Sima Milutinovic Sarajlija
Encyclopedia
Sima Milutinović "Sarajlija" (1791–1847) was a Bosnian
–Serbian
poet
, hajduk
, translator, historian
, philologist, diplomat
and adventurer.
in 1791, hence his nickname Sarajlija (sarajevan). His mother was a famed Sarajevo beauty. His father was from the village of Rožanstvo, near Užice
. From his birth his life was a constant advenuture. It began with his family's flight from the plague and the Turks. Its zenith came during the Serbian insurrections, and it ended in the unmatched glory of a poet and his grandiose political plans. He attended schools in Zemun
and Szeged
(Hungary) and was later expelled from gymnasium
in Sremski Karlovci
. During the First Serbian Uprising
he was a scribe
in Karađorđe's Governing Council
(Praviteljstvujušći Sovjet). Sarajlija laid Dositej Obradović
to rest and joined a guerilla band, commanded by hajduk Zeka Buljubasa. It was in the heat of battles with Ottoman Turks
that his first poems germinated. They were not revolutionary odes, however, but love songs. They were inspired by his first great love - Fatima, a Turkish girl. After the collapse of the First Serbian Uprising
he was a hajduk
and teacher in Vidin
. He also spent a year or two in a Turkish dungeon. After evading the Turks, he went to Chişinău
(then part of Russia), where he remained, long enough to write "The Serbian Maid". It is said that he sent reports to confidants of Miloš Obrenović I, Prince of Serbia
concerning Karađorđe's followers in exile. This did not keep him later from turning against the Obrenović faction. In 1825 he went to Germany where he enrolled in the University of Leipzig
, though he did not tarry there. Instead, a year later, he went back to Serbia to be a clerk in the employ of Prince Miloš but on arriving in Zemun, however, he turned about and went to Trieste
, Kotor
, and then Cetinje
.
He arrived in Cetinje on September 25, 1827, univited, led by the passions of adventure and poetry and, at the same time, deep patriotism. He was neither the first nor the last stranger to be attracted by the blazing heroism and hidden power of Montenegro. A gifted adventurer—Stephen the Small—had once wandered into this land from out of nowhere, and organized the first civil government. There was something of the adventurer in the Petrović bishops as well—in every one of them, in one way or another. Sarajlija simply blew into the Montenegro wilderness, fleeing before the Kotor police because of the
irregularity of his documents. He was to captivate Bishop Petar I Petrović Njegoš from the beginning. "As soon as I laid eyes on him, he came to my heart", the old man wrote to Jeremija Gagić, the Russian vice-consul at Dubrovnik, and added, "I do not know whether any other Serb would be willing to live in Montenegro." Sarajlija found Rade (the Bishop's nephew and the future Petar II Petrović Njegoš) there when he arrived.
The Bishop immediately took him in as a secretary. Sima pushed himself forward and grasped for power. He was not only sent, but he went himself among the tribes to dispense justice and settle disputes. He took upon himself the education of Bishop's nephew Rade. Then suddenly something came into his head and he disappeared into the mountains, shut himself up in a hut, and after several days returned with the tragedy Obilić
. It was not by accident that this subject came to him precisely in Montenegro, where the cult of the hero Obilić was so widespread.
He already had been everywhwere, had experienced everything, had seen many different forms of government—including those born of revolution and arising from the most primitive conditions. He was nurtured in rebellions and prisons, in political strife, intrigue, and espionage, and, being himself unstable, unpredictable, he was accustomed to quick upheavals. Bishop Petar was to have many trials and tribulations with him. Sima got the old man to sign unread letters which brought the latter into conflict with Prince Miloš of Serbia. Miloš who recognized and had a regard for the genuine thing, was to pronounce a final judgement on Sima: A young cloud-chaster whose nose scrapes the sky.
As soon as he arrived, Sarajlija began to think up schemes, to have ideas, to lay plans. How would it be, he proposed an alliance to Prince Miloš to attack the Turks? He was in the very eye of the Montenegrin storm which lay pent up in the stillness of the monastery waiting to break out at the death of the old Bishop.
Direct and provocative, Sarajlija hardly felt like a stranger. Nor was he regarded as such. It was as though his irrepresible nature had found refuge for the first time, in a land in which—as he himself said -- every rifle is a cannon, every head anointed, every wish the general will, every home a castle, and every cliff a fortress.
He was a handsome man with a mighty frame, and this is not without importance in Montenegro. That is what his painting (the excellent portrait done by Katarina Ivanoviċ) also portrays—masculine beauty, willfullness, energy. He already enjoyed the fame of a poet, and his life was stormy even for those times of rebellions and revolutions.
Sarajlija remained in Cetinje more than three years—until the spring of 1831. But he still did not have enough of Montenegro. He was to come another three times—to be sure, on secret, inexplicable, and perhaps even invetented missions.
In 1836 he escorted Prince Miloš to Istanbul, only to find himself immediately thereafter in Prague, Vienna, and Budapest. He remained a while in Budapest and married there, in 1838, Marija Popović-Punktatorka (1810–1875), who was also a poet. (She carried on a lively correspondence with Vuk Karadžić, Milovan Vidaković, and Đorđe Marković Koder
among many other men of letters, even before her marriage). In 1839 he was in Belgrade—deep in political intrigue. Again flight and wandering. In 1846 he led a group of Serbian students to St. Petersburg, where they were to study. He died suddenly in Belgrade
at the end of 1847 at the height of his strength and vigor. He was mourned by all, as the greatest Serbian poet (of his day), even in distant Montenegro, where his erstwhile pupil, Njegoš, dedicated to his ashes an ode which was lavish and unstinting in love and appreciation. He was buried in the graveyard at St. Mark's Church.
Bosnians
Bosnians are people who reside in, or come from, Bosnia and Herzegovina. By the modern state definition a Bosnian can be anyone who holds citizenship of the state. This includes, but is not limited to, members of the constituent ethnic groups of Bosnia and Herzegovina: Bosniaks, Bosnian Serbs and...
–Serbian
Serbs
The Serbs are a South Slavic ethnic group of the Balkans and southern Central Europe. Serbs are located mainly in Serbia, Montenegro and Bosnia and Herzegovina, and form a sizable minority in Croatia, the Republic of Macedonia and Slovenia. Likewise, Serbs are an officially recognized minority in...
poet
Poetry
Poetry is a form of literary art in which language is used for its aesthetic and evocative qualities in addition to, or in lieu of, its apparent meaning...
, hajduk
Hajduk
Hajduk is a term most commonly referring to outlaws, highwaymen or freedom fighters in the Balkans, Central- and Eastern Europe....
, translator, historian
Historian
A historian is a person who studies and writes about the past and is regarded as an authority on it. Historians are concerned with the continuous, methodical narrative and research of past events as relating to the human race; as well as the study of all history in time. If the individual is...
, philologist, diplomat
Diplomat
A diplomat is a person appointed by a state to conduct diplomacy with another state or international organization. The main functions of diplomats revolve around the representation and protection of the interests and nationals of the sending state, as well as the promotion of information and...
and adventurer.
Biography
Sima Milutinović was born in SarajevoSarajevo
Sarajevo |Bosnia]], surrounded by the Dinaric Alps and situated along the Miljacka River in the heart of Southeastern Europe and the Balkans....
in 1791, hence his nickname Sarajlija (sarajevan). His mother was a famed Sarajevo beauty. His father was from the village of Rožanstvo, near Užice
Užice
Užice is a city and municipality in western Serbia, located at the banks of the Đetinja river. It is the administrative center of the Zlatibor District...
. From his birth his life was a constant advenuture. It began with his family's flight from the plague and the Turks. Its zenith came during the Serbian insurrections, and it ended in the unmatched glory of a poet and his grandiose political plans. He attended schools in Zemun
Zemun
Zemun is a historical town and one of the 17 municipalities which constitute the City of Belgrade, the capital of Serbia...
and Szeged
Szeged
' is the third largest city of Hungary, the largest city and regional centre of the Southern Great Plain and the county town of Csongrád county. The University of Szeged is one of the most distinguished universities in Hungary....
(Hungary) and was later expelled from gymnasium
Gymnasium (school)
A gymnasium is a type of school providing secondary education in some parts of Europe, comparable to English grammar schools or sixth form colleges and U.S. college preparatory high schools. The word γυμνάσιον was used in Ancient Greece, meaning a locality for both physical and intellectual...
in Sremski Karlovci
Sremski Karlovci
Sremski Karlovci is a town and municipality in Serbia, in the autonomous province of Vojvodina, situated on the bank of the river Danube, 8 km from Novi Sad...
. During the First Serbian Uprising
First Serbian Uprising
The First Serbian Uprising was the first stage of the Serbian Revolution , the successful wars of independence that lasted for 9 years and approximately 9 months , during which Serbia perceived itself as an independent state for the first time after more than three centuries of Ottoman rule and...
he was a scribe
Scribe
A scribe is a person who writes books or documents by hand as a profession and helps the city keep track of its records. The profession, previously found in all literate cultures in some form, lost most of its importance and status with the advent of printing...
in Karađorđe's Governing Council
Government of Serbia
Officially the Government of the Republic of Serbia is the executive branch of government in Serbia.-Current government:The current government was elected on 7 July 2008 by the majority vote in the National Assembly of Serbia and restructured on 14 March 2011...
(Praviteljstvujušći Sovjet). Sarajlija laid Dositej Obradović
Dositej Obradovic
Dositej Dimitrije Obradović was a Serbian author, philosopher, linguist, polyglot and the first minister of education of Serbia...
to rest and joined a guerilla band, commanded by hajduk Zeka Buljubasa. It was in the heat of battles with Ottoman Turks
Ottoman Turks
The Ottoman Turks were the Turkish-speaking population of the Ottoman Empire who formed the base of the state's military and ruling classes. Reliable information about the early history of Ottoman Turks is scarce, but they take their Turkish name, Osmanlı , from the house of Osman I The Ottoman...
that his first poems germinated. They were not revolutionary odes, however, but love songs. They were inspired by his first great love - Fatima, a Turkish girl. After the collapse of the First Serbian Uprising
First Serbian Uprising
The First Serbian Uprising was the first stage of the Serbian Revolution , the successful wars of independence that lasted for 9 years and approximately 9 months , during which Serbia perceived itself as an independent state for the first time after more than three centuries of Ottoman rule and...
he was a hajduk
Hajduk
Hajduk is a term most commonly referring to outlaws, highwaymen or freedom fighters in the Balkans, Central- and Eastern Europe....
and teacher in Vidin
Vidin
Vidin is a port town on the southern bank of the Danube in northwestern Bulgaria. It is close to the borders with Serbia and Romania, and is also the administrative centre of Vidin Province, as well as of the Metropolitan of Vidin...
. He also spent a year or two in a Turkish dungeon. After evading the Turks, he went to Chişinău
Chisinau
Chișinău is the capital and largest municipality of Moldova. It is also its main industrial and commercial centre and is located in the middle of the country, on the river Bîc...
(then part of Russia), where he remained, long enough to write "The Serbian Maid". It is said that he sent reports to confidants of Miloš Obrenović I, Prince of Serbia
Miloš Obrenovic I, Prince of Serbia
Miloš Obrenović was Prince of Serbia from 1815 to 1839, and again from 1858 to 1860. He participated in the First Serbian Uprising, led Serbs in the Second Serbian Uprising, and founded the House of Obrenović...
concerning Karađorđe's followers in exile. This did not keep him later from turning against the Obrenović faction. In 1825 he went to Germany where he enrolled in the University of Leipzig
University of Leipzig
The University of Leipzig , located in Leipzig in the Free State of Saxony, Germany, is one of the oldest universities in the world and the second-oldest university in Germany...
, though he did not tarry there. Instead, a year later, he went back to Serbia to be a clerk in the employ of Prince Miloš but on arriving in Zemun, however, he turned about and went to Trieste
Trieste
Trieste is a city and seaport in northeastern Italy. It is situated towards the end of a narrow strip of land lying between the Adriatic Sea and Italy's border with Slovenia, which lies almost immediately south and east of the city...
, Kotor
Kotor
Kotor is a coastal city in Montenegro. It is located in a secluded part of the Gulf of Kotor. The city has a population of 13,510 and is the administrative center of the municipality....
, and then Cetinje
Cetinje
Cetinje , Цетиње / Cetinje , Italian: Cettigne, Greek: Κετίγνη, Ketígni) is a town and Old Royal Capital of Montenegro. It is also a historical and the secondary capital of Montenegro , with the official residence of the President of Montenegro...
.
He arrived in Cetinje on September 25, 1827, univited, led by the passions of adventure and poetry and, at the same time, deep patriotism. He was neither the first nor the last stranger to be attracted by the blazing heroism and hidden power of Montenegro. A gifted adventurer—Stephen the Small—had once wandered into this land from out of nowhere, and organized the first civil government. There was something of the adventurer in the Petrović bishops as well—in every one of them, in one way or another. Sarajlija simply blew into the Montenegro wilderness, fleeing before the Kotor police because of the
irregularity of his documents. He was to captivate Bishop Petar I Petrović Njegoš from the beginning. "As soon as I laid eyes on him, he came to my heart", the old man wrote to Jeremija Gagić, the Russian vice-consul at Dubrovnik, and added, "I do not know whether any other Serb would be willing to live in Montenegro." Sarajlija found Rade (the Bishop's nephew and the future Petar II Petrović Njegoš) there when he arrived.
The Bishop immediately took him in as a secretary. Sima pushed himself forward and grasped for power. He was not only sent, but he went himself among the tribes to dispense justice and settle disputes. He took upon himself the education of Bishop's nephew Rade. Then suddenly something came into his head and he disappeared into the mountains, shut himself up in a hut, and after several days returned with the tragedy Obilić
Obilic
Obilić is a town and municipality in central Kosovo, belonging to the Pristina district. The municipality includes the town of Obilić and 19 villages, with a total population of approximately 21,548....
. It was not by accident that this subject came to him precisely in Montenegro, where the cult of the hero Obilić was so widespread.
He already had been everywhwere, had experienced everything, had seen many different forms of government—including those born of revolution and arising from the most primitive conditions. He was nurtured in rebellions and prisons, in political strife, intrigue, and espionage, and, being himself unstable, unpredictable, he was accustomed to quick upheavals. Bishop Petar was to have many trials and tribulations with him. Sima got the old man to sign unread letters which brought the latter into conflict with Prince Miloš of Serbia. Miloš who recognized and had a regard for the genuine thing, was to pronounce a final judgement on Sima: A young cloud-chaster whose nose scrapes the sky.
As soon as he arrived, Sarajlija began to think up schemes, to have ideas, to lay plans. How would it be, he proposed an alliance to Prince Miloš to attack the Turks? He was in the very eye of the Montenegrin storm which lay pent up in the stillness of the monastery waiting to break out at the death of the old Bishop.
Direct and provocative, Sarajlija hardly felt like a stranger. Nor was he regarded as such. It was as though his irrepresible nature had found refuge for the first time, in a land in which—as he himself said -- every rifle is a cannon, every head anointed, every wish the general will, every home a castle, and every cliff a fortress.
He was a handsome man with a mighty frame, and this is not without importance in Montenegro. That is what his painting (the excellent portrait done by Katarina Ivanoviċ) also portrays—masculine beauty, willfullness, energy. He already enjoyed the fame of a poet, and his life was stormy even for those times of rebellions and revolutions.
Sarajlija remained in Cetinje more than three years—until the spring of 1831. But he still did not have enough of Montenegro. He was to come another three times—to be sure, on secret, inexplicable, and perhaps even invetented missions.
In 1836 he escorted Prince Miloš to Istanbul, only to find himself immediately thereafter in Prague, Vienna, and Budapest. He remained a while in Budapest and married there, in 1838, Marija Popović-Punktatorka (1810–1875), who was also a poet. (She carried on a lively correspondence with Vuk Karadžić, Milovan Vidaković, and Đorđe Marković Koder
Đorđe Marković Koder
Đorđe Marković Koder was a Serbian poet born in Austrian Empire. Misunderstood, largely forgotten and often considered a marginal figure in Serbian poetry, criticized for his cryptic style littered with incomprehensible words and obscure metaphors, Koder was nevertheless a unique phenomenon in...
among many other men of letters, even before her marriage). In 1839 he was in Belgrade—deep in political intrigue. Again flight and wandering. In 1846 he led a group of Serbian students to St. Petersburg, where they were to study. He died suddenly in Belgrade
Belgrade
Belgrade is the capital and largest city of Serbia. It is located at the confluence of the Sava and Danube rivers, where the Pannonian Plain meets the Balkans. According to official results of Census 2011, the city has a population of 1,639,121. It is one of the 15 largest cities in Europe...
at the end of 1847 at the height of his strength and vigor. He was mourned by all, as the greatest Serbian poet (of his day), even in distant Montenegro, where his erstwhile pupil, Njegoš, dedicated to his ashes an ode which was lavish and unstinting in love and appreciation. He was buried in the graveyard at St. Mark's Church.
Notable works
- Serbijanka, epic poem
- Nekolike pjesnice, stare, nove, prevedene i sočinjene Simom Milutinovićem Sarajlijom, book of poems
- Zorica, book of poems
- Tragedija Obilić, epic poem about Miloš ObilićMiloš ObilicMiloš Obilić was a medieval Serbian knight in the service of Prince Lazar, during the invasion of the Ottoman Empire. He is not mentioned in contemporary sources, but he features prominently in later accounts of the Serbian defeat at the Battle of Kosovo as the legendary assassin of the Ottoman...
- Raspjevke Talfiji, book of poems
- Dika crnogorska, dramaDramaDrama is the specific mode of fiction represented in performance. The term comes from a Greek word meaning "action" , which is derived from "to do","to act" . The enactment of drama in theatre, performed by actors on a stage before an audience, presupposes collaborative modes of production and a...
- Istorija Crne Gore, historical workHistoryHistory is the discovery, collection, organization, and presentation of information about past events. History can also mean the period of time after writing was invented. Scholars who write about history are called historians...
about Montenegro - Pjevanija crnogorska i hercegovačka, collection of Serbian epic poetrySerbian epic poetrySerb epic poetry is a form of epic poetry written by Serbs originating in today's Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Macedonia and Montenegro. The main cycles were composed by unknown Serb authors between the 14th and 19th centuries...
from Montenegro and HerzegovinaHerzegovinaHerzegovina is the southern region of Bosnia and Herzegovina. While there is no official border distinguishing it from the Bosnian region, it is generally accepted that the borders of the region are Croatia to the west, Montenegro to the south, the canton boundaries of the Herzegovina-Neretva... - Tragedija vožda Karađorđa, epic poem about Leader Karađorđe