BERAT
Berat or as locals call him ONE UNDER ONE WINDOWS, from its unique architecture also some of them call WHITE CITY because white colour is everywhere through the bildings and houses.Berat is located in the south of the country. It is surrounded by mountains and hills including Tomorr on the east that was declared a national park.Also this city has a long river in the middle of town. Since 2008 this city is designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site comprises a unique style of architecture with influences from several civilizations. This city comprises an old fortified city filled with churches and mosques painted with grandiose wealth of visible murals and frescos. The city is also one of the main cultural centres of the country. This city has many cultural and historical values. Only in the castle were 42 churches but today are only 8. Also in this city are some mosques. Those buildings inside of city are a demonstration of religious coexistence in this city. We can mentions codixes .Codex Purpureus Beratinus is an uncial illuminated manuscript Gospel book written in Greek. Dated palaeography to the 6th-century, the manuscript is written in an uncial hand on purple vellum with silver ink. Also is Codex Aureus, it is a Greek minuscule manuscript of the New Testament on purple parchment, dated paleographically to the 9th century. This is one of the seven “purple codices” in the world to have survived to the present day, and one of the two known purple miniscules written with a gold ink.Those two codices are discovered in the castle in 1972 and now they are in the national historical museum in Tirana. Also another beautiful monument is part of this town. Its called Gorica Bridges and it was build at 1780 by locals and they did a reconstruction at 1922.It has 7 arches and its length is 129,3m and is 10m above the river. Berat castle It dates from 13th century and contains many Byzantine churches in the area and Ottoman mosques.It is built on a rocky hill on the left bank of the river Osum and is accessible only from the south. Historical researches says that since VII-II the castle was a strategic point and it became a city on the castle with big and long walls.Also the castle is part of beautiful old legend that talks about the castle Osum river and two mountains Spirag and Tomorr. This castle is the most visited place by turist from all the word.Another good reason to visit this city is traditional food.We can mentions albanian bread, Burek with chick peas,Burek with chicken.Also they have a traditional food calls Japrak that is composed with rice and grape leaves.Another traditional food is cake that is composed with rosted almonds and white cream.also some traditional drinks are Rakia that has a little beat similarities to tequila and another traditional drink is Boza ..Also a beautiful legend belongs this city. The legend talks about a beautiful princess that locals named Castle and two young and strong granddukes.Locals name them Tomorri and Spirag. Those are names of two big mountains wich are infront of eachother.They both fall in love with the castle so they need to fight with each other to earn te princess.Tomorr made some lines to Spirag with swords and Spirag shot him with broadside.So this is the reasons why the Spirag has lines and the Tomorr has pits.Meanwhile they fight the Castle cried over and over and hear tears formed the river Osum that runs down to her.
