Coordinates: 41°07′01″N 20°48′06″E / 41.11694°N 20.80167°E
| Ohrid Охрид |
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| Nickname(s): Macedonian Jerusalem, European Jerusalem[1] | |||
  Ohrid
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| Coordinates: 41°07′01″N 20°48′06″E / 41.11694°N 20.80167°E | |||
| Country |  Republic of Macedonia |
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| Municipality | Ohrid Municipality | ||
| Government | |||
| - Mayor | Aleksandar Petreski | ||
| Area | |||
| - Total | 383.93 km2 (148.2 sq mi) | ||
| Elevation | +695 m (2,280 ft) | ||
| Population (2002) | |||
| - Total | 42,003 | ||
| - Density | 142.97/km2 (370.3/sq mi) | ||
| Time zone | CET (UTC+1) | ||
| Postal codes | 6000 | ||
| Area code(s) | 389 46 | ||
| Patron saints | Saint Clement and Saint Naum | ||
Ohrid (Macedonian: Охрид, 
[ˈɔxrit] (help·info)) is a city on the eastern shore of Lake Ohrid in the Republic of Macedonia. It has about 42,000 inhabitants, making it the seventh largest city in the country. The city is the seat of Ohrid Municipality. Ohrid is notable for having once 365 churches, one for each day of the year and has been referred to as a "Jerusalem".[2][3] The city is rich in picturesque houses and monuments, and tourism is predominant. It is located southwest of Skopje, west of Resen and Bitola, and east of Elbasan and Tirana in Albania.
In 1980, Ohrid and Lake Ohrid were accepted as a World Heritage Site by UNESCO.
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In Macedonian, and the other South Slavic languages, the name of the city is Ohrid (Охрид). In Albanian, the city is known as Ohër or Ohri. Historical names include the Latin Lychnidus[4] or the Greek names Lychnidos (Λύχνιδος), Ochrida (Οχρίδα, Ωχρίδα) and Achrida (Αχρίδα), the latter two of which are still in modern usage.
Ohrid is located in the south-western part of Macedonia, on the banks of Lake Ohrid, at an elevation of 690 meters above sea level.
The earliest[citation needed] inhabitants of the widest Lake Ohrid region were the Bryges and Encheleans. During the Roman conquests, towards the end of III and the beginning of II century BC,the Greek Dassaretae and the region Dassaretia were mentioned, as well as the town of Lychnidos. The existence of the ancient town of Lychnidos is linked to the Greek myth of the Phoenician prince Cadmus who, banished from Thebes, in Boetia, fled to the Enchelei[5] and founded the town of Lychnidos on the shores of Lake Ohrid [6].
The Lake of Ohrid, the ancient Lacus Lychnitis, whose blue and exceedingly transparent waters in remote antiquity gave to the lake its Greek name; it was still called so occasionally in the Middle Ages. It was located along the Via Egnatia, which connected the Adriatic port Dyrrachion (present-day Durrës) with Byzantium.According to recent excavations by Macedonian archaeologists it was a town way back at the time of king Phillip II of Macedon.[7] They allege that Samuil's Fortress was built on the place of an earlier fortification, dated to 4th century B.C.[7] Archaeological excavations (e.g., the Polyconch Basilica from 5th century) prove early adaptation of Christianity in the area. Bishops from Lychnidos participated in multiple ecumenical councils.
The Bulgarians conquered the city in 867. The name Ohrid first appeared in 879. Between 990 and 1015, Ohrid was the capital and stronghold of the Bulgarian Empire[8]. From 990 to 1018 Ohrid was also the seat of the Bulgarian Patriarchate. After the Byzantine conquest of the city in 1018, the Bulgarian Patriarchate was downgraded to an Archbishopric and placed under the authority of the Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople.
The higher clergy after 1018 was almost invariably Greek, including during the period of Ottoman domination, until the abolition of the archbishopric in 1767. At the beginning of the 16th century the archbishopric reached its peak subordinating the Sofia, Vidin, Vlach and Moldavian eparchies, part of the former Peć Patriarchate (including Peć itself), and even the Orthodox districts of Italy (Apulia, Calabria and Sicily), Venice and Dalmatia.
As an episcopal city, Ohrid was an important cultural center. Almost all surviving churches were built by the Byzantines and by the Bulgarians, the rest of them date back to the short time of Serbian rule during the late Middle Ages.
Ohrid is credited[citation needed] as being the likely birthplace of the Cyrillic alphabet, which was most probably created by St. Clement of Ohrid that further reformed the Glagolic alphabet created in turn by the brothers Saints Cyril and Methodius.
Bohemond and his Norman army took the city in 1083. In the 13th and 14th century the city changed hands between the Despotate of Epirus, the Bulgarian, the Byzantine and the Serbian Empires. At the end of the 14th century it was conquered by the Ottomans and remained under them until 1912. The Christian population declined during the first centuries of Ottoman rule. In 1664 there were only 142 Christian houses. The situation improved in the 18th century when Ohrid emerged as an important trade center on a major trade route. At the end of this century it had around five thousand inhabitants. Towards the end of the 18th century and in the early part of the 19th century, Ohrid region, like other parts of European Turkey, was a hotbed of unrest. Semi-independent feudal lords such as Mahmud Pasha Bushatlija and Djeladin Beg controlled Ohrid and openly defied the central government by not submitting taxes and by using tax money to bolster their own private armies. By the end of 19th century Ohrid had 2409 houses with 11900 inhabitants out of which 45% were Muslim while the rest was mainly Orthodox Christian. Before 1912, Ohrid (Ohri) was a township center bounded to Monastir sanjak in Monastir province (present-day Bitola).
| Natural and Cultural Heritage of the Ohrid region* | |
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| UNESCO World Heritage Site | |
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| State Party | Republic of Macedonia |
| Type | Mixed |
| Criteria | i, iii, iv, vii |
| Reference | 99 |
| Region** | Europe and North America |
| Inscription history | |
| Inscription | 1979 (3rd Session) |
| Extensions | 1980 |
| * Name as inscribed on World Heritage List. ** Region as classified by UNESCO. |
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Its first known bishop was Zosimus (c. 344). In the sixth century it was destroyed by an earthquake (Procopius, Historia Arcana, xv), but was rebuilt by Emperor Justinian (527-565). The new city was made the capital of the prefecture, or department, of Illyricum, and for the sake of political convenience it was made also the ecclesiastical capital of the Illyrian or southern Danubian parts of the empire (southern Hungary, Bosnia, Serbia, Transylvania, Moldavia, Wallachia). Justinian was unable to obtain immediately for this step a satisfactory approbation from Pope Agapetus or Pope Silverius. The Emperor's act, besides being a usurpation of ecclesiastical authority, was a detriment to the ancient rights of Thessalonica as representative of the Apostolic See in the Illyrian regions. Nevertheless, the new diocese claimed, and obtained in fact, the privilege of autocephalia, or ecclesiastical independence, and through its long and chequered history retained, or struggled to retain, this character. Pope Vigilius, under pressure from Emperor Justinian, recognized the exercise of patriarchal rights by the Metropolitan of Justiniana Prima within the broad limits of its civil territory, but Gregory the Great treated him as no less subject than other Illyrian bishops to the Apostolic See (Duchesne, op. cit., 233-237).
The inroads of the Avars and Slavs in the seventh century brought about the ruin of this ancient centre of religion and civilization, and for two centuries its metropolitan character was in abeyance.
But after the conversion of the new Bulgarian masters of Illyria (864) the see rose again to great prominence, this time under the name of Achrida (Achris). Though Byzantine missionaries were the first to preach the Christian faith in this region, the first archbishop was sent by Rome. It was thence also that the Bulgarians drew their first official instruction and counsel in matters of Christian faith and discipline, a monument of which may be seen in the Responsa ad Consulta Bulgarorum of Nicholas I (858-867), one of the most influential of medieval canonical documents[9]. However, the Bulgarian King (Knyaz) Boris was soon won over by Byzantine influence. In the Eighth General Council held at Constantinople (869), Bulgaria was incorporated with the Byzantine patriarchate of Constantinople, and in 870 the Latin missionaries were expelled. Henceforth Byzantine metropolitans presided in Ohrid; it was made the capital of Bulgaria[10] during the rule of Samuil and profited by the tenth-century conquests of its warlike rulers so that it became the Metropolitan of several Byzantine dioceses in the newly conquered territories in the wider region of Macedonia , Thessaly, and Thrace. Bulgaria fell unavoidably within the range of the Photian schism, and so, from the end of the ninth century, the diocese of Ohrid was lost to Western and papal influences.
The overthrow of the Bulgarian empire in 1018 by Byzantine Emperor Basil II recovered Ohrid [11]. It became a seat of the Bulgarian Archbishopric of Ohrid. At a later date some of the great Byzantine families (e.g. the Ducas and the Comneni) claimed descent from the Emperors, or Cars, of Bulgaria. In 1053 the Metropolitan Leo of Ohrid signed with Michael Caerularius the latter's circular letter to John of Trani (Apulia in Italy) against the Latin Church. Theophylactus of Ohrid (1078) was one of the most famous of the medieval Byzantine exegetes; in his correspondence (Ep., 27) he maintains the traditional independence of the Diocese of Ohrid. The Bishop of Constantinople, he says, has no right of ordination in Bulgaria, whose bishop is independent. In reality Ohrid was during this period seldom in communion with either Constantinople or Rome. Towards the latter see, however, its sentiments were less than friendly, for in the fourteenth century we find the metropolitan Anthimus of Ohrid writing against the procession of the Holy Spirit from the Father and the Son. Yet Latin missionaries appear in Ohrid in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, mostly Franciscan monks, to whom the preservation of the Roman obedience in these regions is largely owing. In the thirteenth century, the noted judge Demetrios was archbishop of Ohrid.
Pursuant to Archbishop Arsenius II's petition, the Ecumenical Patriarch Samuel I had the see finally abolished as an autocephalous unit in January 1767 by an order of the Ottoman Sultan Mustapha III. At the height of its authority, Ohrid could count as subject to its authority ten metropolitan and six episcopal dioceses.
There is a legend supported by observations by Ottoman traveler from 15th century, Evlia Celebia that there were 365 chapels within the town boundaries, one for every day of the year. Today this number is significantly smaller. However during the medieval times, Ohrid was called Slavic Jerusalem[12].
Note: Besides being a holy center of the region, it is also the source of knowledge and pan-Slavic literacy. The restored Monastery at Plaošnik was actually one of the oldest Universities in the western world, dating before the 10th century.
There is a nearby airport, Ohrid Airport (now known as Apostle Paul Airport) that is open all year round.
Ohrid is twinned with:
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 View from the Lake |
 The Church of St. John at Kaneo high above the lake |
 Church of St. John at Kaneo |
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 Monument of saints Cyril and Methodius |
 Church of St. John at Kaneo against Ohrid's panorama |
 1000-year-old tree in Ohrid's old bazaar |
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 View of the fortress and city |
 St. Panteleimon at night |
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Ohrid is a large town in southwestern Macedonia on the shore of Lake Ohrid. A town of vast history and heritage, it was made a UNESCO heritage site in 1980. Nestled between high mountains up to 2,800 m and Lake Ohrid, it is not only a place of historic significence but also of outstanding natural beauty. Ohrid is the jewel in Macedonia's crown.
Archaeological finds indicate that Ohrid is one of the oldest human settlements in all of Europe. The lake itself is over three million years old. Ohrid town is first mentioned in Greek documents from 353 B.C.E., when it was known as Lychnidos - or, “the city of light.” Only much later, in 879 C.E., was it renamed Ohrid. The name probably derives from the phrase “Vo Hrid” – meaning roughly, “on the hill.” The town as we know it today was built mostly between the 7th and 19th centuries. During the Byzantine period, Ohrid became a significant cultural and economic center, serving as an episcopal center of the Orthodox Church and as the site of the first Slavic university run by St. Kliment and St. Naum at the end of the 9th century. At the beginning of the 11th century, Ohrid briefly became the capital of the great Samuil empire, whose fortress still presides over the city today.
There is a regular bus service from Bitola and Skopje. The bus from Skopje takes approximately three hours.
The easiest way to get to Ohrid is from Skopje, where buses run every few hours. A bus from Skopje takes about 3 and a half hours and costs €10 one-way. From Albania, there is a bus from Tirana to the town of Struga, just north of Ohrid, where there are taxis to Ohrid for about €5. It's a little bit trickier to get to Ohrid from Greece. From Thessaloniki, the easiest way is to take a train to Skopje and then hop on a bus to Ohrid. If you wan't reach Ohrid and Macedonia from Montenegro there is a regular bus line from Herceg Novi to Skopje via Albania, passing through Kotor, Budva, Bar and Ulcinj. Ticket price vary from place in Montenegro and most expensive is from Herceg Novi and cost around 25 EUR.
The Ohrid bus station is a few kilometers outside of the center of town (about a 30 minute walk). A taxi from the bus station to the center costs around 1 euro. In the summer, travelers to Skopje from Ohrid will want to buy a ticket a day or two in advance.
Ohrid - Skopje. 5:00, 5:30, 7:30, 10:45, 12:15, 15:00, 17:45, 19:00 Skopje - Ohrid. 6:00, 8:00, 10:00, 14:00, 14:45, 15:30,16:00, 16:30, 18:30
Call the busstation at +389 (0)46 260 339
Ohrid also has an international airport: "St Paul the Apostle" (IATA: OHD)[1] about 7 km from city center which connects Ohrid with Belgrade, Ljubljana, Zurich, Dusseldorf, Tel Aviv, Vienna, and Amsterdam. The airport is open year round but most airlines only fly during the summer, so check with your travel agent or airline for most current information. Ohrid Travel Agency located in Clifton, New Jersey, is an ARC accredited travel agency and offers low price affordable consolidator fares to Ohrid and Skopje from the United States.
Flights are operated between Ohrid and the following locations (although on occasional incoming flights have been known to be diverted to Skopje instead, without notice):
Transport in Ohrid is inexpensive and covers all areas of the city. Taxi drivers may try charge tourists higher rates, so insist on a set price.
The city center and the old town is compact and best seen on foot. An interesting walk that takes in the main attractions starts in the main square. The city's museums are in this area. From here, visit St.Sophia Church, the Antique Theater. Finally, walk up the hill to King Samuil's Fortress. Plaoshnik, and St John - Kaneo can be visited on the return journey.
Aside of the lake, Ohrid is most famous for its ancient churches, basilicas, and monasteries where Saints Kliment and Naum with the help of king Boris I (students of Cyril and Methodus) wrote their teachings and formulated the Cyrillic alphabet used in the Republic of Macedonia, as well as neighboring countries Bulgaria, Serbia and Montenegro and as far as Russia, and many of the countries of the former Soviet Union. Most of these churches charge an entry which for tourists is normally double that what locals pay, but is still worth it. It is a good idea to cover up when entering a church, but most locals will understand the inconveniences involved during a hot Macedonian Summer. There is also a wonderful ancient walled fortress at the top of the city. Churches to visit include:
Restaurants and hotels throughout Macedonia are proudly displaying Ohrid trout (Ohridska pastrmka) on their menus because it is very delicious but it is illegal to catch the fish along the Macedonian shoreline of Lake Ohrid. Please do not support or encourage the consumption of the trout. Ohrid trout, an ancient living fish, is in severe danger. There is also another trout species called Belvica. Some popular restaurants in Ohrid known to most people in town simply by the name are:
Try these foods:
The traditional Macedonian alcoholic beverages are rakija and mastika. Boza is a refreshing drink on a hot summer day; it was spread throughout Macedonia with the arrival of the Turks and it has significant nutritional value. Other popular drinks are Macedonian wines called Kavadarka and Smederevka and Skopsko beer.
Main forms of accommodation are private houses, apartments and villas. For an average price of around 10 - €15 per night, you will find an excellent private facilities, located mostly in the Old Town. While arriving there, to get a host you can ask at the nearest Tourist Information Bureau (at the bus station, for example). However, the best solution is to make your reservation in advance via Internet or phone, having in mind the growing popularity of Ohrid as tourist destination:
East coast of Lake Ohrid:
The east coast is the most beautiful part of Ohrid Lake. It is part of Galičica National Park and it is protected by UNESCO along with the lake for its natural values. The first part of the east coast is less interesting, the road goes along the lake and is lined with hotels, tourist settlements and organized beaches.
From here on the coast becomes more wild and beautiful with stunning views over the lake.
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   | Ohrid - OHRID AT YOUT FINGERTIPS / OHRID NA DLANKA |
| | Ohrid Photo Gallery - Ohrid :: Sabin Photo Gallery - Travel Pictures - Poze |
| | Antique Theatre - Culture - Republic of Macedonia |
| | Travel Macedonia - Macedonian Travel Guide - Skopje Hotels offer cheap and luxure Hotel in Skopje Macedonia |
| | Ohrid Information Database - Ohrid News - Mojot Ohrid |
| | Church of St. John of Kaneo - Sv. Jovan Bogoslov - Kaneo |
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