GREAT MOSQUE AND CHURCH OF ST. UROŠ

This mosque (Xhamia e Madhe, Velika Džamija) and Serbian Orthodox Church (Kisha e Shën Uroshit, Crkva Svetog Cara Uroša) are located in the centre of Ferizaj/Uroševac, along the railway line that runs through the middle of the town. Both dating from the 20th century, they are of limited interest, except that they are placed next to each other. Such proximity is rare, even in the Balkans. This appears today as a symbol of possible reconciliation between Orthodox Serbs and Muslim Albanians. The mosque is distinguished by its two minarets of 40 m height and its large dome of 10.50 m diameter. A first version was erected around 1894 thanks to a donation from Sultan Abdülhamid II. Partly destroyed after the departure of the Ottomans (1913), it was rebuilt at the beginning of the occupation, in 1941. It was renamed the Mollah-Veseli Mosque in honour of the Muslim preacher and local poet Mulla Vesel Guta (1905-1986), who was expelled to Turkey in 1945 for collaboration with the Nazis. It remains best known as the "Great Mosque" and was not damaged during the Kosovo war.

A unique architectural ensemble. The church, completed in 1933, was designed by the Serbian architect Josif Mihailović (1887-1941), who was mayor of Skopje in the 1930s. He was inspired by the church of the Gračanica monastery in covering the building with five domes reaching 30 m in height. Financed by donations from the local Serbian community (which still represented 10% of the population before 1998), it is one of the few churches dedicated to Emperor Uroš V, known as "the Weak", the last ruler of the Nemanjić dynasty, who died in 1371 and was canonized by the Serbian Patriarchate in the 16th century. It has been looted and damaged several times since 1999. With its campanile deliberately placed next to the mosque porch, the church was built here to mark the new Serbian rule during the period of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia (1918-1941). Abandoned since the beginning of the Kosovo war, it was renovated in 2015 and has had a priest again since 2016. That same year, the church and the mosque were classified as a single architectural ensemble by the Kosovo Ministry of Culture. The last time I heard, the priest and the imam who officiate here have become friends: together they talk about football and have had the wall that separated their places of worship knocked down.