Counter Monument
Slavic 151 Herscher
12/17/12
Nick Rakic
Term Paper Pride and Inat Form a Counter Monument
What is the first thing you think of when you see a skull? It is usually not a happy thought. The usual thoughts are scary. The connotations usually associated with skulls are death, gloom, and despair. If a person were to see a skull they would most likely get freaked out. Seeing a skull means that someone has died. If someone were to go outside on Halloween while children are trick or treating, or were to go out to a haunted house, they would undoubtedly encounter multiple skeletons, or skulls. This is because they are scary, and represent death, making them perfect for the celebration of the Day of the Dead. But if you …show more content…
go to Serbia, and you ask the Serbian people what they think of when they see Skull Tower, a tower made out of human skulls, they will tell you that they feel proud. They feel the pride that those skulls felt for their country, and that they had no problem giving up their lives for the sake of their country. The pride that is felt when people see Skull Tower, is the reason why Skull tower has been transformed from a monument into a counter monument.
When Patrick Henry declared, “Give me liberty or give me death” he displayed Inat (pronounced eenut). When John F. Kennedy gave his speech about the moon landing he said the following: “We choose to do this & these other things not because they are easy but because they are hard", he showed a prime example of Inat. There is no literal translation for Inat, but loosely translated it means stubborn pride. There is a saying “There is no translation for inat because Serbians are the only ones have it” While stubborn pride is the simplest definition for Inat, a more accurate and deep description of the word is proud defiance, stubbornness, and self preservation, most often with total disregard to how it will affect anyone else. This same Inat is what has had the power to turn a gruesome and intimidating statue into a counter monument, and a source of pride. A monument is a structure that is erected with the purpose of commemorating a famous or notable person or event. A Counter-monument is a monument that is erected not only to commemorate a famous or notable event, but also to show the truth about what happened. To help clarify this I will use two possible monuments for the famous explorer Christopher Columbus. The first one will be a monument, while the second one will be a counter monument. For example, lets say that someone decided to erect a monument for Christopher Columbus. A more traditional monument for Columbus would be a sculpture of Christopher Columbus on a huge ship. This would be accurate because Columbus is one of the most famous explorers in history, and is typically credited with the finding of the new world, also known as the Americas. So because of this, a monument depicting Columbus as an explorer is an accurate one, and it is focused on Memory, because it is what Columbus is famous for. Now let’s say that someone is trying to erect a counter monument for Christopher Columbus. A statue depicting Columbus being lost, and then killing and enslaving Native Americans would be an accurate depiction of the event. While they are both depicting the truth about what happened in the New World, the counter monument would be more focused on the truth, and the things that seem to get forgotten quite often, which is more eye opening and not as censored for the public.
The Ottoman Empire was an extremely powerful dynasty, which ruled much of Europe and Asia from the late thirteenth century all the way until the early twentieth century. More specifically, it ruled Serbia from the fifteenth century up until 1912. Throughout these five centuries, there were many attempted revolutions. They were all pretty much unsuccessful. Some of those revolutions ended up being successful for a few years at a time, but none of them ended up being completely successful. One of those revolutions was responsible for the skulls on Skull Tower, the first Serbian Uprising (1804-1813) led by Stevan Sindelic. On May 31, 1809 on Cegar Hill, a few kilometers Northeast of Nis, which is one of the main cities in Serbia, the Serbian revolutionaries suffered their greatest defeat of that uprising. Their advance towards the city of Nis was stopped at Cegar Hill, where the far stronger, and far more numerous Turkish forces attacked. Then once the Serbian insurrectionists saw that their future looked dire, and that they were most likely facing eminent death or capture, killed themselves. The Serbian commander, Stevan Sindelic. Sacrificially fired at his gunpowder depot, thus killing himself and the rest of his troops and not giving the advancing Turks that satisfaction. And event though the insurrectionists’ sacrificial killing destroyed any chance of their group winning the battle, all in all the move was extremely beneficial to the cause as a whole because the blast killed many Turk as well. This in turn gained Stevan Sindelic and his men a great deal of respect. They knew they were pinned down, but they did not let that stop them. They did all that they could to help the Serbian Population, and because of this gained the insurrectionists a great deal of respect, even if they did all die. Sindelic’s final act was pyrrhic. It ensured that the Turks victory cost them much more than they possibly could have stood to gain/ (Koundounaris). It not only gave the rest of the live Serbian troops pride and motivation, but also affected the Turkish metal state in a negative way. After the Serbian Army waved the white flag, the Turkish Commander in Nis, Hursid Pasha decided to build a monument with the severed skulls of the Serbian insurrectionists. This gruesome monument was going to serve as a reminder of what happened there that day, but it was also going to serve as a warning. That if any more Serbian forces were going to attack the powerful Turks that they were going to face the same dire outcome. Skull tower ended up being built with 952 skulls, featuring Stevan Sindelic’s skull at the top. As if that was not enough for the Turks, they followed the building of that monument with the scalping of their heads. Hursid Pasha scalped the skulls and sent them to Sultan Mahmud the second as proof of what his army was able to do. The tower then stood in open air until the liberation of Nis in 1878. However, by this time a much of the tower had deteriorated because of weather conditions or because family members of the deceased removed the skulls in order to give their relatives a proper burial. Then in 1892, with donations gathered from all over Serbia, a chapel was designed to enclose what was left of the tower. Today, there are only fifty-eight skulls remaining, including the one of Stevan Sindelic. The Skull tower was declared Monument of Culture of Exceptional Importance.
One of the main reasons why Skull Tower transformed into a counter monument is because it changed meaning.
It had a certain meaning when the Turks had control over Serbia but then the meaning changed after the Serbians were liberated. When the monument was erected, it stood as a warning. It was used to intimidate and hopefully discourage any potential uprising by the Serbian people. The Initial monument served as a testament to the strength of the Ottomans (Milentijevic). It showed the Serbian population that a lot more power was necessary for them to overcome the Ottomans. And while it was intended to both intimidate the Serbians and display the Ottomans strength, it seemed to only show how powerful the ottomans were, without having any negative effects on the psyche of the Serbian people. If anything it just encourage the Serbians to keep fighting, and to not give up. One of the reasons why the Serbians found the monument so disrespectful was because it was extremely old fashioned and barbaric. “ Cele Kula is the last skull tower ever constructed; in fact, it was archaic even at its conception since the practice had long been out of style, but was intended to shock the Serbs with its anachronistic display of Old World barbarity” (Koudounaris). This further exemplifies the fact that the initial meaning behind the statue was to be used as a warning and to put the Serbian people and soldiers in place, and further dissuade any potential
uprisings. In the end this proved to be unsuccessful as the Serbians eventually freed themselves and were able to establish their own independence and a new independent country called Yugoslavia. While Yugoslavia as a whole country officially became independent in 1912, the region that included Nis and Cele Kula was liberated in 1878. An important decision was needed to be made following the emancipation. What should the Serbian people do with violent, and morbid Skull Tower? Should they take it down, and try to move on past the transgressions that were caused? Or should they leave it and use it as a source and display of pride? The final decision was to turn into a patriotic monument (Koudouairis). This may seem astonishing to most people, as it was to me when I came across this in my research. But the more information I found, and the more I thought about it the more it made sense. While it may have initially succeeded in its aim to display Old-world Barbarity, and to be seen as a mark of humiliation and intimidation, the end result was quite different. It ended up being looked at as a symbol of bravery and sacrifice while at the same time being looked at as a great source of pride. This is the beginning of why the statue is currently a counter monument, another reason why is the pride and the how the events that transpired are remembered. This alteration in the meaning is the reason why Skull Tower stands as a counter monument today. Not because of the fact that it changed meanings but because of how it changed meanings and what the new meaning became. The only purpose Skull Tower served before the liberation of Nis was as a commemoration of what happened, albeit an extremely gruesome one. Its purpose was to intimidate but that was achieved because when you someone saw the statue they remembered what took place there in the past. This is follows the definition of a monument, as was laid out earlier in the essay. The new purpose and meaning was to remember the events exactly as they happened and the negative aspect that was associated with what the Turks did. It was not enough for the Turks to be in complete control of the country and to have won a pivotal battle, which slowed the revolution, they had to embarrass the Serbians. It wasn’t enough to just have the victory, they had to flaunt and shove it into the Serbian’s faces, and this is the main reason why he whole ordeal bothered the Serbians as much as it did. To further exemplify why Skull Tower is currently a counter monument as opposed to being regular monument, we need to look at some examples of different, made up, monuments that could have been used instead. The first possible way to display the Serbian’s defeat is to depict Stevan Sindelic kneeling in defeat. This would suffice as a good enough memory for what happened there. It would summarize the event nicely; Stevan Sindelic and his men came up short and lost the battle. Another potential monument for the memory of what happened there is a statue depicting the Turkish forces as victorious. This would be a monument because again it suffices as a summary of what happened there. The Turks met the opposition and came out on top victorious. The reason why those two would be monuments is because all they do is tell the people looking at the statues what happened there. If a Serbian were to look at those two fictional statues, they would not hash up a lot of resentment towards what happened there. They would see it as an act of war, and that it was justifiable. But since Skull Tower is none of those things, it causes people to get a lot angrier and it brings up the more barbaric side of the statue. Much how Koudounaris stated that it was a sign of old- world barbarity, and humiliation, that is what conjures those feelings of anger. When someone, more specifically a Serbian person, looks at Skull Tower today, they do not think about the Serbian insurrectionists losing the battle, they think about the disrespect and humiliation that the Turks displayed towards the late troops. Much like the Christopher Columbus example explained earlier, the monuments would focus on the bigger picture of what happened in both situations. How Columbus was an explorer, or how the Turks just defeated the Serbian forces. Whereas the counter monuments in both cases would look at the truth behind everything that happened, and some of the uglier, less appealing details.
So now that Skull Tower has been established as a counter monument, where do pride and Inat play their role? To begin with, without Inat there never would be such a statue. Inat is what promoted Stevan Sindelic to kill himself and his troops as opposed to letting the Turkish forces be the ones that kill them. By killing himself and his men Sindelic displayed the proud defiance, stubbornness, and self-preservation when he decided to kill his men. The defiance came in by denying the Turkish forces the privilege of ending his life, and the life of his men. The stubbornness played a role because he was set in his ways, and the beliefs of the rest of the Serbian soldiers at the time, and refused to be captured. The belief was that if you couldn’t kill your enemies while you were in war, that you might as well kill yourself. (Petrovic). Stevan Sindelic’s stubbornness to stick to this belief no matter what is why he had to kill himself. The self-preservation had a huge factor in the suicide as well. Legacy is one of the most important things in Serbian culture. How you are remembered far outweighs anything you could have done while you are alive. (Milentijevic). Sindelic refused to let his place in history be one of surrender and capture, and he definitely did not want it to be one of murder at the hands of the people he was supposed to kill. If it weren’t for Inat, then Sindelic would not have had the proud defiance to not give in to the Turks, and let them kill them. Had he not had inat he would not have had the stubbornness to stick so closely to his personal beliefs, and the beliefs of the Serbian army at the time. And lastly, had he not had Inat he would not have had the felt the need for the self preservation of his legacy, and he would have rather lived even if he might have gotten captured, than to kill himself.
Since Skull Tower is a counter monument that causes the Serbian people to remember the barbarity of the Ottomans, overcoming that, and finally gaining liberty from the Turks is a source of great pride for them. The famous French writer, poet and politician, Alphonse de Lamartine, had a quote summing up the pride behind the monument for the Serbian People, in his work the Journey of the East. “My eyes and my heart greeted the remains of those brave men whose cut-off heads made the cornerstone of the independence of their homeland. May the Serbs keep this monument! It will always teach their children the value of the independence of a people, showing them the real price their fathers had to pay for it.” It is a great source of pride to the Serbians. The national pride that those soldiers showed everybody, how they would have rather sacrificed their own lives and made a slight difference to the cause, as opposed to just sitting down and surrendering is still talked about to this day.
When I talked to Grandma about this topic, and told her what I was writing about she immediately broke down into tears. I was confused, I did not know if maybe I crossed some cultural line, or said some sort of taboo. I wondered maybe the monument is something that people did not talk about, maybe two hundred years later the wound was still fresh. Then she went on to explain the tears. When my grandmother and grandfather went on their first date, one of the things they talked about was the statue. Why on earth would someone bring up a tower made of human skulls on their first date with someone? Then my grandmother clarified. My grandfather’s great grandfather was one of the men whose skulls were featured on the skull tower. This means that my grandfather’s great grandfather was one of the men that gave up their life for the sake of Serbia. This sort of pride is common through out. This is why, as mentioned earlier, Skull Tower is currently considered a symbol of bravery and heroic sacrifice. (Koudounaris) It is a symbol of people that would do anything for their country, and they deserve the utmost respect. Just like de Lamartine said in his quote, it shows children the true price of freedom and what their fathers paid for it. This is why they deserve to be appreciated, and the Serbian People today should be proud to have had such great men before them make it possible for them to enjoy life in the way that they do.
This anecdote of my grandmother and grandfathers date is a perfect example of post memory. Post memory is when an event is described to you, and then you start to take what was told to you as a part of your history, and you almost start to believe it as if it actually happened to you. Post memory is when someone can envision something so vividly in their mind, that they almost feel like they were there when it happened. It’s like hearing a story, and being able to envision all of the details, like what color the curtains were, what color the walls were, how many windows were in the room, what sounds were heard in the background etc. A reason why this is an example is post memory is because the story and what actually happened at the battle has only been told. There were very few witnesses, if any, that witnessed what, happened firsthand, besides the Turkish soldiers. (Milentijevic). So because of this the Serbian people relied on word of mouth to spread the story. Parents, and grandparents told theirchildren about it, who in turn spread the word to their friends, and so on and so on. This is how my grandfather told him about the story. His father told him the story, which he heard from his father, who heard it from his family, in the same way in which my grandmother told me. When I heard my grandma explain what happened when the Serbian insurrectionists killed themselves, it sounded as if she was there when it happened. She describes the surroundings so vividly. And now because of that, whenever I think of that battle it feels to me like I was hiding behind some bush or tree and just observing what was going on. I can see Stevan Sindelic’s long handlebar mustache, I can see the Serbians and their red uniforms, I can see Sindelic aiming his rifle at the gunpowder rifle, his hands shaking, him missing the first time and then finally making contact and blowing everything up. While these details that I am seeing might be completely wrong, they are still post memory. It is how the event was described to me, and to me truly feels like I actually was there. This is post memory. Post memory is being described a certain event and then taking that memory as if it was your own and remembering it, and thinking that it actually happened to you.
Pride and inat are what made it possible for the Serbians to overcome the Turks. At the same time pride and inat is what turned a gruesome and barbaric monument into a national symbol of pride, sacrifice, bravery, and perseverance. This same pride and inat is the reason why Serbia, a country that is a shell of what it once was, is still an extremely proud country. You ask a Serbian what the greatest country in the world, they will, without hesitating, yell Serbia and hold up their thumb, index and middle finger (a gesture representing Serbia) In a country that has been ravaged by war in the recent decades, that needs a rebirth, is having pride in a monument praising death and skulls, the right thing to do. How can a country that is desperate for an improvement in living conditions, improve anything when it is stuck in the past, angry about what was done against them in the past. Only when Serbians can move on, and forget about the barbaric act the Turks did in erecting Skull Tower, and take away its status as a counter monument will they be able to take steps in the right direction towards recapturing prominence.
SOURCES
Petrovic, Vojislav. Cele Kula i Cegar. 1st Ed. Belgrade: Republika Zavod za Zastitu, 2004. Print.
Milentinovic, Zoran. Cele Kula. Nis: Shtampa Procbeta, Print.
Alphonse de la Martine, A Pilgrimage to the Holy Land: Comprising Recollections, Sketches, and Reflections Made During a Tour in the East, vol. 2 (New York: 1842), 266-267
Koudounaris, Paul. "The Cele Kula: The Last of the Skull Towers." Ezine. n.d. n. page. Print. <http://citationmachine.net/index2.php?reqstyleid=1&reqsrcid=MLAMagazine&srcCod&more=no&mode=for>.
12/17/12
Nick Rakic
Term Paper Pride and Inat Form a Counter Monument
What is the first thing you think of when you see a skull? It is usually not a happy thought. The usual thoughts are scary. The connotations usually associated with skulls are death, gloom, and despair. If a person were to see a skull they would most likely get freaked out. Seeing a skull means that someone has died. If someone were to go outside on Halloween while children are trick or treating, or were to go out to a haunted house, they would undoubtedly encounter multiple skeletons, or skulls. This is because they are scary, and represent death, making them perfect for the celebration of the Day of the Dead. But if you …show more content…
go to Serbia, and you ask the Serbian people what they think of when they see Skull Tower, a tower made out of human skulls, they will tell you that they feel proud. They feel the pride that those skulls felt for their country, and that they had no problem giving up their lives for the sake of their country. The pride that is felt when people see Skull Tower, is the reason why Skull tower has been transformed from a monument into a counter monument.
When Patrick Henry declared, “Give me liberty or give me death” he displayed Inat (pronounced eenut). When John F. Kennedy gave his speech about the moon landing he said the following: “We choose to do this & these other things not because they are easy but because they are hard", he showed a prime example of Inat. There is no literal translation for Inat, but loosely translated it means stubborn pride. There is a saying “There is no translation for inat because Serbians are the only ones have it” While stubborn pride is the simplest definition for Inat, a more accurate and deep description of the word is proud defiance, stubbornness, and self preservation, most often with total disregard to how it will affect anyone else. This same Inat is what has had the power to turn a gruesome and intimidating statue into a counter monument, and a source of pride. A monument is a structure that is erected with the purpose of commemorating a famous or notable person or event. A Counter-monument is a monument that is erected not only to commemorate a famous or notable event, but also to show the truth about what happened. To help clarify this I will use two possible monuments for the famous explorer Christopher Columbus. The first one will be a monument, while the second one will be a counter monument. For example, lets say that someone decided to erect a monument for Christopher Columbus. A more traditional monument for Columbus would be a sculpture of Christopher Columbus on a huge ship. This would be accurate because Columbus is one of the most famous explorers in history, and is typically credited with the finding of the new world, also known as the Americas. So because of this, a monument depicting Columbus as an explorer is an accurate one, and it is focused on Memory, because it is what Columbus is famous for. Now let’s say that someone is trying to erect a counter monument for Christopher Columbus. A statue depicting Columbus being lost, and then killing and enslaving Native Americans would be an accurate depiction of the event. While they are both depicting the truth about what happened in the New World, the counter monument would be more focused on the truth, and the things that seem to get forgotten quite often, which is more eye opening and not as censored for the public.
The Ottoman Empire was an extremely powerful dynasty, which ruled much of Europe and Asia from the late thirteenth century all the way until the early twentieth century. More specifically, it ruled Serbia from the fifteenth century up until 1912. Throughout these five centuries, there were many attempted revolutions. They were all pretty much unsuccessful. Some of those revolutions ended up being successful for a few years at a time, but none of them ended up being completely successful. One of those revolutions was responsible for the skulls on Skull Tower, the first Serbian Uprising (1804-1813) led by Stevan Sindelic. On May 31, 1809 on Cegar Hill, a few kilometers Northeast of Nis, which is one of the main cities in Serbia, the Serbian revolutionaries suffered their greatest defeat of that uprising. Their advance towards the city of Nis was stopped at Cegar Hill, where the far stronger, and far more numerous Turkish forces attacked. Then once the Serbian insurrectionists saw that their future looked dire, and that they were most likely facing eminent death or capture, killed themselves. The Serbian commander, Stevan Sindelic. Sacrificially fired at his gunpowder depot, thus killing himself and the rest of his troops and not giving the advancing Turks that satisfaction. And event though the insurrectionists’ sacrificial killing destroyed any chance of their group winning the battle, all in all the move was extremely beneficial to the cause as a whole because the blast killed many Turk as well. This in turn gained Stevan Sindelic and his men a great deal of respect. They knew they were pinned down, but they did not let that stop them. They did all that they could to help the Serbian Population, and because of this gained the insurrectionists a great deal of respect, even if they did all die. Sindelic’s final act was pyrrhic. It ensured that the Turks victory cost them much more than they possibly could have stood to gain/ (Koundounaris). It not only gave the rest of the live Serbian troops pride and motivation, but also affected the Turkish metal state in a negative way. After the Serbian Army waved the white flag, the Turkish Commander in Nis, Hursid Pasha decided to build a monument with the severed skulls of the Serbian insurrectionists. This gruesome monument was going to serve as a reminder of what happened there that day, but it was also going to serve as a warning. That if any more Serbian forces were going to attack the powerful Turks that they were going to face the same dire outcome. Skull tower ended up being built with 952 skulls, featuring Stevan Sindelic’s skull at the top. As if that was not enough for the Turks, they followed the building of that monument with the scalping of their heads. Hursid Pasha scalped the skulls and sent them to Sultan Mahmud the second as proof of what his army was able to do. The tower then stood in open air until the liberation of Nis in 1878. However, by this time a much of the tower had deteriorated because of weather conditions or because family members of the deceased removed the skulls in order to give their relatives a proper burial. Then in 1892, with donations gathered from all over Serbia, a chapel was designed to enclose what was left of the tower. Today, there are only fifty-eight skulls remaining, including the one of Stevan Sindelic. The Skull tower was declared Monument of Culture of Exceptional Importance.
One of the main reasons why Skull Tower transformed into a counter monument is because it changed meaning.
It had a certain meaning when the Turks had control over Serbia but then the meaning changed after the Serbians were liberated. When the monument was erected, it stood as a warning. It was used to intimidate and hopefully discourage any potential uprising by the Serbian people. The Initial monument served as a testament to the strength of the Ottomans (Milentijevic). It showed the Serbian population that a lot more power was necessary for them to overcome the Ottomans. And while it was intended to both intimidate the Serbians and display the Ottomans strength, it seemed to only show how powerful the ottomans were, without having any negative effects on the psyche of the Serbian people. If anything it just encourage the Serbians to keep fighting, and to not give up. One of the reasons why the Serbians found the monument so disrespectful was because it was extremely old fashioned and barbaric. “ Cele Kula is the last skull tower ever constructed; in fact, it was archaic even at its conception since the practice had long been out of style, but was intended to shock the Serbs with its anachronistic display of Old World barbarity” (Koudounaris). This further exemplifies the fact that the initial meaning behind the statue was to be used as a warning and to put the Serbian people and soldiers in place, and further dissuade any potential
uprisings. In the end this proved to be unsuccessful as the Serbians eventually freed themselves and were able to establish their own independence and a new independent country called Yugoslavia. While Yugoslavia as a whole country officially became independent in 1912, the region that included Nis and Cele Kula was liberated in 1878. An important decision was needed to be made following the emancipation. What should the Serbian people do with violent, and morbid Skull Tower? Should they take it down, and try to move on past the transgressions that were caused? Or should they leave it and use it as a source and display of pride? The final decision was to turn into a patriotic monument (Koudouairis). This may seem astonishing to most people, as it was to me when I came across this in my research. But the more information I found, and the more I thought about it the more it made sense. While it may have initially succeeded in its aim to display Old-world Barbarity, and to be seen as a mark of humiliation and intimidation, the end result was quite different. It ended up being looked at as a symbol of bravery and sacrifice while at the same time being looked at as a great source of pride. This is the beginning of why the statue is currently a counter monument, another reason why is the pride and the how the events that transpired are remembered. This alteration in the meaning is the reason why Skull Tower stands as a counter monument today. Not because of the fact that it changed meanings but because of how it changed meanings and what the new meaning became. The only purpose Skull Tower served before the liberation of Nis was as a commemoration of what happened, albeit an extremely gruesome one. Its purpose was to intimidate but that was achieved because when you someone saw the statue they remembered what took place there in the past. This is follows the definition of a monument, as was laid out earlier in the essay. The new purpose and meaning was to remember the events exactly as they happened and the negative aspect that was associated with what the Turks did. It was not enough for the Turks to be in complete control of the country and to have won a pivotal battle, which slowed the revolution, they had to embarrass the Serbians. It wasn’t enough to just have the victory, they had to flaunt and shove it into the Serbian’s faces, and this is the main reason why he whole ordeal bothered the Serbians as much as it did. To further exemplify why Skull Tower is currently a counter monument as opposed to being regular monument, we need to look at some examples of different, made up, monuments that could have been used instead. The first possible way to display the Serbian’s defeat is to depict Stevan Sindelic kneeling in defeat. This would suffice as a good enough memory for what happened there. It would summarize the event nicely; Stevan Sindelic and his men came up short and lost the battle. Another potential monument for the memory of what happened there is a statue depicting the Turkish forces as victorious. This would be a monument because again it suffices as a summary of what happened there. The Turks met the opposition and came out on top victorious. The reason why those two would be monuments is because all they do is tell the people looking at the statues what happened there. If a Serbian were to look at those two fictional statues, they would not hash up a lot of resentment towards what happened there. They would see it as an act of war, and that it was justifiable. But since Skull Tower is none of those things, it causes people to get a lot angrier and it brings up the more barbaric side of the statue. Much how Koudounaris stated that it was a sign of old- world barbarity, and humiliation, that is what conjures those feelings of anger. When someone, more specifically a Serbian person, looks at Skull Tower today, they do not think about the Serbian insurrectionists losing the battle, they think about the disrespect and humiliation that the Turks displayed towards the late troops. Much like the Christopher Columbus example explained earlier, the monuments would focus on the bigger picture of what happened in both situations. How Columbus was an explorer, or how the Turks just defeated the Serbian forces. Whereas the counter monuments in both cases would look at the truth behind everything that happened, and some of the uglier, less appealing details.
So now that Skull Tower has been established as a counter monument, where do pride and Inat play their role? To begin with, without Inat there never would be such a statue. Inat is what promoted Stevan Sindelic to kill himself and his troops as opposed to letting the Turkish forces be the ones that kill them. By killing himself and his men Sindelic displayed the proud defiance, stubbornness, and self-preservation when he decided to kill his men. The defiance came in by denying the Turkish forces the privilege of ending his life, and the life of his men. The stubbornness played a role because he was set in his ways, and the beliefs of the rest of the Serbian soldiers at the time, and refused to be captured. The belief was that if you couldn’t kill your enemies while you were in war, that you might as well kill yourself. (Petrovic). Stevan Sindelic’s stubbornness to stick to this belief no matter what is why he had to kill himself. The self-preservation had a huge factor in the suicide as well. Legacy is one of the most important things in Serbian culture. How you are remembered far outweighs anything you could have done while you are alive. (Milentijevic). Sindelic refused to let his place in history be one of surrender and capture, and he definitely did not want it to be one of murder at the hands of the people he was supposed to kill. If it weren’t for Inat, then Sindelic would not have had the proud defiance to not give in to the Turks, and let them kill them. Had he not had inat he would not have had the stubbornness to stick so closely to his personal beliefs, and the beliefs of the Serbian army at the time. And lastly, had he not had Inat he would not have had the felt the need for the self preservation of his legacy, and he would have rather lived even if he might have gotten captured, than to kill himself.
Since Skull Tower is a counter monument that causes the Serbian people to remember the barbarity of the Ottomans, overcoming that, and finally gaining liberty from the Turks is a source of great pride for them. The famous French writer, poet and politician, Alphonse de Lamartine, had a quote summing up the pride behind the monument for the Serbian People, in his work the Journey of the East. “My eyes and my heart greeted the remains of those brave men whose cut-off heads made the cornerstone of the independence of their homeland. May the Serbs keep this monument! It will always teach their children the value of the independence of a people, showing them the real price their fathers had to pay for it.” It is a great source of pride to the Serbians. The national pride that those soldiers showed everybody, how they would have rather sacrificed their own lives and made a slight difference to the cause, as opposed to just sitting down and surrendering is still talked about to this day.
When I talked to Grandma about this topic, and told her what I was writing about she immediately broke down into tears. I was confused, I did not know if maybe I crossed some cultural line, or said some sort of taboo. I wondered maybe the monument is something that people did not talk about, maybe two hundred years later the wound was still fresh. Then she went on to explain the tears. When my grandmother and grandfather went on their first date, one of the things they talked about was the statue. Why on earth would someone bring up a tower made of human skulls on their first date with someone? Then my grandmother clarified. My grandfather’s great grandfather was one of the men whose skulls were featured on the skull tower. This means that my grandfather’s great grandfather was one of the men that gave up their life for the sake of Serbia. This sort of pride is common through out. This is why, as mentioned earlier, Skull Tower is currently considered a symbol of bravery and heroic sacrifice. (Koudounaris) It is a symbol of people that would do anything for their country, and they deserve the utmost respect. Just like de Lamartine said in his quote, it shows children the true price of freedom and what their fathers paid for it. This is why they deserve to be appreciated, and the Serbian People today should be proud to have had such great men before them make it possible for them to enjoy life in the way that they do.
This anecdote of my grandmother and grandfathers date is a perfect example of post memory. Post memory is when an event is described to you, and then you start to take what was told to you as a part of your history, and you almost start to believe it as if it actually happened to you. Post memory is when someone can envision something so vividly in their mind, that they almost feel like they were there when it happened. It’s like hearing a story, and being able to envision all of the details, like what color the curtains were, what color the walls were, how many windows were in the room, what sounds were heard in the background etc. A reason why this is an example is post memory is because the story and what actually happened at the battle has only been told. There were very few witnesses, if any, that witnessed what, happened firsthand, besides the Turkish soldiers. (Milentijevic). So because of this the Serbian people relied on word of mouth to spread the story. Parents, and grandparents told theirchildren about it, who in turn spread the word to their friends, and so on and so on. This is how my grandfather told him about the story. His father told him the story, which he heard from his father, who heard it from his family, in the same way in which my grandmother told me. When I heard my grandma explain what happened when the Serbian insurrectionists killed themselves, it sounded as if she was there when it happened. She describes the surroundings so vividly. And now because of that, whenever I think of that battle it feels to me like I was hiding behind some bush or tree and just observing what was going on. I can see Stevan Sindelic’s long handlebar mustache, I can see the Serbians and their red uniforms, I can see Sindelic aiming his rifle at the gunpowder rifle, his hands shaking, him missing the first time and then finally making contact and blowing everything up. While these details that I am seeing might be completely wrong, they are still post memory. It is how the event was described to me, and to me truly feels like I actually was there. This is post memory. Post memory is being described a certain event and then taking that memory as if it was your own and remembering it, and thinking that it actually happened to you.
Pride and inat are what made it possible for the Serbians to overcome the Turks. At the same time pride and inat is what turned a gruesome and barbaric monument into a national symbol of pride, sacrifice, bravery, and perseverance. This same pride and inat is the reason why Serbia, a country that is a shell of what it once was, is still an extremely proud country. You ask a Serbian what the greatest country in the world, they will, without hesitating, yell Serbia and hold up their thumb, index and middle finger (a gesture representing Serbia) In a country that has been ravaged by war in the recent decades, that needs a rebirth, is having pride in a monument praising death and skulls, the right thing to do. How can a country that is desperate for an improvement in living conditions, improve anything when it is stuck in the past, angry about what was done against them in the past. Only when Serbians can move on, and forget about the barbaric act the Turks did in erecting Skull Tower, and take away its status as a counter monument will they be able to take steps in the right direction towards recapturing prominence.
SOURCES
Petrovic, Vojislav. Cele Kula i Cegar. 1st Ed. Belgrade: Republika Zavod za Zastitu, 2004. Print.
Milentinovic, Zoran. Cele Kula. Nis: Shtampa Procbeta, Print.
Alphonse de la Martine, A Pilgrimage to the Holy Land: Comprising Recollections, Sketches, and Reflections Made During a Tour in the East, vol. 2 (New York: 1842), 266-267
Koudounaris, Paul. "The Cele Kula: The Last of the Skull Towers." Ezine. n.d. n. page. Print. <http://citationmachine.net/index2.php?reqstyleid=1&reqsrcid=MLAMagazine&srcCod&more=no&mode=for>.