Things to see and do Central

This former Sufi place of worship (Teqeja e Helvetive) is distinguished by its porch, whose antique columns come from the site of Apollonia in Illyria. It was built in 1780 and occupied in the ^19th century by Halveti dervishes, a brotherhood now very rare in Albania. Today, it houses the regional offices of the Monuments Culturelles. The building was originally erected to house the supposed mausoleum of Sabbatai Tsevi (1626-1676), a mystical rabbi who converted to Islam and was considered the Messiah by many Jews in the Ottoman Empire. Born in Smyrna, according to the beliefs of the time, he died in Berat. Thus, for over two centuries, Dönme, Islamicized Jews who followed Tsevi, came here on pilgrimage from Thessalonica, then Europe's largest Jewish city. The shrine was built at the request of Berat's Jewish community (around 150 families at the end of the ^18th century) and financed by the Ottoman governor of the Berat pashalik Ahmet Kurt Pasha (c. 1710-1787). However, it was partly destroyed by his former rival, the redoubtable Ali Pacha de Tepelena, when the city was taken in 1808, and rebuilt shortly afterwards. The so-called tomb may well have survived, as Dönme continued to gather here until the early ^20th century. One thing is certain: it disappeared during the atheist campaign of 1967. As for the real mausoleum, it was identified in 1985 in Ulcinj, Montenegro, where Sabbatai Tsevi had been exiled by the Ottomans in 1673.