History as identity: the Adriatic sea

Abstract

The Adriatic is a homogeneous sea as far as its form is concerned, and at the same time a complex one when its cultural stratifications are considered, stratifications particularly evident along the eastern littoral, a border zone between civilization models, between Western and Eastern Europe, Central Europe and the Mediterranean. The Adriatic as a region does not have a common historiography, there is not a single version of its past accepted by all the nations that make part of it. Recent trans‑frontier policies impose a new political vision of the Adriatic, a regionalization of this sea. This tendency will have, sooner or later, a cultural implication, involving the way we look at the Adriatic past.