Introduction

Abstract

Europe has a blurred identity in the sense that it is a place, a mosaic of countries, but also an idea and a project, open to multiple interpretations and speculations. In other terms, Europe is „manifest“ ⁽¹⁾, but its diversity makes it difficult to grasp; it was never made up of separate regions (empires or nations) but of „overlapping layers“⁽²⁾,that is, it has been modulated from the beginning by successive processes of integration and disintegration, while at the same time engaged by a certain desire for wholeness.