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ULLETIN

OCIETY

FOR

ENAISSANCE

TUDIES

Volun1e

XX;

Nun1ber 2.

April2003

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CONTENTS

ARTICLES
Cn1a.1ia i.n .tire F{freeutlr and Sixteenth Ce11tr1n'es: An Overview
FO R D A N RAVANC I C
6

Rrn"i sar1Ce Art ,md Arc.llitecturc in Croatia : Recent Researclr

D ANKO

Nidwlas

ZELIC

of ;\fodm! (1427-1480): Bishop, Man of Letters and

v7aim

(If Cimmutarrces

15

J A.DRANK A NERALIC

REPORT
1(lwards

of the Potmcey Index of Baldinucci's

Publiration

Notizie

24

BRIAN TOVEY

REVIEW
L<turo Martin.:.s, Strmt Vordi: JtVriting and Social Strain
in the &m1isumce ,
JUDITH BRYCE

27

REPORTS and NOT'ICES

CONFEREN C E REPORT

30

RE. POR T

31

F O RTH C OMI NG EVENT$

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N OTI C ES

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fof contributors

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The Society for Renaissance Studies

founded 1967

HaN. CHAIRMAN

Dr David Chambers
W arburg Institute
Woburn Square
London WClH OAB
HaN. TREASURER

Hot SEcRETAR v

Richard Simpson
12A Manley Street
London NW1 8LT

Dr David Rundle
Corpus Christi College
Oxford OXl 4JF
BRANCH OFFICERS

Dr Sarah Alyn-Stacey, Trinity College, Dublin

email: salynsta@tcd.ie
&orland: Dr Edward Thompson, University of Dundee (Treasurer)
email: ehthomp@dux.dundee.ac. uk
Wales: Dr Claire Jowitt, University of Wales, Aberystwyth
email: cwj@aber.ac.uk
Ireland:

embership of rhe Society is open to anyone interested in Renaissance

studies and to institutions. All members receive issues of the Bulletin,
which is published twice yearly, in April and October. The S oci e ty and

its branches organiz.e a

full programme of events including an annual lecture, sym

posia and sixth-form conferences. Anyone interested in joining the Society should
contact the Membership Secretary, Dr Kenneth Carleton, 35 Winchester Avenue,
Cnnhan1., Upm.inster, Essex RM14 3LP, email: kwt@carleton.fsnet.co.uk. The
nnuaJ subscription now stands at 10 for ordinary members, 12 for institutions,

5 for students, and 20 for overseas members.

letin are available

ro

members from the Editor at 2 each.

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Copies of back numbers of the Bul

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Croatia in the Fifteenth and Sixteenth

Centuries: An Overview
Gordan Ravancic

roatia in the fifteenth and si.xtenth cenries was a lnd of three dis
tinct regions, each charactenzed by 1ts own soctal and cultural
developments. Beginning in the south, the first region was

Dalmatia. Together with part of the Istrian peninsula, this became incorpo
nted into the Venetian Empire. After the treaty ofZadar (1358) Venice lost
all its possessions in Dalmatia but regained them in the course of the wars
between Sigismund of Luxembourg and Ladislas of Naples in the early fif
teenth century. In some respects this imperial presence suited the Dalmatian
cities be c ause Venice could offer protection and prosperity, such as rival
powers c ould not. In the course ofthe century, this protection was compro
rnised by the Venetian need to prioritize her trading interests and therefore
to reach accommodation with the Ottoman Turks. At the same tin1e, the
Ottomans repeatedly devastated the hinterlands of Dalmatia's coastal cities,
for the Venetians fortified only the cities themselves and their commercially
vital harbours. It was in the light of this dubious Venetian protection that
M.2rko Marulic- Marui, a poet from Split -lamented the misfortune of the

Dalmatian cities in his poem Molitva suprotiva Turkom (Prayer against the
Ttrks).

To the nonh of Dalmatia lay that part of Croatia which was under the
rule of the Hongarian-Croatian kings. This region suffered severely from
Otto nun incursions and much of it became incorporated into the Ottoman
Empire. Early modem geographers created a tradition of referring to the
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Western part of t he Ottoman border in the Balkans as 'Turkish Croatia'.

Consequendy, many historians n1eaningfully referred to Croatia as 'reli

quiae rdiquiarum olim tngni et tncliti regni Croatiae', which speaks for
itself about the circuntstances of the region in the Renaissance period. For
that reason, Simon Kofific Benj a bishop of Modrus, in his speech De
Corvat_iae dcsolatione, pleaded with the pope to help Croatia. He was only
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RAVANCIC

nobles, poets, and intelletuals who

one atnong nu.ny Croatian prelates1
courts and representative assemple.aded fur help from various European
blies.'
a1 and Renaissa nce
f-urther north again lay Slavonia. For the mediev

ography re ers to a much larger

period the term Slavoni.a in Croatian histo
rua covered the area
territory than it does for the modem penod. Slavo
bcnveen the river Sutla to the \vest and the Danube to the east, while its
northern border was marked by the river Drava and that to the south by the
Sav; and the Kupa. The region is mostly flat and presented little ch all en ge to

the Ottotrun conquerors. Nevertheless, it is important to stress that they

c onqu e re d only a portion of it. Cities like Zagreb, Koprivca, Krizevci and
Mter the Ottoman invasion, this region, like
the nujority of Croatia, had to be administratively restructured for military
purposes. By the end of this process the imperial court in Vienna created a

Varafdin were not captured.

fortified border to\vards the Ottoman Empire known as the 'Vojna

.l
krajin.a'
Together with their Hungarian neighbours, the people of Croatia
entered a new phase in th eir political history when the Christian forces were
defea ted at the battle of Mohacs in 1526, the encounter in which the Hun
garian king, Louis II, lost his life. Both kingdoms entered into a period of
conflic t between the riva.l candidates for the vacant throne: Ferdinand of
Habsburg and Janos Za polya Al thou gh the ultimately victorious Habsburgs
prom.is.ed to protect both Croatia and Hungary, Ottoman border inc urs ions
remained a pro ble m throughout the sixteenth century. In spite of these
unbvorable circumstances, the territorial losses and depopulation caus ed by
the Ottoman invasions, va ri ous aspects of Croatian cultural and social life
an still be traced. Though severely damaged, econonuc and me rca n tile
s.tructures survived and adapted. Th e se are generalisations, for the
&on1 region to region, depending on political circumstances, social
expen.nce and cultural herita g e
.

situation

varie

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16.

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1
for lls.t onan duir speeches see. Govori
protiv Ttraka (Speeche..s a.aittsl Tmks),
cd. V Gligo (Split: K.Jtir!evm k:rug, 1983
), passim.
l For Oto re dl.-UJls ahout the roatian
military border see Milan Knt\lek, KrajiJkc uttrrde i

\- :_) :. v "'] l?lt' (T"""" s

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of the Croatian nobles and their subjects accepted

:
-. lPft.l m>tJw krtJljnJ.Swa tiJckom stoljeta (For
>: l:lf dr C'CUJQ)'). (Zeb: Hrvauki instirut :z.a trcnes and difmse iftle Croatianynkitl,ski,{!tlomGr.indovtllri
tt;cJ
povijcst. 1995); Alexander Bucz
:

sonte

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Croorian

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military bordu),
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was the emergence of Protestantisn1 in six

tten?l-<enrury roatia, especially in Slavonia.3 Although Croatia remained

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One significant development

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(Zagreb; Hrvatski institut

Z.1

pOVlJeSt,

-l\
rt t<

:\ i tA IN

THE

15 T H

AND

l ftTH

CENTURIES

(lJ

u ntisnl. A Protcsunt print s_hop appeus to have operated in the town

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in the 15 70s a11d '80s. None of its output ha stt rvived but tr.t

'lllion ha

it th.tt the rub priest, Mi c h a el Bucic, \-Vas responsible for the

printing of a Protest.lnt catechism. a New Test:Jment and a tract entitled
.

C: nlrJ reaJcm pnu:satti,tm Corporis Christi in Euhan'stiae sacramettto.

,.

The

in1perial court in Vienna e).-pressed discontent at this development, but the

en1peror had to tole ra te it since a great part of the Hungarian nobility had
lccptcd Protest.antism. A number of religious reformers \Vere also to be
tound in htria. The most pronunent of these \Vas Mathias Vlacic Ilirik
(Acius). Since lstria was divided benveen Venetian and Habsburg rule, the
officiJ.l attitude toward Protestantism varied depending on the political

<authorities. While the Habsburg approach \-Vas similar to the one they
<applied in Hungary, the presence of the Venetian Inquisition caused many

Protestants, including Flacius, to seek sanctuary elsewhere, generally in

Gemun lands. Protestantism tended to reach Croatia by way of Hungary,
but its impact

\Va5

neither profound nor \Videspread. On the other hand, in

the regions under Ottoman donlinion Protestantism was surprisingly much

more tolerated than it was in the Croatian lands under Habsburg or
Venetian ,control. It seems that a Calvinist church existed there for 140 years

and that, in 1551, a Calvinist synod took place at Tordinci in Slavonia, but
the documentary evidence for this is not substantial: a reminder that this
period of Croatian history is almost completely obscure and requjres further
investigation. !S Mter Slavonia was liberated from Ottoman domination in

number of Calvinists moved from the region and some of them

retumd to Catholicism.
1687,

Croatians

were

in evidence among the artists and men of letters at the

Hung.uian court of Matthias Corvinus (d 1490) and his successors. These

included the sculptor IV3n Duknovic from Trogir, and the writer and illu
nlinator Felix Petancic frorn

Dubrovnik. Another Croatian,

Stjepan

r of H ung.1ry in 1526 and wrote an eye-witness

account of the battle of Mohacs, De wnjlilltt Hungaronmt wm Solymano
Bro<hnc,

was c ha n ce ll o

dca.ih on Ptote1bntism in Croatil see Franjo Buar. PovUtst riformaaje i

J'fl'lJ4.trjcmtanjt u A1djumurj u 1 JUJjdnoj Hn'fltskoj (History of Rdomratio,J ,md' Cotmttr-riformation
.

For

more

.\tltdirtmrjt. and rteighbonrw Cr-aatia), (Vmidin, 1913), passim; Franjo Buar. Povijest
protesQilGke knji!evnosti- u refomucije (Hntory of Croatian Protestant literature
dunng the Refomution). (Z:tgreb. 1910), passim; Josip Adameek, 'Refomucija u
hwaak.i.nt. u-tnljum' CReJomution in the Cro2tian lands'), Su.sreti na dragorn kamenu
in

h:n11.tske

(195}. 61-77.

Jl;;ntij..n lrn-41Jiu protatantslu knjiitvnorti, p lfl.

1\,d:unttlc. Rtfoncija u lrn'll l$ltim umljama, pp. 74-75.
Bu.ar.

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[4)

RAVANCIC

sima. 6 Brdaric also pleaded with

Turr1Znlm imperatore ad Mohaclz historia veris
_

, but his apeal ws as futile as

the papal court for help against the invaders
ts based In Croatia, the n me
many others before and after. Among humanis
_
of Krbava and Modrus, Is
of Nicholas of Modrus, successively bishop
rt writtn by Nicholas
probably the best kno,vn outside the regio. A rep?
osrua as for long
in the \Vake of his diplomatic mission to neighbounng
the nud-fifteenth
the principal source of information about tht kigdo In
as a means
century. This is no\v viewed in a more sceptical light, Interpreted

of deflecting blame away from Nicholas himself and the part he played as
adviser to the last Bosnian king, before the kingdom fell to the Ottomans in
1463. A later generation of Croatian intellectuals is represented by
Bernardin Frankapan, who made a patriotic appeal on behalf of Croatia at
the Diet of Niimberg in 1522 and had his speech printed to publicize the
plight of his homeland. 7
Dalmatia was economically, culturally, and intellectually distinct from

the other two regions of Croatia as a consequence of its contacts with Italy.
Humanist studies found fertile ground in Dalmatia, and the aforementioned
Marko Marulic- Marui, the 'father of Croatian literature' - was a native of
the region. 8 Though he never left Split, his literary reputation spread
beyond Croatia. Other notable Croatian/Dalmatian \vriters of the period
included: Mik.Sa Pelegrinovic, Hanibal Lucie, Petar Hektorovic, Ludovik
Crijevic Tuberon, Franjo Petris, Petar Zoranic, Marin DrZic (Dersa), Brne
Karnarutic.9 Some prominent Dalmatian/Croatian intellectuals were better
known as diplomats or at least as prelates. These included the Dominicans
Ivan Stojkovic from Dubrovnik and Andreas Jamometic, both of whom
6

This work

W<lS

first published in Krakow in 1527; Croatian edition: Stiepan Brodaric,

Zlatko Virc (Vinkovci, 1990).
1
For more deCJ.ils see Ivan Jurkovic, 'Diplomatska aktivnost hrvatskoga plemstva u
vrijeme turskoga pririska na Hrvats u' ('Diplomatic activities of the Croatian nobility during
_
_
the Ottoltl2n preuure on Croana) m Mhden Andrlic and Mirko VaJentic (eds). Zbomik

Jtvfol1ach1 bitka 1526 (711t battlt cif J\tfohacs, 1526), ed.

diplcmatJlu c2kadanij'c Radovi sa simpo:zij'a Hrvatska Jrtdnjovjekovn a diplomacija, held in Zadar

9-11 September 1998, Zagreb: Diplomatska akadernija Ministarstva vanjskih
poslova

1999, 243-256.
There is extensive litenrure about Marulic,

Republike Hrv:u:ske,
11

but the following is a sample of what studies

Tonwovic
, 'Zivotopis Mark.a Marulica Marula' ('Biography of Marko
there are: Mirk:o
Marui'). Moguenosli 45 (l
1-23; ntolija lln,auke knjitrvnosti (A mhology of Cro
atlan !Jtcraturr),
Nernzcu T
nyvkiado, 1999), passim; Antologija: izbor iz poe.zije;
prozc Marko M4ru/Jc (Anthology: stlut1on .from tlre poetry attd prose: Marko Mandie}, ed. Mirko
TollUSOvit {Z1greb: Konzor, 2000 ) ; Josip Frolschuetz, livot i rad Marka Mamlic
a: s hatkim
o.rvrtorn lrrv11tsku Jmjigu od zamtlka njainih do dana!njtg doba (Uje and tvork of Marko Marulic:
with a nefsurvey ofthe book in Croatia from iu origins to the present day), (Zagreb,
1901) .

M::uuc

J8),

(Bupest:

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CROATIA IN THE

15TH AND

16TH

CENTURIES

[5]

became most notable for being in conflict with their ecclesiastical superi0

rs.

10

Notwithstanding the achievements of artists and men of letters, it was

during the Renaissance period that Croatia entered a long epoch of
economic, social and cultural stagnation. Lacking a significant cultural
centre within the borders of the kingdom, Croatian intellectuals tended to
congregate in Vienna or Rome, where they could enjoy a small share in the
mainstream of European culture and civilisation.
HRvATSKI INSTITUT zA PoviJEST
(CROATIAN HISTORICAL INSTITUTE, ZAGREB )

One can find essential infonnation about each of them in 'Hrvatski latinisti - Croatici
auctores qui latine scripserunt' ('Croatian Latinists- Croatici auctores qui latine scripserune),
<J

ed. Veljko Gortan and Vlatimir Vratovic, in

Pet stoljeca IJnJatske knjiicvnosti, vols 2-3 (Zaweb: .

Zora and Matica hrvatska, 1969), passim.

to For more detailed information see Tomislav Raukar,

HnJatsko srednjovjekovlje- prostor,

ijudi, ideje (Croatia in the Middle Ages - land, people, ideas), (Zagreb: Skolska knjiga, 1997),

387-393 and other chapters on humanism and the Renaissance, together with an extensive
,

bibliography on this topic.

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