Bajazid Doda

Bajazid Elmaz Doda (1888 – 25 April 1933) was an Albanian ethnographic writer and photographer. He is the author of the book Albanisches Bauerleben im oberen Rekatal bei Dibra (Makedonien) (Albanian Peasant Life in the Upper Reka Valley near Dibra (Macedonia)), written in Vienna in 1914, as well as of numerous rare early-20th-century photos of Albanian-inhabited lands during the period when they belonged to the Ottoman Empire, especially of Upper Reka, his birthplace region. The fossil turtle species Kallokibotion bajazidi was named after him by his longtime companion and romantic partner Franz Nopcsa.

Life Bajazid Doda was born in 1888 in Štirovica, an Albanian-inhabited village of the Upper Reka region of Macedonia in what was then the Ottoman Empire. He went to Romania to work abroad, like many other Upper Reka inhabitants. On April 25, 1933, suffering from depression, Nopcsa killed Doda in his sleep and then committed suicide.

Photographic and literary works Doda is author of the book Albanisches Bauerleben im oberen Rekatal bei Dibra (Makedonien)(Albanian Peasant Life in the Upper Reka Valley near Dibra (Macedonia)), which was completed in Vienna in April 1914 and was published posthumously in Vienna 2007, after being rediscovered within the archives. Other scholars like Andrea Pieroni describe the work as a "very detailed ethnographic account" that includes "important notes concerning local food and medicinal plant uses" about research of the Upper Reka region.

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