The author, starting from this issue of Αρχαιολογία, begins publication of a series of articles on the construction of official, state buildings during the period of time that Capodistrias was governor of Greece. These articles, thorough and perfectly documented, are part of a wider project of the author’s on the organization and planning of towns, the question of the building of public edifices and the town-planning law of the Capodistrian period.
The articles will deal with the erection of public buildings in three Greek towns, where the presence of the Capodistrian government was immediate and continuous, that is in Argos, Nafplion and Aegina. The series starts with the erection of a building for Public Administration in Argos, that today houses the town-hall.Data on the entire history and development of this edifice from the time of its building until now is included in the article. These articles are part of a more general issue concerning the contribution both of Capodistria himself and of his administration to the upbuilding of a European state in Greece, immediately after the 1821 Greek Revolution against the Turkish occupation, that in 1827 had almost turned out a complete catastrophe. Consequently, a wide range of data referring to the erection of public buildings, such as their financing, supervision and the obvious or obscure role assigned to them by the administration, is examined. The author’s basic idea is that only after individual and thorough studies, which will examine the subjec twithin the framework of its time, any sound conclusion on the Capodistrian – and other periods – can be reached, free of passion and prejudice that usually have a negative effect on research and its outcome. The Capodistrian period is typical of the excessive use and misuse of a later ideology for the study and interpretation of a former period.
