Albi (;
Calabrian: ) is a
commune and
town
A town is a type of a human settlement, generally larger than a village but smaller than a city.
The criteria for distinguishing a town vary globally, often depending on factors such as population size, economic character, administrative stat ...
in the
province of Catanzaro
The province of Catanzaro (; Catanzarese: ) is a province of the Calabria region of Italy. The city Catanzaro is both capital of the province and capital of the region of Calabria. The province contains 80 '' comuni'' (: ''comune'').
Catanza ...
. It is situated in the east southeastern portion of
Calabria
Calabria is a Regions of Italy, region in Southern Italy. It is a peninsula bordered by the region Basilicata to the north, the Ionian Sea to the east, the Strait of Messina to the southwest, which separates it from Sicily, and the Tyrrhenian S ...
,
Italy
Italy, officially the Italian Republic, is a country in Southern Europe, Southern and Western Europe, Western Europe. It consists of Italian Peninsula, a peninsula that extends into the Mediterranean Sea, with the Alps on its northern land b ...
.
Possibly the first Korean to have set foot in Europe,
António Corea
António Corea () or António Korea was a Korean slave who was taken to Italy. He is possibly the first Korean to have set foot in Europe. Little is known about Corea's life; he is attested to only briefly in a travelogue by his Italian master F ...
has been theorized to have settled in Albi, with descendants with the surname Corea still living in the village today.
The theory gained significant traction in both Albi and South Korea, and was widely repeated for decades. In Albi, a monument was installed in 1989 to commemorate the supposed meeting of Corea and his Italian wife. The mayor of Albi and a number of Corea's supposed descendents visited South Korea in 1992. However, this theory is now considered to be unlikely to be true.
References
External links
*
Cities and towns in Calabria
Articles which contain graphical timelines
{{Calabria-geo-stub