Deçan

Dečani was first recorded in 1330 in the decrees known as the Dečani chrysobulls as being a village with a population of 89 households, consisting of 623 people.^[2] The village was one of many feudal holdings of the Visoki Dečani monastery. As part of their feudal obligations, the local population of Deçan provided labour and payment in products to the Visoki Dečani monastery. The chrysobulls listed that Visoki Dečani held such rights over 2,097 households of meropsi (dependent farmers-serfs), 266 Vlach households (pastoral communities) and 69 sokalniki (craftsmen) over a large area in southern Serbia, Kosovo, Montenegro and north Albania.^[3] In the charters of Deçan, there were several cases where a father had an Albanian name and his son would have a Serbian name. This has been interpreted as highlighting the process of slavicization in the region.^[4][5]

Following the migration of the Serbs in the 17th and 18th century, many ethnic Serbs who lived in Dečani left. The local Albanian population of Dečani who remained continued to guard the local Visoki Dečani monastery.^[6]

During the Kosovo War, Dečani was one of the strongholds of the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA). The KLA regularly smuggled weapons from Albania across the border to Dečani and as a result, the area saw significant fighting between the KLA and Yugoslav army and police.^[7] The town was one of the areas where armed attacks against Serbian police and military began. On August 1995 in one of the most serious incidents before the Kosovo War, the Serbian police stations was attacked and set on fire by an armed group.^[8]

Geographically, Dečani is located in the Accursed Mountains mountain region. It is surrounded by the Beleg Mountain.

The medieval Serbian Orthodox Visoki Dečani monastery stands around 2 km (1.2 mi) to the west of the town.

• Fine, John Van Antwerp (1994). The Late Medieval Balkans: A Critical Survey from the Late Twelfth Century to the Ottoman Conquest. University of Michigan Press. ISBN 978-0-472-08260-5.
• Novak, Viktor (1954). Историјски часопис 4 (1952-1953). Istorijski institut.
• Vickers, Miranda (1998). Between Serb and Albanian: A History of Kosovo. Columbia University Press. ISBN 0-631-19807-5.

• Municipality of Dečani – Official Website