In 1881 the Italian explorer Giuseppe Haimann and his wife made a two-month journey through the Gebel Akhdar from Benghazi to Derna, travelling under the auspices of the Società d'Esplorazione Commerciale of Milan and Haimann's report first appeared in the Bollettino della Società Geografica in 1882. Haimann's sober assessment of Cyrenaica's potential contrasts favourably with the later accounts of Italian journalists and other visitors who in the early twentieth century had their own reasons for presenting Turkish North Africa to the Italian public as a veritable Paese di Bengodi – a Land of Cockaigne. But 30 years before the Italian intervention of 1911, Haimann had come to the conclusion that Cyrenaica – ‘in ancient times so civilised and prosperous’ – might be restored to new life if agriculture, industry and commerce ‘were to be given an effective impulse’.