Walking through Çifti — Civita in Italian — I filmed the houses and the streets around me. I described how quiet it felt. You could occasionally hear people speaking Albanian or Italian, but the calm was what I kept returning to.
The surrounding terrain led me to an image: mountains as a shield. In the video I wondered whether people arriving here had looked for somewhere they would feel safer, away from the coast and among the hills.
An impression is not a historical explanation
That was my interpretation while walking, not evidence of the settlers’ exact motives. The municipality’s own description places Civita at about 450 metres above sea level, within Pollino National Park, and identifies it as one of Italy’s historic Albanian communities.
The view prompted a question; it did not answer it. The recording cannot establish why particular families chose this location.
What it does preserve is our small moment there. I pointed out the houses and where the centre seemed to be, with Eduardi visible further ahead. I also mentioned our interest in renting a house among the community to experience the place. That was an idea in the recording, not a claim that we had already done so.
Civita: encountering a living Arbëreshë heritage
Original social post · 2026-10-12
