Throughout history, depending on the rulers, the city of Bitola has had many names.
The Slavic name for the city, Bitola, comes from the word Obitel, which during the Middle Ages was used for a community of monks, i.e. a monastery. It was named after the many monasteries that were located in the city and its surroundings, some of which still exist today.
Over time, the sound O was dropped in the pronunciation of the word “Obitel”, and the name of the city became Bitola.
The Greeks called the city Monastiri (Greek: Μοναστήρι) for the same reasons.
Bitola is today’s official name for the city, but at the same time the oldest name, judging by the Bitola tablet from 1015, on which the city is mentioned, as well as by the many military commanders of Tsar Samuil, as well as travelers from that time.
The Arab traveler Abu Abdallah Muhammad al-Idrisi wrote in the 12th century:
“It takes two days of travel to the east to get from Ahrid (Ohrid) to Butili (Bitola). Butili is an unusual and beautiful city.”
There are stories according to which there were 41 churches on the right bank of the Dragor River and the same number of watermills to support them. There were also 29 churches on the left bank of the Dragor River with the same number of watermills. During the holidays at that time, the people from the villages of the Bitola Plain gathered at these churches where they performed their religious rites. Since the land on which the city of Bitola was then located was covered with numerous churches, the city was named Manastir.
There is a version that says that the city of Bitola got its name Manastir after a huge church that was located above Bitola, near the current bridge called Black Bridge (Turkish: kara köprüsü). This church could accommodate all the villagers from the Bitola plain who came during the holidays to perform religious rites.
According to the records of Marko Cepenkov, the city of Bitola was named after the landowner Toljo, who had his own fortress near the present-day village of Bukovo in Bitola. At the time when the Turks came to conquer this part of Macedonia, to call the landowner Toljo to fight, they called him “Bi Toljo, do bi Toljo”, which is where, according to Marko Cepenkov, the current name of the city of Bitola comes from.
During the Ottoman rule, the city was called Manastir, which the Turks and Albanians adopted from the Greeks. After the Balkan Wars of 1913, the city fell under Serbian occupation and regained its old name Bitola.