Skopjan

Skopje ( , , ; mk, Скопје ; sq, Shkup) is the capital and largest city of North Macedonia. It is the country's political, cultural, economic, and academic centre.

The territory of Skopje has been inhabited since at least 4000 BC; remains of Neolithic settlements have been found within the old Kale Fortress that overlooks the modern city centre. Originally a Paeonian city, Scupi became the capital of Dardania in the second century BC. On the eve of the 1st century AD, the settlement was seized by the Romans and became a military camp. When the Roman Empire was divided into eastern and western halves in 395 AD, Scupi came under Byzantine rule from Constantinople. During much of the early medieval period, the town was contested between the Byzantines and the Bulgarian Empire, whose capital it was between 972 and 992.

From 1282, the town was part of the Serbian Empire, and acted as its capital city from 1346 to 1371. In 1392, Skopje was conquered by the Ottoman Turks, who called it (). The town stayed under Ottoman control for over 500 years, serving as the capital of the pashasanjak of and later the Vilayet of Kosovo. In 1912, it was annexed by the Kingdom of Serbia during the Balkan Wars. During the First World War the city was seized by the Kingdom of Bulgaria, and, after the war, it became part of the newly formed Kingdom of Yugoslavia as the capital of Vardarska Banovina. In the Second World War the city was again captured by Bulgaria and in 1945 became the capital of SR Macedonia, a federated state within the Yugoslavia. The city developed rapidly, but this was interrupted in 1963 when it was hit by a disastrous earthquake.

Skopje is on the upper course of the Vardar River, and is on a major north–south Balkan route between Belgrade and Athens. It is a centre for metal-processing, chemical, timber, textile, leather, and printing industries. Industrial development of the city has been accompanied by development of the trade, logistics, and banking sectors, as well as an emphasis on the fields of transportation, culture and sport. According to the last official census from 2021, Skopje had a population of 422,540 inhabitants in its urban area and 526,502 in ten municipalities that form the city and, beside Skopje, include many other less urbanized and rural settlements some of which are away from the city itself or even border the neighbouring Kosovo.

Name

The name of the city comes from Scupi, which was the name of early Paeonian settlement (later capital of Dardania and subsequently Roman colony) nearby. The meaning of that name is unknown, but there is a hypothesis, it derives from the Greek , (lit. "watcher, observer"), referring to its position on a high place, from which the whole place could be observed.

After Antiquity, Scupi was occupied by various people and consequently its name was translated several times in several languages. Thus Scupi became "Skopje", and later "Üsküb" ( ota, اسكوب) for the Turks. This name was adapted in Western languages in "Uskub" or "Uskup", and these two appellations were used in the Western world until 1912. Some Western sources also cite "Scopia" and "Skopia". is in fact the name of the city in Aromanian. Nowadays, the local Albanian population call the city "Shkup" and "Shkupi", the latter being the definite form.

When Vardar Macedonia was annexed by the Kingdom of Serbia in 1912, the city officially became "Skoplje" () and this name was adopted by many languages. To reflect local pronunciation, the city's name was eventually spelled as "Skopje" ( mk, Скопје) after the Second World War, when standard Macedonian became the official language of the new Socialist Republic of Macedonia.

Geography

Topography

Skopje is in the north of the country, in the centre of the Balkan peninsula, and halfway between Belgrade and Athens. The city was built in the Skopje valley, oriented on a west–east axis, along the course of the Vardar river, which flows into the Aegean Sea in Greece. The valley is approximately wide and it is limited by several mountain ranges to the north and south. These ranges limit the urban expansion of Skopje, which spreads along the Vardar and the Serava, a small river which comes from the North. In its administrative boundaries, the City of Skopje stretches for more than , but it is only wide.

Skopje is approximately 245 m above sea level and covers 571.46 km².