The City of Ferizaj

The city has been populated since the prehistoric era by the Starcevo, Vinca and Baden culture. During the Ottoman period, Ferizaj served as a trading centre on the route between Belgrade and Thessaloniki. Ferizaj has always been considered as a city where tolerance and coexistence in terms of religion and culture has been part of the society in the last centuries. The town, was named Ferızovık when it was part of the Ottoman Empire, was little more than a village until 1873, when the Belgrade-Thessaloniki railway was opened, passing through the town.

 

The name derives from a pre-1873 hotel owned by a local named Feriz Shasivari. The oldest ethno-cultural group who lived in the 6th and 5th millenniums BC in the territory of Kosovo was the Starcevo culture. Members of this group constructed their homes near rivers and the river terraces. They made their homes of willows and mud, while their main profession was ploughing and farming. Starting from the 8th century BC and then during the next centuries, until the Roman conquest, can transmit continuously development of a new culture in the region, the Dardanian tribe. The Dardanian burned their dead and bury their remnants in tumuli tombs.

 

In the city, two necropolis have been found, one in the locality of Kuline near the railway station in Gërlicë, the other in region of Mollopolc, along the Ferizaj-Štimlje road. After the Austrian-Turkish wars of the late 17th century and the first half of the 18th century, major ethnic changes occur and begins the rapid Islamization from Ottoman Empire. Until the construction of the railway from Skopje to Mitrovica, according to Turkish sources they didn't found a residence called Feriz-Bey (Ferizaj). At the beginning it was called "Tasjon" by surrounding villagers by the Turkish pronunciation of French word Station, but the name Ferizaj is obtained by Feriz Shasivari. Its rapid development starts with construction of the railway station and within a short period become the city with inns, warehouses, and permanent market.

 

Traffic, traders of Kosovo from Prizren to Shkodër, which at that time was by caravan, was mainly diverted toward Thessaloniki. Exporting raw materials especially that of cereals went through Ferizaj and through aligned foreign goods turnover came from Thessaloniki and Skopje. This was the reason that Ferizaj for a period of thirty years become the city with about 400 houses and 200 shops. Most of the population work in trade, crafts and other activities related to trade.

 

During this period, the opening of the colonial shops, craft workshops so accelerated development of the city enough that some passengers of the 20th century describing how the city at that time resembled and at that time the city had more stores than houses. The city suffered some damage during the 1999 Kosovo War, with some of its Albanian-populated neighbourhoods being shelled and burned by the Yugoslav Army. Following the war, the city has seen serious inter-communal unrest, which has resulted in almost all of the Serbians, and other non-Albanian inhabitants, either being expelled or fleeing. The Serbian churches of St. Nicholas and St. Stephen were destroyed in 1999.