Stip (Штип, Shtip) - a city in the eastern part of the Republic of Macedonia, spread along the valley of the river Bregalnica. According to the 2002 census, the city had 40,016 (43,625 with Novo Selo) inhabitants and is the largest city in Eastern Macedonia and the 7th largest city in Macedonia. Stip is the seat of the Municipality of Stip and the center of the East-planning Region. Stip is one of the oldest cities in Macedonia. In 2008, St. Nicholas was named patron saint of the city.
In written documents, the name Astibo is first
mentioned by the ancient chronicler Polyenes in the 3rd century BC.
AD, who reported that the Paeonian kings were crowned in the river
Astibo (today's Bregalnica). Macedonian King Alexander I around 360
BC he annexed this area to the ancient Macedonian empire. Stip is
mentioned in the 1st century AD, during the time of the Roman
emperor Tiberius (14-37) as the Paeonian city of Astibo and was
included among the larger and more important ancient Paeonian cities
in eastern Macedonia. Scientists locate Astibo in the area of
today's old part of the city of Stip, on the eastern slopes of the
hill Isar and the locations Star Konak, Tuzlija and Gorno Maalo. The
city is also noted in Tabula Pјttingemiana (ancient map of the 4th
century) as a settlement, one of the stations on the road to
Stobi-Pautalia (Kyustendil) - Serdika (Sofia).
In late
antiquity and in the early Byzantine period, the settlement existed
under the name Stipeon, and in the Middle Ages, around the 6th and
7th century, it received the present name Stip. In the Middle Ages,
around the end of the 4th century and during the 7th century, during
the conquests of the Avars and the Slavs in the Balkans, almost all
the late antique and early Byzantine cities were destroyed,
including Stipeon. Stip existed during the reign of Samuel, in the
period between 976 and 1014, and was later conquered by the
Byzantines. In the 9th century, the city was under Bulgarian rule,
and after the Battle of Velbuzhd near (Kyustendil), Stip fell under
the Serbian ruler Stefan Decanski.
Ottoman period
In 1395,
Stip finally fell under the rule of the Ottoman Empire and became
kaza (nahija) in the composition of the Kyustendil Sandzak. From
then until the 17th century, there are few written documents about
the fate of Stip.
With the Spanish Inquisition at the
beginning of the 16th century, a large number of Sephardic Jews fled
to the territory of the Ottoman Empire, and some of them settled in
Stip, which can be seen from the Turkish sources from 1519 when 38
Jewish families or 200 lived in Stip. souls.
In a document
from 1620, the city is mentioned as an episcopal seat, and in 1661
the famous Turkish travel writer Evliya Çelebi passed through Stip.
He described the city in the following words:
"Stip is a Cadillac
with a fortress on the hill that guards. In the city there are
mosques, baths, a large caravanserai and a small river."
Evliya Çelebi wrote that Stip had 2,240 houses, 24 Muslim temples
(mosques and mosques), seven tekkes, seven annas, two baths, one
caravan-saraj, eleven schools and one madrasa. The city had a bazaar
with 450 craft and trade shops, with a bazaar full of valuable goods
from all seven parts of the world.
The French consul Peony
noted that in 1800 the city had between 3 and 4,000 inhabitants.
During the Austro-Turkish war, in 1689, Stip was conquered by
the Austro-Hungarians, but in 1691 it was captured again by the
Turks.
During the Austro-Turkish War, the city suffered great
damage. Namely, when entering the city, in the autumn of 1689, by
order of General Piccolomini, they first robbed him and then set him
on fire. After these sufferings, Stip could not recover until the
XIX century, after which it returns to its former glory. The famous
French Balkanologist - Ami Boue (1794-1881), visited Stip in the
middle of the XIX century and called it a golden city, which then
had about 20,000 inhabitants, most of whom were half Christian, a
city with a developed city bazaar, with beautiful mosques, many
public fountains, etc. During this period, Stip was an economic and
cultural center in Eastern Macedonia. In the city there were
developed handicrafts from which they stood out: tannery, cobbler,
bobbler, shoemaker and others. The merchants-shopkeepers from Stip,
spread their goods loaded on horses on the surrounding kazi. Exactly
in Stip, there were charlagan's workshops in which poppy was
processed.
In 1830, the first school in the vernacular was
opened in Stip, and in 1868, Josif Kovachev (1839-1898) opened the
first pedagogical school. A little later, in 1872, the first public
reading room "Dejatelnost" started operating. At the end of the 19th
century, from 1894 to 1896, Goce Delchev, the ideologue of the
Macedonian national liberation movement, taught at the school (built
in 1872) in Novo Selo.
The Balkan and World Wars
During the Balkan Wars, the Stip
area was occupied by the Bulgarian and Serbian armies, and the
demarcation line between the two armies was drawn along the river
Bregalnica, so that Stip and the villages on the left side were
occupied by Bulgaria, which here begins to introduce its
administration. The territories on the right side of the river are
occupied by Serbia.
The same fate befell this people during
the First World War. Among the 58,000 soldiers from Macedonia
included in the mobilization, there are many citizens of Stip who
participate on many fronts, such as: Krivolak 1915-1916, the
Dobrudjani Front in 1916 and the Macedonian Front in 1916. Among the
other horrors and consequences of the First World War in Stip and
the Stip region are the appearance of infectious diseases, including
malaria, typhoid fever, cholera and the terrible Spanish flu.
During the Second World War, on April 6, 1941, Stip was bombed
by German planes that took off from bases from Bulgaria. In the
first attack, the Sokolana, which housed two military units of the
Royal Yugoslavia, was bombed, and in the second, the Isar and the
houses in the surrounding neighborhoods, as well as the city
hospital. On April 7, 1941, the city was captured by the 73rd German
Infantry Division, and on April 18 of the same year, the Bulgarian
General Staff received a notification from the command of the 12th
German Army that the units of the First Bulgarian Army were being
allowed to enter part of Macedonia. The Bulgarian occupying power in
Stip was established on April 26, 1941. On March 11, 1943, the Jews
from Stip (551 people from 131 families) were deported to the
concentration camp "Treblinka", where almost all of them were
killed, and only seven were rescued. Immediately after the
deportation of the Jews, the fascists destroyed the Jewish quarter
in the center of Stip, together with the Jewish school, the
synagogue and other buildings. On November 8, 1944, the National
Liberation War liberated the city. The citizens of Stip actively
participated in the National Liberation War, and about 2,000
fighters joined the resistance against the occupiers. During the
occupation, 814 inhabitants lost their lives, of which 88 in a
direct fight against the occupiers.
The city of Stip is located in the central part of
Eastern Macedonia. It covers an area of 13.5 km2 and lies at an
altitude of 300 m. The city is divided into many neighborhoods,
among them the Leftists and the Rightists, situated on the left and
right side of the upper course of the river Otinja. The city is
located between the heights of the Isar, Meri and Kumlak. The small
river Otinja (3 km long) flows through the center of Stip and
divides it into two parts. Also, the river Bregalnica passes through
Stip. Otinja flows into the river Bregalnica, in the southwestern
part of the city, in Stipsko Novo Selo. An integral part of the city
of Stip is Novo Selo, which is located in the southern part of the
city, in the gorge of Bregalnica, just behind the Isar, on the road
to Radovish. Novo Selo continues in Kezovica Maalo, which extends to
the mineral geothermal springs Kezovica and L'dzi (with water
temperature between 58 and 62 degrees).
Settlements and
neighborhoods
The center is located between the mall and the city
church. Isar is a neighborhood on the slopes of the hill of the same
name. In the neighborhood Radanski Pat, mostly Roma live. From the
rest of the city, the older neighborhoods are: Star Konak, Kadidere,
Tuzlija, Gorno Maalo and Novo Selo. Among the newer neighborhoods,
built mostly after the Second World War are: November 8 (according
to the day of liberation), Senjak (1-4), Prebeg, Duzlak, Peltekovo
Imanje, Babi, Levaci, Desnaci, Makedonka, Balkanska, Suitlak,
Avdokomanda, Prolet , Railway and others.