In the Doge's Palace: the glory and infamy of Venice

Walking through the Doge’s Palace in Venice, one marvels not only at the splendour of the Most Serene Republic, but at the sense of timelessness of a city whose greatness evaporated so suddenly, but left its monuments, its grandeur, its buildings in place, frozen in time, like an entire city transformed into a museum. Venice was not just an architectural, artistic and cultural marvel. It was the capital of an empire, at its height the greatest trading and naval power in the Mediterranean. It was well past the prime of its political power when revolutionary France kicked down the door in 1797. The republic which had survived untrammelled through a millennium of turmoil in Europe was gone, just like that. Perhaps the most poignant reminder of the suddenness of its demise is the coat of arms of the last Doge, the head of state of the republic, in the Shield Room, where the Doge held official receptions. On the wall in that room had been displayed the coat of arms of each Doge for the duration of his office. Since his exit, the arms of the last Doge, Lodovico Manin, have remained there, a sad memorial to a lost world, preserved now only as empty rooms, filled with fine artworks, but dead and gone.

Great Council chamber, Doge's Palace

I was especially struck by a series of paintings along one wall in the Great Council chamber, where the nobles of Venice once met to discuss the affairs of the republic. The paintings portray key events of the Fourth Crusade, at the beginning of the 13th Century, one of the most notable and most controversial episodes for the Republic. One of the paintings shows the conquest of Zadar, then the most important city on the Dalmatian coast. Zadar (Zara in Italian) had passed to Hungarian control a few years earlier, and Venice was determined to get it back. The Fourth Crusade presented an opportunity for the elderly Doge Enrico Dandolo. Venice had agreed to hire out ships to transport the French crusaders to the Holy Land. However, the French could not afford to pay. So the wily Venetians proposed that, in lieu of payment, the French could help them capture Zadar. The result was the sacking of the city in 1202. In Zadar, this is still seen as an infamous event. When he heard of it, Pope Innocent III excommunicated the Crusade’s participants, although he later partially relented, restricting the ban to the Venetians only. Yet here, in the Doge’s Palace, the conquest of Zadar is presented as a heroic and glorious event.

Other paintings celebrate the conquest of Constantinople and the coronation of a Venetian puppet, Baldwin of Flanders and Hainault, as the new eastern Emperor. The rapaciousness of the crusaders as they smashed, looted and murdered their way through the city in 1204 made this one of the most notorious events in European history. Its legacy is still felt in the bitterness of many Orthodox Christians towards the West. The Venetian army fully participated in the capture of the town, and they shared in its plunder. Among numerous artistic works carted off back to Venice were the four great bronze horses, which dated from antiquity and had stood in the hippodrome for centuries, and which were placed above the entrance to St. Mark’s Basilica (they were replaced by replicas in the 1980s). Crusaders, who had taken an oath on the cross, desecrated the great Basilica of Hagia Sophia, raped nuns, and smashed holy icons and relics in a wanton frenzy of destruction.

The destruction wrought by the Crusaders in Constantinople had longer term consequences than the devastation of the great city. Byzantium was left withered and territorially truncated, an enfeeblement that left it unable to withstand the later Ottoman onslaught. But from the battering of Constantinople it was Venice that emerged as the greatest immediate winner. With the help of the Crusaders, Venice recaptured Zadar; humbled Byzantium; acquired key strategic territories in the eastern Mediterranean; excluded rivals Genoa and Pisa from trade in the reduced Byzantine Empire; and deflected the Crusaders from their initial goal of attacking Egypt, with which Venice was negotiating a trade deal. As depicted in the painting in the Great Council chamber, for Venice it was a triumph. And yet as I looked at the paintings, I was most struck by how such events, regarded in the Eastern Orthodox world as infamous and shameful, were here celebrated as glorious.

Hvar and Korčula; Partisans and the British

Visiting the island Hvar in November, there was little to see. Out of the tourist season, the little town of Hvar seemed rather empty, and the important sites were closed. Even the coming parliamentary election did not elicit much excitement. I observed a rally of the ruling HDZ party, attended by a crowd of mainly elderly supporters, whose mechanical applause for the dull speeches of party figures appeared no more than dutiful. Hvar is however a very charming little place. I first visited in 2000, for a wedding. The name derives from the Greek colony of Pharos, on the other side of the island. In the middle ages, the capital of the island was moved to the present site of Hvar town, the old capital being renamed Stari Grad, literally ‘the Old Town’.

Hvar

When the English architect T.G. Jackson and his wife visited Stari Grad in the 19th Century, they found little of interest. The locals tried to dissuade them from making the journey across the island to Hvar, which they described as ‘a poor decayed place’. Coincidentally, before I left Split for Hvar, my landlady there also told me that there was nothing much to see in Hvar town, and that I would do better to stay in Stari Grad. For the Jacksons, getting from Stari Grad to Hvar involved a boat down the coast, followed by donkeys across the island – an arduous trip. For me, it was a short bus ride.

Jackson was delighted by Hvar town, although he noted its dilapidation, writing that ‘on all sides we saw roofless walls set with beautiful traceried windows through which the blue sky was seen, and handsome houses with rich balconies now deserted or turned into magazines or storehouses.’ Jackson added that Hvar’s heyday was in the past, as ships no longer put in there, and the end of the Turkish threat meant there was no need for its fortifications any more.

The town is in much better condition today, although walking through the narrow streets, one still comes across occasional abandoned buildings, greenery poking through ornate stone windows. Some of them are in the process of renovation. A common problem in Dalmatia is that the ownership of fine old houses is diffused among dozens of relatives, many of them in Zagreb or spread around the world. Getting agreement on what to do with such properties can be difficult, with the result that they are left to continue their slow decline. Hvar boasts the oldest theatre in Croatia. Built in 1612, it is above the arsenal, and was under renovation when I visited.

When I visited Korčula for the first time in 1990, it poured with rain. During my second visit, more than 20 years later, the rain again poured down. And indeed, the island does seem to be notably damper than the rest of Dalmatia. Travelling by bus in 1990 from Vela Luka at the western end of the island to the town of Korčula at the eastern end, I was struck by the lush green of the place, such a contrast with the arid, rocky dryness of other Dalmatian islands. The 19th British traveller A.A. Paton wrote of the ‘luxuriant and variegated shrubbery’ on Korčula, which he described as looking like ‘one great conservatory.’

In its Venetian heyday, the town of Korčula was a prosperous place, as attested to by its fine buildings. Its glory was considerably faded when Paton and Jackson visited. Paton described the Arneri Palace, across the square from the cathedral, as ‘sadly dilapidated’. Both he and Jackson were much taken by the enormous door knocker of the palace, in the form of Hercules flanked by two lions. Jackson sketched it. Sgr. Arneri described the pleasure he derived from giving the knocker a knock, which made the risk of the knocker being stolen worthwhile. A Hapsburg prince had offered its weight in gold in exchange for the knocker. Now, the knocker is kept at the museum of Korčula, in the next-door Gabrieli Palace. It is an impressive piece. I gave it a knock myself, and understood Sgr. Arneri’s delight at its rich, deep tone.

The Arneri door knocker, Korčula

Jackson also remarked on a ruined house with a ‘splendid window with carvings of birds and serpents’. The house’s balconies had been sold to an American, for his house in New York, and the impoverished owner was being tempted by offers for the window as well. I was told at the museum that the window had been kept in Korčula, but had been removed to the cathedral museum. I asked a priest at the cathedral office if I could see the window, but was peremptorily dismissed. A Korčula woman told me that Jackson had played an important role in saving the town’s heritage, setting up a fund for the purpose, and that his contribution was still appreciated. She contrasted Jackson’s efforts on behalf of Korčula with the conduct of the former Venetian rulers, who she said had ruled only for Venice, and not for Korčula.

I had heard such bitterness towards the Venetians in Dalmatia on previous occasions. Typically, they are reproached for having stripped Dalmatia of its resources, especially timber, while showing scant concern for the economic or social well-being of the inhabitants. Of course, Venetian rule did see a cultural flowering in towns up and down the coast, as the numerous fine buildings attest. And those buildings also give evidence to the prosperity that Venice’s trading empire brought to the coastal towns. But foreign travellers confirmed the neglect and backwardness of the Dalmatian interior. Paton considered that, among the various foreign rulers of Dalmatia, the Austrians had done most for the populace, building infrastructure and introducing universal education. The Egyptologist, J. Gardner Wilkinson, remarking on the primitive state of the Dalmatian hinterland in the 1840s, also noted that the Austrians had made improvements after the neglect by the Venetians.

Korčula’s particular claim to fame, disputed by many, is its assertion that Marco Polo was a native of the island. Indeed, the house where he is supposed to have resided, round the corner from the cathedral, is one of the main attractions. During my visit, it was in the process of being renovated. Wherever he originated, it is certain that Marco Polo took part in the Battle of Korčula between the Venetians and Genoese in 1298, as a galley commander, and that he was wounded, captured and imprisoned by the victorious Genoese.

In the museum of Korčula is a collection of photographs and documents concerning the Partisan struggle against the Italian and German occupiers on the island. Along with most of the rest of Dalmatia following the dismemberment of Yugoslavia in April 1941, Korčula was annexed by Italy. Partisan groups were formed, as a result of whose activities six hostages were shot by the Italians in August 1942. Following the capitulation of Italy in September 1943, the Partisans briefly took control of the island, before the Germans took over in December.

Fitzroy MacLean (centre, wearing beret),

Korčula, 1943

On 4 November 1943, the first Conference of the People’s Liberation Council for the District of Korčula took place in Korčula town. Among the participants emerging from the conference in a photograph displayed at the museum is Fitzroy MacLean, Churchill’s envoy to Tito. MacLean had an illustrious career as a diplomat (he was in Moscow during Stalin’s purges, and travelled widely throughout the country, later writing about his experiences); soldier (he was an early member of the SAS); and politician (as a Conservative MP). But it was for his role in World War II Yugoslavia that he was most remembered, and with which he is most associated. I met him, a very old man by then, at the beginning of the 1990s, as Yugoslavia was on the point of collapse.

In 1943, MacLean was instrumental in a change in British policy towards Yugoslavia, away from supporting both the Royalist Chetniks of Draža Mihailović and the Communist-led Partisans, instead fully backing the Partisans. His brief from Churchill was apparently to find out who was killing the most Germans in Yugoslavia, and how Britain could help them to kill more. Maclean’s relatively brief stay in Yugoslavia, during which he was a guest of Tito, and had no contact with Mihailović’s adherents, resulted in his so-called ‘blockbuster’ report, which confirmed the already widely held view among the British that their full support should go to Tito. His report was, and remains highly controversial, contributing as it did to a switch in policy that helped the Communists triumph in Yugoslavia.

Evelyn Waugh, another of the British agents with the Partisans, warned of the consequences of Communist victory, including repression of dissent, and in particular of religion. Waugh met Maclean, and did not warm to him, expressing distaste at his evident ambition. Indeed, MacLean elicited resentment among many of the British military officers concerned with Yugoslavia, especially because of his close relationship with Churchill. Not only Maclean, but also an earlier British envoy to Tito, Bill Deakin, were close to Churchill. Churchill took a keen interest in the activities of the two young men, who he perhaps saw living through similar adventures to those of his own youth. He seemed to have an almost romantic attitude to the Partisan struggle in Yugoslavia, viewing Tito as a kind of T.E. Lawrence in the Balkans. Tito remarked that Churchill wept the first time they met, on the island of Vis in 1944, saying that he was the first person he had met from ‘enslaved Europe.’

MacLean was fully aware of the import of his recommendation to support the Partisans, which was perhaps remarkable for a man of his conservative disposition. When he noted to Churchill that, as a consequence of supporting the Partisans, Yugoslavia would be Communist after the war, Churchill apparently responded by asking whether MacLean intended to live in Yugoslavia? Ironically, MacLean did own a house on Korčula after the war.

Klis and Dalmatia's Ottoman heritage

While the Roman and Venetian history of Dalmatia is well known, less is said about the, largely effaced, Ottoman heritage. The Ottoman Empire reached the Dalmatian coast at Neum (now part of Bosnia and Herzegovina), where a thin strip of land separated the Dubrovnik Republic to the south from Venetian territory to the north. At the Empire’s height, in the 16th and 17th centuries, its territory stretched up and down the Dalmatian hinterland, within sight of the sea in places. Just a few kilometres inland from Split is the fortress of Klis, for centuries a vital strategic point controlling the pass from the interior to the sea.

Klis

The Scottish architect Robert Adam, who visited Split in 1757, and was responsible for some very important drawings of Diocletian’s palace, described the fortifications at Klis, and wrote about their strategic value. His visit coincided with the start of the Seven Year’s War, and he was suspected of being a British spy. Travelling through Dalmatia almost a hundred years later, the renowned English Egyptologist J. Gardner Wilkinson also described the strategic importance of Klis.

Looking up at Klis from Solin, now an outer suburb of Split, it is easy to see its significance. The fortress sits atop a hill standing in a gap between the mountains of the Dinaric range that blocks off the coast from the interior. In the days before highways and tunnels, control of Klis was the key to Split and the whole of Dalmatia. It had been held by Romans, Croats, Hungarians and Venetians, and in 1537 it fell to the Turks, in the long succession of wars that pitted Venice and its Dalmatian subjects against the Ottoman Empire.

Apart from a brief interlude in 1596, when a force from Split surprised the Turks and held the fortress for a few weeks, Klis was under Ottoman control for over a century, until a Venetian army recaptured it in 1648. And that was the end of the Turks. The mosque they had built inside the fortress was converted into a church, dedicated to St. Vitus. The call of the muezzin, which for over a century had echoed in the rocky hills of this now most Catholic country, would be heard no more. Yet a small trace of the Ottoman period remains in the name of the main square of the small town of Klis, below the fortress, ‘Megdan’, derived from the Turkish word ‘meydan’.

The Venetians enlarged the fortress, which they held until their empire was rubbed out by the French in 1797. The importance of the site continued even until the Second World War, when it was occupied by the Germans and bombed by the Allies.

Split underground: Reflections on Yugoslavia

Over centuries of habitation, the palace of Diocletian in Split was adapted to the needs of the residents, who built their houses among the columns and arches of the former emperor’s retirement home. It is all an extraordinary hotchpotch, with Roman arches appearing out of later buildings and passing through cafes. But underneath the palace, the basement was for centuries ignored, left much as it was, with little modification. During the Middle Ages it was gradually filled up with refuse and rubble. Only in the 1950s was the importance of what lay beneath the palace realised, and gradually the basement has been cleared away. Nowadays, the cavernous halls, with their huge archways, and the little rooms around them, are open to the public.

When I visited, the halls of the palace basement were occupied by various artistic installations, some of them involving TV screens and soundtracks. I was not moved. There was no overarching theme. I felt it was an inappropriate setting, that no thought had been given to how to fit the installations into that particular space, of how the space and the installations could enhance each other. Rather, it seemed the installations had just been plonked there for no reason. They detracted from the experience of visiting the palace basement. This was in contrast with the wonderful experience of visiting the Basilica Cistern beneath Istanbul in 2003, the cavernous underground crypt built in the reign of the Emperor Justinian, whose installations and low music enhanced and were enhanced by the Cistern, adding to the whole experience.

Yet there was one installation that I did find striking. It was a short televised documentary concerning a popular communist-era war film based on the true story of a teenage partisan hero, Boško Buha. The actor who played the part of Buha, Ivan Kolundžić, now a middle-aged man, had, in the 1990s, joined the Croatian forces during the independence war. In the documentary, Kolundžić gave two interviews, one as himself, and the other in the spirit of the Yugoslav, partisan tradition of which the Boško Buha film was an inspirational part. The two interviews are juxtaposed, giving two diametrically opposite views on Yugoslavia, communism and the war for Croatia’s independence.

Ivan Kolundžić as Boško Buha

In the recollection of one Kolundžić, Yugoslavia was a country in which all were united, and could travel freely without borders. By building self-management socialism, the Yugoslav variant of communist ideology, they were creating a just society. This was the beautiful dream to which many Yugoslavs were once committed, and the ideal for which partisans like Boško Buha had given their lives. As the narrator of the film noted in her interview with Kolundžić, this was the vision she grew up with, watching films such as Boško Buha. It was the vision of the ‘brotherhood and unity’ of the Yugoslav peoples.

For the other Kolundžić, Croats had never believed in the Yugoslav ideology, which had been imposed on them. They had given the appearance of going along with it merely to avoid persecution. For that Kolundžić, joining the struggle to liberate Croatia in the 1990s had been the natural thing to do, as had been the emphasis in that struggle on religious, Catholic values, so alien to communism, but so bound up with Croatian nationalism.

Kolundžić appeared convincing in both roles. To the question at the end of documentary, which Kolundžić should we believe, he replied with a smile, “me”. Watching the documentary with me were two young women, too young to have any memories of their own of Yugoslavia. Too young certainly to have been exposed to the idea that there might have been something noble in the effort to build a state based on multi-ethnic harmony, contrary to the usual 20th century practice in eastern Europe of population exchanges, expulsion and forced assimilation, all in the name of the nation state. They smiled, a faint giggle, as they passed on to the next exhibit. Yugo-nostalgia in today’s Croatia is perhaps little more than an eccentricity of a few old fogies from a past era.

But there is something uncomfortable and challenging about the Kolundžić documentary for those who accept uncritically the now dominant national ideology that Yugoslavia was always doomed, that the multi-ethnic state was a sham, and that Croats never believed in it. Undoubtedly some always loathed Yugoslavia, and were never reconciled to it. Unquestionably too, by the end of the 1980s disenchantment with the common state, with its flawed constitutional set-up, its economic failure and all its disappointed promises had undermined its legitimacy in the minds of a great many Croats, and others. But Kolundžić, speaking as Boško Buha, reminded Croats that, at some level, the Yugoslav idea had once had a positive message, at least for some.

Travelling through Dalmatia, one is repeatedly confronted with signs of the still powerful draw of Croatian nationalism, and the overwhelming influence on the national psyche of the war of the 1990s. The posters of the war hero Ante Gotovina, convicted for war crimes by the international tribunal in The Hague, the graffiti about the tragedy of Vukovar, and the pre-election posters of the ruling HDZ, all reflect the pervasiveness of Croatian national feeling. In such an environment the notion that Yugoslavia ever had any place in Croatian hearts gets short shrift in most quarters. But, as the documentary in the Split underground gently reminded, Croats were once part of Yugoslavia, they participated in it, helped build it, and at least at some level, some of them even believed in it.

Trogir and the Propitious Moment

I first visited Trogir in 1990. My recollection of this beautiful old town, as one of the most charming in Dalmatia, was confirmed by this return visit. Since 1997 it has been a UNESCO World Heritage site, although I could not help wondering at the placing of the word ‘UNESCO’ in neon lights above the entrances to the old town. Perhaps someone had misunderstood the point of that honour. Still, wandering the narrow streets and alleys of Trogir is as great a pleasure as in any town in Dalmatia.

Portal of the Church of St Lawrence, Trogir

The jewel of the town is the church of St Lawrence, on the main square in the old town, and especially its intricately carved portal by the 13th century master Radovan. I was especially struck by the carved figures holding up the portal on their backs, some of whom clearly appear to be in Muslim attire, complete with turbans. Trogir had been sacked by Saracens in the 12th century, and it seemed interesting that Radovan should have wished to represent such figures in his creation.

Trogir was founded as a Greek colony in the 3rd century BC. Early in the 20th century a relief of Kairos, the Greek god of the propitious moment, from the 3rd century BC, was discovered in the abandoned house of a local family. It depicts the god as a young man whose forelock must be grasped in order to catch the fleeting moment, or else it will fly away, never to be caught again. The poet Posidippos described how Kairos, in answer to a question about why the artist had created him, replied that he was a moral, to remind people. The relief and the story attached to it struck a chord with me, as it might with anyone who has ever missed an opportunity, and as a reminder to grasp opportunities that come our way.

Kairos, Trogir

There is another nice story attached to the Trogir Kairos. Before its significance was realised, the stone had apparently for some time been fitted into a barrel and used for pressing down salted fish. Nowadays it is housed in the Benedictine convent of St. Nicholas in Trogir. I had to see it. Finding that the convent museum was closed, it being out of the tourist season, I went to the evening Mass and afterwards asked one of the sisters if I could see the Kairos. She kindly opened the museum for me the following morning.

Travellers in Šibenik

In setting out on a journey through Dalmatia, revisiting many places I had been to before, as well as some I had not, I was inspired by a book by the excellent Sonia Wild Bićanić on past British travellers in the region (British Travellers in Dalmatia, 1757-1935, Faktura, Zaprešić, 2006). I envisaged myself following in the footsteps of such travellers as Robert Adam, A.A. Paton, J. Gardner Wilkinson and T.G. Jackson in the 18th and 19th centuries. The experience today, in the age of mass tourism, aeroplanes, buses and tourist offices is vastly different to what those earlier adventurers found. In the 1880s Jackson could write of Dalmatia as “a strange, mysterious and almost unknown shore.” Nowadays you can fly there with Easyjet.

Yet in Šibenik I could look at the same old streets as Jackson, still dominated by the marvellous cathedral of St James, which so inspired him. Jackson approached the city by sea, passing through the narrow channel into the elongated bay that leads to the city and the mouth of the Krka river. He described it as “an imposing mass of picturesque old houses piled up the mountainside, with the great white-domed cathedral in the middle.” I arrived overland, but the impression is much the same.

Cathedral of St James, Šibenik

The architecture of the cathedral is noteworthy, built entirely by blocks of stone, pre-carved before being lifted into place. Great interlocking stone slabs make up the roof on one side and the ceiling on the other. It was built in several stages in the 15th century, but the principal architect was Juraj Dalmatinac, who was born in nearby Zadar. In 2000, it was proclaimed a UNESCO World Heritage site. Jackson, a leading Oxford architect, was astounded, describing the cathedral as one of the wonders of Christendom, its architecture ‘original to the point of daring’, adding that ‘it would be difficult to match it in singularity of construction.’ The cathedral’s ornate baptistery, to one side of the main alter, is particularly fine. A notable and unusual feature is the depiction of God the Father on the ceiling above the baptismal font, as an old man with flowing long hair.

Also appealing are little touches of humour in the cathedral’s construction. Either side of the side entrance, giving on to the central town square, are touching statues of Adam and Eve, naked and sheepishly holding hands over their private parts, their faces pictures of embarrassment. Around the outside of the apse are sculptured portraits said to be of people known to Juraj Dalmatinac, some of them plainly caricatures.

Out of the tourist season, Šibenik was quiet, nearly deserted on the Saturday evening when I arrived. It came to life on Sunday, as people gathered on the square outside the cathedral, drinking coffee in the sunshine, spilling out of the cathedral following the morning Mass. Among the devotees attending the Mass was a group of men and women from Bosnia decked out in traditional dress, who performed traditional dances for the onlookers, the older men intoning haunting, wailing, almost howling chants.

Sunday lunch was at a restaurant overlooking the cathedral entrance, Pelegrini. A marvellous place, highly unusual in my experience of Dalmatian restaurants, its cooking displayed a sophistication, ambition and adventurousness I had not previously associated with the region. Seafood in Dalmatia can be very nice, so long as you are happy with a narrow repertoire of grilled fish, crustaceans, seafood pasta dishes and risottos. Nice, but safe and unexciting. And unfortunately not always very nice, with a surfeit of restaurants offering poor quality, over-cooked fare aimed principally at ripping off easily pleased tourists. But Pelegrini is so far above all that. I started with an aubergine soufflé, perfectly executed, light and delicious. I followed it with a mushroom risotto with truffles – yum. And their home-baked bread was exceptional.

Šibenik is a charming and rewarding town to walk around and explore, with beautiful views around almost every corner in its narrow streets and alleys, and intimate little squares. So many of the buildings feature wonderfully ornate stone doorways and windows, attesting to the wealth once enjoyed by the town’s notable residents. Little churches abound, most of them closed at this time of year. Among them is a small Orthodox Church, the centre of the Serbian Orthodox diocese. Serbs have clung on in Šibenik, despite ongoing resentment from the war in the 1990s, when Serb rebel forces controlled territory inland from the city.

The Krka waterfalls

Jackson travelled by boat up the River Krka, marvelling at the waterfalls. With none of the tourist boats operating in November, I travelled by bus, but the falls are still splendid, a series of cascades interspersed with blue-green pools, framed by the greens, reds, browns and yellows of autumnal trees. Nowadays there are wooden walkways enabling the visitor to stroll around the network of pools and falls. There is a cluster of stone buildings, given over to tourism today, although closed when I visited. In their day they housed mills, powered by the water flows. Gardner Wilkinson also travelled up the Krka, continuing to the Franciscan monastery of Visovac, and then on to the Orthodox monastery of Michael the Archangel.

Zadar post scriptum

Not long after my visit to Zadar (see journal posting of 18 November 2011), it was announced that the city was granting an award to Ante Gotovina, the Croatian general convicted of war crimes for his commanding role in Operation Storm, which in 1995 returned swathes of previously Serb-controlled territory to Croatia. The operation resulted in the murders of hundreds of Serb civilians, the flight of almost the entire Serb population, and the destruction of thousands of Serb properties with the intention of preventing their return.

A Zadar city councillor from the ruling Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ) expressed the view of most in Croatia when he said that Gotovina “defended the truth about himself and the Homeland War … with honesty, dignity and pride.” Opposition councillors abstained from the vote, one of them explaining that, while they considered Gotovina a hero, his name should not be used for political purposes.

Indeed, the move is probably connected with the coming parliamentary elections in Croatia. The HDZ faces an uphill struggle in the wake of corruption scandals that have seen its former leader and prime minister Ivo Sanader accused of bribe taking, and an economic crisis that has hit the country hard. The party, which ruled throughout the 1990s, under its founding leader Franjo Tudjman, has appealed once again to wartime patriotism, stressing the rights and dignity of veterans. It may be helped by the 20th anniversary of the fall of Vukovar in November 1991, an event still pregnant with emotion in Croatia. However, with some pointing the finger at Sanader for alleged war profiteering, the appeal to patriotism rings hollow for many Croatian voters. Fifteen years after the end of the war, some object to the power of the veterans lobby, suspecting that the numbers of its beneficiaries are in any case inflated.

Given the image that Zadar, so close to the emptied former Serb-controlled lands, has honed as a centre of virulent Croatian nationalism, it was not surprising that a decision to honour Gotovina came from there. But, whatever the merits of the case against Gotovina, or lack thereof, the move reflects the continuing failure of most in Croatia to face up to the fact that war crimes were also committed by Croats, and that many of their hallowed veterans were far from being heroes. The trial of Gotovina by the international war crimes tribunal for former Yugoslavia served mainly to burnish Gotovina’s reputation in Croatia, and if anything set back any proper accounting with the sins of the country’s recent past.

A visit to Nin

Nin is a tiny little town at the northernmost end of Dalmatia, close to Zadar. I visited on a bright, blustery autumn day, the town swept by the bura, the north wind that is such a relief in summer, blowing away clouds along with stiflingly humid, muggy weather, leaving everything clear and fresh. In winter it is cold and bracing, and at its strongest, on the coast roads, can be dangerous.

Nin had a key place in the early medieval history of Croatia, one of the oldest Croatian towns and the seat of early medieval rulers. It is a charming little place, a small island situated in a lagoon, reached by two 16th century bridges. But its historical place as the cradle of the Croat nation is much bigger than its physical size. At the entrance to the town is a statue depicting Prince Branimir, a ninth century ruler whose loyalty to Rome in its rivalry with the Byzantine Empire elicited letters from Pope John VIII in 879 referring to the Croatian people, the first recorded international acknowledgement of Croatia.

Gregory of Nin, Split

Another important figure in medieval Croatia, Bishop Gregory of Nin, is remembered for his defiance of Rome for, in the tenth century, defending the use of the Slavonic liturgy, in the Glagolitic script, rather than Latin, as insisted upon by Rome. An enormous statue of Gregory, by Ivan Meštrović, the most noted 20th century Croatian sculptor, stands just outside the walls of Diocletian’s palace in Split. It had originally been placed in the peristyle of the palace, but was moved by the Italian occupation authorities during the Second World War. A smaller replica of the statue stands in Nin.

Church of St Nicholas, Nin

Nin is also notable for some remarkable churches. In the town itself is the 9th century Church of the Holy Cross, known as the smallest cathedral in the world. Perhaps even more extraordinary is the tiny pre-Romanesque Church of St Nicholas, situated on a mound not far from the town. Popular tradition associates the church with the coronation of medieval Croatian kings. Especially incongruous looking are the battlements around the roof of the church. These were apparently added during the Turkish wars, to turn the church into a lookout point. As well as being at the centre of early medieval Croatian settlement, the site of Nin has an earlier pedigree, with Roman remains, including a fine mosaic floor.

A return to Zadar

My first ever visit to Dalmatia, in 1989, was to Zadar. Looking back, it seems a strange choice. I went on from there to Dubrovnik, but would not Split have been a more obvious starting point, if choices had to be made? But Zadar too is a remarkable town.

Dating back to Roman times, it was, under the Venetians, the administrative centre of Dalmatia, and the largest and most important town. Later, in the 19th century, it lost out to Split, which surpassed it in size and importance. Following the First World War, Zadar (Zara in Italian), with its Italian majority, was ceded to Italy, while the rest of Dalmatia, which had been part of Austria for the previous century, passed to the new Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes, Yugoslavia. The city’s severest blow came during the Second World War, when it endured carpet bombing by the Allies in 1943-44. The town was devastated, 60 per cent of its building destroyed, and an estimated 1,000 of its inhabitants killed (Italians claimed a much higher figure). After the war, only the churches were renovated, while large swathes of the old town were rebuilt in modern style, medieval streets replaced by soulless blocks. Most of the Italian inhabitants fled, either from the bombs or from the Yugoslav Partisans who took control in 1944 and summarily murdered several leading Italian citizens.

The town has spread out since then, its population boosted by an influx of Croats and some Serbs from the hinterland. There is little sign of its previous Italian character. When I visited in 1989, I noted that the waiter at a seafood restaurant repeated my order to himself, and counted out the bill, in Italian. But that was about it.

Church of St Donat, Zadar

The most striking feature of the town is the extraordinary church of St Donat. A ninth-century, pre-Romanesque edifice, it is quite unlike any of the later, more familiar styles of church architecture. An enormous rotunda, with three apses on one side, it looks like an enormous drum. On the inside, it has a gallery, held up by arches and, in front of the apses, two pillars from the Roman forum that once stood in the area around the church. In fact, the church includes a great deal of masonry filched from the forum. Most remarkably, chunks of Roman masonry, including upended bits of pillar, were fitted higgledy-piggledy into the foundations in an extraordinary mish-mash. Visiting Zadar in the 1880s, the English architect T.G. Jackson described St Donat’s as ‘rude to the point of barbarism, but not without a certain simple dignity’. The bombing during World War II levelled an area next to St. Donat’s, including the forum, whose outline and much masonry have now been revealed.

Jackson thought highly of other churches in Zadar, describing St Grisogonus (Krsevan, being renovated during my present visit) as a perfect example of Romanesque architecture. He left his own mark in Zadar, as he was commissioned to design the campanile of the cathedral of St Anastasia, which had been left unfinished in the 15th century.

In the 1990s, Zadar, like several other Dalmatian cities, became a noted hotbed of hard-line Croatian nationalism. In May 1991, following the murder by Serb paramilitaries of Croatian policemen in Borovo Selo, in eastern Slavonia, and of a policeman in a small place nearby, there was an anti-Serb pogrom in Zadar, as well as in Šibenik, during which Serb property and businesses were trashed, in what a local newspaper, Narodni list, described as ‘Zadar’s Chrystal Night’. That Croatian nationalism was especially fierce here may have been in part due to the proximity of Serb-controlled territory during the war. Zadar was partially cut off from the rest of Croatia for part of the war, and atrocities were committed against Croats in the surrounding area. All this left a legacy of bitterness. When Croatian forces swept through the region in 1995, most of the Serbs in the formerly Serb-controlled areas fled. In the years following, in the hinterland of Zadar, around the town of Benkovac, which had previously had a Serb majority, the local Croat population offered especially stiff resistance to the return of Serb refugees to their homes.

When I visited Zadar in 2002, a huge poster was prominently displayed, expressing support for General Ante Gotovina, who had the previous year been indicted for war crimes by the international war crimes tribunal for former Yugoslavia, in The Hague. A decade later, and following the guilty verdict against Gotovina (see journal posting of 1 May 2011), such posters can still be seen in Dalmatian towns, on walls, in bars, proclaiming that Gotovina is a hero, not a criminal.

Zadar had not always been such a breeding ground of Croat-Serb antagonism. Narodni list, the oldest Croatian newspaper, founded in the 1860s, had, as a focus for Croatian aspirations, been directed against Italian domination. At one time it had appealed to the town’s Serbs as well as Croats. Indeed, before the formation of the Yugoslav state, Dalmatia had been a centre of Yugoslavism, and some of the most prominent advocates of Yugoslav unity had been Croats from Dalmatia.

In addition to its old churches, Zadar also boasts some fine examples of modern design. Along the quayside from St Donat’s is the Sea Organ. As one approaches, one can hear the gentle, randomly piped sounds of an organ. There in the quay are holes, the entrances to pipes that go down to the lapping waves below. As they wash against the quay, the waves push air up through the pipes, creating a soothing music. A little further along, is the ‘Greeting to the Sun’. Discs of glass set in the quay, representing the sun and all the planets, soak up sunlight into solar panels by day, the energy from which powers a multi-coloured light show by night. Visitors and the citizens of Zadar stroll over the sun disc, some of them dancing across the coloured floor, while children run about, inventing games with the lights, jumping as the colours move and ripple across the ground.

Blood sausage and chestnuts in Zagreb

Any time of year can be lovely in Zagreb. Walking up Sljeme, the mountain on the edge of Zagreb, on a crisp autumn day, with the trees a mass of golds and browns, and still some greens, is a delight. And autumn has its special food opportunities. Krvavice (blood sausages) on Sljeme, with kiseli kupus (sauerkraut) have me salivating even before the plane touches down at Zagreb airport. Nowhere else have I enjoyed black pudding as much as here, deliciously spicy, homemade. That’s what makes the food in the Sljeme mountain huts so special. Good simple fare, sourced from local peasants, homemade, luscious.

And it’s also the time of year for chestnuts, found in abundance on Sljeme. Sunday walks punctuated with long detours to pick them by the sack full. Roasted chestnuts on sale in squares and on street corners; the cooperative effort of roasting and peeling our own at home; pureed chestnuts served with cream; cakes made of chestnuts with cream and chocolate. Gorging ourselves on chestnuts.

None of this is sophisticated fare, just simple, traditional and delicious. Zagreb is in many ways a conservative place. I hope it stays so, and that all the things that delight me so do not change. Let them open new, fancier restaurants, catering to more cosmopolitan tastes. But let’s keep the old pleasures as well.

I was sorry to see that my favourite Kod Žaca is no more, at least not in the form it used to be. A cosy little restaurant near the Archbishop’s garden, run by a couple of young boys from Slavonia, but with cuisine from Istria. Can there be two cuisines more dissimilar than Slavonian and Istrian? One old gentleman from Rijeka told how, when he first married, he wondered whether his Slavonian wife was trying to kill him with the heavy food she served. But, as my Italian friend, one of their most faithful customers, put it, the mama of the two boys at Kod Žaca had taught them well. Wonderful food. Delectable steaks. Perfectly textured gnocchi with a truffle sauce. And such an atmosphere, and such generosity. It felt like we were their guests, in their own home. A grater and a truffle were placed in front of the eater, who was left to grate his own. It was at Kod Žaca that I first tasted the delicious Istrian honey liqueur, a wonderful aperitif. And again, no messing about; the bottle and glasses were simply placed on the table, the guests left to serve themselves. I have not tasted as good anywhere else. They had their own source. The restaurant was, I think, not legal, part of the grey economy; there was no sign outside the door. That did not stop prominent politicians eating there. Now there is a sign, still called Kod Žaca, but a pizzeria.

Plov and lepeshka in Kyrgyzstan

Leaving behind the modern comforts of Bishkek, we boarded a flight for the southern city of Jalal Abad, close to the border with Uzbekistan. The flight, in an old, rickety little aircraft, with seats that would not go into the upright position, and smelling much like the old and decrepit buses still found around the former Soviet Union, was not a lot of fun. The weather was atrocious, and the plane kept swooping and diving, leaving stomachs behind as it went. I concentrated hard not to spill the beaker of water the stewardess had given me, as she struggled up and down the floor of the plane, now sloping one way, now the other. One of our party sat next to an official from the transport ministry who told him that the model of plane we were flying in was now outlawed in Kyrgyzstan, but it was still flying – just.

Arriving, relieved, at Jalal Abad airport, we had to wait for our luggage in the driving rain. Turning around, there was a sign above the entrance to the runway wishing departing passengers ‘good luck’. After our flight, it seemed apt.

A short stop in Jalal Abad to eat samsa (samosas) and delicious little pastries stuffed with pumpkin. Then the bus journey on to Kerben, through the still lashing rain. We arrived during a power cut, a rare event, we were told, due to the weather. Supper was by candlelight, starting with tasty little scraps of mutton fat, followed by salad and plov, the ubiquitous plov, found all over central Asia, consisting of rice, laced with raisins and pieces of mutton, boiled until they resemble leather. All washed down with green tea and vodka.

We had been expecting the worst from the accommodation, but in fact it was not too bad, if basic. The rooms were clean and warm, and the beds comfortable. And though the water pressure was weak, I had a hot shower.

Kerben is a quiet little town, quite dark at night even when there is no power cut, with just the very centre dimly lit, and one solitary set of traffic lights – the central feature of the town. Walking along the dim main street in softening rain, we heard pounding music off to one side. Perhaps Kerben had a night life after all.

Aksi district

Then a couple of days off in the villages of Aksi district. Muddy, charming little places with smiley people and a spectacular surround of snow-capped mountains. Ladies with scarves and men with tall woollen hats. Some on donkeys, sometimes a man atop a sprightly horse, reminding of the nomadic Kyrgyz past. One old lady sitting on a donkey, asked by our interpreter if I could photo her, cackled happily; ‘does he love me’, she asked?

Then there is our most frequented eating place; a little shack in one of the villages, the only restaurant for miles around, if the word restaurant is appropriate for such a hovel. Goat soup; fried potatoes and chicken; fried potatoes and eggs; and truly the worst plov I have tasted – inedible for me and my Russian companion. Hailing originally from Kazakhstan, she professes to like central Asian cooking; her father spends hours preparing gargantuan quantities of plov for the whole family. But neither she nor I could eat this. Our interpreter and driver wolfed it down however. But somehow I grew fond of the place, and of the cheerful lady who served us. Arriving for a pot of hot green tea and the latest offerings from her blackened pots seemed almost homely. And her lepeshka (central Asian bread) was the most delicious of my whole stay in Kyrgyzstan, when it was fresh and warm.

Krujë and Skenderbeg

In Albanians’ sense of their history, a uniquely significant position is occupied by Skenderbeg, the preeminent national hero. His statue stands in prominent places in capital cities around the Albanian-inhabited areas of the Balkans, in Tirana, Prishtina and Skopje, and elsewhere. It is hard to think of a European country where a single historical figure holds such an important place in the national consciousness. For a small nation, ruled and dominated by others more powerful for much of their history, often seen as occupying a peripheral region, isolated from the main currents of European history, the memory of Skenderbeg is an affirmation for Albanians of their self-worth. They too produced a great hero, who played a significant role in the affairs of the continent. Despite their frequent disappointments, the example of Skenderbeg continues to provide inspiration.

Statue of Skenderbeg, Tirana

Born Gjergj Kastrioti, Skenderbeg was the name given him by the Turks, meaning in Turkish, roughly, Lord Alexander, it is presumed after Alexander the Great, a reference to his prowess as a military commander. Skenderbeg lived in the 15t Century, when the Ottomans were extending and consolidating their rule in the Balkans. Following his father’s submission to the empire, Skenderbeg served with distinction as a soldier of the Sultan before turning to rebellion. Instrumental in forming the League of Lezhë, a town in northern Albania, then under Venetian rule, for two decades Skenderbeg led Albanian resistance to the Ottomans from a base in his hilltop redoubt of Krujë, not far from Tirana. He led a guerrilla campaign and withstood sieges, putting off the extension of Ottoman rule until after his death.

Today, Krujë is a pleasant little town, with a small Ottoman-style bazaar, now mainly given over to selling tourist souvenirs. The fortress’s defensive value was appreciated also by the Turks, and much of what one sees today dates from the Ottoman period rather than from Skenderbeg’s time. Particularly fine is a beautifully maintained 18th-century house inside the castle walls, which had once accommodated the Ottoman commander of the fortress. The original decoration, including ornate wooden ceilings and simple yet exquisite murals, is a striking example of Ottoman style. Unlike the open verandas of the houses in Berat and Gjirokaster, here the gallery is enclosed by a tightly latticed wooden screen, through which the occupants could see out, but outsiders could not see in. Did this perhaps reflect the practice of a stricter version of Islam, with its preoccupation with hiding a house’s womenfolk away from view? Displayed photographs of the bazaar from the beginning of the 20th century showed women completely covered, burka-like.

18th-century house, Krujë castle

The castle contains the Skenderbeg Museum, opened in 1980s. The Hoxha regime eagerly tapped into the cult of Skenderbeg. A 1970 novel by the great Albanian writer Ismail Kadare, ‘The Seige’, described an Ottoman siege of an unnamed Albanian fortress in Skenderbeg’s time. The book was published in the aftermath of the 1968 Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia. Hoxha’s rule had nothing in common with the suppressed Prague Spring, except that Hoxha feared Albania might face a similar fate. The clampdown on the Prague Spring sparked heightened paranoia in the Albanian regime, which responded by building the thousands of defensive bunkers that once peppered the Albanian countryside. Kadare’s novel portrayed a defiant Albania, led by Skenderbeg, standing up to and defying the mighty Ottomans. Of course, Albania ultimately succumbed, albeit after Skenderbeg’s death, and in that sense the book’s message for the 20th Century was ambiguous.

The museum contains surviving documents signed by Skenderbeg, his correspondence with European rulers. Skenderbeg was lionised in much of Europe for his feat of withstanding, with few resources or men, the Ottoman Empire for so long, as a defender of Christendom and of European civilisation. However, many of the exhibits appear to have more to do with ‘creating’ history rather than recording it. Concrete knowledge of Skenderbeg and others involved in the resistance is limited, lost in the mists of time, and certainly many of the pictures and busts of people from that time are based on imagination. Such embellishment, selectiveness and fabrication is a feature of many Albanian museums. Perhaps it reflects a need for a small nation to give itself a history of which it could be more proud. But Skenderbeg’s story was remarkable enough without the need for embellishment. A (much embellished) history of Skenderbeg was written by Marin Barleti at the beginning of the 16th century, and was subsequently translated into several languages. Not a peripheral state, Albania under Skenderbeg was at the forefront of the defence of Europe.

The mountains of northern Albania

A hundred years ago, when Edith Durham travelled through the mountains of northern Albania, the world she described in her book, ‘High Albania’, was one in which there were no roads, just tracks, some of which could not be passed on horseback, let alone by any kind of vehicle. It was a world in which only the priests could read or write. And though the Catholic mountain people were devoted to the symbols of their Church, it was the Kanun – code – of Lek Dukagjin that held sway over their lives, and the honour code of the blood feud, which substituted for the lack of any effective state institutions.

This remarkable Edwardian woman dragged herself up mountain passes and along cliff ledges; she ate and slept in the primitive houses of the region, listening to the stories of the men, and sometimes women (for she generally ate with the men, not the women, who grubbed up the leftover scraps of the men, and were treated as little more than chattels, their role to bear male children and serve the family of their in-laws). Hospitality was sacred for the mountain people, and, though often poor, they gave her the best that they could.

Valbona

So much has changed now. The valley of the Valbona, close to Bajram Curri, a mainly Moslem region, is now a national park. It is rapidly being developed for tourism, mainly for visitors from Albania and nearby Kosovo, as well as a smattering of westerners. Wooden hotels and restaurants in a style that looks more like Scandinavia than the Balkans are being erected by families with the right political connections in Bajram Curri (construction in Albania depends on political patronage). The scent of money and opportunity is in the air Many of the traditional stone houses have been left to fall into decay, as have the barracks for an abandoned military base, placed here due to the proximity of the Yugoslav (now Montenegrin) border. The natural beauty of the place is spectacular, the mountains rising up on all sides. Driving into the valley, the villages of stone houses dotted around the verdant slopes have great charm.

The day we visited, a minor American film star of partly Albanian descent, Eliza Dushku (she was in ‘Buffy the Vampire Slayer’), was in the region, as part of a tour of Albania to help promote tourism. We saw her greeted by the head of Valbona commune together with a troop of traditional Tropoje dancers. She gamesomely joined in the fun, while the cameras whirred. Valbona is going to be developed further. One can only hope that it will be done with sensitivity and respect for the nature and the local traditions and styles.

Theth

Just across a mountain pass from Valbona is the valley of Theth, a Catholic area, also a national park. Part of Shkoder region, Theth can only be reached from Valbona by a tough climb over the mountains. The only road is from Shkoder, which in its higher reaches becomes a rocky track, unsuitable for vehicles less robust than a four-by-four or the sturdy little furgons (minivans) that push their way up, although some adventurous cyclists make the journey too.

Edith Durham was much taken with Theth, which she described as “a grandly wild spot”. She wrote of the valley that “great isolated boulders are scattered over it, on which stand kullas.” A kulla is the traditional tower that was the home and castle of mountain families, with tiny slit windows from which it could be defended from enemies. In such homes extended families lived in Durham’s time, and owed absolute obedience to the head of the household, the house lord. Many older houses remain. Some have been abandoned, but others have been renovated, some with red corrugated iron roofs in place of the traditional stone ones. The little church at one end of the valley has been restored. Durham would have been heartened by the fact that a school now stands in the heart of the village.

Not far from the church stands a traditional lock-out kulla, where men once took refuge to escape from blood feuds. Even now, as a tourist attraction, it seems a bleak and forbidding place. When Durham visited, the mountain tribes were in a state of near-constant feud, with their neighbours and within the tribe itself. The writer Ismail Kadare wrote about one such tower in his novel ‘Broken April’. Blood feuds have made a comeback since the end of communist rule, though mercifully not on their previous, all-pervasive scale. Travelling through Valbona, our local driver pointed out two houses whose occupants were in feud with a nearby family. Two people had been killed already. The men of the two houses dared not go out except at night, and the police apparently stayed clear of the matter. Most local people, he averred, still approved of revenge killings. The primitive call of honour continued to exert a pull in the villages.

Lock-out kulla, Theth

Many of the houses in Theth now take in guests. The conditions can be fairly basic. The village has for some time been without an electricity supply. At the place I stayed, a generator was switched on for a couple of hours in the evening. Hot water for washing came in a bucket that could be ladled over the body for a primitive shower. But this is nothing compared to the conditions experienced by Edith Durham on her travels, where the living area of a house frequently consisted of one large room, where she slept with all the family, and on occasion animals as well. Nevertheless, the warmth and hospitality with which she was everywhere received delighted her.

Nowadays, the guesthouses in Theth are commercial operations. The hosts have satellite television, and some of them speak English. But some of the spirit and charm Durham witnessed remains. Most of the food served is local produce, including home-baked bread, wine, butter, honey, and utterly delicious fig jam. Homemade fig jam featured on the breakfast menu in most of the places I stayed in Albania. It was wonderful. One still has the feeling of staying with a family, from the old lady, with her hair dyed jet black and worn long, topped by a light scarf, in the local style, who smiled benevolently at her guests (when not shooing away the hens or the family cow from the front of the house), to the little children who ran around throughout the day, and greeted me each morning and evening, telling me their names.

Theth too is surely going to experience further tourist development, including a tarmacked road that will bring in greater numbers of visitors, a reliable electricity supply, new hotels, shops etc. The wilderness that Durham wrote about is being overtaken by the modern world. As with Valbona, one hopes it will be done sensitively. Perhaps, away from these national parks, some unfrequented, more truly wild places will remain for a time.

Re-established links: Gjakova and Tropoje

The recently built Kukes highway and tunnel have transformed links between Albania and Kosovo. Old ties among communities on the two sides of the border are being re-established after decades of communist and, in the case of Kosovo, Serbian rule. Travelling to Tropoje, in the northeast corner of Albania, is now quickest and easiest by the new road, passing through Kosovo, via Prizren and Gjakova (Djakovica in Serbian).

Tropoje is a sparsely populated region, neglected by Tirana since the end of communist rule, despite the fact that current Prime Minister Sali Berisha, the dominant figure in Albanian politics for two decades, comes from here. The main town, Bajram Curri, has not fared well. Lacking the frenzy of new construction that characterises more favoured Albanian towns, Bajram Curri is shrinking, its citizens moving away in search of better prospects. The ill-lit streets have an especially forlorn feel at night. Someone in Tirana told me all Albanian towns were similarly dark and unlit in communist times. Bajram Curri seems hardly to have moved on since then. The high number of UK-registered vehicles is evidence of how many people from the region have moved to Britain. Some of them have moved back with cars they bought there, but many are just visiting for the summer holidays. Strolling through Bajram Curri one evening, a boy from Twickenham, with a pronounced London accent, started talking to me, over to visit the town of his birth.

Bajram Curri

Historically, this region had not looked primarily to Tirana or the coast. Rather, its main link was with Gjakova. Indeed, it was formerly known as the Highlands of Gjakova. Tropoje was part of the hinterland of Gjakova, and it may be becoming so again. Gjakova is a fine old Ottoman town, with a large bazaar, much in the style of many others in the Balkans. Unlike some of them, such as those of Sarajevo and Mostar in Bosnia, or Kruje, near Tirana, the Gjakova bazaar is not at all touristy, at least not yet. Instead, the little shops sell ordinary things to local people, clothes, shoes, hardware. The bazaar has the hustle and bustle so typical of Kosovo, where everyone seems to be doing business in a constant hubbub of activity. The bazaar was damaged during the 1999 conflict, some of its wooden buildings burned. The fine old mosque was damaged. But the damage has largely been repaired, and it has been done sensitively, in keeping with the traditional style.

The furgon (minibus) that drove us from Gjakova to Bajram Curri stopped at several places along the way, picking up supplies from various small shops which were piled along the floor. All manner of things: food; soft drinks; electrical goods. The driver had apparently taken orders from people in Bajram Curri. Travelling to remote areas in Albania it is often like that. The furgons are the conduits for trade. And it Tropoje, it now seems that the source for goods and supplies is coming once again to be Gjakova, as it once was. Old links among Albanian-inhabited lands are being re-established. Will these revived social and commercial ties have political consequences as well? Maybe. Certainly the logic of geography says that Tropoje should never have been separated from Gjakova.

Bajram Curri takes its name from an Albanian hero of the same name. His statue stands in the town, rifle in hand, the picture of the rebel outlaw. Bajram Curri hailed from Gjakova. He fought the Turks and, one of the leading members of the Committee for the National Defence of Kosovo, organised resistance to Serbian rule after 1918, as part of the Kachak insurgency. He served as Minister for War in the Albanian government, but fell out with Ahmed Zogu (later King Zog). Pursued by Zog’s troops, Bajram Curri was trapped and killed (some say he killed himself to avoid capture) in the mountains of the Valbona valley, close to the town whose name now commemorates him.

Berat, Gjirokaster and Ali Pasha Tepelena

From being one of the least known corners of Europe, Albania has now started to become a tourist destination. Outside travellers had been here and written about the country and its people. Among British travellers, they included Byron early in the 19th Century and Edith Durham a century later. Now, two decades after the end of the isolationist communist regime, the numbers are growing, and the infrastructure is being built.

In the south, Berat and Gjirokaster are both UNESCO protected sites, their fine old cities displaying unique architectural styles. Berat is known as the city of a thousand windows. Looking up from the valley of the Osum River at the Mangalem district, rising up the hillside towards the citadel, it is clear why. Each white-washed building presents a façade of large windows that take up most of its area. Unlike the traditional defensive towers of northern Albania, with their tiny windows, closed against a hostile outside, the houses of Berat appear open to the world. It is a beautiful sight.

City of a thousand windows, Berat

The citadel, built along the crest of the hill above Mangalem, is an impressive size. Many outside powers saw the value of the site, which was at different times in the Middle Ages held by Byzantium, Bulgaria and, briefly, Serbia, before finally being taken by the Ottomans. Inside the walls are houses as well as numerous little churches, mostly closed for restoration, and a ruined mosque that once served the Ottoman garrison.

Inside the citadel, Berat

Early in the nineteenth century, Berat was briefly incorporated into the semi-autonomous dominion of Ali Pasha Tepelena, one of the most colourful Albanian rulers of the Ottoman period. Travelling south from Berat, in the town of Tepelana, the home region of Ali Pasha, is a statue of the old man, who died in his 80s, reclining in his oriental robes, his belt stuffed with weapons, white beard flowing across his chest. Born into a powerful family, Ali Pasha’s father was murdered by rivals when he was a teenager. Turning to brigandage, he gradually clawed his way back, in time finding favour with the Ottoman authorities. In 1788, he seized Ioannina, now in north-west Greece, from where he controlled large chunks of Albania and Greece. Finally, this over-mighty and independent ruler came into conflict with the Sultan, and was killed in 1822. Byron visited him at his court in 1809, writing with approval of the Greek cultural revival that he encouraged, and of his renowned bravery, but also of the tyranny and cruelty of his rule.

Ali Pasha’s life illustrates the complex, ambiguous pattern of national and religious affiliation which characterised the Balkans before the advent of modern nation states forced peoples into more homogeneous national territories. An Albanian from Tepelena, as a Muslim and an Ottoman potentate many would have considered him a Turk. Yet the language of his court in Ioannina was Greek.

On the coast, south of the largely Greek speaking town of Himara, is a castle named after Ali Pasha, at a little place called Porto Palermo. Guidebooks often state that the castle was built early in the 19th Century for Ali Pasha’s wife. Others assert that in fact it long pre-dated Ali Pasha, and was probably Venetian. But it was in his territory. Around the fortress are other, more modern fortifications, abandoned and ruined buildings of a communist era military base, and several of Enver Hoxha’s once ubiquitous bunkers squatting around the castle walls. Close by is a submarine base, tunnelled into the rock.

A bunker at Port Palermo

Ali Pasha also added Gjirokaster to his realm, and renovated and extended the fortress there. The fortress was used by both King Zog and Enver Hoxha as a prison for political prisoners. Gjirokaster produced two of the most notable Albanians of the 20th Century, Hoxha and the novelist Ismail Kadare. Gjirokaster too has a very particular architecture. Some of the big stone houses that were once home to extended wealthy families include shaded terraces in between wings on either side, where the families would have spent much of the time during summer. Hoxha’s house burned down in 1916, and on its site there is now a replica of a traditional Gjirokaster house, with its rooms for hospitality, separate rooms for men and women, and windows through which the women could look in on the men, but not vice versa. Here, the guide told me, a bride-to-be could spy on her future husband for the first time.

Gjirokaster

Gjirokaster contains an ethnic Greek minority, and is considered the centre of the Greek community in Albania. The city, as well as much of what is today southern Albania, was claimed by Greece and occupied by Greek forces during the Balkan Wars and again in the First World War. As the international powers favoured Albania, local Greeks in Gjirokaster proclaimed an Autonomous Republic of Northern Epirus, which received international sanction, but did not last long. The 1919 Paris Peace Conference confirmed the region as part of Albania.

Like elsewhere in the Balkans, there was no clean boundary line, with one national group on one side and another on the other. Just as there were Greeks left on the Albanian side of the border, so Albanians, known as the Chams, were left in the northwest corner of Greece. As with other indigenous minorities in Greece, the Chams did not fare well. Having suffered discrimination in the inter-war years, and accused of collaboration with the German and Italian occupiers during the Second World War, the Muslim Chams were expelled from Greece, while the Orthodox Chams were subjected to the same kind of assimilationist pressures imposed on remaining Macedonian and Bulgarian Slavs in Greece.

These issues continue to affect Greek-Albanian relations. Albanians worry that Athens deliberately tries to inflate ethnic Greek numbers in Albania, encouraging Orthodox Albanians to declare themselves as Greeks. A plan to include a question about ethnic affiliation in the census this year for the first time, strongly supported by Greeks, raised fears among Albanians about Greece’s intentions.

And since the end of communist rule in Albania, the descendants of the expelled Chams in Albania have started to raise their voices, demanding the restoration of their lost property rights in Greece. In the past couple of years, the Chams have organised their own political party, the Party for Justice, Integration and Unity (PDIU), which has broadened its message from Cham rights to a wider pan-Albanian nationalism which, if its appeal continues to grow, would be bound to poison relations with neighbouring countries. It is as if the lessons of a decade of ethnic conflict in former Yugoslavia have not been learned.

Nevertheless, Greece’s systematic denial of the rights of minorities is a disgrace in an EU country. Athens’s hullabaloo about the rights of Greeks in Albania, a country that has Greek-language schools, dual-language road signs in Greek areas, and which, by comparison with Greece, is almost a model of a country that respects minority rights, cannot elicit much sympathy given Greece’s ill-treatment of the Chams, Macedonians and other minorities in Greece.