Elbasan

Elbasan is a city in central Albania. It is located on the Shkumbin River in the District of Elbasan and the County of Elbasan, at 41°06′N 20°04′E / 41.100°N 20.067°E. It is one of the largest cities in Albania: the population at the 2011 census was 78,703. It was called Neokastron in Greek, Novigrad in Slavic and Terra Nuova in Italian. The modern name may derive either from the IE root *alb or from the Turkish il-basan. Before the Second World War, Elbasan was a city with a mixture of eastern and medieval buildings, narrow cobbled streets and a large bazaar. There was a clearly defined Christian settlement within the castle walls, a Vlach district on the outskirts of the city and several fine mosques and Islamic buildings. At the time the population was about 15,000 people. The English journalist James David Bourchier, then the Balkan correspondent of The Times, records that on a visit in 1911 he saw: "The population celebrating Bairam in central space: wonderful primitive merry-go round with gypsy minstrels, pushed round by the men with poles; also a cartwheel poised on a tree top; pekhilvans wrestling, mostly refugees from Dibra, thus gaining a precarious livelihood."