Efimiya

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Jefimija (her monastery name) (* 1349 ; † 1405 ), originally despot Jelena Mrnjavčević , was a Serbian nun and poet who also set up an important medieval center for silk embroidery. In Serbian historiography she is considered the first female poet in Serbia. Among her works, an encolpion diptych and the Katapetasma Jefimijas in Hilandar Monastery as well as the gold-embroidered shroud for Prince Lazar's head in the museum of the Serbian Orthodox Church in Belgrade have been preserved.

Life

Baptized as Jelena , Jefimija was the daughter of Caesar Vojihna under the Serbian Tsar Stefan Uroš IV. Dušan . She married the brother of King Vukašin and despot from Serres Jovan Uglješa . After her husband died in the Battle of the Mariza , the twenty-two-year-old Jelena stayed in Serres and became a nun. Shortly before 1389 she moved to Serbia to live with friends and relatives at the court of Princess Milica and Prince Lazar Hrebeljanović in Kruševac . While still in Serres, she belonged to a milieu with strong intellectual ties to Holy Mount Athos . Her husband had patronage over various Athos monasteries as well as over the artistic and literary activity in Serres itself. A gift from Jefimijas to Hilandar monastery was a carved encolpion diptych that originally belonged to her son, who died in childhood. She commissioned a silver fitting and a carved text in the form of a personal prayer about the suffering of a mother.

Yefimija's father Vojhina found his final resting place in the Naos of the Catholic of Hilandar Monastery. The child Yefimiah was also buried in the father's grave. Also the monastery can be found in the Treasury still a 1398-9 made for the altar rail of the iconostasis of the monastery Katapetasma . It is a gold embroidery on red silk. It shows Jesus as a priest, holding the liturgy between John Chrysostom and Saint Basil and two archangels waiting. A text running between the figures describes the donations that Jefimija made to the monastery and mentions her father's grave in the monastery. A reference to the writings of Symeon the New Theologian was established for the prayer .

After the Serbs were defeated by the Ottomans in the Battle of the Blackbird Field , she and Princess Milica retired to the Županja monastery, and later to Ljubostinja . Towards the end of her life, she became abbess (megalos schimos) and took the name Jevpraksija (Eupraxia) .

Yefimiya was also involved in diplomatic affairs. In 1398 Princess Milica Hrebeljanović was with Bayezid I to intercede for Stefan Lazarević , who had fallen out of favor in Bosnia for refusing to participate in the 1398 campaign. On this occasion Bayezid gave permission to transfer the bones of Saint Petka Paraskeva in the presence of Grigory Camblak from Widin to Serbia. They remained in the Church of St. Petka in Belgrade until 1521 and are now in the Metropolitan Church of St. Paraschiva in Iași, Romania .

Literary works

Praise to Prince Lazar

Efimija's poetry has been preserved in two textiles and a devotional item:

  • Tuga za jedincem ( "Mourning for the only son" , Uglješa's little icon) - 1368
  • Moljenje gospodu isusu hristu ( "Prayer to the Lord Jesus Christ" , Jefimijas Katapetasma in Hilandar Monastery) - 1398
  • Pohvala knezu Lazara ( "Praise to Prince Lazar" , Eefimija's shroud for Prince Lazar) - 1402

The poems of Jefimiah belong to the genres of prayer, eulogy and laments .

Among Jefimija's works, the praise of Prince Lazar is particularly noteworthy. It is a prayer in the form of a poem asking the holy martyr Lazar for protection for the prince's sons during the battle of Angora . Praise is her earliest surviving poem.

The text has been handed down as gold embroidery on a shroud for the head of Saint Lazar Hrebeljanović , which was made around 1402 in the Ljubostinja monastery. Today the cloth is in the museum of the Serbian Orthodox Church in Belgrade .

literature

  • Zaga Gavrilović: Women in Serbian politics, diplomacy and art at the beginning of Ottoman rule . In: Elizabeth M. Jeffreys (Ed.): Byzantine style, religion, and civilization: in honor of Sir Steven Runciman . Cambridge University Press, Cambridge 2006, ISBN 0-521-83445-7 , pp. 72-90, here: pp. 78 f.
  • Slobodan Mileusnić: Pall for the face of Prince Lazar (Jefinija's embroidery). In: Helen C. Evans (Ed.): Byzantium. Faith and Power (1261-1577). Yale University Press, New Haven CT et al. 2004, ISBN 0-300-10278-X , pp. 320–321 (exhibition catalog, New York, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, March 23 to July 4, 2004).
  • Slobodan Mileusnić: Jelena, srpska despotica; Efimija, srpska pesnikinja; Jevpraksija, srpska molitvenica. Belgrade 1993.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ RTS, March 22, 2013, Kod Dva Bela Goluba: Despotica Jelena, kaluderica Jefimija (audio, 60 min in Serbian)
  2. ↑ Zaga Gavrilović 2006: Women in Serbian politics, diplomacy and art at the beginning of Ottoman rule . In: Elizabeth Jeffreys (Ed.) 2006: Byzantine Style, Religion and Civilization: In Honor of Sir Steven Runciman , Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, ISBN 0521834457 . Here pp. 78–79
  3. ↑ a b c d e f Zaga Gavrilović 2006: Women in Serbian politics, diplomacy and art at the beginning of Ottoman rule . P. 78
  4. ↑ a b Zaga Gavrilović 2006: Women in Serbian politics, diplomacy and art at the beginning of Ottoman rule . P. 79
  5. ↑ Women writers: Yefimija
personal data
SURNAME Efimiya
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Jelena (maiden name); Jelena Mrnjavčević; Jevpraksija (religious name); Eupraxia (religious name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Serbian nun and poet
DATE OF BIRTH 1349
DATE OF DEATH 1405
Place of death uncertain: Ljubostinja