing nearly 200,000 Butrint Foundation was created talks to Lord Sainsbury ancient art and architecture? Not tourists in 2016 – that its institu- by Lord Rothschild and Lord of Preston Candover, at all. Indeed, should they care? tions need overhauling to protect its Sainsbury (9) in 1993 to protect Lord Rothschild and Archaeology has slavishly followed precious ruins and environment. and preserve Butrint and that same Richard Hodges, in the Classical (or historical) tradition As a brand, this place remains October 1995. year I joined them. Our simple in making places, but with the huge special in Albania, a flagship in the aim, perhaps presumptuous, was All the images are boom in global tourism western forthcoming cultural heritage legis- to sustain the genius loci – spirit the property of the (Classical) traditions belong to lation. As such, as post-Communist of place, for future visitors, gener- Butrint Foundation. another age. Cultural heritage Albania looks forward, taking the ating tourism and employment, tourism has moved on, driven by Butrint model of placemaking in while bringing new archaeological ever-changing popular values, and terms of management and practice, thinking to this time-warped place. so has its management has become axiomatic to the newly With such neo-liberal values, rightly Then there is the issue of identity. elected government’s economic or wrongly, we championed a new Whose identity? For foreign visitors planning. Virgil might be aston- episode in placemaking in the long they become grand tourists again. ished and he would certainly be history of Butrint. For Albanians it is different. very proud. n Butrint was unforgettable when The Communist state had appro- I first ventured here in 1993, and priated an identity for Butrint, but • The Archaeology remains a precious oasis within the today, for the young couples who are of Mediterranean growing pains of modern Albania getting married here, as for children Placemaking and today. On every visit, notwith- from local schools, Butrint’s tacit Travels with an standing the circumstances, the packaged (Mediterranean) history Archaeologist: glorious assault on one’s senses is in a woodland oasis conjures Finding a Sense as powerful as ever. You need know something almost sacred. of Place by nothing about Aeneas to be seduced Modern tourism is about Richard Hodges by the shimmering reflections off consuming goods and services are published the lagoon, or to fall in love with that, in some respects, are unnec- by Bloomsbury the shafts of sparkling light filtered essary. They are consumed Academic in hardback at £85 by the woodland canopy where because they generate pleasurable and £20 respectively. butterflies, turtles and golden experiences, different from those

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