A UNESCO World Heritage City and its Unique Icons
Gjirokastër to Berat
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| Albania |
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| Down the Drino Valley from Gjirokaster |
We were headed for Berat, which the map shows as almost due north, but inland Albania is a land of hills and mountains and main roads follow the wide river valleys.
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| You would not think that the quickest route from Gjirokastër to Berat goes via Fier, almost on the coast. |
We drove northwest through a few small towns and villages…
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| North from Gjirokaster |
…and a lot of countryside….
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| The hills became lower as we approached the coast |
Fier
…before reaching the coast at Fier.
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| Arriving in Fier |
Flames from escaping natural gas and the presence of oil, asphalt and bitumen were recorded near Fier in the 1st century CE. Oil and bitumen are still important to this industrial city of some 60,000 people, as are chemicals. It will also be a hub on the soon to be completed Trans Adriatic Pipeline which will link to the South Caucasus Pipeline and bring natural gas from the Caspian Sea to Albania and Italy without crossing Russia. Two cheers for this; diversifying Europe’s energy supply is important – though stopping the use of fossil fuels completely maybe even more important.
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| Time to turn right in Fier, even if Berat is not on the signpost. |
We turned east here towards Berat. The road signs are to Tiranë and Lushnje, while the map above has Tirana and Lushnja. Albanian nouns have a definite and indefinite form (very roughly like having a definite or indefinite article appended at the end). Tirana and Lushnja are definite, but Albanian grammar insists that the unwritten ‘to’ on every road sign must be followed by the indefinite. Maps produced in Albania use the indefinite form, maps produced elsewhere usually use the definite form, but inconsistently. Confused? Me too.
Lunch in Berat
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| Berat |
We reached Berat at 2 o’clock, lunchtime had come and gone and we were peckish. Edi, again sure about where we should eat, parked in a road heading up the hill and ushered us into a large old and not particularly inviting hotel. We were not very upset to discover they were catering for a function and had no space for us. He marched us 100m up the hill to a similar but entirely empty establishment; we rejected that.
There was a small, downmarket, pub/café opposite where we had parked, so we said we would go there. Edi looked askance; it was not a place for rich foreigners. We insisted, he shrugged with an ‘on your own heads be it’ look and told us where and when to meet afterwards.
It was basic but friendly enough and very soon we were equipped with beer and a menu. Chicken fillets – a breast each bashed flat, bread-crumbed and grilled – and a bowl of fergesë – tomato and peppers roasted to a pulp with fermented cheese – provided a cheap, wholesome and tasty lunch.
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| Lunch in Berat - this restaurant looks empty, too, but there were several occupied tables to Lynne's left |
Pasha's Gate
We had ten minutes before our rendezvous with Edi and a local guide, so we could not go far, but we had a look at the nearby Pasha’s Gate. It is an elegant 18th century construction…
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| Pasha's Gate, Berat |
…and so, probably, was the Pasha’s house behind, but that was bombed in World War 2 and the communist regime was not interested in restoring the residences of Ottoman rulers kicked out before World War 1. They built a rather ugly middle school in what might have been the Pasha’s garden, but did nothing else with the site, and little has been done since.
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| Pasha's House, Berat |
Berat ‘Castle’
If the castle at Gjirokastër is better described as a citadel, that applies doubly to Berat. The hilltop was settled in the Bronze Age and the earliest traces of building date from the late 4th century BCE. Berat was then the home of an Illyrian tribe called the Dasseretes, in time it came under Macedonian control and then, around 200 BCE, the Romans arrived.
Berat was part of the Roman and then the Eastern Roman (or Byzantine) Empire. The Byzantine Empire started to decay in the 13th century, fading away gradually until the Ottomans finally took Constantinople in 1453. The trading routes from the south through the mountain valleys enter Albania’s northern plain at Berat so whoever controlled Berat controlled the trading networks. The citadel was besieged, taken and re-taken several times during the difficult period between the end of Byzantine control and absorption into the Ottoman Empire, but it does not resemble a medieval castle; there are no imposing gatehouses, no towers and nothing that might be identified as a keep, though some defensive walls and arches survive.
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| Inside the Berat citadel |
Low walls follow the contours of the hill enclosing a large triangular area with a network of cobbled street many of them looking surprisingly residential. Like the fort of Jaisalmer in India, Berat citadel is still inhabited.
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| Inside Berat citadel |
There were also 42 churches within the citadel of which 8 remain, along with a couple of later mosques.Seven of the surviving churches open only on their name day, but the eighth, the Church of the Dormition of St Mary houses the Onufri National Iconographic Museum.
Onufri National Iconographic Museum
Onufri (pronounced on-OFF-ree) was a major 16th century icon painter. He was born either in Berat or Kastoria, Northern Greece, and spent much of his working life in Berat where he founded a school of painting.
The museum’s no photography policy was enforced, so I have borrowed a picture of the church iconostasis from traveladventures.org. Part of the museum was church-like, part laid out as a standard art gallery. Much of the work was by Onufri, but there are also icons by his son Nikolla who inherited his school of painting, his successor Onouphrios Cypriotes and others.
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| Iconostasis, Church of the Dormition of St Mary |
Our Eastern Europe travels have introduced us to many icons and icon painters, but neither of us know much about the subject. I read, and pass on in good faith and without comment (at least on the art) that Onufri broke with the strict conventions of the time by introduced greater realism and individuality into facial expressions. He developed his own colour, the first pink to be used in icon painting, and kept the production method to himself. I can imagine a professional painter jealously guarding his USP, but taking the secret to his grave smacks of selfishness.
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| Mary and Child by Onufri, National Iconographic Museum, Berat The icon uses his unique pink, and the Child is held in Mary's right arm rather than left (and this was, apparently, revolutionary!) Borrowed from Wikipedia and believed to be in the Public Domain |
Painting Christian icons even in the relatively tolerant Muslim Ottoman Empire was political as well as religious; a symbolic restoration of pre-Ottoman culture.
Berat and Mount Tomorr
There is little apparent evidence that the citadel was once well fortified, but it is clearly a very defendable position with commanding views over the approach. Below, the modern city sits on the right bank of the wide but shallow River Osum, overlooked by Mount Tomorr (2,417m) some 18 km distant. The large, domed white building middle right on the edge of the urban area was the Albanian University of Berat. An independent venture, it opened in 2009 and closed a few years later. It is allegedly being converted into a hotel.
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| Modern Berat, the River Osum and Mount Tomorr |
Mangalam and Gorica
The castle and the old districts of Mangalam and Gorica together make up the UNESCO World Heritage Site. Mangalam, where we had lunch is tucked into the hillside below the castle, some roofs and the minaret of a small mosque can be seen right at the bottom of the photograph above. Gorica on the opposite back of the Osum is just beyond the bottom right corner, though unlike Mangalam it can be seen after a slight shift of position.
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| The Gorica district of Berat |
Driving down to the river we walked onto the footbridge across the Osum. In front of us was the church of St Thomas at the eastern corner of Gorica…
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| Church of St Thomas, Gorica, Berat |
…while behind us was Mangalam. Gjirokastër is called the City of Stone, Berat is the City of Windows and this angle explains why.
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| Mangalam, Berat |
Sultan’s Mosque, Berat
The King Mosque or Sultan’s mosque was built in the 15th century by the Ottoman Sultan Bayezid II as a gift to the Albanian people. The mosque is currently undergoing extensive repair and redecoration.
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| The Sultan's Mosque, Berat |
Albanians were largely Christian under the Byzantine Empire. The Islamic Ottomans arrived in the 14th century and controlled most of Albania by 1431. As rulers they were relatively tolerant, there were no forced conversions and Christian worship was permitted, but Christians had to pay higher taxes, and lucrative positions in the Ottoman administration were closed to them. Albanians started to convert to Islam, many driven more by pragmatism than conviction. The Bektashi order a sub-group of the mystic Sufi branch of Shi-ism was popular among Ottoman intellectuals and became the majority sect in Albania.
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| The Sultan's Mosque, Berat |
After the end of communism and state sponsored atheism, there has, perhaps surprisingly, been little sign of a religious revival. Today 58% of Albanians self-identify as Muslims, 17% as Christians, though the majority of these say their faith is not particularly important to them.
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| The Sultan's Mosque, Berat |
On to Tirana
Around 5 o’clock we set off on the 100km journey north to Tirana. Leaving the mountains behind, we travelled through more gently rolling countryside.
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| Beside the road to Tirana |
Some of the agricultural practices have not been seen in western Europe for decades, particularly the conical stacking of hay round a central spar.
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| Stooks of straw on the road to Tirana |
Dinner in Tirana
Edi deposited us at a solid, four-square business hotel in a business district of Tirana. We saw no eating opportunities nearby but Google suggested an Italian restaurant a short walk down the road and across a small park. Had we realised we were very near Blloku, once a restricted residential area for members of the Politburo, now Tirana’s entertainment and restaurant district, we might have made a different decision.
No matter, we found a large, busy Italian restaurant exactly where Google had promised and they furnished Lynne with a pizza, me with a very satisfactory veal pappardelle and both of us with a decent enough Italian red, coffee and a glass of raki at a modest cost.
Part 1: Ksamil on the Albanian Riviera
Part 2: Butrint and the Blue Eye
Part 3: Gjirokastër
Part 4: Berat
Part 5: Tirana
Part 6: Tirana to Saranda
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