The ancient trunk
About 10 m around, scarred by fire.
BuhaM — CC BY-SA 4.0 · Zabijako Sergej — CC BY-SA 4.0 · Aleksey Churushkin — CC BY-SA 4.0 · Кокан — CC0 · Qasinka — CC0
Stara Maslina, the Old Olive Tree, grows in Mirovica in Bar and is counted among the oldest olive trees anywhere: dating put it at about 2,240 years in 2015. Its gnarled, partly hollow trunk is about 10 m around, and the tree, a protected natural monument, has been the emblem of Bar since the mid-20th century. Mirovica is said to take its name from mir, the local word for peace, as feuding families made peace in its shade. Its managers recount that Italian occupiers in the Second World War offered the owner a jar of gold to ship the tree to Bari, and were refused. It was declared a public good under state protection in 1957, they add, and the next year a fire inside the hollow trunk scorched it; lore blames card players and a dropped match. The tree stands in a small fenced park, with its age certificate on show and seven younger olives, 500 to 700 years old, around it. Custom asks visitors to circle it three times, for health, luck and love. From 2020 high groundwater weakened it; after a municipal commission had a drainage trench dug, fresh shoots came in spring 2024 and by 2025 it bore fruit again. The park lies beside the main road to Ulcinj, about 4 km by road from central Bar. Pair it with the hilltop ruins of Stari Bar, 1.6 km north as the crow flies, where the Maslinijada olive fair has run since 2002; Ulcinj Castle and Old Town lie about 18 km south in a straight line.
About 10 m around, scarred by fire.
Once each for health, luck and love.
Oil, souvenirs and local food on site.
Mirovica, beside the Bar to Ulcinj main road
Under a project funded by the EU and UNIDO in 2014 and 2015, core samples were taken in November 2014 from 50 old olives around Bar and Ulcinj and analysed at Istanbul University's forestry faculty, which in 2015 put this tree's mean age at about 2,240 years.
Yes, in small amounts: in 2021 about 100 kg of its fruit gave 8.3 litres of oil, and after its recovery its olives were pressed again in 2025.
