Name of Object:

Film camera of the Manaki brothers

Other name of the Object (second name):

Film camera of Charls Trade Company, serial no. 300

Location:

Bitola, North Macedonia

Holding Institution:

The Archive of the City of Bitola

 About Museum of Macedonia, Bitola

Date of Object:

1905

Description:

Janaki (1878–1945) and Milton (1880–1964) Manaki were born in Bitola and went on to become pioneers of Macedonian film and the first filmmakers in the Balkans. The Manaki brothers shot their first film merely 10 years after the Lumiere brothers. In 1905, they shot their grandmother Despina spinning wool with women from the neighbourhood. Their first film of ethnographic value was shot soon after. It documents celebration of the feast of St. Cyril and Methodius in front of the Church in Bitola devoted to these saints. In their films, the Manaki brothers strived to document visually events from everyday life and to frame them as real works of art. In 1921, they projected the first film in the open-air arena at the Shirok Sokak Street in Bitola.

Type of Object

Camera; part of filming equipment

Citation of this web page:

Aco Kimovski (Archive of the City of Bitola) "Film camera of the Manaki brothers" in "Sharing History", Museum With No Frontiers, 2026.
https://sharinghistory.museumwnf.org/database_item.php?id=object;AWE;mc;41;en

Prepared by: Aco Kimovski (Archive of the City of Bitola)
Copyedited by: Daniel de la VegaDaniel de la Vega

Daniel de la Vega is a copy editor based in Portland, Oregon. He obtained his bachelor’s degree in linguistics from the University of California at Santa Cruz in 2014 and has since done editing and localization work on everything from college applications to magazines to video game dialogue.

MWNF Working Number: MC 041