Historical Note
During the long course of the imposition of Ottoman dominion upon the suffering Christian races of the Balkans there were always at the courts of the Christian princes malcontents whom the cunning Turkish statesmen easily seduced from their allegiance to their rightful lords, and to whom they extended hospitality in Constantinople, often overwhelming them with riches and honours. In return they have rendered most important services to the sultans in their many campaigns, being, of course, well acquainted with the strategic dispositions of their countrymen, and often with important state secrets. Sometimes such traitorous men have served the Turk in their own country by sowing the seed of dissatisfaction with their rulers among the peasantry, assuring them that they would be better off under Ottoman rule. The influence of such renegades prevailed upon the peasantry in Bosnia and Herzegovina, at the time of the Battle of Kossovo (1389), to rise against their rulers, and they did not participate in that memorable battle.
Very few instances of such treachery, however, occurred in Montenegro, which has been from the earliest times the home of the noblest of Serbian aristocrats and heroes, and where the adoption of the faith of Islam, no matter for what reason, or from what motive, was considered as the greatest cowardice of which a Christian could be guilty.
[1] A ballad of Montenegro, county Byelopavlitch.
[2] Danitza is the Morning Star. The Serbian bards often begin their poems with a reference to the dawn and “Danitza.” Several well-known ballads begin thus: “The Moon scolds the star Danitza: Where hast thou been? Wherefore hast thou wasted much time?” And Danitza in order to exonerate herself, invariably relates to the Moon something she has seen in the night during her absence; usually some wrongful deed by a Turk or dishonourable conduct on the part of a young man to his brother or other relatives, such as an unjust division of patrimony, &c.
[3] Sidjadé, a divan.
[4] Hodja, a Mussulman priest.
[5] Kadi, an Ottoman judge.
[6] Djelat, an executioner.
[7] Vladika means in Serbian ‘Bishop.’ In Montenegro members of the Petrovitch-Niegosh family were bishops as well as political rulers. It was Vladika Danilo Petrovitch, uncle of the present king of Montenegro, who first assumed the title of prince as an hereditary one.