THE MUSEUM ON WATER IN THE BAY OF THE BONES AT LAKE OHRID, SITE PLOCHA MICHOV GRAD, GRADISHTE, PESHTANI IS OPENED 08.12.2008

On the 8th of December 2008, the President of the Government of the Republic of Macedonia Mr. Nikola Gruevski opened the Museum on Water at an official ceremony, at the site “Gradishte” in the village Peshtani, at the southeast coast of Lake Ohrid. This is a first of a kind museum in our, wider surroundings.

The Museum on Water represents a reconstruction of a settlement from the Iron and Bronze ages, and it will be a tourist attraction for Macedonia but also for many visitors from abroad.

On the south coast of the Gradishte peninsula in the Bay of Bones , there is the prehistoric (palafitte) settlement which according to the investigations, spread on a surface of about 8500 sqm.

A reconstruction of a part of the pile-dwelling settlement was made, identical to the remains of the underwater archaeological site Plocha Michov Grad, chronologically belonging to Bronze Age and the beginning of Iron Age, between 1200 and 700 B.C.

According to the director of the Cultural Heritage Protection Office, Pasko Kuzman, the project will develop in the future and in the second phase, in the next two years, additional 16 houses will be built.

The Museum on Water represents a place where the visitors will be able to travel back in time, from Slavic to Roman times, all the way to Prehistory, at the end of Bronze Age and the beginning of Iron Age.

Furthermore, the Director of the Cultural Heritage Protection Office emphasized that there are valuable archeological and scientific data significant for the functioning of the ethno-genesis, and the beginnings of the formation and recognition of the tribes in ethnical sense. In the period when this pile-dwelling settlement is dated, dwelt the Bryges- the oldest tribe in the Balkans, predominant in the territory of present-day Macedonia . Precisely in this period, between 1200 and 700 BC, they left for Asia Minor, forming the state of Phrygia , which is very important for us because in a certain way, we are ethnically connected with them.

In parallel to the project Museum on Water, in the proximity of the same hill above the Bay of the Bones, was made a reconstruction of the Roman military fortification (castrum) at the site Gradishte. The walls of the military fortification had been reconstructed and the interior arranged.

The castrum is connected by a stone path with the pile-dwelling settlement, offering the tourists and the visitors a unique opportunity to travel in the history if the site.