Rising in the Neogene hills of the Mallakaster, the rivers Seman and Vjosa have built up two large joint deltas on the Albanian Adriatic shore. This shoreline is characterized by a low sandy coast with bars and spits. Changes in the river courses and migration of the mouths of the deltas were rapid and numerous from the Holocene period until the beginning of drainage works in the 1950s. The drainage basins of the two rivers are developed in soft clastic rocks (flysch and molasse) in the proportion of 71Ð4 per cent for the Seman and 44Ð8 per cent for the Vjosa. Both rivers carry abundant sediment loads, amounting to 6Ð7 ð 10 6 tonnes per year for the Vjosa and 13Ð2 ð 10 6 tonnes per year for the Seman. This is the reason why the alluvial deposits of the Seman have built up two-thirds of the alluvial plain.The use of a SPOT image dated 25 May 1995 (HRV 3 081-268) enabled us to view the effects of coastal and fluvial dynamics, the role of neotectonics as well as the predominance of the plume of suspended sediment of the Seman river. Using this image, a geomorphological map was drawn, which identifies the palaeochannels of the Seman and the Vjosa. In order to date those palaeochannels we have made an archaeological inventory from oral and written published information. The location of the sites we studied was checked systematically in the field. The mediaeval and Ottoman archives kept in Tirana also provided substantial information, as well as the reconstitution of the evolution of the shoreline between 1870 and 1990, carried out using an inventory of topographic maps. This work allowed us to reconstitute the progression of the deltas of the Seman and the Vjosa since antiquity.We may then infer that from antiquity up to the Middle Ages, the deltas of the Seman and the Vjosa both progressed very moderately and in a comparable way. However, at the end of the 15th century the Seman underwent a major change in its course, through a southward migration of the river. The natural processes of alluviation and changes in the river courses seem to have been accelerated as agricultural exploitation of the Neogene hills that form most of the drainage basin of the Seman increased. This exploitation is linked with the massive exportation of cereal from the port of Skela e Pirgut, which started in the 14th century. It appears that the 20th century has been the period of the largest progression of the deltas during historical times. The speed of progression increased as early as the beginning of the century, as a result of the rapid growth of the rural population densities. Soil erosion from arable fields increased catchment sediment yields to promote rapid changes in the river courses. This resulted in abandonment of deltaic mouths, a phenomenon leading to a straightening of the coast. Thus to the south of the present mouth of the Seman the coast receded by 7 to 30 m per year between 1968 and 1990 as a result of the abandonment of a mouth.
The distribution of the road network in Albania is condition by physico-geographic and socio-economic factors. The small density of the road network puts Albania in the last group of world countries, together with Romania and Bulgaria, but behind all Balkan countries. The unequal development of the road network is one of the strongest reasons for the unequal economic development of different regions of Albania. Inadequacy of road infrastructure is also a major cause for the high level of pollution in urban areas. The study assesses and differentiates Albania's national road network based on several statistical indicators, according to the administrative organization (municipalities and districts) approved by law. The data sources are the road and topographic maps, as well as the data of the Ministry of Transport and Infrastructure and the Ministry of Local Affairs. Maps and images are georeferenced and processed in ArcGIS 10.2, where digital lines, road junctions, and other geographic objects related to them are digitized.
This paper attempts to identify ancient settlements in Albania by cartographic methods by elaborating geographical coordinates obtained from Ptolemy's work. The results of the paper are of interest for archeology, history, geography, geodesy, photogrammetry etc. The problem addressed is not simple, as for some settlements, different literature sources give different values of geographical coordinates. In this context, those geographic coordinate systems that best deal with the real position of these settlements are selected. Thus, for example, the longitude (L) of Ohrid (which serves as a support point), in some sources is given the value L1 = 46040 ', while in later sources it is given the value L2 = 470 40'. The calculations are performed for both cases of this longitude, but greater certainty is given when L2 = 47040 'is obtained, because the geographical longitude of Skopje (Scupi with L = 48030'), Prishtina (Ulpiana, with L = 48040 '), Peja (Siparantum, with L = 46030'), etc., are closer to reality than L = 46040 ', according to which Ohrid appears to be highly displaced to the west, in relation to the aforementioned sites (pic. 2.1). Consequently, settlements located in and near the Apollo - Orikum-Ohrid triangle are identified with other sites (as noted in the following statements). All of these anomalies and others such as these have been handled carefully and according to a logical rationale for the material being processed, taking into account all factors that positively impact the settlement identification process.
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