Tanners Bridge

The Ura e Tabakeve was built in the eighteenth century to carry the road east out of Tirana over the Lana stream, taking its name from the tanners' guild whose quarter it served and whose mosque stands nearby, and it is one of the very few Ottoman structures left in the centre of a city that was rebuilt almost completely in the twentieth century. In the 1930s the stream was diverted, which left the bridge standing over dry ground, and it fell out of use until it was restored in the 1990s as a monument. It is a single stone arch with a cobbled deck, about eight metres long, now surrounded by modern buildings and traffic, and it takes a few minutes to look at, which is its whole scale.

History

The 18th-century stone bridge carried the Shëngjergj road, which linked Tirana with Debar and the eastern highlands and was used mainly by farmers bringing produce and livestock to the city, over the Lanë stream, and it took its name, like the road and the square, from the tanners, tabakë, families such as the Xheleti and Kuka who worked hides here. It stayed in use until the Lanë was diverted in the 1930s, and in the 1990s it was cleaned and fully restored for pedestrians; in 2007 the underground works were reported finished, with the foundations uncovered and a pond recreated on both sides, and the municipality counts it among the most important cultural monuments of the city (Wikipedia, Tanners' Bridge).

What you'll find

• A single Ottoman stone arch - eighteenth-century masonry in the city centre.
• A bridge over dry ground - the stream diverted away in the 1930s.
• The cobbled deck - the original surface restored.
• A rare Ottoman survival - most of old Tirana was cleared.

When to go

Year round; it is a public monument in the street, free and always accessible. Thirty minutes. Evenings when it is lit. It is a stop rather than a destination.

Things to know

It is small and takes ten minutes. The setting is modern buildings and traffic on all sides. There is no interpretation beyond a plaque. Nothing else of the old quarter survives around it.

Nearby

Skanderbeg Square and the Et'hem Bey mosque are a short walk west.

Key facts