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The infidel
Yanya of Brlog
led Mustay Bey's Muslim army on a
round of pillaging through a series of places rich
with booty: Brlog itself, but also the neighboring
Crnorika, Otoka, and Ledenik. Though they were all
widely travelled warriors, neither Mustay Bey nor the
other men in his army had ever been in this territory
before, and without Yanya's path-finding they would not
have known what rich prizes lay in that country, nor by
what routes to reach them. It was a land of bandits;
the riches in it had been accumulated by robbery and
plundering that were not different in kind from those
to which the Muslims now subjected it under the guidance
of its own erstwhile bandit leader. But Yanya had a
falling-out with the other bandit-masters at the mansion
that had been their headquarters, and so she made that
mansion itself the last and richest prize of all in the
series of sackings. The Muslim captive and the booty
put into the hands of the Muslim army by its alien
leader bought acceptance of that leader as a new citizen
of the Turkish Border. All these are traits not only of
Bećir Islamović's story about Yanya of Brlog, but
also of Murat Žunić's tale about Luke Paulson and Mighty
Osman Bey as translated here (and also of Avdo
Međedović's equivalent story about
Smailagić Meho).
Other renditions of the Luke and Osman epic are detailed
here and
here.
A succession of places subjected to spoilation by
a Muslim army under the leadership of an infidel
turncoat was everywhere a staple element in the
stories of Sila(n) Osman Bey's alliance with Luke
Paulson. Some tellings made those places no more
than two in number, but others, like the renditions
of Murat Žunić and Avdo Međedović, multiplied
them extensively. The idea that presently humble
villages had once upon a time been populous metropoles
of intense commercial activity and wealth (until
plundered by Muslim raiders) was a component not
only of the South Slavic epic tradition but also of
local legend. That the sites of such once-prosperous
communities had latterly sunk into insignificance,
or been forgotten altogether, was of course explained
by the permanent damage done to them in that terrific
war of a bygone age. Their precise analogues in
ancient epic tradition are Eëtion's Thebe and the
other towns sacked like it in the Troad of the
Iliad.
A small manuscript collection formed by a
nineteenth-century cleric in Zadar (subsequently
belonging to the Yugoslav Academy in Zagreb) affords
an example of both the local legend and the epic, both
of which had a certain currency in Roman Catholic as
well as in Muslim tradition. The collector was Ivo
Rajić, who gave his codex the title Narodne
pjesme Hercegovačke, skupio Ivo Rajić, Hercegovac,
rodom iz sela Dračeva blizu Metkovića
(Hercegovinian Popular Songs, collected by Ivo Rajić,
a Hercegovinian born in the village of Dračevo near
Metković). The codex is dated 1885, and it contains
in lieu of an introduction Neke Opaske (Several
Observations) at its head.
Concerning his own native village and others like it
in the same district, Rajić remarked in his “Several
Observations:”
Dračevo, Doljani, Višići, and Tersana are at present
all tiny little villages in the vicinity of Metković.
But old folks have told me that at one time there were
seventy-seven artisans' shops between Tersana and Višići,
as you will see mentioned in the second song[in this
collection]; and the song even indicates to whom the
shops belonged. It takes about half an hour to go
from Tersana to Višići, which would indicate that the
shops were situated one right next to the other all
along the way.
Some tales
of the present kind, like Žunić's and
Međedović's versions, dilated at length about the
commercial riches clustered at strong points along
the raiding Muslims' route, while others, in the
manner of Bećir Islamović, only mentioned the names
of places sacked. Some omitted even the names. Such
omissions would greatly shorten the telling, but might
still leave the main events of the story—including the
series of plunderings—unchanged in principle. Jozo
Rajić, whose age Ivo Rajić noted as seventy-five, and
who was apparently a relative of the collector, gave
him a text of just 199 lines, which bears the title
Pavičić Luka
i stari Osmanbeg
(Luke Paulson and Old Osman Bey). It is no. 13 in
the Rajić codex, and it tells the story in a fashion
utterly bare of ornament:
|
35.
Old Osman Bey the Mighty gat him up betimes | 1 | |
in the bright city of Osik, | 2 | |
high in his mansion with windows framed in iron. | 3 | |
The old fellow sat beside his window case | 4 | |
and gazed across the fields into the distance. | 5 | |
As the sun rose from behind the mountaintop | 6 | |
he spied a horseman riding on the flatland, | 7 | |
one clad all in silver and in pure gold, | 8 | |
astride a raven warhorse. | 9 | |
Old Osman the Mighty watched | 10 | |
the young man as he approached the town | 11 | |
and gan to make his way through narrow alleyways. | 12 | |
Taking out a paper with symbols written on it, | 13 | |
the man glanced continually at it as he rode. | 14 | |
As Mighty Osman Bey watched him, | 15 | |
he guided his well-fed black mount | 17 | |
straight toward Osman Bey's own mansion. | 16 | |
When Mighty Osman Bey realized | 18 | |
that the young man meant to enter his courtyard, | 19 | |
he summoned his son Mehmed: | 20 | |
“Go down to the courtyard gate, my son, | 21 | |
and meet this warrior and his horse. | 22 | |
Take the horse into the warm stable | 23 | |
and bring the man up here to me. | 24 | |
By the light of mine eyes, the man's a stranger here, | 25 |
who needs directions on a piece of paper to help him
find my house.” | 26 | |
His son without comment | 27 | |
went down to meet the youth and raven horse. | 28 | |
Wishing him good morning, | 29 | |
the young man asked immediately for his father, | 30 | |
to which Childe Mehmed answered: | 31 | |
“Old Osman Bey's at home.” | 32 | |
Again the youth politely said ‘good morning’ | 33 | |
as he came into Osman's chamber, | 34 |
where he again drew forth the paper
with the writing on it. | 35 | |
Taking off his cap, he put it underneath his arm | 36 | |
and presented the paper to Mighty Osman Bey. | 37 | |
Reading what the letter said, | 39a | |
Mighty Osman Bey | 38 | |
began to weep, | 39b | |
and then the old bey spoke: | 40 | |
“Luke Pavičić, my son, | 41 | |
sit down here and let us talk. | 42 | |
Where are my two daughters presently, | 43 | |
my daughters, my pair of mourning doves?” | 44 | |
“They're now in Germany, | 45 | |
in General Kreiser's keep, the rogue. | 46 |
The girls have made me pledge myself in brotherhood
to them. | 47 | |
I was formerly in King Vukašin's service. | 48 | |
He said he'd give me noble Helen for my bride, | 49 | |
but then he gave her not, | 50 | |
and on account of Helen I've revolted. | 51 | |
I'll make the two lands quarrel, | 52 | |
Turkey on the one side, and Infidelia on the other. | 53 | |
Father by adoption, mighty comrade, | 54 | |
raise an army here in Osik, | 55 | |
as great a host as ever you are able, | 56 | |
a hundred thousand registered recruits. | 57 | |
I'll be your guide. | 58 | |
You'll march your army off in this direction | 59 | |
until you reach the uplands of Mount Kita; | 60 | |
then on you go to Mount Jastreb, | 61 | |
where there once dwelt a bandit chief so named; | 62 | |
that's why its called Jastreb. | 63 | |
From there to Broken Fir, | 64 | |
where you'll turn your army's line of march | 65 | |
down the far declivity, | 66 | |
passing under Arab's Peak | 67 |
until you come to Marshall Matan's
marble monument; | 68 | |
steeply downward thence | 69 | |
to One-Eyed Mary's Bridge, | 70 | |
where one-eyed Basil's standing guard | 71 | |
as Keeper of the Bridge. | 72 | |
To force a crossing there will not be easy either | 73 | |
against the Keeper's seven companies of troops. | 74 | |
Then down you'll go again | 75 | |
to Riđić's bright castle, | 76 | |
which Sirdar Riđić holds | 77 | |
with eight companies. | 78 | |
The lovely girl Bodulica dwells there. | 79 | |
The man who seizes Riđić's sister | 80 | |
may truly say he's married well. | 81 | |
The way leads steeply down again | 82 | |
to General Kreiser's palazzo, | 83 | |
where dwell the pair of Turkish girls, | 84 | |
daughters of the mighty Osman Bey. | 85 | |
He who seizes the pair of Turkish maidens | 86 | |
may truly claim he has a wife. | 87 | |
The way leads steeply down again | 88 | |
to the ancient monastery, brother. | 89 | |
Ten companies of soldiers closely guard it. | 90 | |
In its attic ample treasure's stored. | 91 | |
He who takes the Hand of Holy Christ | 92 |
will get him wealth enough thereby to make
a pilgrimage to the Kaaba | 93 |
and still have plenty left
for living comfortably at home. | 94 | |
The way leads steeply down again | 95 | |
to the Vukovićes' bright castle. | 96 | |
Old Vukašin deceased not long ago, | 97 | |
but his nine sons survive him still. | 98 | |
They've made division of Vukašin's legacy; | 99 | |
each son's portion was a chamberful of treasure. | 100 | |
There the noble Helen also dwells, | 101 | |
she because of whom I have rebelled, | 102 | |
for whom I'll make the two lands quarrel. | 103 | |
Twelve companies of soldiers hold that castle.” | 104 | |
Lo, Mighty Osman Bey | 105 | |
began to raise a mighty army, | 106 | |
a hundred thousand registered recruits. | 107 | |
So he marshalled his slaughterous battalions, | 108 | |
then marched them forth | 110 | |
from bright Osik city | 109 | |
with Luke Pavičić in the van. | 111 | |
First he struck Mount Kita, | 112 | |
then passed on to Mount Jastreb, | 113 | |
and thence to Broken Fir. | 114 | |
Steeply downward thence | 115 | |
under Arab's Peak | 116 | |
to Marshall Matan's marble monument, | 117 | |
and onward to the bridge. | 118 | |
As they crossed the span | 119 | |
they found that one-eyed Basil wasn't there. | 120 | |
He was on a visit to the ancient monastery. | 121 | |
So all the army made its way across the bridge | 122 | |
and onward till it came to Castle Riđić. | 123 | |
The Sirdar too was not at home; | 124 | |
he too was on a visit to the monastery church. | 125 | |
Down they went again | 126 | |
to General Kreiser's castle, | 127 | |
but neither he himself | 128 | |
nor his nine companies of soldiery were there; | 129 | |
he too was on a visit to the monastery church. | 130 | |
Marching to the ancient monastery, | 131 | |
they sacked its church | 132 | |
and took the money that they found. | 133 | |
Which man was it whom dear God helped | 134 | |
to seize the Hand of Holy Christ? | 135 | |
Luke Pavičić himself despoiled it. | 136 | |
Thence the Turks moved on | 137 | |
towards the Vukovićes' shining mansion, | 138 | |
where dwelt the nine brothers Vuković themselves. | 139 | |
All nine of them were there | 140 | |
with their dozen companies of troops, | 141 | |
and General Kreiser too. | 142 | |
The Turks attacked the place full force. | 143 | |
The Vlachs were ready though, | 144 | |
and met their charge with lively fire. | 145 | |
Three hundred ancients died of it, | 146 | |
and the Vlachs repulsed the rest some little distance. | 147 | |
But then the Turks charged them again, | 148 | |
and again the Vlachs met their attack | 149 | |
with black powder and flying lead. | 150 | |
Once more three hundred banner-bearers | 151 | |
of the Turkish force fell dead, | 152 | |
But Luke Pavičić | 153 | |
had the Hand of Holy Christ in his possession, | 154 | |
and therefore was invulnerable to saber stroke, | 155 | |
nor would any rifle bullet touch him; | 156 | |
he rode his raven horse straight into the courtyard. | 157 |
The Turkish Janissaries talked of this
amongst themselves: | 158 | |
some said “Luke has betrayed us;” | 159 | |
others, “Luke's gone over to the other side;” | 160 | |
still others, “Luke has perished.” | 161 |
What he was really doing all the while inside
Castle Vuković | 162 | |
was sabering all nine brothers. | 163 | |
There he captured noble Helen, | 164 | |
dragged her down to the courtyard, | 165 | |
and put her on his raven mount. | 166 | |
Then he sacked the Castle Vuković | 167 | |
and forthwith turned the army | 168 | |
towards the house of General Kreiser. | 169 | |
General Kreiser had by then come home | 170 | |
with all nine companies of his soldiery. | 171 | |
The Turks attacked his mansion, | 172 | |
where they liberated both the Turkish maidens | 173 | |
and left a large donation to the place. | 174 | |
Thence the Turks moved on again | 175 | |
to the little man Sirdar Riđić's high house, | 176 | |
where little Sirdar Riđić had by then come home | 177 | |
with all his eight companies of soldiery. | 178 |
Here the Turks attacked again,
and breaking its defences, | 179 | |
left a large donation to this place too. | 180 |
Thence the Turks moved on again until
they reached the bridge, | 181 | |
where one-eyed Basil had by then arrived | 182 | |
with seven companies of his soldiery. | 183 | |
Though Basil strove to hold the bridge, | 184 | |
Luke Paulson drove on straight across | 185 | |
ariding his black mount, | 186 | |
and so brought noble Helen out [of Infidelia]. | 187 | |
Up they went onto the highlands then, | 188 | |
and underneath the Arab's Peak, | 189 | |
and on past Marshall Matan's marble monument, | 190 | |
and over the jagged ridge at Broken Fir, | 191 | |
across Mount Jastreb | 192 | |
and Mount Kita too, | 193 | |
until they'd safely passed the highlands, | 194 |
whence by one way and another they went down
until they came to Osik. | 195 | |
Thus the Turks came home to Osik city | 196 | |
with Luke Paulson in the van, | 197 | |
and by the time they'd come to bright Osik | 198 | |
their army numbered only forty thousand men. | 199
|
An important modulation of the Luke Paulson epic paired
Luke not with an elder Muslim (such as Mighty Osman Bey),
but rather with one of his own age. In either case however,
Luke's Muslim partner in the violent invasion of Luke's own
Christian world was motivated by the same principle,
namely the Muslim's inability to secure a necessary feminine
com-ponent for the perpetuation of his house and lineage by
solely Muslim means. Both forms of the story are however
only local expressions in detail of a great overriding
tenet: the Muslim world as portrayed in this tradition
never contained adequate resources for the sustenance of
all its citizens, and was always driven by the dire
necessity of some of its most worthy persons to predatory
seizures of Christian—i.e., northern and western
European—assets. Thus, respected and powerful though he
is in his own country, old Osman in Murat Žunić's (and
Avdo Međedović's) telling of the Luke-Paulson-and-Osman
epic has no male kinsmen or other allies within the
confines of Islam who can help him to locate and liberate
his only female kin, namely his two daughters.
A corresponding failure in the society of the Christian
world generates Osman's Christian collaborator, Luke
Paulson, who similarly has no male kin or other allies
within the confines of Christendom who will help him
liberate the female whom he too needs to perpetuate his
house and lineage. The only asymmetry in the two allies'
predicaments is that one man is old and wants his
daughters, while the other man is young and wants a
wife.
By simple elimination of this asymmetry, a modulation
arose wherein both collaborators were young, and both
needed wives whom neither had the means to secure in his
own world without the help of the other. As in all this
tradition's epics of every kind, there was significant
loss of life for Muslims in the resultant struggle; but
the infidel Christian world suffered a much greater
devastation of both life and property.
Friedrich Krauss
collected and published such a poem
under the title Pandžić Huso i Pavečić Luka,
Pobra (Mostar, 1885). The story it told lay
on the spectrum of epic modulation midway between
tales like Murat Žunić's “Sila Osmanbeg i Pavišić Luka”
on the one hand, and tales of two Muslim comrades' joint
bride stealing (like Ćamil Kulenović's
Ženidba Vrhovac Alage)
on the other hand. In his sentimental little dedication
to the published poem, Krauss gave no indication as to
who the singer was who dictated the text to him; but it
was probably one of the several from whom he had
collected in the Neretva Valley. The published text
amounts to 932 verses, and narrates as follows:
36.
Hussein Pandžić has no kin anywhere in the world.
He is alone in the upper storey of his house in
Gradnić city one morning before dawn when a postman
knocks at his courtyard gate. The letter carrier
presents him a letter, but gives no indication as
to who sent it, and Hussein is unable to read it
until sunrise brings light enough for him to make
out the characters.
The letter bears as its return address the Vizier's
(Governor's) mansion in Buda, and it is from the
Vizier's daughter Fatima. She reminds Hussein how
in a former time the Emperor in Istanbul had issued
a death warrant against him, and he had fled for his
life from city to city until finally her father gave
him sanctuary in Buda. There he remained for four
years, during which time he engaged himself to marry
Fatima. She reports that many suitors now frequent
her father's house, and he intends soon to betroth
her to one of them. Hussein must intervene promptly
if he wants ever to see her again.
As soon as Pandžić reads the letter, he dresses his
horse and himself in splendid attire, mounts, and
rides away in the direction of Buda. He speaks to
his house as he leaves it, promising it renovation
as soon as he returns with his bride; but if perchance
he should be killed in the coming adventure, the house
is at liberty, he tells it, to tumble down however
it pleases, since there is no one to inherit it from
him.
Pandžić travels no farther than the open field outside
Gradnić before he meets yet another letter carrier,
who is bringing him a second message from Fatima. Her
father the Vizier has been quick about choosing a
fiancé for her: it is Childe Mehmed, son of the Pasha
of Zvornik. Having learned this additional news,
Hussein throws the second letter away and rides on
into the uninhabited mountains until he reaches the
banks of an upland stream, the Čatrnja. There he
dismounts and refreshes himself with brandy.
While he is thus at rest, Hussein observes another
well-mounted and well-armed man approaching. He soon
realizes that it is his fictive brother from Bunić
town, Luka Pavečić. The two greet one another warmly,
and over the remaining brandy Hussein explains to Luke
about Fatima. He considers it providential that Luke
has met him at just this time, since they may now go
together to Buda to claim Fatima.
Luke is however not enthusiastic about Hussein's
proposal. He says that he has no thought of trying
to approach Buda, and that Hussein will not be able
to go there either, because the Vizier has stationed
Miloš the Bandit in the pass at Saddle Mountain
(Prevala planina) to keep it secure against intruders.
Miloš has built a blockhouse in the pass, and hung a
sword on the blockhouse gate. He requires all
travellers to Buda either to kiss the sword or be
beheaded by it. Luke would rather die than accept
such an indignity; he is sure that Hussein will not
be submissive to it either. The only imaginable
outcome of their attempted journey to Buda would
therefore be getting themselves into a fight at
Saddle Mountain, with the probable result of their
both being killed. Hussein had better forget
Fatima and let Luke help him secure a wife from
among the many nice girls to be found on the hither
side of Saddle Mountain.
To this counsel of caution Hussein responds with a
counter-suggestion. Since Luke has no stomach for
trouble in the mountain pass to Buda, he should go
home to Bunić, purchase a distaff and a hank of
Egyptian flax in the market there, then spin, weave,
and sew new linen undergarments as a wedding gift
for Hussein, quite as any woman would do.
Stung by this aspersion on his manliness, Luke
immediately swings himself into the saddle and tells
Huso that he will indeed accompany him to Buda; the
only thing he will not now permit Hussein to do is
to turn back himself from their perilous expedition.
Miloš observes and recognizes the two men even before
they reach his blockhouse. He tells his sixty fellow
bandits that the two appoaching sons of bitches are
Pandžić and Pavečić, and that both they and their
horses are invulnerable to gunfire. Nevertheless he
instructs his men to position themselves behind the
rocks and boulders on either side of the defile
leading to the blockhouse and fire at the two
intruders in order to knock them off their horses.
Unhorsed, the two adventurers might perhaps be
captured alive.
When they come under fire, Luke and Hussein cock
their caps wickedly down over their eyes, draw their
sabres, and charge the gunners, whom they soon rout.
Then they gallop to the blockhouse gate, where Luke
seizes Miloš's sword, beheads Miloš with it, and
then breaks it into three pieces. Luke sets fire
to the blockhouse, and the two travellers proceed
together to Buda.
They find the grounds of the Governor's palace
teeming with the horses that Fatima's myriad suitors
have ridden to Buda. Luke remains below in the palace
courtyard with their own mounts while Hussein goes
upstairs to the Vizier's audience chamber. It is full
of the suitors, with whom Hussein exchanges conventional
civilities. Last to greet him is the Vizier himself,
who asks sarcastically why Hussein has come to Buda,
when he must know that he cannot hope to marry Fatima
while so many more desirable pashas, viziers, aghas,
and spahis are also suitors to her. Pandžić replies
that destiny will decide the matter, and not the will
of men.
The Vizier places a golden tray in the midst of the
assembly and tells all those present to place their
respective tokens on it. That man whose tokens Fatima
selects from the tray will be her husband. (This
despite the second letter delivered earlier to Hussein
from Fatima, in which she reported that her father had
already promised her to Mehmed, son of the Pasha of
Zvornik. The Vizier of Buda is, as usual, perfidious.)
Every man puts down an engagement ring, and other gifts
with it, each according to his wealth. Hussein for his
part offers a golden orb and a thousand ducats of gold.
But while carrying the tray from the assembly hall to
the women's quarters, the wicked Vizier removes Hussein's
offerings and pockets them. Left to make her choice
from among the remaining tokens, Fatima studies the
collection, detects the shortage, and declines to accept
anything in the absence of Hussein's tender. She goes
to a window overlooking the courtyard, smashes the glass,
thrusts her head through the opening, and cries out to
Luke Pavečić, telling him to pass on her advice to
Hussein: let him not waste time and wealth in the
fraudulent ritual of bidding for her through her father
the Vizier, for nothing Hussein attempts to convey to
her by that channel will ever reach her.
Luke reacts with a tremendous shout, which instantly
brings Hussein to his feet and down into the courtyard.
When Luke has reported Fatima's words to him, the two
companions decide to abandon civil entreaty within the
Vizier's corrupt court and take a more warlike approach
to their problem. Following Hussein's suggestion, they
leave the city, camp on the field outside the walls,
and offer single combat to anyone who will be brave
enough to offer an armed challenge to Hussein's claim
on Fatima.
Apprised of this development, the Vizier calls for
volunteers to combat Hussein, with Fatima to be the
winner's prize. No one responds however except a
certain Indian Arab, much to the Vizier's and Fatima's
disgust: this doubly alien person is ungratifying to
the Vizier as a prospective son-in-law, and positively
repulsive to Fatima, who now dreads the possibility not
only of Hussein's destruction but also of her own
forced union with so unseemly a mate.
The Arab presents himself for combat on the field
outside Buda, and Hussein is about to engage him
when Luke intervenes and insists on championing
Hussein, lest the latter be killed and Fatima left
to marry the Arab. Luke first lets the Arab do his
worst, but he cannot harm Luke. Then the Arab flees
towards the sanctuary of the city. Luke outraces
him however, and spears him through-and-through at
the gate.
While Hussein refreshes the victorious Luke with
coffee and brandy outside the city, the Vizier inside
calls for another volunteer to contest Hussein Pandžić's
blockade. A young, unnamed vizier's son comes forward,
and soon he too stands ready to do battle on the duelling
field outside Buda. Again Luke wants to fight on
Hussein's behalf. This time however Hussein insists
on facing the challenger himself. Their duel exactly
replicates the one between Luke and the Arab; Hussein
leaves the corpse of his opponent piled atop the Arab's
at the city gate, and returns to drink wine with Luke
in mid-field.
There being no more volunteers from amongst Fatima's
remaining suitors to duel further with Luke and Hussein,
the Vizier calls instead for someone to run their
blockade and carry a letter to Miloš at Saddle Mountain;
the Vizier desires Miloš to come and deal with the pair
of troublemakers. But the Pasha of Zvornik speaks up
and asks the Vizier whether he has any eyes to see with;
during their visit to his palace, did the Vizier not
observe the soot smudged on the faces of Luke and
Hussein? It could have only one meaning: they must
already have burned Miloš's blockhouse, which of course
they could not have accomplished had they not also
killed Miloš. To dispatch any messenger to Saddle
Mountain for help would therefore be useless.
Stymied by this apparent truth, the Vizier has nothing
more to say.
Luke meanwhile proposes a further adventure for himself
and his Muslim comrade. Now that they have won Fatima
for Hussein, Hussein should help Luke win the bride whom
he desires from Lower Rosnica. She is Angelia, the
daughter of Rosnica's military commander. Hussein
responds now to Luke's marital ambition no differently
than Luke did earlier to his. Not one [says he] but
seven successive blockhouses obstruct the way to and
from Rosnica, which lies not through mountain fastnesses,
but extended all across a great lowland plain. Not
sixty but a hundred bandits garrison each of the seven
blockhouses. No matter how courageous they may be, no
two men travelling alone can hope to pass such obstacles
alive, much less when encumbered with a stolen bride.
Luke's answer to this objection is what Hussein's was
earlier: Hussein should go home to Gradnić and occupy
himself there with woman's work till Luke comes back
from Rosnica with Angelia. Thus goaded, Hussein
consents to Luke's plan, and the two depart together
for Rosnica.
Their journey to the castle where Angelia dwells is
effortless; no one at any of the seven intervening
blockhouses deigns so much as to notice them as they
pass. They find the castle gates securely closed
with four great chains; Angelia is within, but her
father is not at home. From an upstairs window she
addresses Luke, telling him to go away; her father
keeps in his stable a four-year-old thoroughbred of
such surpassing fleetness that had Luke already
begun yesterday to gallop away towards the Turkish
frontier, and were her father to set out in pursuit
of him some time later today, he would still be able
easily to overtake Luke before the latter could
escape across the border. Under these circumstances,
any thought of elopement would be fatuous.
But Luke is not so easily put off. He asks Angelia
to come down and open the gate. When she refuses,
he sets his chestnut mount at the courtyard wall,
leaps it, and opens the gate from the inside. This
time Hussein remains in the courtyard as sentry and
keeper of their two chargers while Luke goes upstairs
into the castle to find Angelia. He asks her for the
keys to the stable, but she does not know where her
father keeps them. So Luke goes downstairs again and
circumambulates the palace until he locates a great
ironclad door in the foundation: the entrance to the
stable. This Luke batters mightily with his war mace
until he succeeds in breaking through. Within the
broken portal he finds a set of keys that open nine
more doors, until finally behind the ninth he
encounters four syces who guard the remarkable
four-year-old stallion. Sabering them, he extracts
the stallion from the stable, mounts Angelia on it,
and rides away with her and Hussein back to the
lowland path guarded by her father's seven companies
of bandits in their seven blockhouses.
The three fugitives have almost reached the crest of
the mountain overlooking the great plain that separates
them from Turkey, when Luke suddenly stops and asks
Hussein whether when they departed he left the castle
gate at Rosnica open or closed. Hussein says that he
closed it. But Luke is not satisfied, and tells
Hussein to stop on the mountain with Angelia while he
returns to set the castle afire. If he does not do
this, says Luke, he knows that the Commander will cast
aspersion on his character for having stolen horse and
daughter but neglected manfully to complete his attack
and burn the castle too.
Angelia warns Luke that burning the castle will destroy
any hope of their safe escape to Turkey. Her father
keeps three cannon always loaded, and were the castle
to burn, the fire would soon ignite them. Their three
detonations are precisely the signal agreed upon by the
Commander and his seven blockhouse garrisons to indicate
that the road across the plain should be closed and
anyone attempting to leave Rosnica apprehended. But
Luke has come to Rosnica not only for Angelia's sake;
he is equally as determined to clear the road of its
present interdictors as he is to steal the girl. So
he returns to the castle and sets fire to it exactly
because the resultant alarm will produce the human
obstructions that he wishes to destroy.
The castle burns quickly, and the cannon in it explode
sooner than Luke had expected; the three fugitives are
not able to pass even the first of the seven blockhouses
before its garrison has heard the alarm. There a
veritable rain of bullets greets the three travellers,
and Luke instructs Hussein to stay with Angelia and her
father's prize horse while he clears the road of its
defenders. Charging into the cloud of gunsmoke with
his saber drawn, Luke disappears from view. But
because the dense smoke prevents his seeing what is
happening to his comrade Luke, Hussein cannot long
forbear to follow him into the fray, and so he
abandons his guard duty. Together they prevail and
then safely conduct the girl and the horse past the
first blockhouse.
The same sequence of events is repeated at the second
barrier, except that now it is Hussein who leads the
attack, and Luke who cannot abide idle sentry duty.
So one by one the two men break through each of the
first six obstacles.
The seventh blockhouse is however much more strongly
defended than the previous six. All the survivors
from the first six garrisons have gathered at the
seventh to fight again, this time under the direction
of the Commander himself, Angelia's father. Here it
is once more Luke's turn to lead the way, and Hussein's
to stand guard over Angelia and the horse. Anticipating
the fiercer resistance of this seventh and last enemy
stronghold, Luke warns Hussein that as the point-man
in the coming struggle he may very probably be killed.
Should this happen, he desires that Hussein should not
give Angelia away to any other man, but take her rather
as a second wife for himself, together with the Vizier's
daughter Fatima.
And indeed, by the time Hussein enters the pall of battle
at the seventh blockhouse, Luke has been wounded so badly
that he can scarcely keep himself in the saddle as the
blood flows from him. Hussein asks Luke whether he
thinks he has been mortally hurt, but Luke refuses even
to consider the question; he is too preoccupied with
disappointment. Although he has routed the garrison at
this last stronghold too, and done so despite its many
reinforcements, he has still not yet been able to
confront Angelia's father face to face. The Commander
has fled the fighting on horseback, and Luke does not
know where he has gone. He begs Hussein to help him
take down Angelia and mount himself on the Commander's
own wonderful four-year-old race horse. Hussein does
this, and puts a naked saber in Luke's hand. Then Luke
rides out away, of the dense cloud that still covers the
battlefield.
No sooner is he clear of the miasma than he spies the
Commander already so far away that a long rifle would
not carry the distance, and the noise of a pistol shot
would not even be audible. Nevertheless Luke gives
a great shout, and the stallion under him whinnies in
response. It is not however Luke's shout but the
horse's whinny that prevents the Commander's escape.
The latter is riding a bedouin mare that happens to be
in heat, and when it hears the call of the stallion,
the mare stops stock-still in her tracks. The
Commander flails at her vainly with his riding crop,
but Luke is upon him in a moment, and cuts him in half.
The mare's and stallion's love affair so prolongs Luke's
return to the waiting Hussein and Angelia, and Luke was
so sorely wounded when he rode away in pursuit of the
Commander, that Hussein imagines he must have died by
now, killed either by the Commander or by his previous
wounds. Far from wishing to make off with the comely
Angelia, Pandžić is delighted and relieved by Luke's
eventual reappearance. The three then complete their
journey across the Turkish frontier, and sit down on
the other side to a refreshment of aquavit while they
consider how they may best extract Fatima from Buda.
But events solve this problem for them. Even as they
sit debating the matter, singing and the sound of
gunfire signal the approach of a wedding procession.
It proves to be Childe Mehmed's parade with the girl
Fatima; during the two comrades' absence in Rosnica,
Mehmed's father, the Pasha of Zvornik, has decided
to go ahead with his son's marriage. Hussein instantly
resolves to attack the procession and seize Fatima for
himself by force, but Luke restrains him with a better
plan. Acting as Pandžić's go-between, Luke will
peaceably approach Fatima's coach and ask the girl
directly whether she desires to be Mehmed's wife or
Hussein's. If she elects Childe Mehmed of Zvornik,
they should let the procession continue unmolested;
there are plenty of other maidens from among whom
Pandžić may choose a more willing bride. But if
Fatima prefers Hussein, Luke will take her out of
the Pasha's carriage, put her in Hussein's lap, and
be prepared for a fight. While Luke does his part,
Hussein should stand ready for battle if it comes
to that.
The two adventurers carry out Luke's plan. Childe
Mehmed is disposed to put up a struggle for possession
of Fatima, but his father the Pasha points out to him
the girl Angelia from Lower Rosnica, whom the very
devils in hell could not have abducted; yet there she
is, demurely seated on the stolen four-year-old stallion
as living proof of her two captors' irresistible
fighting prowess. Mehmed should let Fatima decide
the issue, since there are other desirable girls with
whom the Pasha may make a good match for Mehmed if
Fatima is truly unwilling. She opts for Pandžić.
After a moment of hesitation, the party from Zvornik
irenically dissolves; Pandžić and Pavečić go home with
their respective brides, each to his own land.
So Luke Paulson, whatever the form of the story in
which he figures, (re)establishes ties of feminine
kinship for a Muslim who is a kind of adult ‘orphan,’
whether young (Huso Pandžić) or old (Osman Bey of Osik).
But Luke's Muslim beneficiary and cohort is not the
only other stock personage of the tale about him.
The Turkish Sultan regularly figures in his story
also, where he habitually shows the same two contrasting
faces that characterize the Ottoman Emperor in a wide
spectrum of this tradition's epics.
Osman Bey of Osik (=Osjek, Osijek) loses his two
daughters because he is in the Sultan's good graces,
i.e., he is away in Istanbul on government service when
the infidels sack his settlement at Osjek and capture
his darling daughters. Contrastingly, Hussein Pandžić
is in the Sultan's disfavour; the Sultan has issued a
death warrant against him, and it is this terrible
danger emanating from the Sultan that brings Hussein
and Fatima together in the first place. For another
typical instance of the Sultan's favour harming a
worthy man's family life, while his disfavour enhances
it, see Ibrahim Nuhanović's tale of
Osmanbeg Omerbegović.
Another such modulation-by-inversion is seen in the
character of Childe Mehmed, who, at the direction of
the Pasha of Zvornik in Krauss's epic about Pandžić
and Pavečić, peaceably surrenders his intended bride
Fatima to a rival bridegroom when that rival confronts
his wedding procession militarily. But in Krauss's
other epic
from the same region, the one about old Smail Agha's
Childe Mehmed, Mehmed does just the opposite under
the direction of another pasha, Hasan Tiro. There
Mehmed stands and fights his rival to the death and
keeps his Fatima, who wants him and not his rival.
Smail's Childe Mehmed and his wedding band then turn
on the Vizier of Buda and destroy him too; whereas
Childe Mehmed of Zvornik and his party were and remain
the Vizier's best friends. Whatever the tradition
countenanced in one tale, it deliberately turned
upside down and aft-end fore in some other tale.
As usual in epics about Luke Paulson, a Muslim
expedition which he leads into Christendom finds
the journey lengthy but unopposed; as in the ancient
Greek conception of the house of Hades, entering that
world is easy, but getting out again is desperately
difficult. Like the ancient Kerberos, its guardians
detain no immigrants, but only would-be émigrés. And
like the surly gatekeeper at Buda in Avdo Međedović's
Smailagić Meho,
the bandit chieftain Miloš is the sole obstacle to
entering Buda in Krauss's poem about Pandžić and Pavečić.
But there are seven far more formidably manned stopping
places on the way to and from Lower Rosnica.
Correspondingly, in Ibrahim Nuhanović's epic about
Osmanbeg Omerbegović,
a double series of seven stopping places on the way
to and from the heartland of infidelia intervenes
between the Muslim hero's claiming an endogamous bride
for himself and his escape to actual commencement of
settled life with her.
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