s and 20, 424
Montenegrins (Serbs from Montenegro) moved to Serbia and other regions from
1961 to 1980. After the secessionist revolt of ethnic Albanians in Kosovo
and Metohia in the spring of 1981, another 38,000 Serbs and Montenegrins
moved out under duress. Their emigration has still not been stemmed.
The injuriousness of the policy of narrowing Serbia's sovereignty and
deliberately neutralizing Serbs in communist Yugoslavia is best illustrated
in the case of Kosovo and Metohia, where the Serbs, although formally in
their own state (Republic of Serbia) were forcibly reduced to a minority
with limited civil and national rights. Thanks to the organized actions of
the Province's local administration, which had backing from federal bodies,
the Serbs in Kosovo and Metohia were forced in many cases to leave, owing to
the atmosphere of unsafety, fear and persecution. After almost a decade of
waiting in vain for the federal Yugoslav bodies to stop Kosovo's further
Albanization and halt the exodus from Kosovo and Metohia, a large-scale
Serbian movement erupted, aided by the ecclesiastical circles and the
Belgrade liberal intelligentsia, demanding that the 1974 Constitution be
changed and Kosovo returned to Serbian sovereignty. The movement, which
spread to encompass Serbs from all over Yugoslavia, regardless of their
ideological convictions, emerged (afterwards carefully manipulated by new
leadership in Serbia), prior to the 600th anniversary of the Battle of
Kosovo (1989), heralding, not only symbolically, the return to the eternal
foothold of Serbian national entity - the Kosovo covenant.
1 V. Djuretic, op. cit., pp. 326-335.
2 K. Cavoski, Komunisticka partija Jugoslavije i kosovsko pitanje, in:
Kosovo i Metohija u srpskoj istoriji, pp. 361-375.
3 K. Cavoski, Uspostavljanje i razvoj kosovske autonomije, in: Kosovo i
Metohija u srpskoj istoriji, pp. 379-383
4 V. Djuretic, Kosovo i Metohija u Jugoslaviji, pp. 329-333; More
details in: B. Tonnes, Sonderfall Albanien - Enver Hoxhas "Einiger Weg" und
die historischen Ursprung seiner ideologic, Munchen 1980.
5 V. Djuretic, op. cit., pp. 334-341.
6 Large documentation in: R. Rajovic, Autonomija Kosova.
Istorijsko-pravna studija, Beograd 1985
7 Kosovo. Proslost i sadasnjost, pp. 151-257. Cf. J. Reuter, Die
Albaner in Jugoslawien, Munchen 1982, pp. 43-101; S. K. Pavlowitch, The
Improbable Survivor. Yugoslavia and its Problems 1918-1988, London 1988, pp.
78-93.
8 M Misovic, Ko je trazio republiku Kosovo 1945-1985, Beograd 1987.
PART TWO: THEOCRACY, NATIONALISM, IMPERIALISM
FROM THE SERBIAN REVOLUTION TO THE EASTERN CRISIS: 1804-1875
At the beginning of the 19th century, the Serbs in Kosovo and Metohia
lived under extremely unfavorable circumstances. Toward the end of the 18th
century, the general position of Christian subjects in the European
provinces of the Ottoman Empire was becoming worse with authority
deteriorating in the Turkish administration. A country in which affiliation
to Islam marked the foundation of state ideology, Christians were citizens
of a lower order. The empire was overcome by refeudalization. The
timar-sipahi system was turning into the chiflik-sahibi system, thus
affecting mostly Christian farmers. Arrogation of peasant land and the
imposition of additional taxes were carried out by force. The destruction of
free peasant estates, thus constraining farmers to the position of tenant
farmers (chiflik farmers), the evacuation of entire villages and forceful
Islamization made life insufferable for the Christian people of the Balkans.
Uprisings and movements at the beginning of the century announced a struggle
for the restoration of national states on the Balkan Peninsula.1
The unique religious, ethnic and political character had made life more
difficult for the Serbs in Kosovo and Metohia than in other European
provinces of the Ottoman Empire. Aside to the misfortune common to all
Christians of the European parts of the empire (religious intolerance, legal
and economic unprotectedness) was an arduous struggle for physical and
national survival. The Serbs of Kosovo and Metohia had intercepted the path
leading to the biological expansion of the powerful Albanian populace living
in neighboring regions or admixed with the Serbs. The Albanians were an
ethnic element with strong tribal organization only consolidated through
Islam. Sloping the grey mountains circumscribing Kosovo and Metohia on the
south, armed Albanian herdsmen descended to the plains of Kosovo and
Metohia, routing native Serbian inhabitants to make space for the settlement
of their fellow tribesmen. Albanian settlements sprouted in Kosovo and
Metohia like freely growing weeds. Wedging themselves like pegs into compact
Serbian settlements, the armed ethnic Albanians imposed upon the unarmed
Serbs an unequal struggle over the land.
On the plane of political determination, ethnic Albanians were the most
conservative element on the Peninsula, loyal to the shenat. Headed by
illiterate and xenophobic tribal chiefs (krenas) and feudal lords, without
true national awareness, the Albanian highlander was doubly intolerant
toward the Orthodox Serbian. As Islamic believers and representatives of a
privileged class in the state, they defined themselves to the Serbs
confessionally, calling them infidels (djaurs), thus underscoring religious
intolerance and social inequality. Certain racial intolerance was older than
Islamization. ethnic Albanians of all confessions living in regions composed
of an intermingled populace, called the Slavic inhabitants derogatorily Ski,
thus emphasizing an ethnic distinction and their superiority.
In the mid-17th century, when Muslim ethnic Albanians more often occupy
the highest positions in Constantinople, the rise of their fellow tribesmen
to the high military and administrative hierarchy of the Ottoman state
began. Their influence on the policies of the Porte was wielded through the
sultan's personal guard comprised mostly of select ethnic Albanians. From
the second half of the 19th century until the beginning of the 20th century,
mostly during the reign of Sultan Abdulhamid II (1878-1909), they largely
attained eminent positions in the army and administration.
Surrounded by companies of their fellow tribesmen, at times when the
authority exercised by the central government was sinking, Albanian Muslims
became autocratic, hereditary feudal lords, and often sinewy outlaws of the
Turkish authorities. During the Napoleonic wars, the rule of independent and
semi-independent pashas marked the political circumstances in the Ottoman
Empire: beginning with the Belgrade pashalik, where power was usurped by
four dahis, proceeding through Vidine and Janina, where Osman Pasha
Pasvanoglu and the famous All Pasha Tepellena ruled, ending with Syria and
Egypt; provincial governors rose to independent and insubordinate rulers.
The feudal lords of Kosovo and Metohia ruled completely independent of
the central government. Following long struggles for dominion in some
regions, several notable families that gave hereditary regents to the
provinces distinguished themselves. In Pristina and Gnjilane the Dime family
ruled until the end of the 18th century, in the Prizren sanjak the
Rotulovices, originally from Ljuma, and in Pec the powerful Mahmudbegovices,
lords of Metohia from mid-18th century. The ethnic Albanians of Muslim
faith, under the leadership of feudal lords or outlawed regents, were
considered followers of the old regime founded on the sheriat law and
liberal tribal privileges. Their rule was tolerated because they secured
Ottoman legitimacy in regions densely populated by Christian Serbian
inhabitants.2
Independent pashas were also carriers of a proselyte policy in the
central countries of the former Nemanjic state. A surge of religious
intolerance, especially from the end of the 18th century, tossed the
systematic persecution of Christians throughout the Ottoman Empire. When
they grew to heavy pogroms, a large part of the already thinned and deeply
inflamed populace in Kosovo and Metohia adopted Islam to save their bare
existence and family hearths. At the end of the 18th century and the
beginning of the 19th century almost all the Orthodox Serbs from Gora, a
zhupa near Prizren, were compelled to convert to Islam.3
Even though the Serbs always regarded conversion as a temporary and
inevitable evil, the second and third generations were already taking wives
from Muslim Albanian families. Thus Islamization became permanent. Among the
descendants who entered Albanian clans through marriage alliances, accepting
the language and gradually becoming Albanized, old family names were an
admonition of the Serbian past, a token to the glory of the cross. The
ethnic Albanians, as the Orthodox Serbs referred to them, became in time the
most extreme tyrants.4
1 The following works provide a synthetical survey on the life of
Serbian people in Kosovo and Metohia in the 19th and the beginning of the
20th century:
Kosovo nekad i sad (Kosova dikur e sot), chapter: Kosovo pod turskom
vlascu, (H, Kalesi), Beograd 1973, pp. 145-176; Istorija srpskog naroda V/1,
Beograd 1981, pp. 14-16, 133-148 (N. Rakocevic, Dj. Mikic); D. Bogdanovic,
Knjiga o Kosovu, Beograd 1983, pp. 126-195; D. Mikic, Drustveno-politicki
razvoj kosovskih Srba u XIX veku, Glasnik Muzeja Kosova, XIII-XIV (1984),
pp. 231-260. Most informative on the first half of the century is a
monography by V. Stojancevic, Juznoslovenski narodi u Osmanskom Carstvu od
Jedrenskog mira 1829 do Pariskog kongresa 1856 godine, Beograd 1971; On
economy see Dj. Mikic, Drustvene i ekonomske prilike kosovskih Srba u XIX i
pocetkom XX veka, od cifcijstva do bankarstva, Beograd 1988; on territorial
organization in the administrative apparatus see H. Kalesi - H-J. Kornrumpf,
Prizrenski vilajet, Perparimi, 1 (1967), pp. 71-124.
2 Istorija srpskog naroda, V/1, A. Urosevic, Etnicki procesi na Kosovu
tokom turske vladavine, Beograd 1987.
3 M. Lutovac, Gora i Opolje, Antropogeografska istrazivanja, Naselja i
poreklo stanovnistva, 35 (1955), pp. 230-279.
4 J. Cvijic, Osnove za geografiju i geologiju Makedonije i Stare
Srbije, III, Beograd 1911, pp. 1162-1166; Todor P. Stankovic, Putne beleske
po Staroj Srbiji 1871-1898, Beograd 1910, pp. 111-140.
The Serbian Insurrection and Pasha-Outlaws
The attempts of Sultan Selim III (1789-1807) to change and modernize
the administrative system of the Ottoman Empire with reforms ended in
failure. Resistance to the reforms was exceptionally strong throughout the
empire. Reform plans to improve the position of Christians turned the
Albanian feudal lords and tribal chiefs of Kosovo against the Orthodox
Serbs - chiflik farmers on their large sipahiliks. Efforts undertaken by the
Sublime Porte to win over support from Albanian lords in Kosovo against
outlawed provincial regents had no apparent effect. Albanian pashas,
availing themselves of a favorable opportunity to greater gain by imposing
new taxes upon the rayah, took no heed to orders from
Constantinople.1
The Serbian Insurrection against the dahis in the Belgrade pashalik in
1804, under the leadership of Karadjordje (Black George), moved the Serbs in
all regions of the Ottoman Empire. Beginning as an uprising against the
dahis, the insurrection soon grew into the first national revolution of
Balkan Christians, opening the perspectives of a total national liberation.
At that moment, the Serbs in Kosovo and Metohia, remote from the Belgrade
pashalik, unarmed and without immediate contact with the leadership of the
insurrection, had no opportunity to rise and join the insurgents. The feudal
lords of Kosovo used the beginning of the Serbian national revolution to
consolidate and expand their power. The Porte needed their assistance both
to curbe the rebelling forces and as a warrant against any moves the Serbs
might make in regions under their control.
Chronic lawlessness, perpetual danger from possible incursions of
Albanian outlaws, religious intolerance and the unbearable clench of feudal
lords all created an impenetrable wall separating the Serbs of Kosovo and
Metohia from rebelling Serbia. Hardly any testimony remains from individual
participants of the Serbian national revolution. Nevertheless, some
documentation was preserved from the boldest among them, whose affairs took
them to Belgrade and the bordering Austrian regions, and who found
themselves in the center of events.2
An important role in preparations for the rebellion was played by
Andrija, a wealthy merchant from Prizren (father of Sima Andrejevic
Igumanov, a renown Serbian benefactor and founder of the Seminary in
Prizren), who had extensive business ties in Belgrade, Pest and Vienna. On
the eve of the uprising against the dahis, he secretly transported gunpowder
from Zemun to Belgrade. When the uprising began, Andrija continued to supply
the rebellious companies with arms and ammunition. Two of his four sons,
Kraguj and Petar, fought in the insurgent lines with several other Serbs
from Prizren, until the fall of the insurrection in 1813.3
Beside Andrija, the most prominent Serbian from Prizren to take part in
the First Serbian Insurrection was Anta Colak Simonovic, who moved to
Belgrade when he was a young man, and dealt in furs. On the eve of the
insurrection, the Belgrade dahis ordered several loads of guns from him.
Colak Anta obtained the arms in Prizren, but on his return he handed them
over to Karadjordje at Topola. When the surrounding Turkish provinces rose
together with Sumadija (regions between the Drina and Tara rivers, the
tribal regions of Drobnjak, Moraca and Albanian Kliments) in 1805, the
number of volunteers joining Karadjordje's troops from Kosovo, Metohia, Old
Raska and other regions increased.
From the beginning of the uprising, void (supreme leader) Karadjordje
aimed to raise in arms, beside the Belgrade pashalik, as many lands of
Serbia as possible. From 1806, the insurgent army penetrated toward Stari
Vlah, Bosnia and Macedonia. The following year the insurgents reached
Kursumlija, and in 1809, using their alliance with Russia, then at war with
Turkey, the insurgent companies extended to Sjenica, Nova Varos, Prijepolje
and Bijelo Polje. According to the estimates of a French travel writer,
Henri Pouqueville, who passed through Kosovo in 1807, areas around Banjska
were encompassed by the insurrection, while Gerasim, the bishop of Sabac,
left testimony on the area of upper Ibar, on the space between Josanica,
Kopaonik and Vucitrn, where battles were waged with aid from the local
Serbian populace. Historian Stojan Novakovic even believed that the whole
region was under Serbian control until the fall of the Insurrection in
1813.4
Karadjordje's endeavor to establish contact with Montenegrin tribes
through the Sjenica instigated a considerable number of Serbs from Kosovo to
join the insurgent forces and caused fermentation among the Serbs of the
northwestern parts of Kosovo. In the Ibarski Kolasin, a wooded and
impassable area, inhabited mostly by Serbians, a movement was formed to aid
Karadjordje's campaign at the Sjenica. However, the Turks discovered their
intentions and captured the most famous leaders of Kolasin, banishing them
to exile in Egypt.5
Karadjordje's victorious campaign toward Montenegro and Kosovo was
severed by the defeat of Serbian insurgents at the battle of Kamenica near
Nis, in 1809. The army at the southwest of Serbia was forced to retreat
north; the endeavor to expand the uprising to Montenegro and the northern
regions of Kosovo came to an end.
The victories of the Serbian troops during the first years of waging
seriously imperilled the feudal privileges and estates of Albanian pashas in
Metohia and Kosovo, where the rayah was mostly Serbian. When the flame of
the uprising spread to the surrounding countries, commotion arose even among
Albanian leaders in north Albania. The Belgrade dahis and representatives of
the Turkish government in Serbia, of whom a considerable number were ethnic
Albanians, strove since 1804 to win over Albanian pashas in the neighboring
regions for the struggle against a common enemy.
Turkish forces engaged to wage Serbian troops on the southern and
southwestern battlefield were composed mainly of ethnic Albanians lead by
pashas and tribal chiefs. In 1806, the bashibazouk (irregular) troops of the
pashas of Scutari, Leskovac, Vranje, Pristina, Djakovica, Prizren and
Skoplje, a force numbering 33,800 men, assembled at the Morava, at a front
toward the Serbs. Many of them fought Serbian insurgents in the years to
follow. The Turkish army, composed of ethnic Albanians, checked the Serbs at
Prijepolje and Nova Varos. In the battles at the Sjenica and Suvodol in
1809, the decisive role in defeating the Serbs was played by troops
belonging to the pashas of Scutari and Pec. In battles waged at Rozaj, the
pasha od Djakovica was defeated. Muktar Pasha, son of the most influential
independent Albanian feudal lord, Ali Pasha Tepellena of Janina, fought
against the Serbs at Deligrad. Battling together with Albanian feudal lords
against the Serbs were influential tribal chiefs - krenas. At the battle of
Kamenica alone four standard bearers of one clan were killed at Drenica.
Mehmed Pasha Rotulovic and his army took part at the battle of Kamenica and
returned to Prizren with loads of spoil and Serbian slaves -women and
children.6
The hereditary pashas of Kosovo, Metohia and north Albania were a
constant threat to Karadjordje and his successor Knez (Prince) Milos
Obrenovic. When possibilities for resuming the struggle were discussed prior
to the 1813 fall of the Serbian Insurrection, Karadjordje counted on the
possibility of all ethnic Albanians being dispatched to Serbia. He thus
entreated Prince-Bishop Petar I of Montenegro to execute a demonstration on
the Albanian border to compel their neighbors to remain on their land. A
similar entreaty was again sent by prince Milos to the Metropolitan of
Cetinje in 1821, for fear that the uprising in Greece might be followed by a
Turkish preventive incursion on Serbia.
The number of armed men under the command of Albanian pashas displayed
the dimensions of their military capabilities, as well as deep fear [or the
possibility of the insurrection expanding to their regions. The victories of
the insurgents caused the exertion of great pressure upon the subjugated
Serbian populace under Albanian lords. Lord Malic Pasha Dzinic of the
Pristina region, moved Serbian chiflik farmers from the northern areas of
Lab, and settled ethnic Albanians to secure the boundaries of his territory
from incursions of insurgent Serbian companies. Passing in 1807 through
Pristina, estimating around 1,500 homes in it, Henri Pouqueville noted:
"From its narrow and muddy streets, poor trade, wretched people and the
bloodthirsty rule of Malic Pasha, who then commanded, a distinct aura of
terror and woe emanated. It did not seem appropriate to pay a visit to the
Albanian, a sworn mortal enemy of the Christians".7
Anarchy created through the rule of independent pashas was favorable to
the raiding parties of Albanian outlaws. They attacked passengers and
merchant caravans from their hideouts, plundered and blackmailed the
Christian rayah, assaulted and dishonored their wives and daughters. In
Gnjilane, Pouqueville saw passengers raided by outlaws and learnt that some
merchants were killed just at the entrance to the town. As a result, at
orders given by pashas, entire forests were burnt in spaces between
Pristina, Gnjilane, Novo Brdo and Kumanovo, where the outlaws
hid.8
The position of the Serbs in Kosovo and Metohia did not change even
when comparative peace prevailed in Serbia. Kosovo was governed by Jashar
Pasha, nephew of Malic Pasha, inviolable lord of the Pristina sanjak during
the second and third decades of the 19th century. He was engraved in the
memory of the people on account of his merciless persecution of the Serbs,
the destruction of their free estates, confiscation of church and monastic
lands, and, above all, for demolishing Serbian villages. For less than a
decade, Jashar Pasha succeeded in destroying or evacuating 32 Serbian
villages in the Pristina nahi, 22 in the Vucitrn nahi, and another 25
settlements in other parts of Kosovo. Jashar Pasha distributed a large
amount of the seized lands among newcome Albanian settlers and local Muslims
of Serbian origin, while also appropriating some himself. The newcome ethnic
Albanians, mainly herdsmen, had no experience in farming so the fertile
plains of Kosovo soon became neglected pastures.9
Faced with the terror of the Pristina pasha, the Serbs fled to the
nearby sanjaks of Vranje or Leskovac, or crossed over to Serbia under the
wing of knez Milos. Similar examples where deliberate change in the
demographic picture of certain Turkish provinces were carried out existed in
southern Albania and northwestern Greece, where the brutal Ali Pasha of
Janina mercilessly destroyed Christian villages, forcefully executed
Islamization and reduced farmers to tenant, chiflik farmers. During the
twenties of the 19th century (1821-1825), armies of feudal lords utterly
devastated vast lands from Moreja to Epirus and Thessaly while fighting
Greek insurgents.10
The reform action of Sultan Mahmud II (1808-1839), the introduction of
a regular army and abolition of the Janissary Corps (1826) infuriated the
independent pashas in Metohia and Kosovo. Intentions to grant certain rights
to the Christians inflamed the hatred of Muslim ethnic Albanians. Anarchy,
marking a period of unlimited power for independent pashas, suited many
outlaws. "During the reigns of these pashas, any Muhammedan could, if he
desired, murder any Serb without due consequence, only if he sought refuge
under a mosque or tekke. In those days, Prizren, Kosovo, Pec, Djakovica and
Scutari were governed by harshest oppression."11
To survive, the Serbs turned to collective mimicry. The men wore
Albanian clothes, and the women veiled their faces. Jashar Pasha attacked
Serbian churches, especially the Gracanica monastery and the Samodreza
church. He demolished four Serbian churches (in Batus, Skulanovac, Rujan and
Slovinja and the Lipljan church parvis) and built a bridge from their stone
over the Sitnica river near Lipljan. The clergy also bore the brunt of
independent pashas. In 1820, two monks from the Decani monastery were hanged
in Novi Pazar, and one in Pristina.12
As soon as imminent danger from the expansion of the Serbian, and then
Greek insurrection was past, rivalry among Albanian lords for dominion over
the surrounding territories revived. The Serbs were the greatest victims:
they were compelled to receive them for overnight stay, supply food and
provide field trains for the armies of warring provincial regents. In these
campaigns, requisition, imposition of additional taxes and the looting of
Christian villages, through which the army passed, was habitual. At the end
of the conflict, the Christians would be overwhelmed by both the rage of the
defeated and the plunder of the victorious.
In March 1827, a small provincial war began, when regent of Scutari,
Mustafa Pasha Bushatli (the so-called Shkodra Pasha), ventured to subjugate
Numan Pasha of Pec. The clash spread when the regents of neighboring regions
were hauled into it, being troubled, like Jashar Pasha, by insubordinate
tribes in their own regions.13
The need for fresh forces was imposed by the Russo-Turkish war
(1828-1829), in which the sultan's troops on the battleground of the
Bulgarian Danube Basin, were faced with great temptations. The Porte granted
Mustafa Pasha of Scutari dominion over Scutari, Elbasan, Debar and Dukadjin,
expecting him, in return, to muster and dispatch a large army to the Danube
front. Meanwhile, Prince Milos acquired through money and sage advice, a
considerable number of admirers among north Albanian tribal chiefs, and
strove to dissuade the powerful Scutari pasha from sending 60,000 warriors
to assist the sultan's army. The Prince warned him that the reforms of
Mahmud II were directed mainly against hereditary pashas. However, the
belligerent disposition of his fellow tribesmen compelled Mustafa Pasha to
dispatch his army to the Russian front, but instead of 60,000, he sent only
2,000 warriors. The powerful Scutari pasha was then able to establish his
rule in Metohia.14
The Peace Treaty of Edime, signed in 1829, under conditions extremely
unfavorable for the Ottoman Empire, deepened its internal crisis. The
Christian populace, the uprisings of which, owing to Russia's support,
developed into movements for national liberation, was faced with novel
temptations. In Kosovo and Metohia, where conflicts between provincial
regents were frequent, and autocracy toward the Christians was acquiring a
more immediate physical and fiscal pressure, anarchy was widely expanding
its dimensions.
The news that Prince Milos intended to establish the borders of his
recently recognized Principality (Knezevina) in 1830, according to the
decrees of the Bucharest Peace Treaty of 1812, disturbed the pashas and beys
of six nahis, formerly under Karadjordje's rule. Jashar Pasha of Pristina
secured the borders of his regions from the territorial pretensions of the
Serbian Prince by compelling the evacuation of Serbs through terror. He
settled ethnic Albanians from Malissia, Metohia and the vicinity of Scutari
in their place.15
When the imminent danger of new wars was past, Mahmud II was determined
to intercept the obstinacy and disloyalty of hereditary pashas. The educated
Sultan particularly disliked Albanian chiefs, followers of the conservative
Islamic order, who hindered the realization of his aspirations to end feudal
anarchy and create a modern, centralized state. His reforms anticipated the
abolition of all feudal and tribal autonomies, the formation of a regular
army, introduction of military duties, equation of tax payments and
improvement in the position of Christians.
Strongest objection to the reforms came from Bosnia, Albania, Metohia
and Kosovo. The ethnic Albanians saw in these reforms a most serious threat
to their privileges. The Porte counted on their objection beforehand, since
they could easily turn against Turkish authorities armed to the full. The
most difficult part was compelling them to join the regular army. Thus the
most important reform task for the ethnic Albanians was crushing the power
of numerous independent pashas who would not recognize central government,
and by refusing to acknowledge modern judiciary, remained loyal to the
common law according to the Law of Leka Dukagjinit.
Albanian leaders were not only against the introduction of novel
reforms but requested of the Porte to recognize all their benefits and
tribal independence: "The new army was introduced to destroy the old feudal
one. The regular army and the prohibition to carry arms - aimed to destroy
Albanian condottieres enabling ethnic Albanians to attain privileged
positions in Turkey - since, like military castes, they had a free hand
concerning the Christian tribes they brutally exploited without bearing any
legal consequences. Thus, the reform deeply cleaved Albanian tribal
relations [...]".16
The Albanian pashas objected to the orders of the Porte to surrender
their arms. In 1831, a large assembly of Albanian leaders, ulems and tribal
chiefs in Scutari, rejected the Sultan's decrees as contrary to Islamic law,
determined to defend the existing system by force. Mustafa Pasha refused to
obey the sultan's order to receive a garrison of a regular army in Scutari
and to submit territories granted him during the war for governing over to
the grand vizier. He was supported by independent pashas in Prizren, Pec,
Djakovica, Pristina, Debar, Vranje, Tetovo, Skoplje and Leskovac, who had
every reason to be worried about their positions if the reforms were to be
implemented. Mustafa Pasha, the last Bushatii, found new allies in Bosnia
where the beys decidedly opposed the introduction of reforms.
The empire was so endangered that Grand Vizier Mahmud Reshid Pasha lead
his army against the ethnic Albanians in person. A large number of Albanian
leaders from south Albania were killed upon encountering him at Bitolj in
1830. At orders from the Porte, the grand vizier introduced "many beneficial
decrees" in Pristina and Vucitrn in summer 1832, thus improving the up till
then insufferable position of the Serbian Christian rayah in villages
throughout Kosovo.
In 1835-1836, after crushing the power of insubordinate Bosnian
captains, the Turkish army finally eliminated the independent pashas of Old
Serbia - Mahmud Pasha Rotulovic of Prizren, Arslan Pasha of Pec, Seifudin
Pasha of Djakovica, and finally the heirs to the Pristina Dinices, by
warring rebellious tribes in mid and south Albania, on whose side the feudal
lords of Pec, Debar and Djakovica fought. The law on the timar system was
abrogated. The administration was entrusted to army commanders, and measures
were implemented to centralize the administration and tax system. The
sanjaks of Scutari, Prizren and Pec were under the control of the Rumehan
vilayet seated at Bitolj. The established regime was considerably more
endurable for the Serbian rayah than the brutal reign of independent
pashas.17
1 D. Mikic, Drustveno-politicki razvoj kosovskih Srba u XIX veku, p.
231.
2 D. Mikic, Oslobodilacka aktivnost kosovskih Srba u svetlosti srpske
revolucije 1804-1813, Obelezja, 11 (1981), pp. 39-46; idem.,
Drustveno-politicki razvoj kosovskih Srba u XIX veku, pp. 231-232.
3 D. Mikic, Drustveno-politicki razvoj kosovskih Srba u XIX veku, p.
232.
4 St. Novakovic, Manastir Banjska u srpskoj istoriji, Beograd 1892, pp.
35-41; A. Popovic, Ustanak u gornjem Ibru i Kopaoniku 1806-1813, Godisnjica
Nikole Cupica, 27 1908), p. 229.
5 Several years hence only few people of Kolasin returned from exile in
Egypt. M. Lutovac, Ibarski Kolasin, Naselja i poreklo stanovnistva, 34
(1958), pp. 8-10.
6 Albanians of Catholic and Orthodox faith fought against the Turkish
authorities at the time. The Catholic Albanian tribe Kliment fought with
Montenegrin tribes Kuci, Piper and Bjelopavlici against vizier of Scutari,
Ibrahim Pasha in 1805. South, the Toskas - Orthodox Albanians, fought with
the Greeks and Tzintzars against Ali Pasha of Janina. See D. Mikic,
Drustveno-politicki razvoj kosovskih Srba u XIX veku, 234; I. Dermaku, Neki
aspekti saradnje Srbije i Albanaca u borbi protiv turskog feudalizma od
1804-1868. godine Glasnik Muzeja Kosova, XI (1971-1972), pp. 236-238.
7 S. Novakovic, Iz godine 1807. srpske istorije, Iz belezaka s
putovanja H. Pukvilja kroz Bosnu i Staru Srbiju, Godisnjica Nikole Cupica, 2
(1878), p. 275.
8 Ibid., pp. 276-277.
9 V. Stojancevic, Juznoslovenski narodi u Osmanskom Carstvu, pp.
115-117.
10 V. Stojancevic, Drzava i drustveno obnovljenje Srbije (1815-1839),
Beograd 1986, pp. 38.
11 Savremenici o Kosovu i Metohiji 1852-1912, fed. D. T. Batakovic),
Beograd 1988,300.
12 V. R. Petkovic - D. Boskovic, Visoki Decani, I, Beograd 1941,p. 16;
J. Popovic, Zivot Srba na Kosovu 1812-1912, Beograd 1987, p. 220.
13 V. Stojancevic, Juznoslovenski narodi u Osmanskom Carstvu, pp.
45-46.
14 Mustafa Pasha's army included 150 Montenegrins from the Vasojevic
tribe, headed by voivode Sima Lakic (ibid., pp. 46-47.)
15 V. Stojancevic, Juznoslovenski narodi u Osmanskom Carstvu, pp. 46,
332.
16 D. M. Pavlovic, Pokret u Bosni i Albaniji protivu reforama Mahmuda
II, Beograd 1913, pp. 73-74.
17 Ibid., pp. 80-89; V. Stojancevic, Juznoslovenski narodi u Osmanskom
Carstvu, pp. 117-128.
Time of Reforms in Turkey
The successor to Mahmud II, Sultan Abdul Mejid (1839-1861) issued, in
1839, the famous Hattisherif of Gulhane that was to become some sort of a
"charter of freedom" for subjects of the Ottoman Empire. The Christians were
officially equated with the Muslims. The imperial letter warranted their
lives, protection, honor and property. It anticipated the introduction to a
regular military obligation, centralization of government and fiscal
reorganization, as well as the Europeanization of judiciary and education.
In Kosovo, Metohia and Albania, however, the Tanzimat reforms were
never effected to the full. At the beginning of the reforms, the mainly
Serbian populace was left without its self-governing community, previously
renewed by the firmans of erstwhile sultans, but it benefited from the calm
by renewing devastated fields. The reforms brought the revival of business
for the merchants and handicraftsmen in towns throughout Kosovo, and the
right to erect churches and schools. The comparatively quiet years brought
some relief to the Serbs, but not for long.
Discontent growing in Bosnia and Rumelia due to the reforms, encroached
Kosovo and Albania. The ethnic Albanians would not concede to centralization
and the abolition of their feudal and tribal privileges. In 1839, the ethnic
Albanians of Prizren rebelled, routing the local sanjak-bey.
The aggravated position of Serbs in Turkey incited a great Christian
insurrection in the Nis sanjak in spring, 1841. The insurrection,
preparations of which were known in Belgrade, spread to southern Serbia and
western Bulgaria. Kosovo and Metohia did not have the conditions to rise
although some preparations were made in the Prizren, Djakovica and Pec
regions. The insurrection was brutally suppressed by Albanian Muslims.
Representatives of Great Powers, especially Russia and France, surprised at
the dimensions of violence, requested from the Porte information on the
position of Serbs in rebelling regions.1
Again fermentation swarmed over Kosovo in 1843 with the collection of
taxes and regular military recruits. The Albanian insurrection against the
Turkish authorities began in 1844, broke out in Pristina and soon spread to
Prizren, Djakovica, Skoplje and Tetovo. It was seated at Skoplje and headed
by Dervish Tzara. At the beginning, the insurgents overmastered part of
Kosovo, occupied Skoplje, Tetovo, Pristina, Veles and the vicinity of
Bitolj. The Turkish army managed to suppress the insurrection in summer
1844, after several severe clashes.
During the insurrection, the Serbs were cleaved between the ethnic
Albanians and Turkish troops, like they had been so many times before. In
Vranje, the rebels roasted Serbian youths on fire only because they took
part in the construction of a new church. After driving out the state tax
collector (muhasil) in Pristina, 1841, the ethnic Albanians exacted taxes
from the Serbs by employing weapons, even though they were explicitly
forbidden to do so under the firman. In the vicinity of Pec, according to
the testimony of Gedeon Josif Jurisic, a monk from the Decani monastery, the
highlanders of Malissia were public outlaws. Supported by local district
chiefs (zabits), they wreaked terror upon the Serbs without any
disturbance.2
In a complaint lodged to the French consul at Belgrade, sent by 19
leaders of the Pristina and Vucitrn kaza in the name of the Serbs, seven
points include many examples of suffering due to Albanian violence. In a
petition to the Russian Tzar Nicholas I, official protector of Orthodox
inhabitants in the Ottoman Empire, the Serbs of Prizren entreated, at the
end of 1844, for protection against innumerable oppressions: "Allow not, you
most Honored liberator, for heaven's sake, allow not us paupers and people
to become Turkized, and flee to lands unknown! Our children were Turkized,
our wives and daughters dishonored, raped; our brothers gunned down in
uncountable numbers, treading on our law [faith], and dishonoring our
priests, pulling them by their beards. Fleecing us immeasurably, each in his
own manner; the pasha fleeces, the bey fleeces, and the sipahi, the master
and sub-pasha, the qadi and oppressors - all fleece!"3
Devastation and murder did not bypass the monasteries Visoki Decani and
the Pec Patriarchate, where Albanian outlaws murdered several monks.
1 Istorija srpskog naroda, V/1, pp. 241-243.
2 Savremenici o Kosovu i Metohiji 1852-1912, pp. 6-7.
3 Zaduzbine Kosova, Prizren - Beograd, 1987, pp. 612-613; D. Mikic,
Drustvene i ekonomske prilike kosovskih Srba, pp. 21.
Pogroms in Metohia
The fifties of the 19th centuries passed in the dispersion of anarchy,
while the sixties marked new Albanian revolts in the political scene of
Kosovo and Metohia, with new Serbian suffering. When Serbia endeavored to
prepare a widespread uprising of Balkan Christians against the Turks, Kosovo
and Metohia were totally out of reach to Serbian national and political
propaganda. The control of Muslim ethnic Albanians over Serbian inhabitants
excluded any possible cooperation with Serbia. Periodical Albanian revolts
against the new measures of the Porte in the Pristina region in 1855, in the
area of Djakovica 1866, in the Prizren, Pec and Djakovica region in
1866-1867, again in Pec in 1869, and operations carried out by the Ottoman
army against them, resulted in heavy pogroms of the Serbian populace.
1
After the Crimean War (1853-1856), anti-Orthodox and anti-Serbian
feelings in the southwestern parts of the Ottoman Empire culminated;
Serbian pogroms attained wider dimensions. Albanization of the Serbs,
stimulated by independent pashas during the first decades of the 19th
century, reached their peak during the Crimean War. The Albanian language
was then accepted in many Islamized Serbian villages. The Cherkezes,
colonized then in Kosovo, surpassed in the devastations and murders of the
Christian populace.
The monastic fraternities of Visoki Decani and the Pec Patriarchate
lodged a complaint to the Serbian government and church dignitaries of the
Principality of Serbia, warning them of the dimensions of violence and the
frequency of banditry. The monks of Decani entreated the Serbian government
in 1856 to somehow intermediate with the Turkish authorities to put an end
to the violence. Archimandrite Hadji Serafim Ristic of Decani entreated
Prince Milos in 1859 to aid the monastery and intercede to the Porte for the
protection of the Decani laura. He warned that "since the last war until
today we are more concerned with armed defense from the perpetual attacks of
ethnic Albanians and Turks, and the papists [French Catholic missionaries],
luring us by various wiles."2
Attestations of Serbian origin evincing the position of Christian Serbs
in Metohia and Kosovo exhibit detailed portrayals of the horrifying pogroms.
Attempts to draw attentions to the arduous sufferings of the Serbs with the
sultan and the government of the Serbian Principality, the Russian court and
the European public were particularly expressed by the learned Archimandrite
Hadji Serafim Ristic, prior of the Visoki Decani monastery.
When Grand Vizier Kirbizli Mehmed Pasha called on the European
provinces of the empire in 1860, establishing order by punishing the
insubordinate Christians at the borders, Hadji Serafim, together with local
Serbian leaders, submitted to him people's complaints in Pristina. Their
hopes that the vizier's visit would wield influence in curbing Albanian
anarchy dispersed: the grand vizier saw the Christians only as rebels and
malcontents.3
The Prior of Decani, however, did not abate in his attempts to help he
people. His petitions to Sultan Abdulaziz, Russian Tzar Alexander II and
Serbian Prince Mihailo contained lists of countless brutalities committed by
ethnic Albanians upon the Serbian populace in Metohia. In the book Plac
Stare Srbija (Wails of Old Serbia, Zemun 1864) - which he dedicated to the
British pastor William Denton - aiming to demonstrate "that evil deeds
committed by the Turks upon the rayah had gone one step too far", Ristic
submitted a complaint to the sultan from 1860, in which he included several
hundred examples of violence committed by ethnic Albanians over the Serbs -
fires, plunders, murders, blackmail, fleecing, confiscation of property and
cattle-raiding, raping of women and children, destroying churches and
abusing priests and monks - naming the doers and victims.
Addressing the sultan, the Archimandrite of Decani entreated that his
quiet complaint "against brutal Albanian oppressors" be heard, for if they
were not stopped, the Serbs would be compelled to leave their fatherlands
wherever the sultan ordered: "Pec and the Pec nahi indescribably scourged
day after day, with increasing evils on the part of ethnic Albanians, with
no errors committed, God only knows why, afore the eyes of Your councils and
pashas wailing upon their bitter destiny in bondage.'4
Russian diplomat and historian AF. Hilferding, while sojourning Metohia
in 1858, penned numerous examples of oppression upon the Serbian
inhabitants. He remarked that there were few parishioners in the Gorioc
monastery, "all poor men horribly oppressed by the ethnic Albanians". He was
convinced that Serbian Christians in Pec endured insults and injuries from
the unbridled and hot-tempered ethnic Albanians every day, and that measures
undertaken by the township chief (mudir) "who strives to bridle and punish
the Albanian obstinacy" had no effect, since his small in number policemen
(zaptijas) were drafted from Albanian lines: "What could one man with the
best of intentions do against an armed mass ignorant of law and judgment,
habituated to unlimited obstinacy and tyranny, in other words, as the local
saying goes, one that fears God a bit, the Emperor not at all'."5
Almost exact observations on the position of Serbs in Old Serbia were
noted by two Englishwomen, Miss Irby and Miss MacKenzie, in their famous
traveling account of the Slavic countries of European Turkey. Their
description on the position of ethnic Albanians in Pec reads: Their
indifference to authority and the importance of the Porte is as harsh as
their insolence and cruelty against the Christians. A Turkish mudir in
Vucitrn complained to the two ladies that with a dozen zaptijas there was
little he could accomplish against the self-will of ethnic Albanians: there
are 200 Christian houses and 400-500 Muslim ones, so the ethnic Albanians do
as they please. They seize from the Christians whatever and whenever they
desire; so many times they would walk into a man's store, require some goods
and then leave by simply saying they would pay another time, and often
without saying as much. Even worse in the affair is their wholly savage,
stupid and unrestrained living that retains the entire society to a state of
barbarism and since the Christians receive no help against them and no
education from Constantinople, they thus turn to Serbia for everything - to
the Serbia of the past, inspiring themselves to enthusiasm by its memories,
and to the Principality for hope, advice and enlightenment.6
Official reports of Yevgeny Timayev, the first Russian consul to
Prizren - representative of the power that had been the traditional
protector of Orthodox subjects in the Ottoman Empire - complete the picture
of the situation in Metohia and the dimensions of suffering endured by the
Serbian population in the second half of the sixties. At the end of 1866,
Timayev reported on the severity of violences inflicted by ethnic Albanians
of the Pec nahi. Devastating about a dozen Serbian villages, they murdered
the male progeny and assaulted the women, and even desecrated the graves of
their forefathers. In Pec, as cited by Timayev, government representatives
aided the ethnic Albanians in their maltreatment of Serbian Christians:
"They receive letters from Pec informing me that crimes committed by the
ethnic Albanians are countless, that the destruction of the Christians is
immeasurable and unexpressible, while the local Turkish authorities give
assurance of peace, stating that nothing unusual is happening. These
assurances cannot be trusted, by no means, because I have irreprovable
evidence of an irregular and disquieting situation in the
country."7
Parallel to the extent of oppression, observed Timayev, was the
forceful colonization of ethnic Albanians to Old Serbia: "The Albanian
people overmastering more and more of the lands they settle, and will
perhaps soon play a role in the destiny of Europe, notwithstanding the
current illiterate and almost savage condition of the majority. [...] Mass
Albanian settlings of the Prizren sanjak meet with no obstacles. The Turkish
government, it seems, would be very happy if there were no more Christians
in the province, there is no way the Christians could withstand the Albanian
deluge, since here they are small in number and very disunited [Orthodox and
Catholics]. In normal circumstances one might say that upon one Christian
come at least six Muslims ethnic Albanians, except in the western and
southern outskirts of the Prizren sanjak."8 Reports of the
Russian consul show that the position of Orthodox Serbs did not differ in
regions to the other side of Mount Sara, in Tetovo, Debar, Ohrid, Prilep and
the vicinity of Bitolj (Monastir).
The pogroms of the Serbs in Metohia resulted in the dissipation of the
Serbian population. Villages were most often the targets of violent
inflictions. According to a research carried out by Ivan Stepanovich
Yastrebov, between 1855 and 1860, twenty Serbian villages in the vicinity of
Decani contained 165 houses, whereas their number in 1870 diminished to only
50 Serbian homes.9
At the beginning of the 70's, until the opening of the Eastern crisis
and the Serbian-Ottoman wars, the position of Serbian inhabitants did not
alter drastically. Even though there were no large Albanian moves nor
Turkish campaigns, the Christian Serbs were confronted with high taxes,
unpaid labor (kuluk), attacks and blackmail. The main targets were usually
Serbian girls seized by ethnic Albanians who then forced them accept Islam.
Religious intolerance and thirst for land and property were causes for much
blackmail, conflagration estates and cattle raids. The custom of the ethnic
Albanians was first to warn the Serbian family the property of which was to
be arrogated, by leaving a bullet on the hearthrug. The choice was limited
to evacuating the entire family, or, in case of resistance, killing the men
and kidnapping or Islamizing the girls.10
1 Kosovo nekad i sad, 154; A. Lainovic, Prizrenski pasaluk polovinom
XIX veka na osnovu izvestaja francuskih konzula u Skadru, Kosovo, 3 (1974),
pp. 3-7.
2 Zaduzbine Kosova, pp. 613.
3 J. Hadzi-Vasiljevic, Srpski narod i turske reforme (1852-1862),
Bratstvo, XV (1921), pp. 187-188.
4 Savremenici o Kosovu i Metohiji 1852-1912, pp. 20-21. The plea sent
to the Russian tzar in 1859, to help the Decani brotherhood published in
Decanski spomenici, Beograd 1864; ibid., pp. 423-426.
5 A. F. Giljferding, Putovanje po Hercegovini, Bosni i Staroj Srbiji,
Sarajevo 1972, pp. 154-155,165.
6 Putovanje po slovenskim zemljama Turske u Evropi by G. Mjur
Makenzijeve and A. P. Irbijeve, Beograd 1868, pp. 188, 210.
7 M. Seliscev, Slavianskoe naselenie v Albanii, Sofia 1931, pp. 7-10.
8 Ibid., pp. 43-46; D. Bogdanovic, Knjiga o Kosovu, pp. 134-136.
9 I. Jastrebov, Stara Serbia i Albanija, Spomenik SKA, XLI, 36 (1904),
pp. 86.
10 V. Stojancevic, Prvo oslobodjenje Kosova od strane srpske vojske u
ratu 1877-1878, in: Srbija u zavrsnoj fazi velike istocne krize (1877-1878),
Beograd, 1980, pp. 461-462. J. Muller, Albanien, Rumelien und die
Osterreichisch-montenegrinische Granze, Frag 1944; A. Ivic, Rumelijski
vilajet u godini 1838, Prilozi za knjizevnost, jezik, istoriju i folklor,
XIII, 1-2 (1933), pp. 117-126. An elaborate analysis of data provided by V.
Stojancevic, Etnicke, konfesionalne i demografske prilike u Metohiji 1830-ih
godina, Zbornik okruglog stola o naucnom istrazivanju Kosova, Beograd 1988,
pp. 99-114.
Population
More detailed information concerning the number, ethnic and religious
affiliation of the inhabitants of Kosovo and Metohia is contained in lists
dating from the thirties of the 19th century.1 The traveling
account of Joseph Muller, based on official Turkish data and personal
inquiries, and a detailed roll of the Rumelian vilayet in 1838 from the
Kriegsarchiv in Vienna provide a precise demographic and confessional
picture of the population in Kosovo and Metohia:2
District |
Muslims |
Christians |
Total |
Prizren |
49,000 |
29,000 |
78,000 |
Pec |
34,000 |
31,000 |
65,000 |
Djakovica |
31,000 |
21,000 |
52,000 |
According to Muller, in Pec, 12,000 inhabitants lived in 2,400 houses,
of which 130 were Orthodox and 20 Catholic. The Slavs comprised the majority
of the population, 62 families were Turkish, 100 Albanian and 28
Tzintzar.3 Almost identical data on the populace in Pec is
provided by the list of the War Archives in Vienna.4
Djakovica, according to Muller, had 21,050 inhabitants: 18,000 Muslim,
450 Catholic, 2,600 Orthodox. Among them 17,000 were Albanian, 3,800 were
Slavic (Serbian), 180 were Turkish, and a few Tzintzar houses.5
In Prizren, as noted in the same source, 24,950 people inhabited 6,000
houses. Among them 4,000 were Muslim, 2,150 Catholic and 18,000 Orthodox.
According to Muller's estimate, Serbs comprised 4/5, ethnic Albanians 1/6,
Tzintzars 1/12 and Turks 1/60 with the military company.6
Thus, the ethnic composition, considering many among the Muslims in
Metohia were of Serbian origin and spoke the Serbian language, and that
among the Christians few were Albanian Catholics, the ethnic picture based
on Muller's research would look like the following:
|
All town-dwelling Serbs |
All town-dwelling ethnic Albanians |
|
Catholics |
Muslims |
Catholics |
Muslims |
Pec |
510 |
10,540 |
100 |
400 |
Djakovica |
2,600 |
1,200 |
450 |
16,500 |
Prizren |
16,800 |
- |
2,150 |
4,000 |
All: |
19,900 |
11,740 |
2,700 |
20,950 |
Total |
Serbs: 31,650 |
ethnic Albanian: 23,650 |
Based upon Muller's data, V. Stojancevic calculated the total number of
village dwellers in three Metohian districts:7
district |
Muslims |
Christians |
Pec |
22,750 |
30,250 |
Djakovica |
13,000 |
17,950 |
Prizren |
44,400 |
8,050 |
Total: |
80,150 |
56,250 |
The cited data exhibits that in Metohia, despite being the most
endangered from violence, devastation and blackmail, the Serbian populace
composed the most numerous ethnic group at the end of the 1830's. Even
though no precise data exists on the then demographic situation in Kosovo,
considering subsequent rolls, one could suppose that the relationship
between the Serbian and Albanian population was at least close to the ethnic
disposition in Metohia.
A more complete picture of the demographic disposition in Metohia and
Kosovo in the first decades of the 19th century could be attained only if
the aforesaid data was compared with available information on the evacuation
of Serbs from Kosovo and Metohia, from Prince Milos. In keeping with a
preserved incomplete documentation of Serbian origin, 180 families moved to
Serbia from the Prizren, Pristina, Pec and Scutari pashalik, and another 160
from the northern regions of Kosovo, all in the period between 1815-1837.
Most of them were farmers; following were handicraftsmen and several
merchants. Keeping in mind the sizes of families, particularly the extended
family groups in Metohia (10-30 persons), the number of Serbs fleeing to
Serbia was considerable.8
The total number of Serbs in Kosovo and Metohia during the first half
of the 19th century is hard to determine. Turkish annual censuses
(sal-namas) were generally unreliable, since the real number of family
members was concealed due to taxes, and the Muslims especially refused to
have their wives and female children listed.
Information also varies in the traveling accounts of contemporaries,
foreigners mostly. The data is mainly comprised of the inhabitants of towns
and surrounding areas. A somewhat more voluminous and reliable source is the
traveling account of Russian diplomat and scientist A. F. Hilferding.
Conforming to his data and estimates, there were 4,000 Muslim and 800
Christian families in Pec in 1858; in Podrima 3,000 Albanian and 300
Orthodox families; in Orahovac 50 Albanian and 100 Serbian homes; in the
Sredska zhupa 200 Albanian and 300 Serbian families; in the
Prizren Podgora more than 1,000 Albanian Muslims, 20 Albanian Catholics
and around 300 Orthodox homes; in Pristina 1,500 homes with around 1200
Muslim and 300 Orthodox inhabitants, in Vucitrn 250 Muslim and 150 Orthodox
houses. Furthermore, Hilferding noted 3,000 Muslim, 900 Orthodox and 100
Catholic families with 12,000 inhabitants.9
The relativity of data provided by the travel writers is demonstrated
by the statistics of Austrian consul Johan Georg von Hahn (1863), who relied
on official information when he cited that Prizren contained 11,540 houses
with 46,000 inhabitants, of whom 8,400 were Muslim, 3,000 Orthodox and 140
Catholic. The salnama of 1874 noted 3,687 homes in Prizren whereas data of
the then Russian consul, Ivan Stepanovich Yastrebov, in reference to the
same year, recorded 4,089 houses.10
Yastrebov was the most reliable researcher; he spoke Albanian, Turkish
and Serbian well, and as consul to Prizren had the opportunity to personally
check on official documents and determine the exact results. Between 1867
and 1874 Yastrebov provided information regarding Serbs and ethnic Albanians
in Metohia, classifying them in relation to the traditional territorial
division between Albanian tribes and religious affiliation:11
bairak |
villages |
Albanians |
Serbs |
Serbs |
Albanians |
Mala Hoca |
24 |
827 |
284 |
- |
30 |
Poluzje |
28 |
434 |
4 |
223 |
22 |
Suva Reka |
42 |
691 |
294 |
- |
45 |
Ostrozub |
33 |
1,052 |
5 |
- |
45 |
Sredska |
32 |
502 |
488 |
900 |
- |
Opolje |
21 |
985 |
- |
- |
- |
Gora |
31 |
- |
- |
2,167 |
- |
Sirinic |
15 |
157 |
786 |
- |
- |
Total |
226 |
4,646 |
1,861 |
3,740 |
142 |
All this data exhibits that, notwithstanding the emigration of the
Serbian populace to Serbia, Islamization and Albanization, still in progress
(excluding only Gora), the Serbs in Kosovo and Metohia still comprised the
largest ethnic group.
1 J. Muller, Albanien, Rumelien und die Osterreichisch-montenegrinische
Granze, Frag 1944; A. Ivic, Rumelijski vilajet u godini 1838, Prilozi za
knjizevnost, jezik, istoriju i folklor, XIII, 1-2 (1933), pp. 117-126. An
elaborate analysis of data provided by V. Stojancevic, Etnicke,
konfesionalne i demografske prilike u Metohiji 1830-ih godina, Zbornik
okruglog stola o naucnom istrazivanju Kosova, Beograd 1988, pp. 99-114.
2 J. Muller, op. cit,. p. 12; V. Stojancevic, Etnicke, konfesionalne i
demografske prilike, p. 102.
3 J. Muller, op. cit., pp. 73-74.
4 A. Ivic, op. cit., pp. 122.
5 J. Muller, op. cit., pp. 77-78; same data stated by the Kriegsarchiv
in Vienna (A. Ivic, op. cit., p. 122).
6 J. Muller, op. cit., pp. 82-83; A. Ivic, op. cit., p. 122.
7 V. Stojancevic, Etnicke, konfesionalne i demografske prilike, pp.
104-104.
8 V. Stojancevic, Drzava i drustvo obnovljene Srbije (1815-1839), pp.
45-63.
9 A. F. Giljferding, op. cit, pp. 157,183,193, 214.
10 J. G. Hahn, Putovanje kroz porecinu Drina i Vardara, Beograd 1876,
pp. 127-128; I. Jastrebov, op. cit., p. 40.
11 I. Jastrebov, op. cit., pp. 52-91; V. Stojancevic, Juznoslovenski
narodi u Osmanskom Carstvu, p. 331.
Political Action of Serbia
From the Middle Ages, until the First Serbian Insurrection of 1804, the
lands comprising Serbia were considered to range from Belgrade to Veles, and
from Kladovo to the plateau of Malissia. However, the creation of an
insurgent state in north Serbia (1804-1813), brought on a new apprehension
of its frontiers. Ever since the downfall of the Insurrection, Milos
Obrenovic strove, with patience, perseverance and cunning diplomatic
actions, to create an autonomous principality of the subjugated pashalik (of
which the foundations for restoring the Serbian state were laid under
Karadjordje), within the boundaries of the Bucharest treaty (1812), giving a
new name to those Serbian regions remaining beyond its range. Vuk Karadzic
united all spacious lands south and southwest of Milos's Serbia, close to
the courses of the Drina and Lim rivers, and the river basin of the Juzna
Morava (regions that were seats of the Nemanjic state), under a common name
- Old Serbia.1
The growing political independence of Serbia, that by 1833 formed an
autonomous Principality under Turkish sovereignty, territorially and
politically, revived the hopes of Serbs in Metohia and Kosovo. French travel
writer Ami Boue remarked that the Serbs in Metohia, even though oppressed by
all sorts of brutalities, looked upon Prince Milos as their messiah who
would one day liberate them of the harsh bondage of Turkish rule. The
Principality of Serbia, during the first reign of Prince Milos (1830-1839),
became an attractive place for all Serbs who lived in lands under Turkish
domain.2
Prince Milos never disregarded the severe destiny of Serbs in Kosovo.
Even during the reigns of independent pashas, he undertook efforts to
mitigate the position of his compatriots through ties with the Rotulovic
family of Prizren and the Mahmudbegovic family of Pec. The Prince received
and bestowed gifts upon the monks of Old Serbia, gave them permission to
collect donations for their monasteries in Serbia, and sent gifts whenever
he could to the impoverished fraternities in Metohia and Kosovo. He is to be
credited for the restoration of the Visoki Decani palace in 1836. In
complaints lodged to him, mostly from Visoki Decani, monks bewailed that
ethnic Albanians were arrogating monastic lands, notwithstanding the firmans
of former sultans, giving warrant for their estates. They pleaded for him to
intermediate with the Porte, requesting that a new firman be issued for the
fraternity of Decani. Sultan Abdul Mejid confirmed all monastic estates in
1849, but nothing changed, since in the mountains, no one heeds for the
firman".3
During the reign of the constitutionalist and Prince Aleksandar
Karadjordjevic (1842-1858), Serbia continued to aid churches, monasteries
and schools in Old Serbia, but was unable to improve the position of the
unprotected rayah. In the mid-19th century, little was known about the
political situation of Serbs in Kosovo and Metohia. Sporadic connections
were made through monks and teachers, who drew attention to the unbearable
position of the Serbian populace by sending pleas to the Prince, government
or metropolitan. The harsh fate of the people in Old Serbia, as far as the
public of the Principality and the Serbian intelligentsia in Austria were
concerned, fell into a vague picture of hard life under Turkish rule.
The mid-19th century saw no solid grounds enabling closer contact with
Albanian chiefs in Kosovo and Metohia. The Nacertanije, by Ilija Garasanin
(1844), the first modern Serbian national program within the framework of a
foreign-policy plan, spoke of "liberating all non-Ottoman people of the
Balkan Peninsula from this bitter bondage through a well-conceived plan";
winning over the ethnic Albanians was part of the plan, as a potential to
rely on for the entire Christian uprising against the Turks. The aim to
secure a free trade route for the future state by way of Ulcinj and Scutari
to the Adriatic shores, compelled Garasanin to cooperate with Albanian
Catholics in north Albania.
Serbian political propaganda in north Albania was administrated by
Matija Ban. According to the Ustav politicke propagande (Constitution of
Political Propaganda) of 1849, north Albania belonged to the Southern
region". Several agents were assigned to work on winning over north Albanian
tribes but most of the burden fell upon the Catholic miter bearer, abbot don
Caspar Krasnik, of Albanian nationality, who, after his first successes, was
named an agent, receiving annual payment of 270 talers from the Serbian
government. Owing to his efforts, Bib Doda, heir to the great Catholic tribe
Mirdit, had been won over for cooperation with Serbia. At the time, Bib Doda
told Krasnik "that he, with the Mirdits, would be ready to join in the rise
for liberation, so the Mirdits would have an autonomy and the freedom to
practice their religion under Serbian rule". Abbot Krasnik arrived at
Belgrade in 1849, informed Garasanin of the situation in north Albania and
confirmed the readiness of the Mirdits to start an uprising against the
Turks if they were given gunpowder and flints.
Due to Garasanin, lord of Montenegro, Prince-Bishop Petar II Petrovic
Njegos, established tolerable relations with the Mirdits, there until in
hostile relations with Montenegrin tribes. Prince-bishop of Montenegro and
Bib Doda contracted an alliance at the end of 1849 for attack and defense
against the Turks. In 1851, a relative of Bib Doda, Marko Prokljes, arrived
at Cetinje and in Belgrade, promising "the Prince and Serbian government up
to 2,000 soldiers any time they may require them". Cooperation with the
Mirdits soon evolved through Montenegrin ties. At the same time, Krasnik won
over Domazen, the Catholic bishop in Scutari.4
International circumstances, especially the political situation on the
European side of the empire, would not allow for a great Serbian uprising,
nor military cooperation with the Mirdits. The campaigns of Omer Pasha Latas
in Walachia, Old Serbia and Bulgaria, from 1849-1851, the great rise of the
Serbs in Herzegovina under the leadership of Luka Vukalovic in 1852, and the
1853 war between Montenegro and Turkey, brought on new campaigns and a
concentration of Turkish troops in Albania, Old Serbia and at its borders
with Montenegro. The Mirdits did not, for the first time in long while,
respond to a call to war with Montenegro. The Turks blamed and arrested
Abbot Krasnik for this weak response; he evaded penalty due to French
intervention.
At the same time, in 1853, Ilija Garasanin, the instigator of national
action in Turkey, was replaced. Prince Aleksandar Karadjordjevic, pressured
by the Porte, which regarded Serbia as the source of all subversive action
on the Peninsula, ceased all national action outside the boundaries of the
Principality and prohibited public anti-Turkish manifestations. At the
beginning of the Crimean War, 1853, the loyalty of Prince Aleksandar to the
Porte grew, thus incurring the cessation of all propaganda actions. The
Mirdits were compelled to join the Danube Ottoman army.5
Following several years of slowdown, particularly during the reign of
Prince Mihailo, when Garasanin occupied the seat of prime minister and
minister of foreign affairs (1861-1867), plans revived for the Balkan
uprising against the Turks. Garasanin believed, with the cooperation of
Montenegro and Greece, that Serbia, as the most powerful Balkan force,
should bear the heaviest load in the organization and in preparations for
the uprising. Following the plan, Serbia was to encompass, through
propaganda, a larger part of Bulgaria, Macedonia, Old Serbia and the
northern and mid-regions of Albania. In a memoir addressed to Prince Mihailo
in 1860, Garasanin underscored the explicit necessity for the ethnic
Albanians to be politically neutralized. The aim was to separate them from
the Turks, to prevent them from hindering the Serbian-Greek alliance. He
intended to exert influence over their clans and prominent tribal chiefs,
warning him that the people were mostly illiterate, had no national center,
and were segregated by three religions.
Anticipating the creation of a common Serbian-Bulgarian state,
Garasanin believed that Albania, after liberating itself from the Turks, as
well as Greece, should be an independent country, allied with the new Slavic
state for purposes of defending common and special interests. In
negotiations with Greece, in 1860, Serbia agreed, in principle, to divide
Albania, whereby the northern territories, Durazzo and Elbasan, would be
annexed to Serbia, and Berat and Korea, to the Greek state. However, this
contract was never signed. The final text of the contract on the alliance
between Greece and Serbia (1866) allowed for the creation of an independent
Albania, or its annexation to either Serbia or Greece.6
Both Serbian and Greek statesmen observed how important Albanian
determination was in case of a total Christian uprising on the Balkans, due
to Albania's geopolitical position and the role of Albanian warriors in the
Turkish army. According to a belief of the contemporary French minister to
Athens, the stand of the ethnic Albanians was a knot in all controversial
matters regarding Turkey and the Christian population.
The formation of the Balkan alliance for a joint struggle against the
Turks helped reestablish contacts with north Albania. Gaspar Krasnik was
interned at Constantinople in 1865, so Garasanin assigned a Slovenian
priest, Franz Mauri, secretary of the bishop of Scutari, to be the agent
instead. However, cooperation was soon severed due to suspicions that he was
working for Austria and Turkey.
Albania most severely opposed the Forte's reforms; this discontent was
thus used for contracting new alliances. In 1866, Djelal Pasha, member of
the powerful Zogu clan and influential chief of the Mati region, who was
interned at Constantinople, was won over for cooperation. For the first
time, contacts, though only in principle, were established with ethnic
Albanians of the Muslim faith. Since there were no Serbian settlements in
Mati, no intolerance existed like in Old Serbia. Djelal Pasha was to head
the great uprising against the Turks. When it was learnt in Constantinople
that the Porte was working on winning over and arming the ethnic Albanians
for the Christian uprising, the Serbian government, bolstered by the until
then reserved Russian diplomacy, activated its tasks among the ethnic
Albanians. In Belgrade in 1868, six Albanian chiefs were sojourning. After
being won over by gifts, they were familiarized with the preparations for
the uprising and sent to Albania to await the beckon to rise. Cooperation
with Dzelal Pasha was not realized for his instability and the unreliability
of his nearest retinues. There could be no political nor military
organization, for everything depended upon the competence of a handful of
chiefs.7
Serbia had high hopes for the Albanian revolt against Turkish
authorities, until abandoning the idea of rising in Turkey in 1868. However,
Belgrade did not apprehend that the readiness of ethnic Albanians to rise
evolved out of the desire to resist Turkish reforms and retain tribal
privileges. During the sixties of the 19th century, the ethnic Albanians
were void of national awareness, in the modern sense of the word, nor did
they comprehend, excepting a small number of educated tribal chiefs, their
problems as national, beyond narrow tribal and confessional frameworks. As
soon as imminent danger from the introduction of reforms was past, the
ethnic Albanians would again respond to calls from the sultan to defend
Islam and pay their dues of loyalty with abundant spoils and devastated
Christian countries.
1 V. Karadzic, Danica za 1827, Budim 1827. G. J. Jurisic considered the
following nahis part of Old Serbia in 1852: Novi Pazar, Pec, Djakovica,
Prizren, Skoplje, Kosovo, Pristina, Vucitrn, Vranje, Leskovac and Nis. A. F.
Giljferding, nevertheless, included the Novi Pazar nahis with Kosovo and
Metohia as part of Old Serbia (More detailed analysis in: V. Stojancevic,
Jugoslovenski narodi u Osmanskom Carstvu, p. 327).
2 A. Bou , Recueil d'itin raires dans la Turquie d'Europe, Paris 1854,
p. 198.
3 Zaduzbine Kosova, 611-612; V. Stojancevic, Juznoslovenski narodi u
Osmanskom Carstvu, p. 235.
4 D. Stranjakovic, Juznoslovenski nacionalni i drzavni program
Knezevine Srbije iz 1844. god., Beograd 1931, pp. 3-29; idem, Politicka
propaganda Srbije u juznoslovenskim pokrajinama 1844-1858. godine, Beograd
1936, pp. 20-25.
5 V. Stojancevic, Juznoslovenski narodi u Osmanskom Carstvu, pp.
292-293.
6 D. Stranjakovic, Albanija i Srbija u XIX veku, Srpski knjizevni
glasnik, 52 (1937), pp. 624-627; G. Jaksic - V. J. Vuckovic, Spoljna
politika Srbije za vlade kneza Mihaila. Prvi balkanski savez, Beograd 1963,
pp. 137.
7 G. Jaksic, Jedan izvestaj o Albaniji, Arhiv za Arbansku stranu, jezik
i etnologiju, II (1924), pp. 169-192; G. Jaksic - V. J. Vuckovicic, op.
cit., pp. 240-246, 413-416, 468, Srbija i oslobodilacki pokret na Balkanu od
Pariskog mira do Berlinskog kongresa (1856-1878), I (ed: V. Krestic- R.
Ljusic), Beograd 1983, pp. 435-444, 558-563.
Restoration of Religious and Cultural Life
National life evolved under the wing of the church. After the
abolishment of the Pec Patriarchate in 1766, gone was the only national
institution around which the Serbs congregated; gone was the guider of
national living. It was in 1807, by the edict of Sultan Mustafa, that the
Serbian Janicije was named metropolitan of the Raska-Prizren Eparchy. Owing
to himself and his successor, Hadzi-Zaharije (1819-1830), during the first
three decades of the 19th century, the Raska-Prizren Eparchy helped maintain
national awareness with the assistance of lower clergy of Serbian
nationality, even though remaining under the Patriarchate of Constantinople.
The people in Kosovo and Metohia were bound, perhaps more strongly than
those in other Serbian lands, to their national heritage. Living memories of
the sacred rulers and heroes of Kosovo, of past glory and the unfortunately
lost empire were kept alive by priests and monks from the fraternities of
medieval endowments. In Visoki Decani and the Pec Patriarchate, in Gracanica
and Devic, the most powerful seats of national and spiritual life, the cults
of ruler-martyrs, patriarchs and ascetics were cherished. Beside the
tradition of the once glorious Serbia under the Nemanjices, the minds of the
people were kept alive with the memories of uprisings and migrations of
centuries past. The endurance sustaining the Serbs despite all their
miseries, evolved out of a profound attachment to the spiritual and national
heritage of the medieval Serbian state.
Not with standing the raging anarchy that shook Old Serbia, waning only
from time to time, the Serbs in Metohia and Kosovo were able to organize and
restore their spiritual and educational lives with assistance from official
Serbia. Continuity of work, with periodical suspensions during times of
turbulence, was maintained by monastic schools in the Pec Patriarchate,
Visoki Decani, Devic and Gracanica (containing a press at one time). Here
pupils from different areas of Serbia under Turkish rule were being taught
the clergyman's vocation. The first more deeply felt financial support given
to the monastic schools, began to arrive from Prince Milos during the third
decade. During the reign of Prince Aleksandar Karadjordjevic and the
constitutionalist regime in Serbia (1842-1858), financial aid began to
arrive more regularly for the restoration of churches and the maintenance of
monasteries, and gifts were sent in books for religious service. Excluding
the most renown medieval endowments, aid from the Serbian government also
arrived to fraternities of the monasteries St. Marko and the Holy Trinity
near Prizren, the Holy Transfiguration near Pec, and to priests of the
Prizren and Djakovica churches.
Since the mid-18th century, Serbian church-school communities operated
in Metohia and Kosovo, founded first in towns and then in village parishes,
the cores of township and village self-government. Until the Rasko-Prizren
metropolitans were of Serbian nationality, they nominated members for the
governing bodies of church-school communities, usually for no limited time.
The selection was limited to the most noted priests, wealthy merchants and
guild representatives. Communities saw to the maintenance of religious
schools and the education of monastic progeny, strove to establish contact
with Serbia and effect relations with Turkish authorities, both on religious
and educational grounds, and when possible, on economic ones, too. Members
of church-school boards collected contributions for the repairement of
monasteries and churches. Beside many monasteries and churches (Gracanica,
Visoki Decani, Devic, Duboki Potok, Vracevo, Draganac), palaces were built
for the operation of monastic or religious schools, and subsequently secular
ones.
At the beginning of the 19th century, the inauguration of schools was
urged by Raska-Prizren Metropolitans Janicije and Hadzi Zaharije. When the
bishopric chair was taken over in 1830 by Greek bishops, endeavors were
undertaken, especially during Metropolitan Ignjatije's time (1840-1849), to
open Tzintzar schools where lessons in Greek would also be attended by
Serbian children.1 The Phanariot bishops strove to sustain the
subjugation and ignorance of the Serbian clergy, so as to facilitate their
manipulation of The flock. Some of them sold their clerical positions for
money and fined the people with large church taxes. Being of open
anti-Serbian determination, they impeded or hampered the restoration or
construction of new churches, attempted to Hellenize the populace by
imposing the celebration of the name-day feast, instead of the Slava
(Serbian family feast for its patron saint), a definitely Serbian
custom.2
In the first half of the 19th century, religious schools existed in all
major towns (Pristina, Pec, Mitrovica, Vucitrn, Gnjilane, Djakovica) and in
some villages (Musutiste, Vitina, Korminjan). Private schools were opened
usually under the name of a notable leader who was to finance its operation,
but the burden of maintenance usually fell upon church-school communities
and guilds. Private schools provided lessons in subjects both religious and
secular. The best among them were at Prizren, Vucitrn, Mitrovica, and the
Donja Jasenovo and Kovaci villages. The inauguration of new private schools
falls with the Turkish reforms at the middle of the century. Merchant and
craftsmen guilds in Pec, Prizren and Gnjilane introduced funds for opening
new schools and obtaining better teaching staff. The constitutionalist
government sent the schools money, books and other facilities through
merchants and other members of church boards. According to available data,
several dozens of schools in Metohia and Kosovo were attended by around
1,300 pupils during the sixties.
The oldest and most renown Serbian church-school community was in
Prizren, the economical center of Serbs in Metohia, where a community school
aiming to prevent Greek propaganda was established in 1836. Hilferding
recorded that the male school had 200 pupils in 1857. Other important seats
of scholastic life were at Pristina (150 pupils in 1865) and Pec (150 pupils
in 1866), in which Serbian teachers from different regions (Srem, Serbia,
Croatia) lectured according to secular programs from Serbia. Special schools
were opened for female children. The highest degree of education was
provided by an extensive school at Prizren, a kind of high school, though of
lower level.3
A number of talented pupils from Kosovo and Metohia aspiring to the
teaching vocation, were being prepared in Serbia from the beginning of the
sixties, owing to scholarships received from wealthy Prizren merchant Sima
Andrejevic Igumanov (1804-1882). Their number greatly increased already
after 1868, when in Belgrade, at the proposition of Serbian Metropolitan
Mihailo, an Educational Board was formed for schools and teachers in Old
Serbia, Macedonia, Bosnia and Herzegovina. Under the patronage of the Board,
works on the improvement of teaching conditions soon produced significant
results. New schools were opened and old ones given financial support, and
the curriculum contained better programs. The tasks of teachers educated in
Serbia were not solely to educate, but were, above all, aimed to maintain
national awareness of the people, prevent conversions and prepare the
progeny to carry on the duties of national enlightenment.
The turning point in the educational life of Serbs in the Ottoman
Empire, was marked by the Bogoslovija (Seminary), founded in Prizren in
1871. Even though some suggestions for its inauguration were directed at
Pec, the prevailing attitude in Belgrade was that Prizren was the most
favorable place, being the center of economical life for Serbs in Old Serbia
and seat of the vilayet. Sima Andrejevic Igumanov lived in Prizren, the
contemporaneously greatest benefactor who bequeathed his riches obtained by
trades in Russia, to the people. He was a Russian subject and was thus able,
with assistance from the Russian consulate at Prizren, to obtain a license
from the Turkish authorities to found a Seminary. It soon became the seat of
the overall spiritual and educational life and the stronghold for political
work on national affairs. More important was the fact that for the first
time, contact had been established with the government in Belgrade, able
thus to exert immediate influence on national operations amongst Serbs in
Old Serbia.
From its inauguration in 1871, until the liberation in 1912, the
Seminary worked according to instructions given by the Serbian government.
At the beginning, its operation was under the jurisdiction of the Ministry
for Education and Religious Affairs, and then the Ministry for Foreign
Affairs. All expenses of the Seminary were paid by the Serbian government,
but important means for its maintenance came from various funds founded by
the church and from the endowment of Sima Igumanov. The first rector of the
Theological college was a monk from Decani, Sava Decanac, a graduate of the
Spiritual Academy in Kiev.4
Owing to the Bogoslovija, primary schools operated in all larger
settlements in Metohia and Kosovo until 1912, and graduated theologians from
Prizren became teachers and priests all over the Ottoman Empire, from
Macedonia to Bosnia. According to incomplete data, around 480 students
graduated from the Seminary (subsequently transformed to a
theological-teaching school) until 1912, among whom 196 were from Metohia
and Kosovo.
The inauguration of the Seminary in Prizren proved to be a secure dam
against any attempts undertaken by the Constantinople Patriarchate to
Hellenize the Serbian populace through Tzintzar oases in Metohia and against
the aims of the Bulgarian Exarchate (1870) to build strongholds in the
Gnjilane region. Until the Serbian consulate was opened in Pristina in 1889,
the Seminary was the center of Serbian political life in Metohia and Kosovo.
From Belgrade, by way of the School, books, journals and newspapers were
delivered, for expanding liberational ideas and consolidating national
awareness. From the beginning of its operations, the Turkish authorities and
ethnic Albanians suspected the School of being the center of Serbian
national action, thus political contacts with Belgrade were carried out
through the Russian consulate in Prizren which secured the transmission of
confidential mail.5
In Prizren (seat of the vilayet from 1868-1874), from 1871, until the
abolition of the vilayet, the paper Prizren was published in two languages,
Turkish and Serbian, in which official news, laws, orders, new regulations,
verdicts over violators, and columns on events taking place in Turkey and in
other countries were published. The Serbian section of the paper was
editored by Ilija Stavric, rector of the Seminary, and texts were translated
into Serbian by a distinguished national worker and subsequent Serbian
consul to Pristina, Todor P. Stankovic. In Pristina, where the Kosovo
vilayet was formed in 1877, a similar vilayet paper Kosovo was instigated,
also in the Serbian and Turkish language. When the seat of the Kosovo
vilayet was moved to Skoplje in 1888, the paper resumed its publication only
in Turkish.6
1 See most important works: P. Kostic, Crkveni zivot pravoslavnih Srba
u Prizrenu i njegovoj okolini u XIX veku, (with writer's memories), Beograd
1928; idem, Prosvetno-kulturni zivot pravoslavnih Srba u Prizrenu i njegovoj
okolini u XIX veku i pocetkom XX veka, (with writer's memories), Skoplje
1933; J. K. Djilas, Srpske skole na Kosovu od 1856. do 1912. godine,
Pristina 1969.
2 J. Popovic, Zivot Srba na Kosovu 1812-1912, pp. 222-226.
3 The most distingushed teachers during the sixties were Nikola Musulin
and Milan Novicic in Prizren, Milan D. Kovacevic in Pristina, and Sava
Decanac in Pec.
4 J. K. Djilas, op. cit., pp. 53-104.
5 Spomenica Sezdesetogodisnjice prizrenske Bogoslovske uciteljske Skole
1871-1921, Beograd 1925, pp. 133-160; J. K. Djilas, op. cit., pp. 105-110.
6 T. P. Stankovic, Putne beleske po Staroj Srbiji 1871-1897, pp. 67-72;
H. Kalesi - H.J. Kornrumpf, op. cit., pp. 117-122.
The Economy
The essence of Serbian economy in Metohia and Kosovo lay in the town
and village handicrafts and trades. Centers of Serbian society in Metohia
and Kosovo were the towns Prizren, Pristina and Pec, and during the last
quarter of the century - Mitrovica. In Prizren, a large town on an important
crossroad toward Scutari and Salonika, trade and craftsmanships flourished
in the preceding centuries. The local Serbs called it "small
Constantinople", since most of the trade and crafts traditionally belonged
to Serbian citizens.
According to available sources, life in Serbian towns evolved under
irregular circumstances during the entire 19th century. The perpetual shifts
of anarchy, wars and uprisings, and continual peril upon one's life and
property, compelled the small-in-number Serbian citizens in Kosovo to adapt
to the existing conditions with haste. Using bribes and tips, common means
with bribable government representatives, they somewhat expanded narrow
economic frameworks, and discovered, always coinciding with momentous
political conditions, new opportunities for work and ways to protect their
estates and families. Life in the Serbian towns of Kosovo and Metohia
continued parallel to the Turkish and Albanian ones dictating the terms.
Even though corroded by irregular conditions, Serbian tradesmen and
craftsmen, gathered in church-school communities and parishes, united in
times of hardship, succeeded in organizing their lives. Acted as a unity
toward the authorities and tyrants, they often quarreled when settling
matters in local communities. The obstinacy with which they resisted
temptations to move to Serbia - a land that soon trod the path of national
and economic emancipation by European standards - proves that among the best
national representatives, a high degree of awareness existed on the need for
survival on Kosovo grounds.
Anachronic methods of trade, insecurity on roads and competition of
cheap European goods impeded the development of trade and handicrafts among
Serbs. The Muslims forbade the Christians to deal in crafts of wider
significance, for instance, the gunsmiths', leather dealers', and even the
barbers' trade. Beside the Muslims, who were mostly Turks, the Tzintzars,
Jews and Catholic Slavs of Janjevo were also in the handicraft business. Yet
the Serbs did very well in all the permitted trades. A larger part of their
produces satisfied their domestic needs and provided for nearby bazaars in
Old Serbia and Macedonia. Only a smaller portion of handicraft produces,
particularly of the goldsmiths', leather dealers' and tailors' guild
(especially in Prizren, Pristina and Pec), were vended on larger markets.
Costly decorative pieces of silver and gold, as well as saffian, had their
buyers on markets in Salonika, Constantinople and other Levant towns. Bulk
traders of Prizren, Vucitrn and Pristina sold various articles in Serbia,
mostly produces of different guilds, and purchased larger livestock. The
Vucitrn tradesmen of the Camilovic family had successful dealings with
Sarajevo, while merchants from Pec and Pristina traded with other towns in
Bosnia. Enterprising Prizren tradesmen held warehouses with leather and wool
in Belgrade from where their goods were delivered to Pest, Vienna and
Constantinople.1
The dynamic development of enterprises accomplished by Serbian
merchants in the mid-19th century provoked religious intolerance in
conservative competitive circles - tradesmen of Muslim faith. The commercial
successes of Serbs also disturbed the Turkish authorities, who reckoned them
to be signs of national rising. As a result, in 1859 and 1863, Serbian shops
were burnt in Prizren, Pec and Pristina, which incurred a sudden economic
downfall in these towns. Hadji Serafim Ristic recorded that when the army
occupied Prizren in 1860, 12 shops were burnt, and in Pristina, at two
strokes, 90 shops belonging to reputable merchants blazed, with values
amounting to almost a million coins.2 Yet, commerce remained in
Christian hands in Prizren, according to the attestation of Austrian Consul
J. G. von Hahn.3 A new commercial swing came with the opening of
the railway track from Mitrovica to Salonika in 1873-1874, while handicrafts
recorded a decrease in sales due to competition from cheap European goods
brought to Kosovo by Jewish merchants from Salonika. Nevertheless, the
revival of handicrafts and trade among the Serbs in the mid-19th century,
despite irregular conditions, considerably influenced the slowdown of
emigration to Serbia. In towns, contrary to the villages, a certain amount
of legal security existed and a possibility for developing ventures.
The position of Serbs living in villages was incomparably harder.
ethnic Albanians of Muslim faith organized raiding parties and mercilessly
sacked Serbian villages. Being Muslims, being privileged in every way, they
united into compact communities of blood brotherhoods or tribes, socially
homogeneous, maintaining their clans by terrorizing the Serbs, seizing their
lands or exacting taxes. By curbing Serbian farmers from certain regions,
they made space for the settlement of their fellow tribesmen living in the
indigent plateaus of north Albania. Unused to life in the plains and hard
work in the fields, the ethnic Albanians who settled from the hilly regions
rather picked up guns than hoes.4
There was no public safety on the roads of Kosovo and Metohia during
the 19th century. Passageways were controlled by bands of outlaws or tribal
companies, thus roads could be passed only with military escorts of the
Turkish police or with protection from Albanian clans supervising parts of
tribal territory, lurking about for an opportunity to fleece merchants and
passengers.
The Serbian peasant could not hope to be protected even in the fields,
where he could be assaulted at any moment by a wandering outlaw, or
blackmailed, and if he resisted, killed. Being the rayah, the Serbs had no
right to carry weapons, and when they contrived to obtain them, they had
nowhere to hide from the vengeance of the Albanian clan with which they
clashed. The haiduk tradition, characteristic of Serbs living in all regions
under Turkish domain, had no effect in the plains of Kosovo and Metohia.
Haiduk activity occurring from time to time on the ranges of Mount
Prokletije, in the vicinity of the Decani and Pec monasteries, took place
with the assistance and protection of Serbs from Montenegro, but still it
could not be sustained. In times of peace, rule in towns was maintained by
Turkish military garrisons. Passage through roads depended upon the will of
numerous Albanian clan companies until 1912. Villages inhabited by ethnic
Albanians and situated along the roads of Metohia where interspersed with
high stone towers, small fortresses from where passengers were attacked and
where concealment lay from members of other companies.
Both day and night, Serbian homes, made of glued mud, were open to
attack by individuals or bands of outlaws without fear of sanctions. French
travel writer Ami Boue recorded that his escort terrorized and robbed the
inhabitants of a Serbian village. When the host opposed the assailant with
an axe, the latter threatened to notify Pristina, from where the
"janissaries" and the tax collector would pop out. Under such threats, the
head of the Serbian home was compelled to comply to the demands of the
assailant, and even to part with him on "friendly" terms.5
During the second and third decade of the 19th century, when
independent pashas reigned, the position of Serbian village populaces was
extremely difficult. Agrarian-legal relations depended not on Turkish
regulations but on physical force. Feudal lords forced free farmers to the
position of chiflik farmers, especially in Drenica, and the Pec, Vucitrn and
Pristina nahis. Many free farmers fled to Serbia, while Islamization and
Albanization decreased the resistance of Serbian villages toward chiflik
labor. The seized estates were returned to some of the Serbs in 1832, owing
to the merit of Grand Vizier Reshid Pasha. The vizier then attempted to
permanently settle agrarian-legal relations in Rumelia with a decree issued
in Vucitrn, but in practice it was all different. Agas and subpashas settled
in villages to control the division of incomes of Serbian chiflik laborers.
Fearing sanctions, the Serbs were forbidden to collect income from the lands
they tilled unless given permission.
By the Hattisherif of Gulhane, the chiflik-sahibi system was legalized;
private ownership of land was recognized legally. The chiflik-laboring Serbs
tilled the lands of their lords and gave them part of their income. In
Kosovo and Metohia, until the Tanzimat reforms, the transformation of
sipahiliks to chifliks was executed by force. Chiflik-laboring was most
expressed in districts where Serbs and ethnic Albanians lived admixed.
Landowners were mostly Muslim ethnic Albanians and Turks, free farmers -
ethnic Albanians, and chiflik-laborers mainly Serbs with a small portion of
Catholic ethnic Albanians.6
Pressure exerted upon the Serbian chiflik inhabitants following 1839
was so great that when a large Christian uprising was prepared in Bosnia and
Rumelia, serious thought was given to rising. When the plans to rise were
divulged, the position of farmers grew worse. Muslims in Prizren routed the
tax collector in 1841, but Christian Serbs were compelled to pay. Having no
one to seek protection from, the Serbs of the Vucitrn and Pristina nahis
addressed the government in Belgrade in 1842, requesting help. Weighed down
by high taxes, which in some areas amounted to half of their total incomes,
Serbian farmers became impoverished. Economic pressure did not exclude
violent deeds which became daily events at the end of the fifth and sixth
decade. Blackmail, fleecing, arrogation of incomes and estates were followed
by countless acts of violence over Serbian inhabitants under Albanian
raiding bands. Only a part of these oppressive acts were divulged by
archimandrite of the Decani monastery, Hadji Serafim Ristic, in his
complaints to the sultan, Serbian Prince and Russian ruler.7
1 D. Mikic, Drustvene i ekonomske prilike kosovskih Srba, pp. 235-260.
2 Savremenici o Kosovu i Metohiji 1852-1912, D. Mikic,
Drustveno-politicki razvoj kosovskih Srba, pp. 236-237.
3 J. G. Hahn, Putovanje kroz porecinu Drina i Vardara, 130.
4 T. P. Stankovic, op. cit., pp. 131-138.
5 D. Mikic, Drustvene i ekonomske prilike kosovskih Srba, p. 90.
6 D. Mikic, Drustveno-politicki razvoj kosovskih Srba, pp. 236-239
(with earlier bibliography).
7 Savremenici o Kosovu i Metohiji 1852-1912, pp. 22-52. 104
PART TWO: THEOCRACY, NATIONALISM, IMPERIALISM
ENTERING THE SPHERE OF EUROPEAN INTEREST
The Albanian national movement was born during the great Eastern crisis
(1875-1878). The basis for its gathering contained the direct denial of
liberatory aims of Serbian states and of the political and national rights
of the Serbs in Kosovo and Metohia. Bound, in its matrix course, to the
Islam concept of tribal autonomy within the framework of the Ottoman state,
the Albanian movement radiated a peculiar intolerance toward European
comprehensions of society. The movement for autonomy was, to the Muslim
masses of Kosovo and Metohia, synonymous to the preservation of tribal and
feudal privileges; to the conservation of the anachronous regime in which
the Serbs had no place.
The outcome of the Eastern crisis brought Kosovo and Metohia under the
direct influence of Great Powers. Subsequent to the occupation of Bosnia and
Herzegovina and the entrance of Austro-Hungarian troops in the northern
parts of the Kosovo vilayet, the remote Turkish province became the key of
dominion on the Peninsula. In Vienna, strong argumentation underscored that
the Ottomans conquered the Balkan Peninsula only after the battle of Kosovo
in 1389.
The formation of oppositional power blocks in Europe, with
Austria-Hungary and Russia as their main exponents in the Balkans, was
conducive to a clearer refraction of their mutual conflicting interests in
Kosovo, Metohia and Macedonia than in other Ottoman provinces.
Internationalization of the problem of Old Serbia, which intercepted German
penetration to the east, heavily affected the local Serbian populace.
Russia's influence on political issues in the Balkans, since the Congress of
Berlin until the Young Turk Revolution (1908), was diminishing despite aims
for its restoration and consolidation. Austro-Hungarian supremacy on the
Balkans, destroyed in World War I, was based on mercilessly checking Serbian
national interests and liberatory aims (Bosnia and Herzegovina, Novi Pazar
sanjak, Old Serbia, Macedonia). Favorizing the ethnic Albanians and the
conservative regime of Abdulhamid II, the Dual Monarchy made the Serbs of
Kosovo and Metohia victims of a policy aiming to a total expulsion of Serbs
in areas between the Una river and the Vardar river basin, mid Hungar