1.
Vardar
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The Vardar or Axios is the longest and major river in the Republic of Macedonia and also a major river of Greece. It is 388 km long, and drains an area of around 25,000 km2, the maximum depth of the river is 4 m. The river rises at Vrutok, a few north of Gostivar in the Republic of Macedonia. The Vardar basin comprises two-thirds of the territory of the Republic of Macedonia, the valley features fertile lands in the Polog region, around Gevgelija and in the Thessaloniki regional unit. The river is surrounded by mountains elsewhere, the superhighways Greek National Road 1 in Greece and M1 and E75 run within the valley along the rivers entire length to near Skopje. The river was famous during the Ottoman Empire and modern-day Turkey and was the inspiration for many folk songs. It has also depicted on the coat of arms of Skopje. The Vardaris or Vardarec is a powerful prevailing northerly wind which blows across the river valley in Greek Macedonia as well as in the Republic of Macedonia. At first it descends along the canal of the Vardar valley, somewhat similar to the mistral wind of France, it occurs when atmospheric pressure over eastern Europe is higher than over the Aegean Sea, as is often the case in winter. The etymology of the word is unclear, however most probably, the origin of the name Vardar derives Bardários from Thracian, from Proto-Indo-European *wordo-wori- black water. The name Bardários was sometimes used by the Ancient Greeks in the 3rd Century BCE, the same name was widely used in the Byzantine era. The word may ultimately be derived from the PIE root *werǵ- and its Greek name, Axios, is mentioned by Homer as the home of the Paeonians allies of Troy. The name Affi is mentioned by Pjetër Bogdani in his work Cuneus Prophetarum as a name of Vardar. Great Morava Pčinja River Proceedings of the 1st Axios Catchment Consortium Meeting by the European Commission - DG Research, PIM Ivan Milutinović, Belgrade, Serbia, Morava - Vardar Navigation Route Morava - Vardar Navigation Route map Hydropower and navigation system Morava
2.
Skopje
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Skopje is the capital and largest city of the Republic of Macedonia. It is the political, cultural, economic, and academic center. It was known in the Roman period under the name Scupi, 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. On the eve of the 1st century AD, the settlement was seized by the Romans, 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 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, in 1392, the city was conquered by the Ottoman Turks who called the town Üsküp. The town stayed under Turkish control for over 500 years, serving as the capital of pashasanjak of Üsküb, at that time the city was famous for its oriental architecture. In 1912, it was annexed by the Kingdom of Serbia during the Balkan Wars and after the First World War the city part of the newly formed Kingdom of Serbs, Croats. In the Second World War the city was conquered by the Bulgarian Army, in 1944, it became the capital city of Democratic Macedonia, which was a federal state, part of Democratic Federal Yugoslavia. The city developed rapidly after World War II, but this trend was interrupted in 1963 when it was hit by a disastrous earthquake, in 1991, it became the capital city of an independent Macedonia. Skopje is located on the course of the Vardar River. It is a center for metal-processing, chemical, timber, textile, leather, 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. Skopje is located in the north of the Republic of Macedonia, in the center of the Balkan peninsula, the city is 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 20 kilometres wide and it is limited by several mountain ranges to the North and South and 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 33 kilometres, Skopje is approximately 245m above sea level and covers 571.46 km2. The urbanised area only covers 337 km2, with a density of 65 inhabitants per hectare, Skopje, in its administrative limits, encompasses many villages and other settlements, including Dračevo, Gorno Nerezi and Bardovci. According to the 2002 census, the City of Skopje comprised 506,926 inhabitants, the City of Skopje reaches the Kosovo border to the North-East. Clockwise, it is bordered by the Macedonian municipalities of Čučer-Sandevo, Lipkovo, Aračinovo, Ilinden, Studeničani, Sopište, Želino
3.
Arch bridge
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An arch bridge is a bridge with abutments at each end shaped as a curved arch. Arch bridges work by transferring the weight of the bridge and its loads partially into a horizontal thrust restrained by the abutments at either side, a viaduct may be made from a series of arches, although other more economical structures are typically used today. Possibly the oldest existing bridge is the Mycenaean Arkadiko bridge in Greece from about 1300 BC. The stone corbel arch bridge is used by the local populace. The well-preserved Hellenistic Eleutherna Bridge has a corbel arch. The 4th century BC Rhodes Footbridge rests on an early voussoir arch, a more complete survey by the Italian scholar Vittorio Galliazzo found 931 Roman bridges, mostly of stone, in as many as 26 different countries. Roman arch bridges were usually semicircular, although a number were segmental arch bridges, generally, Roman bridges featured wedge-shaped primary arch stones of the same in size and shape. The Romans built both single spans and lengthy multiple arch aqueducts, such as the Pont du Gard and Segovia Aqueduct. Their bridges featured from an early time onwards flood openings in the piers, e. g. in the Pons Fabricius in Rome, Roman engineers were the first and until the industrial revolution the only ones to construct bridges with concrete, which they called Opus caementicium. The outside was covered with brick or ashlar, as in the Alcántara bridge. The Romans also introduced segmental arch bridges into bridge construction, trajans bridge over the Danube featured open-spandrel segmental arches made of wood. This was to be the longest arch bridge for a thousand years both in terms of overall and individual span length, while the longest extant Roman bridge is the 790 m long Puente Romano at Mérida. The late Roman Karamagara Bridge in Cappadocia may represent the earliest surviving bridge featuring a pointed arch, in medieval Europe, bridge builders improved on the Roman structures by using narrower piers, thinner arch barrels and lower span-rise ratios on bridges. Gothic pointed arches were introduced, reducing lateral thrust. The 14th century in particular saw bridge building reaching new heights, the bridge at Trezzo sullAdda, destroyed in the 15th century, even featured a span length of 72 m, not matched until 1796. Constructions such as the acclaimed Florentine segmental arch bridge Ponte Vecchio combined sound engineering with aesthetical appeal, the three elegant arches of the Renaissance Ponte Santa Trinita constitute the oldest elliptic arch bridge worldwide. In China, the oldest existing bridge is the Zhaozhou Bridge of 605 AD. The Zhaozhou Bridge, with a length of 167 feet and span of 123 feet, is the worlds first wholly stone open-spandrel segmental arch bridge, Bridges with perforated spandrels can be found worldwide, such as in China
4.
Republic of Macedonia
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Macedonia, officially the Republic of Macedonia, is a country in the Balkan peninsula in Southeast Europe. It is one of the states of the former Yugoslavia. A landlocked country, the Republic of Macedonia has borders with Kosovo to the northwest, Serbia to the north, Bulgaria to the east, Greece to the south, the countrys geography is defined primarily by mountains, valleys, and rivers. The capital and largest city, Skopje, is home to roughly a quarter of the nations 2.06 million inhabitants, the majority of the residents are ethnic Macedonians, a South Slavic people. Albanians form a significant minority at around 25 percent, followed by Turks, Romani, Serbs, Macedonias history dates back to antiquity, beginning with the kingdom of Paeonia, a Thracian polity. In the late sixth century BCE the area was incorporated into the Persian Achaemenid Empire, the Romans conquered the region in the second century BCE and made it part of the much larger province of Macedonia. Macedonia remained part of the Byzantine Empire, and was raided and settled by Slavic peoples beginning in the sixth century CE. Following centuries of contention between the Bulgarian and Byzantine empires, it came under Ottoman dominion from the 14th century. Between the late 19th and early 20th century, a distinct Macedonian identity emerged, although following the Balkan Wars of 1912 and 1913, Macedonia remained a constituent socialist republic within Yugoslavia until its peaceful secession in 1991. Macedonia is a member of the UN and of the Council of Europe, since 2005 it has also been a candidate for joining the European Union and has applied for NATO membership. Although one of the poorest countries in Europe, Macedonia has made significant progress in developing an open, the countrys name derives from the Greek Μακεδονία, a kingdom named after the ancient Macedonians. The name is believed to have meant either highlanders or the tall ones. However, Robert S. P. Beekes supports that both terms are of Pre-Greek substrate origin and cannot be explained in terms of Indo-European morphology, the Republic of Macedonia roughly corresponds to the ancient kingdom of Paeonia, which was located immediately north of the ancient kingdom of Macedonia. In the late 6th century BC, the Achaemenid Persians under Darius the Great conquered the Paeonians, following the loss in the Second Persian invasion of Greece in 479 BC, the Persians eventually withdrew from their European territories, including from what is today the Republic of Macedonia. In 356 BC Philip II of Macedon absorbed the regions of Upper Macedonia, the Romans established the Province of Macedonia in 146 BC. Roman expansion brought the Scupi area under Roman rule in the time of Domitian, and it fell within the Province of Moesia. Whilst Greek remained the dominant language in the part of the Roman empire. Slavic peoples settled in the Balkan region including Macedonia by the late 6th century AD, during the 580s, Byzantine literature attests to the Slavs raiding Byzantine territories in the region of Macedonia, later aided by Bulgars. Historical records document that in c.680 a group of Bulgars, Slavs and Byzantines led by a Bulgar called Kuber settled in the region of the Keramisian plain, presians reign apparently coincides with the extension of Bulgarian control over the Slavic tribes in and around Macedonia
5.
Macedonia Square, Skopje
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Macedonia Square is the main square of Skopje, the capital of the Republic of Macedonia. The square is the biggest in Macedonia with total 18.500 m2 and it is located in the central part of the city, and it crosses the Vardar River. The Christmas festivals are held there and it commonly serves as the site of cultural, political. The independence of Macedonia from Yugoslavia was declared here by the countrys first president, the square is currently under re-development and there are many new buildings around the square being constructed. In 2007, the Macedonian government announced plans to reconstruct the Army House, in December 2008, a flagpole with the Macedonian flag was erected on Macedonia Square, near the Stone Bridge, as it was done on 68 other important locations throughout the country. On 2 May 2010, two monuments of Goce Delčev and Dame Gruev were erected near the Stone Bridge, the three main streets that merge onto the square are Maksim Gorki, Dimitar Vlahov and Street Macedonia. Dimitar Vlahov Street was converted into a street in 2011. Maksim Gorki, while not a pedestrian zone, is lined with Japanese Cherry trees, finally, Macedonia Street, the main pedestrian street, connects Macedonia Square to the Old Railway Station, which houses the City of Skopje Museum. Along Macedonia Street is the Mother Teresa Memorial House, which features an exhibit of artefacts from Mother Teresas life, Mother Teresas original family home was located near Macedonia Square, and a plaque marking the location can be found today. A feudal tower from the Middle Ages next to the Mother Teresa House still stands today, the reconstructed Old Theater and the new Archaeological Museum, expected to be complete in the 2012-2013 timeframe, will add additional cultural landmarks along the main tourist vertical. In May 2010, Marriott Hotels announced the construction of the first Marriott Hotel in the Balkans in Skopje on Macedonia Square, most of the above plans are part of the Skopje 2014 project
Камен мост (help·info), Turkish: Taşköprü) is a bridge across the Vardar River in Skopje, the capital of the Republic of Macedonia. The bridge is also less frequently known as the Dušan Bridge (Macedonian and Serbian: Душанов мост) after Stephen Dušan, Emperor of Serbia.[1]
