This, therefore, formed a fitting preface to the armorial bearings of the great Serbian Czar himself. Above the shield appeared a crowned helmet, whose crest was the double-headed eagle of empire, supporting another rayed crown. On either side were two other casques, each crested with two lions,—I take it, from a Macedonian den,—crowned and guardant. The shield itself was divided into eleven compartments; in the centre reappeared the double eagle of the Némanjas, argent on a field gules, and round this were quartered the arms of all the provinces of his empire. Here was the red, crowned lion of Macedonia (this alone appeared in two quarters); the Moorish trophies of Bosnia; the Slavonian leash of hounds; the three bearded kings of Dalmatia; the chequers, gules and argent of Croatia; the rampant lion of Bulgaria; the Serbian battle-axes; the three horse-shoes of Rascia; the armour-cased arm of Primorie, holding aloft her sable scimetar.
The original of this comprehensive escutcheon was devised fifteen years before Czar Dūshan marched with such sanguine hopes to seize Byzantium; and already we see him claiming sway over a territory which embraces the southern provinces of modern Austria, and the greater part of Turkey-in-Europe. The Eastern question was nearer a felicitous solution then than it ever has been since! Had Dūshan found a successor worthy to support his shield, or to wear the double-eagled casque, in all human probability the Turk would never have made good his footing in Europe, the dotard Greeklings of Byzantium would have given place to a youthful power capable of acting as the champion of Christendom and of competing successfully with the civilization of the West; and the different destiny of these Sclavonic lands might nowhere have been more conspicuous than in this very valley—so rich in the mineral wealth of nature, so deficient in human industry! Dîs aliter placitum; and were Czar Dūshan himself to return from the grave, he might well shrink from the attempt to form anew the Serbian empire; or if he attempted to cut the knot of complications by the sword, he would find himself opposed not only by Turkish scimetars, but more effectually by the ignoble jealousies of Christendom; and, in a last resort, by the arms of military monarchies, whose rulers prefer to have for neighbours decrepit infidels whom they can bully at their pleasure, to see a Christian State rise on their borders, which might some day form a healthy rival!
After the arms of Stephen Dūshan follow those of the various Illyrian provinces in detail, as being more immediately involved in this Armorial of Nobility. Illyria herself as a unity does not figure in the Czar’s shield, but her crescent beneath a star of eight points follows, argent on a field gules. This design appears in the centre of the Bosnian arms; to betoken—so the monks assured us—that Bosnia is the heart of Illyria. One is at once struck with its general resemblance to the star and crescent of the Turks, though their star is at one side of the moon instead of above it. Indeed the presence of these emblems on the Bosnian arms has given rise to the erroneous idea that they were imposed by the Turks as a badge of suzerainty on their conquest of the country.[217] The monks, however, were undoubtedly right in referring the star and crescent on the Bosnian shield to her Illyrian connexions; and in fact, in the title at the beginning of the book, Bosnia and Illyria are made synonymous.
Bosnian Armorial Bearings.
Besides the star and crescent, the Bosnian arms consisted of two crossed stakes, sable on ground or, each surmounted by the head of a Moorish king. These trophies appeared in the arms of several of the nobles contained in the volume, and recalled the long struggles of the Sea Serbs with the African corsairs. The early annals of Ragusa—or, as the Serbs call her, Dubrovnik, who often stood in peculiarly close relations with Bosnia, being practically her seaport and emporium—are much occupied with these Saracenic infestations, which extended along the whole Serbian coastland to Albania, and at one time desolated the Bocche di Cattaro. These trophies bear interesting witness to the deep impression left by those struggles on the national mind; and point to those early days when Trajekto on the Bocche di Cattaro was the residence of a Bosnian Ban.[218]
The scimetar on the arms of Primorie, or Serbia-on-the-Sea, seems to refer to these same struggles, and I cannot help suspecting that here is also to be found the true clue towards solving the mystery of the appearance of the star and crescent on the Illyrian escutcheon. The Moslems had early appropriated the old Byzantine half-moon,[219] and Richard Cœur de Lion, on returning from his wars in Palestine, added it as a Saracenic trophy to his royal seal. The moon and stars appear on the Irish coins of John. Nothing could have been more natural than for the Illyrian Serbs engaged in the long contests with the Saracen corsairs to have added this device to their shields for the same reason.
Following the escutcheons of the various Illyrian kingdoms come those of the nobility—there being no less than 126 families whose armorial bearings are blazoned in this book. How much is here to throw a light on the extension of Western ideas over the old Serbian area! How much to illustrate the national history, the national customs—aye, even the old Sclavonic mythology; how much to recall the origin of illustrious dynasties! I have spoken of the Némanjić ensigns; here, too, were the Castriotić, belonging to the family of Scanderbeg—again, a double-eagle, sable on or, and eagle crest to the helm—the arms of the royal house of Bosnia that was to be—the Tvartkoević shield semé of golden fleurs de lys. In many of the arms might be detected a curious play on words. The Kopiević arms, for example, had four lances, in allusion to the Bosnian word for a lance, Kopje. Brzo is the native word for ‘quick,’ and the device of the Barzoevic family is a fish in water. More interesting still is the occasional cropping up of the heathen Sclavonic mythology—chiefly seen in the frequent appearance of zmaje or dragons, who play so important a part in Serbian folk-lore; and—more fascinating than these fire-drakes—the Vila herself appears on the shield of the Mergnjavić—long-haired and devoid of raiment as in Serbian poetry: the guardian nymph of the race, holding aloft the eagle banner of empire.
The book appropriately concluded with a shield charged with the armorial bearings of the united Bosnian Nobility; and the monks, with an enthusiasm worthy of record, pointed out the motto—read by the light of after events, not without its pathos—Semper Spero.