Page 48 - Studia Universitatis Hereditati, vol 11(2) (2023)

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studia universitatis hereditati, letnik 11 (2023), številka 2 / volume 11 (2023), number 2

Figure 1: Location map of places mentioned in text
(source: Sintès (2019)) ta

varied, but they all led to a classic movement in ments reveal the key factors that determined
the Mediterranean context: the conquest and both the departures and the relocations of the
the intensive exploitation of the plains, and the populations: the violence that drove the inhab-
abandonment of mountain areas and traditional itants from their villages of origin, but also the di
farming methods. intervention of the State, which sought to con-
trol those who might willingly or unwillingly re-
A society Shaken by War inforce the Communist troops during the civ-
Most of these displacements were the direct re- il war. This objective of controlling populations
sult of the violence of the 1940s. In Sagiada, for through relocation can be found even more ex-
example, it was the partial destruction of the vil- plicitly in the neighbouring village of Asprokkli-
lage by the Germans on 23 August 1943 that led si, where a large proportion of the inhabitants, here
the population to abandon the village. The in- sometimes coming from very distant areas, were
habitants then crossed the border en masse to settled during the civil war in order to limit the
take refuge in neighbouring Albanian villag- movements of groups that were still very mobile
es, where the strength of the resistance kept the until the 1940s: the Kalatzidès (καλατζήδες) of
Germans away. When they returned in the win- Murgana (tinsmiths with itinerant work) or the
ter of 1943, they were confronted with the last Sarakatsani or Aromanian Vlachs, pastoralists
turmoil of the war and the beginnings of the civ- from Pindus. These stories indicate a desire on
il war. In January 1948, a raid by partisans who the part of the authorities to control the moun-
wanted to forcibly conscript young men from the tain populations and keep them away from are-
village prompted the inhabitants to take refuge as of conflict where they could provide aid to the
on the shore. The authorities sent them to the is- communist army.
land of Corfu, from where they did not return These relocations took the inhabitants studiauniversitatis
until the very early 1950s (between 1952 and 1953) through different phases, ranging from sponta-
to set up the new village of Sagiada, between the neous settlements in temporary dwellings to the
plain and the shore (Tsogas 2009). These move- erection of permanent houses and participation