Leskovik

Leskovik (Leskoviku) is a town in Korçë County, in southeastern Albania. Historically, until 2015, it was a municipality, after which it became a subdivision of Kolonjë. The town is located close to the Greek-Albanian border. The population at the 2011 census was estimated as being 1,525.

Name
The name comes from the Slavic word leska ("hazel" or "hazel river"), together with the suffix ik(ë). The name of the town was shown as Lexovico in an 1821 map by the French writer and traveller François Pouqueville, and as Leskovik in an Ottoman document produced in 1851.

History
Leskovik was created as a summer resort by the Ottomans, when the region came under their control in the 15th century. It was within the Sanjak of Ioannina. It was recognised as a town in the early 1800s. It was elevated from a kaza (subdistrict) into a sanjak. Leskovik kaza (subdistrict) was located within Ioannina sanjak, and was part of Yanya Vilayet (province) until 1912.

19th century
Leskovik and the nearby mountain Melesin was the site of a battle in 1831.

Ottoman Albanian spahis and landowners from 19th century Leskovik owned estate properties (chiftlik) in parts of the Balkans and in particular the Thessalian plain, until its loss to Greece in 1881 leading to local economic decline and increasing reliance on agriculture. Leskovik was an important centre for the Sufi Bektashi order, and it was strongly established in the surrounding area. The Sufi Halveti order was also present in the town, and the Sufi Hayatiyya order had a tekke dating from 1796. In the late Ottoman period and on the eve of the Balkan Wars, the population of Leskovik was mostly Muslim Bektashi. In Leskovik, a Bektashi tekke was founded in 1887 by Abedin Baba, a town native and religious figure. The tekke housed a small number of dervishes and Abedin Baba's gravesite, later destroyed by war. Another religious building was the Pazar (Bazaar) mosque of Leskovik. A few Muslim Albanians from Leskovik were employed in the Ottoman bureaucracy as administrative officials governing some districts in parts of the empire. Greek education was present in Leskovik at the 1898–1899 school year with one boys' and one girls' school and a total of 100 pupils attending them.

20th century
During the Balkan Wars (1912–1913) Ottoman rule came to an end and Leskovik briefly came under the control of the Greek forces. Shortly after the town was visited by an international commission who was responsible to draw the precise borders between the Kingdom of Greece and the newly established Principality of Albania. There was some difficulty in drawing the new border by the international demarcation border commission as the area around Leskovik and nearby Konitsa contained mixed populations of Albanians and Greeks. After the partition of Leskovik kaza (1913) along demographic lines, its Greek settlements went to Greece and its Albanian settlements became part of Albania, with Leskovik itself placed in the Albanian province of Kolonjë.

Leskovik was finally ceded to Albania under the terms of the Protocol of Florence (17 December 1913). In March, 5 1914 the town officially joined the Autonomous Republic of Northern Epirus.

World War II
At 21 November 1940, during the Greco-Italian War, units of the II Army Corps of the advancing Greek forces entered Leskovik after breaching the Italian defences. The Greek positions, including Leskovik, were abandoned after Albania was invaded by Germany in April 1941.

Cold War
The People's Socialist Republic of Albania, being an ally of the Soviet Union, was involved in the Greek Civil War (1946–1949) by supporting the communist led Greek Democratic Army. Leskovik became for a period its headquarters. The town also hosted a training, a supply center, as well as medical facilities for the communist guerrillas, who mounted several invasions from Albanian soil into the Greek region of Grammos and fled back to Albania once an operation was completed.

Religion
Part of the Eastern Orthodox community consists of Aromanians that are found in mixed neighbourhoods in the town.

One of the surviving (and undamaged) monuments in Leskovik is the decorated tomb of Kani Pasha, who died in 1918. It is located inside the present Bektashi tekke. In around 2000, a number of Muslims, living in Greece but originally from Leskovik, and who had a Bektashi background, began work on restoring the tekke.

In the wider area, the religious composition is distributed between Islam: (Bektashis and Halvetis) such as in nearby Gjonç and Gline and Christianity (mostly Orthodoxy) with some converts to Orthodoxy, others to Roman Catholicism and Protestantism, as well as some irreligious people.

There is evidence that that Sa'di order of dervishes, who were an Islamic Sufi sect, had a presence in Leskovik.

Local government
The local government of Leskovik was reorganised during the 2015 local government reforms, when it became a subdivision of Kolonjë.

Geography
Leskovik is located 0.7 mile from Melesin mountain, inside Ersekë-Konitsa-Çarshovë triangle.

Demography
Leskovik's population during the General Census of 1881–1883 was recorded as consisting entirely of "Muslims" and 'Greeks":

The population has decreased after the 1990s, due to emigration. In the modern period, the town of Leskovik is religiously mixed, composed of Muslim Bektashis and Eastern Orthodox Christians. The population of Leskovik the 2011 census was estimated as being 1,525.

According to the 2011 Albanian census, out of the 1,525 inhabitants, 63.41% declared themselves as Albanians, 10,16% as Greeks and 1,44% as Aromanians. The rest of the population did not specify its ethnicity. However, on the quality of the specific data the Advisory Committee on the Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities stated that "the results of the census should be viewed with the utmost caution and calls on the authorities not to rely exclusively on the data on nationality collected during the census in determining its policy on the protection of national minorities.", while, the census was boycotted by a significant number of the Greek community of Albania.

Notable people



 * Jani Vreto (1822–1900), Albanian rilindas and a founding member of the Central Committee for the Defence of the Rights of the Albanian People, was born in the village of Postenan, near Leskovik.
 * Abedin Baba of Leskoviku (born before 1867 – 1912) – Bektashi religious figure and poet.
 * Hafize Leskoviku (born c. 1870), singer and instrumental musician
 * Nezir Leskoviku (1876 – c. 1970), diplomat and Ottoman administrator
 * Ahmed Vefiku (born 1882), Albanian politician.
 * Mustafa Qulli, better known as Muço Qulli (1887–1915), Albanian patriot, publicist, publisher of the  Shkodër-based newspaper Populli
 * Ajdin Asllan (1895–1976), musician, record label owner, Vatra activist, composer of Vatra's hymn;
 * Naim Frashëri, actor, (1923–1975), born in Leskovik.
 * Asllan Rusi (1944–1983), volleyball player, the main volleyball arena in Tirana bears his name
 * Ibrahim Sirri Leskoviku, Albanian politician.