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Asmara Heritage Project: Documenting Eritrea's Colonial Past

Asmara, Eritrea's capital, is a UNESCO World Heritage Site recognized for its unique modernist architecture, a result of Italian colonial construction and subsequent isolation. It's the first modernist urban site listed entirely and Africa's first explicitly modernist World Heritage Site.

The city, situated over 2,300 meters above sea level, was inscribed in July 2017. Its heritage value stems from a convergence of Eritrea's history: intense colonial construction by Italy and a long period of isolation that preserved the city from redevelopment.

Before European colonization, Asmara was a small highland settlement. Oral tradition suggests its name, "Arbate Asmera," means "the four made them unite" in Tigrinya, referencing four clans who unified. The city's earliest written mention is from a late fourteenth-century Latin itinerary, and it grew as a trade route stop towards Massawa.

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