Twenty Years of Balkan Tangle | Page 4

casual traveller are meaningless if he knows
not what went before. They are mere sentences from the middle of a
book he has not read. Before going further we must therefore tell
briefly of Montenegro's past. It is indeed a key to many of the Near
Eastern problems, for here in little, we see the century-old "pull
devil-pull baker" tug between Austria and Russia, Teuton and Slav, for
dominion.
In 1900, Montenegro, which was about the size of Yorkshire, consisted
of some thirty plemena or tribes. A small core, mainly Cetinaajes,
Nyegushi, Rijeka and Kchevo formed old Montenegro. To this was

added the Brda group, which joined Montenegro voluntarily in the
eighteenth century, in order to fight against the Turks. These are mainly
of Albanian blood and were all Roman Catholics at the time of their
annexation, but have since been converted to the Orthodox Church and
Slavized. It is noteworthy that they are now strenuously resisting
annexation by Serbia. Thirdly, came the extensive lands, some of them
wholly Albanian, annexed to Montenegro in 1878 under the Treaty of
Berlin, much of which, in spite of the efforts of the Montenegrin
Government, is by no means Slavized.
Certain other small districts have also from time to time been joined to
Montenegro at different times, e.g. Grahovo. Each of the Montenegrin
tribes has a distinct tradition of origin from an individual or family.
They tell almost invariably of immigration into their present site in the
fifteenth or sixteenth century. Thus Nyegushi in 1905 told me of
descent from two brothers Jerak and Raiko, who fled from Nyegushi in
the Herzegovina fourteen generations ago. The Royal family, the
Petrovitches, traces descent from Jerak. If we take thirty years as a
generation this gives us 1485. The Turks had then begun to overrun
Bosnia and the Herzegovina.
Ivan Tsrnoievitch, chief of the tribes of the Zeta, was so hard pressed
by the oncoming Turks that he burnt his capital of Zhablyak and
withdrew to the mountains, where he founded Cetinje in 1484.
Tradition thus corresponds closely with historic fact. The strength of
Turkish influence is shown by the fact that even to-day the peasant
speaks of Ivan as Ivan Beg.
The oft-repeated tale that Montenegro was founded by the refugees
from Kosovo is thus we see mythical, as Kosovo was fought a century
earlier in 1389. Lineally, the Montenegrins are Bosnians,
Herzegovinians and Albanians rather than Serbs of Serbia. Bosnia and
the Herzegovina were independent of the old Kingdom of Serbia,
which explains much of the reluctance of Montenegro to be to-day
incorporated by the Serbs.
Ivan and his refugee tribes successfully resisted the Turkish attacks on
their stronghold and were helped by Venice. But conversions to Islam

became frequent. One of Ivan's own sons turned Turk and fought
against Montenegro. Finally, the last of the Trsnoievitch line, Ivan II,
who had married a Venetian wife, decided that the leadership of a band
of outlaws in the poverty-stricken mountains was not good enough. He
retired to the fleshpots of Venice, trusting the defence of the district to
a civil, hereditary leader and charging the Vladika [Bishop] with the
duty of preventing ore of his flock going over to Islam, as the Serbs of
Bosnia were now doing in great numbers.
It has been inaccurately represented that Montenegro was singular in
being ruled by her Bishop. In this respect Montenegro in no way
differed from other Christian districts ruled by the Turks who, with a
tolerance at that date rare, recognized everywhere the religion of the
country and entrusted all the affairs of the Christians to their own
ecclesiastics. To the Turks, the Montenegrin tribes and the Albanian
tribes of the mountains--who had also their own Bishops --were but
insubordinate tribes against whom they sent punitive expeditions when
taxes were in arrears and raids became intolerable. The Montenegrins
descended from their natural fortress and plundered the fat flocks of the
plain lands. They existed mainly by brigandage as their sheep-stealing
ballads tell, and the history of raid and punitive expedition is much like
that of our Indian frontier.
Till 1696 the Vladikas were chosen according to the usual methods of
the Orthodox Church. After that date they were, with one exception,
members of the Petrovitch family. This has been vaguely accounted for
by saying that to prevent quarrels the Montenegrins decided to make
the post hereditary in the Petrovitch family. As the Vladika was
celibate, his successor had to be chosen from among members of his
family. Later events, however, throw much light on this alleged
interference with the rules of the Orthodox Church.
In June, 1696, Danilo Petrovitch, of Nyegushi, who, be it noted, was
already in holy orders, was chosen as Vladika. A man of well-known
courage such as the country needed, he accepted