IN the middle of the seventh century, a number of Slavonian tribes
stretched themselves along the Sava and the Danube, down to the Black
Sea, and founded, at different times, no less than six separate kingdoms,
those of Bulgaria, Croatia, Servia, Bosnia, Slavonia, and Dalmatia; under
the name _Srb_, the four last of these nations must be considered as
comprised. Their earlier history it is not easy to trace. Slavonian
writers are disposed to represent the Maestidæ, who made an incursion
into Italy during the age of Claudius Tacitus (A.D. 276), as synonymous
with the Sarmatæ; and Kopitar (a high authority) has gathered much
evidence to prove that the dialect spoken in the district to the east of
Sparta is of Slavonic origin. Leake has remarked, that many of the names
of places in the Morea are Slavonian,—Kastanika, Sitina, Gorica, and
others. In the neighbourhood of Sparta is a town called Σηλαφοχωρὶ, and
it is notorious, that the language of several of the islands of the
Grecian Archipelago, Hydra for example, is Slavonic. The original
meaning of the word _Srb_, it is not easy to fix. Some derive it from
_Srp_, a _sickle_, _others from Sibir_, _Sever_, _the north_; others from
_Sarmat_, or _Sarmatian_; some from the Latin _Servus_; but Dobrowsky
says, “Significatum radicis _Srb_, consultis etiam dialectis omnibus,
nondum licuit eruere.” {0a} In the year 640, the Servians built, with
the permission of Heraclius, the city of Servica, on the banks of the
Danube. Little can be traced of their history till, under Vlastimir, at
the end of the ninth century, they were the tributaries of the Greeks.
At this period, they appear to have been engaged in wars with the
Bulgarians, whom they subdued. At the beginning of the 11th century,
Vladimir assumed the title of king of Servia. Afterwards, during the
reign of Tzedomil, the Servians acknowledged the Roman authority, and
leagued themselves with its emperors against Comnenus the Grecian
monarch, in consequence of which Comnenus marched upon Servia (in 1151),
subdued its inhabitants, and led their leader Tzedomil into captivity.
The submission of the latter obtained his release; but the Servians,
impatient of foreign control, made another attempt to free themselves,
but were defeated on the banks of the Morava, by Isaac Angelos, in 1192,
when Stephen Nemana was proclaimed monarch, with the title of _Despot_.
His successor, Stephen Nemanich, was driven from his throne by the
Hungarians, and his brother Vuk Nemanich was proclaimed king or _Kral_ of
Servia, under Hungarian authority. He reigned for a very short period,
and the regal power again reverted to Stephen. At this period, however,
separate from, and almost independent of monarchical authority, a number
of dukes, princes, and _Bans_, exercised a sway in Servia; Bosnia, then
called Rama, South Bosnia or Herzegovina, and Rascia, that part of
southern Servia, through which the river Raska flows, were frequently
detached from, and as frequently re-united to Servia proper. Milutin
Urosh, who reigned from 1275 to 1321, was subdued by Charles the First of
Hungaria. Soon after arose the monarch who is one of the most
illustrious names in Servian song and Servian story, Dushan Silni (Dushan
the mighty), who carried on several successful campaigns against the
Greeks, and recovered many of the lost provinces of his country. He took
the title of Tzar, {0b} and was succeeded by that ill-fated Lazar, whose
defeat by the sultan Murad (Amurath), on the field of Kosova (June 15,
1389), is the subject of so many of the melancholy ballads of the
Servians. Murad was stabbed by the Servian Molosh Obilich, and Lazar was
executed in the Mussulmans’ camp. Murad’s brother (Bajazet), divided
Servia between the two sons of Lazar, who did homage and paid heavy
tribute. Since then, no dawn of liberty has shone upon Servia. Reduced
to be the bloody theatre of the fierce wars which have been carried on
between the Turks and Hungarians, every struggle for freedom—each feebler
than the former one, has only served to deteriorate her condition, and to
destroy her hopes. In 1459, Servia was treated solely as a conquered
province,—her most respectable families banished or destroyed, while,
from time to time, vast numbers of Servians emigrated into Hungary. In
1481, prince Pavo Brankovich made an irruption into Servia, and after
defeating the Turks in several battles, headed 50,000 Servians, who fixed
themselves as colonists under the protection of Hungary. In 1689, many
thousand Servians flocked to the army of Leopold the First. The
following year, the patriarch Tzernovich led into Sirmia and Slavonia
nearly sixty thousand Servian families. By the treaty of Passarovich, in
1718, the greater part of Servia was transferred to the Austrians. It
reverted back to the Porte in 1739. In 1759, a vast number of Servians
emigrated into Russia, and peopled Newservia, but they have since been
completely blended with the Russians, whose language they soon adopted.
At the beginning of the present century, Servia was again released from
the Turkish sway, and under the auspices of the Austrian emperor, is now
governed by a _Knes_, or prince, whose name is Milosh Obrenowich. {0c}
* * * * *
There are four provinces or governments (Sandshaks), Semendria, Perserin,
Veltshterin, and Aladshahissar, consisting of nearly a million of
Servians, subjected to Turkish authority. The greater part of these are
Christians of the Greek Church. The number of Servians who recognise the
_Greek Church_ is estimated by Schaffarik at 2,526,000. {0d}
* * * * *
The various idioms of the Slavonian language may, without exception, be
traced up to one single stem, the old or church Slavonic. From this one
source, two great streams flow forth; the northern, comprehending the
Bohemian, Polish, and Russian; and the southern, composed of the
Hungarian, Bulgarian, and Servian tongues. The latter branches were much
less extensively employed than the former. About a million and a half of
men speak the Hungarian; not more than half a million the Bulgarian,
which in Macedonia has been superseded by the Romaic, the Albanian, and
the Turkish; while the Servian idiom, the most cultivated, the most
interesting, and the most widely spread of all the southern Slavonian
dialects, is the language of about five millions, of whom about two
millions are Mahommedans. {0e}
* * * * *
The vicinity of Greece and Italy modified and mellowed the language of
Servia, which is, in fact, the Russian hellenized, deprived of its
hardiness and its consonant terminations, and softened down into a
perfect instrument for poetry and music. {0f} Of the descendants from
the ancient Slavonic, it is more closely allied to the Russian and
Windish idioms, than to the Bohemian or Polish. Vuk Karadjich divides it
into three distinct dialects, the _Herzegovinian_, or that spoken in
Bosnia, Montenegro, Dalmatia, and Croatia; the _Sirmian_, which is used
in Sirmia and Slavonian and the _Resavian_. No doubt the Servian
language has been considerably influenced by the Turkish, but though it
has been enriched by oriental words, it has not adopted an oriental
construction. Schaffarik, in describing the different Slavonic tongues,
says, fancifully but truly, that “Servian song resembles the tune of the
violin; Old Slavonian, that of the organ; Polish, that of the guitar.
The Old Slavonian in its psalms, sounds like the loud rush of the
mountain stream; the Polish, like the bubbling and sparkling of a
fountain; and the Servian like the quiet murmuring of a streamlet in the
valley.”
* * * * *
The Servian alphabet consists of only twenty-eight letters, which is
twenty less than the old Slavonic, and seven less than the Russian. The
letters Ъ (dj), Ђ (tj), and Џ the soft g of the Italians, are unknown to
the Russians, and the Servians have added two letters to their alphabet,
by combining the Ь of the Russians with А and Н, making Љ and Њ, which
are equivalent to the Italian gl and gn, the Spanish ll and ñ, and the
Portuguese lh and nh. They have wholly dismissed the Б, which so
constantly and so uselessly occurs in the church Slavonic and Russian.
No traces of Servian literature go beyond the thirteenth century. {0g}
The Hexaemeron of Basil, the Bulgarian exarch, written in 1263, and the
Epistle of Damian, in 1324, are both in the old church Slavonian tongue.
The first Servian literary record is the _Rodoslov_ of Daniel, archbishop
of Servia, which is a chronicle of the four kings who were his
contemporaries (from 1272 to 1336), beginning with Urosh. This book is a
valuable register of the laws enacted during his life, and throws much
light on early Servian history. An almanack, entitled _Ljetopis_, of
this period, also exists; and of a somewhat later period, the
_Tzarostavnik_, or _Register of Princes_, by an unknown author. Dushan,
with whose name the Servians associate all that is glorious, caused a
book of laws to be written for the use of his kingdom, which breathe a
milder and kinder spirit than would be expected in an age and among a
people so little instructed. They contain some remarkable provisions in
favour of travellers and strangers; and not only compel hospitality, but
protect property, by making the host responsible for its security. The
battle of Kosova introduced a long night of darkness and desolation into
Servia; and though a few religious books were published soon after the
invention of printing, no one work of the slightest interest appeared
till the end of the 17th century, when George Brankovich, {0h} the last
of the Servian _despots_, wrote a history of Servia, bringing it down to
the time of Leopold the First. In 1758, Demetrius Theodosijev
established a Servian press. In 1796, the Austrian government granted a
monopoly of all Servian literature to the university of Ofen, by
suppressing all printing-presses elsewhere.
* * * * *
Though it is not my intention to write a general history of the
literature of Servia, in introducing one interesting branch of it to the
English reader, I cannot but slightly refer to the essential services it
has received from a few distinguished writers.
* * * * *
_John Raich_ was born in Karlovitz in 1726, and died in 1801. He
received his elementary education from the Jesuits in Komorn, removed to
the evangelical school at Oedenburg, and completed his studies at Kiev.
He afterwards visited the famous convent of Chilendar (on Mount Athos),
which was built and endowed by Shupan Nemana, who died there as a monk,
having taken the name of Simeon. Raich was ultimately chosen
archimandrite of the convent of Kovil, in Chaskisten bataillon. His
principal work, printed at Vienna (1792–5), is his history of the
Slavonian people. {0i} He also wrote a history of Servia, Rasza, Bosnia,
and Rama (Vienna, 1793); a tragedy on the death of the Tzar Urosh (Ofen,
1798); and many theological treatises. He uses the church Slavonian
dialect, but his style is full of Servian and Russian phraseology, which
he perhaps adopted as likely to recommend his productions.
* * * * *
_Dosithei Obradovich_, who was born in 1739, and died in 1811, was the
first who ventured to apply the popular language to the purposes of
literature. His birth-place was Chakovo in the _Banat_ of Temeshvar, and
at the age of fourteen he became a monk in the Opovo convent. Here he
was too restless to remain, and having determined to see foreign
countries, he travelled for a quarter of a century, and visited Greece,
Albania, Italy, Turkey, Russia, Germany, France, and England. The love
of home had mastered the desire of change, and he returned to Servia,
when he was made a senator at Belgrad, and appointed to superintend the
education of the children of Tzerny George. He published at Leipzig, in
1783, an auto-biography, entitled “_Tzivot i prikliuchenjia D.
Obranovicza_,” besides sundry poems and fables, and moral treatises.
* * * * *
_Demetrius Davidovich_ has greatly assisted in elevating the language of
the Servian people to the best purposes of literary instruction. He is
(I believe at this time) the secretary to Milosh, the hospodar of Servia.
For many years he edited a Servian newspaper at Vienna, and has annually
published a Servian almanack (_Zabavnik_), in which are many interesting
particulars respecting the literary and political history of his country.
The indisposition on the part of the superintendents of schools in
Servia, to employ the popular tongue as the instrument of education, has
been long the ban of civilization, and the barrier to national
improvement. But of late the influence of those who have endeavoured to
make literature subserve the interests and the happiness of the many
rather than the few, has led to the dismissal of Slavonian, and the
substitution of Servian books. A controversy, with much controversial
bitterness, is at the present moment carried on in Servia (where, as
elsewhere, to be dignified is by some thought better than to be useful,
and to please a few pedants is deemed more worthy of ambition than to
instruct a whole people), between the advocates of the antiquated
Slavonic, and those whose simple and intelligible maxim is, “write as you
speak, if you would be understood;” and of the latter every year adds
greatly to the numbers.
* * * * *
But of all the writers of Servia, he from whom the volumes emanate whence
these translations are taken, is beyond comparison the most attractive
and the most popular.
* * * * *
_Stephanovich Karadjich Vuk_ was born on the 26th October, O. S., in the
year 1787, at _Trshich_, an obscure village in Turkish Servia (Iadar),
near the town of Losnitza and the river Drina, at a short distance from
the Austrian and Hungarian frontier, where, however, the Servian language
is spoken with far more purity than in the larger towns. In his early
youth he passed the borders, and received his education at the Gymnasium
of the dissidents from the Greek church at Karlovitz. There his school
instruction began and ended; but having visited Vienna, intercourse there
with intelligent and instructed men led to the development of the natural
powers of his mind, and directed his inquiries to the hidden stores of
popular literature which his country possessed. A feeble and crippled
frame unfitted him for bodily labour, and all his thoughts and all his
ardour attached themselves to intellectual exertions. He began his
literary career at Vienna, and published in 1814 his Servian Grammar, and
a century of Servian songs; but the embarrassments of the censorship
induced him to seek a freer field for the publication of his works, and
he removed to Leipzig, where the edition, in three volumes, of his
popular Servian poetry, appeared in 1823–4. He soon obtained high
reputation there, and received the diploma of doctor in philosophy, and
was elected to many literary distinctions. The emperor Nicholas, in that
spirit so honourable to many of the autocrats of Russia, has conferred on
him a yearly pension of 100 ducats; and he now pursues his interesting
inquiries, and from time to time exerts that creating and regenerating
power which has called the poetry of Servia into existence, and
established for it a permanent reputation. {0j}
* * * * *
The Servians must be reckoned among those races who vibrated between the
north and the east; possessing to-day, dispossessed to-morrow; now fixed,
and now wandering: having their head-quarters in Sarmatia for many
generations, in Macedonia for following ones, and settling in Servia at
last. But to trace their history, as to trace their course, is
impossible. At last the eye fixes them between the Sava and the Danube,
and Belgrade grows up as the central point round which the power of
Servia gathers itself together, and stretches itself along the right bank
of the former river, southwards to the range of mountains which spread to
the Adriatic and to the verge of Montengro. Looking yet closer, we
observe the influence of the Venetians and the Hungarians on the
character and the literature of the Servians. We track their connexion
now as allies, and now as masters; once the receivers of tribute from,
and anon as tributaries to, the Grecian empire; and in more modern times
the slaves of the Turkish yoke. Every species of vicissitude marks the
Servian annals,—annals represented only by those poetical productions of
which these are specimens. The question of their veracity is a far more
interesting one than that of their antiquity. Few of them narrate events
previous to the invasion of Europe by the Turks in 1355, but some refer
to facts coeval with the Mussulman empire in Adrianople. More numerous
are the records of the struggle between the Moslem and the Christian
parties at a later period; and last of all, they represent the quiet and
friendly intercourse between the two religions, if not blended in social
affections, at least associated in constant communion. {0k}
* * * * *
The earliest poetry of the Servians has a heathenish character; {0l} that
which follows is leagued with Christian legends. But holy deeds are
always made the condition of salvation. The whole nation, to use the
idea of Göthe, is imaged in poetical superstition. Events are brought
about by the agency of angels, but the footsteps of Satan can be nowhere
traced;—the dead are often summoned from their tombs;—awful warnings,
prophecies, and birds of evil omen, bear terror to the minds of the most
courageous.
* * * * *
Over all is spread the influence of a remarkable and, no doubt, antique
mythology. An omnipresent spirit—airy and fanciful—making its dwelling
in solitudes—and ruling over mountains and forests—a being called the
_Vila_, is heard to issue its irresistible mandates, and pour forth its
prophetic inspiration: sometimes in a form of female beauty—sometimes a
wilder Diana—now a goddess gathering or dispersing the clouds, and now an
owl among ruins and ivy. The Vila, always capricious, and frequently
malevolent, is a most important actor in all the popular poetry of
Servia. The _Trica polonica_ is sacred to her. She is equally renowned
for the beauty of her person and the swiftness of her step:—“Fair as the
mountain Vila,” is the highest compliment to a Servian lady—“Swift as the
Vila,” is the most eloquent eulogium on a Servian steed.
* * * * *
Of the amatory poems of the Servians, Göthe justly remarks, that, when
viewed all together, they cannot but be deemed of singular beauty; they
exhibit the expressions of passionate, overflowing, and contented
affection; they are full of shrewdness and spirit; delight and surprise
are admirably pourtrayed; and there is, in all, a marvellous sagacity in
subduing difficulties and in obtaining an end; a natural, but at the same
time vigorous and energetic tone; sympathies and sensibilities, without
wordy exaggeration, but which, notwithstanding, are decorated with
poetical imagery and imaginative beauty; a correct picture of Servian
life and manners,—everything, in short, which gives to passion the force
of truth, and to external scenery the character of reality.
* * * * *
The poetry of Servia was wholly traditional, until within a very few
years. It had never found a pen to record it, but has been preserved by
the people, and principally by those of the lower classes, who had been
accustomed to listen and to sing these interesting compositions to the
sound of a simple three-stringed instrument, called a _Gusle_; and it is
mentioned by Göthe, that when some Servians who had visited Vienna were
requested to write down the songs they had sung, they expressed the
greatest surprise that such simple poetry and music as theirs should
possess any interest for intelligent and cultivated minds. They
apprehended, they said, that the artless compositions of their country
would be the subject of scorn or ridicule to those whose poetry was so
polished and so sublime. And this feeling must have been ministered to
by the employment, even in Servia, of a language no longer spoken, for
the productions of literature, though it is certain the natural
affections, the everyday thoughts and associations could not find fit
expression in the old church dialect:
“The talk
Man holds with week-day man in the hourly walk
Of the mind’s business, is the undoubted stalk
“_True song_” doth grow on.”
The collection of popular songs, _Narodne __srpske pjesme_, from which
most of those which occupy this volume are taken, was made by Vuk, and
committed to paper either from early recollections, or from the
repetition of Servian minstrels. These, he informs us, and his statement
is corroborated by every intelligent traveller, form a very small portion
of the treasure of song which exists unrecorded among the peasantry. How
so much of beautiful anonymous poetry should have been created in so
perfect a form, is a subject well worthy of inquiry. Among a people who
look to music and song as a source of enjoyment, the habit of
improvisation grows up imperceptibly, and engages all the fertilities of
imagination in its exercise. The thought which first finds vent in a
poetical form, if worth preservation, is polished and perfected as it
passes from lip to lip, till it receives the stamp of popular approval,
and becomes as it were a national possession. There is no text-book, no
authentic record, to which it can be referred, whose authority should
interfere with its improvement. The poetry of a people is a common
inheritance, which one generation transfers sanctioned and amended to
another. Political adversity, too, strengthens the attachment of a
nation to the records of its ancient prosperous days. The harps may be
hung on the willows for a while, during the storm and the struggle, but
when the tumult is over, they will be strung again to repeat the old
songs, and recall the time gone by.
* * * * *
The historical ballads, which are in lines composed of five trochaics,
are always sung with the accompaniment of the _Gusle_. At the end of
every verse, the singer drops his voice, and mutters a short cadence.
The emphatic passages are chanted in a louder tone. “I cannot describe,”
says Wessely, “the pathos with which these songs are sometimes sung. I
have witnessed crowds surrounding a blind old singer, and every cheek was
wet with tears—it was not the music, it was the words which affected
them.” As this simple instrument, the Gusle, is never used but to
accompany the poetry of the Servians, and as it is difficult to find a
Servian who does not play upon it, the universality of their popular
ballads may be well imagined.
* * * * *
Independently of the measure of ten syllables, universally used in the
ballads of the Servians, they have verses of seven syllables, consisting
of two trochaics and one dactyl:
Wĭlt thoŭ lōve thy̆ Mīlĭtză?
Of eight syllables, consisting of four trochaics: as,
Hāstăn ōnwărd tō thě wēddĭng.
And of one trochaic between two dactyls:
Mērrĭly̆, dāncĭng, mērrĭly̆.
Of ten syllables, two trochaics and two dactyls:
Mōrăvă’s bānks ăre trōd by̆ thě māidĕn.
Of twelve syllables, composed of two trochaics and one iambic:
Gō thěn, Kūm, thŏu lōv’d ŏne, wāits shě fŏr thēe.
And of thirteen syllables, namely, four trochaics, a dactyl, and a
closing trochaic:
Lōok ăroūnd, thŏu lōvěly Crētă, smīlĭngly lŏok rōund.
The translations which have appeared in Germany under the name of Talvj
are the work of an amiable woman (Theresa von Jacob), who having passed
the earlier part of her life in Russia, and possessing a mind cultivated
by literature, and captivated by the natural beauties of Servian poetry,
has most successfully devoted herself to their diffusion.
* * * * *
Professor Eugenius Wessely, of Vinkovcze in Slavonia, has also published
a small volume of Translations from the Nuptial Songs of the Servians;
{0m} the renderings have the merit of perfect fidelity, and his
introduction contains many interesting illustrations of Servian manners.
* * * * *
In the following translations I have, in all the narrative poetry,
preserved the original measure. _Rhyme_ is seldom used by the Servians.
It is found in some of the shorter lyrical pieces, in the rendering of
which I have allowed myself some latitude of expression. But the wish,
above all things, to preserve most faithfully the character of the
original, has prevented my introducing many very obvious decorations, and
my veiling many equally obvious defects. To fidelity, at least, this
volume may lay an honest claim. I have endeavoured to avail myself of
all the authors who have written on the subject, particularly of the
valuable criticisms of Dr. Kopitar in the Vienna _Iahrbuch der
Litteratur_, of the works of Göthe, Grimm, and Vater. The notes attached
to Talvj’s translation I have employed, without any special reference to
them.