Sotir Kolea was born in the Goricë district of Berat, southern Albania (then part of the Ottoman Empire) on September 4, 1872. His father Kristo was a lawyer that worked as a legal counselor for the French company Louisiana Regie Des Tabacs, which held the monopoly of tobacco in the Ottoman Empire.
Along with Thoma Kaçorri he has been labeled as the Last of the Rilindas. After graduating from the local Greek-language gymnasium, he was hired by Louisiana Regie Des Tabacs and worked in their Ohrid branch. Between 1899 and 1902 he was transferred to the Drama and Kavala branches of the company.
Later Kolea migrated to Egypt, where he was elected secretary of the local Bashkimi organization.
After the Albanian Declaration of Independence, he took part of a delegation sent to the London Conference, together with Rasih Dino, Filip Noga, and Mehmet Konica. In 1913 he co-organized with Faik Konica the Albanian Congress of Trieste.
After settling in Switzerland he published in Lausanne the newspaper L"Albanie from 1915 to 1919. In 1920 he migrated to Madagascar and later to France, where he lived in Marseille until 1927.
From 1928 to 1937 he served as the director of the National Library of Albania, the volumes of which tripled during his term.
According to some sources, Kolea was the one bringing the rare Codex of Constantine of Berat, part of the Christian literature known as "Kodikët e Shqipërisë" (Albanian Codex), discovered by Ilo Mitkë Qafëzezi. Since 1937 he had lived in Elbasan, where he died in 1945. In 1944 his work on Albanian proverbs Një tufë proverba was published in Tiranë.
In 1919-1920 he was a member of the Albanian delegation to the Paris Peace Conference and the Franco-Albanian Administrative Council.
