1987 MACEDONIA - The Church of St. Panteleimon in Gorno Nerezi

Located near Skopje, at an altitude of 771m, on the wooded slopes of Mt. Vodno, Gorno Nerezi is known for the Church of St. Panteleimon, dedicated to the protector of health. The church was constructed in 1164 by order of Alexius Angelus Comnenus, a member of the imperial family, and its frescoes are famous examples of Comnenian Age Byzantine Art, depicting scenes from the Passion of Christ and various hagiographical illustrations.

1909 MACEDONIA - The Church of The Holy Saviour in Skopje

According to the 2002 census, 68.5% of the population of Skopje belonged to the Eastern Orthodox Church, while 28.6% of it belonged to Islam. However, because of its Ottoman past, Skopje has more mosques than churches. Among those is the Church of The Holy Saviour, built in the late 17th century or early 18th century upon foundations on an older church, and situated on a plateau under the Skopje Fortress, in the Old Town, not far from the Stone Bridge. It is interesting to note that inside the church there is preserved fragment of fresco painting that belonged to the older church.

0544 MACEDONIA - Young women in old traditional dress

Because today, March 8, is the International Women's Day, firstly I want to wish to all the representatives of the fair sex who follow this blog to have many happy years. For the same reason, today I will post four postcards depicting women from four continents. The first one is from Europe, more accurate from Macedonia, and show young women in beautiful traditional costumes. The national costumes in Macedonia (created over a long period of time), preserved the traces of old cultural influences, and in their way of development fit the elements of old Balkan, Slav and Oriental culture.

0293 MACEDONIA (Polog) - Galičnik Wedding Festival

Located on the slopes of the Bistra Mountain, in the western part of Macedonia, Galičnik is one of the two biggest and oldest Mijak villages in the region. Mijaks are known for their ecclesiastical architecture, woodworking, icon painting, and also for the extent to which old customs are preserved in their every day life. They speak the Galičnik dialect, which is distinguished by the archaic words, and was used in many historically important literary works for the Macedonian literature. Some historians suggested that they were originally Aromanians (Vlachs) speakers, assimilated later into the South-Slavic Macedonian society, but this theory needs more research.

0142 MACEDONIA (Skopje) - The Stone Bridge

The valleys of the rivers Morava (which flows north and empties into the Danube) and Vardar (which flows south and empties into the Aegean Sea) form a continuous natural corridor between the Pannonian Basin and the Aegean Sea, inhabited and used as migration route since Neolithic. In Roman times, Balkan Peninsula was crossed from east to west by three imperial roads, all intended to unite Rome and Constantinopolis (Istanbul). The first two journeyed from Viminacium, located not far from Singidunum (Belgrade), one of them following the Danube course, and the other one, Via Militaris (Via Diagonalis), descending on Morava valley until Naissus (Niš), and reached to Constantinopolis through Serdica (Sofia) and Philippopolis (Plovdiv). The third, the famous Via Egnatia, a continuation of the Via Appia, started from Dyrrachium (Durrës - Adriatic Sea) and also reached to Constantinopolis, through Thessalonice (Thessaloniki) and Aenus. Between Via Militaris and Via Egnatia was a road on the Vardar valley. So the mentioned corridor connected the three roads, being of utmost importance.

0030 MACEDONIA (Southeastern) - Natural and Cultural Heritage of the Ohrid region - Saint Panteleimon Monastery (UNESCO WHS)

Historical and geographical region of Macedonia, is not a secret, includes the Republic of Macedonia and larger or smaller parts of Greece, Bulgaria, Albania, Serbia and Kosovo. Macedonia is... Macedonia, a distinct entity and not a province of another country. Even if over time its boundaries have changed considerably, as well as the ethnic composition (in the sixth century Slavs began to settle in the Balkans, and later, under Byzantine rule, but especially under the Ottomans, have occurred many population movements). Even if the current Macedonians have just as much connection with Alexander the Great as the French with Vercingetorix, Romanians with Decebal or Iranians with Xerxes. Its inhabitants self-identification, culturally and regionally, as Macedonians is sufficient. Have anything to do with the postcard all these things? Maybe or maybe not.