ON THE ARCHAEOLOGICAL SIDE...

DÜRRES AND APOLLONIA, ALBANIA - OCTOBER 2004

While preparing the materials for this post I found an interesting site on Albania. It deals with almost every aspect that might be relevant for the preparation of your visit to the country...
Albania is full of testimonials about the Illyrian cities that were created in the fifth century BC, and this is the subject of this post. The main excavations have been made in Korce, Durres, Apollonia, Butrint and Ardenitza. I'll deal with Durres and Apollonia.

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DURRES


"ESCORT - It's nice to have some help to drive through the busy roads. It spares time and allows seeing a little more even if you are in a hurry. But sometimes it looked like a nightmare running on the wrong side of the road and at an incredible speed..."


"DÜRRES, 35 km far from Tirana, westwards, is the second largest city in Albania and the main seaport of the country. It is situated at one of the narrower points of the Adriatic Sea, opposite the Italian ports of Bari (300 km away) and Brindisi (200 km away). The city is also the oldest town in Albania and was founded as Epidamnos in 627 BC by Greek colonists from Corinth and Corfu. No wonder you find ruins there..."


"THE AMPHITHEATRE, built in the 2nd century A.D., has a holding capacity of 15,000 spectators and its diameter must have been more than 120 metres. It is one of the biggest and most exquisite monuments that have survived from the ancient city"


"MONUMENT BY THE SEA - Durres was for centuries the largest port on the Adriatic, and the start of the Via Egnatia to Constantinople. Like many other Albanian cities, it still has its share of impressive sculptures"


"BUNKER - When Enver Hoxha started dissociating from Moscow, he decided to put up more than 600,000 bunkers to repel attack from whatever quarter it might come. The concrete bunkers created a surreal atmosphere of permanent insecurity amongst the population, but its destruction costs a lot and so they still punctuate the landscape everywhere in the country..."

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FIER


"FIER, a city that is located twelve kilometres far from Apollonia, was founded by the Vrioni family, beys of Berat, as a market town in the 18th century and its history is linked to oil, gas and bitumen deposits existing nearby"

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APOLLONIA

Aristotle, being unable to find any element of democracy whatsoever in Apollonia's political organisation, considered the city an important example of an oligarchic system, as the descendants of the original Greek colonists controlled the city and prevailed over a large serf population of majority Illyrian origin.


"APOLLONIA, whose name was changed to honour the god Apollo, is located on the right bank of the Aous and has it all: ruins of an ancient city founded by Greeks in 6th century BC, defensive walls, theatre, obelisk, temples, remains of medieval monastery, museum and Byzantine church! However, as much of the site remains unexcavated, it seems that most of the ruins are still to be discovered..."


"SECURITY - The image of the security guard with a machine-gun, a cigarette and an alcoholised visage was far from being reassuring..."


"SHEN MERI - The Monastery and Church of Saint Mary was built in the thirteenth century. It seems however that Apollonia was an already early centre of Christianity in the region and had a bishop attending the Council of Ephesus in 431"



"ARCHES of Saint Mary"


"BELL TOWER as seen from the upper floor of the monastery"


"MUSEUM - Inside the monastery there are lots of statues from the Greek and Roman periods"


"SAINT MARY as seen from the top of the Bell Tower"


"APOLLONIA was noted by Cicero in his Philippics as «magna urbs et gravis». Its economic prosperity grew on the basis of trade in slaves and local agriculture"


"BUNKERS - Some more..."


"THE BOULEUTERION is an elegant building, thought to date from the second quarter of the 2C AD, whose facade with six marble Corinthian columns was restored in the 1960s, though most of the marble architrave is original. The building measures 15m by 20m and the columns stand 9m high. It was used as the office of the imperial administration in the city"

TOWN OF A THOUSAND WINDOWS

BERAT - ALBANIA - OCTOBER 2004

Berat , a town located on the right bank of the river Osum (just a short distance from the point where this is joined by the Molisht river) in south-central Albania, has a population of around 45,500 people and is the capital of both the District and the County of Berat.

According to Wikipedia (from where most of this information was taken), «the town is thought to be one of the oldest in Albania, with a settlement having existed there since at least the 6th century BC, when it was a fortress-settlement of the Illyrian Dasaretes tribe on the old border between Illyria and Epirus. Known as Antipatrea, it was captured by the Romans in the 2nd century BC». It was named Pulcheriopolis during the Byzantine period, was captured by the Bulgarians under Simeon I in the 9th century, passed to the Serbs in 1345, who renamed it «Beligrad» ("white city"), to be finally conquered in 1450 by the Ottomans, who retained it until 1912. It represents a remarkable example of an Ottoman town, with beautiful buildings of architectural and historical interest.

Berat was also the centre of the Albanian nationalist movement in the late 19th century, becoming a major base of support for the League of Prizren, and is known as the site where took place the meetings in October 1944 in which the Albanian Communist Party formed a provisional government headed by Enver Hoxha. It has a mixture of Muslim, Orthodox and Vlach inhabitants and was proclaimed a «Museum City» by Hoxha in June 1961. It's definitely a worth-visiting place!


"THOUSAND WINDOWS - Berat is renowned for its historic architecture and scenic beauty, and is known as the «Town of A Thousand Windows» (as Gjirokastra is named «The City of Two Thousand Steps») due to the wonderful large windows of the old decorated houses built on terraces, one over another, in the steep hills overlooking the Osum. It seems to be unclear whether its name actually means "Thousand" (një mijë) or "One over Another" (një mbi një) Windows"


"THE CITADEL - The Osum River has cut a 915-metre deep gorge through the rock on the west side of the valley to form a natural fortress, around which the town was built on several river terraces. The Citadel, built on that rocky hill on the left bank of the river overlooks the river and the modern city as well as the old Christian quarter across the river"



"MODERN BERAT consists of three parts divided by the Osum River: Goritsa ("little mountain" in Old Slavonic), Mangalem and Kalaja, the latter being a residential quarter within the old Byzantine citadel that overlooks the town. The town also has a 15th century mosque and a number of churches of the Albanian Orthodox Church"




"WEDDING - The Square was almost empty when we got there. As soon as we went to the terrace of a Hotel to see the views and have a drink, cars arrived at the square and started turning around, making a hell of a noise. Then we perceived a bride in one of them..."




"INSIDE THE CITADEL we find a very well preserved area containing narrow streets, Turkish houses and Orthodox churches. The initial walls of the Citadel were burned down by the Romans in 200 B.C. Then, they were strengthened under Theodosius II (5th century), rebuilt under the Justinian (6th century) and again under the Despot of Epirus (13th century)"


"TRADITIONAL LIFE - It's quite interesting the visit of the Citadel because people still live in the traditional houses within its walls. Of course, they use some more recent means to get up there, though sometimes not the last word in car transportation..."


ONUFRI MUSEUM - According to the site Travel in Berat that I linked at the beginning of this post «the most interesting place to visit is the cathedral of St. Nicholas, which has been well restored and is now a museum dedicated to Onufri. Onufri was the greatest of the 16th century painters in Albania. Not only was he a master of the techniques of "fresco" and "icons", but he was the first to introduce a new colour in painting, pink, which was considered by the French critics as Onufri's red. In addition, Onufri introduced a certain realism and a degree of individuality in facial expression. The first inscription recording Onufri's name was found in 1951, in the Shelqan church. The church has a date 23 July 1547 and has a reference to Onufri's origin: Une jam Onufri, dhe vij nga qyteti i shkelqyer i Beratit (I am Onufri, and come from the town of Berat). [...] In Onufri's museum are to be found works of Onufri, his son, Nikolla and other painters. There are also numbers of icons and some fine examples of religious silversmith's work (sacred vessels, icon casings, covers of Gospel books, etc). Berat Gospels, which date from the forth century, are copies (the originals are preserved in the National Archives in Tirana). The church itself has a magnificent iconostasis of carved wood, with two very fine icons of Christ and the mother of God. The bishop's throne and the pulpit are also of considerable quality». Don't lose it. It's worthwhile visiting..."



"ORTHODOX CHURCH - The population of the fortress was Christian, and it had about twenty churches and only one mosque, for the use of the Turkish garrison. The fourteenth century Church of the Holy Trinity is built in the form of a Greek cross and has Byzantine murals"





"MAGNIFICENT VIEWS from the top"


"THE CITADEL seen from the other side of the river Osum, near the eighteenth-century seven-arched stone bridge"


"GUESS WHAT is written in colossal letters at the top of the rampart"


"CHAPEL - Outside the ramparts is the Church of St. Michael, also built in the thirteenth century"



"RESTAURANT - When we went to have lunch at a restaurant on the top of one of the hills surrounding Berat, we found out that the site, with pine trees all around, provided a magnificent view towards the mountains on the other side"

KRUJE, SKANDERBEG'S HOME TOWN

Kruje is the hometown of Albania's national hero, George Kastrioti (Skanderbeg, the Dragon of Albania), who successfully resisted the Ottomans from 1443 until 1478 in Kruje. His castle resisted four sieges before final capitulation shortly after the death of Skanderbeg, Albania's greatest national hero.





"Kruje is a lovely panoramic mountainside location with roughly twenty thousand inhabitants. It's an interesting tourist attraction; however, the road from Tirana that passed near the airport was far from being first-class..."



"CASTLE - A main point of interest in Kruje is the restored castle and citadel"




"SKANDERBEG MUSEUM - Inside the restored castle there is the Skanderbeg museum"


"TRADITIONAL COSTUMES - Kruje has everything you expect to find in a tourist location. It's your problem not to be caught in tourist traps..."


"WEDDING - It seems that the Kruje Castle is also a favourite place for bride's photos...."


"FARM ANIMALS"


"RUINS"



"MOUNTAIN VIEWS"





"HOUSE - Located inside the castle, the citadel includes a restored house from the Ottoman epoch that serves as the Ethnographic Museum"



"BAZAAR - The old restored bazaar is also a Kruje attraction"


"SUNSET"