Nea Pikerni

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The location of Elis on the Peloponnese peninsula

Nea Pikerni ( Greek Νέα Πικέρνη ( f. Sg. ), New Pikerni) was a settlement that belonged to the municipality of Vouprasia in the former Prefecture of Elis on the Peloponnese peninsula in western Greece .

history

prehistory

Emigration route of the population from Piqeras to Villa Badessa in Abruzzo

In 1875, 40 (42 or 45 in other sources) Albanian-speaking Greek-Byzantine families from the village of Villa Badessa in Abruzzo in Italy tried to emigrate to Greece in order to settle there. The residents of Villa Badessa originally came from the Albanian town of Piqeras in northern Epirus , where they were attacked on December 6, 1742 by the people of Borsh and Golëm in Kurvelesh, who had converted to Islam . 372 residents of Piqeras then decided to emigrate to "Albania-friendly" Italy, where they founded the Villa Badessa settlement.

Over time, the pressure of the Roman Catholic Church on the Arbëresh who celebrated the Byzantine rite (this is how the ethnic minority of the Albanians in Italy is called) increased so that from 1857 they were only baptized in the Greco-Byzantine rite. In addition, demographic growth led to a lack of land and tax increases in the Kingdom of Italy . The Badessani (name for the population of Villa Badessa) cherished the idea of "preferring to live under the Ottoman yoke rather than the papal yoke" and the desire to return to their homeland.

As part of the Greek agrarian reform of 1871 by the government of Alexandros Koumoundouros , 2.65 million hectares of state land were distributed over 357,217 plots, so that almost all farmers became landowners. However, several areas were excluded from the reform.

In April 1875, George Dourouti, the Greek consul in Ancona , received Demetrio di Martino, the representative of 40 Albanian families from Villa Badessa who were willing to emigrate and who asked for cultivable land in Greece. With a royal decree of June 16, 1875, the area of ​​Vouprasia at that time was released for “useful public purposes” for “Italian” immigrants. Each family should receive between 20 and 30 hectares of land.

After those wishing to emigrate had been struck from the Italian registers, the Greek consulate in Ancona gave them ordinary Greek passports. In the end there were seven families [Blasi, D'Alessio (2 families), D'Andrea, Palli (2), Varsi]. The other 34 families willing to emigrate waited in Villa Badessa for the official publication of the law and immigrated to Greece in 1877. The annual index of citizenship from 1878 shows that the families were: [Blasi (2 families), D'Alessio (3), D'Attanasio (2), D'Ambrogio (2), D'Andrea ( 3), Credico, Dima (3), Mili (8), Mattucci, Di Mattia, Di Martino (3), De Micheli, Sardini, Sbrania and Varfi (2)].

The first immigrant families from Villa Badessa to arrive in the port of Patras in the fall of 1876 received no warm welcome from either the local population or the local authorities. They were left to their own destiny. On December 14, 1876, the law was passed by the Greek Parliament. Each family received 30 hectares of state land for cultivation in the Vouprasia area. They were brought by ship to the nearest possible bank. On their departure from Patras they received a farewell ceremony with cannon shots.

The creation of Nea Pikerni

Approximate location of Nea Pikerni in the former Elis prefecture
Arcadia on the Peloponnese peninsula

By decree they got the area between Varda , Psari and Kapeleto . Construction of the settlement began in January 1877. Under its founding law, the state granted each family 400 Greek drachmas for the construction of the house and the engineer S. Otiriadis was appointed for technical support. The total area granted to them was estimated to be half a square kilometer. The "Italian" settlement was named Nea Pikerni (New Pikerni) in 1879 on the recommendation of the Philological Association "Parnassos" based on the original home town of Piqeras. The same association created an Italian-Albanian-Greek school there for needy children in the same year, a novelty for the region where illiteracy was 92% at the time. The gradual depopulation of the settlement resulted in the school building being closed. From 1882 the school in the surrounding settlements was attended and in 1884 the school was moved to Kapeleto.

There were Albanian villages all over the region. Within a radius of around 20 km there were at least 17. In the mid-1870s, Psari had around 400, Kapeleto 300 and Mazi (today: Ano Kourtesi ) 100 inhabitants.

Despite the mobilization that led to the emergence of the Nea Pikerni settlement, the settlement was one of the most ephemeral settlements in modern Greece. While the settlement had 71 inhabitants in 1879, ten years later there were only eleven. In 1881 the settlement was hit by a meningitis epidemic, which killed 27 settlers in a few days. The Blasi family returned to Villa Badessa while the survivors are said to have moved to the center of the Peloponnese peninsula and founded Pikerni in the Arcadia regional district .

Today it is difficult to identify the settlement as it was formally dissolved on December 18, 1920. It was south of Varda and Psari and north of Kapeleto and like in its original home in the northern Epirus it had a neighboring town of Borsi . The short lifespan of this settlement led to oblivion in the collective consciousness. All that survives is the designation the area "the Italians".

Population development

1877 1879 1889 1896 1907 1920
13 families 71 inhabitants 11 inhabitants 22 inhabitants 15 inhabitants N / A

Administrative development

With the law ΦΕΚ 59Α of August 25, 1879, Nea Pikerni was recognized as a settlement and came to the municipality of Vouprasia. With the law ΦΕΚ 256Α of August 28, 1912, it was replaced by Vouprasia and came to Kapeleto.

literature

  • Leonidas Kallivretakis: Νέα Πικέρνη Δήμου Βουπρασίων: το χρονικό ενός οικισμού της Πελοποννήσου τον 19ο αιώνα (και η περιπέτεια ενός πληθυσμού) [New Pikerni the community Vouprasia: The chronicle of a settlement of the Peloponnese in the 19th century (and the adventure of a population)] . In: Vasilis Panagiotopoulos: (Ed.): Πληθυσμοί και οικισμοί του ελληνικού χώρου: ιστορικά μελετήματα [Population and Settlements of the Greek Territory: Historical Studies] . Institute for Neohellenic Research, Athens 2003, p. 223 (Greek, helios-eie.ekt.gr [PDF]).
  • Κώστας Ν. Τριανταφύλλου (Kostas N. Triantafyllou): Ιστορικόν Λεξικόν των Πατρών [Historical Lexicon of Patras . 3. Edition. Volume: A. Patras 1995, p. 910 , entry "Italiotai" (Greek).

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c Leonidas Kallivretakis, p. 223
  2. ↑ a b K.Ch. Vamvas: Περί των εν Ιταλία Ελληνοαλβανών και ιδίως των εις Ελλάδα μεταναστευσάντων (About the Greek Albanians in Italy and especially about those who emigrated to Greece) . Parnassos Literary Society, Athens 1877, p. 24 (Greek, lsparnas.gr ). , accessed February 21, 2015
  3. ↑ a b c K.Ch. Vamvas, p. 25
  4. ^ Agricultural reform. In: Hellenic History on the Internet. Retrieved May 28, 2017 (English).
  5. ↑ Leonidas Kallivretakis, p. 228
  6. ↑ Leonidas Kallivretakis, p. 229
  7. ↑ a b Indice annuale per gli atti di cittadinanza, Comune di Rosciano, Provincia di Teramo, anno 1877 ( Many thanks to Ms. Antonietta Schimanski (descendant of the Blasi family) from Villa Badessa, who provided the revision list. )
  8. ↑ a b c Leonidas Kallivretakis, p. 232
  9. ^ Kostas N. Triantafyllou, p. 910
  10. ↑ a b Leonidas Kallivretakis, p 231
  11. ↑ Leonidas Kallivretakis, p 233
  12. ↑ a b Leonidas Kallivretakis, p 234
  13. ^ Eyewitness report by Mrs. Antonietta Schimanski (descendant of the Blasi family) from Villa Badessa
  14. ↑ EETTA - Administrative changes of settlements. In: Eetaa.gr. Retrieved July 20, 2017 (Greek).
  15. ↑ a b E.ETTA - Administrative changes to settlements. In: Eetaa.gr. Retrieved July 20, 2017 (Greek).
  16. ↑ Leonidas Kallivretakis, p. 240
  17. ↑ Leonidas Kallivretakis, p 237
  18. ↑ a b c d e Leonidas Kallivretakis, p. 239.

Coordinates: 38 ° 0 ′ 35 ″  N , 21 ° 22 ′ 19.4 ″  E