Zupanija Dragoslava of Kraljevina Srebija (Serbia)

A concept drawing of a Medieval Serbian Woman Warrior as part of the Historically Wrong Sketch Series: Medieval Revisited which aims to portray Women Warriors of various cultures in a fictitious historical settings based on AD 800s - AD 1400s era of warfare. The name Kraljevina Srebija is the name in the series used to refer the Historical Kingdom of Serbia in the middle ages as well as Serbian Empire at its height in the 14th century.

Inspired by the theme: Requiem Aeternum Dona by Jesper Kyd



The history of medieval Serbia is perhaps very little known outside the Balkan Region. In fact, the history of the rest of the Balkan world remains a much less popular subject, being only assumed as the place where crusaders pass trough and occasionally, loot and came in conflict with. Little do we know, that in this small pocket of the region, lies a history of Ambition and Warfare that turned simple, poor cattle-raising Serbians into a powerful kingdom and eventually, won themselves an empire in the 14th century.



In this drawing, Zupani Dragoslava Slavkovic is portrayed in a stylized 14th century attires of a Serbian Heavy Infantry, with brimmed helmet and huge metal gorget. The armor would probably be most common in Italy at this time (a major source of Imports in armor), but his Tunic and and lamellar elements in the armor shows a much more Turkic and Byzantine influence. There's very very little historical records of Serbian women taking up arms at this time, so the drawing can be considered very inaccurate or anachronistic. Behind her is her Albanian retainer, dressed in similar fashion but dressed with full mail hauberk and lamellar gorget.

This drawing is dedicated to the Serbians here in DA! I'm not sure if there's many of them here, but i'd appreciate if they can correct any errors here




History of Serbia is in my own words, as interesting as the History of the Serbs (Ethnic Serbian) themselves. The Serbs had their origin with the Slavic invasion of the Balkan region in the 6th century, which was at this time, was under the administration of Byzantine Empire with Emperor Justinian I as its head. The period is followed by numerous incursions and raids that targeted Thessalonica, Thrache and Illyricum (a region that strecthed from the Drin river (in modern north Albania) to Istria (Croatia) in the west and to the Sava river (Bosnia and Herzegovina) in the north). Historians speculated that up to 100,000 Slavs have moved the region and eventually settled there. Amongst those, were the ancestors of Serbs, called the White Serbs, from their mythical homeland called White Serbia.

Up until the 10th century, the land of Serbia were ruled by a mixed of various Serbs Tribes under their own Zupan, partly tribal, partly feudal, and partly christian. It was not until the mid 11th century that 2 distinct Serbian principalities began to emerge, Zeta in the West and Raska in the East. Zeta was pretty backward as compared to the rest of the region, but nevertheless remain independent and free, while Raska, was more developed but was ruled under byzantine administration. In late 12th century, a man by the name of Stefan Nemaja, the Zupan of Raska, threw of the Byzantines amidst the instability and united the two principalities, bringing Raska and Zeta together to form the first Medieval Serbian state.

For the next century and a half, the small Serbian state had to survive amidst the growing onslaughts of the Bulgarian, Byzantines and Hungarian ambitions to rule supreme in Balkan. It was also in this period, that Bogolism was suppressed and the Kingdom of Serbia thoroughly became Orthodox. What followed in this period is also the establishment of Serbian Orthodox Church, as well the strong identity of Serbian Culture, Art and Language. Regardless, that did not stop the Serbians from carving their own legacy in the area.

The rising power of the Serbian state in the 13th century was seen as threat by the Bulgarians and the Byzantines, who had been the traditional power in the region. The Serbians too, did not stay quite, as such The first militaristic move to exert the Serbian influence over the region was started by Stephan Uros II, but the credit often goes to his son, Stephan Uros III who defeated the Bulgarian at Kyustendil in 1330 (see, Battle of Velbazhd). Despite the victory, Stephan Uros III was dethroned by the nobility who considered him to be too peaceful, and installed his son, Stephan Dusan, as the king of Serbia. The results of the battle and the coronation of Stephan Dusan paved a way for Serbian dominance in the region, because the Bulgarians who had lost most of its forces, could do little to stop the Serbian advance into Macedonia. After conquering the region, along with parts of Thessaly and Epirus, the Serbian established itself as the Empire of Serbia with the coronation of Stephan Dusan as its first emperor, as well as being proclaimed to be Serbia's greatest conqueror.

Unfortunately, he suddenly died in 1355 while preparing to invade Constantinople and his empire soon disintegrated into numerous independents states vying for power. It was at this time as well that the Ottomans began to exert their own supremacy on the Balkan region. At first, the Serbs united to fend of the Ottoman incursions in 1371, but was seriously defeated. The south fell as tributary state to the Ottoman Turks, and while the North manged to gather its strength to defeat the Ottomans in 1386 and 1388, a year later in 1389, the forces was utterly annihilated at the battle of Kosovo. for the next 70 years, the despotate of northern Serbia served as vassals of the Ottomans and played important role in tipping the balance to ottoman favor, against the combined Hungarian-Crusader army at the battle of Nicopolis in 1396. When the Hungarians wanted to launched another campaign against the Ottomans in 1443, its Despot, George Brankovic, refused to break peace with them, though he himself supported John Hunyadi/ Hunyadi Janos, After the disastrous campaign of Varna a year later in 1444, in just 15 years, the Ottomans annexed the rest of Serbian territory, ending their independence, before breaking free almost 5 centuries later.