The Slav Nations

by Srdan Tucic

Who and what manner of people were the Slavs? The Roman historian Jordanis (551 A.D.) already distinguishes the “Sloveni,” as he calls them, from the rest of the Slavs, whom he calls “Veniti.” He speaks of an innumerable Slav people (“Venetharum natio populosa”) divided into many tribes, of which the chief were the “Russi,” (“Anti”) between the Dniestr and Dniepr, and the “Sloveni” on the lower Danube. It is true that a number of different tribes were included under this name, just as to-day it is used to designate the whole Slav race (“Slavyane” in Russian, “Slovane” in Csech). Strictly speaking only the Southern Slavs have a right to this name, and until well into the nineteenth century they styled themselves “Sloveni” in addition to their local appellations of Croat, Serb, Bulgar, etc. With the formation of local states, the local names came more into use, but in literature and folk-poesy the name “Sloveni” is invariably adopted. As a matter of fact, the local names arose from the political and historical distribution of the race.

The geographical position of the Balkan Peninsula, as well as the two currents of civilization which flowed in upon the Southern Slavs from either side, prevented the formation of a United Southern Slav State. They split up into several lesser states, which soon lost their freedom, and submitted to foreign rule. Carniola was the first to fall a victim, for she passed under German rule as early as the eighth century.

Towards the end of the seventh century the Finnish tribe of the Bulgars conquered the Slav tribes north and south of the Balkan range and incidentally adopted the Slav language as their own. They merely retained their original name, and their distinctive, coldly methodical genius for organization—a racial characteristic which is totally absent in the other Southern Slavs. In a short time the Bulgars also conquered the Slav tribes in Macedonia, Epirus and Thessaly, and subjugated the whole country as far as the Morava. In the ninth century the Bulgarian Empire reached from the Carpathians in Hungary to the Pannonian Valley, and, as a matter of fact, Budapest, the capital of Hungary, was founded by the Bulgars. The Bulgarian Tsar Boris was baptized by the apostles Cyril and Method, who also introduced the Slav liturgy in Bulgaria. The Slav dialect spoken between Constantinople and Salonika was adopted as the literary language, and the Glagolitza (Glagolithic alphabet) and eventually the Cyrillitza (Cyrillic alphabet) were introduced. This fact is of world-wide importance, for on this foundation rests the whole subsequent intellectual development of Russia and the Balkan Peninsula—in fact, of Eastern Europe. Under Simeon the Great (893-927) Slav literature reached its zenith—its golden age. The Moravian monks, who were driven out by Svatopluk, found a hospitable welcome in the monasteries around the Lake of Ochrida, and developed great literary activity. The Southern Slav monasteries sent monks and books to Russia, and thus they became the first instructors of their mighty brothers in the North. Still later, the Macedonian Empire was founded and the Emperor Samoilo resided in Ochrida. He, however, was soon overthrown by the Byzantine Emperor Basil II. in the Battle of Belassitza (1018). But the Bulgarian Empire recovered again under Tsar Ivan Asen II. (1218-1271) and had reached the zenith of its power when it was shattered for centuries by the invading Turks (1391).

The central Southern Slav (Serbian) countries—Illyria, Moesia, and Dalmatia—for a long time remained broken up into separate counties. Not before the twelfth century did Rasa become the centre of a Serbian state, founded by Stefan Nemanya (1165), to whom the Serbs owe the famous Nemanya dynasty. After their victory over the Byzantines at Kossovo the Serbs penetrated further and further south towards Macedonia. Under Dušan Silni (1331-1355) Serbian power reached its meridian. He organized the nation into a state and gave the people good laws. In his time Serbia reached from the Save and the Danube to the Gulf of Corinth, and from the Adriatic to Mesta on the frontiers of Thrace and Macedonia. After the battle of Belbushde (1330) even the Bulgars had to acknowledge the supremacy of Serbia. The Serbian Metropolitan of Petcha was made Patriarch, the National Serb Church was founded, and, in the Macedonian town of Skoplye, Dušan Silni proclaimed himself Tsar of the Serbs, Bulgars and Greeks. With an army of 100,000 men he marched on Constantinople in order to establish his throne there, and to be revenged upon the Greeks who had a few years previously called the Ottoman Turks to Europe.[11] But he died on the way,—it is said that he was poisoned by a Greek.

Architectural and literary monuments from the age of the Serbian rulers in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries still clearly show traces of the high degree of culture that had spread from Byzantium, Venice and Florence. But these are merely sparks which the Serbian discriminative genius and natural ability would doubtless have kindled into a bright flame had not the advent of the Turks frustrated the great plans of Dušan Silni. Constantinople would have remained in the hands of a Christian people who love art and progress. No other nation was so well fitted as the Serbs to infuse new life into the culture of the ancients. The presence of this sane and strong young nation would have saved the humanists their flight from Byzantium.

After the death of Dušan Silni the great Serbian Empire crumbled into a large number of small states, whose rulers played a dangerous game, and intrigued one against the other, whilst the Turks were conquering Thrace. The Macedonian despots became vassals to the Turks, and only a few countries like Zeta, Bosnia, and the empire of Prince Lazar (the Serbia of to-day) maintained their independence. So long as these countries were free, the Ottoman invasion of Europe was delayed, because in the Kossovo polje (the field of Kossovo) Serbia held the key of Europe. The Turks knew this and constantly prepared their attacks accordingly. On Vidovdan (St. Vitus Day, 1387) 100,000 Serbs and 300,000 Turks met in battle on the Kossovo. The battle was fierce and the losses on both sides were enormous. The Serbs lost their Prince Lazar and all their nobility; the Turks the greater part of their army and their Sultan Murat I. In Europe the report spread that the Serbs had been victorious; in Florence and Paris all the bells were rung for joy, and a service of thanksgiving was held in Notre Dame, which was attended by Charles VI. with all his Court.

Murat’s successor, Bayazit did not penetrate further; he permitted the Serbs to retain their own laws, but they had to acknowledge him as their suzerain. In 1459 Serbia was finally crushed and fell completely under Turkish rule. Soon after (1463) the same fate befell Bosnia and Hercegovina. Only the mountain fastnesses of Montenegro remained unconquered.

III.

When Serbia began her life as an independent State, she was still bleeding from the many wounds inflicted upon her through centuries of slavery, and first of all these wounds had to be tended. The Serbian nation, intellectually and economically bankrupt from long Turkish misrule, was in the position of a merchant—an honest fellow, but robbed to his last farthing, whose ruined shop is being restored to him, and who is expected to work up the old business to its former prosperity out of these ruins. Years had to elapse ere the people got accustomed to the new order of things, and, out of the welter of beginnings, found the way to sound civic development. In those days Serbia fell a victim to every political infantile disease, but on the other hand she was inspired with a poetic, truly Slav patriotism. Their golden freedom, which they had so long yearned and fought for, and had now at last won, affected the nation not as a political event but as a great family festival, in which all the members were united in love and joy. They revelled in their new-found freedom; the sordid considerations of the day were put off till the morrow, or left to the care of a small body of “cold-blooded” men. Civic law and order, and regularity in the administration—unheard of under Turkish rule—were first looked upon as purely miraculous, and then tacitly accepted as the inevitable consequences of freedom. The idea of a free State is only of theoretical value to the Serbs, the main thing for them is that they should be a free people. As a free people they followed their leaders—not as superiors, but as children obey their fathers. With childlike simplicity they gathered round their rural magistrate to hear his instructions, and in the same spirit they assembled under the ancient plane-tree in the Topchider Park to hear Miloš, their first Gospodar and Prince, dispense wise counsel and even-handed justice. But in these council-meetings between ruler and people was sown the seed of the true constitution of the State, and, like the empire of Dušan Silni in days gone by, modern Serbia has grown up out of her own people. And this is why Serbia is an eminently nationalistic state, free and independent of foreign influence. Perhaps in some ways this has been a drawback, but it has also been a great source of strength to Serbia. The intimate connection between the reigning house and the people proved a bulwark against foreign attempts at denationalization, and gave Serbia the necessary strength to keep herself free from Germany’s corroding influence to this day.