TIRANA, May 16 – The exhibition “Celebrating Europe in Albania: Unicum and Diversity” opened to the public on Friday inside Albania’s former dictator Enver Hoxha’s vila, located in the heart of downtown Tirana but usually closed to the public.
In the context of the Pan-National Skanderbeg Year, the General Directory of Archives brings manuscripts and prints from different funds of the Main National Archive dating from 6th century AD to the 19th century.
The books and codices previewed are thus in Persian, Greek, Latin, Arabic, Albanian and Osman languages both in handwritten and printed forms.
The texts’ theme is dominated by theology and the Holy Scriptures, considering the biggest part of books that has managed to reach us today comes from the shelves of God adoring temples and churches.
However, although less in number, the exhibition also contains literary, judicial, philosophical and astronomic scriptures and texts.
As stated by the exhibition’s own curators, “this variety of cultures, languages ”‹”‹and themes is more than common for Balkan Albania. In times of turmoil this worm is used to divide people and countries. Today, in the European context, this variety is the argument that Albanians are an integral part of Europe. The modest libraries of ancient Albania, or the Central State Archives today, naturally inherited such wealth, carrying the Western culture amalgam before the West concept was defined in the West.”
Although the handwritten and printed books presented in the exhibition don’t cover all historical Middle Age and Renaissance themes and don’t seek to express the analogy of cultural influences to Albania, “they are the remaining elements of a broad cultural mosaic, from which we see fragments of time and place, enough to show the greatness of the past to the public.”
In addition to the rare manuscripts, visitors were also given the chance to see free of charge Hoxha’s impressive yard at a time the country was struggling with poverty at large under communism and even take a peek at some of the furniture and decoration inside the house otherwise dominated by the beauty of the scriptures.
The exhibition will remain open until May 20, everyday until 10 pm.
