Day 17 - Belgrade
Surprising Belgrade is a very nice city. In appearance a little tired and battle scared from the 6 wars it has endured over the last 100 years but has some beautiful buildings and parks.
Today I did 2 walks, the first was the 20th century history walk which took in places of interest during that period and the guide, Stefan, talked about Serbia’s chequered history. How after the First World War it was joined in an uneasy alliance with other Slav countries and became know as the Kigdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes and later in 1929 it changed its name to Yugoslavia eventually, after 4 name changes and divisions with the other Slav countries, reverted back to Serbia in 2003. The time under communist rule and Tito and then Milosevic. It’s sobering to think that less than 20 years ago this city was being bombed by NATO due to the arrogance of 3 nationalist leaders of Kosovo, Serbia and Montenegro - each as bad as the other but NATO saw Serbia as the worse, hence a 76 day bombardment and the eventual deposing of Milosevic.
A few pictures from the tour:
Ended the morning tour at the Church of St. Sava. Sava was a prince who became a priest in the 12th century. He was the first Archbishop of the Serbian Church and a very knowledgable monk by all accounts. They have been building his church for nearly 100 years and it still isn’t finished. The inside is to be all mosaic tiles, they’ve done the dome but not much else. The Crypt is marble and is finished but doesn’t hold any ‘patriarchs’ yet.
The after noon I met up with Stefan again to do the Underground at the Fortress Tour, it was supposed to be a group tour but ended up just being me - hey ho.
As said above, the Serbs have had a bit of a chequered past and were ruled for over 400 years by the Ottomans and in 1521 the Turks took Belgrade. There were various rebellions against the Turks but they were crushed and although the Austrians had a good go and took Belgrade for a while they too were defeated and many Serbs went with them. Peace for a while under Ottoman rule but eventually the Serbs got restless again and there were 2 National Up-rising in the 19th century, the second being the most effective and the Turks agreed to give the Serbs their independance and in 1882 Serbia became a Kingdom.
Anyway, the point for telling of this is that they all added their bit to the Fortress and over the years it had got blown up a few times and restored. A major incident being the Austrian invasion, as the Turks had decided to store their gunpowder in a room with an external wall on the battlements, the Austrians got a lucky blow and blew the whole wall down and walked right in. When the Austrians were later pushed back the Turks leant their lesson and started to build storerooms in the rock of the hill under the Fortress.
Only up to 10 years ago, some enterprising people thought it would be a good idea to use these storerooms as a party venue. As they had found remains of Roman occupation through burial paraphernalia this was also stored there and they partied round it all.
In the Fortress is also a Roman well which is neither Roman nor a well but just a hole that was dug around the 14th centaurs to find water but it was dry.
The tour finished at a waterfront storeroom that was built into the rocks of the hill and used to be used to keep wine and fresh produce cold. It’s now used as just a stop to have a glass of wine.
Last night was rounded off by a trip to the National Opera House to see Tosca. Then I had a very late dinner.
Today I did 2 walks, the first was the 20th century history walk which took in places of interest during that period and the guide, Stefan, talked about Serbia’s chequered history. How after the First World War it was joined in an uneasy alliance with other Slav countries and became know as the Kigdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes and later in 1929 it changed its name to Yugoslavia eventually, after 4 name changes and divisions with the other Slav countries, reverted back to Serbia in 2003. The time under communist rule and Tito and then Milosevic. It’s sobering to think that less than 20 years ago this city was being bombed by NATO due to the arrogance of 3 nationalist leaders of Kosovo, Serbia and Montenegro - each as bad as the other but NATO saw Serbia as the worse, hence a 76 day bombardment and the eventual deposing of Milosevic.
A few pictures from the tour:
Ended the morning tour at the Church of St. Sava. Sava was a prince who became a priest in the 12th century. He was the first Archbishop of the Serbian Church and a very knowledgable monk by all accounts. They have been building his church for nearly 100 years and it still isn’t finished. The inside is to be all mosaic tiles, they’ve done the dome but not much else. The Crypt is marble and is finished but doesn’t hold any ‘patriarchs’ yet.
The after noon I met up with Stefan again to do the Underground at the Fortress Tour, it was supposed to be a group tour but ended up just being me - hey ho.
As said above, the Serbs have had a bit of a chequered past and were ruled for over 400 years by the Ottomans and in 1521 the Turks took Belgrade. There were various rebellions against the Turks but they were crushed and although the Austrians had a good go and took Belgrade for a while they too were defeated and many Serbs went with them. Peace for a while under Ottoman rule but eventually the Serbs got restless again and there were 2 National Up-rising in the 19th century, the second being the most effective and the Turks agreed to give the Serbs their independance and in 1882 Serbia became a Kingdom.
Anyway, the point for telling of this is that they all added their bit to the Fortress and over the years it had got blown up a few times and restored. A major incident being the Austrian invasion, as the Turks had decided to store their gunpowder in a room with an external wall on the battlements, the Austrians got a lucky blow and blew the whole wall down and walked right in. When the Austrians were later pushed back the Turks leant their lesson and started to build storerooms in the rock of the hill under the Fortress.
Only up to 10 years ago, some enterprising people thought it would be a good idea to use these storerooms as a party venue. As they had found remains of Roman occupation through burial paraphernalia this was also stored there and they partied round it all.
In the Fortress is also a Roman well which is neither Roman nor a well but just a hole that was dug around the 14th centaurs to find water but it was dry.
The tour finished at a waterfront storeroom that was built into the rocks of the hill and used to be used to keep wine and fresh produce cold. It’s now used as just a stop to have a glass of wine.
Last night was rounded off by a trip to the National Opera House to see Tosca. Then I had a very late dinner.
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