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From France to the Balkans and Back Intercultural Relations between Medieval France and Serbia in the 13th and 14th Centuries [Paper given at the
conference The Angevin Dynasty (14th Century), Trgovite, 21-23 October 2011]

Dear Ladies and Gentlemen, Our history begins in the time of the First World War. After the conquest of Serbia by the Central Powers Germany, Austria and Bulgaria in 1915 a significant group of Serbian emigrants established themselves in France. From 1916 until 1918 they published a journal entitled La Patrie serbe in Vitr and in Paris, in which they addressed the Serbian youth in exile la jeunesse serbe en exil as well as the French public. The issues of the journal contain several articles on the relations between Serbia and France in the Middle Ages, by means of which ties between both peoples in their joint military efforts during the First World War should be strengthened. In the issue of La Patrie serbe dating to February 1917 Tich Georgevitch, a former professor at the University of Belgrade, published an article on La Sainte-Hlne serbe, in which he states: Notre sainte Hlne est la reine serbe Hlne dAnjou, la grande, sage et noble Franaise, femme du roi Ouroche de Serbie (1243-1276), et mre des rois serbes Dragoutine (1276-1281) et Miloutine (1281-1321). Elle a t, dans ce pass lontain, un lien prcieux entre les Serbes et les Franais, et de plus elle a jou un rle important dans la politique et dans la culture de notre peuple. He finishes his article: Tous les Serbes unis acquitteront mieux la dette envers cette noble reine ; sjournant dans son pays natal, nous voquons aujourdhui son souvenir avec pit. In the first part of my paper I will emphasise two aspects, which are of importance with regard to this conference entitled Between Worlds: The Age of the Angevines. Both of them were addressed initially by the above-mentioned Georgevitch. Firstly, he linked the Serbian queen Helen to the noble family of Anjou. This notion has been regularly discussed and disputed in the Serbian scholarly community throughout the 19th and the 20th centuries. The last synthesis of all relevant aspects has been most recently given by the scholar Miroslav Popovid in his monograph entitled Serbian Queen Jelena between Roman Catholicism and Orthodoxy. After reviewing all relevant sources again, her French descent is in my opinion indisputable on the following grounds: her contemporary, the Serbian

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archbishop Danilo II, writes in his biographies of the mediaeval Serbian rulers that she was of French origin, a daughter of illustrious parents, who possessed wealth and glory. We have no reason to distrust Danilo II. Mauro Orbini also addresses Helen as Helena di natione Francese, femina Christianissima in his book Il regno degli Slavi. What is more, Charles I of Anjou (1266-1285) and Charles II of Anjou (12851309) issued charters, in which they name Helen as consanguinea nostra carissima, cognata nostra and affinis nostra carissima. Hence, a relationship between her and the noble family of Anjou existed, the extent of which we cannot determine because of the lack of sources. She kept contact with the Anjou, who ruled over southern Italy with their centre in Naples after they had been expelled from Sicily by the uprising of the Sicilian Vespers in 1282. It is not by accident that Helen donated an icon to the church of Saint Nicholas in Bari, which has not been preserved apart from its inscription published in a description from 1620 and quoted again in the article by Gojko Subotid: Memento Domine famule tue Helene Dei Gratia Regine Servie uxoris magni Regis Urosii et matris Urosii et Stephani suprascriptorum Regum. Hanc Yconam ad honorem Sancti Nicolai ordinavit. If we have in mind that the strait of Otranto only spans approximately 70 km and thus allows an unhampered communication between present-day Albania and Montenegro on the one side and Italy on the other, Helens close contact with her relatives and their dominion does not come as a surprise. Helen was not the only member of her family seeking contact via the strait of Otranto. She had a sister named Maria, who was married to Anselme de Chau. De Chau was a member of an important French noble family and military commander of Charles I of Anjou in Albania. When he died before 1281, his widow Maria received the town of Ulcinj in todays Montenegro, which then belonged to the territory of her sister Helen. Maria de Chau died in Ulcinj and was buried in the Franciscan monastery of Saint Mark. Let us return to the article of Tich Georgevitch and the second aspect in this first part of my paper. Georgevitch emphasises Helens important role in the politics and in the culture of the Serbian people. Most probably, Helen married the Serbian king Uro I around 1250. Uro I was himself of partly Western descent. His father was Stephen the First-Crowned ( 1228), his mother was Anna Dandolo ( 1246), a granddaughter of the famous Venetian doge Enrico Dandolo. Helen gave birth to the sons Dragutin and Milutin, who should both become kings of the Serbian mediaeval state. Dragutin usurped the throne from his father king Uro I in 1275 and donated territories in Zeta, Trebinje, Plav and the

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upper flow of the river Ibar to his mother Helen. Thus, she ruled over a state in the state on the eastern coast of the Adriatic Sea (that is present-day Albania and Montenegro) and at the same time over a contact zone between Roman Catholicism and Orthodoxy. The religious life in this contact zone under Helens rule is very difficult to reconstruct and remains obscure to a certain extent. Based on my research so far, I would like to suggest to separate the personal faith of queen Helen as well as of her sons Dragutin and Milutin from the reason of state imposed upon them by internal and external political and religious factors. With regard to Helens personal faith Miroslav Popovid has shown that the written sources do not provide a clear and definite answer, whether Helen had remained a Catholic her entire life or whether she had embraced Orthodoxy at a certain point. Evidence exists for both interpretations. Whatever the answer to this difficult question might be, it is remarkable that Helen erected the Orthodox monastery of Gradac, which served as her funerary mausoleum. Moreover, she was canonised by the Serbian Orthodox church in 1317 (that is three years after her death in 1314). She is celebrated together with her sons Milutin and Dragutin by the Serbian Orthodox church on 30 October (12 November) as Sveti kralj Milutin, Teoktist i mati im Jelena. Her son Dragutin usurped the throne from his father king Uro I in 1275 and reigned until 1282. In accordance with the treaty of Deevo in 1282 he handed over power to his brother Milutin. Like his mother queen Helen, Dragutin retained control over a defined territory within the Serbian mediaeval state. He reigned over parts of northern Serbia, the territory of Srem and the northeastern part of Bosnia. On 22 February 1288 the Franciscan friar Girolamo Masci was elected Pope Nicholas IV. In July of the same year he sent two letters via his emissaries, the Franciscans Marinus and Cyprianus, to the Serbian king Stephen Uro II Milutin and his brother Dragutin proposing the union of churches. On 8 August 1288 he dispatched a third letter to queen Helen, in which he urged the carissima in Christo filia regina Sclavorum illustris to support his initiative. We do not have clear evidence on the result of the Popes approach. While Milutin appears to have remained observant, there seems to have been some kind of positive reaction by Helen and by Dragutin, because Nicholas IV granted official protection to their territories in 1291. In 1291 Dragutin wrote a letter to Pope Nicholas IV, in which he asked for assistance against the heresy of the Bogomils in his part of Bosnia and for the

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deployment of missionaries. Pope Nicholas IV answered to his plea in a letter from 23 March 1291 and decided to send two Franciscan missionaries to Dragutin. On this basis one would expect to definitely find Dragutin in the sphere of the Roman Catholic church. But this was not the case. Dragutin died in March 1316 as Orthodox monk Theoktist and was buried in the Orthodox monastery of Djurdjevi Stupovi. Again, we can discern the complexity of personal faith and the influence of internal as well as external political and religious factors. Queen Helen for her part was very well aware of her crucial role between the two religious denominations. This becomes clear, when we take a closer look at her endowments. Until recently it was widely accepted by the scholarly community that Helen founded Roman Catholic churches and monasteries in her territory at the coast of the Adriatic Sea, while she supported the Orthodox church in its hinterland. This interpretation in the bibliography had been intertwined with her personal faith and explained by her preference for Roman Catholicism. Although written sources on this aspect are very scarce and although scholars have to rely mostly on early modern sources as well as on archaeological or arthistorical evidence, Miroslav Popovid succeeded in giving new interpretations in his recent monograph, which allowed him to draw the conclusion that Helen fostered the Orthodox faith at the coast of the Adriatic Sea as well (for example the monastery Sveti Nikola na Vranjini). If we take a precise look at this slide, we realise instantly that queen Helens radius of action in favour of both religious denominations was remarkable. The second part of my paper refers specifically to the religious policy of king Milutin in the contact zone between Roman Catholicism and Orthodoxy. In comparison to his mother and his brother, Milutins approach towards the religious denominations in his state appears to have been tolerant, diplomatic and pragmatic. For example, when he summoned his council in Kotor in 1305 Orthodox bishops of Hum and of Zeta, Catholic bishops of Bar and of Kotor and an elder (dd) of the Bogomils called Miroslav were present. Milutins contact with the Papacy is attested since the above-mentioned letter of Nicholas IV in 1288. In January 1301 Charles Count of Valois, the brother of the French king Philippe le Bel, married Catherine I of Courtenay, the granddaughter of the last Latin emperor of Constantinople, Baldwin II of Courtenay, and consequently the Titular Empress of Constantinople. This had far-reaching consequences for the Byzantine Empire, because Charles of Valois had the aim to reestablish the

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Latin Empire in Constantinople and began to pave the way for powerful alliances as well as to collect money for the military campaign to come. From his perspective one of his preferential partners had to be the Serbian king Milutin. That is why both political and religious contacts between West and East intensified since 1301. On 23 December 1303 Pope Benedict XI wrote a letter to Milutin urging him on the union of churches. When Raymond Bertrand de Got became Pope Clement V in 1305 and moved the Curia away from Rome ushering in the period known as the Avignon Papacy, the diplomatic and the pending military pressure on the Byzantine Empire as well as on South-Eastern Europe were rising. That is why king Milutin decided to take the initiative and to send an embassy to the Pope and to Charles of Valois. He named the Latin speaking Marko Lukarid and Trifun Mihailovid as emissaries, who travelled to France in the beginning of the year 1308 and met Clement V in Poitiers. They expressed their rulers wish to achieve union with the Roman Catholic church and to receive protection by the Pope, which they confirmed by handing over a personal letter of Milutin to the Pope. This letter is not preserved, but we have Clement V answer to Milutin. The Pope decided to send Patriarch Egidius of Grado, the Dominican Lapo and the Franciscan Artinisius to Serbia in order to implement the union of the Serbian Orthodox church with Rome. Moreover, he named the Franciscan Gregory of Kotor and the Dominican Henry of Rimini as personal advisors to the Serbian king. In his answer Clement V sent a creed to Milutin, his clergy and his subjects and defined the preconditions of the union. Milutins emissaries left Poitiers and continued their journey to Charles Count of Valois, whom they met in the monastery Notre-Dame du Lys in Dammarieles-Lys in March 1308. Marko Lukarid and Trifun Mihailovid handed over to him a letter of Milutin, in which the king proposed a French-Serbian alliance for the conquest of the Byzantine Empire. On 27 March 1308 Charles of Valois and the Serbian emissaries concluded a treaty in Latin language concerning the partition of areas of influence in the case of the reestablishment of the Latin Empire in Constantinople. In accordance with its dispositions, the Serbian king should have received territories up to the line of Deber (Debar), Prilep (Prilep), Prisec (Prosek), Ouciepoullie (Ove Pole) and Stip (tip). This geographical outline in the treaty enables us to identify the approximate border zones between the Byzantine Empire and the Serbian mediaeval state at that time. The emissaries returned to king Milutin in the summer of the year 1308 and the ruler himself ratified the treaty on 25 July 1308. This whole process of negotiations was described thoroughly by Mihailo Gavrilovitch in his article

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Ouroche II Miloutine, roi de Serbie, et Charles de Valois in La Patrie Serbe in April 1917. However, the close ties between France and Serbia did not last for long. When the Serbian side found out that Catherine I of Courtenay had died in October 1307, that Charles of Valois had changed his political ambitions towards Germany after the death of Albert I of Habsburg in 1308 and that Venice had come into conflict with the Papacy in Avignon in 1309, Stephen Uro II Milutin decided to bring his policy of appeasement towards the Pope and France to an abrupt end. This fact testifies to his pragmatic approach regarding the union with the Roman Catholic church and had as a consequence Serbias definite cultural orientation towards Byzantium. In the mirror of the described historical events we were able to discern three different personalities united in one ruling family. Although we are speaking of a mother and her two sons, we witness the whole complexity of their specific approaches towards personal faith and religious denominations in their dominions. The sources do not offer clear-cut answers, but reveal instead a symbiosis of faith in a contact-zone between Roman Catholicism and Orthodoxy. Despite their obvious differences queen Helen, king Dragutin and king Milutin were finally united as saints by the Serbian Orthodox church on one single day of celebration.