Italian colonists in the Dodecanese Italian colonists in the Dodecanese Italian colonists were settled in the Dodecanese Islands of the Aegean Sea in the 1930s by the Fascist Italian government of Benito Mussolini, Italy having been in occupation of the Islands since the Italian-Turkish War of 1911. By 1940, the number of Italians settled in the Dodecanese was almost 8,000, concentrated mainly in Rhodes. In 1947, after the Second World War, the islands came into the possession of Greece: as a consequence most of the Italians were forced to emigrate and all of the Italian schools were closed. However, their architectural legacy is still evident,
Italian Islands of the Aegean Italian Islands of the Aegean The Italian Islands of the Aegean (; ) were a group of twelve major islands (the Dodecanese) in the southeastern Aegean Sea, which — together with the surrounding islets — were ruled by the Kingdom of Italy from 1912 to 1943 and the Italian Social Republic from 1943 to 1945. The Dodecanese, except Kastellorizo, were occupied by Italy during the Italo-Turkish War of 1912. Italy had agreed to return the islands to the Ottoman Empire according to the Treaty of Ouchy in 1912; however the vagueness of the text allowed a provisional Italian administration of