Galičnik () is a mountain village in

North Macedonia North Macedonia, officially the Republic of North Macedonia, is a landlocked country in Southeast Europe. It shares land borders with Greece to the south, Albania to the west, Bulgaria to the east, Kosovo to the northwest and Serbia to the n ...

and along with

Lazaropole Lazaropole () is a village in the Municipality of Mavrovo and Rostuša, North Macedonia. Situated on a plateau at Mount Bistra and surrounded by beech and oak forest; at 1,350 m altitude, it is one of the highest settlements in the country. Dem ...

is one of the two biggest and oldest Mijak villages in the region. Galičnik has well-preserved traditional

architecture Architecture is the art and technique of designing and building, as distinguished from the skills associated with construction. It is both the process and the product of sketching, conceiving, planning, designing, and construction, constructi ...

, including an

amphitheater An amphitheatre ( U.S. English: amphitheater) is an open-air venue used for entertainment, performances, and sports. The term derives from the ancient Greek ('), from ('), meaning "on both sides" or "around" and ('), meaning "place for vie ...

in the village square, and is famous for its surrounding countryside and nature reserve. The village is known for the Galička Svadba, a traditional wedding custom held annually in summer (in July), on the day of the village feast of the

Patron Saint A patron saint, patroness saint, patron hallow or heavenly protector is a saint who in Catholicism, Anglicanism, Eastern Orthodoxy or Oriental Orthodoxy is regarded as the heavenly advocate of a nation, place, craft, activity, class, clan, fa ...

– '' Petrovden'' ( St. Peter's day). During the wedding, local men will dance the " Teškoto" (the ''"hard"'' or ''"heavy"'').

History

Galičnik has traditionally been identified as a Mijak village. Galičnik (''Galiçnik'') is attested in the Ottoman ''

defter A ''defter'' was a type of tax register and land cadastre in the Ottoman Empire. Etymology The term is derived from Greek , literally 'processed animal skin, leather, fur', meaning a book, having pages of goat parchment used along with papyrus ...

'' of 1467 as a village in the

ziamet Ziamet was a form of land tenure in the Ottoman Empire, consisting in grant of lands or revenues by the Ottoman Sultan to an individual in compensation for their services, especially military services. The ziamet system was introduced by Osman I, ...

of Reka which was under the authority of Karagöz Bey. The village appears as uninhabited. At the end of the 19th century, Galičnik was a large Bulgarian palanka , with its inhabitants engaged in masonry and animal husbandry - mainly sheep breeding. According to ''Ethnographie des Vilayets D'Andrinople, de Monastir, et de Salonique'', published in Constantinople in 1878, the village had a total of 500 houses, with 1482 Orthodox Bulgarians. In statistics gathered by

Vasil Kanchov Vasil Kanchov (26 July 1862 – 6 February 1902) was a geographer, ethnographer and teacher who served as Minister of Education of Bulgaria. Early life and education Vasil Kanchov was born in Vratsa. Upon graduating from High school i ...

in 1900, the village of Galičnik was inhabited by 3300 Orthodox Bulgarians. At the beginning of the 20th century, the entire Christian population of the village was under the rule of

Bulgarian Exarchate The Bulgarian Exarchate (; ) was the official name of the Bulgarian Orthodox Church before its autocephaly was recognized by the Ecumenical See in 1945 and the Bulgarian Patriarchate was restored in 1953. The Exarchate (a de facto autocephaly) ...

. According to the Secretary of the Exarchate Dimitar Mishev ("La Macédoine et sa Population Chrétienne”) in 1905 there were 4840 Bulgarian Exarchists in Galičnik and a Bulgarian school operated in the village. According to statistics from the newspaper " Debarski Glas " in 1911, there were 560 Bulgarian exarchate and 20 patriarchal houses in Galičnik (since 1892). A Serbian school operates in the village with 1 male and 1 female teacher and 22 students. On his 1929 ethnic map of Northwestern Macedonia, Afanasy Selishchev marked Galičnik as a Bulgarian village.

Archictecture

The village is built based on traditional housing standards used for centuries in the region. Stone wall construction, supported by wooden beams, compact earth insulation and using stone slate roofing. There are many houses owned by prominent families in Galičnik that are protected by the Macedonian Cultural Heritage Protection Office. A selected few are as follows: * House of Jovan Muratovski * House of Pejčin Tomovski * House of Miloš and Dingo Melovski * House of Pavle Cincarovski * Residence of Gjorgji Čalčevski Galicnik 1908

Notable people from Galičnik

* Slavko Brezoski (1921-2017) *

Lazar Ličenoski Lazar Ličenoski ( Macedonian: Лазар Личеноски; 26 March 1901 in Galicnik – 10 April 1964 in Skopje) was one of the first Macedonian expressionist painters and one of the most authentic painters of landscape, in which he importe ...

(1901-1964) *

Doksim Mihailović Doksim Mihailović (; 20 February 1883 – 24 October 1912) was a Macedonian Serb ''voivode'' (military commander), originally a teacher, who joined the Serbian Chetnik Organization to fight in Ottoman Macedonia, and then the Balkan Wars (in the a ...

(1883–1912) * Risto Ognjanovikj-Lonoski (1870-1941) *

Georgi Pulevski Georgi Pulevski, sometimes also Gjorgji, Gjorgjija Pulevski or Đorđe Puljevski ( or Ѓорѓија Пулевски, , ; 1817 – 13 February 1893), was a Mijak revolutionary, self-styled lexicographer, self-taught grammarian, historian, te ...

(1817–1895) * Aleksandar Sarievski (1922–2002) * Partenij Zografski (1818–1876)

References

External links

Official web site of GalichnikPenultimate Phase of Procedure for Entrance of Galicnik Wedding in UNESCO List - Custom with More than 30 RitesGalicnik Macedonia, Kinoteka na Makedonija 1939-40 from filmarchivesonlineImages from GaličnikPhotos from Galichnik Wedding

"Narodne pesme bugarske (iz Galečnika)"
folk songs from Galichnik, published in the Croatian magazine "Kolo; Članci za Literaturu, Umetnost; Narodni Život", knjiga IV/V, Zagreb, in 1847. {{DEFAULTSORT:Galicnik Villages in Mavrovo and Rostuša Municipality