НОВИ ЗАШТИТНИК ХРИШЋАНА У ОСМАНСКОМ ЦАРСТВУ: СВЕТИ СТЕФАН ШТИЉАНОВИЋ
THE NEW PROTECTOR OF CHRISTIANS IN THE OTTOMAN EMPIRE: SAINT STEFAN ŠTILJANOVI

Summary/Abstract: The paper investigates the nature of the commemoration of saints using the cult of Stefan Štiljanović, a new saint in the Ottoman Empire, as an example. All sources on his veneration: marginal notes, inscriptions, cultic texts, and their transcriptions, as well as the saint’s depictions, were analyzed in their spatial and temporal context. Thus, the emphasis was on the diachronic development of the veneration of the saint from Šišatovac Monastery during the first century and a half of its existence – between the middle of the 16th century and the end of the 17th. An analysis of the earliest texts, written between the last decades of the 16th century and the first quarter of the 17th century , showed that the creation of the cult was conditioned by events related to the veneration itself and to the contemporary social, spiritual, and church-political needs. It is interesting to note that the comparison with the hagiography of Georgije (George) of Kratovo revealed that the cults of that period had a more pronounced didactic function. Furthermore, the cult of Stefan Štiljanović was supported by metropolitans and patriarchs of Peć over the course of the 17th century. The subsequent reinterpretations of the saint’s image show an adaptation to the tradition of veneration of holy rulers – probably under the influence of the celebration of the holy despots Brankovićs in Krušedol and the depiction of the life of Stefan Štiljanović as a warrior against the Ottomans during the conquest of Srem. Therefore, a new prose text was composed that portrays Stefan as the last Serbian despot. Behind this reinterpretation stood Patriarch Pajsej (1614–1647) or someone familiar with his program. A few decades later (in 1669/1670), Stefan was named king in a marginal note. This change could have been the result of the interpretation of the lines in one of the earliest texts describing the honors Stefan received from the Hungarian king. However, the reason for this particular reinterpretation remains unclear. The new versions did not exclude the previous ones, because the earliest cultic texts continued to be used and copied. This confirms some of the general characteristics of the cults of saints, such as the polyphony of memory of saints, the facts that they had layered functions, influenced their surroundings in different ways, and permeated more aspects of Christian life than it seems at first glance.

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