Tirana: a capital city transformed by the Italians

Archive research was carried out in connection with studies for a Nato-CNR Senior Fellowships Programme grant in 2005. Documents collected and located in the Technical Archives for Construction of Tirana, though neatly arranged in files, were yet to be classified in the archives in 2005.

G. Caudo, ‘Metropoli incoerente’, Specchio +  04 (2008): 157.

The Technical Archives for Construction of Tirana contain various important drawings of the city. The oldest, dated 1916, on a scale of 1:5000, was drawn by a military unit expressly appointed for this purpose under the supervision of the k. u. k. Kriegsvermessu, the Imperial Geographical Institute of Vienna. In 1917, the map was drawn again to indicate the principal constructions. The survey was drawn again by Skender Frasheri in 1921 on a scale of 1:3.300.

‘The Islamic city. One of its distinctive features was the presence of the place of worship, which enters the town for good. […] The mosque as a religious building probably dates back to a relatively later period, since it represents the house of the prophet in Medina, where he preached the new religion of the Arabs to the faithful: however, it was probably erected as an imitation of Christian and Jewish places of worship first in the Christian churches themselves, which were commandeered and divided into half, assigned to two different groups of worshippers … The entry of the Great Mosque or Friday Mosque into the city was neither fortuitous nor merely a cultural imitation, nor a symbolic event of an ethical and religious nature. The mosque occupied a specific location – it was generally built and rebuilt on the same site as previous places of worship, in the centre of the town, next to the prince's castle-palace, not far from the souk, the market and the throbbing heart of the city's economic activities. Around this group of public buildings – the Friday Mosque, the prince's castle-palace, the souk, which undoubtedly represent in topographic and architectural terms the importance of the new Islamic city as an institutional reality in the context of the urban community – lie the residential districts of noble families and popular working-class neighbourhoods, while the suburbs are usually inhabited by merchants – with caravanserai, wells and cisterns to supply caravans with a water – and by craftsmen’. Valeria Fiorani Piacentini, La città islamica, in Pietro Rossi, Modelli di città. Strutture e funzioni politiche (Turin, 1987). Also see: Jasenka Gudeli on Sarajevo in ‘CITTA’ e STORIA' n° 1 (2006) and Luda Klusakova, The Road to Constantinopole.

The remains of a mosaic floor dating from the II–III century BC were found in the centre of Tirana in 1970.

Decio Cinti, Tirana, Le capitali d'Europa illustrate (Milan: Sonzogno, 1930), 729–32.

Ibid.

The independence of Albania was declared on 28 November 1912 in Vlora by a National Assembly consisting of 83 delegates headed by Ismail Kemal Bey. The treaty of Bucharest signed on 10 August 1913 endorsed this declaration. On 10 April 1914, the international Commission delegated the Conference of Ambassadors, convened and headed by Sir Edward Grey to whom Ismail Kemal Bey had handed over his powers, to approve the Statute and proclaim the Kingdom of Albania, guaranteed by the six Great Powers. Prince Wilhelm zu Weid was appointed to the throne. On 3 September 1915, Prince Weid was forced to flee from Albania, never to return. Subsequently, various nations – Italy, Serbia and Greece – occupied Albania. In 1920, the Albanian National Assembly met at Lushnje to state the intention of re-establishing national unity and finally on 20 January 1920, the Albanian Constituent Assembly declared the birth of the First Republic.

In 1928, the Constituent Assembly headed by Pandeli Evangeli proclaimed the fall of the Republic and the birth of the Monarchy. The crown was offered to Zogu who took the title of Zogu I, King of Albania.

The proclamation of Gjirokaster was signed by General Ferrero.

As a consequence of this policy, the Italian minister P. Aloisi and the Albania Foreign Minister Hysen Bey Vrioni signed the Pact of Friendship in Tirana on 27 November 1926, according to which Albania named Italy its partner of preference: ‘the two countries undertake not to conclude with other Powers any political or military agreements prejudicial to the interests of the other Party’. A year later (22 November 1927), the two countries signed another alliance pact in Tirana. The process was consolidated by the establishment in 1928 of the National Bank of Albania, with Italy as the major shareholder, Albanian, Yugoslavian, Belgian and Swiss shares and the gold franc as unit.

On 29 May 1925 the SVEA and the Albanian government signed an agreement ratified by the Albanian Parliament and published in the Albanian Official Gazette (Fletorja Zyrtare) no. 36 of 12 July 1925 and no. 40 of 31 July 1925.

Albania was made up of a constellation of badly linked cities due to an underdeveloped infrastructural system, consisting of wooden bridges, long dirty roads in bad condition and sea ports lacking freight unloading facilities. To quote a report by the SVEA in 1925 published in Un decennio di vita della SVEA, La libreria dello Stato, Rome 1936, p. 19: ‘The lack of safe harbours on the Albanian coast made it difficult for goods to be unloaded and passengers to disembark, and even impossible during the numerous days of bad weather; the absence of bridges on the principal Albanian rivers, similar to torrents, and the condition of the roads made it impossible to guarantee regular contact between the various parts of Albania, so that the country was actually divided up into distinctly separate zones’.

Op.cit, Un decennio di vita della SVEA.

The sea port of Durrës was designed by Luigi Luiggi of the Civil Engineering Corps, succeeded by Tito Consigli.

The firms were Italian (69.6%), Albanian (21.8%) and foreign (5.1%). The principal among these were: F.lli ingg. A.M. Ragazzi, M. Sacco, Wagner and Birò, Beça and Cassina, H. Neviri and Bylla, Staccioli, Dan Hassani Sefer Maliq, engineer Pilika, Kristaq Gjyuli, Krahu, Società Ansaldo, F.lli Desideri, Società S.I.T.A., Scagnetti, Mario Rocco and Xh. Kadesha, Sulço Bushati. Op. cit Un decennio di vita della SVEA.

Ahmet Zogu was born in Bergajet on 8 October 1895 and came to power as early as 1920, though with changing fortunes.

They consist of perspective drawings in the Archives of San Luca in Rome. A monograph edited by Mario Pisani has also been published (Architetture di Armando Brasini (Rome: Officina Edizioni, 1996)).

Paolo Orano, Urbe Massima: l'architettura e la decorazione di Armando Brasini (Rome: A. F. Formiggini, 1916).

Quotation of Armando Brasini from the text by M. Pisani, Architetture di Armando Brasini (Rome: Officina Edizioni, 1996), 24–5 and note 7.

Technical Archives for Construction of Tirana was formed, the graphic material was separated from the written documents and preserved in the Central Archives. In 2005 most of this material was not available for consultation. This is the reason for the scarcity of information regarding the structure of the offices active in Tirana and the role of the plans' designers.

The drawings in the Tirana Archives consist in: a general planimetry of the project and a series of plants and prospects of the various buildings on a scale of 1:100.

B. Aliaj, K. Lulo, and G. Myftiu, ‘From independence to the world wars (1920–1938)’, in Tirana the Challenge of Urban Development (Tirana: Sloalba, 2003): 27–51.

Besides the plan of the residential area, W. Kohlër designed various projects for Tirana, including the one of the Civil Hospital and the royal villa, working with various Italian firms. Owing to the scarcity of written documents in the Albanian archives W. Kohlër's role in designing the plan for Tirana is not clear, nor do we know who appointed him.

The designers of New Dehli, Swinton, Lutyens and Baker draw on the models of Versailles and Washington and ‘the representational centre is organised around a Mallo f the same size, 3 kilometres, oriented almost exactly from east to west’, in L. Benevolo, La cattura dell'infinito (Bari: Laterza, 1991), 98.

The SVEA was active during the decade from 1925 to 1935 and was succeeded by the SOFINES in 1936.

On 8 March 1939 King Zog I asked Italy to draw up a new pact between the nations and on 20 March he requested that Italian troops be sent. Mussolini refused his request and on 5 April the authorities of the Italian Legation and Council in Albania ordered the Italians to leave the country. Only civil servants and officers of the diplomatic service stayed on in Tirana. On 7 April 1939, Italian troops arrived in Albania, landing at the same time in Durrës, Vlora, Santi Quaranta (now Porto Edda) and S.Giovanni di Medua. King Zog I, defenceless, was forced to flee Albania for Greece. On 8 April at 9.30 Itlian troops entered Tirana. On 12 April 1939, the Constituent Assembly of the delegates of all ten Albanian provinces was convened in Tirana; in the course of the meeting, Zog was deposed and the crown of Albania was offered, in the form of a personal union, to the King of Italy and Emperor of Ethiopia Vittorio Emaneule III. On 14 April, the Italian Council of Ministers sanctioned the acceptance of the new title of the King of Italy and ruled that it would be represented in Albania by a General Deputy resident in Tirana. On 22 April Il 22 aprile fu nominato Francesco Iacomoni di San Savino was appointed. The Fascist Party was founded in Tirana on 23 April 1939 in the presence of Achille Starace, Secretary of the Italian Fascist Party.

On 14 September 1943, the Albanian Regency Council proclaimed its independence from Italy under the protection of Germany.

Deputyship Decree dated 12 October 1939 XVII in Mbretnija Shqiptare Fleorja Zyrtare Tirana, Establishment of the Central Building and Town Planning Office; tax breaks for new or restored buildings, no. 122. The decree is signed by the Deputy Francesco Jacomoni di Sansavino, Sh. Verlaci, F. Anzillotti, M. Bushati.

Gherardo Bosio was assisted by Giuseppe Paladini who took over in 1941 after his untimely death, and subsequently by Leone Carmignani and. Ferdinando Poggi. The latter continued in office until the Central Building and Town Planning Office became subject to the Albanian Ministry of Public Works in 1942.

C. Cresti, Gherardo Bosio architetto fiorentino 1903–1941 (Florence: A. Pontecorboli, 1996).

Regulations of the Albanian Building and Town Planning Office and Central Commission, Tirana 1940 XVIII, in Mbretnija Shqiptare Fleorja Zyrtare, no. 27.

Archives of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, Albanian Building and Town Planning Central, Report on the work carried out by the Office for Town Plan Studies, 21 April 1940 XVIII.

Officially, the office began to function after the Deputyship Decree on 12 October 1939, though it was set up some months earlier.

L. Nuti, ‘La città nuova nella cultura urbanistica e architettonica del fascismo’, Metodo 17 (2001).

G. Gresleri, ‘La via dell'est: da Tirana a Lubiana’, in Architettura Italiana d'oltremare 1870–1940 (Florence: Marsilio, 1994).

Le principal firms were: Imprese Cidonio, S.A. Mediterranea Albania, Imprese Aureli, Imprese Vaselli, S.A. Marinucci, Impresa Simoncini, S.A. Ferrobeton, Impresa Federici, Società Italiana Costruzioni Edilizia e Lavori Pubblici, Ditta Stacciali, Imprese Moscati. Op.cit. Un decennio di vita della SVEA.

The outline plan is published in the Gazzetta Ufficiale no. 40 dated 29 March 1940, approved by law no. 71 of 7 March 1940.

The final plan was concluded in January 1943, as testified by the report signed by Il piano definitivo fu concluso nel gennaio del 1943, come testimonia la relazione di piano firmata da Ivo Lambertini and Ferdinando Poggi as advisor.

M.A. Giusti, Albania architettura e città (Florence: Maschietto, 2006).

Ivo Lambertini and Ferdinando Poggi, Relazione di piano, Tirana 1943 (Building Archives, Tirana).

Between 1936 and 1938, Bosio was given the task by the Italian Government of drawing up the project of the town plans of Gondar, Dessiè and Gimma in Italian East Africa (A.O.I.). Op. cit. C. Cresti.

G. Bosio, ‘Future città dell'Impero’, Architettura 7 (July) (1937): 429.

G. Bosio, Piano regolatore di Tirana, Regolamento urbanistico del viale dell'Impero, 1940, Ufficio per l'Edilizia e l'Urbanistica (Building Archives, Tirana).

‘… continuous and unified facades of a width in proportion to the width of the road: the width of the facades of individual buildings are established in planimetry as to be built on multiple of modular interaxes of 4 m., a measurement allowing maximum freedom in the composition of the plans … harmonious buildings separated the one from the other’, extract from the ‘Town planning regulation for Viale dell'Impero, 1940’ by Gherardo Bosio.

‘Art.9 In consideration of Empire Avenue's future monumental character, all buildings must be built with the same architectural dignity and uniform stylistic features. All fascias, cornices and architectural ornaments must be in stone or marble, while the level surfaces of the background can be of plain plaster. The wainscotting of the buildings, up to a height of not less than 1.80 m. and the enclosure walls must also be covered with stone or marble. The use of artificial stone is allowed, but only for special reasons of a static character, in the crown cornices of the buildings’. Gherardo Bosio, Relazione Regolamento urbanistico del viale dell'Impero, 1940 (Building Archives, Tirana).

The barracks buildings were designed but not built.

Urbanistica no. 3 (1937): 146.

Rassegna di architettura no. 9 (1933): 384.

C.E. Rava, ‘Architettura coloniale’, Gli annuali dell'Africa Italiana, year II, no. 4 (1939): 401.

Ferdinando Poggi and Ivo Lambertini, Relazione di piano, Tirana 1943 (Building Archives, Tirana).

Ibid.

A comparison with the 1937 plan shows that no building work took place in the area.

The building was completed later, during the Communist regime.