The fabulous city of Butrint

Where's the city?

Butrint is situated on a peninsula jutting out into an inland lake, and the whole site is wooded, so that when the low hill is seen from the lake, nothing of the remains are visible

This view from the top reveals the answer. The lake lies only just inland from the sea, and is joined to it by the winding channel. But it would have made a superb ancorage for a ship making its way down the coast, where it could come in and take on water and supplies.

The great attraction of the site was its spring of pure water. This became sacred to Asclepius, the god of healing. A small shrine was erected and adjacent to it a Greek theatre.

The Greek theatre and beyond it the shrine to Asclepius. As the site is low lying the orchestra is still under water and a modern timber stage has been erected. This was recently the site of the Miss Albania contest. However the archaeologists had a good bargain out of this. In return for borrowing the theatre, the organizers asphalted the road from Serranda, 15 miles away.

The inscriptions.

The side walls of the theatre are covered in Greek inscriptions. It was apparently the custom, as payment of the Gods to liberate your slave and the names of the freed slaves were inscribed on the theatre. 

The baptistery

In the early Christian period, Butrint was the site of a bishopric, and one of the finest buildings from this period was this circular Baptistery, the actual font or bath is at the centre, perhaps reused from an earlier bath suite. It had steps on both sides. You went down one side, then had your sins washed away and emerged the other side a newly minted Christian.

The cathedral.

The grandest building still standing is the cathedral. This was reused in the 13th century when Butrint was refounded by the Venetians, and this rebuilding dates to that period.

Triconch palace

The tri-conch palace
The major work in recent years has been on the Tri-conch palace. This is a large palatial building down by the sea shore where the main upstanding architecture consists of three apses or conches, hence the name Tri-conch palace. Excavation has shown that it reached its peak in the 4th and 5th centuries AD when the new town wall cut it off from the sea. In the 6th and 7th centuries it was given over to industrial purposes, but it was reused again in the 12th and 13th centuries when the site was re-occupied by the Venetians.

The villa

In a letter to Cicero, his friend, Atticus writes in glowing terms about his magnificent villa near Butrint with glorious views. Is this the villa? It lies on the other side of the lake - Butrint is the small hill in the far distance, and early 1st century pottery has been recovered from it

Visiting Butrint

It is not possible to stay at Butrint itself. All accommodation is at Saranda – a pleasant town 15 miles to the north which is not unsuccessfully reinventing itself as a sea side resort. The best way to get to Saranda is from Corfu, from which boats run daily across to Albania.

The biggest success of the recent campaigns has been not so much in the archaeology but in the conservation. Under the communist regime, the area around Butrint was not developed, but when the communist regime collapsed, there was a danger that the whole area around Butrint would be developed as a holiday resort. However thanks to financial support from Lord Rothschild and Lord Sainsbury, and more recently from the Packard (Hewlett Packard) Foundation in America, the whole area for 10 miles around has been declared a National Park and is being preserved for its archaeology and its wild life.

It is a magical site to visit!