International conference „Paros and its colonies“ took place on June 11-14, 2015 in Paroikia, capital of the Greek island Paros. Ancient Greeks have established many colonies in the Mediterranean, on Black Sea shores, in Asia Minor etc, and the Greek island Paros was one of the starting points of these colonizations. This is of particular importance for Croatia since ancient Greeks from Paros have in 385/384 b. C. colonized the Croatian island of Hvar and established the city of Faros, today Stari Grad. Mutual relations between two islands and two countries can thus be traced 24 centuries into the past.
In the immediate vicinity of Stari Grad, ancient Greek colonizers have cultivated the plain („Faros hora“), landscape which has stayed practically unchanged since. It is a unique system of land parcelization, where individual parcels have been separated by stone walls and borders, including small stone buildings. Authentic agriculture has been maintained on this fertile plain, mainly growing vineyards and olives, from Hellenistic times up to today. Since this site presents the best preserved of all ancient parcelizations on the Mediterranean it has been listed on the UNESCO list of the world cultural heritage as one of seven sites Croatia has on this list.
Having in mind the importance the Parian colonization bears in the general context of Croatian-Greek cultural relations, a group of eight prominent Croatian scholars from the island of Hvar as well as from Zadar, Split and Zagreb participated in the works of the conference. In their contributions they analyzed various scientific and professional aspects of Parian colonization of Hvar, the current state of affairs when it comes to the Greek heritage on the territory of Croatia as well as broader cultural links between Croatia and Greece.
A special ceremony was organized during the conference to mark the Parian colonization of Hvar 24 centuries ago and on this occasion a plaque was posted commemorating this event both in the Croatian and Greek languages, later to be permanently exhibited in Paroikia. The Croatian delegation included also the mayor of Stari Grad Vinko Maroevic and the Croatian Ambassador to the Hellenic Republic dr. Ivan Velimir Starcevic.
It is anticipated that the delegation from Paros will visit Hvar in September of next year, in order to celebrate jointly the 2400th anniversary of the establishment of Stari Grad and to set up an identical plaque there. Future activities towards strenghtening the ties between two islands and states will be agreed upon on this occasion.
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