Opolje

Opolje Opoja
Geographic region in Kosovo
The region and its settlements.
Country	Kosovo
District	District of Prizren
Municipality	Prizren
Area
• Total	108 km2 (42 sq mi)
Population  (1981)
• Total	18,036
• Density	170/km2 (430/sq mi)

Opolje (Albanian: Opoja/Opojë, Serbian: Опоље) is a region in the southern part of the municipality of Prizren in southern Kosovo^[a]. The region has 19 villages inhabited by Albanians.^[1]

Settlements[]

The region of Opoja includes 19 settlements:

• Belobrod
• Bljač
• Brezna
• Brodosana
• Brrut
• Buča
• Buzec
• Kapra
• Kosovce
• Kuklibeg
• Kukovce
• Plajnik
• Plava
• Rence
• Šajinovac
• Zapluxhë
• Zgatar
• Zjum Opoljski
• Zrze

Name[]

The name Opolje is of Slavic, Serbian origin.^[2] According to Milisav Lutovac, the name "had to do with the inhabited localities dotted around a field".^[2] The name also appears in Lower Silesia, in Poland - Opole,^[2] and in Russia - Opolye.

Geography[]

Gora, in a collective term, refers to both the Gorani-inhabited Gora (which greater part is in Kosovo, the rest in Albania and Macedonia), and its sub-region Opolje, which is inhabited by Albanians.^[3] According to the Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts (1955), Opolje had an area of ca. 108 km², while Gora had an area of ca. 500 km².^[3] Sheltered by high mountain ranges of strong and cold winds, Gora and Opolje does not have harsh winters.^[4] There is no natural border between Gora and Opolje, while the northern part of the town of Dragaš has been considered part of Opolje as well.

Opolje is one of the traditional župa (county) in the Šar Mountains massif in southern Kosovo, alongside Sredačka Župa, Sirinićka Župa, Gora and Prizrenski Podgor.^[5] In the west of Opolje is the region of Lumë, which extends in both Kosovo and Albania.^[6]

History[]

Middle Ages[]

The villages of Brodosavce, was mentioned in a charter dated 1330, of King Stephen Uroš III. The ruins of the Zinovo fortress is most likely located beneath Brodosavce. There exists ruins of medieval Serbian Orthodox churches and monasteries in Brodosavce, Brut, Plajnik, while old Serbian cemeteries exist in several of the villages.

The Serbian rulers King Stephen Uroš III (in 1326) and Emperor Stephen Dušan (in 1348, 1355) mentioned many of the Opolje and Gora villages in their charters, which shows that they existed before those dates.^[2] Opolje was a church estate of the Church of the Holy Theotokos in Prizren throughout the Middle Ages.^[7]

The surrounding region possesses a good amount of Aromanian toponyms which Dumbrowski argues show the linguistic situation before Slavification.^[8]

In one of Nemanja’s charters giving property to Hilandar, 170 Vlachs are mentioned, located in villages around Prizren. When Dečanski founded his monastery of Dečani in 1330, he referred to ‘villages and katuns of Vlachs and Albanians’ in the area of the white Drin.^[9]. King Stefan Dečanski granted the Visoki Dečani monastery with pasture land along with Vlach and Albanian katuns around Drim and Lim rivers of whom had to carry salt and provide serf labour for the monastery^[10]

Ottoman era[]

In 1455, the southern territories of the Serbian Despotate were annexed by the Ottomans, and organized into the beylerbeylik of Rumelia. Gora, in its broadest meaning, became a nahiyah of the Sanjak of Prizren.^[11] The Ottoman conquest resulted in the old trade routes that linked the Adriatic to the Aegean and Black sea lost their importance because of the insecurity on the roads, and the towns and villages along the roads stopped growing.^[11] There are no sources which name Opolje a nahiya in the 15th century.^[12]

In 1955, Lutovac argued that in the 16th century, the Slavic population of Opolje partially adopted Islam and partially emigrated elsewhere, and the vacancies created by emigration were filled by Albanian incomers.^[13] Dumbrowski in 2012 argued that the situation described by Lutovac led to language shift from Slavic to Albanian in Opolje and the surrounding region (but not Gora), and that this is the reason for what Dumbrowski argues is evidence of Slavic substrate effects in the Opoja Albanian dialect.^[8] Pulaha in 1984 noted that most Christians in Opolje in 1591 had Albanian names, which Dumbrowski interprets to indicate that at the time Opolje was switching from Slavic to Albanian, what Dumbrowski argues were the Albanian incomers had not yet been fully Islamized.^[8]

The Ottoman officials noted which heads of families were new arrivals in their places of residence; in the Sanjak of Prizren in 1591 only five new arrivals out of forty-one bore Albanian names^[14]. In the nahiye of Pec in 1485, majority of new arrivals had Slavic names. In several Kosovo towns in the 1580's and 1590's; twenty five new Albanian immigrants were recorded and 133 immigrants with Slav names, several of them described coming from Bosnia.^[15]Noel Malcolm argues this counts strongly against a mass immigration from northern Albania^[16]. Kosovo's population was bigger during this period than that of central and northern Albania and its rate of growth was lower^[17]

A prominent family of Opoja in the 16th century emerged in the new social environment. The Kuka, descendants of Iljaz Kuka built many public buildings, trade routes, shops and left a large endowment (waqf) to the city of Prizren. The mosque of Iljaz Kuka, rebuilt by his grandon Mehmed Bey Kuka (known as Kukli Bey) is one of the oldest mosques of Prizren. ^[18]

Modern[]

Opolje and other rural areas of the upper Drin valleys were economically tied to Prizren.^[19]

From 1945 to [sometime after 1981] Opolje was part of the municipality of Gora, but was then given status of a municipality (due to its Albanian population, as opposed to Gora, which was inhabited by Gorani people). It was abolished on November 3, 1992, under the law of the federal Federal Yugoslav Republic of Serbia, and instead joined into the municipality of Prizren.^[1] The Gora municipality and Opoja region remained separated during the Milošević period.^[20]

During the Kosovo war (1999), Albanians from Opoja fled to neighbouring Albania in cars, trucks and tractors along with others on foot that following the conflict returned home.^[21] After the war, Opoja was merged with Gora to form the municipality of Dragaš by the United Nations Mission (UNMIK) and the new administrative unit has an Albanian majority.^[20][21] Located in Gora, the town of Dragash is the regional and municipal centre for both the Opoja and Gora regions of Dragash municipality.^[20]

Demographics[]

The population of Opolje, in 19 localities, is totally homogeneously Albanian. According to the 1981 census, Albanians constituted 99.9% of the Opolje population (18,003 of 18,036). The ethnic homogeneity of Opolje dates from long before, as evident from the 1948, 1953 and 1961 censuses, when 99.8% declared as Albanians. Opolje had an annual population growth in 1961-1971 of 33 per 1,000, and in 1971-1981, 29.8 per 1,000, which represents an enormous relative overpopulation (Albanian population boom); according to estimates for 1991, there were 173 people per 1 square kilometre, and in some villages, up to 250 per 1 square kilometre, all in conditions of scarce natural and economic resources.^[22] The majority professes Islam.

Gallery[]

• 

  Bresana

• 

  Brut

Notes[]

References[]

Sources[]

External links[]

• Map of Opolje (Harta e Opojes) on Albanian Wikipedia

Further reading[]

• Reineck, Janet Susan (1991). The past as refuge: Gender, migration, and ideology among the Kosova Albanians (Ph.D.). University of California. (detailed ethnographic study of the Opoja region)

Coordinates: 42°03′38″N 20°38′25″E / 42.06056°N 20.64028°E / 42.06056; 20.64028

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