Joanna Lumley unveils Hampstead plaque to explorer Edith Durham

Edith Durham is a huge figure in Kosovo and Albania with schools and streets named after her – but until now she has few memorials in her native country.

Albanian ambassador Uran Ferizi told a 20-strong group outside Edith’s former Hampstead home on Tuesday (October 13) that her name is known to every schoolchild in Albania and Kosovo, where she is referred to as ‘The Queen’.

Dame Joanna Lumley with Kosovo ambassador Ilir Kapiti outside 20 Ellerdale Road where the plaque to Edith Durham was unveiled on Tuesday October 13. (Image: John P Watkins)

Dame Joanna was also joined by Kosovo ambassador Ilir Kapiti outside 20 Ellerdale Road as she told the crowd it was “an honour to commemorate such a remarkable woman”.

The Ab Fab and Amandaland star is a supporter of both countries which Edith travelled to and loved while lobbying for Albania to gain independence in 1912.

Edith Durham lived at the Ellerdale Road address for 10 years and also spent her final decades at a house in Glenloch Road, Belsize Park (Image: John P Watkins)

She has previously said: “My admiration for Edith Durham and her adventurous spirit and lovely prose is off the scale: and It is a huge privilege to be at the unveiling of the plaque commemorating this extraordinary traveller and passionate supporter of Albania.”

Ambassadors, historians and authors joined Dame Joanna Lumley outside the former home of Edith Durham on Tuesday, October 13 to unveil a plaque to the Edwardian explorer. (Image: John P Watkins)

Also in attendance was historian Sir Noel Malcolm, president of the Anglo Albanian Association, who has penned numerous books on Albania and the Balkans.

He reminded the group that Edith travelled to parts of the Balkans considered too dangerous for European men to visit, much less a lone woman.

He said without her support and advocacy, modern Albania would be much smaller than it is.

Ambassador Ferizi added that Albanians are grateful to this day for Edith’s part in establishing the country as an independent nation.

The intrepid writer, artist and anthropologist spent most of her adult life in Hampstead and Belsize Park living in Ellerdale Road for a decade and later moving to Glenloch Road for many years before her death in 1944.

In the early years of the 20th century she travelled all over Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbia and what is now Albania and wrote books about the region and its customs.

She was a war correspondent for The Times; formed the Anglo-Albanian Society to pressurise Britain to recognise Albanian independence; was the first female vice president of the Royal Anthropological Institute; and campaigned for famine relief after the Balkan Wars.

Other senior members of the Anglo Albanian society along with Edith’s great niece and nephew Gillian Trethowan and Dr James Hickson were at the gathering.

Elizabeth Gowing, author of Edith and I, Marcus Tanner, author of Albania’s Mountain Queen, Edith Durham and the Balkans, Guardian cartoonist Mick Kidd and David Shankland, director of the Royal Anthropological Institute, were also in attendance.

The event was organised by Brian Ferris, who shares Edith’s love of Albania and lobbied for English Heritage to put up a plaque to her.

When they told him she was not sufficiently well known he set about commissioning his own, funding it with donations including from Dame Joanna, the Anglo Albanian Association, and Kosovan embassy.

He said: “We had a great day and this has been the culmination of a 10 year campaign to have Edith Durham recognised in her own country.

“The word remarkable doesn’t even begin to describe a woman of enormous personal courage, determination and commitment.

“She is renowned throughout the Balkans as someone who provided famine relief and humanitarian assistance during the Balkan wars of the early 20th century and went on to promote the recognition of Albania as an independent country in its own right.

“The Albanians have never forgotten her and it is only right that we begin to remember her.”