International congress of byzantine studies belgrade, 22 27 august 2016

Ljubica Jovanović
American Public University System, Nashville TN, United States; 
[e-mail]
Byzantine Historiography in Slavonic Disguise
This presentation will take a close look at the transmission and transformation of the literary 
patterns of prognostication of Byzantine historiography of Niketas Choniates into South Slavonic 
tradition. In honor of the host city of this conference, Belgrade, I will focus on the presence of the same 
literary model in the nineteenth century epic poem, 
The Beginning of the Revolt against the Dahias
. The 
main storyline takes place in Kula Nebojša at the feet of Kalemegdan at Belgrade’s river bank.
The twelfth century Byzantine historiography follows into the steps of the Classical and 
Hellenistic scientific, literary, and religious traditions. Niketas Choniates in a true style of Byzantine 
Renaissance writes his 
History
in classicizing tradition and his historiography reminds us of 
Herodotus, with the main difference that it is Christianized. As Paul Magdalino rightly remarks, 
Choniates, in a good classical tradition makes the events being triggered by oracles and prophecies 
and weaves their fulfillment into a good story.
The sequence of divine signs that Choniates describes follows a certain pattern: it starts with the 
saintly people, continues with astronomical bodies, then points out to certain changes in the emission 
of the sun-light, discusses the transmission of the light, and ends with its effects on the water surfaces. 
We will find this model partially of fully transposed and transformed in Slavonic literary tradition of 
various genres, such as in fifteenth century script of Žitie Asenethi. What is interesting is that it appears 
almost intact in an orally transmitted Serbian humourous epic poem from nineteenth century, 
The 
Beginning of the Revolt against the Dahias
(Početak Bune protiv Dahija).

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