326 



SERVIA 



grape* for wine (annual production 2} million 

 gallon*). Nearly 12 per cent, of the total is, how- 

 ever, uncultivated or lying waste. The extensive 

 mountain |>asture8 have been already mentioned. 

 Fruit treeH exist in very great abundance, especi- 

 ally plums (annual crop 25,000 ton*), which are 

 dried and exported to a value between 250,000 ami 

 500,000 a year, and from which also the brandy 

 of the Servians (slovovltza) is extensively made. 

 Large herds of swine are fed on the acorns of the 

 oak forests, and then driven into Hungary (mostly 

 to Pesth) to be sold. Great numbers of cattle and 

 sheep are kept, the former heing exported to the 

 value of nearly 250,000 annually. The remaining 

 exports of consequence embrace wheat and other 

 cereals (150,000 to 430,000 annually ), hides, 

 wine, wool, timlier, cordage, and sheep. The total 

 exports for the six years ending 1890 averaged 

 1,589,000 annually. The imports consist princi- 

 pally of cottons, woollens, salt, timber, iron, steel, 

 ami other metals, hides, sugar, coffee, glass, paper, 

 tobacco, machinery, &c., and range from 2,067,800 

 (1886) to 1,862,440 (1897). In addition to this 

 there is a rapidly growing transit trade (29,000 

 in 1887 and 633,760 in 1896). By far the greater 

 portion of the foreign trade of Servia is in the 

 bands of Austria- Hungary, nnd is concentrated at 

 Belgrade, the capital of the country. But a little 

 is done by Nisch, the chief town of southern 

 Servia, by rail (since 1889) through Salonicalq.v.). 

 The manufacturing industry is still in its infancy, 

 though the government are trying to encourage it 

 by the system of monopolies. There are, however, 

 now in operation flour-mills, breweries, brick-works, 

 coojierages, sawmills, and factories for making 

 cloth, paper, tobacco, and gunpowder. Clothing 

 and carpets are made by the women in their own 

 homes. The country is naturally rich in minerals, 

 though they are not extracted to anything like the 

 extent they might 1 ; nevertheless coal, lignite, 

 quicksilver, lead, silver, antimony, oopjtcr, and oil 

 shales are mined. Along the valley of the Mnrava 

 passes part of the chief railway line connecting 

 Vienna with Constantinople. T~his, together with 

 three or four short branch-lines, gives to Servia a 

 total of 334 miles of railway. 



The Servians are a well-built, stalwart race, 

 proud and martial by temperament, with a warm 

 love of home and country, of dance and song, hos- 

 pitable, brave, and energetic, but at the same time 

 quick-tempered and prone to violence. They are a 

 primitive people, cling to old customs and beliefs, 

 and are thoroughly democratic in their institutions. 

 The most striking feature of their social life is the 

 family community or Xmlruqa. The farms are 

 all small in size, and the agriculture is backward 

 and primitive. There are no paupers, no asylums, 

 no 'homes' in Servia. Pop. (1884) 1,901,736; 

 (1898) 2,384,205, including some 150,000 Rou- 

 manians, 34,000 Gyiwies, and 25,000 of other 

 nationalities. Besides these there are some 

 250,000 Servians (Serbs, Sorbs) in Montenegro, 

 1,300,000 in Herzegovina, and 2,350,000 in Austria- 

 Hungary. The |teople of Servia Iwlong to the 

 Greek Catholic Church. The highest authority 

 of the Servian church is the national synod, coii 

 sist ing of the Archbishop of Belgrade ( metropolitan 

 of Servia) and the bishops of Nisch and Zica. 

 Kdncation does not reach a very high standard, 

 and is not generally diffused, although attendance 

 at the primary sehools is free and compulsory. 

 Besides a university (at Belgrade) with less than 

 300 studcnU, there are a military academy, a 

 theological seminary, an agricultural, a commer- 

 cial, and some technical schools. The elementary 

 schools number over 900, and are attended (1893-94) 

 by about 77,000 children. 



Servia is a constitutional and hereditary mon- 



archy. The king or the regency acts as the solo 

 executive, through eight ministers (for Foreign 

 Affairs, War, Finance, Justice, Interior, Political 

 Economy, Public Works, Religion and Education), 

 who are responsible to the nation. The legislative 

 [H.wer is vested in the king and the National 

 Assembly. This last, called the Sku/ish Hint, con- 

 sists of deputies elected by the people every third 

 year, one tor every 4500 voters in each province. 

 <!cs this body there is a senate of sixteen 

 members, eight chosen by the king and eight by 

 the National Assembly ; this body act* as a per 

 manent state council. On extraordinary occasions 

 four members are returned by every constituency 

 instead of one. The national income in 1898 was 

 2,752,980, the expenditure fJ.T.VJ.IHcJ. and in the 

 same year the public debt amounted tolli,:ts|,.%iKi. 

 The army, armed from 1892 with the Mannlicher 

 rifle, embraces all men capable of bearing arms 

 between the ages of twenty and fifty, divided into 

 three classes : the regular army with a total war 

 strength of 160,000, the first reserve of 126,000, 

 and the second reserve of 66,000. The French 

 (metrical) system of weights and measures is in 

 use, and the coinage system of the Latin union, 

 though the ' franc ' is called dinar, and is divided 

 intolOO/xiras. 



See Gopoevi6, Serfiitn and die Serben (1888) ; I*e- 

 leye. The Balkan Ptnintula (Kag. trans. Lend. 1887); 

 K de Borchfrrave, 7,r Rnimume fit Serbir ( BnuneU, 1883 ) ; 

 Kanitz, Serbien (Lei p. 1868); Denton, Servia and the 

 Servian* ( Lend. 18G2>; and the consular reports on the 

 trade of Servia. 



HISTORY. The Servians emigrated from the 

 slopes of the Carpathians to the regions now called 

 Servia, Bosnia, and Herzegovina in the year 638, 

 and not long afterwards accepted Christianity in 

 the form adopted by the Eastern or Byzantine 

 Church. The rulers of the people during the follow- 

 ing four hundred years were powerful feudal lords, 

 of whom now one, now the other, exercised the 

 chief authority. Sometimes they were in subjec- 

 tion, in whole or in part, to the Byzantine em- 

 perors ; but all through they steadily strove for the 

 preservation of their independence, and in the long 

 run successfully withstood the power of Byzan- 

 tium, as well as resisted the unceasing attacks of 

 the Bulgarians. Like most Eastern Christians 

 the people cherished an unconquerable aversion 

 to the Latin Church and its head, the pope ; and 

 from the last years of the 12th century the Servians 

 elected their own archbishop. A chief, Stephen 

 Nemanya by name, founded the Rascian dynasty 

 in 11")!), and under his successors Servia pushed 

 her way into the front rank amongst the Balkan 

 states. The greatest ruler of this dynasty was 

 Stephen Miishan (1336-56), who after subjugating 

 Bulgaria, Macedonia, Albania, and the greater part 

 of the peninsula, conceived the ambitious design 

 of welding Servia, Bulgaria, and Byzantium into 

 an empire strong enough to resist UN assaults of 

 the Osntanli Turks. But he died l>cfore he could 

 carry out his plans. Under his feeble son and 

 successor the great nobles divided the power 

 amongst them, and consequently weakened the 

 country. This favoured the aggressive advance 

 of the Turks, who routed the chief Vukashin on 

 tin' Marit/a in 1371, ami Prince I,a/.ar at Kossovp, 

 on the celebrated ' Field of the Blackbirds,' in 

 l.'isll. By this last fight, which figures very pro- 

 minently in the national ballads, the independence 

 of Servia was virtually lost : she was made tribu- 

 tary to the sultan, and gradually l>ecame a pashalik 

 of the Ottoman empire, though hopes of freedom 

 were revived for a time by the great successes of 

 the Hungarian captain and ruler Hunyady and the 

 Albanian chief Scanderbeg in the middle of the 

 15th century. 



