BiblicalMotifsinMedievalSerbianPaintingandLiterature

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SERBIAN STUDIES PUBLISHED BY THE NORTH AMERICAN SOCIETY FOR SERBIAN STUDIES

CONTENTS VOLUME 4, NUMBER 3 SPRING 1988

Alex N. Dragnich AMERICAN SERBS AND OLD WORLD POLITICS 5

Vasa D. Mihailovich THE IMAGE OF AMERICA IN CONTEMPORARY SERBIAN LITERATURE 2 7

Michael Bora Petrovich KARADZIC AND NATIONALISM 41

George Vid Tomashevich BIBLICAL MOTIFS IN MEDIEVAL SERBIAN PAINTING AND LITERATURE 59

Laura Gordon Fisher THE PATRIOTIC POETRY OF MILAN RAKIC 71

NOTES (Student essays)

Jelona S. Bankovic-Rosul ORIENTAL FATALISM AND VICTORY OF TANAT SIN DEVJL'S YARD AND DERVISTI AND DEATJJ. 79

Ani Lo. L kic-Trboj vic NARRATOR AND NARRATIVE IN ANDRI ' Pll KLETA AVLIJA. 33

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George Vid Tomashevich 59

BIBLICAL MOTIFS IN MEDIEVAL SERBIAN PAINTING AND LITERATURE

In its formative phase under the leadership of the maritime prov-ince of Duklja (Dioclea, Zeta or Montenegro), the bifocal and mar-ginal Serbian civilization gravitated predominantly toward Rome, though its ties "INith and borrowings from Byzantium were often strong and significant. During its maximal development, however, under the guidance of the continental province of Raska (Rascia), it made a decisive switch to\vard Constantinople, though its connections \Vith the \"lest remained considerable.

Caught between Roman Catholicism in the west and Byzantine Orthodoxy in the East, early Serbian rulers perceived substantial differences between the two in the distribution and wielding of ec-clesiastical and secular powers.1 The first Serbian sovereign to act upon that perception was Stefan Nemanja (1114, 1168-1196, 1200) who decided to fashion his own state structure after that of Byzan-tium, precisely when the latter was at the peak of its last grand effort, during the reign of Manuel Comnenus (1143-1180). 2

Born in Duklja and baptized a Roman Catholic, 3 Temanja moved to Raska and converted to Orthodoxy. 4 In the history of Serbian civilization he is important as the renewer of statehood after the disintegration of the kingdom of Duklja, gatherer of Serbian lands, creator of a slate which lasted more than 300 years, 5 and founder of a royal house under whose rule the Serbian people reached the ap-ogee of their medieval development. It is the kings and emperors of the Nemanjic dynasty that st ill provide the woof of much of Serbian folklore. 6 lt \'vas under that same dynasty that Serbian culture rip-ened into a civilization while the Serbian state grevv into an empire seeking to replace Byzantium itself.7

In his determination to build a loyal church, Nemanja clashed with the Bogumils, a religious and social movement of complex Near-Eastern origin. 8 An important precursor of the Reformation, their dualistic metaphysical and somewhat anarchistic socio-polit-ical doctrines, rooted in Mazadaism and related to Manichean , Pau-lician, Patarene and Albigensian heresies, were aimed against the feudal hierarchies of both church and slate.9 Expelled from Byzan-tium and Bulgaria, the Bogumils sought a haven in Serbia, but Ne-manja found them subversive and dangerous to his designs. The


"heresy" was widespread among disaffected serfs, but it won over even some nobility and clergy, particularly the monks. According to his son and biographer, King Stefan the Firstcrowned, Lhe Grand Zupan followed medieval usage in eradicating the growing and stub-born "heresy" from all of his domains. Comparing his father with the Prophet Elijah, the royal writer leaves us in no doubt that Ne-manja dealt with them in a Draconian manner. 10

Ejected from Serbia, thousands of persecuted Bogumils moved to Bosnia, where they managed to survive until the Turkish conquest (1463) despite persistent allempts by both Rome and Constantinople to convert or extirpate them. 11

Nemanja's youngest son, Rastko, the later St. Sava, while still an adolescent, fled to Mount Athas and became a monk.12 Toward the end of his life, Nemanja abdicated (1196) and himself entered a monastery, under the name of Simeon, thus establishing a precedent followed by most of medieval Serbia's royally and nobility. 13 He and Sava restored Hilandar, a long-abandoned monastery in Chalcidice, which soon developed into a major center of Serbian theological, literary and legal scholarship.14

A man of many-sided erudition and a conscious teacher and civ-ilizer, Sava not only translated from medieval Greek into Serbian, but also wrote several typicons, i.e., rules of monastic life, as well as a hagiography of his father. 15

After the capture of Constantinople by Lhe Crusaders in 1204,16 the Byzantine government moved to NiceaY The balance of power and influence between Eastern and Western Christendom, at odds since the Great Schism of 1054 and even before, clearly shifted in favor of the latter. "It was a supreme religious crisis in the history of the Balkans."10

In 1217, Pope Honorius III sent Nemanja's son, Stefan the First-crowned, a set of royal insignia. 19 After this move toward the West, Sava turned to the East. In 1219, he went to Nicea and convinced the Emperor and the Patriarch that it was in their interest to recog-nize the autonomy of the Serbian Orthodox Church, 20 with Sava himself as its first archbishop endowed with the right to consecrate his successors. 21 Sava established his archiepiscopate at Zica (1207-20),22 created seven new bishoprics staffed wilh Sorbs, gave his na-tional church a strong central organization23 and ordered his disci-ples to translate a number of books which he had brought to Serbia


from his travels in Europe, Asia and Africa.24 On all these journeys he bought whatever he deemed useful and compatible with his country's native traditions. He also traveled through the interior of his homeland and taught his people not only Christian religion, but even such worldly subjects as more efficient methods of agriculture and other aspects of rural economy. 25

Besides, for many years, he also served as foreign minister, am-bassador and adviser to his brother, Stefan, and to his royal neph-ews, Radoslav and Vladislav. 26 He died in Bulgaria in 1236.27 Almost immediately, the church made a concerted effort to build him up as a national saint and benefactor. 26

St. Sava is to the Serbs what St. Patrick is to the Irish, St. Stephen to the Hungarians and St. Olaf to the Norwegians. He is a culture hero with certain features of Prometheus as well as Hiawatha. 29 A plethora of references to Sava's life and achievements, in written as well as oral literature of many centuries, represents one of the fun-damental themes of Serbian civilization. His cult contributed to the preservation of Serbian nalional consciousness especially during the difficult centuries of Ottoman domination. 30

After the fatal weakening of Byzantium by the so-called Latin Em-pire (1204-1261), Serbia's own imperial ambilions began to emerge. Under a series of rich, well-armed and cultivated rulers, she steadily grew in economic, military and cultural respects. Having become, through mining and trade, one of the foremost powers in southeast-ern Europe, she began to expand mainly at the expense of her By-zantine model and teacher. Inspired by the examples of Nemanfa and Sava, all Serbian monarchs supported their loyal Orthodox church as the main agency of educalion and welfare and all spent lavishly on monumental architecture and pain ling. 31

MEDIEVAL SERBIAN PAINTING While the oldest church on Serbian soil is that of St. Peter in Ras

(tenth or eleventh century), started probably before the conversion of the Serbs, the oldest examples of monumental Serbian painting are the early Romanesque frescoes in St. Michael at Stan (1077-1150) containing theological molifs as well as a royal portrait.J2

In the country's sacred architecture, which includes more than 1500 churches and monasteries, one can distinguish several tradi-tions. Most of the early churches of the School of Raska are royal


tombs or mausoleums of the aristocracy. Apart from Hilandar, the principal monuments of the Nemanjic period are Djurdjevi Stubovi and Studenica both from the second half of the twolfth century); Zica (1207-1220); Mileseva (around 1254); Sopocani (from 1260); Gracanica (about 1321); Banjska (1313-1317); Decani (1327-1335); and the cluster of churches of the Patriarchate of Pee (from the thir-teenth and fourteenth centuries). 33

Another important group of ecclesiastical structures, such as Las-novo (1341) and Marko's Monastery (second half of the fourteenth century), was erected in Macedonia by the high dignitaries of the Serbian empire under the Tsars Stefan Dusan (1308, 1331-1345, 1355), and his son, Uros V (1355-1371). 34

The most significant monuments of the period of post-imperial dissolution belong to the School of Morava . They include Lozarica (1371) Ravanica (1377); Ljubostinja (end of the fourteenth century); Kalenic (1407-1413); and the great literary center within the ram-parts of Manasija (1406-1418). 35 As for secular architecture, it sur-vives primarily in hundreds of military fortifications and half-ruined castles, although several royal palaces have been identified.36

In the beginning of their apprenticeship in the school of Byzantine masters, medieval Serbian painters duly reflected their teachers' tendency toward unworldliness which gives to their mostly Biblical motifs "a profoundly transcendental atmosphere."37 But in the sec-ond half of the twelfth century Byzantine art itself began to undergo a renaissance without which the whole revival of anliquily in later Western developments cannot be understood.38

The finest purely Serbian work is to be found in the thirteenth-century royal mausoleums of Mileseva and Sopo6ani. 39 Andre Gra-bar describes the portrait of Mileseva's founder, King Vladislav, as a "frankly realistic ... landmark in the history of European painting, and of the European portrait in particular."40 In his own words, "the Serbian painters can be seen at their best in the decorations of So-pocani (ca. 1265) ... "He admires "the rare quality of the painting" especially "in details of the huge Dormition of the Vir-gin . .. (where), as at Milesevo, what instantly impresses us is the artist's feeling for grandiose effect, and the dignity of the draped figure. This applies particularly to the bearded apostles beside the couch who remind this art historian "of philosophers of antiq-uity."41


According to David Rice, "This love of realism is ... one of the principal factors that distinguish the work of the Serbian school from that of the Byzantine stream in Greece or Constantinople."42

The break from the old Byzantine stem became even more pro-nounced in the fourteenth century, "under the patronage of the Ser-bian princes and nobles," but also of well-to-do burghers and free peasants who often subsidized artistic activity.43

The complex structure of medieval Serbian art, no less than that of medieval Serbian literature, depended in many respects on move-ments and conditions beyond the borders of the Serbian state. As noted by Svetosar Radojcic,

Millet ... showed that the painters employed by King Milutin, King Stephan Decanski, and the Emperor Du-san borrowed iconographic motifs, and were often in-spired by works of considerable antiquity, in particular by miniatures. Living on the frontier of two worlds, the old Serbian masters often exploited the abundance of artistic models of both East and West. 44

Some medieval Serbian painters are known to us by name. Such as George, Demetrius and Theodore, the decorators of Mileseva, as well as Astrapas, Michael and Eutychius,4 s members of the Court School of King Milutin, which existed, with interruptions, from the thirteenth century till the fall of Smederevo in 1459.46

The content and form of the solemn style of thirteenth-century Serbian painting completely reflects the character of the society and state. The same spirit that animates the biographies of the first Ne-manjices prevails also in the grandiose composilions of Mileseva and Sopocani.4 7 Certain passages in the texts of writers furnish a full commentary to the frescoes of contemporary painters.48

The themes of these murals include large-scale scenes from the earthly life of Christ as described in the Gospels, illustrations of great holidays and processions of saints and historical personages. Only at Sopo6ani are there beginnings of new subjects, such as The Tree of jesse, the Old Testament story of Joseph, the Ecumenical Councils and the Last Judgment. 4 9

The unusually rich pictorial repertoire of the fourteenth century consists of numerous cycles arranged in an encyclopedic manner.


This is true especially of Decani (1335) where the frescoes illustrate almost literally texts of the Gospels, Acts of the Apostles, apocryphal stories, hagiographies, liturgical scenes, verses of church poetry and fragments of the Old Testament. The whole Decani material is di-vided into 19 cycles making up an illustrated calendar of 365 scenes. The narrative character of this art is enlivened by dramatic, poetic and symbolic details.50

The realistic tendencies of medieval Serbian art are most promi-nently expressed in the abundance of portraits, sacred as well as secular. 51 That the painters were not isolated from everyday life is evident from the frequent presence in their works of such motifs as Madonnas spinning wool or feeding the infant Christ in the manner of peasant women, the bathing of the child, the labor of a delivering mother, etc . In general, medieval Serbian artists deviated from the canon of the official sacred art and began to mix Biblical motifs and metaphysical themes with images from the reality around them.sz In the words of Radojcic, this is an art in which "calculated theo-logical tendencies are clad in a literary aes thetic form."

The literary element in these paintings is stressed by the legends written pedantically on the frescoes always quoting the sources. The masters of the Serbian fres-coes of the early 14th century were well read, and seized every opportunity to reproduce in painting stories de-rived from contemporary literature. Their literary taste usually maintained a high standard, and they mostly chose dramatic scenes.53

There are also instances illustrating the passing of a certain motif from written literature to painting and from this to the oral tradition. As already noted by Banasevic and other scholars, medieval Serbian painting must have communicated important elements of national as well as foreign high traditions to the illiterate peasants around the monasteries. The masses were thus constantly reminded of the great civilization that was theirs prior to the Turkish conquest. 54

MEDIEVAL SERBIAN LITERATURE The incipient development of Serbian literature between the ninth

and twelfth centuries coincides wilh the divergence of the corrunon


Slavic legacy of Saints Cyril and Methodius and their disciples, Clement and Naum, into several increasingly distinct lingual and literary traditions. It is roughly since the 1100s that one can clearly observe and study the emergence of the so-called Bulgaro-Slavic, Serbo-Slavic and Russo-Slavic morpho-phonetic redactions and lit-erary languages. 55

The earliest known monument of the Serbian recension is the Gospel of Prince Miroslav (Miroslavljevo Evandjelje) written be-tween 1169 and 1197 by a "Sinful Gregory" and a certain Versa-meleon. 56 Its decorative miniatures and illustrations represent a combination of borrowings from both East and West, including, per-haps, some coastal Benedictine influencesY Another Cyrillic doc-ument of early Serbian literature is the 1189 Charter of Ban Kulin, the most popular ruler of Bosnia, to the Ragusans, guaranteeing their freedom of commerce. 58 Finally, The Chronicle of the Priest from Dioclea represents a Latin translation of a Slavic work apparently lost in later centuries. 59 Although of a predominantly secular char-acter, both of these documents contain more than just traces of Bibl-ical motifs.

After the "Sinful Gregory," the first clear personality among the medieval Serbian literati was St. Sava himself. With a brief but his-torically valuable hagiography of his father, he set an example to be followed by all Serbian writers until the Turkish conquest and laid the very foundations of the Serbian literary language. Subsequently, as noted earlier, King Stefan the Firstcrowned also composed a life of his father, St. Simeon, while Domentijan and Teodosije wrote biographies of St. Sava. In pursuit of the same tradition, Archbishop Danilo II started a series of Lives of the Serbian Kings and Arch-bishops (Zivoti Kraljeva i Arhiepiskopa Srpskih). His lead was fol-lowed by numerous continuators well into the fifteenth century.60

The most original works of early Serbian literature were the bio-graphies of a hagiographic character, while the least original were the liturgical writings directly translated from Byzantine Greek. 61

Besides the Code of Emperor Duson (1349) and various charters and chrysobulls granted by his predecessors and successors, 6 2 tem-poral literature consisted mainly of translations of Byzantine and Western works, as well as borrowings from the Arab world, Persia and India. Thus there are Serbian versions of The Trojan War; The Book of Alexander the G1eat; the Life of Aesop; books on cosmog-


raphy; imitations of The Physiologus; Stephanit and Ichnilat (bor-rowed from the Panchatantra); One Thousand and One Nights; Tristan and Isolda (certainly from the West); and various other works con-taining a fusion of Greco-Roman and Judeo-Chrislian learning.sa Many motifs from these and other literary sources have been detected in the Serbian Oral tradition.

Especially widespread was the influence of the so-called apocry-phal books, that is, works inspired by interpretations of the Judea-Christian heritage unacceptable to the church and not contained in the canon. Some Serbian apocrypha came from Byzantium while others seem to have entered from Bulgaria and Macedonia, the most important strongholds of the Bogumil and other heresies. Among the works of St. Sava there is a Serbian adaptation of the Nomocanon (Krmcaja Knjiga).64 Containing an index of canonical and apocry-phal books, this document testifies to the strength of unorthodox influences among the masses whose oral literature appears to have relished forbidden interpretations of the Bible. 65

Among the Old Testament apocrypha, Serbian literature embraces Narratives of Adam; the Book of Enoch; Narratives of Abraham; the Apocalypse of Baruch; Paralipomena of Jeremiah, a story of the destruction of Jerusalem; and Isaiah's Vision, present also in Bul-garian literature.as

Among the apocrypha of the New Testament, medieval Serbian scholars translated the Gospel of St. Thomas, an unorthodox version of the life of Christ; the Gospel of Nicodemus, dealing with the Saviour's death; The Protoevangelium of fames, the oldest story of the conception of the Virgin and the death of Zacharias; the Epistles of Emperor Abgar, with questions addressed to Christ and His pur-ported answers; the Acts of the Apostles, with miraculous stories not recognized by the church; the Questions of Lhe Apostle Bar-tholomew addressed to Christ; the Voyage of the Virgin in Hades, with echos in the oral tradition; the Questions of fohn the Theolo-gian directed to Christ on Mount Tabor; the Voyage of the Apostle Paul to the infernal world; and Discussions of the Patriarch Meth-odius, concerning the pagan empire.67 Il is through these writings that the oral tradition of the peasants came into contact not only with reflective thinking but also with legends, myths and other folk-lore of Near-Eastern, African and even more distant provenience.as Many elements of this highly heterogeneous heritage found an


expression in the folk tales and poems of later centuries. I hope to have shown that, irrespective of their generally recog-

nized esthetic value and their purely decorative function, medieval Serbian fresco murals, even more than sometimes closely corrobor-ative contemporary hagiographies, were designed by the elite to im-press and awe the masses. The ruling classes used the painted walls of churches as well as Sunday and holiday sermons, suffused with Biblical themes and motifs and accessible to nobles and peasants alike, as their principal and most potent media for imparting, es-pecially to the illiterate, the religious ideology of their orthodox Christian feudal society in its struggle with socially troublesome dualist and other heterodoxies.

State University College at Buffalo

'Steven Runciman, Byzantine Civilization, Arnold & Co., London, 1948, pp. 23-68; see also B. Moycndorff and N.H. Baynes, "The Byzantine Inheritance in Russia," in Byzantium, ed. by N.H. Baynes and H. St. L.B. Moss, Oxford, at the Clarendon Press, 1949, pp. 382-385.

2Nikola Radojci(;, Srpski drzavni sabori u srednjem veku (Serbian State Assemblies in the Middle Ages}, Srpska kraljcvska akadomija (Ska). Beograd, 1940, p. 45.

3Kralj Stefan Prvovoncani (King Stefan the Firstcrownod), Zivot Sv. Simeona-Ste-fan a Ncmanje (fhe Lifo of St. Simeon-Stefan Nemanja) , in Stare srpske biografije (Old Serbian Biographies), prepared by Milivoje Basic, Srpska knjizevna zadruga (Skz), kolo XXVI!, br. 180, Beograd, 1924, p. 31; sec also Sv. Sava, Zivot Svetog Simeone (fhc Lifo of St. Simeon), Ibid., pp. 24-25.

N. Radojcic, op. cit., p. 45. H.M.V. Temperloy, Jlistory of Sorbio, Second Impression, B. Bell & Sons, Ltd.,

London, 1919, p. 38. W.A. Morison, The 11evolt of the Serbs Against the Turks, translation from the

Serbian National Ballads of the Period, with an introduction, Cambridge, at the Uni-versity Press, 1942, p. xiii, see also Vuk Karadzic, Pjesmo (Songs),vol. II.

7Charles Diehl,"An Outline," in /Jyzantium , pp. 37, 45. Jordan Ivanov, Bogomilski Knigi i Legcndi (/Jogomil Books and Legends), Bulgar-

skata Akademia na Naukite (Bulgarian Academy of Sciences), Sofia, 1925, p. 30; see also Dmitri Obolensky, Tho Bogomils, A Study in Balkan Neo-Manichaeism, Cam-bridge, The University Press, 1946, 283-84, and Steven Runciman, The Medieval Manichee, The Viking Pross, Now York, 1961, pp. 63- 93.

Obolensky, op. cit., pp. 10- 13; sec also Ivanov, op. cit., p. 23, and Runciman, op. cit., pp. 116, 145- 170 and passim.

1oPrvoven~ani (Firstcrowned), op. cit., p. 40.


"L.P. Brockett, The Bogomils of Bulgaria and Bosnia or. lila Early Protestants of the East, American Baptist Publication Society, Philadelphia, 1879, pp. 73- 74, 83-85.

12Domentijan, iivot Svetoga Save (fhe Ufe of St. Sova), Skz, kola XLI, knjiga 282, Beograd, 1938, pp. 31-39; sec also Teodosije, iivot Svotoga Save (fho Life of St. Sava}, in Stare srpske biogrofije, pp. 83- 95, and Thomas Butler, Monumenta Ser-bocroatica, The University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, 198?, PP 55;-61.

13Sv. Sava, iivot Svetog Simeono (fhe Life of St. S1meon}, m Stare srpske bio-grafije, pp. 7- 17; see also Prvovencani, op. cit., pp. 47- 49, and Domenlijan, op. cit., pp. 255-281. . 'Sv. Sava, op. cit., pp. 15-1_7; Prvovencani, op. cit., PP 50- 52; and Domentijan,

Z1vot Sv. Save, pp. 65-69 and Zivot Sv. Simeona, pp. 269-272. " Domentijan, Zivot SV. Save, pp. 33-41; Stanojc Stanojcvic, Svoti Sava, Dr~ . Stamp.

Kralj. Jugoslavijc, Beograd, 1935, pp. 120- 123. 16Runciman, Byzantine Civilization, pp . 54-55. 17Gcorgije Ostrogorski, Istorijo Vizantije, Prosvcta, Beograd, 1947, pp. 212-215;

Runciman, Byzantine Civilization, pp. 54-57. '"Temperley, op. cit., p. 45. '"Ibid., p. 45; A.A. Vasiliev, History of the Byzantine Empiro, University of Wis-

consin Press, Madison, 1952, p. 612. '"St. Stanojevic, Sv. Sava, pp. 44-47. "Temperley, op.cit., p. 46. 22loc. cit. 23St. Stanojevic, op. cit., p. 50. ' 4Pavle Popovic, Pregled srpske knjizevnosli (Survey of Serbian Utorature), Beo-

grad, 1909, pp. 26-27. " St. Stanojevic, op. cit., pp. 34-36. '"Sir Charles Eliot, Turkey in Europe, New Edition, Edward Arnold, Publisher to

the India Office, London, 1908, p. 36. 27St. Stanojevic, op. cit ., p. 52. '"Ibidem, p. 180. ' 9Veselin Cajkanovic, 0 srpskom vrhovnom bogu (About tlw Serbian Supreme God),

Ska Royal Serbian Academy, Beograd, 1941, p. 22. 30See Otpori (Resistance), in "Jugoslovenski narodi pod turskem vla~cu, xvi-xviii

vek," Opsta enciklopedija Larousse, tom 3, Vuk Karadzic, Beograd, 1973, p. 461. 31See Svetozar Radojcic, S1pska umelllost u srodnjom voku (Serbian Art in the

Middle Ages). Jugoslaviaja, Beograd, 1982, "Poceci monumcntalno umctnosti u Ras-koj," pp. 28-42, esp. p. 28, "Zreli raski stil (1200- 1300)," _PP 43-56 and passim. See also Dr. Vladimir R. Petkovic, Pregled crkvenih spomcmka kroz povesnicu srpskog naroda (Survey of Church Monuments Through tlw Jlistory of the Serbian People), San (Serbian Academy of Sciences) , Beograd, 1950.

3 'Milan Kasanin, L'Art Yougoslave, Mus6e du Prince Paul, Beograd, 1939, pp. 16-17.

33Ka~anin, op. cit., pp. 21-32 and Umetnost i umetnicl (Art and the Artists). "Ju-goistok," Beograd, 1943, pp. 89-118; see also Vlad. R. Potkovic, La Peinture Serbe du Moyen Age, Musee d'Histoire de L'Art, Monuments Sorbes ~II. Beograd, pp. 5-46 and David Talbot Rice, Byzantine Art, Penguin Books, Rev1sed Edition, Pelican Books, Baltimore, Maryland, 1954, p. 150. See especially V.R Petkovic, Pregled crkvenih spomenika . .. , p. 1.

"Rice, Byz. Art, pp. 121-124 and V.R. Petkovic, La Pointure Serbe du Moyen Age, pp. 51-57 .


35Petkovic, La Peinture, pp. 59-64; Ka~anin, L'Art Yougoslave, p. 76; Rice, Byz. Art, p. 124; Sv. Radojcic, in Yugoslavia, UNESCO World Art Series, New York Graphic Society, by arrangement with UNESCO, printed in Italy, 1955, pp. 27-28 and N. Okunev, Monumenta Artis Serbicae, lnstitutum Slavicum, Pragae, 1928, val. I, p. 11.

36A. Deroko, Srednjevekovni gradovi u Srbiji, Crnoj Gori i Makedoniji (Medieval Castles in Serbia, Montenegro and Macedonia), Prosveta, Beograd, 1951, pp. 112, 119, 136, M. Ka~anin, Umolnost i umetnici, pp. 119-149 and Pera J. Popovic, editor, Spomenica petstagodisnjice smederevskag grada, Drz. ~tamparija u Beogradu, Beo-grad, 1930, 1931, pp. 31-132.

"Rice, Yugoslavia, UNESCO, 1955, p.9. 36Vasiliev, op. cit., p. 562. 39Rice, Yugoslavia, p. 10. 40A. Grabar, Byzantine Painting. Historical and Critical Study. Skira, Inc., New

York, 1953, pp. 149-151. 41lbid., p. 151 42Rice, Yugoslavia, p. 9. 43lstorija naroda jugoslavije, Knjiga Prva, Prosveta, Beograd, 1953, p. 482. sv. Radojcic, Yugoslavia, pp. 14, 18. Ibidem, p. 20. Ibid., p. 18. 47lsl. nor. jugoslavije, I, p. 482. sv. RadojCic, Yugoslavia, p. 22. Jst. nor. juga., I, p. 482. 50Jbid., p. 484. 51 D. Diehl, R. Guilland and R. Grousset, Histoire du Moyen Age, Tome IX. Premiere

Partie, L'Europe Orientale de 1081 a 1453. Presses Universitaires de France, Paris , 1945, p. 295.

52See examples in The Virgin of the Annunciation (Church of St. Clement, Ohrid, Xlth-Xllth), Personification of the Earth in Veluce (end of X!Vth century). Nativity (St. Dimitrius, Pee, 1338- 1346), Birth of the Virgin (Studenica, 1313-1314), Master Serge's frescoes in Decani (ca. 1350) and many other instances.

53Sv. Radojcic, Yugoslavia, p. 25. Op. cit., Joe. cit. Sec also N. Banasevic, Ciklus Marko Kraljevica, "Nemanja,"

Skopljo, 1935, p. 191 ct passim. "M.S. Stanoycvich, Early Yugoslav Literature {1100-1800), Columbia University

Press, New York, 1922, p. 11 and Boris Unbegaun, Les Debuts de la Langue Lilleraire chez les Serbes, Libraire Ancienno Honore Champion, Paris, 1935, pp. 18, 34.

Lazar Mirkovic, Miroslavljevo Evandjelje (The Gospel of Miroslav), Naucna knjiga, Beograd, 1950, pp. 49- 50.

571. Mirkovic, op. cit., Joe. cit. as well as Butler, Manumenta Serbocroalica, p. 21. M.S. Stanoyovich, op. cit. , p. 13. K. Jirecek - J. Radonjic, lstoria Srba, Vol. I, Naucna knjiga, Beograd, 1952, p .

131. 60M. Ba~ic, Stare srpske biografije, p. viii; P. Popovic, Pregled, pp. 26-39 and L.

Mirkovic, Stare srpsko biografije XV i XVll veka, Skz, kolo XXXIX, knjiga 265, Beo-grad, 1936, pp. 43- 120 (Zivot despota Stefano Lazarevica od Konstantina Filosofa).

"'M.S. Stanoycvich, op. cit. , pp. 16- 17 and P. Popovic, op. cit., pp. 17-27. 62Stojan Novakovic, Zakonski Spomenici srpskih drzava srednjega veka (Legal

Documents of Medieval Serbian States), Ska (Royal Serbian Academy), Beograd, 1912. 63P . Popovic, op. cit., pp. 11- 16; Ch. Diehl. L'Europe, p. 294; M.S. Stanoyevich, op.

cit., pp. 18-20 and M. Ba~ic, lz stare srpske knjizevnosli (Out of Old Serbian Liter-ature), Skz., 137, Beograd, 1911, pp. 33- 35.


64Bozidar Koval::evic, Iz Proslosti (From tho Past), Skz, Kolo XLV, knjiga 308, Beo grad, 1949, pp. 303- 306.

M.S. Stanoyevich, op. cit., p. 23. 66lbid., Joe. cit. and I. Ivanov, op. cit., pp. 131- 151. 07M.S. Stanoyevich, op. cit., pp. 23-24. 08M. Basic, Iz stare srpske knjizevnosti, Vol. Ill; F.H. Marshall, "Byzantine Litera

lure," in Byzantium, ed. by Baynes and Moss, p. 238.

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