European studies blog

28 posts categorized "Serbia"

08 May 2025

Terror, triumph and resistance: Women in the Yugoslav Partisans, 1941-1945

8 May 2025 marks 80 years since the surrender of Nazi Germany to the Allied Forces and the celebration of victory in Europe. Jubilant crowds thronged the streets of cities across the continent, but the guns did not fall silent until 25 May, when the Partisans triumphed at the now forgotten Battle of Odžak. This last European battle of the Second World War took place in Yugoslavia, where victory over fascism came at a terrible cost: the country lost over ten percent of its population, and the material damage was on an equally vast scale. For Britain, VE Day was the culmination of a storied resistance to the Nazi juggernaut – its ‘finest hour’ – which saw the island as a beacon of freedom as the swastika cast its long shadow across occupied Europe. Yet four years earlier, while London burned in the Blitz, resistance was brewing in a remote southeastern corner of the continent, which would turn the tide of the war and persist until that final hard-won victory on 25 May.

Black and white photograph of a young partisan woman wearing a military cap
A partisan girl from Kozara mountain, winter 1943. Illustration from Jelena Batinić, Women and Yugoslav partisans...(Cambridge, 2015) YC.2015.a.8652

The Axis powers (Nazi Germany, followed by Italy, Hungary and Bulgaria) invaded the Kingdom of Yugoslavia beginning in April 1941 and the country was plunged into crisis as rival factions took shape. In July 1941 Yugoslav Communist party leader Josip Broz ‘Tito’ called on Yugoslavians to unite irrespective of their ethnic and religious differences and mount a national war of liberation against the invaders, appealing to their historic tradition of opposing foreign occupation. Thus was born the Yugoslav Partisan movement, which grew from an irregular guerilla operation to become the most significant and successful anti-fascist resistance movement in wartime Europe.

Map showing the partition of Yugoslavia in 1941

The partition of Yugoslavia, 1941. Illustration from Jozo Tomasevich, War and Revolution in Yugoslavia...(Stanford, 2001) m02/11817

The success of the Partisans, who fought in desperate conditions and won victories against overwhelming odds, could not have been secured without the mass participation of women, one of the most remarkable phenomena of the Second World War. It is estimated that nearly two million women participated in the Partisan movement, including about 100,000 in combat roles, of whom 70 percent were under 20. 25,000 of these female soldiers were killed, and tens of thousands were wounded. Away from the front, women were active as underground fighters in occupied cities, as medical personnel and army suppliers, as political activists and as members of the national liberation committees. There are few, if any, instances in recent history where women were so deeply involved both politically and militarily in defeating an occupying enemy and establishing a new state.

Black and whit photograph of a young partisan woman in uniform carrying a rifle and a grenade

A partizanka on the move. Illustration from Barbara Jancar-Webster, Women & Revolution in Yugoslavia...(Denver, 1990) 90/14790

The British Library contains key works exploring this astonishing yet undeservedly neglected aspect of the war. Jelena Batinić’s pioneering 2015 study, Women and Yugoslav partisans : a history of World War II resistance (Cambridge, 2015; YC.2015.a.8652) investigates female Partisan participation through the lens of gender, South Slavic culture, and its intersection with war. Batinić draws on primary sources and on the slim body of partizanka scholarship, including the first English-language study on the subject, Barbara Jancar-Webster’s Women & revolution in Yugoslavia, 1941-1945 and the 2011 Serbian-language study Partizanke kao građanke : društvena emancipacija partizanki u Srbiji, 1945-1953 (‘Female partisans as citizens: social emancipation of partisan women in Serbia, 1945-1953’) by Ivana Pantelić (Belgrade, 2011; YF.2012.a.25362). The British Library holds other key Yugoslav-era sources on the subject, including Dušanka Kovačević’s Women of Yugoslavia in the National Liberation War (Belgrade, 1977; X.529/35030) and Žene Srbije u NOB (‘Women of Serbia in the National Liberation War’) (Belgrade, 1975; LB.31.b.20477).

Black and white photograph of a woman addressing a crowd
Meeting of the Antifascist Front of Women, Dalmatia, 1943. Illustration from Dušanka Kovačević, Women of Yugoslavia in the National Liberation War

Batinić begins by surveying Yugoslavia in 1941, a patriarchal peasant society with the highest rates of female illiteracy and maternal mortality in Europe, and explores how young peasant women, who formed the bulk of partizankas, were recast as central actors in that most quintessentially masculine of activities, military combat. Following Tito’s landmark decision in February 1942 to admit women as frontline combatants – the first army of its day to officially do so - Partisan leaders recruited women through an unlikely combination of communist ideology about female emancipation and the rich tradition of freedom-fighting lore from South Slavic epic poetry, itself a product of local resistance to centuries of Ottoman occupation. This way, argued Batinić, Partisan leaders sanctioned women’s role as warriors and presented themselves as bearers of the ‘great heroic tradition of the Yugoslav peoples’. This tradition was by no means exclusively male – Macedonia, Serbia and Montenegro had a long history of women participating in liberation struggles. Then there was the blunt reality that for many women, taking up arms and going ‘into the woods’ was, for all its hardships, preferable to living in terror in the occupied towns, because it offered the possibility of autonomy and of self-defense.

Black and white photograph of a brigade of women partisans sitting on a hillside
Fourth Montenegrin Proletarian Brigade, Bosnia, 1942. Illustration from Jelena Batinić, Women and Yugoslav partisans

Women’s dramatic entry into the political and military fray of Yugoslav society led to the formation in June 1942 of the Yugoslav Antifascist Front of Women (AFW), one of the largest and most active women’s mass movements in the region. The AFW undertook activities crucial to the war effort: supplying Partisan units on the move, providing care for orphans, and coordinating operations between the liberated and occupied territories. From 1944, partizankas were gradually withdrawn from the front line and transferred to political or administrative functions, although women remained active in most units until the final liberation.

Magazine cover with a drawing of two female soldiers on either side of a male soldier
Cover page, 1st edition of ‘The Vojvodina Woman at War’. Issued by the Vojvodina Antifascist Front of Women, January 1944. The slogan reads ‘death to fascism, freedom to the people!’. Illustration from Bosa Cvetić, Žene Srbije u Narodnooslobodilačkoj borbi (Belgrade, 1975) LB.31.b.20477

Partisan life was physically and mentally gruelling, testing the very limits of human endurance. A partizanka and doctor, Saša Božović, recalled typhus victims rolling in the snow to relieve their high fevers, before hauling supplies to their comrades up icy mountain paths. Detachments would come upon villages which had been burned to the ground, sometimes with the families locked inside the houses, and find themselves caring for children who emerged from the smouldering ruins. Wounded soldiers had to be rescued from the battlefield under enemy fire, children were murdered in front of their parents. Yet survivors above all recalled the sense of camaraderie, conviction and solidarity which pulled them through the horror.

Black and white photograph of soldiers travelling in the snow
A partisan column in the snow, Macedonia. Illustration from Dušanka Kovačević, Women of Yugoslavia in the National Liberation War

Black and white photograph of a thatched wooden hut

A makeshift partisan hospital in a peasant hut, Serbia. Illustration from Bosa Cvetić, Žene Srbije u Narodnooslobodilačkoj borbi

Pregnancy and motherhood were also part of the female Partisan experience, often in heart-rending circumstances. Saša Božović’s march through the mountains of Herzegovina in the winter of 1941 claimed the life of her three-month old daughter, who died of exposure and starvation. Partizanka Đina Vrbica was ordered to kill her own baby, after giving birth on the battlefield, as the infant’s crying was making an ambush impossible. The order was later withdrawn as the female officer charged with the task was too distraught to comply; this left Vrbica to struggle through the wilderness with a rifle in one arm and an infant in the other. She finally left the baby in the care of a local family but was killed in battle when she returned in search of her. Many partizanka casualties were reported to be pregnant when they were killed, despite a ban on Partisan marriages and penalties imposed for sexual relations among the rank and file.

Black and white photograph of a group of women with baskets of herbs
Kosovar women bringing medical herbs for a hospital. Illustration from Dušanka Kovačević, Women of Yugoslavia in the National Liberation War

Blacks and white photograph of children sitting at wooden benches and being served food

A children’s care centre in liberated Croatia, 1942. Illustration from Dušanka Kovačević, Women of Yugoslavia in the National Liberation War

For most of the war, Hitler and his collaborators refused to recognise the Partisans as legitimate belligerents, and their troops acted accordingly, shooting hostages and treating combatants, prisoners and civilians alike with brutality. Partizankas were not spared the atrocities inflicted on their male counterparts and suffered additional indignities, including sexual violence. 17-year-old Lepa Radić, who was hanged by the Nazis in 1943, and many other young women who were tortured and executed became celebrated martyrs and icons of partizanka fortitude and defiance, with many achieving the status of National Hero. They were dragged to death behind vehicles, thrown into disused wells, stretched on the rack, and worse. Survivors later recalled the virtually unprintable details of the tortures they withstood at the hands of their captors. Žene Srbije u NOB, a haunting Yugoslav-era compendium about women in the war, features short biographies and portraits of fresh-faced smiling teenagers, their hair set in victory rolls, with details of their war activities, and if known, their fate. The same girls sometimes appear a page later, as corpses hanging from lampposts, or with features mutilated beyond recognition.

Black and white photograph of a young partisan woman with a military cap and a medal

Milka Travar, company commander and machine gunner of the First Proletarian Brigade. Illustration from Dušanka Kovačević, Women of Yugoslavia in the National Liberation War (Belgrade, 1977) X.529/35030

The partizanka story has a personal resonance. My grandmother, Savka Korov (1926-2004), fled her occupied home village in northern Serbia as a 16-year-old and followed her elder brother into the Partisan ranks in 1942, enlisting in the Second Proletarian Brigade and changing her name to Slavica to conceal her identity and prevent reprisals against her family. She endured bitter winters in the rugged mountains of Herzegovina, surviving bouts of typhus and frostbite, and saw active combat at the Battle of Sutjeska (May-June 1943), one of the region’s deadliest battles, where over 15 percent of troops were female. Sutjeska was a crucial moment for the Partisans, whose success in thwarting better-equipped Axis forces with over six times as many troops and losing nearly one third of their own troops, turned the tide of the war in Yugoslavia and won them unconditional support from Churchill and the Western Allies. It marked the last major Axis offensive against the Partisans and saw British Special Operations Executive (SOE) soldiers parachuted into Montenegro at the height of hostilities at Churchill’s behest to make official contact with Tito. The only trace of this carnage in my grandmother’s later years was a scar on her forehead where a bullet had whistled past, separating her from death by mere millimetres. Like her, many had endured the same hardships; unlike her, not all had the fortune to witness the defeat of fascism and to rebuild their lives. She christened her firstborn son after the war Slobodan, meaning ‘free’, symbolic of the collective sense of hard-won liberation which defined her generation.

Black and white photograph of a woman carrying a large Yugoslav flag
Women’s meeting in Montenegro, with the Yugoslav flag. Illustration from Dušanka Kovačević, Women of Yugoslavia in the National Liberation War

Batinić goes on to explore the changing fortunes of the partizanka in the (ex)-Yugoslav collective memory – from her iconic status in the early post-war era to virtual oblivion and trivialisation from the 1990s onwards. The demise of socialism and the collapse of Yugoslavia condemned many of its founding icons, including the partizanka, to the proverbial scrap-bin of history, victims of the collective identity crisis which plagued post-Yugoslav society. In the West, as an historical figure, she is obscure and unacknowledged. Yet the partizanka deserves a different and better fate. Irrespective of her ideology, religion or ethnicity, the resilience, sacrifice and extraordinary contribution of a lost generation of young women, many of whom paid the ultimate price to halt the fascist juggernaut, deserves recognition, celebration and most of all, respect.

Black and white photograph of a group of partisan women

Partizankas and organisers of the AFW in Macedonia. Illustration from Dušanka Kovačević, Women of Yugoslavia in the National Liberation War

Savka Andic, Acquisitions South

Further reading:

Vladimir Dedijer, The war diaries of Vladimir Dedijer. (Ann Arbor, 1990). YC.1991.b.425

Ben Shepherd, Terror in the Balkans: German armies and partisan warfare. (Cambridge, Mass, 2012). YC.2012.a.9950

Lydia Sklevicky, Konji, žene, ratovi. (Zagreb, 1996). AFŽ Arhiv, https://afzarhiv.org/items/show/720.

Heather Williams, Parachutes, patriots and partisans: the Special Operations Executive and Yugoslavia 1941-1945. (London, 2002). m04/17827

19 February 2025

For the Love of Books: European Collections at the British Library Doctoral Open Days

On February 14, European Collections featured at Doctoral Open Day themed ‘Global Languages, Cultures and Societies’. Marja Kingma, Curator of Germanic Collections, delivered a presentation introducing PhD students from across the UK and beyond to navigating the collections and identifying resources to support their research. In the afternoon, our curators hosted a show-and-tell session, offering the students a glimpse into the Library's unmatched holdings from continental Europe. The selections ranged from a quirky bottle-shaped Czech book to a Russian glossy LGBT magazine and a modern illuminated manuscript from Georgia. Spoiler alert – love-themed curatorial picks proved crowd pleasers. For those who could not make it, here is a taster of what you might have missed.

Katya Rogatchevskaia, Lead Curator of Slavonic and East European Collections, Olga Topol and Hanna Dettlaff-Kuznicka, Curators of Slavonic and East European Collections, turned the spotlight on minority languages and cultures, giving voice to the Evenks, Sakha, Kashubians, Silesians, and the Gagauz people of Ukraine. It was a revelation to many of the students to learn that Eastern Europe was both linguistically and culturally diverse, with a plethora of languages, ethnicities, and religious traditions across the region.

Cover of 'Evenki i iakuty iuga Dalʹnego Vostoka' with a black and white photograph of a man riding a reindeer

V. A. Dʹiachenko, N. V. Ermolova, Evenki i iakuty iuga Dalʹnego Vostoka, XVII-XX vv. (St. Petersburg, 1994) YA.1997.a.2298.

Cover of 'ōmisorz Hanusik: we tajnyj sużbie ślonskij nacyje' with a black and white illustration of a detective sitting at a bar with a bottle and glass
Marcin Melon, Kōmisorz Hanusik: we tajnyj sużbie ślonskij nacyje (Kotōrz Mały, 2015) YF.2017.a.20547. An interesting example of a crime comedy written in the Silesian ethnolect.

Milan Grba, Lead Curator of South-East European Collections, highlighted a groundbreaking work by Vuk Stefanović Karadžić, Srpski rječnik (‘Serbian Dictionary’), which proved very popular among researchers with an interest in linguistics. Title-page of 'Srpski rječnik' with the title in Serbian, German and Latin

Vuk Stefanović Karadžić, Srpski rječnik (Vienna, 1818) 12976.r.6.

It was the first book printed in Karadžić’s reformed 30-character Cyrillic alphabet, following the phonetic principle of "write as you speak." The dictionary contained over 26,000 words and was trilingual, with Serbian, German, and Latin entries. It standardised Serbian orthography but also preserved the nation’s oral tradition. The dictionary’s encyclopaedic entries encompassed folklore, history, and ethnography, making it a pivotal text in both linguistic reform and cultural preservation.

Anna Chelidze, Curator of Georgian Collections, showed the students a contemporary illuminated manuscript created in 2018 by the Georgian calligrapher Giorgi Sisauri. The Art Palace of Georgia commissioned the work especially for the British Library to enrich our Georgian collections. The poem Kebai da Didebai Kartulisa Enisa ('Praise and Exaltation of the Georgian Language') was written in the 10th century by John Zosimus, a Georgian Christian monk and religious writer. It is renowned for its profound reverence for the Georgian language, employing numerological symbolism and biblical allusions to underscore its sacredness.

A manuscript in flowing Georgian script headed by an illuminated design of an angel amid gilded and jewel-like roundels

(Giorgi Sisauri), John Zosimus, Kebai da Didebai Kartulisa Enisa, (2018) Or. 17158

Sophie Defrance, Valentina Mirabella and Barry Taylor, Curators of Romance Language Collections, treated the students to some ... romance.

Sophie Defrance took a tongue-in-cheek approach to the theme by suggesting another way to look at (some) love letters with Le rire des épistoliers.

Cover of 'Le rire des épistoliers' with a painting of a man in 17th-century costume laughing

Cover of Charrier-Vozel, Marianne, Le rire des épistoliers: XVIe-XVIIIe siècle (Rennes, 2021) YF.2022.a.9956

The volume gathers the proceedings of a 2017 conference at the University of Brest on the expression, manners, and importance of laughing and laughter in 16th- and 17th-century correspondence, with examples from Diderot’s letters to his lover Sophie Volland, or from the exchanges between Benjamin Constant and his confidante Julie Talma.

Valentina Mirabella decided to revisit the Boris Pasternak’s timeless love story ‘Doctor Zhivago’. Turns out, the history of the novel’s publication in Italy was nearly as turbulent as the story itself! It was first published in Italian translation as Il dottor Živago in 1957 by Giangiacomo Feltrinelli. Although an active communist, Feltrinelli smuggled the manuscript out of the USSR and resisted pressure against its publication. The demand for Il dottor Živago was so great that Feltrinelli was able to license translation rights into 18 different languages well in advance of the novel's publication. The Communist Party of Italy expelled the publisher from its ranks in retaliation for his role in the release of the book they felt was critical of communism.

Title-page of 'Il dottor Živago' with a list of the number of print runs since its first publication

Cover of the 34th (in the space of just two years!) edition of Il dottor Živago by Boris Pasternak translated from Russian by Pietro Zveteremich (Milano : Feltrinelli, 1959) W16/9272

Barry Taylor drew attention to the epistolary relationship and an electric bond between the Spanish author Elena Fortún (1886-1952) and the Argentine professor Inés Field (1897-1994) with the book Sabes quién soy: cartas a Inés Field (‘You know who I am: letters to Inés Field’).

Cover of 'Sabes quién soy' with a black-and-white photograph of Elena Fortún

Elena Fortún, Sabes quién soy: cartas a Inés Field (Seville, 2020) YF.2021.a.15259

Fortún was the author of the popular Celia books, which followed the heroine from a seven-year-old in well-to-do Madrid to a schoolteacher in Latin America. The books give a child’s-eye-view of the world. They were censored by Franco and the author was exiled, but the books have been re-published by Renacimiento of Seville in the 2000s. Fortún’s novel Oculto sendero (‘The hidden path’) published in 2016 is seen as a lesbian Bildungsroman.

Fortún met Inés Field in Buenos Aires. Now that both women are dead, critics feel free to read the correspondence through the prism of the Bildungsroman.

Ildi Wolner, Curator of East and South-East European Collections, explored the representations of love in art with Agnes’s Hay Sex : 40 rajz = 40 drawings.

Cover of 'Sex: 40 rajz' with a design of an ampersand, its arms ending in the cross and arrow of the symbols for masculine and feminine

Agnes Hay, Sex: 40 rajz = 40 drawings ([Budapest, 1979]) YA.1997.a.2586

Ágnes Háy is a Hungarian graphic artist and animation filmmaker, who has lived in London since 1985. Her unique experimental style of drawing uses simple lines and symbols to convey complex meanings and associations, and this booklet is no exception. Considered rather bold in Communist Hungary at the end of the 1970s, this series of sketches explores the diverse intricacies of gender relations, without the need for a single word of explanation.

A page from 'Sex: 40 rajz' with variants on the male and female gender symbols

Page from Sex : 40 rajz = 40 drawings [Budapest, 1979] YA.1997.a.2586

Susan Reed, Curator of Germanic Collections, shared a fascinating collection of essays examining aspects of the love letter as a social and cultural phenomenon from the 18th century to the present day.

Cover of 'Der Liebesbrief' with a pixellated image of an 18th-century woman reading a letter

Cover of Der Liebesbrief: Schriftkultur und Medienwechsel vom 18. Jahrhundert bis zur Gegenwart, herausgegeben von Renate Stauf, Annette Simonis, Jörg Paulus (Berlin: de Gruyter, 2008) YF.2010.a.14652

The authors scrutinised letters from historical and literary figures including Otto von Bismark, Dietrich Bonhoeffer and Rainer Maria Rilke. The book ends with a consideration of how online messaging forms might transform the way we write love letters.

Ela Kucharska-Beard, Curator of Baltic Collections, displayed a mysterious metal box containing a booklet in English and Lithuanian, some photographs, posters and letters.

Metal box containing the publication 'Liebe Oma, Guten Tag'

Vilma Samulionytė, Liebe Oma, Guten Tag, or The Pact of Silence (Vilnius, 2018) RF.2019.a.120

Liebe Oma, Guten Tag, or The Pact of Silence is a moving tribute from the Lithuanian photographer Vilma Samulionyė to her grandmother, a Lithuanian German Elė Finkytė Šnipaitienė. When Vilma’s grandmother took her own life in her 70s, Vilma and her sister Jūrate decided to delve into the family history. Their research resulted in a documentary film, an exhibition, and an artists’ book. Along the way the sisters face taboos, one of them being a chain of suicides in the family.

Facsimiles of handwritten letters and a photograph from 'Liebe Oma, Guten Tag,'

The journey into the family’s German history and their post-war life in Lithuania left them with some unsettling questions. Who was Kazimieras and was he the reason why Ella Fink left her family behind? Throughout the story letters and photographs create a link between the family in the West and in the East, between the living and the dead. 

We hope you have enjoyed this virtual show-and-tell of highlights in our European collections. We look forward to welcoming you to the next Doctoral Open Days in 2026!

17 January 2025

Capturing ancient shadows: Vera Stein Ehrlich and the anthropology of the Western Balkans

As a scholarly discipline, anthropology was a relative latecomer to the Balkans, unlike its counterparts, ethnography and ethnology, which were well established in the region since the 19th century. The first serious anthropological studies of the region were carried out during the interwar period, which saw the establishment of the Kingdom of the Serbs, Croats and Slovenes (1918-1929), later the Kingdom of Yugoslavia (1929-1941). This new kingdom, which emerged in the wake of post-First World War imperial collapse, merged multiple communities who had long lived under Austro-Hungarian, Venetian and Ottoman dominion into an ethnically and culturally diverse modern state.

Black and white photograph of women washing linen in a stream
Croatian women washing linen. Illustration from Vera Ehrlich’s Porodica u transformaciji — Studija u tri stotine jugoslavenskih sela (Zagreb, 1971) YA.2001.a.13905

One of the key anthropological studies to emerge in this period was the work of a remarkable Croatian-Jewish scholar, Vera Ehrlich (1897-1980). Born in Zagreb, Croatia, then a province of Austria-Hungary, Ehrlich was a precocious young woman, composing her first critical works in 1916 aged 19 and later studying psychology in Vienna and in Berlin. She married Ben Stein, a noted doctor, and together the couple worked on the psychiatric study of child development, publishing numerous articles on the subject.

Black and white photograph of three women and their merchandise

Market day in Travnik, Bosnia. Illustration from Porodica u transformaciji...

In the 1930s, Ehrlich turned her attention to her own country, Yugoslavia, simultaneously “East and West, traditional and modern … backward and progressive”. She was particularly interested in the status of women in Yugoslav society. In 1937, a group of her Bosnian Muslim students invited her to write about the condition of women in their communities and together they drew up a survey to research the domestic life of Bosnian Muslims. Ehrlich later extended the scope of her research to Serbia, Montenegro and Macedonia, which had among the highest rates of female illiteracy and maternal and infant mortality in Europe and where archaic practices persisted such as bride abduction. For Ehrlich, the study of Yugoslav society, with its geographic and demographic diversity, social complexity and economic disparities – “the co-existence side by side of primeval and modern conditions of life, and of customs (which in other countries centuries or thousands of years have separated from each other)” – afforded unique opportunities for comparison and analysis.

Black and white photograph of an elderly woman with two small children

Woman with great-grandchildren, Herzegovina. Illustration from Porodica u transformaciji...

Ehrlich began her investigation of rural family life on the eve of the Second World War, sending surveys to local schoolteachers and doctors based in 300 villages across Yugoslavia, covering Muslim, Catholic and Eastern Orthodox communities in different stages of socio-economic development. The surveys sought to define the nature of family relationships concerning personal authority and the individual positions of members within the family hierarchy, and to study the conditions relating to courtship, marriage, childbirth, childrearing and other key aspects of family life.

Black and white photograph of a woman hand-spinning wool

Spinning wool, Herzegovina. Illustration from Porodica u transformaciji...

The advent of war following the 1941 Axis invasion of Yugoslavia and the establishment in 1945 of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia under Josip Broz Tito changed the social fabric of the country – and indeed Ehrlich’s own life – forever. Her survey of 300 villages on the cusp of a traumatic and transformative period of war and socialist revolution was, as she later observed, “a film of forms of life that were soon to disappear…. the survey of peasant family life in Jugoslavia [sic.] has acquired a certain documentary importance, not originally anticipated”. The information she collected, documenting the twilight of an ancient patriarchal order, later formed the basis of her seminal work, Porodica u transformaciji — Studija u tri stotine jugoslavenskih sela (Zagreb, 1964), published in English translation in 1966 as ‘Family in Transition: A study of 300 Yugoslav villages. It remains the most extensive and detailed anthropological analysis of pre-war Yugoslavia. The British Library holds a copy of the 1966 English-translation and a second enlarged edition of the original published in 1971.

Black and white photograph of two people and a child's cradle on the shores of a lake where a small boat with four passengers is floating

Lake Ohrid, Macedonia. Illustration from Porodica u transformaciji...

In the study, Ehrlich documents the ‘zadruga’ – the South Slav patriarchal family – offering a detailed analysis of the relations between different family members, family and community social problems, and the variety of family types, including what she terms ‘tribal’, ‘Oriental’ and regional varieties. She analyses the effect of contact with neighbouring cultures and describes the processes of family transition and transformation in response to socioeconomic change.

Black and white photograph of five women and two men in folk costumes dancing

Folk dance (kolo), Dalmatia. Illustration from Porodica u transformaciji...

Although predicated on male authority and governed by rigid protocols, the traditional patriarchal family as she observed it was nevertheless characterised by relative stability and low levels of abusive and socially irresponsible behaviour, such as alcoholism and domestic violence. Issues such as the latter became prevalent, she observed, during the transition phases from the patriarchal system to the modern nuclear family unit, when pre-industrial societies developed into market economies, with their attendant volatilities.

Black and white photograph of four women making coral necklaces

Making coral necklaces, Dalmatia. Illustration from Vera Ehrlich’s Family in Transition: A study of 300 Yugoslav villages (Princeton, 1966) X.800/2138

Ehrlich herself was not immune to the tragedy of her times. She narrowly dodged the Gestapo, who tried to seize her fieldwork notes, and lost her husband following his capture and internment in German concentration camp in Serbia. Armed with little more than her data, jealously preserved in a battered suitcase, she survived a series of miraculous escapes before fleeing across the Adriatic Sea to Italy in 1943, in a small boat under enemy fire.

Black and white photograph of two men seated with bundles at a market

At market, Herzegovina. Illustration from Family in transition...

From 1945 to 1950, she used her psychiatric training as a United Nations social worker, helping with the repatriation of Yugoslav refugees from German camps, all the while continuing her anthropological research. A scholarship led her to the United States, where she gained a doctorate in social anthropology from the University of California at Berkeley, and for the next ten years she worked as a lecturer in Slavic languages and literature and research fellow in anthropology. In 1960, she returned to Yugoslavia and became a professor in anthropology at the University of Zagreb, lecturing and touring around Yugoslavia and internationally until her death in 1980. She published numerous other works in her lifetime, including U društvu s čovjekom — tragom njegovih kulturnih i socijalnih tekovina (‘In the company of man - tracing his cultural and social heritage’; Zagreb, 1968).

Black and white photograph of a seated Montenegrin woman in traditional costume

Montenegrin woman in traditional costume. Illustration from Porodica u transformaciji...

Ehrlich is remembered for her pioneering contribution to Balkan anthropology and for her unique scholarly portrayal of a now-vanished society. Her work was crucial in raising awareness about the condition of women and families – especially in rural areas – within Yugoslavia’s ethnically diverse territory and in highlighting the challenges they faced. In doing so, she paved the way for the postwar activism of the Yugoslav Women’s Antifascist Front (AFŽ), a state-sponsored women’s organisation which organized mass postwar campaigns to achieve female emancipation through combating illiteracy and reducing maternal and infant mortality through improved sanitation and better education in rural areas.

Black and white photograph of a woman feeding chickens and a man sitting on the step of a house

Croatian peasants. Illustration from Family in transition...

Savka Andic, Acquisitions South team

References:

Chiara Bonfiglioli, ‘“An Age Fated to Vanish”: Vera Stein Erlich’s Anthropological Records of Interwar Yugoslavia. Contribution to the web-feature ‘European history – gender history’, in Themenportal Europäische Geschichte, 2016, <www.europa.clio-online.de/searching/id/fdae-1676>.

Vera Stein Erlich, Biografija i bibliografija, Rev. za sociologiju, Vol. XIV (1984), JY° 3-4 : 339-342 UDK 92 V. St. Erlich Pregledni

Vera Stein Ehrlich, Jugoslavenska porodica u transformaciji : Studija u tri stotine sela. (Zagreb, 1971). YA.2001.a.13905

Vera Stein Ehrlich, Family in Transition: A study of 300 Yugoslav villages (Princeton, 1966). X.800/2138

Žene kroz povijest: zbornik radova sa znanstvenog skupa Dies historiae 2012. - Žene kroz povijest održanog 5. prosinca 2012. godine [edited by Matea Jalžečić and Petra Marinčić] (Zagreb, 2014).

02 January 2025

New Year, Old Years: a Look Back

Usually around the start of a new year we look back over our previous year’s blogging before turning our faces to the future. This time we’re actually looking back over 2023 as well as 2024 because BL blogging activity was suspended for a while following the cyber-attack on the Library in October 2023, so we couldn’t do a review of that year at the time. And to break up the prose, we include some wintery scenes from the BL’ s Flickr stream.

Photograph of tethered reindeer with wooden huts in the background

Reindeer from Sophus Tromholt, Under Nordlysets Straaler. Skildringer fra Lappernes Land (Copenhagen, 1885) 10280.eee.13.

Both years saw our usual excitement over the annual European Writers’ Festival held in May. In 2023 we featured an interview with Greek Cypriot writer Anthony Anaxagorou,  winner of the 2024 RSL Ondaatje Prize, while in 2024 we published a series of posts, beginning with this one, profiling some of the authors featured in the festival. As usual, literature featured in many other posts. We celebrated the award of the 2023 Nobel Prize in Literature to Norway’s Jon Fosse and mourned the death in 2024 of Albanian author Ismail Kadare. We were proud to learn that our Curator of Italian, Valentina Mirabella, was one of the judges of the 2024 Premio Strega, a major Italian literary prize, and she wrote about her experience for us.

A theme that ran through both years was the work of the Endangered Archives Project to preserve cultural heritage from Eastern and Southeastern Europe. Our coverage included posts on the indigenous peoples of Siberia, minority communities in Bulgaria, an important Serbian family archive, and material relating to the Ukrainian writer Taras Shevchenko, who was also the subject of a small display in our Treasures Gallery

Colour illustration of a group of men pulling a sledge across a polar landscape with a sunrise in the background

Polar scene from Die zweite Deutsche Nordpolarfahrt in den Jahren 1869 und 1870, unter Führung des Kapitän Karl Koldewey, edited by Alexander Georg Mosle und Georg Albrecht (Leipzig, 1873-4) 10460.ff.11.

Events in the library are a regular source of inspiration for our blog posts. In 2023 we highlighted events commemorating two colleagues who died in recent years: a symposium on Italian Futurism was dedicated to the memory of Chris Michaelides, former curator of Italian and Modern Greek, who did much to build our collection of Futurist books. The Graham Nattrass Lecture, in memory of the former Head of Germanic Collections is an annual event, and in 2023 marked the 80th anniversary of the arrest and execution of members of the German resistance group ‘Die Weisse Rose’. A conference on European political refugees in Britain generated posts on the same topic, including one on how the then British Museum Library became ‘a lifeline of books’ for Polish refugees from Soviet and Nazi occupation. On a lighter note, we celebrated the BL’s annual Food Season in May 2024 with a post introducing a selection of cookbooks from around the continent.

In summer 2024 we went a bit sports mad with both the European Football Championships and the Summer Olympics taking place. We highlighted the world-beating football tactics of the Hungarian ‘Golden Team’ in the early 1950s and the ‘Miracle of Bern’ that saw them unexpectedly beaten by West Germany in 1954’s World Cup, as well as exploring why the Dutch fans show symptoms of ‘orange fever’ at international matches. Our Olympic posts included explorations of the political side of the supposedly apolitical games in Czechoslovakia and the two German states during the Cold War, and a look at the Baltic States’ love for (and proud record in) basketball.

Black and white engraving of a figure on a dog-sled with the northern lights in the background

The northern lights, from Emmanuel Liais, L’Espace céleste et la nature tropicale, description physique de l’univers (Paris, 1866) 10003.d.10.

But not all our blog posts are driven by events and unifying themes. As ever, we continued to write about items from our vast and varied collections, from Georgian manuscripts to contemporary Queer writing in Poland, via a Russian Braille edition of The Hobbit, French caricatures from the Franco-Prussian War, and pamphlets from the Cypriot independence campaign.  We also explored stories of the Slovenian Enlightenment and the first Professor of Spanish in Britain, and discovered the hidden but crucial role played by women in underground publishing under the Polish Communist regime.

As we head into 2025 we would like to wish all our readers and contributors a very happy new year. We look forward to bringing you another year of stories and discoveries from the Library’s European Collections.

Susan Reed and Hanna Dettlaff-Kuznicka, European Studies Blog Editors

Black and white engraving of people skating on a frozen pond, with a windmill in the background

Ice-skating, from A.J. van der Aa, Ons Vaderland en zijne Bewoners (Amsterdam,1855-57) 10270.f.5

25 October 2024

Dimitrije Mitrinović: From the Decolonization of the Balkans to a United Europe

On 15 November we are hosting a conference on European Political exiles and émigrés in Britain. This is one of a series of blog posts on the same topic. Conference details can be found here. Attendance is free, but registration is required.

Dimitrije Mitrinović (1887-1953) was a noteworthy figure in the cultural and philosophical circles of the early 20th century, who left a lasting impact on both European thought and the communities he engaged with.

Black and white photograph of  Dimitrije Mitrinović wearing an outdoor coat and bowler hatMitrinović in 1920 (Image from Wikimedia Commons)

Born in Bosnia-Herzegovina, Mitrinović’s early activism centred on the struggle for independence from the Austro-Hungarian Empire and the vision of a united Yugoslavia. His educational background in art history in Munich further cultivated his intellectual pursuits.

With the outbreak of the First World War, he relocated to England in 1914, securing a position with the Serbian Legation in London. Mitrinović quickly integrated into influential cultural circles on the European continent and in England. He contributed extensively to The New Age, a radical journal, writing under the pseudonym M. M. Cosmoi, where he addressed ‘World Affairs’. His commentary often reflected his vision of a new stage in human development, emphasising the importance of recognising the complementary roles of various ethnic, religious, and social groups. He believed that societal conflicts could be resolved through intermediation, guided by a deep re-evaluation of historical wisdom in fields such as religion, philosophy, psychology, and the arts.

In England, Mitrinović established himself as a private philosophy teacher in London’s Bloomsbury. He gathered a significant library filled with annotated works, which he shared with his followers. This collection was crucial for those studying with him, as it facilitated an exploration of diverse intellectual traditions.

Front cover of an essay about Mitrinović by Nenad V. Petrović
Front cover of an essay about Mitrinović by Nenad V. Petrović (Windsor, Ontario, 1967), X.900/10994.

He also founded the English Branch of the International Society for Individual Psychology in 1927, focusing on the teachings of Alfred Adler. The group’s practical approach to psychological studies led to the creation of the Chandos Group and later, in 1931, the New Europe Group.

The New Europe Group advocated for a federal Europe with a decentralised political system and a renewed cultural consciousness. This vision expanded with the formation of the New Britain Movement in 1932, which proposed comprehensive societal reforms, including national changes, financial restructuring, and workers’ control through national unions.

Title-page of 'Initiation and initiative'

Title page of Andrew Rigby, Initiation and Initiative: an Exploration of the Life and Ideas of Dimitrije Mitrinović (New York, 1984; X.529/70412), which draws from Predrag Palavestra, Dogma i utopija Dimitrija Mitrinovića: počeci srpske književne avangarde (Belgrade, 1977; X.989/88735) and the Archives of New Atlantis Foundation, Ditchling, East Sussex.

While the New Britain Movement dissolved in the mid-1930s, the New Europe Group persisted into the 1950s, promoting cultural activities through the Renaissance Club, which hosted lectures and concerts.

From the late 1930s, Mitrinović focused on fostering personal development, gender studies, spiritual growth and mutual self-exploration among a close circle of friends and associates, all aspiring to the ideal of the ‘cosmopolitan citizen’.

Black and white portrait photograph of Mitrinović in middle age
A portrait of Mitrinović in London, from Andrew Rigby, Initiation and Initiative...

After Mitrinović's death in 1953, a group of his closest friends established the New Atlantis Foundation (later renamed the Mitrinović Foundation), to preserve and promote his cultural and social philosophy, carrying his legacy forward. One of the Foundation’s early actions was to donate a substantial portion of Mitrinović’s annotated books to the University of Belgrade. This collection is held at the Svetozar Marković University Library in Belgrade. In 1994, the Foundation donated the Mitrinović Library to the University of Bradford, where it remains an important resource for researchers in Special Collections. The Mitrinović Archive, including documents from the New Europe Group and related organizations, was also donated to the University of Bradford in 2003 and 2004.

Title page of 'Certainly, future'
Title page of Certainly, future, edited by H.C. Rutherford (New York, 1987; YC.1988.a.9005), a selection of Mitrinović’s articles originally published in the journals Bosanska vila (1913), The New Age (1920-21), New Britain (1933), Purpose (1934), and his editorials published in New Britain, New Europe, New Atlantis and Eleventh Hour (1933-35).

Mitrinović’s intellectual legacy, preserved through the activities of the Mitrinović Foundation, continues to resonate with those interested in the intersection of culture, philosophy, and social change. His efforts to foster dialogue, personal transformation, and cultural re-evaluation remain significant, highlighting a vision of a more integrated and conscious society.

Milan Grba, Lead Curator South-East European Collections

References/further reading:

Dimitrije Mitrinović, The Religion of Logos and Sophia from the writings of Dimitrije Mitrinović on Christianity. 12th New Atlantis Foundation lecture, 1966 (London, 1968), X.0529/21.(12.).

Dimitrije Mitrinović, Sabrana djela [Collected works], edited by Predrag Palavestra (Sarajevo, 1991), 3 vols. ZF.9.a.10589.

Dimitrije Mitrinović, Lectures 1926-1950 (Bradford, 1995), YC.1996.b.2972.

Predrag Palavestra, Dogma i utopija Dimitrija Mitrinovića: počeci srpske književne avangarde (Belgrade, 2003), 2nd rev. ed. YF.2006.a.13809.

Dimitrije Mitrinović, Treća sila (Čačak, 2004), YF.2006.a.22892.

Andrew Rigby, Dimitrije Mitrinović: a biography (York, 2006), 2nd ed. YK.2007.a.20791.

Dragana Mihailović, Stvaralačka kritika Dimitrija Mitrinovića (Belgrade, 2008), YF.2011.a.1677.

Slađana Milenković, Pesničkim stazama Dimitrija Mitrinovića (Sremska Mitrovica, 2009), YF.2018.a.5443.

Andrew Rigby, ‘Mitrinović, Dimitrije (1887–1953)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, (Oxford, 2013), YC.2013.b.2479.

See also a Serbian Public Service broadcast programme from 2021 (In Serbian): Dimitrije Mitrinović: From a Teacher of National Energy to a Cultural James Bond

 

01 October 2024

How Bitter the Savour is of Other’s Bread? International Conference on European Political Refugees in the UK from 1800

Join us on Friday 15 November 2024 for the ‘European Political Refugees in the UK from 1800’ conference taking place in Pigott Theatre, Knowledge Centre at the British Library. This one-day in-person event will explore the rich history of political refugees from Europe who sought asylum in the UK from the 19th century onwards. International academics, scholars, and curators will investigate how European diaspora communities have woven themselves into the fabric of British society, fostering intercultural exchange and contributing to the shaping of modern Britain.

‘European political refugees in the UK from 1800’ conference poster with programme and list of speakers

‘European Political Refugees in the UK from 1800’ conference poster

The conference is organised by the European Collections section of the British Library in partnership with the European Union National Institutes of Culture (EUNIC) London. It will be accompanied by the exhibition ‘Music, Migration, and Mobility: The Story of Émigré Musicians from Nazi Europe in Britain’ and by events run by the conference partners.

The event is open to all and attendance is free, but registration is required. Booking details can be found here.

Programme

10:00 Welcome

10:05 Session 1: Artists

Moderator: Olga Topol, British Library

‘Leaving Home’ – Franciszka Themerson and Her Artistic Community in the UK, Jasia Reichardt, Art Critic and Curator

Austrian Musicians and Writers in Exile in the 1930s and 1940s, Oliver Rathkolb, University of Vienna and Vienna Institute of Contemporary and Cultural History and Art (VICCA)

On the Rock of Exiles: Victor Hugo in the Channel Islands, Bradley Stephens, University of Bristol

Music, Migration & Mobility, The Story of Émigré Musicians from Nazi Europe in Britain, Norbert Meyn, Royal College of Music, London

12:00 The stone that spoke screening

Introduction by Gail Borrow, ExploreTheArch arts facilitated by EUNIC London

12:15 Lunch

13:00 Session 2: Governments in Exile

Moderator: Valentina Mirabella, British Library

London Exile of the Yugoslav Government during the Second World War and its Internal Problems, Milan Sovilj, Institute of History of the Czech Academy of Sciences, Prague

The Spanish Republican Exile in Great Britain: General Characteristics and the case of Roberto Gerhard, Mari Paz Balibrea, Birkbeck, University of London

Fascism and anti-fascism in London's 'Little Italy' and Giacomo Matteotti's secret visit to London in 1924, Alfio Bernabei, Historian and Author

14:30 Break

14:45 Session 3: Building Communities

Moderator: Katya Rogatchevskaia, British Library

Tefcros Anthias: poet, writer, activist, and public intellectual in Cyprus and the Cypriot Community in London, Floya Anthias, University of Roehampton, London

The Journeys in Stories: Jewish emigration from Lithuania via United Kingdom, Dovilė Čypaitė-Gilė, Vilna Gaon, Museum of Jewish History, Vilnius University

Political migration from Hungary, 1918-1956, Thomas Lorman, UCL's School of Slavonic and East European Studies, London

16:15 Break

16:30 – 17:00 Session 4: Writing Diaspora

Moderator: Anthony Chapman-Joy, Royal Holloway, University of London, British Library

Newspapers published by 19th-century German political exiles in England, Susan Reed, British Library

Clandestine WWII pamphlets, Marja Kingma, British Library

We look forward to welcoming you to the conference in November. In the meantime, we invite you to discover a new display of works by Franciszka Themerson ‘Walking Backwards’, currently on show at Tate Britain, and to explore the history of Lithuanian Jewish immigration to the UK at the annual Litvak Days in London.

22 March 2024

The Endangered Archives Programme: Safeguarding the Private Archive of the Lazic Family

The Endangered Archives Project’s work in 2015 to digitize and preserve the private archive and library collections owned by the Lazic family in Serbia was a vital endeavour. Spanning six generations, the Lazic family has meticulously gathered significant and rare material. The collection encompasses a diverse array of genres and subjects, including rare law books dating back to the early 20th century, published by Geca Kon, a prominent Serbian publisher whose life was tragically cut short in the Second World War. Additionally, it comprises Serbian First World War publications, along with editions of the scarce periodicals such as Pregled listova (‘The Review of Newspapers’), Misao (‘Thought’), and Srpske novine (‘Serbian newspaper’). Among its treasures are printed calendars dating from the late 19th century, and ephemeral material documenting the events of the First World War.

Cover of the magazine 'Misao' with a decorativve border

Misao: mesečni časopis za jugoslovensku kulturu (Thought: monthly magazine for Yugoslav culture), 1 September 1918. EAP833/1/2/4/1.

Approximately 50,000 pages have been digitized, and the digital copies have been deposited with both the University Library in Belgrade and the British Library. The original material will continue to be safeguarded by the Lazic family within their private collection.

First page of an issue of the newspaper 'Srpske novine'

Srpske novine. Službeni dnevnik Kraljevine Srbije (Serbian Newspaper. Official Gazette of the Kingdom of Serbia) no. 74, 10 October 1916 EAP833/1/2/8/1.

The preservation of this rare and unique material is important for researchers, offering invaluable insights into different historical periods. For instance, Serbian newspapers printed in Corfu and Thessaloniki during the Austro-Hungarian and Bulgarian occupation of Serbia from 1915 to 1918 shed light on a pivotal era in this nation’s history. As the official gazette of the Serbian state, Srpske novine, published in Corfu between 1916 and 1918 monitored and interpreted the political landscape, reflecting the policies of the Serbian government up until the conclusion of the First World War and the establishment of the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes in 1918.  Pregled listova, printed in Geneva between 1916 and 1918 for government and military officials in a small number of copies, kept the Serbian government apprised of the media’s portrayal of Serbia, the Serbian army, and ongoing war developments.

A page of 'Pregled listova' in purple typescript

Pregled listova (The Review of Newspapers), no. 48, 2 January 1916. EAP833/1/2/5/2. 

The Serbian newspapers printed in Corfu and Thessaloniki during the First World War exile years constitute rare material that were avidly read by Serbian soldiers on the battlefield. Additionally, journals published by Serbian emigrants in Europe and periodicals originating outside Europe during the war, such as those printed in America, North Africa and South America, are included in this collection. Rare issues of periodicals printed within Serbia also contribute to the breadth of this collection.

Cover of 'Mala Srbija'

Mala Srbija. Srpsko useljeništvo u Americi (Little Serbia. Serbian immigration in America) New York, 1916. EAP833/1/1/92.

Printed publications from the First World War hold particular significance and value. Many were printed amidst the chaos of war, outside of Serbia and on foreign soil, using scarcely available printing resources, and during a time of paper shortages.

 

Cover of 'La patrie Serbe' with an allegorical image of a woman and child

La Patrie serbe: revue mensuelle pour la jeunesse serbe en exil (‘The Serbian Fatherland: a monthly magazine for Serbian youth in exile’). No. 3, 14 January 1917. EAP833/1/2/1/1.


These publications were produced in limited quantities, with some being lost to fires, war damage, or deterioration from poor-quality paper. Despite these challenges, they served a crucial purpose in informing, entertaining and boosting the morale of soldiers.

Cover of Kranjčević's selected poems with a drawing of a naked warrior

Silvije Strahimir Kranjčević, Izabrane pjesme (‘Selected poems’), 1918. Part of an  ‘Edition of the Series of Yugoslav literature’. Drawing by Jozo Kljaković.

After the war, only a fraction of these publications made their way back to Serbia with returning soldiers, many were dispersed and remain undiscovered. The Lazić private archive boasts one of the most extensive collections of these publications, thanks to Luka Lazić, a Serbian soldier stationed in Corfu, who diligently collected this literature and brought it back to Serbia after the war.

Cover of 'Un appel des socialistes serbes' with red type on a white background

Un appel des socialistes Serbes au monde civilisé (‘An appeal from Serbian socialists to the civilized world’). Uppsala, 1917. EAP833/1/1/53. Memorandum written by the Serbian socialists Dušan Popović and Triša Kaclerović addressing the challenging circumstances, famine, terror, and civilian internment within occupied Serbia from 1915 to 1918.

 

VIII Little Children

Little Children of Serbia, London, [undated], EAP833/1/1/40. The Brotherhood movement assumed the duty of providing care for several hundred Serbian orphaned children. The initial group of a hundred children arrived in London on 24 September 1918, and were accommodated in Faversham, Kent (Photograph above, ).


One of the most cherished readings, considered essential in every literate household, was the annual calendar – an almanac featuring literary, scientific, educational and entertaining content meant to be enjoyed by the entire family throughout the year. Due to their production on low-quality paper and the common practice of discarding them at the end of each year, calendars have become exceedingly rare items to find.


One notable example of such a calendar was called Vardar and the issue shown below is for 1923.

Cover of 'Vardar' calendar 1923 with a picture of a lake surrounded by mountains.

Vardar calender for 1923. Edition of the League of Serbian Women printed in 30,000 copies. EAP833/1/4/2/2.

The calendar showcases a poignant photograph capturing a group of women clad in black (below). The image portrays grieving widows who have assembled in Belgrade in 1922 to implore the government for justice against perpetrators of war crimes inflicted upon innocent civilians. Their husbands fell victim to Bulgarian terror during the occupation of Serbia from 1915 to 1918.

Photograph of a group of women wearing black


The widows in the photograph are delivering a presentation to the League of Serbian Women, a charitable organization, appealing for aid for their fatherless children. It’s disheartening to acknowledge that these widows lacked adequate support from the government during such trying times. The photograph serves as a moving reminder of the hardships endured by those who lost loved ones in war, underscoring the significance of community assistance and charitable endeavours.

We are very pleased to hold a digital copy of this collection in the British Library. It is a significant addition to our small Serbian and Balkan collections from the First World War. It comprises exceedingly rare newspapers and other printed materials produced in Serbian exile, reflecting the people’s responses to the living conditions and their experiences during the war. This collection serves as a precious testimony not only to the war itself but also to the individuals caught in its turmoil, yearning for peace and a return to normality with their families and in their homeland.

The material fits perfectly into our collections about the war and can be used for research, education, and it is valuable for anyone interested in primary source material.

Milan Grba, Lead Curator South-East European Collections

01 December 2021

From Dositej Obradović with thanks: a donation of the first Serbian books

Dositej Obradović (1739-1811) was a Serbian educator and the most prominent writer of the Serbian Enlightenment. Obradović is credited for the revival of Serbian culture and he is regarded as the founder of modern Serbian literature.

Portrait of Dositej Obradović

Portrait of Dositej Obradović from Dela Dositeja Obradovića (Belgrade, 1911) 012265.dd.3.

Obradović was a man of wide interests and great learning. He spent most of his life travelling widely through the Balkans, Asia Minor, Western Europe and Russia earning a living as a private tutor.

Map from The Life and Adventures of Dimitrije Obradović

Map from The Life and Adventures of Dimitrije Obradović (Los Angeles, 1953) Ac.2689.g/4.

With a great interest in books and learning, Obradović set out into the world in 1760 in search of education and knowledge. His mission was to pass on the knowledge onto others. In Smyrna (Izmir) he studied classical antiquity and learned Ancient and Modern Greek. In Vienna, Modra and Bratislava he became systematically acquainted with Latin, western European languages and the German philosophy of Enlightenment. Finally in 1782-1784 in Halle and Leipzig he fulfilled a long-standing ambition to attend university lectures.

Obradović believed that South Slav peoples living in the Habsburg and Ottoman lands would be able to progress and achieve an independent and free life only in the community of cultured and enlightened European nations. He argued that reason, science and tolerance were a precondition for the emancipation of peoples. He was true to these believes in his original works about his personal life experiences and in all of his translations and adaptations from classical and modern European literature and moral philosophy of the time.

Title page of Život i priključenija Dimitrija Obradovića

Život i priključenija Dimitrija Obradovića (Life and Adventures of Dimitrije Obradović. Autobiography, part 1). (Leipzig, 1783) C.59.d.25.(1.)

In the latter half of his life Obradović was entirely devoted to writing and printing books with the aim of promoting the ideas of Enlightenment among the Serbs. In 1783 in Leipzig Obradović found printers able to print Cyrillic texts and his first four works were printed there in the printing shop of Johann Gottlob Immanuel Breitkopf.

Title page of Sovjeti zdravago razuma

Sovjeti zdravago razuma (Common Sense Counsels). Compiled by Dositej Obradović (Leipzig, 1784) C.59.d.25.(2.)

Title page of Slovo poučitelno

Slovo poučitelno (Instructive Discourse). Translation from the sermons of Georg Joachim Zollikofer (Leipzig, 1784) C.59.ff.15.(3.)

These are the first three of Obradović’s books printed in Leipzig by which the modern Serbian literature was created. Obradović presented the books to the British Museum Library in 1785. These books would have the distinction of being the first modern Serbian books acquired by the British Museum Library.

Handwritten note of the donation, signed and dated by John Jackson, Obradović’s friend in London

Handwritten note of the donation, signed and dated by John Jackson, Obradović’s friend in London. The note is inserted in front of the title page of the first part of Obradović’s Autobiography. The note states Obradović’s abode in London. Later on Obradović moved to Rotherhithe in south-east London where he stayed until June 1785 when he left London for Hamburg.

Obradović was not only a social reformer, adopting and promoting the ideas of the Enlightenment, he was also the first reformer of the Serbian literary language. In the 18th century two languages were in parallel use among the Serbs: Russo-Slavonic and Slavonic-Serbian. Obradović opposed the general use of the Russo-Slavonic language in favour of the Serbian national language. In addition to the use of vernacular, Obradović was also an advocate of secular literature in the spirit of the Enlightenment.

VII_IMG_20190602

A plaque on the wall of a house in Clements Lane in the City of London at the site of the house in which Obradović stayed in 1784-85.

In his the second part of his Autobiography (which is inserted in his translation of Aesop’s and other fables, pp. 311-425, C.59.ff.15.(1).) Obradović published an account of his visit to London in 1784-85. In this account he expressed a boundless sympathy for the country and the people. For this early portrayal of London and its inhabitants Obradović is characterised as the first Serbian Anglophile in Serbian literature. Obradović celebrated English literature, commerce, science and the English way of life in general, as well as the friends he acquired and the ordinary people he met in London. His impressions were translated into English as ‘The London impressions of a famous Servian’ by Čedomilj Mijatović in Servia of the Servians (London, 1915) YD.2006.a.3929.

Furthermore in Anglo-Serbian literary connections, Obradović is known as the author who introduced the works of Joseph Addison and Samuel Johnson to Serbian readers.

A 1914 statue of Dositej Obradović

A 1914 statue of Dositej Obradović erected in the Studentski trg square in front of Belgrade University

Education and enlightenment of the Serbian people are Obradović’s main accomplishments. He is celebrated for the creation of a new culture in which the modern literature is written in the national language. Another important aspect of Obradović’s legacy is his commitment to the emancipation of people from spiritual backwardness through general secular education and the opening of schools for everyone. In 1808 Obradović founded a High School in Belgrade which eventually led to the establishment of the University of Belgrade in 1905.

In his lifetime Obradović didn’t succeed in having all his works printed. A total of 21 works: original editions, reprints and translations into different languages were printed before his death in 1811. The British Library holds five original editions and two posthumous editions of Obradović’s main works. This collection also includes the first edition of his complete works (Zemun, 1850. 012264.e.4) and a facsimile edition of Obradović’s preserved autograph manuscripts (Novi Sad, 1961. 11880.aa.13). Literary criticism, research and scholarship of all periods about Obradović are well represented in the collection.

Milan Grba, Lead Curator South East European Collections

Digitised books

Aesop's Fables. Translated and edited by Dositej Obradović (Leipzig, 1788) Digital Store C.59.ff.15.(1). 

Dositej Obradović, Song about the liberation of Serbia (Vienna, 1789) Digital Store C.59.ff.15.(2.) 

Dositej Obradović, Mezimac. A collection of essays on morale and practical philosophy (Budapest, 1818) Digital Store 869.h.34. 

Bukvice (Vienna, 1830) the abbreviated text of Obradović’s manuscript ‘Prvenac’ the first-born of Dositej Obradović written in 1770. Digital Store 8311.eee.64. 

A collection of Dositej Obradović’s 15 digitised books by from the Digital National Library of Serbia

References

Pavle Popović, Dositej Obradović u Engleskoj (Oxford, 1919) 010795.c.10.

Pavle Popović, ‘Serbian Anglophil, Dositheus Obradović’ The Quarterly Review, no. 461 (London, 1919) P.P.5989.ab.

The Life and Adventures of Dimitrije Obradović. Translated and edited by George Rapall Noyes (Los Angeles, 1953) Ac.2689.g/4.

Dositej Obradović, Sabrana dela. Introduction by Vojislav Đurić (Belgrade, 1961) 12521.w.35.

 

29 April 2021

The Gospels of Metropolitan Jakov of Serres

The Four Gospels of Metropolitan Jakov of Serres is one of the most prominent and finely decorated Serbian mediaeval codices, produced in 1354-55, during the greatest ascent of the Serbian mediaeval state, in the reign of Stefan Dušan, King of Serbia (1331-46) and “Emperor of the Serbs and Greeks” (1346-55). This codex has recently been digitized.

Headpiece of the Gospel of St Mark decorated with birds in coloured vine scrolls on a gold background. A coloured initial with interlace and foliate decoration at the beginning of the Gospel

Headpiece of the Gospel of St Mark decorated with birds in coloured vine scrolls on a gold background. A coloured initial with interlace and foliate decoration at the beginning of the Gospel. Add.MS.39626, f. 89r

The military success of Stefan Dušan was crowned with the conquest of the city of Serres in 1345. The Serbian mediaeval state incorporated large parts of the Byzantine Empire, almost all of Macedonia, Khalkidhiki, Epirus and Thessaly, as well as Mount Athos, the centre of monastic and spiritual life.

After the conquest of Serres, Stefan Dušan was crowned Emperor in 1346, and Jakov, the former abbot of the Monastery of the Holy Archangels near Prizren, was proclaimed the Metropolitan of Serres. Jakov remained a Metropolitan until his death, between 1360 and 1365. Shortly after the conquest, the city of Serres became a prominent literary, artistic and political centre of the Serbian Empire, along with other major centres such as Novo Brdo, Prizren, Skopje and Prilep.

The contacts between the Serbian monks, scribes and illuminators and the Greek scribes resulted in the adoption and exchange of stylistic and artistic expressions of the masters in the time of the Palaeologus dynasty of the Byzantine Empire.

Kephalaia (numbered chapters) to the Gospel of St Luke. Each Gospel is preceded by kephalaia. The heading is in uncial and text is in semi-uncial scrip

Kephalaia (numbered chapters) to the Gospel of St Luke. Each Gospel is preceded by kephalaia. The heading is in uncial and text is in semi-uncial script. Add.MS.39626, f. 142r

The Gospels of Metropolitan Jakov of Serres was produced on parchment and has 302 leaves and a mediaeval parchment flyleaf. It consists of the four Gospels preceded by a colophon. At the end of the Gospels are synaxarion and menology (lists of Gospel readings for the liturgical year) and octoechos (weekly cycle of hymns). The dimensions of the codex are 315 x 225 mm.

The Gospels are decorated with five large and five smaller head-pieces, four lavishly decorated initials and three drawings in the colophon.

Headpiece of the Gospel of St Luke. The headpiece is painted in the upper part of the page at the beginning of each of the Gospels

Headpiece of the Gospel of St Luke. The headpiece is painted in the upper part of the page at the beginning of each of the Gospels. Add.MS.39626, f. 145r

The Gospel of St John with floral decoration on gold background

The Gospel of St John with floral decoration on gold background. Add.MS.39626, f. 229r

Full page illustration of Jakov the Metropolitan of Serres

Full page illustration of Jakov the Metropolitan of Serres. Add.MS.39626, f. 292v

Inscription stating that the codex was made in 1355 for Jakov in his Metropolitan church at Serres, in the time of Tsar Stefan Dušan, his wife Helena, a sister of Tsar Ivan Alexander of Bulgaria, their son the King Uroš, and the Patriarch Joanikije

Inscription stating that the codex was made in 1355 for Jakov in his Metropolitan church at Serres, in the time of Tsar Stefan Dušan, his wife Helena, a sister of Tsar Ivan Alexander of Bulgaria, their son the King Uroš, and the Patriarch Joanikije (d. 1354). Add.MS.39626, f. 293

The Gospels of Metropolitan Jakov of Serres were created under his patronage in the monastery of St. Theodore as a product of the Serres scriptorium. The manuscript is written in Serbian Church Slavonic and was the work of a single scribe. In the colophon Kalist Rasoder is recorded as the scribe and the Metropolitan as the patron of the codex.

The researchers’ conjecture is that Kalist Rasoder arrived in Serres from Mount Athos (most likely from the Hilandar Monastery), where he worked under the auspices of the Metropolitan. In the period of Serbian rule the proximity of Mount Athos enabled the close association of the Metropolitanate of Serres and the district lords with the Hilandar Monastery. A sudden rise and increased production of copying and artistic activities occurred in that time. Additionally, the influences of Thessaloniki and Trnovo were of great importance in selecting the letters and rich decoration, especially floral decoration, which is one of the primary characteristics of 14th century manuscripts.

Synaxarion (a list of Gospel readings for the liturgical year) decorated with a coloured headpiece above the text

Synaxarion (a list of Gospel readings for the liturgical year) decorated with a coloured headpiece above the text. Add.MS.39626, f. 294r

Table relating the lessons to the Octoechos cycle (weekly cycle of hymns) in red and black lettering in a table made of red and gold lines, and decorated with interweaving floral and geometric motifs

Table relating the lessons to the Octoechos cycle (weekly cycle of hymns) in red and black lettering in a table made of red and gold lines, and decorated with interweaving floral and geometric motifs. Add.MS.39626, f. 302v

This work is considered as one of the most beautiful examples of 14th-century manuscripts produced in the lavish art style during the reign of the Palaeologus dynasty. It is assumed that the Gospels of Metropolitan Jakov of Serres were donated to the monastery of St. Paul in 1365, while this area was still under Serbian rule. The significance and value of the manuscript was recognized by the Hon. Robert Curzon (1810-1873), traveller and collector of manuscripts, in the first half of the 19th century. During a visit to the monastery of St Paul on Mount Athos the codex was presented to him together with the Gospels of Tsar Ivan Alexander

These codices were later bequeathed to the British Museum Library (now the British Library) in 1917.

Branka Vranešević, Associate Professor, University of Belgrade, Faculty of Philosophy, Department of Art History

Milan Grba, Lead Curator South East European Collections

References:

Ralph A. Cleminson, Union catalogue of Cyrillic manuscripts in British and Irish collections. The Anne Pennington catalogue. (London, 1988) 2725.e.600.

Zaga Gavrilović, ‘The Gospels of Jakov of Serres (London, BL Add. MS 39626), the Family of Branković and the Monastery of St Paul, Mount Athos’, in Through the Looking Glass. Byzantium through British eyes. (Aldershot 2000), 135–144. YC.2000.a.6271.

 

10 July 2020

Coronavirus (Covid-19) ephemera material from Southeast Europe

The British Library has joined forces with the Central and Eastern European Online Library to connect to open access electronic resources and preserve ephemeral material about society and health in Southeast Europe during the pandemic in 2020.

Since 2006 the Central and Eastern European Online Library has provided access for our users to a growing collection of 2,300 humanities and social science journals from Central, East and Southeast Europe. This collection also includes more than 5,500 grey literature items and over 4,200 ebook titles.

Photograph of a group of people in a city square c. early 1900s. Features the CEEOL logo and words 'CEEOL - Broadening Horizons'

A resource ‘Covid-19 in Southeast Europe’ has been created for information and research into the activities of the public health professionals and organisations in the fight against the infection. The resource provides useful data on the provision of public health infrastructure and Covid-19 hospitals, and details of the measures employed in combating the pandemic by country and region within Southeast Europe.

This online resource documents how the appearance of yet another virus from nature, SARS Cov-2, has affected the social, cultural, private and religious life and the health of the peoples of Southeast Europe. The material gathered in one place demonstrates the relativity of any current data comparison, such the one published by Forbes, ‘100 Safest Countries in the World for COVID-19’ , based on the Deep Knowledge Group report, and highlights the importance of locally available data. Some ambiguities and contradictions in publicly available reports demonstrate the lack of world leadership in the pandemic. On the other hand at the local level the data show various attitudes and differences in opinions between experts in advisory roles. These new experiences only serve to show the gravity and uniqueness, scale and complexity of the crisis the world is facing at the moment.

As far as Southeast Europe is concerned, one conclusion that can be drawn is that so far major casualties and the collapse of the healthcare systems have been avoided, and all countries have managed to preserve the functioning of the vital systems of state and society.

A poster in Serbian showing how to protect yourself from Covid-19

“How to protect yourself from a new coronavirus infection” A poster published regularly in the Belgrade daily Politika.

We are grateful to the Serbian public health institute for giving us permission to reuse their open access material, and to the Central and Eastern European Online Library for harvesting and arranging this material for our users.

A poster showing the symptoms of Covid-19

The symptoms of a new coronavirus. Let us be responsible to ourselves and others.

A poster aimed at showing how to protect children against Covid-19

The new coronavirus - recommendations for children. How to protect yourself against infection

A poster showing 3 ways to protect against Covid-19

“One - two - three. You too protect yourself".

A poster showing how to use a mask correctly

How to use a mask properly.

Certificate of a building disinfection in Belgrade

Disinfection of the City of Belgrade’s Stari grad borough. Certificate of a building disinfection.

A leaflet from the Sarajevo Institute for Health and Food Safety

A leaflet from the Sarajevo Institute for Health and Food Safety put in a shop window reads: “Everything will be fine. Follow the prescribed measures and be careful. The coronavirus will pass.”

Other open access content related to research into Covid-19, including scholarly journals, can be located via our Find Electronic Resources pages.

The colleagues and partners in the Central and Eastern European Online Library and the British Library believe that access to e-resources is important, necessary and useful. However, ‘e-only’ – especially in connection with social distancing – cannot and should not replace the real human relations, interactions and encounters, which hopefully will return to our everyday life in the near future.

Milan Grba, Lead Curator South-East European Collections 

Bea Klotz and Iulian Tanea, Central and Eastern European Online Library

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