ISAR FORTRESS (ТВРДИНАТА ТВРДИНАТА)

This ruined fortress (Тврдина Исар/Tvrdina Isar) offers a beautiful panorama. Placed on a hilltop plateau, 360 m above sea level, it overlooks the city to the west, but also the confluence of the Bregalnica and Otinja rivers to the south, from a height of 100 m. The site was permanently occupied from the ^3rd century BC by miners. They exploited an iron deposit on the site. The plateau was then equipped with a wall defending an area of 7 ha. Later, in the Middle Ages, when the deposit was exhausted, only a part of the plateau was used. The Bulgarian and Byzantine empires succeeded one another here and built powerful walls, in some places more than 1.50 m wide. These are partly preserved as well as the remains of a keep. Two necropolises, one ancient, the other medieval, have also been discovered, as well as a basilica and a cistern. The site was occupied again by the Serbs in the ^14th century, then abandoned by the Ottomans in the ^17th century. The road that leads there stops in front of the necropolis of the partisans of the Second World War dating from 1974. It is marked by beautiful stone blocks carved by the Serbian designer Bogdan Bogdanović (1922-2010). Then you have to climb a long series of steps to reach the top. The most courageous can make the whole climb on foot: a path starts in the city and passes by the beautiful church of Archangel Michael erected in 1332. But this one lost its frescoes when it was transformed into mosque.