Small Prespa Lake

Small Prespa Lake
Small Prespa
Location of Small Prespa Lake in Greece.
Location of Small Prespa Lake in Greece.
Small Prespa Lake
Location within Greece
Interactive map of Small Prespa Lake
Location
LocationBalkans (primarily Greece, Albania – a small part)
Coordinates40°46′N 21°06′E / 40.767°N 21.100°E / 40.767; 21.100
Typetectonic
Basin countriesGreece, Albania
Surface area
46.8 km2 (18.1 sq mi)
Max. depth7.7 m (25 ft)
Surface elevation
853 m (2,799 ft)
IslandsAgios Achillios, Vidronisi
Official name
Mikri Prespa Lake (Greece)
Designated21 August 1975
Reference no.60
Official name
Albanian Prespa Lakes
Designated13 June 2013
Reference no.2151

Small Prespa Lake (Greek: Λίμνη Μικρή Πρέσπα, Limni Mikri Prespa; Albanian: Prespa e Vogël; Macedonian: Мало Преспанско Езеро, Malo Prespansko Ezero) is a lake shared between Greece (138 km² drainage area; 42.5 km² surface area) and Albania (51 km² drainage area; 4.3 km² surface area). It is the smaller of the two Prespa Lakes.

Details

Small Prespa Lake in particular has been recognized as an important wetland ecosystems favoring breeding and feeding of rare water bird species. It is best known for hosting the largest breeding colony of the Dalmatian pelican in the world. The flora in the region is composed of more than 1,500 plant species of which 146 endemic species in the Lake Ohrid and 39 endemic species from the Prespa Lakes.

The villages of Rakickë, Shyec, Buzliqen and Tren surround the Albanian portion of the lake. In Greece the villages surrounding the lake are Agios Germanos, Laimos, Milionas, Platy, Kallithea, Lefkonas, Prespes, Karyes, Mikrolimni, Oxia, Pyli and Vrontero.

During 1970, significant amounts of water from the Devoll river was diverted into the lake with the intention to use it latter during the summer time for the irrigation purposes. Due to the high suspended solids in the river water significant siltation did occur on the Albanian side. The practice has recently stopped. The Albanian part of this lake has a surface of 420 hectares. In 1999 the Society for the Protection of Prespa received the Ramsar Wetland Conservation Award for its conservation efforts regarding the Lake Prespa Ramsar site.

Agios Achilleios

Small Prespa Lake contains the island Agios Achilleios where is a village of the same name Agios Achilleios (Saint Achilleus); For a brief period in the 10th century, the island with its town of Prespa served as the capital of the First Bulgarian Empire under Tsar Samuel. Following the capture of Larissa by Samuel, he ordered the remains of Saint Achillius to be transported from the city to the island and buried in a specially built basilica named after the saint. In 1014, the Bulgarian army was defeated in battle by the Byzantine army of Basil II and Samuel died shortly after and was buried in the basilica. Over time the location became known as Saint Achillius (Agios Achilleios, Sveti Ahil) or simply Achillius (Ahil), after the basilica. In February 1948, in the midst of the Greek Civil War, Nikos Zachariadis, the General Secretary of the Communist Party of Greece, married Roula Koukoulou, his long-time lover, on this island, in a widely publicized ceremony. The island became a tourist and fishing centre in the 1970s.

See also

References

  1. ↑ "Lake Mikri Prespa". Ramsar Sites Information Service. Retrieved 25 April 2018.
  2. ↑ "Albanian Prespa Lakes". Ramsar Sites Information Service. Retrieved 25 April 2018.
  3. ↑ Etnografia shqiptare. Akademia e Shkencave e RPSH, Instituti i Historisë, Sektori i Etnografisë. 1962.
  4. ↑ Danforth 2020, pp. 30–31.
  5. ↑ Risos, Antonios (1990). "The Vlachs of Larissa in the 10th century". Byzantinoslavica. 51 (2): 206.
  6. 1 2 Danforth, Loring M. (2020). ""Three Countries, Two Lakes, One Future": The Prespa Lakes and the Signing of the Prespa Agreement". In Neofotistos, Vasiliki P. (ed.). Macedonia and Identity Politics After the Prespa Agreement. Routledge. pp. 31–32. ISBN 9781000281835.
  7. ↑ Mihajlovski, Robert (2021). The Religious and Cultural Landscape of Ottoman Manastır. Brill. p. 17. ISBN 9789004465268.
  8. ↑ Włodzimierz, Pianka (1970). Топономастиката на Охридско–Преспанскиот базен [The Toponymy of the Ohrid–Prespa basin] (in Macedonian). Institut za makedonski jazik "Krste Misirkov". p. 141.
  9. ↑ Miska, Marialena Argyro (2020). Επώνυμοι Τόποι: Ονομασίες Οικισμών στην Περιοχή της Φλώρινας [Named Places: Names of Settlements in the Florina Region] (Master's thesis) (in Greek). University of Western Macedonia. p. 84. Archived from the original on 22 February 2025. Retrieved 18 February 2025.
  10. ↑ Α.Ε., tovima.gr — Δημοσιογραφικός Οργανισμός Λαμπράκη. "tovima.gr - Ο "μεγάλος αρχηγός" διάλεξε την κρεμάλα". Retrieved 28 October 2016.

Sources