Žitomislići Monastery
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The Žitomislići Monastery ( Bosnian and Serbian Manastir Žitomislići Манастир Житомислићи ) is a Serbian Orthodox monastery in Bosnia and Herzegovina . The village north of the monastery bears the same name.
location
The monastery is located south of Mostar on the eastern bank of the Neretva in south-western Herzegovina , on the territory of the large municipality of Čapljina in the Herzegovina-Neretva canton , which in turn is part of the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina , which is mainly inhabited by Bosniaks and Croats . At the level of the monastery, the river forms the border with the neighboring large municipality of Čitluk to the west .
history
founding
The monastery, named after one of the twelve main Orthodox festivals of the Annunciation of the Lord , was founded with financial means from Milislav Hrabren during the Ottoman rule in 1566, on a site where the ruins of an older monastery were located. Since then the monastery has assumed ever greater religious importance for the Serbs in the lower Neretva valley.
Ottoman Empire
In 1609 the wall paintings were created inside the monastery. The iconostasis of the monastery was created in 1710 by the icon painter Mihailo. From the 16th to the 18th centuries, when Žitomislići had one of the most active Orthodox scriptoria in Ottoman Bosnia-Herzegovina, numerous valuable manuscripts were collected in the monastery . During the fall of the Ottoman Empire , the neighboring village of Hajduken was conquered from Montenegro .
Kingdom of Yugoslavia
While the region belonged to the Kingdom of Yugoslavia , the village of Žitomislići formed a base for the Chetniks from eastern Herzegovina, who repeatedly undertook raids in the area. These were tolerated by the Serbian-dominated government.
Second World War and consequences
During the Second World War , Herzegovina was part of the Independent State of Croatia . In late summer 1941 surrounded troops of the Ustasha , the monastery and took extensive looting before. In the course of this, the refectory was burned down, but it was not completely destroyed.
On June 21, 1941, members of the Ustasha committed a massacre of 559 Serb civilians in Šurmanci, on the west bank of the Neretva opposite Žitomislići , the so-called massacre of Prebilovci , including several monks of the monastery, which prompted the local bishop Alojzije Mišić in September 1941 to write a protest letter to Cardinal Alojzije Stepinac, Archbishop of Zagreb .
The communist government of Yugoslavia had the cave called Golubinka , in which the bodies were located, sealed with a concrete slab, which is why they could only be exhumed in 1989 and buried in the Prebilovci cemetery in Čapljina.
In the post-war years, there were repeated acts of revenge against families whose relatives had been involved in this massacre.
Bosnian War and Consequences
A few months after the outbreak of the Bosnian War , in the last days of June and the first days of July 1992, the village, which is predominantly inhabited by Serbs, was destroyed by the so-called ethnic cleansing by the Bosnian-Croatian armed forces and the population was expelled. In early July 1992, the convent by troops of the Croatian Defense Council , which from the western pilgrimage Medjugorje , had set out with the help of bulldozers destroyed and several monks were killed.
In the course of the fighting in early summer 1992, more than 1200 shells fell on the village ; about 400 Serbian survivors fled towards Gacko and Nevesinje in the Republika Srpska .
In 1993, when Žitomislići was now part of the Herceg-Bosna Republic proclaimed by Mate Boban and never recognized internationally , the ruins of the monastery were blown up with dynamite and the area and the access road were mined . The monastery site remained an inaccessible restricted area for several years after the peace agreement in 1995.
reconstruction
It was not until April 8, 2002, after the mines had been cleared and almost ten years after the destruction of the monastery, that the reconstruction of the building could begin. Both the three-member State Presidium of Bosnia and Herzegovina and the President of Serbia , Boris Tadić , took part in the rededication ceremony by Patriarch Pavle I. in May 2005 . However, the local Roman Catholic Bishop Ratko Perić turned down the invitation to participate.
Former residents of the neighboring village were able to return after the end of the war.
present
Today the monastery is again a popular tourist destination in southern Herzegovina and can be visited by prior arrangement. It represents one of the most important Serbian Orthodox monasteries in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b c d e Michael Sells and András Riedlmayer: Zitomislici ( Memento of July 13, 2008 in the Internet Archive ), Haverford College
- ↑ a b c d Ivo Žanič: War and Peace in Hercegovina , Zagreb 1995
- ^ Roger Cohen: Serbian Church Blocking Pope's Visit to Belgrade , New York Times , September 6, 1994
- ^ E. Michael Jones: The Ghosts of Surmanci , South Bend (Indiana) , 1998
- ↑ a b Mostar ( memento of October 8, 2007 in the Internet Archive ), Society for Threatened Peoples , Sarajevo 2005
- ↑ The Zitomislici Orthodox Monastery in Hercegovina rebuilt ( memento of the original from October 7, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , ORF , May 16, 2005
- ↑ Images of Revival ( Memento of the original from September 27, 2008 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , Haverford College 2002
- ↑ Entry in the Tourist Board of the Herzegovina-Neretva canton ( Memento of the original from October 18, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
Web links
- Official website of the monastery (Serbian)
- Žitomislići on the website of Bryn Mawr College (English)
Coordinates: 43 ° 11 ′ 23 " N , 17 ° 46 ′ 50" E