"An impressive place with rare values"/ Austrian researchers and archaeologists visit the Kamenica Mound

2025-07-13 16:17:00, Qyteti im CNA

"An impressive place with rare values"/ Austrian researchers and

The Kamenica Mound was the next stop this Sunday for a group of visitors from Austria, composed not simply of ordinary tourists, but of archaeologists, researchers and teachers of ancient languages, who are developing a cultural tour in Albania with a focus on the archaeological sites and prehistoric heritage of the country. Part of the group are professionals from the universities of Vienna and Salzburg, who showed a strong interest in the unique structure of the mound, in the way it is preserved and presented, but also in the importance that this object carries within the framework of the early history of the region.

The visitors were introduced to the entire history of the Tumë, its complex structure and the data obtained from many years of excavations, which have turned this site into one of the most significant archaeological destinations in Albania. Coming from various fields of study, including underwater archaeology, the history of medicine, Latin and ancient languages, they considered this visit a very valuable stop for their academic and professional formation.

"An impressive place with rare values"/ Austrian researchers and

Annamaria Lesigang, a Latin and English teacher in Vienna, expressed her great satisfaction with this visit, mentioning other ancient sites she has visited in Albania.

"We have been on this tour for 2-3 days and have seen Tirana and Shkodra. We are visiting ancient and prehistoric sites and this place is very rich. I am a Latin and English teacher in Vienna, Austria. We have a very busy schedule, we have seen the excavations of Lin and it was a very beautiful view of the lake. It is amazing, we were on a tour in Bulgaria earlier and there we saw similar mounds, which reminds me somewhat of that culture. My main interest is Roman culture and I really liked the 'Egnatia' road in Elbasan, but I think this museum here is very informative and very well maintained," says Lesigang.

Barbara Beckenberger, also a Latin teacher in Vienna, praised the way the story is presented.

"I come from Vienna and I am a Latin teacher so I am very interested in Balkan archaeology. We have a lot of students originating from Balkan countries like North Macedonia, Bosnia as well as Albania, so it helps me to understand more about the places they come from. I think it is very interesting and you have done a very good job in the way you present your history. I think it is still developing and what I wrote to my husband yesterday is that I am very curious how it will look in 10 years, so I hope we come in 10 years to see it," said Beckenberger.

Rupert Breitwieser, a specialist in underwater archaeology and the history of medicine at the University of Salzburg, emphasized the importance of the Mound from a scientific perspective.

"I work in the Department of Antiquity at the University of Salzburg and my focus is underwater archaeology and the history of medicine. Very impressive, I liked it a lot. A very important area here and from what I heard there is a connection between the location and the Tum here, which is very rare. The work that has been done here is very important, not only on the medical side, so it is very impressive. Albania is a very interesting country, I am happy to be here. I was there years ago and visited Butrint and this time I saw many historical and archaeological sites," says Breitwieser.

"An impressive place with rare values"/ Austrian researchers and

The visit was accompanied by archaeologist and national guide Ols Lafe, who has been part of the excavations since 2000. He emphasized that this was a select group of professionals from various fields of antiquity, who had made the Kamenica Mound a must-see on their tour of Albania. Lafe added that the many years of work on this site, including its maintenance, care and permanent enrichment of information, is increasingly turning the Mound into a reference destination for archaeological and anthropological studies in the Balkans.

"The visit we made today to the Kamenica Mound is a planned visit since last year. The Austrian group, which I have the pleasure of accompanying throughout Albania for about 1 week, had a special point about the Kamenica Mound because it is a special object, so we do not have two of them in the territory of Albania. The work done here for many years, the fact that I myself participated in the excavations of 2000, the continuous maintenance, care and presentation that grows day by day, to make it an indispensable destination in Korça. The Kamenica Mound remains an important point to explain its history. It is very important from an archaeological and anthropological point of view. The dating issues are things that we discussed. The group in question are experts in the field, there are archaeologists from the Universities of Vienna and Salzburg, historians of antiquity, philologists of Latin and ancient Greek, so they connect their professionalism with the developments in the territory", - he says Goodbye.

"An impressive place with rare values"/ Austrian researchers and

This visit serves not only as an example of the growing interest of international academia in Albanian heritage, but also as an incentive to further invest in its promotion and integration into broader research and tourism networks. /CNA