It is known that there was a town called Draudacum, Draudàkon (Δραυδάκον in
Ancient Greek), built in 170 BCE, near or on the current locality of Gostivar. Early mentions of the town was made by the
Roman historian Livy. He records how during the
Third Macedonian War the King of
Macedon Perseus at the head of 10000 men, after taking Uskana (Kicevo), attacked Drau-Dak, today Gostivar.
Ottoman Period In the late 14th century, Gostivar came under Ottoman rule along with the rest of Vardar Macedonia. In the late 19th and early 20th century, Gostivar was part of the
Kosovo Vilayet of the
Ottoman Empire. During this period it became the centre of a
kaza (municipality) and grew into one of the richer towns of Ottoman Vardar Macedonia. Gostivar remained under Ottoman rule for more than 500 years until 1912, when it was occupied by Serbian troops during the
First Balkan War.
Yugoslav Period Jordan Ivanov, professor at the University of Sofia, wrote in 1915 that Albanians, since they did not have their own alphabet, due to a lack of consolidated national consciousness and influenced by foreign propaganda, declared themselves as Turks, Greeks and Bulgarians, depending on which religion they belonged to. The Orthodox Albanians of Gostivar were Bulgarianized by due to them being near the Bulgarian population. A policy of Turkification of the Albanian population was employed by the Yugoslav authorities in cooperation with the Turkish government, stretching the period of 1948-1959. A commission was created to tour Albanian communities in Macedonia, visiting Gostivar amongst other cities. Starting in 1948, six Turkish schools were opened in areas with large Albanian majorities, such as
Tearce,
Gorna Banjica,
Dolna Banjica Vrapčište as well as in the outskirts of
Tetovo and Gostivar. Contemporary analysis described cases of resistance to the Turkish schools in the Polog area, with Albanian speaking students and teachers refused to attend Turkish schools. A notable case happened in Gostivar, where a teacher from Banjica, who according to the committees analysis: "even though he was born in the same village and his mother tongue is Turkish, when the Turkish school was opened he refused to teach in Turkish and had asked to work in Albanian villages ...". Thus the Yugoslav committee characterized the local population as having adopted a "Greater Albanian political worldview". Resistance against the opening of Turkish schools was most prevalent in Tetovo and Gostivar. In Gostivar the nationalist activist Myrtezan Bajraktari was detained and interrogated by the Yugoslav secret police (
UDBA). During his interrogation he stated he openly opposed the Turkish schools, and that he does so "just so Albanians can feel like patriots and not allow themselves to be Turkified." == Economy ==