Tirana
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Wikipedia-Article "Tirana"
Tirana (Albanian: Tiranë or Tirana) is the capital and largest city of Albania. Its population is estimated officially at 353,400 in 2003, though other estimates put the figure as high as 1,000,000. Founded in 1614, it became Albania's capital city in 1920.
It is located at 41.33°N, 19.82°E in the district and county with the same name. Average altitude is 90 meters above sea level. The temperature varies between 6.7°C (44.0 °F) in January and 23.8°C (74.5 °F) in July. Annual rainfall is 1200 mm (47 inches); the driest months are July and August.
Located on the Ishm River, Tirana is Albania's chief industrial and cultural centre. The principal industries include agricultural products and machinery, textiles, pharmaceuticals and metal products. Tirana has experienced rapid growth and established many new industries since the 1920s.
Tirana is presently trying to develop a tourist industry, although this effort is hampered by the political instability in the region, owing to military conflicts during the 1990s in Albania and neighboring Bosnia-Herzegovina, Kosovo and the Republic of Macedonia.
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Cultural elements
The Et'hem Bey Mosque, which was begun in 1789 by Molla Bey and finished in 1821 by his son, Haxhi Et'hem Bey, great-grandson of Sulejman Pasha is a significant landmark. Another landmark located near the Ethem Bey mosque in Skanderbeg Square is the clock tower (Kulla e Sahatit) which was built in 1830. In 2001, the construction was finished on the biggest church of Tirana, Catholic Church of Saint Paul. The world headquarters of the Bektashi Sufi Order can also be found in Tirana.
Tirana also features the University of Tirana, founded in 1957, and many governmental and social buildings such as the Albanian Institute of Sciences, the Academy of Arts, the Agricultural University, the Military Academy, the Institute of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the People's Assembly, and the High Court.
History
Tirana, the capital of Albania, is an ancient city with an early history enriched by the interplay of cultural forces originating in the Islamic and European Christian worlds. There are a number of hypotheses concerning the origin of the name.
- One is that it is from the word Theranda that Greek and Latin sources employ to refer to the area, after the term te ranat used by the inhabitants, meaning fallen material, in reference to the composition of the terrain out of hard earth swept down by water from the nearby mountains.
- It is from Tirkan, the name used by the sixth century Byzantine historian Prokop to refer to a castle, first built in the first century BC, on Mount Dajti, and the ruins of which are extant.
- It is from tyros, the old Greek word for dairy, on the hypothesis that it was in the field there that the shepherds of surrounding areas gathered to trade dairy products.
- An often-repeated explanation, though ultimately fallacious, is that Tirana was so named by Sulejman Pasha, the Turkish military leader at the time of Turkey’s conquest of Persia in the 17th century, after Tehran, the capital of Persia (now Iran). Such a theory would, however, seem to be contradicted by the evidence of Tirana’s name in its current form appearing in a 1418 Venetian document.
- A further ‘spin’ on the Sulejman Pasha idea is that when he was at the location of what became the city of which he is considered to have been the founder, he came across an elderly woman who, when he asked her what she was doing, replied, Po tir an: spinning silk.
Records of the first land registrations under the Ottomans in 1431-32 reveal that Tirana then consisted of 60 inhabited areas, with nearly 1000 houses and 7300 inhabitants.
Marin Barleti, the first to write a history of Albania (and himself of Albanian descent), tells us that in the 15th century there were ‘Tirana e Madhe’ and ‘Tirana e Vogël’ (Great and Small Tirana). Barleti, a Catholic priest and scholar, was largely responsible, through his biography of him, for creating what became the cult of Iskander Bey, the title (in Turkish) (rendered in Albanian as Skenderbeu, and frequently anglicized as Skanderbeg) given to Gjergj Kastrioti, an Albanian nobleman who, after being forcibly brought to Adrianople as a youth and given military training, distinguished himself in a number of campaigns for the Ottomans, and was promoted to the rank of general, but then returned to Albania to liberate it, and spent the next 25 years, until his death, leading a successful guerilla resistance against the forces of the Turkish empire. Skenderbeu continues to be the national hero of Albania.
The 1583 registration records inform us that at that time Tirana had 110 inhabited areas, 2900 houses and 20,000 inhabitants.
When Sulejman Pasha established the city in 1614, his first constructions were a mosque, a bakery and a hamam (Turkish sauna).
Two centuries later, control of the city was won by the Toptani family of Kruja. It was noted that the two oldest neighbourhoods were Mujos and Pazari, between the geographical centre and Elbasani Street, on either side of the Lana River.
- In 1703 Tirana had 4000 inhabitants.
- In 1769 Tirana and its environs exported 2600 barrels of olive oil and 14,000 packages of tobacco to Venice.
- In 1820 Tirana had 12,000 inhabitants.
- In 1901 its population was 15,000. It had 140,000 olive trees, 400 oil mills, and 700 shops.
- In 1938 Tirana’s population had grown to 38,000.
- By 1945 it had 60,000 inhabitants.
The construction, by the best artisans in the country, of the mosque in the centre of Tirana, called the Mosque of Ethem Beu, was begun in in 1789 by Molla Beu of Petrela (a locale in Albania). It was finished in 1821 by his son, who was also Sulejman Pasha’s grand-nephew. The Clock Tower was started by Haxhi Et’hem Beu around 1821-22, and was finished with the help of the richest families of Tirana. Its installation was the work of the Tufina family. In 1928 the Albanian state bought a modern clock in Germany, and the tower was raised to a height of 35 metres. The clock was damaged during World War II, but was restored to full function in July 1946.
The Orthodox Church of Saint Prokop was built in 1780.
The Catholic Church of Saint Maria was constructed in 1865 at the expense of Emperor Franz Joseph of Austria. The Tabakëve and Terzive bridges (respectively in front of the Parliament building and on Elbasani Street) date from the beginning of the 20th century. The mosque that is also the tomb of Kapllan Hysa (near the monument to Ushtari I Panjohur (‘the unknown soldier’)) was built in 1816.
The Library was established in 1922, with 5000 volumes.
The Fortress of Petrela, 12 kilometres from Tirana, dates from the fourth century BC. It took its current form in the 13th century, under the rule of Topiaj, and later became the property of the Kastriotis.
On 8 February, 1920 Tirana was made the temporary capital by the Congress of Lushnja, and acquired that status permanently on 31 December, 1925.
Since 1925, when they were banned in Turkey, Tirana has been the primary centre in the world of the Bektashis, an order of dervishes who take their name from Haji Bektash, a Sufi saint of the 13th and 14th centuries. (It was the same Haji Bektash who blessed the Janissaries, the famed Ottoman fighting corps that originally comprised non-Muslim conscripts, many of them Albanians.)
The first regulatory plan of the city was compiled in 1923 by Estef Frashëri. Durrësi Street was opened in 1922, and was called Nana Mbretneshë (Mother Queen). Many houses and surrounding properties were demolished to make way for it. The existing parliamentary building was raised in 1924, and first served as a club for officers. It was there, in September 1928, that Ahmet Zogu proclaimed the monarchy.
The centre of Tirana was the project of Florestano de Fausto and Armando Brasini, well known architects of the Mussolini period in Italy. The Palace of Brigades (of the former monarch), the ministries buildings, the National Bank and the Municipality are their work.
The Dëshmoret e Kombit (National Martyrs) Boulevard was built in 1930 and given the name Zogu I Boulevard. In the communist period, the part from Skënderbej Square up to the train station was named Stalin Boulevard.
The Palace of Culture (Pallati I Kulturës), where the Theatre of Operas and Ballet and the National Library stand, was completed in 1963 on the site of the former Trade of Tirana building, with the first brick being placed by Soviet president Nikita Khruschev in 1959.
The monument to Skënderbeu, raised in 1968, is the work of Odhise Paskali in collaboration with Andrea Mana and Janaq Paço. It commemorated the 500th anniversary of the death of the national hero.
The monument to Mother Albania, 12 metres high, was inaugurated in the Dëshmoret e Kombit cemetery in 1971.
The Academy of Sciences building was completed in April 1972.
The Gallery of Figurative Arts was created in 1976, and includes around 3200 works by Albanian and foreign artists.
The National Historical Museum was built in 1981. The ornamental mosaic on its front is called The Albanias.
The International Cultural Centre, formerly the Enver Hoxha Museum, was inaugurated in 1988. Popularly referred to as ‘the Pyramid’, it was designed by a group of architects under the direction of the dictator’s daughter, Pranvera Hoxha, and her husband Klement Kolaneci.
The city's population, estimated at only 12,000 in 1910, rose to 30,000 at the 1930 census and 60,000 in 1945 despite the intervening years of foreign occupation and war. During the 1950s Tirana experienced a period of rapid industrial growth, raising the population to 137,000 in 1960. In the late 1990s Tirana experienced its fastest population upsurge as Albanians from the north moved to the capital in hopes of a better life. In 1990 Tirana had 250,000 inhabitants, and since then the large scale influx from other parts of the country has increased the population to over 700,000.
In 2000 the centre of Tirana, from the central campus of Tirana university up to Skënderbej Square, was declared the place of Cultural Assembly, with special claims to state protection. In the same year the area began a process of restoration under the name ‘Return to Identity’.
Currently, the city suffers from the problems of overpopulation such as waste management, lack of running water and electricity as well as extremely high levels of pollution from the 300 000 cars moving in the city (The Guardian March 27 2004). The problem is exacerbated by an aging infrastructure. Despite the problems, Tirana has also experienced a very rapid growth in the construction of new buildings, especially in the suburbs of Tirana, where many of the new neighbourhoods do not have yet street names. (BBC) It is alleged that many of these buildings are the result of money laundering operations.
During the recent years pollution has also become a very big problem for Tirana as the number of cars has increased to several orders of magnitude. These are mostly older, diesel cars that pollute much more than the newer models in circulation elsewhere in Europe. Additionally, the fuel used in Albania contains larger amounts of sulphur and lead than is allowed in the EU countries.
It is worth mentioning that there is a unique trait to the city, that effectively moderates the impact of air pollution: The Saint Prokopi park- a very vast forested park in the outskirts of the city, that absorbs and purifies much of the polluted air.
The current mayor of Tirana, Edi Rama, has tried to beautify the city scape by cleaning up the banks of the Lana and painting old buildings.
During the late 1980s and early 1990s Tirana was the focal point of violent demonstrations which ultimately led to the collapse of the communist government.
Past and present mayors
- Zyber Hallulli 1913-1914
- Servet Libohova 1915-1916
- Ismail Ndroqi 1917-1922
- Ali Begeja 1922-1923
- Ali Derhemi 1923-1924
- Xhemal Kondi 1924-1925
- Fuat Toptani 1925-1927
- Izet Dibra 1927-1928
- Rasim Kalakula 1928-1930
- Rexhep Jella 1930-1933
- Abedin Nepravishta 1933-1935
- Qemal Butka 1936-1937
- Abedin Nepravishta (2nd time) 1937-1939
- Qazim Mulleti 1939-1940
- Omer Fortizi 1940-1943
- Halil Meniku 1943-1944
- Tomor Malasi 1991-1992
- Sali Kelmendi 1992-1996
- Albert Brokaj 1996-2000
- Edi Rama 2000 - present
See also
External links
- www.tirana.gov.al (official site)
- Guide 2002 - Curiosities about Tirana
- Map of Tirana (1.35MB)
- Who were the Illyrians
- Photo Albums: [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] [9]
- 360° views in Macromedia Flash: [10]
- The history of Tirana a fusion of Islamic and Christian influences
- Maps and Aerial Photos
