Cultural site: Native Museum Ganića kula

History

The Ganićs were a rich family of the region, they had their own chitluks, kept cattle and mercenaries. The inhabitants of the area were amazed by the richly built building, so there is a legend about a strange source of wealth. Legend has it that the shepherd of Ganić found a strange object in Brezovački brdo, where there are remains of an old town, resembling bent iron, which only partially protruded from the ground. The sheep were constantly walking and grazing around him, so the shepherd tried to pull him out with a hoe for days. But, the hoe would constantly, by some miracle, bounce, and the object would sink into the ground. The shepherd eventually confided in his master Selim-aga. When the master

was convinced of the miracle, he asked the hodja for advice. Ganića kula is one of the oldest buildings in Rožaje, built at the beginning of the 19th century, and used to be used for housing. Today it is one of the few old buildings that have been preserved in the city.

Cultural site details

The Kula is home to the Homeland Museum, conceived as a complex institution with the task of collecting, preserving, presenting and publishing original testimonies about the life and customs of the people in the Rožaje area in order to adequately valorize the past and meet the tourist development component of the city. The building was a three-story building. The two floors above the chamber, as well as the chamber itself, are built of carved and naturally shaped stone. The thickness of the foundation walls is 120 cm, but they are narrowing on the outside, so they are 90 cm thick at the top of the second floor. The top floor was built of wood, and was called a loggia. The slenderness of this building is even more prominent with this wooden part that expands and boldly covers its lower floors. The tower is covered with a wooden roof covering - shingles. At the top of the roof there is a wooden, carved spike 150 cm long. In 1979, the tower was damaged by an earthquake, then the Municipality bought the building from the Etem-aga Ganić family, and the building was entered in the register of protected monuments in 1987. In the 1990s, the Institute for the Protection of Monuments deleted Ganić's tower from the register.2 In 2012, conservation measures were carried out, and in 2014, the plateau was arranged and the building was fenced. Reconstruction was carried out in 2019/2020, the stone part of the building and the wooden structure were renovated, ie the loggia and the installation of shingles, and the foundation was strengthened.

The current state of the Ganić tower is a renewed look from 2019. In the first phase, the exterior was renovated - a stone part and a wooden structure. In the second phase, the interior (floors, toilets, etc.) was renovated. During the reconstruction, the foundation was strengthened.3 Today, Kula houses the City Museum, a complex facility, whose goal is to collect, preserve, present and publish original testimonies about the life and customs of the people of Rozaje, all with the aim of nurturing memories and traditions in the right way. and to meet tourism needs.