Miloš Obilić facts for kids

Quick facts for kids Miloš Obilić Милош Обилић
Painting by Aleksandar Dobrić, 1861
Born	Unknown
Died	28 June 1389 Kosovo field, District of Branković
Occupation	Knight
Known for	the assassination of Murad I

Miloš Obilić (Serbian Cyrillic: Милош Обилић, pronounced [mîloʃ ôbilit͡ɕ]) was a legendary Serbian knight who is reputed to have been in the service of Prince Lazar during the Ottoman invasion of Serbia in the late 14th century. He is not mentioned in contemporary sources, but features prominently in later accounts of the 1389 Battle of Kosovo as the assassin of Sultan Murad. Although the assassin remains anonymous in sources until the late 15th century, the dissemination of the story of Murad's assassination in Florentine, Serbian, Ottoman and Greek sources suggests that versions of it circulated widely across the Balkans within half a century of the event.

Although his original name was Miloš Kobilić, several variants of this name appear in historical sources and it is not certain that he actually existed. But Lazar's family – strengthening their political control – "gave birth to the myth of Kosovo", including the story of Obilić. He became a major figure in Serbian epic poetry, in which he is elevated to the level of the most noble national hero of medieval Serbian folklore. Along with the martyrdom of Prince Lazar and the alleged treachery of Vuk Branković, Miloš's deed became an integral part of Serbian traditions surrounding the Battle of Kosovo. In the 19th century, Miloš also came to be venerated as a saint in the Serbian Church.

Miloš is also remembered in the Albanian epic poetry from Kosovo, as Millosh Kopiliqi, and his birth place is said to have been in the Drenica region, where villages which bear the name Kopiliq are located.

Name

Miloš is a Slavic given name recorded from the early Middle Ages among the Bulgarians, Czechs, Poles and Serbs. It is derived from the Slavic root mil-, meaning "merciful" or "dear", which is found in a great number of Slavic given names.

Several versions of the hero's surname have been used throughout history. His original surname was Kobilić or Kobilović, a thesis which is further supported by archival findings by historian Mihailo Dinić in Ragusan archives of 1433 which show that Miloš's original surname was indeed Kobilić (Latin: Cobilich). In Albanian folklore, the original name is preserved and he is known as Kopiliq. The root of the name 'Kopiliq' might be in an old Balkan substrat word, in Albanian kopil (child or illegitimate child), in Romanian copil (child) and in Serbian kopile (illegitimate child) or kobila (mare, from which kobilić, son of the mare). The etymological origin of his name is indicated in Serbian folk stories which claim that the hero is said to have been nursed by a mare. Jireček connected the surname to two noble families in medieval Ragusa and Trebinje, the Kobilić and Kobiljačić in the 14th and 15th centuries, and noted that they altered their surnames in the 18th century in order not to be associated with mares. A poem by Croat Andrija Kačić Miošić titled Pisma od Miloscia Cobilichja i Vuka Brancovichja(Pisma od Kobilića i Vuka Brankovića, modern spelling) preserves the old name in the 18th century.

The rendering Obilić has universally been used by Serbian writers in modern times. Its first version is found in the History of Montenegro (1754) by Vasilije Petrović, who wrote of one Miloš Obilijević, and in 1765, the historian Pavle Julinac who rendered the surname as Obilić. According to Czech historian Konstantin Jireček, the surname Obilić and its different renderings are derived from the Serbian words obilan ("plenty of") and obilje ("wealth, abundance").

Miloš is often referred to in the epic poems as "Miloš of Pocerje", and according to local legends, he came from the western Serbian region of Pocerina. In Pocerina there is a spring known as "Miloševa Banja" (Miloš's spring) and an old grave that is claimed to be the grave of Miloš's sister.

Literary sources

The earliest sources on the Battle of Kosovo, which generally favour the cult of Prince Lazar, do not mention Miloš or his assassination of the sultan. The assassination itself is first recorded by Deacon Ignjatije on 9 July 1389, only 12 days after the battle. The assassination of sultan Murad and one of his sons (Yakub Çelebi) was also mentioned in the instructions of the Venetian Senate issued to Andrea Bembo on 23 July 1389, although Venetians were uncertain if news about the assassination were true. On 1 August 1389 King Tvrtko I of Bosnia (r. 1353-1391) wrote a letter to Trogir to inform its citizens about Ottoman defeat. Victory over the Turks (Latin: ob victoriam de Turcis) was also reported by Coluccio Salutati (died 1406), Chancellor of Florence, in his letter to King Tvrtko, dated 20 October 1389, on behalf of the Florentine Senate. The killer is not named but he is described as one of twelve Christian noblemen who managed to break through the Ottoman ranks.

Another Italian account, Mignanelli's 1416 work, asserted that it was Lazar who killed the Ottoman sultan.

The assassin's first appearance in Serbian sources is in the biography of Stefan Lazarević, Lazar's son, by Constantine the Philosopher, written in the 1440s. The hero, still anonymous, is described as a man of noble birth whom envious tongues had sought to defame before the prince. To prove his loyalty and courage, he left the front line on the pretext of being a deserter, seized the opportunity to stab the sultan to death and was killed shortly afterwards. The initial phase of ignominy and its redemption by a courageous plot of slaying the sultan are narrative ingredients which would become essential to the Serbian legend as it evolved in later times.

The loss of the Sultan also made an impression on the earliest Ottoman sources.

Halil İnalcık explained that one of the most important contemporary Ottomans sources about the Battle of Kosovo is the 1465 work of Enveri (Turkish: Düstûrnâme). İnalcık argued that it was based on the testimony of a contemporary eyewitness of the battle, probably Hoca Omer, an envoy sent by the Sultan to Lazar before the battle. In this work Enveri explains that before he became a Serbian nobleman, Miloš (Miloš Ban is how İnalcık rendered the name in Enveri's text) was a Muslim at the Sultan's court who deserted Ottomans and abjured Islam. The Sultan allegedly called him to return to his service many times. Enveri explains that although Miloš always promised to return, he never did. According to this account, when Lazar was captured, Miloš approached the Sultan who was riding a black stallion and said: "I am Miloš Ban, I want to go back to my Islamic faith and kiss your hand." When Miloš came close to the Sultan, he struck him with the dagger hidden in his cuff. The Sultan's men cut Miloš into pieces with swords and axes.

Since about the late 15th century, Greek sources also begin to record the event. The Athenian scholar Laonicus Chalcocondyles (d. c. 1490) claims to draw on Greek traditions when he refers to Murad's killer as Miloes, "a man of noble birth [... who] voluntarily decided to accomplish the heroic act of assassination. He requested what he needed from Prince Lazar, and then rode off to Murad's camp with the intention of presenting himself as a deserter. Murad, who was standing in the midst of his troops before the battle, was eager to receive the deserter. Miloes reached the Sultan and his bodyguards, turned his spear against Murad, and killed him." Writing in the second half of the same century, Michael Doukas regarded the story as worthy of inclusion in his Historia Byzantina. He relates how the young nobleman pretended to desert the battle, was captured by the Turks and professing to know the key to victory, managed to gain access to Murad and kill him.

In 1976, Miodrag Popović suggested that the narrative elements of secrecy and stratagem in the Serbian tradition were all introduced from Turkish sources, seeking to defame the capabilities of their Christian opponents by attributing the death of the Murat to "devious" methods. Thomas A. Emmert agrees with him.

Emmert says that Turkish sources mentioned the assassination several times, while Western and Serbian sources didn't mention it until much later. He thinks that Serbians knew about the assassination, but decided not to mention it in their first accounts for unknown reasons.

In 1512, Ottoman historian Mehmed Nesri wrote a detailed account of the battle that became the source for later Ottoman and Western descriptions of the battle. Nesri's account took several elements from popular Serbian tradition, and described the assassination in a way which reflected negatively on the perpetrators.

Oral traditions

Serbian traditions

Miloš Obilić is a major hero of the Serbian legend of Kosovo, whose central part is the Battle of Kosovo. According to the legend, Miloš was married with the princess Jelena, daughter of the Serbian Prince Lazar. A quarrel broke out between his wife and her sister who was married to Vuk Branković, about superiority in valour of their respective husbands. As a consequence of this, Branković took offence and picked a fight with Miloš. Filled with hate, Branković maligned Miloš to Lazar, saying that he conspired with Turks to betray the prince. At Lazar's supper on the eve of the battle, the prince reproached Miloš for disloyalty. To prove his loyalty, Miloš went into the Turkish camp feigning defection. At a favourable moment, he killed the Turkish Sultan Murad, whose attendants then executed Miloš. The legend then goes on to describe events regarding the battle.

Albanian traditions

In Albanian epic poetry, the hero is known as Millosh Kopiliqi, a version of the which corresponds to the original name attested in Slavic. He is thought to have been born in Kopiliq of Drenica region. In Albanian epic poetry, Prince Lazar is not existent in most variants. Instead Milosh Kopiliq, presented as a Christian Albanian warrior, is the sole killer of Sultan Murat. In the story, after Murat's death he is betrayed by an old Slavic woman (shkina in the original) and then is executed by the Ottomans. Gligorije Elezović recorded the Albanian version in the 1920s in Kosovo as sung by folk singers. Albert Lord, an expert in Balkan epic poetry, considered the tale of Milos Kobilić as a "mainly Albanian folk expression which traced its major elements to Albanian oral traditions". By comparing the Slavic and Albanian traditions about Kobilić, Lord came to the conclusion that they developed independently, but also borrowed from each other. Lord considers this cultural meeting point to have happened in Sandžak, where Albanians and Slavs lived as neighbours.

Legacy

Icon of Miloš Obilić in Hilandar, depicted as a holy warrior.

It was not until the early 19th century that Miloš was also venerated as a saint in the Serbian Church. During the Serbian Revolution (1804–1815), a fresco of Miloš as a haloed, sword-bearing saint was painted in Prince Lazar's narthex in the Hilandar Monastery on Mount Athos (Greece). The historian Rade Mihaljčić suggests that the cult was a popular movement which originated among the Serbs south of the Sava and Danube during the Ottoman period.

Later in the same century, the heroic figure of Miloš was given a national boost in the epic poem The Mountain Wreath (1847) by Petar II Petrović-Njegoš, prince-bishop of Montenegro. The poem praises the assassin's valour in battle, calling him "the victim of a noble feeling, / An all powerful military genius, / A dreadful thunder that smashes crowns". Njegoš also instituted the Obilić medal for courage.

This event and the Battle of Kosovo itself has become embedded in the Serbs' national consciousness, history, and poetry. Njegoš's tales, including Miloš, inspired later generations of Serbs – notably Gavrilo Princip, the assassin of Archduke Franz Ferdinand.

In 1913, the Medal of Miloš Obilić was awarded by King Peter I to soldiers for the acts of great personal courage, or for personal courage demonstrated on the battlefield. It was given during the Balkan wars, World War I, and during World War II, to members of the Yugoslav Army or allied forces and was discontinued with the end of the war.

In the late 1980s, religious nationalists began to breathe further life into the figure of Miloš and the Kosovo Myth. Special inspiration was taken from Njegoš's The Mountain Wreath, with its portrayal of Lazar as a Christ-like martyr and Obilić as the Serb sacrificing himself to prove his loyalty and seek retribution. A key event which gave expression to this idea was the 600th anniversary of the Battle of Kosovo (Vidovdan) on 28 June 1989, which was held at the Gazimestan plain, near the site of the battle. Obilić's feat has been cited as a source of inspiration in public speeches by political leaders, notably President Milošević, who referred to him in his Gazimestan speech on the occasion of the battle anniversary. His regime often alluded to Obilić frequently in comparison to Milosević, who was proclaimed the "saviour of the nation".

Obilić is featured in Serbian rhymical idiom "Dva loša ubiše Miloša" or "Dva su loša ubila Miloša" which translates as "Two no-goods have killed Miloš". The idiom addresses the issue of quantity prevailing over quality as a sad fact of life, since Obilić was outnumbered by the enemies.

In Serbian epic poetry, there are several blood brotherhoods. Miloš Obilić with Milan Toplica and Ivan Kosančić, Miloš Obilić with Prince Marko, Miloš Obilić with the Jugović brothers.

He is included in The 100 most prominent Serbs.

See also

• Battle of Kosovo
• List of Serbs
• History of Serbia
• Lazar of Serbia