Roman glass, an Ottoman masterpiece and the country’s power plant — the north’s most layered town, and its least visited.
Pljevlja is Montenegro's northernmost city, set in a bowl of forested mountains close to the borders with Serbia and Bosnia and Herzegovina. It is a working town, with coal mined here for decades and a power station on its edge supplying much of the country, but it is also one of the longest continuously settled places in Montenegro, and the layers show. At nearby Komini stood a Roman municipium whose necropolis produced glassware now held in the town's heritage museum and counted among the best Roman finds in the region.
Stay in Pljevlja
1 accommodation in Pljevlja
The north’s towns, counted
Settlement populations, 2023 census
Still bigger than the bay’s biggest town — the north empties, but Pljevlja remains its second city.
Dinner for twogrill portions built for miners, with wine
€15–30
Pljevlja cheesea kilo of Pljevlja cheese at the market — the real souvenir
€3–5
Apartments, per m²asking — the cheapest urban square metres in the country
€700–1,200
Montenegro’s lowest prices, attached to its most underrated sights.
Who lives here
Census population, Pljevlja municipality
Five thousand people left between the last two censuses — the coal town is living the question the whole north asks.
Four empires, one valley
Pljevlja has been Roman, Ottoman, Austrian and Yugoslav — each left a monument. Widths are to scale.
Monastery 1465; mosque 1569; standard chronology.
A day in the high north
A working town’s clock, an empire’s sights
08:00the market smells of cheese — Pljevlja’s white gold
11:00the mosque and monastery, both open to visitors
14:00Komini’s Roman stones, ten minutes out of town
19:00the main-street korzo, coal-town honest
1569
Meanwhile, in 1569
The year the pasha built for beauty
Pljevlja,1569: Husein-pasha Boljanić, a local man risen high in the empire, endows his home town with a mosque of Istanbul quality — a dome, painted walls and a needle of a minaret.
Across town —the Holy Trinity monastery, a century older, keeps its scriptorium working; Pljevlja holds both faiths’ finest work a walk apart.
The empire —the same decade, Sinan builds the Selimiye in Edirne; provincial pashas compete in stone, and Pljevlja wins its class.
Underfoot —the Romans got here first: Municipium S at Komini buried its dead with glass diatreta cups that museums still argue over.
Today —the mosque still stands complete, the monastery still chants, and the valley in between mines the coal that lights the country.
Voices
“Roman Pljevlja buried its dead with diatreta — openwork glass cages so rare that only a handful survive in the world, and one came from Komini.”
Local legend
The glass of Municipium S
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Pljevlja is in the far north of Montenegro, close to both the Bosnian and Serbian borders, at about 770 m above sea level. It is around three hours from Podgorica by road and the largest town in the region, with roughly 30,000 people.
What is there to see in Pljevlja?
Two buildings stand out. The Holy Trinity monastery, from the 16th century, holds one of the richest collections of manuscripts and church treasure in the country. The Husein Pasha mosque of 1594 has the tallest minaret in the Balkans at around 42 m.
Is there anything Roman near Pljevlja?
Yes. Municipium S, at Komini just outside town, was a Roman settlement whose necropolis produced remarkable glassware and jewellery, now in the local heritage museum. It is one of the most productive Roman sites excavated in Montenegro.
What is Pljevlja cheese?
Pljevaljski sir is a white cheese matured in brine, sharp and crumbly, and the town's best-known product after coal. It appears on every menu here and travels well. The surrounding highland pastures are what give it its character.
What is the countryside around Pljevlja like?
High, open and continental — long cold winters and short warm summers, unlike anywhere on the coast. Ljubisnja mountain rises to the north-west, and the Tara canyon is within reach to the south, which makes the town a base for rafting and hiking.
Is Pljevlja worth visiting?
For travellers interested in the interior, yes: the monastery, the mosque and the Roman finds are all genuinely worth the drive. It is a mining and power-station town rather than a resort, and few visitors come, which is part of the appeal.
Pljevlja through the year
SepDays of the diaspora — the town refills in August — book ahead, oddly
OctHarvest market weeks — cheese, honey and heather rakija at their best
The local plate
Pljevaljski sir
The town’s cheese is its passport: white, layered and sharp, sold in wooden buckets at the market and melted over everything from burek to grilled meat. No coastal menu matches it.
Where The town market; grill konobas on the main street
