Memorie.al publishes the unknown history of the “Public Houses” from the period of the Zog Monarchy in the early 1930s, which had been opened and regularly operated in several of Albania’s larger cities, and about which some newspapers, such as “BESA” through an article dated 4 August 1934, called on the municipalities to take better care of the maintenance and control of the “Sex Houses” because they had been left in a miserable state and that by taking care of them, they would save [society] from the scourge of homosexuality and manuskerizmit [masturbation]. How were 12 young men with communist convictions caught in a “Bordello” in Korçë, following the order of Prefect Abedin Nepravishta, sent to the gendarmerie for the control of premises where Bolshevik literature was being propagated and distributed?!
Even though nearly three decades have passed since Albania opened up to the outside world, the issue of public houses in our country has never been seriously taken into consideration by the relevant bodies of our state and society. Apart from a few very rare articles in the daily press and the occasional television programme that has touched on this issue, it continues to remain a taboo. One of the main arguments or barriers that public opinion has raised against their opening is the one concerning the lack of tradition of such public houses in our country. But does this actually hold true? Excluding the period of the communist regime, which created a “vacuum” in this matter, since the time of Ottoman occupation, “Sex Houses” have never been absent from our country.
Legal public houses – or as they are otherwise known in popular jargon, “Bordellos” or “Kuplaras” [brothels] – were first opened in Albania in the early 1930s in some of the country’s main cities such as: Tirana, Shkodër, Elbasan, Korçë, Gjirokastër, Vlorë, etc. In those years, the majority of “women of common use” as they were considered in official documents or “prostitutes in popular jargon, who plied their trade in those “Sex Houses”, were locals, but there were also some from Montenegro and Macedonia. The flourishing of public houses in our country occurred in the years 1939–’44, during the period of the Italian and German occupation, which was also their golden age. In this regard, the Italian army played a major role: along with their heavy weapons, they brought with them to our country several young girls whom they employed in those houses to satisfy their desires. During this period, most of the prostitutes employed in those sex houses were Serbo-Montenegrin and Macedonian. But with the capitulation of the Italian army and the end of the war, those public houses also capitulated, never to open again. They remain few to this day.
Somewhere near the beginning of Kavaja Street, besides the building where the Institute of Folk Culture now stands, there is a large house, almost completely ruined. Although after the ’90s the demand for housing or construction land was very high, no one has approached that house and its owner has still not come forward?! The old residents of Tirana and of that neighbourhood who lived through the pre-war period or that of the Zog Monarchy remember very well what that house served for. This was a “Public House” that operated legally until the end of the war in November 1944.
And given this fact, with the establishment of the communist regime, its owners abandoned it, never to return. Regarding the existence of public houses and their tradition in our country, the following article, which we have taken from the press of the 1930s (the newspaper Besa, 4 August 1934) and are publishing in full, also speaks.
Newspaper “Besa”: Public houses must be well maintained
Today we have occasion to speak on a subject that many would consider repulsive. But it is not so. Those who would take it that way should cast their gaze upon other states and observe what importance is given to these houses. We see that in the cities of Albania these public houses are generally lacking, and where they do exist they are kept with such negligence that they sow death among our people, especially among the youth, the foundation of the nation. By lacking such places in various cities, especially the smaller ones, the people are given occasion to succumb to other harmful vices, harmful to themselves and to the State. The two plagues that most strongly destroy our population are: homosexuality and masturbation [manuskerizmi]. Both are destructive from the moral and material point of view and stem from the lack of women and from certain other causes. Physiological homosexuality is against human and natural laws. There are also many who have defended it, but despite this, anyone who thinks and judges with sound reason hates and curses it. This act is the ruin of society. Why does it exclude woman? The family is ruined. Thus we have a lack of births, about which we so often complain. Society is ruined, because the increase in births is the first factor in the civilisation of a people.
“Education and the Municipalities should take care”
For education and the environment, we hope that the education authorities will take care. Today we only wish to address the Municipalities, that they take care to open public houses, so that we may be protected and rid ourselves of these two evils for our people. On another occasion we shall speak at greater length. They must try harder to maintain them well. It is required that the municipalities take the necessary measures to put these houses under the supervision of competent doctors for such care, and specialised in venereal diseases, i.e., in the hands of those doctors who are able to diagnose these diseases according to scientific methods. Those doctors who are not practised in such diseases would need to take a course, even a short one, and thus to cope with these venereal diseases and especially syphilis [frengjyzën] which has plagued us. In this way, a great service will be rendered to the Albanian people and state, by preparing worthy sons for the Motherland and for Humanity.” (Trinitas)
“Prefect Abedin Nepravishta in ’34 arrested 12 communists in a ‘Bordello’ in Korçë”
Among those cities of Albania where during the period of the Zog Monarchy and that of the fascist occupation of the country, there were those few public houses, was also the city of Korçë. In those years, there were several legal or secret “Public Houses” there, which were mainly frequented by the city’s youth. The opening of public houses in that city dates back to the early 1930s, when many of the Korçë natives who had worked as emigrants in various countries of the world such as the USA, Australia, Romania, etc., returned to their city with a different mentality. The existence of public houses in the city of Korçë is best evidenced by several archival documents dating from the 1930s, which speak about the activity of the Secret Office of that Prefecture. Around the year 1934, following an order from the Ministry of the Interior in Tirana, the Prefect of Korçë, Abedin Nepravishta, instructed the Gendarmerie Command in writing to exercise strict control over several houses and premises frequented by certain persons suspected of spreading Bolshevik literature. During that inspection, in one of the “Public Houses” of the city of Korçë which was legally carrying out its activity, the gendarmerie arrested 12 persons filed as communists and suspected of spreading banned ideas and literature. Some of these arrested individuals, in the late 1930s, formed the Communist Group of Korçë, becoming the main exponents of the Communist Movement in Albania. One of them, who appeared first on the list of the Secret Office of the Korçë Prefecture, held high functions in diplomacy during the years of Enver Hoxha’s communist regime. /Memorie.al
