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Belgrade: Serbia’s Ancient City

Story and photography by
Nancy & Eric Anderson 

 

They came by river starting 2000 years ago to this place, 400 feet above the confluence of the two rivers we now call the Danube and the Sava. They came armed -- to invade. They came in 115 wars. They burned the city down 44 times over two millennia. They were the Celts who established the city in 279 BC, followed by the Romans, then the Goths attacked and the Huns. (Attila’s grave is reputed to be under the city walls.) The Serbs followed in the 7th century – they gave the city their name which means “white fortress.” We call it Belgrade. The Bulgarians were next to attack then the Byzantines and the Hungarians and the Turks, even the Austrians wanted a share. River access determined the importance of any city in those days gone by and a river like the Danube, the second longest river in Europe after the Volga, was a bonus. It flowed for 1700 miles across the continent.

We are hearing all this from Slobodan Stetic, our Uniworld guide. He tells us this fortress (which commands such a panoramic view of the two rivers) was built in 535AD by the Byzantine Emperor Justinian I. We Americans in the group all exchange looks, all acknowledging this is not a history we know well.

A young Serbian woman sitting on the city wall and watching us turns and says in English, “You are looking at our history! That island below us is called Great War Island,” she says, “and that tower down there built by the Hungarians to protect the lower town in 1460 was turned into a dungeon by our ‘hosts’ the Turks in the 19th century.” We would read, later, they famously tortured in that prison a prince, an archbishop and a poet. They were an equal opportunity persecutor. Nobody was safe in the 1800s!

Across town sits the magnificent St. Sava Cathedral reputedly the largest active Orthodox temple in the world. It was built where in 1595 the Turk Siman Pasha incinerated the holly relics of St Sava, one of the most important figures in Serbian history.

The interior is stark. Funding is coming from donations and the first step was to build the exterior. The inside is not yet finished. It’s not far to Belgrade’s main shopping boulevard, Mihailova Street, where we can enjoy some of the city’s statues and architecture. The street has been called one of the most attractive pedestrian areas in all Europe. It is certainly popular with the thousands who stroll it each day to marvel at all the internationally famous stores now present in Belgrade.

We jealously observe a tourist who thought of a way before we did to get a great shot close up of the monument to Prince Mihailo. The prince was preparing an army to free Serbia from Turkish oppression when he was assassinated while walking in the city in 1868.

We are ourselves now walking back to our river boat past young people who are not thinking about their country’s past but enjoying their present. They are on roller blades and bicycles.

Back on the Uniworld River Countess we find folk dancers similarly showing a more relaxed demonstration of Serbian life than what we were told about on the city walls] 

 
 

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