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Ipek

1911 Encyclopedia Britannica

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(Sla y. Petch, Lat. Pescium), a town of Albania, European Turkey, in the vilayet of Kossovo and sanjak of Novibazar, 73 m. E.N.E. of Scutari, near the eastern base of the Mokra Planina, the Montenegrin frontier, and the headwaters of the Ibar and White Drin. Pop. (1905), about 15,000, principally Albanians and Serbs. A small stream bearing, like several others in the Balkan peninsula, the name of Bistritza (the bright or clear), flows through the town. On one of the neighbouring heights is situated the monastery of Ipek, founded by Archbishop Arsenius in the 13th century, and famous as the seat until 1690 of the patriarchs of the Servian church. The buildings are surrounded by thick walls, and comprise a large central church (Our Lady's), and two side chapels (the Martyrs' and St Demetrius'), each surmounted by a leaden cupola. The church dates from the 16th and 17th centuries. Among its numerous objects of interest are the white marble tombs of Arsenius and other chiefs of the Servian church, and the white marble throne on which the patriarchs were crowned. Ipek has been incorrectly identified by some writers with Doclea or Dioclea (Dukle in Montenegro), the birthplace of Diocletian, and the capital of a small principality which was overthrown by the Bulgarians in the 11th century.

See Barth, Reise durch das Innere der europaischen Turkei (Berlin, 1864); A. P. Irby and G. M. M. Mackenzie, Travels in the Slavonic Provinces of Turkey (1877); M. E. Durham, Through the Lands of the Serb (London, 1904).