By Artan P쳮aska
apernaska@tiranatimes.com
The head of the healing god Asclepius, which was stolen from Butrint in 1991, was returned to Albania at the beginning of the week, on the 18th of May 2009, the International Day of Museums. After eighteen years of obscure peregrinations, the famous head was returned to the Albanian authorities after two Albanian international footballers (Lorik Cana and Igli Tare) had frozen 20,000 Euros in payment to an auctioneer that had acquired the marble at an auction in London. The Italian possessor, Massimo Rossin, handed the sculptural fragment to the Albanian state at auction price, and was thanked by Albanian authorities, who will pay the sum.
The head was found in 1932 near the staircase to the east of the theatre of Butrint, in excavations conducted by the Italian Count Ugolini. The body of the statue has not been found.
The Butrint Foundation estimates that the cult of Asclepius was from the first considered an image epitomizing the identity of Butrint, and makes known that Asclepius was the most important of the healing gods of antiquity. He was the son of Apollo and a mortal woman (Coronis or Arsinoe) but soon became a god himself. Asclepius was married to Hygieia (Health) and became so skilled at his art that he could bring the dead back to life, an action for which he was killed by Zeus. The largest sanctuary to Asclepius was at Epidaurus, but sanctuaries were established also in Athens and Corinth – even in Rome.
The marble head found at Butrint in 1932 shows Asclepius as a mature man with a rich mass of wavy locks and a finely curled beard and moustache, His eyes are rounded with a firm outline of both upper and lower lids. The head has been damaged, but still retains much of its original beauty.
The press reports that the head is actually lodged at the National Museum of History in Tirana, in waiting of a decision whether it will be sheltered in the National Museum, or go back to the site where it was originally found and from whence it had been stolen, in Butrint, south of Albania (Agon, 19.05.2009).
Other reports sate that Izet Duraku, Director of the National Center for the Inventory of Cultural Wealth (Qendra Komb쵡re e Inventarizimit t롐asuris롋ulturore) think possible the return of the more than 2000 cultural objects that have been stolen from Albania and of other non-inventoried objects (Koha Jon묠19.05.2009). He estimates that the Albanian state can pay for their return, but that the objects that will be returned will never be as many as those that have fled the country.
