By the middle of the 15th century, the Ottoman Empire’s territory stretched as far as modern-day Croatia. In 1469, Ottoman border soldiers controlled areas around Vinica in Bela Krajina. Because of Gottschee’s location near the Austro-Ottoman borderland, Ottoman raiding paths crossed through this region on their way to the heart of the Austrian Empire. The first recorded raids in Gottschee occurred in 1468. Records from 1471 and 1479 tell of devastating attacks on Kočevje, while 50 separate attacks were recorded between 1525 and 1530. Ottoman raiders camped in the vast forests around Gottschee and Snežnik.

Gottschee suffered no less from these raids than any other part of Carniola or Styria. Gottscheer oral tradition and toponyms that point to the presence of tabori are evidence of this shared experience.

Ottoman Raiding in Gottscheer Folk Songs and Tales

Memory in the form of oral tradition passes from generation to generation, even though some content may change over time. As it came down to us today, Gottscheer oral tradition (folk songs, stories, legends, etc.) illustrates the Gottscheer experience of Ottoman raiding.

Folklore moves across a geographical space, crossing local and even linguistic borders. Such is the case with folk songs, which change as different populations adopt them: place names might be substituted, characters may change, and themes may vary. As such, it is difficult to determine the exact origin of Gottscheer folk songs and legends. Nonetheless, the presence of a number of songs about the Ottoman Incursions in the folkloric opus of the Gottscheers shows that this period of history held significant cultural and historical meaning. The body of known Gottscheer oral tradition describing the Incursions is relatively small. However, the folk songs and stories available to us tell of a time of violence (both from raiding and of soldiers going to fight Ottoman forces), the shock and horror of devşirme and kidnappings, and the helplessness Gottscheers felt at the hands of Ottoman raiders. That helplessness is manifest in stories of divine intervention and miracles as well.

The Gottscheers and Ottoman Violence

The folk tale collection of Wilhelm Tschinkel contains one particular tale on the origin of the church in the village of Mozelj (German: Mösel). The tale begins: “When the Turks once again raided Gottschee and robbed and murdered from village to village, they also rode through the lovely little village of Mozelj.”

The village church in Mozej. Photo: Anja Moric.

Two folk songs collected by Adolf Hauffen in the 19th century tell of life near the Austro-Ottoman borderland. The first, appropriately titled “Vom Türkenkriege,”6 tells the story of a young soldier crossing through Gottschee on his way to fight the Ottomans in Ogulin.7 He encounters St. Barbara, who asks him where he travels. The soldier responds: “I must go to the grand army/ to the grand army, to Turkey” and tells St. Barbara that he knows he will neither return nor have a Christian burial among “Turkish guns … [and] dogs.” It is not certain whether the soldier in the song is a Gottscheer or not. However, it is clear that the wars against the Ottomans were also a Gottscheer affair, and that Gottscheers came into contact with soldiers passing through their region or fighting in wars.

The second song tells the story of the Councilor Stephen, who, riding around Koprivnik (German: Nesseltal) comes upon a well. He throws his matrimonial ring into the well: “If the ring floats,/ I shall return” (from war against the Ottomans). The ring sinks, Stephen bids his wife farewell, and rides for Ogulin, where he falls in battle. The “Turks” put his head on a spike, which they send to Koprivnik. The song ends with the Turks announcing, “Rejoice, rejoice, people of Koprivnik,/ the lord Stephen is no more!” As a result of how the Gottscheers experienced raids, the Ottomans became a symbol of violent acts in Gottscheer folk songs.

Kidnappings

Forced recruitment for the Ottoman palace guard and kidnappings by the Ottomans feature prominently in folk songs and legends around the Balkan Peninsula. Gottscheer songs are no exception. These songs focus on reported kidnappings of women and young maidens to the Ottoman Empire.

One such story features prominently in a legend in Tschinkel’s collection and in a song collected by Hauffen. In Tschinkel’s version, a beggar begs a Turkish pasha for alms. The pasha has nothing to offer; he is poor and without a wife. The beggar tells the pasha that he knows of two maidens in “beautiful Gottschee,” who sit in the church in Stara Cerkev (German: Mitterdorf) on August 15th, the Feast of the Assumption. The pasha travels to Gottschee on the holiday, where he declares to frightened pilgrims upon entering the church not to fear, for “[He has] only come for that which [he] lack[s].” The pasha grabs the beautiful Margaret by her hand and rushes back with her to Turkey before the congregation can react.

In Hauffen’s version, the pasha also directly tells the maiden that she will come with him “to the Turkish lands.” The song follows a similar story, albeit in more detail and with an ending where Margaret curses the pasha. The shock of the congregation conveyed in the first story surely reflects the shock and horror of locals when raiders kidnapped Gottscheer maidens in the 15th and 16th centuries. In both stories, the pasha arrives on one of the vital holidays of the Catholic calendar. We may assume that the Gottscheers also saw their religious life endangered by the Ottomans.

Miracles and the Divine

Miracles as well as averted catastrophes appear in Tschinkel’s collection of folk tales. In the story of Sveta Kri by Mozelj, a band of Ottoman raiders thunders into Mozelj, where their horses drop to the ground and freeze when they encounter a rosebush covered in dew made of blood. The frightened raiders retreat. The locals went on to build the chapel of the Holy Blood at that spot; ruins of the chapel can be found not far from the village church today.

In another legend, a group of villagers hides from raiders in a cave near Vrbovec (German: Tiefental). When the raiders arrive, the besieged take a flame in hand and burn their last bull, which was in hiding with them. The howls echoe so loudly that the Ottoman raiders think an entire herd of cows, and thus many men, remain in the village. The raiders lose hope and make their retreat.

Gottscheer and Regional Folklore

Folklore I have recounted here is specifically about the Gottscheers. It is notable that the structure of this folklore is similar in many respects to that of Slovenian folklore about the Ottoman Incursions. That tradition, too, contains songs and legends about Slovenian peasants hiding in caves, divine intervention connected to foritifed churches, and multiple expressions of helplessness. These similarities indicate two conclusions. First, the Ottoman Incursions were a shared experience across the Slovenian Lands, even though these accounts tend to leave out the Gottscheers. Second, taken together, these bodies of folklore demonstrate a common tradition across the Slovenian Lands; the Gottscheers and Slovenians borrowed from one another, influencing their own cultures in turn.

Ottoman incursions and toponyms

Due to the large number of abandoned Gottscheer villages in the Gottschee region, it is difficult to discern how many tabori existed in this space. However, it is possible to determine from local toponyms that the Gottscheers also constructed anti-Ottoman fortifications in their villages. We may assume that the Gottscheers fortified their churches specifically as centers of village wealth and spiritual life. One such fortification existed in Mozelj, which may have been able to shelter several hundred people (Mosbruker). Stari Tabor (German: Alttabor, Gottscheerish: Autrtawr) and Novi Tabor (German: Neutabor) are now-abandoned Gottscheer settlements in today’s municipality of Semič. Stari Tabor, according to the Local Lexicon of the Drava Banate, has its origins in an anti-Ottoman fortification. Novi Tabor shares similar origins, founded during the 16th-century period of raiding.

Remarks:

To call these raids “Turkish” would be historically inaccurate. The armed men carrying out attacks on the Slovenian Lands would most likely have been Christian converts to Islam: they were Ottoman military men. The term “Turk” reflects the name the inhabitants of what we today call Europe gave to Muslims for much of history. The term “Ottoman” would be more appropriate. The name for what would perhaps more accurately be called “Ottoman raids” or “incursions” survives in Slovenian memory under the name “Turkish.” I use the term “Ottoman Incursions” in this article.

Devşirme: The Ottoman child levy or “blood tax”, whereby the Ottomans would kidnap young boys from among their Christian subjects to be raised as soldiers (Janissaries) or bureaucrats in the Ottoman court.

Sources:

– Fister, Peter. Arhitektura Slovenskih protiturških taborov. Ljubljana: Slovenska matica, 1975.

– Moric, Anja (ur.). Pesemsko izročilo Kočevske: Adolf Hauffen: nemški jezikovni otok na Kočevskem. Zgodovina in narečje, življenjske razmere, šege in navade, pripovedke, pravljice in pesmi: znanstvenokritična izdaja. Ljubljana: Založba ZRC SAZU, 2024.

– “History.” Gottscheer Heritage and Genalogy Association. https://gottschee.org/history/.

– Krajevni leksikon dravske banovine. Ljubljana: Uprava Krajvnega leksikona dravske banovine, 1937.

– Mosbruker, Mojmir, “Tabori.” Turški vpadi, 2020. https://turki.splet.arnes.si/tabori/.

– Savnik, Roman, Planina, Francè, and Šifrer, Živko, Krajevni Leksikon Slovenije: repertorij z uradnimi, topografskimi, zemljepisnimi, zgodovinskimi, kulturnimi, gospodarskimi in turističnimi podatki vseh krajev Slovenije. Vol. 2, Ljubljana: Državna založba Slovenije, 1971.

– Tschinkel, Wilhelm. Kočevarska Folklora v šegah, navadah, pravljicach, povedkah, legendah in drugih Folklornih Izročilih: Gottscheer Volkstum in Sitte, Brauch, Märchen, Sagen, Legenden Und Anderen Volkstümlichen Überlieferungen. Ljubljana: ZRC, 2004.

– Voje, Ignacij. Slovenci pod pritiskom Turškega nasilja. Ljubljana: Znanstveni inštitut Filozofske fakultete, 1996.

Članek je nastal v okviru projekta Teža preteklosti: dediščina večkulturnega območja – primer Kočevske, ki ga sofinancira Javna agencija za znanstvenoraziskovalno in inovacijsko dejavnost Republike Slovenije, in s finančno podporo Ministrstva za kulturo Republike Slovenije.

Read in the previous post: Gottscheer recipients of Olympic medals.

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