Fieri ( or ) is a
cityA city is a relatively large and permanent settlement, particularly a large urban settlement. Although there is no agreement on technical definitions distinguishing a city from a town within general English language meanings, many cities have a particular administrative, legal, or historical status...
in southwest
AlbaniaAlbania , officially the Republic of Albania , is a Mediterranean country in South Eastern Europe. It is bordered by Montenegro to the north, Kosovo to the northeast, Macedonia to the east and Greece to the south-east...
, in the district and county of the same name. It is located at , and has a population of 82,297 (2005). Fier is from the ruins of the ancient
CorinthCorinth, or Korinth Corinth, or Korinth Corinth, or Korinth (Greek Κόρινθος, Kórinthos is a city in Greece. In antiquity it was a city-state, on the Isthmus of Corinth, the narrow stretch of land that joins the Peloponnesus to the mainland of Greece. To the west of the isthmus lies the Gulf of...
ian city of
ApolloniaA city of the ancient world , known as Apollonia , was located on the right bank of the Aous; its ruins are situated in the Fier region, near the village of Pojan...
.
The history of Fier is bound up with that of the oil, gas and bitumen deposits nearby. It was founded by the Vrioni family, beys of Berat, as a market town in the 18th century.
Fieri ( or ) is a
cityA city is a relatively large and permanent settlement, particularly a large urban settlement. Although there is no agreement on technical definitions distinguishing a city from a town within general English language meanings, many cities have a particular administrative, legal, or historical status...
in southwest
AlbaniaAlbania , officially the Republic of Albania , is a Mediterranean country in South Eastern Europe. It is bordered by Montenegro to the north, Kosovo to the northeast, Macedonia to the east and Greece to the south-east...
, in the district and county of the same name. It is located at , and has a population of 82,297 (2005). Fier is from the ruins of the ancient
CorinthCorinth, or Korinth Corinth, or Korinth Corinth, or Korinth (Greek Κόρινθος, Kórinthos is a city in Greece. In antiquity it was a city-state, on the Isthmus of Corinth, the narrow stretch of land that joins the Peloponnesus to the mainland of Greece. To the west of the isthmus lies the Gulf of...
ian city of
ApolloniaA city of the ancient world , known as Apollonia , was located on the right bank of the Aous; its ruins are situated in the Fier region, near the village of Pojan...
.
History
The history of Fier is bound up with that of the oil, gas and bitumen deposits nearby. It was founded by the Vrioni family, beys of Berat, as a market town in the 18th century. The presence of asphalt and burning escapes of
natural gasNatural gas is a gas consisting primarily of methane. It is found associated with fossil fuels, in coal beds, as methane clathrates, and is created by methanogenic organisms in marshes, bogs, and landfills...
in the vicinity was recorded as early as the 1st century AD. Dioscorides, in
Materia MedicaMateria medica is a Latin medical term for the body of collected knowledge about the therapeutic properties of any substance used for healing . In Latin, the term literally means "medical material/substance"...
, describes lumps of bitumen in the adjacent river Seman, and the concentrated pitch on the banks of the Vjosa river, Strabo, writing in about A.D 17th states:
" On the territory of the people of Apolonia in Illlyria there is what is called a nymphaeum. It is a rock which emits fire. Below it are springs flowing with hot water and asphalt... the asphalt is dug out of a neighboring hill: the parts excavated are replaced by fresh earth, which in time is converted to asphalt."
slm
Industry and Tourism
Fier is an important industrial city and is built by the Gjanica tributary of the Seman river, and is surrounded by marshland. With nearby Patos town, it is the centre of the oil, bitumen and chemical industries in Albania. Fier is a convenient place to stay to visit the major Classical sites at nearby
ByllisByllis was an Ancient Greek polis built at the site of an Illyrian settlement of the Bylliones.The tribe itself was under Hellenization early on....
and Apolonia. The population is mixed Orthodox and Muslim (typical of southern Albanian cities). Main roads from the central square lead south to Vlora and east to the oil and chemical town of Patos . City of Fier had the first Cable Television in Albania 12.20.1995,
TV AVN (Albania Video Network) with founder and president
Fatos Mihali. Today in Fieri there are many other TV and radio stations. Just to mention some, there is TV KOMBI, TV APOLLON, Radio Fieri, Radio +3 and Radio Star.
Apollonia
Twelve km away from Fier is situated Apollonia, one of the two most important ancient Greek colonial settlements in Albania. It was founded in 600 BC on a hill near the sea, and near what was then the course of Vjosa river by settlers from
CorfuCorfu is a Greek island in the Ionian Sea. It is the second largest of the Ionian Islands, and its northern part lies off the coast of Sarandë, Albania from which it is separated by straits varying in breadth from 3 to 23 km , including one near ancient Butrint, while its southern part lies...
and
CorinthCorinth, or Korinth Corinth, or Korinth Corinth, or Korinth (Greek Κόρινθος, Kórinthos is a city in Greece. In antiquity it was a city-state, on the Isthmus of Corinth, the narrow stretch of land that joins the Peloponnesus to the mainland of Greece. To the west of the isthmus lies the Gulf of...
. At the time before the changes in land formation and the Adriatic coastline caused by an earthquake in the 3 century A.D, the harbour af Apollonia could accommodate as many as 100 ships. The site is thought to be on the sothern boundary of a native Illyrian settlement, being mentioned in
PeriplusPeriplus is the Latinization of an ancient Greek word, περίπλους , literally "a sailing-around." Both segments, peri- and -plous, were independently productive: the ancient Greek speaker understood the word in its literal sense; however, it developed a few specialized meanings, one of which became...
, a sailor's account of the Adriatic written in the middle of the
4th century BCThe 4th century BC started the first day of 400 BC and ended the last day of 300 BC. It is considered part of the Classical era, epoch, or historical period.-Overview:This century marked the height of Classical Greek civilization in all of its aspects...
by a Greek writer. It was near the territory occupied by the Illyrian tribes and close to the
GreekGreece , officially the Hellenic Republic , is a country in southeastern Europe, situated on the southern end of the Balkan Peninsula....
tribe of the Chaonians. The colony was said to have been named Gylaceia after its
CorinthCorinth, or Korinth Corinth, or Korinth Corinth, or Korinth (Greek Κόρινθος, Kórinthos is a city in Greece. In antiquity it was a city-state, on the Isthmus of Corinth, the narrow stretch of land that joins the Peloponnesus to the mainland of Greece. To the west of the isthmus lies the Gulf of...
ian founder, Gylax, and later changed its name to that of city of the God Apollo. According to archaeological investigations for 100 years Greek and Illyrian have lived in separate communities.
The economic prosperity of Apolonia grew on the basis of trade in slaves, and the local rich pastoral agricultural. In the middle of the 5th century B.C a workshop for minting coins was set up here. Through trade and commercial transactions these coins spread throughout Illyria and beyond its boundaries. In the years 214 B.C onwards the city was involved in the war between the Illyrian Taulanti and
CassanderCassander , King of Macedonia , was a son of Antipater, and founder of the Antipatrid dynasty.-Early history:...
, the king of Macedonia, and in 229 B.C came under Roman control. In 168 B.C, its loyalty to Rome was rewarded. For 200 years it was of central importance in the Roman effort to colonize the east and may have been an original terminus of the Egnatian Way. It was a vital stronghold for Caesar in the civil war between
PompeyGnaeus Pompeius Magnus, also known as Pompey /'pɑmpi/, Pompey the Great or Pompey the Triumvir , was a military and political leader of the late Roman Republic...
and
Julius CaesarGaius Julius Caesar , , was a Roman military and political leader. He played a critical role in the transformation of the Roman Republic into the Roman Empire....
. In 45 and 44 B.C, Octavian, later to become the Emperor Augustus, studied for 6 months in Apolonia, which had established a high reputation as a center of Greek learning, especially
the art of rhetoricAristotle's Rhetoric is an ancient Greek treatise on the art of persuasion, dating from the fourth century BC. In Greek, it is titled ΤΕΧΝΗΣ ΡΗΤΟΡΙΚΗΣ, in Latin Ars Rhetorica. In English, its title varies: typically it is titled the Rhetoric, the Art of Rhetoric, or a Treatise on Rhetoric.Aristotle...
. It was noted by
CiceroMarcus Tullius Cicero was a Roman philosopher, statesman, lawyer, political theorist, and Roman constitutionalist. Cicero is widely considered one of Rome's greatest orators and prose stylists.Cicero is generally perceived to be one of the most versatile minds of ancient Rome...
, in the Philippics, as 'magna urbs et gravis' a great and important city.
Under the Empire Apolonia remained a prosperous center, but begun to decline as the Vjosa silted up and the coastline changed after the earthquake.
The Excavations and the Monuments of Apolonia
The first attempts to conduct excavations in Apolonia were made during the first World War, by Austrian archaeologists who unearthed and explored mainly the walls that encircled the city. Systematic excavations began in 1824 by a French archaeological mission directed by Leon Rey, who brought to light a complex of monuments at the center of the city. A lot of excavations have been made by Albanian archaeologists during the last 40 years. Many objects are exhibited in the museum which has been the monastery of St. Mary.
The Monument of Agonothetes
This monument decorated the center of the city. The structure had the form of a semicircle and served as an assembly place of the council of the city - the
BuleBule pronounced [Blay] is a commonly used word in Indonesia to describe a white person or person of European descent. It is also used to describe light-colored persons. Many dictionaries point out that the strict definition of the word is albino...
. The front part of the structure was decorated in a special manner: there are 6 pillars crowned with capitals of the Corinthian style. An inscription dating from the middle of the 2nd century A.D. tells that the building was constructed by high ranking officers of the city, a monument with the purpose of commemorating the death of his soldier brother. On the day of the inauguration of the monument, a show was staged in the city with the participation of 25 couples of gladiators. On the western side, from the top of the monumental structure, the tourists can see the ruins of the small
temple of ArtemisThe Temple of Artemis , also known less precisely as Temple of Diana, was a Greek temple dedicated to Artemis completed— in its most famous phase— around 550 BC at Ephesus . Though the monument was one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, only foundations and sculptural fragments of the...
(Diana). At the eastern side there is a street which passes under a
triumphal archA triumphal arch is a structure in the shape of a monumental archway, in theory built to celebrate a victory in war, but often used to celebrate a ruler....
. On the opposite side of the monument of the Agonothetes, there is a colonnade decorated with marble statues.
The Library and the Odeon
This structure rises behind the colonnade. Opposite the monument of Aganothetes stands an Odeon or 'small theatre' for 200 spectators. The building had a stage, an orchestra and tiers. There they gave musical shows, recitals, and held oratorical and philosophical discussions.
The House with Mosaics
A couple of meters away was cavated a rich Apolonian dwelling house of the 3rd century A.D.: The mosaics are of all types. There are mosaics where the main decorative motives are simple geometric figures, others have ornamental mythological figures like : hypocamposes (seahorses), accompanied by
NereidsIn Greek mythology, the Nereids are sea nymphs, the fifty daughters of Nereus and Doris. They often accompany Poseidon and are always friendly and helpful towards sailors fighting perilous storms. They are particularly associated with the Aegean Sea, where they dwelt with their father in the...
and
ErotesErotes or Amores may also refer to:In literature:* Erotes , a group of gods and demi-gods from Classical mythology, associated with love and sex and part of Aphrodite's retinue....
. One of the mosaics represents a scene where Archiles holds the wounded
PenthesileaIn Greek mythology, Penthesilea or Penthesileia was an Amazonian queen, daughter of Ares and Otrera, and sister of Hippolyta, Antiope and Melanippe...
, the beautiful queen of Amazones, in his arms.
Fontana
The Fontana represents in itself a complex structure; it had a wall which collected all the waters that sprang from the earth, and four other aqueducts.
The Museum of Apolonia
The Museum of Apollina has 7 pavilions, a gallery and 2 porticos. Here are exhibited different objects that testify to the history of Apolonia.
The Church of St. Mary
The Church of St. Mary is situated between the museum and the refectory. The church is of
Byzantine styleByzantine architecture is the architecture of the Byzantine Empire. The empire gradually emerged as a distinct artistic and cultural entity from what is today referred to as the Roman Empire after AD 330, when the Roman Emperor Constantine moved the capital of the Roman Empire east from Rome to...
. The interiors of the church had once been painted, but today very few fragments from the mural paintings have remained. The church was built in the fourteenth century. The wall painting represents Emperor Andronicus Paleologus as the builder of the church. The refectory of the monastery was built at the same time as the church.
Fier city official website
Fieri.Com: The official site of Fieri. Title: Portali Fierak Online. Everything about City of Fieri: News, Photo, Music, Forums, Real Estate, Shop Online, Tourism, Televisions, Schools, Radios, Shows etc. Cities of Albania
Famous people
- Luftar Paja- Popular Artist
- Jakov Xoxa- Writer
- Kadri Roshi
Kadri Roshi was an Albanian actor....
- Popular Actor
- Pellumb Kulla- Filmmaker
- Fuat Boci- Actor - Humor
- Kristaq Shtembari- Popular Teacher
- Indrit Sulaj- Founder of Fieri.Com - Portali Fierak Online
- Kujtim Majaci- Famous soccer player from the 1980s
- Hajrie Rondo- Actor
- Ervis Gega- Violinist
- Albert Verria- Actor
- Diana Boja- Athlete
- Vladimir Stefa- Famous soccer player from the 1980s
External links