Where it all began...

[Orphic_Hymn]

Vinko Pribojevic and the Glory of the Slavs
Author: Domagoj Madunic

Abstract:
In the year 1525 on the Island of Hvar in front of a selected audience, the social and intellectual elite of this prosperous Adriatic community, the learned Dominican monk Vinko Pribojevic (Vincentius Priboevius) gave an oration titled De Origine Successibusque Slavorum. With a wide stroke of the brush, Pribojevic painted his history of the Slavs from times immemorial to the present day, incorporating in it the histories of various ancient peoples, such as the Thracians, Macedonians, Goths, Gets, Vandals, Sarmatians, Gepids and Illyrians, all of whom he declared Slavs.

Pribojevic ignored the migration of the Slavs to the Balkan peninsula in the sixth century, and claimed ethnic continuity for the Slavs in these regions.By doing so, he invented an ancient tradition for contemporary Slavic Dalmatia, linking it with the heritage of the ancient Illyrians. In the case of such an invented tradition, one can easily note the obvious connection between the claim of a glorious history, and the author's (in this case Pribojevic's) ability to identify a particular historical person (Emperor Diocletian, Aristotle, St. Jerome etc.) or entire nations such as Goths, Macedonians or Vandals as valid members of a communal past. The mechanism used for distinguishing the ancestors from the others, contains the core elements that constitutes an understanding of itself and its community. For this purpose, Pribojevic used the criteria applied since the early Middle Ages, to distinguish various ethnic groups, namely descent, language and customs.

This study uses Pribojevic's oration as a case study in the research of early modern protonationalism. The aim is, through the use of an ethno-symbolic framework analyse Pribojevic's understanding of collective identity, to show it as a new model of Dalmatian patriotism, one consciously built on the Slavic character of 16th century Dalmatia. Furthermore, the study will suggest that unlike the works from the later period known as "Slovinstvo," which placed an emphasis on the special relationship between South Slavs and Illyrians, Pribojevic's narrative operated on two different levels, a Dalamtian and pan-Slavic. There is no special notion of unity or relationship to the other south Slavs. To the author of Oratio Croatia, Bosnia and Serbia were of equal importance as Moscovia, Cassubia or Bohemia.

1.2. Language as Differentia specifica

Language is an unavoidable element of almost all of Pribojević's argumentation. As shown in chapter two, Pribojević after declaring Thyras as a father of the Slavs, immediately applied language as a connecting criteria. The link that connects Illyrians, Myssians, Dacians and Goths to the Thracians is built solely on records claiming the usage of a common language by all of these nations.

A full discussion concerning the name and the nature of the common language, follows in the sections below. For now, I only wish to mention that Pribojević designates that common language as Slavic. He states that there exists the unity of language among the descendants Thyras, and later in his argumentation in favor of Slavic ethnicity of Macedonians and Istrians claims that they speak Slavic. Apart from this, he states that the Russians are also using Dalmatarum sermone. Through this language unity, Pribojević claims a continuity of the present inhabitants of Balkan peninsula with those from Antiquity.

The case of the kinship among the Dacians, Illyrians and Goths is of lesser
importance, because it was less likely to be disputed. Therefore Pribojević wastes little space for a further elaboration of this unity: several short quotes by a few ancient authorities were sufficient. But the claim on the Slavic character of two other ethnic groups, those of the 16th century Macedonians and Istrians, both not ancient but rather contemporary, associated with real and disputable territories and claims on their historical heritage, required more elaborate and sound argumentation. The argumentation employed by Pribojević in these two cases, to prove the Slav ethnic identity of the Macedonians and Istrians provide us with an excellent case study in application of his identifying mechanism.


1.2.1. Macedonian question


To prove the Slavic character of the Macedonians, Pribojević's first step was to prove that their language is not same as that of the Greeks. To achieve this, he used an anecdote found in History of Alexander the Great by Quintus Curtius Rufus. According to the story told by Rufus (and retold by Pribojević), when Philotas son of Parmenio was put on trial in front of the Macedonian army (large part of which were the Greeks), Alexander asked him, "Philotas, the Macedonians are going to judge you, state whether you will use your mother-tongue in front of them." Philotas answered that he will not, because not everyone will be able to understand him, which provoked Alexander to respond, that Philota hates his mother-tongue.

The conclusion Pribojević draws from this short story is that Philotas decided not to speak his native language (Macedonian) in front of the army because it was a different one from the common language of the entire army (Greek). Since the Macedonians and Greeks did not speak the same language, they can not be considered the same people. So Hvar Dominican argues:

it has become the custom of old, that the unity of the descent is proved by unity of the speech, and thus we consider as the members of the same kin, only those who have in tender age together with the mothers milk, also mothers-tongue received.

This, for him proves that the Macedonians have always, as today, spoke only the Slavic language, and are therefore Slavs.

Conclusion
1. Instead of Conclusion: the Role of the Past and How to
Connect it to the Present



.................................Dalmatia of Pribojević's oratio does not consist only of eastern Adriatic possessions of the Republic of St. Mark. Its borders were set wider, in order to encompasses everything he held to be of importance (all urban centers from Istria to Epirus). Unlike Tuberon, his Ragusan counterpart, who, with the higher degree of historical sensibility, placed the northern border of Dalmatia at the Drava River, for Pribojević regions behind the Velebit Mountains held no interest. In matters of esteem contemporary Illyric has little to offer. On the other hand, what does interest him is the glorious past, in which ancient Illyrians do play a significant role: Illyrians, who are only one among the many "Slavic" gentes – such as Macedonians, Goths and Vandals – whose history is filled with military achievements and successes, revealing that military virtue of the Slavs, which put them on the same footing as the Romans and Germans.