Last Serbian Kings
Every nation has its defining event. For the Americans, it is the War of Independence, and for the Serbs, it is the Battle of Kosovo. No other nation has relived, over and over again, one of the most difficult losses in its history, and it seems that, much like Jesus Christ, through suffering and sacrifice, the Serbian nation reaches redemption. This idea is expressed, among other things, in Serbian ballads throughout the years and in the wonderful epic of the Montenegrin poet Njegoš, The Mountain Wreath.
Every nation experiences a time of flourishing and a time of decline. During the 200-year rule of the Nemanjić dynasty, Serbia blossomed, and it seemed that by the middle of the 14th century, the time had come for the Serbs to bear fruit. However, the process was interrupted in its infancy—first by internal strife, discord, division, and folly among the Serbs themselves, and later, as a result, by a brutal defeat in the Battle of Kosovo, in which a large part of the Serbian nobility was destroyed. This led to the subjugation of Serbia to the Ottomans. The Battle of Kosovo is the founding traumatic event of the Serbian nation, after which it had to endure 500 years of humiliation and suffering.
However, this battle also had its successes. Serbian ethos was built around the events of this battle, Serbian nationalism was strengthened because of it, and its participants became the eternal heroes and saints of the Serbian people and Church. Among them was Prince Lazar, who died on the battlefield by his sword and is often depicted holding his head in his hands in the style of John the Baptist, and the hero Miloš, who managed to behead Sultan Murad I. The Ottomans, discouraged by the heavy losses they suffered, took more than half a century to complete the conquest of Serbia and the Balkans.
The Serbian fighters in the wars of independence against the Ottomans in the 19th and 20th centuries saw themselves as successors to the heroes of the Battle of Kosovo. The Montenegrin fighters who rebelled against the Ottomans in the 18th century also saw themselves as the successors of the heroes of the Battle of Kosovo. In the 20th century—without judging whether this was good or bad—Milošević arrived on the battlefield in Kosovo and declared that the struggle with the Albanians was a continuation of the Battle of Kosovo. The Serbian fighters in the Bosnian War saw themselves in the same way, and so on.
In the Battle of Kosovo, about 30,000 Christian fighters gathered from all over Serbia under the leadership of Prince Lazar, including warriors from Bosnia and Croatia, as well as Hospitaller knights. They faced about 40,000 Ottoman soldiers. The Ottomans had a numerical and technological advantage, but the Serbs relied on their superior fighting tactics, chivalric cavalry, and determination. According to their version, the battle was lost due to the betrayal of Vuk Branković, commander of part of the Serbian army. Instead of victory, they ended with a glorious defeat.
North of Pristina, the capital of Kosovo, stands a large monument in the form of a medieval tower, erected by the Yugoslavs in honour of the Battle of Kosovo at the site where it took place, called Gazimestan. Inscribed on the monument are the words of King Lazar in his address to the Serbs before the battle: Everyone who is a Serb and born a Serb, who has Serbian heritage and blood in him and does not appear in the fight, may he have no descendants whose hearts’ desires are fulfilled, neither son nor daughter. May nothing of what his hands have sown grow, neither red wine nor white wheat, and may he be cursed for all generations by all generations!
The day of the battle, which is St. Vitus’ Day, is considered a national holiday to this day.
The last Serbian Kings
After the death of Uroš “the Weak,” Serbia disintegrated into several kingdoms. In the area of present-day Macedonia, King Marko, a vassal of the Ottomans, ruled from his stronghold in Prilep. In the area of Kosovo, there was an independent Serbian kingdom. In the territories corresponding to today’s southern Serbia, south of the Danube, a kingdom known as Serbian Moravia emerged as the largest and most powerful kingdom. It was ruled by Prince Lazar from his capital in Kruševac, from 1373 until his death in the Battle of Kosovo in 1389.
Lazar was a staunch supporter of the Church and built many monasteries. He brought about reconciliation between the Serbian Orthodox Church and the Byzantine Church, which led to an influx of monks from Mount Athos and the newly conquered territories that were under Muslim rule. Lazar built a series of monasteries to accommodate them, first and foremost the Ravanica Monastery in the Morava Valley, which became a kind of father monastery to many others around it, similar to the Cluny Monastery in France during the Middle Ages. The Gornjak Monastery was established in the Balkan Mountains as a center of the mystical tradition of Hesychasm.
After Lazar’s death, his wife, Princess Milica, ruled and continued to support the Church. After her, their son, Stefan Lazarević, was crowned and recognized by the Ottomans as a vassal ruler. Serbia no longer had the strength to achieve full independence, and Lazarević assisted the Ottomans in several battles. However, after their defeat by Timur the Great in 1402, he restored Serbia’s independence and forged an alliance with the Hungarians, a rising power in the region. As a reward, they granted him the Golubac Fortress at the entrance to the Iron Gates Canyon and Belgrade as a gift. Lazarević made Belgrade his capital, built its fortress, and under his rule, Belgrade became a major city and a center of culture, academia, and the Renaissance (the only surviving remnant from his time is the tower at the entrance).
Lazarević was an interesting figure—a tall man, a capable commander and soldier, a true knight of the Order of the Dragon, a scholar, poet, and writer; in short, a Renaissance man. He was a patron of literature and the arts, and his most famous book is A Homage to Love. He had a large library and encouraged games, music, and possibly even the ideal of romantic love and chivalry.
Economically, militarily, and politically, he strengthened the central government, expanded mining operations, and introduced the use of explosives and cannons in the military. He founded the Manasija Monastery, which functioned as a kind of academy of knowledge and art—a center of culture, religion, and education—and supported many other monasteries and cultural centers throughout the country.
Lazarević’s sudden and strange death (during a hunting ride) in 1427 was seen as the fulfillment of ancient prophecies about the conquest of Christian lands by the Muslim Ishmaelites. He was regarded as a Serbian King Josiah, the last righteous king before the Babylonian conquest of Israel. After his death, he became a legend and was buried in one of the beautiful monasteries he founded in the Morava Valley, called Koporin. Since he had no children, his nephew, Đurađ Branković, succeeded him as ruler.
Đurađ Branković was declared heir while Lazarević was still alive. After his accession to power, he had to return the fortresses of Belgrade and Golubac to the Hungarians, as previously agreed, and had to look for a new capital. Meanwhile, the Ottomans took control of Golubac, so Branković decided to build a new capital halfway between Belgrade, which was in Hungarian hands, and Golubac, which was in Ottoman hands. Thus, the Smederevo Fortress was built at the confluence of the Morava and Danube rivers, becoming the largest fortress in Europe.
Despite being an Ottoman vassal, Branković was attacked by the Ottomans in 1439 and was forced to flee to Hungary. With the help of the Hungarians and Wallachians, he reconquered Serbia in 1445 and returned to rule from Smederevo. However, after the fall of Constantinople in 1453, his spirit failed, and he surrendered Smederevo in 1456. Shortly afterward, he died and was buried there. It is assumed that he was also a member of the Order of the Dragon, whose aim was to maintain Christian hegemony in the Balkans—a kind of secret international society—but the Order ultimately failed in its mission.
Branković’s importance was that he was the first ruler not from the Nemanjić dynasty and, in fact, the one who founded a new dynasty that surprisingly reappeared on the stage of Yugoslav history in the 20th century. The last king of Yugoslavia, Peter II, was a descendant of the Branković dynasty through his mother, the Yugoslav queen Maria of Romania. This dynasty seems to have a fondness for the end of kingdoms and eras.
After Branković’s death, Serbia managed to maintain partial independence for another three years, and in 1459, it was finally annexed by the Ottomans. A few years later, in 1463, Bosnia also fell into their hands, and in 1478, they managed to suppress the Albanian rebellion. By then, the entire Balkans was under Ottoman control, and a new era began. Only Belgrade, protected by the Hungarians, remained a Christian territory for a few more decades.
Unique Art and Architecture
The monasteries and churches of medieval Christian Serbia are notable for their unique architecture, painting, and even sculpture (a rare feature in Orthodox churches). The earliest of them were built in the Raška School style, which developed in the 13th–14th centuries as a combination of Byzantine, Latin-Gothic, and Romanesque architecture—blending European rationalism with Greek mysticism. This style emerged in the Valley of the Kings along the Ibar River, around the ancient capital of Ras.
This was the area from which the kings of Serbia ruled in the Middle Ages and where they built magnificent cathedrals, reminiscent in some ways of those in Italy and along those of the city states along the Dalmatian coast.
In the 12th–14th centuries, Serbia was a powerful kingdom that ruled over large parts of the Balkans. The kings married European princesses, who brought with them master builders from Venice and Dubrovnik. Each king wanted to outdo the other, resulting in a collection of stunning cathedrals built in a style that combined Eastern and Western influences. In addition to their impressive architecture, these cathedrals boast wonderful frescoes in the unique Raška style.
The cathedrals have a large central hall (nave), which sometimes has side extensions forming a cross shape. Above the center of the hall, there is an extended, high, and large cylindrical dome, and in front of it, an entrance hall (narthex), all under one roof. The facades of the cathedrals are made of marble or plaster, with Romanesque decorations and statues, religious and fantastical figures, and plant motifs. The churches combine sculpture, woodwork, and magnificent frescoes in an original Serbian style covering the walls. The aim of the art and architecture is to draw the viewer upwards.
At the beginning of the 14th century, during the time of King Milutin, a different architectural style developed, called the Milutin style. It was used in the new cathedrals built in Kosovo and Serbia. A slightly different style—the Vardar style—more influenced by Byzantine architecture, developed in Serbian ruled Macedonia. In this style, churches were given a Greek cross pattern with five domes: a large central dome and four smaller ones. Some of the churches feature multiple roofs that seem to open from the center, possibly symbolizing the developing concepts of Hesychasm radiating from Mount Athos and influencing the Palaeologan Renaissance.
After the political and cultural center of Serbia moved to the Morava Valley at the end of the 14th century, and during the reign of Kings Lazar, Lazarević, and Branković until the mid-15th century, a new architectural style developed, called the Morava style. This style is characterized by rosettes in the west – open windows in shape of flowers, like those in Gothic churches, that let in coloured light at different times of the day.
The Morava style makes extensive use of sculptural elements, decorated stones, geometric arabesques with floral patterns, it boasts a rich palette of colours in the building materials of the exterior walls (bricks of different and alternating colours) and in the fresco paintings inside. One of the defining characteristics of the architecture is the transverse apses, which feature semicircular arches. The Morava style combines motifs from Armenia, Georgia, Islam, and Venice.
In addition to architecture, one of the most amazing and exciting aspects of visiting Serbia is encountering ancient medieval paintings, especially frescoes. Paintings such as The White Angel from the Mileševa Monastery (often referred to as the Mona Lisa of the Balkans) are particularly renowned. Serbian painting from the 13th century features the unique style and refined aesthetics of the Raška School, which were later lost.
Serbian artists studied in Byzantium but developed their own style, in which subtle details of beauty in the human body and face are emphasized through composition and proportions. Psychological and individual qualities appear through realism—for example, innocence and beauty in the figures of the young, and nobility and strength in those of the elderly. This represents a kind of pre-Renaissance Renaissance, in which emotion and spirituality are emphasized.
In the 14th century, and especially during the time of King Milutin, the Byzantine influence of the Palaeologan Renaissance increased. Many fresco paintings from this period were created by artists from Thessaloniki and the Byzantine territories along the Adriatic coast. These works feature small figures in motion, deep spaces, vast landscapes in the background, and complex themes that tell a story through allegory and representation.
The division of fresco paintings on the walls of churches follows three broad bands, one above the other: the lower band usually depicts earthly human figures such as kings, the second band illustrates events from the Bible and the New Testament, and the third, upper band portrays scenes and figures related to the kingdom of heaven, such as angels.
