Albania - Sovjan

Research topic: Establishment dynamic of protohistoric lake dwellings in Southern Albania

Since 1993, the Franco-Albanian Archaeological Mission in the Korçë Basin - created on the impetus of the Aegean Protohistory Research Team (University of Paris I - CNRS) in partnership with the Archaeological Institute of the Academy of Sciences of the Republic of Albania, with the financial support of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the French School of Athens - has been exploring a protohistoric lake dwelling near the village of Sovjan, in the Korçë Basin (South-eastern Albania). The site is the focus of a multi-disciplinary research programme combining archaeological digs and paleo-environmental studies. It is the first undertaking of this kind carried out in Albania. It is yielding entirely new data on the occupation dynamic along the lake in the region, including the absolute chronology of cultural phases from the Neolithic Age to the Iron Age, the technology and planimetrics of wood construction in the Bronze Age, as well as the interaction between man and the environment throughout the Holocene.