From Italian Imperialism to Cultural Sovereignty: The Birth of Antalya Museum in Türkiy

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2026-04-15

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Aykaç Leıdholm, Pınar

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Following the Italo-Turkish War, Italy articulated a policy in 1912 to expand its influence into Anatolia through consulates, schools, and archaeological expeditions. As part of this policy, Roberto Paribeni, Director of the Museo Nazionale Romano, was commissioned to conduct archaeological surveys around Antalya, a southern port city with strong ancient Roman past. Although Paribeni's plans for excavations in the region was interrupted by the First World War, he continued to promote the region's Roman legacy through conferences and publications, reinforcing Italy's claims in the Mediterranean. Following the Italian occupation of Antalya in 1919, archaeological surveys continued in the region together with conservation work, including at Hadrian's Gate. These efforts eventually culminated in the establishment of a museum within the Italian Consulate. The museum drew objections from local Ottoman officials over the unauthorised collection of antiquities by the Italians and the transfer of some items to Rhodes.In response, Suleyman Fikri, a local teacher at the Ottoman idadi school appointed himself a voluntary antiquities officer. He rearranged the Bayraktar Masjid as a local museum depot in 1919. This depot formed the nucleus of the Antalya Museum, officially established in 1923 under the Turkish Republic. In its early years, the museum focused on incorporating antiquities collected by Italian authorities during the occupation into the national collection. This paper examines how Italy mobilised archaeology and the ideology of Romanita to legitimise its political claims in southern Anatolia, and how these claims were contested both by local actors and Ottoman institutions. It argues that the establishment of the Antalya Museum was both an act of preservation and a claim to cultural sovereignty. By analysing the interplay between international, imperial, and local actors, the paper offers further insight into the contested processes of heritage-making during the transition from the Ottoman Empire to the Turkish Republic.|

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https://sah.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/03/79th-Book-of-Abstracts.pdf
https://hdl.handle.net/11511/119320

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Graduate School of Natural and Applied Sciences, Conference / Seminar