During the Venetian epoch the territory of the Republic had expanded considerably, and when the last count departed it consisted of the following districts:—In the immediate neighbourhood of the city it possessed the valleys of Gionchetto (Šumet), Bergato (Brgat), and Ombla (Rijeka), with the bay of Gravosa and the Lapad peninsula, but the frontiers were very near, and on the crest of Monte Sergio, immediately behind the city, watchmen were posted day and night. Part of this territory had been acquired in the earliest times, but small additions had been made at intervals. Beyond the Ombla the citizens owned the stretch of coast known as Starea or Astarea.[183] Of the islands, they possessed in the thirteenth century Mercana—a small rock opposite the promontory of Ragusavecchia, with a monastery of St. Michael[184]—and Isola di Mezzo, Calamotta, Daksa, and S. Andrea of the group known to the ancients as the Elaphites Insulæ were added in 1080.[185] In 1218 the more distant island of Lagosta had been acquired, and at an early date that of Meleda had been granted by the Servian king to the Benedictine monks, with the condition that the civil government should be entrusted to the Republic. Stephen the First-Crowned gave them Giuppana in 1216. Between 1220 and 1224 Stephen, Nemanja’s son, granted the same monks a stretch of land about Žrnovica and Ombla. As a consequence of the Ragusan alliance with Michael Asen, the Bulgarian Tsar, against Stephen Uroš I., King of Servia, in 1254, the Republic’s southern frontiers were extended so as to include the vineyards of Breno and the peninsula on which the ruins of Epidaurus are said to lie.[186] Here a new town arose, which by a strange inversion of names was called Ragusavecchia. We have seen how in 1333-1334 Stagno and the peninsula of Sabbioncello and the coast as far as the Narenta’s mouth were acquired. In 1357 small additions were made about Breno and Gionchetto between the Ljuta stream and the village of Kurilo[187] (north of the Ombla). The districts of Carina and Drieno, although on the Ragusan side of the mountain above Breno, remained beyond the frontier: eventually they became Turkish territory, and such they remained until 1878.[188]
Cloister of the Franciscan Monastery
The Ragusan Church had also been increasing in wealth and dignity with the growth of the Republic, and a number of handsome ecclesiastical buildings were begun during the fourteenth century. In the eleventh, twelfth, and thirteenth centuries the Slavonic princes gave the churches many valuable gifts of land, gold and silver ornaments, and relics. But in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries Bosnia, Hlum, and Servia were torn by religious wars owing to the spread of that strange and little known heresy called Bogomilism, on which it will be useful to say a few words. Of the origin of this heresy as of its tenets there is very little reliable evidence. In all probability it was an offshoot of Armenian Paulicianism, itself derived from the earlier Adoptionist creed.[189] Paulician colonies have been settled in Europe as early as the ninth century by the Emperor Constantine Copronymus, and the heresy spread to Bulgaria, Servia, Bosnia, and Macedonia. In his History of the Bulgarians, Prof. C. J. Jireček gives an account of the beliefs of the Bogomils according to the researches of various Slavonic scholars. They believed in the existence of two principles, equal in age and power, one good personified in God, and one evil personified in Satan. They recognised the New Testament, but not the Old. All matter and all the visible world were essentially evil; the body of Christ was only an apparent, not a real, body. The sacraments were corporeal, therefore evil. They had no hierarchy, but an executive consisting of a bishop and two grades of Apostles. Besides the ordinary Bogomils there was a special order of the Perfect, who renounced all worldly possessions, marriage, animal food, and lived like hermits. They had no churches or images. They had a deathbed ceremony, without which one went to hell. They did not believe in purgatory.[190] But, as Prof. Bury remarks, it is doubtful if this is a true presentation of the Bogomil creed. Hardly any of their books of ritual survive, and all the accounts of them which have been preserved are written by their prosecutors. It is more probable that they were a monotheistic sect, believing in one God only, and rejecting the Trinity. This view is supported by the fact that at the time of the Turkish conquest such numbers of Bogomils became Muhamedans. It was not merely that they went over to the conqueror’s creed from motives of mere self-interest; there was really more similarity between that religion and Bogomilism than between the latter and either the Eastern or the Western Church.
In the tenth century there was a bishopric of Bosnia, which until the eleventh century was in the ecclesiastical province of Spalato. In 1067 it was transferred to that of Antivari. Later in the same century it was added to the archbishopric of Ragusa. But the dioceses of Antivari and Spalato continued to dispute Ragusa’s supremacy, and in the conflict of authorities Bogomilism found scope to increase its adherents. The Bosnians were mostly Roman Catholics, although there were Orthodox Christians among them. Ban Čulin was himself a Catholic, but when in 1189 the Pope, at the instigation of the King of Hungary, Bela III., transferred the Bosnian bishopric once more from the Ragusan province to that of Spalato, he went over to Bogomilism, so as not to be in any way under Hungarian authority. His conversion gave the heresy a fresh impetus, and it spread all over Bosnia, Slavonia, Dalmatia, and Croatia, even to the coast towns. Pope Innocent III. had to induce the King of Hungary to make a crusade against the Bogomils in Bosnia, but Čulin declared that they were good Catholics, induced the Archbishop of Ragusa to go to Rome with several of the heretics to be examined by the Pope, and asked for a Papal envoy to be sent to Bosnia to study the question. The Pope agreed, and sent his chaplain, Johannes de Casamaris, to Bosnia in 1203. The heads of the Bogomil community, who were also heads of monasteries, met at Bjelopolje on the Bosna, and met the Banus, Casamaris, and Marinus, the Archdeacon of Ragusa, and presented an address in which they affirmed their orthodoxy and their attachment to the Roman Church,[191] and declared themselves ready to obey the Pope in everything. Čulin himself abjured all heresy. They renewed these declarations before the King of Hungary and the Banus at Pest. The Papal legate was quite content, and advised the Pope to erect some new bishoprics in Bosnia.
But in 1218 the heresy was again rampant, and Honorius III. sent a legate to Hungary and Dalmatia to preach a crusade against the Bogomils. But no crusade was organised, and the legate went alone to Bosnia, where he died in 1222. The quarrels between the Pope and Hungary gave the Bogomils a respite, and they became even more numerous in consequence. In 1222 Andrew II., King of Hungary, placed Bosnia under the ecclesiastical jurisdiction of Ugolin, Bishop of Kalocsa, on condition that he stamped out the heresy, and Pope Honorius confirmed the donation. But the crusade never came off, and the Bogomils became so powerful that they deposed the Banus Stephen and succeeded in placing their co-religionary Matthew Ninoslav on the throne (1232). James, the Papal legate, went to Bosnia and found that the greater part of the inhabitants were tainted with the heresy, including the Catholic bishop; the Archbishop of Ragusa knew of this and did not trouble about it, so that the legate reconfirmed the union of the bishopric to that of Kalocsa. He succeeded, however, in inducing Ninoslav to become a Catholic, and endow a new cathedral, which was to be in the hands of the Dominicans. Many magnates followed his example. But the Bogomils soon raised their heads once more, and the Banus was either unable or unwilling to extirpate them. A crusade was therefore proclaimed against them, which lasted from 1234 to 1239. Bosnia was ravaged with fire and sword, and finally conquered by the crusaders under Koloman, the King of Hungary’s son. In 1238 the Dominican Ponsa was made bishop of Bosnia, and by 1239 Bogomilism seemed to have been suppressed. But the moment the crusaders retired the heretics, who were supported by the nation, rose in arms once more and became independent of Hungary. In 1246 Innocent IV. ordered a second crusade, but this time without success. After Ninoslav’s death Bosnia again fell under Hungary, but no very severe measures were taken against the Bogomils. The Bogomil Church of Bosnia became an established institution, and the Catholic bishops themselves no longer resided in the country, but at Djakovar, in Slavonia. Various attempts to organise crusades against them failed. The Bani were afraid of persecuting them lest they should rise in arms and put themselves under the protection of the King of Servia, who as a Greek Christian was also an enemy to the Catholics. Moreover, the missionary efforts of the Catholic Church were hindered by the quarrels between the Franciscans and the Dominicans. Bogomilism spread to Croatia and Dalmatia, and found adherents even at Traù and Spalato. Pope Benedict XII. ordered the Croatian barons to make war on the heretics (1337), but they were too busy fighting among themselves to achieve much result. But the Banus Stephen declared himself a good Catholic in 1340, and protected the Roman Church in Bosnia once more, agreeing to the establishment of two more bishoprics. We hear little more of the heresy after this date until the crusade of 1360.[192]
The Ragusan Church suffered in consequence of the heterodoxy of so many of the Slave princes, and no longer received rich gifts from them. On the other hand, both on account of its convenient situation and because it was a stronghold of Catholicism, the town became the centre of all this missionary activity. In 1225 the Dominican Order was established at Ragusa, and occupied a small house attached to the church of S. Giacomo in Peline. When the Order became more numerous it removed to the Ploce quarter, where a large new church was erected for it in 1306, and a monastery about 1345. The Franciscans first came to Ragusa in 1235, twenty-eight years after the foundation of the Order by St. Francis of Assisi, who is said to have visited the city himself on his return from the Holy Land, although there is no foundation for the legend. In 1250 a monastery was built for them outside the Porta Pile; it was destroyed by the Serbs during the raid of 1319.[193] A concession of land was granted to them within the walls in the Menze quarter, and by the middle of the fourteenth century they were established in the large, handsome monastery which still exists, built partly at Government expense and partly by the munificence of private citizens, including the guild of Ghent merchants established there.[194] The two Orders gave battle to the heretics, and helped to organise crusades against them, which are among the most barbarous examples of religious persecution which history records. On the other hand, if we are to believe the Ragusan legend, the Bogomils themselves persecuted the Catholics in the Cattaro districts, and the bodies of three martyrs who were murdered by them were brought to Ragusa, where a church was built in their honour.[195] It is somewhat difficult to unravel the tangle of contradictory accounts on this subject, especially as Ragusan writers often confuse the Bogomils with the followers of the Oriental Church.