Drisht
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Drisht Drishti |
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Coordinates: 42 ° 7 ' N , 19 ° 36' E |
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| Basic data | |||
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| Qark : | Shkodra | ||
| Municipality : | Shkodra | ||
| Height : | 72 m above sea level A. | ||
 On the Kir river with the castle hill above the village in the center of the picture |
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Drisht ( Albanian also Drishti ) is a place in the Bashkia Shkodra in northern Albania . It consists of two parts: the present-day village of Drisht on the southern bank of the Kir river and the Kalaja castle hill east of it. Kalaja ( Albanian for "castle", "fortress") houses the old town center and the ruins of the city of Drivasto (also called Drivastum in the Middle Ages ).
Drisht is about twelve kilometers east of Shkodra at the entrance to the Dukagjin Mountains . Until a few decades ago, the Shkodra – Kosovo trade route ran through the town along the Kir .
history
The earliest traces of the fortifications go back to the Neolithic . Romans also settled there. In the 9th century, the castle was part of the fortifications of the Principality of Zeta in the Diocese of Bar . The castle complexes were built in the 13th century during the Byzantine rule . Drivastum gained independence from Shkodra in the 14th century when the city was in its prime. The preserved walls and towers date from 1396 to 1478 during the Venetian era . In 1442 Venetian units snatched the castle from the Serbian despot Đurađ Branković . Soon Skanderbeg took over the rule. Eventually Drivasto fell to the Ottomans during the fierce Battle of Shkodra in 1478.
population
Today there are still eleven houses within the castle walls. The place is called Kala (castle) . There is a more than 400 years old mosque from Ottoman times . Prayers are held, but the mosque lacks an imam . All houses in the village are populated by ethnic Turks of the Muslim faith, although the younger ones no longer speak Turkish in contrast to the older ones.
religion
The titular bishopric Drivastum is named after Drisht . The Vatican is working with the Catholic Church in Albania on plans to replace the historic Ottoman mosque with a church. The reason given is that the mosque was built 600 years ago on the foundations of an earlier church, but there is no evidence of this.
literature
- Oliver Jens Schmitt : The Venetian Albania (1392-1479) . In: Southeast European Works . tape 110 . Munich 2001, ISBN 3-486-56569-9 .
- Theodor Ippen: Stari spomenici u Albaniji . In: Zemaljska štamparija (ed.): Glasnik Zemaljskog muzeja u Bosni i Hercegovini . tape 12 . Sarajevo , Austria-Hungary 1900, p. 511-531 .
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ Castles and cont'd. (No longer available online.) In: Shqiperia.com. Archived from the original on May 4, 2014 ; accessed on June 20, 2015 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ a b Arnavutluk Müslümanları. Retrieved June 16, 2015 .
