Communities select and maintain particular memories in order to construct and reaffirm collective self-images.1 For the Greeks of the Dodecanese, memories of the Italian Occupation have been particularly important in upholding their unique identity within contemporary Greece. This chapter will deal with features of the physical, social and historical environment which influenced the nature of conceptions of local identity, and how background factors also shaped the ways in which the islanders remembered the Italian period. The dominant theme of Dodecanesian history was scarcity; scarcity of arable land, water and other necessary preconditions for population expansion. Italian rule had a profound impact on the islands because many of the constraints on local progress were removed. The new occupiers promoted economic development and brought high employment, much of which was subsidised by the Italian state. As later chapters will show, the islanders were forced to reconcile the political unpopularity of the occupiers with the many benefits which the occupiers brought with them. In general, interviewees remembered Italian rule as a positive experience because it brought progress and abundance, and represented a contrast to the scarcity and limited prospects which characterised island life before 1912.