Barilevë

The Barilaj area contains important archaeological evidence. The source describes a Late Neolithic centre regarded as one of the largest and most significant Neolithic settlements identified in Kosovo. To the northeast of the village is Quka e Barilevës, described as a prehistoric Dardanian fortification. Elsewhere, the place-name Arat e Kishës has been preserved, where foundation stones were reportedly found.

Barilaj is mentioned in a charter from 1315 under the form “katun Barelevski”. In the 1455 register it was recorded with 71 households. It appears again in later 18th- and 19th-century sources and in Kosovo Vilayet yearbooks from 1893, 1896 and 1900.

After the expulsion of Albanians from Toplica in 1877–1878, several Albanian muhajir families settled in Barilaj. Between 1924 and 1932, the source documents the colonisation of 13 Serbian and Montenegrin families, placed largely on land belonging to Albanian families from the village. The Albanian population remained the majority, and the last Serbian families left in 1965.

Before the 1999 war, the source records around 310 households and roughly 1,800 Albanian residents. During the spring of that year dozens of houses were damaged or destroyed, along with the school, clinic and private libraries; 12 residents were killed. The population was expelled on 20 March, while a large part returned on 14 April. The village also sheltered thousands of displaced people, mainly from the Llap region.