BOOK REVIEWS

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Journal of Croatian Studies, XX, 1979, – Annual Review of the Croatian Academy of America, Inc. New York, N.Y., Electronic edition by Studia Croatica, by permission. All rights reserved by the Croatian Academy of America.

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ETUDES LITTERAIRES SLAVO-ROMANES. By Riccardo Picchio. Studia Historica et Philologica, VI. Sectio Slavoromanica, number 3. (Florence: Lisosa Editrice, 1978. Pp. 207.) L. 9,000.

Better than any other contemporary Slavicist, Professor Riccardo Picchio represents a splendid and increasingly necessary return to an earlier universalist approach in Slavic studies. Fully equipped to research every Slavic national culture—no mean achievement in itself he has devoted more than three decades of fertile academic work to literary and cultural histories of the Slavic peoples, and he has trained some of the most original younger specialists in this field, first in Italy and more recently in the United States. His scholarly activities are an indispensable antidote to the smattering conceits, ahistorical presentism, narrowness, and general neglect of non-Russian Slavic literary traditions that characterize a considerable portion of North American Slavistic research. Moreover, he has never overlooked the European-wide dimension of Slavic cultural and literary activity: some of his most important work was done in the area of cultural relations and contacts between the Slavic peoples and their Western neighbors, especially the Romance vicinity, with emphasis on the Italians.

This collection of articles consists of Picchio's most recent studies in Slavic-Romance literary ties. Written almost exclusively in the 1970's, the essays are marvelously lucid, concise, and erudite. Several are of particular value to specialists in the field of Croatian literary and cultural history and will be noted herein.

Students of Croatian historiography will welcome Picchio's exposition of the works of Giovan Mario Filelfo (1426—1480), the first Renaissance author to write on Dubrovnik's past. The son of Francesco Filelfo, a famous Italian humanist, and Theodora, a daughter of the Byzantine scholar John Chrysoloras, Giovan Mario probably became interested in Dubrovnik because his younger brother Senofonte spent the last ten years of his life there (1460—1470) working as a chancellor of this patrician and mercantile republic.

Evidently, to judge from the contents of Giovan Mario's poem Ragusaeis and his Historia de origine atque rebus egregie gestis urbis Ragusae, both extant in Latin and Italian in the manuscript collection of the Biblioteca Palatina in Parma, Senofonte passed little of his knowledge of Dubrovnik's history to his elder brother. Giovan Mario's works were typical Renaissance products, concerned more with flourishing rhetorical incantations in support of glorious and ancient origins of contemporary dynasts and states than with critical or even truthful historical narratives. Thus the founder of Dubrovnik is Rago, a prince of Scythian royal blood. Filelfo invented this figure for strictly onomatopoeic reasons. Humanist conventions and the Latin and Italian names of Dubrovnik (Rhagusium, Ragusa) determined the "founder"'s name.

Professor Picchio convincingly shows that Giovan Mario benefitted from Senofonte's earlier information on Dubrovnik's legal customs. But the correctness of some of Filelfo's passages was not sufficient to compensate for the frivolity of the entire work—this despite fairly charming explanations of certain characteristic Ragusan institutions. For example, Rago chose not to marry and passed his political prerogatives to Dubrovnik's ruling Senate, which in the absence of Rago's first-born legitimately assumed the right of primogeniture on behalf of a republican order, but without violating the monarchical principle. Similarly, Filelfo provided mythological explanations of Dubrovnik's state independence and sympathetically commented on its defense against the Venetians and the Turks. The Senate, however, was not satisfied with these gestures. Fifty ducats rewarded to Filelfo in February 1475 were quickly withdrawn after the senators acquainted themselves with the contents. Level-headed patricians concluded that Filelfo's text was unrelated to Ragusan realities.

Professor Picchio believes that the demise of Filelfo's early effort reflects more on the testiness of Ragusan thought control than on the inaccessibility of Dubrovnik for Italian humanist literary genres. His reasons are compelling, except for the claim that Filelfo's failure to account for the Slavic term "Dubrovnik" might have violated the delicate balance between and "la susceptibilité des differents groupes ethnico-linguistiques" in the republic. Renaissance Dubrovnik tolerated far more acute outbursts of "Latin" ire—if such be the unconscious nature of Filelfo's omission---precisely because Croatization already had become irreversible. It is, however, accurate that Renaissance styles need not startled the Ragusans. This is the point of Professor Picchio's theoretical statement on the need for a comparative study Slavic-Romance literary history, which he read at the Eighth International Congress of Slavicists, held in Zagreb in September 1978.

Picchio's main intention in this article was to overcome the irrelevant discussions about the "autonomy" and "originality" of Slavic literary activity as compared with the "influences" of Romance—notably Italian—culture during the age of Humanism and the Renaissance. He proposes a different scheme, whereby the literary communities of Catholic Slavic lands—the area for which Picchio has coined the remarkably apt term "Slavia Romana"—adopted the same "rules of the game" which the Renaissance codified and introduced in the vernacular literatures of the Romance and the majority of the Germanic lands. Thus the chimera of "influences" vanishes and the accomplishments of a given author reflect his skills within the confines of Renaissance conventions: "On peut jouer le meme jeu d'une façon agreable ou désagréable, raffinée ou grossière suivant l'habilité des joueurs".

Obviously a party of tresette cannot be played with a poker hand. And in that sense the Renaissance conventions were imitative. Professor Picchio, however, rejects the Romantic rendering which maintained that imitation was in fact a denial of originality. To the contrary, the imitation of classical models and the raising of the "vulgar tongues" of Romano-Germanic Europe to the level of Latin permitted an out-pouring of creativity. Picchio argues that the pattern was identical in Slavia Romana, particularly among the Croatians and Poles. Moreover, as in Romance Europe, the introduction of vernacular literary activity in Slavia Romana was not a part of some "struggle" or "rebellion" - againt "le conservatisme du pouvor culturel latin", as the Romantics had it. Rather, because Marulić was a powerful Latin poet and Šišmundo and Džore were greatly inspired by Petrarch, these pioneers of Croatian imaginative literature of the Renaissance period were able to play the same game "u uersih haruacchi" (in Croat verses).

Historians of the Croatian language will also be attracted by Professor Picchio's guidelines to the participants in a comparative study of the "Language Question" among the Slays, a project which he is currently completing. Here again, he sees the Renaissance Italian Questione della lingua as the model for similar disputes in the Slavic world over the dignity and norm of various Slavic languages. These disputes also accompanied the process of Croatian linguistic standardization. In fact, Picchio sees so many parallels between Italian and Croatian linguistic arguments that he maintains "qu'en bien des cas on devrait parler d'une zone de civilisation commune comprenant I'Itale et une grande partie des pays croates plutôt que d'influences ou d'équivalences typologiques". Unfortunately cultural communality did not always assure the most harmonious political relations. In the curious Latin of Marin Držić s Pomet, "Contrarus contradia curabuntur!" Much, however, depends on spirited scholarship, such as Riccardo Pischio's.

IVO BANAC

Yale University

ŠIDAKOV ZBORNIK [COLLECTED PAPERS IN HONOR OF JAROSLAV ŠIDAK I. Edited by Mirjana Gross et al. Historijski zbornik, Volume 29-30. (Zagreb: Savez povijesnih društava Hrvatske, 1977. Pp. 585.)

Throughout the postwar period Professor Jaroslav Šidak was rightfully recognized as the dean of Croatian historians. Despite various pressures mounted by sundry ideological hacks and amateurish "patriots", he defended the truthful portrayal of Croatia's past with dignity and consummate scholarly skill. In a sense, nearly every lasting achievement accomplished by Croatian historiography since 1945 is connected with the name of Jaroslav Šidak and that of his students. His scholarly interests have ranged from problems of medieval "Church of Bosnia", Gubec's sixteenth-century rebellion, and the national ideologies of Krilanić and Ritter Vitezović, to the more recent issues of Croatian Revival, especially its Illyrian phase (including various misrepresentations of the 1848 epopee), expressions of South Slav solidarity in Croatian national movements, and the philosophical dilemmas of young Stjepan Radić. Moreover, as professor of modern European history (1945-1958) and as the head of the section of Croatian history (1958-1973) at the Philosophy Faculty of Zagreb University, Šidak trained practically all the Croat historians of the present day. In addition, as the chief editor of Historijski zbornik, he exercised a vast influence on the course of Croatian historical writing, both in content and in style. His scholarly results are evident in the writing of various historical surveys and primers, some of them his own. As historian, appraiser, and ambassador of Croat historiography, participant in work of various civic organizations concerned with historical research, great master of Croatian prose, Jaroslav Šidak continues to exercise tremendous influence even in retirement. During the past seven years he has published three revised collections of his works: on various problems of nineteenth-century Croatian history, on the "Church of Bosnia", and on Croatian policy in 1848. He is currently working on the collective, multi-volume history of Croatia and on a history of Croatian historiography.

The collection at hand was issued by Professor Šidak's students and friends on the occasion of his seventy-fifth birthday. As is the case with all such editions, the forty-nine articles gathered here are extremely difficult to catalogue, much less appraise. But perhaps cataloguing and appraisal are not necessary. Rather, one can view the collection as an opportunity to estimate the present trends in Croat historiography, since the majority of the articles are from Croatia, mainly from Zagreb; nine are by authors from the other republics of Yugoslavia and eleven are from abroad (seven from the socialist countries, one from Austria, and three from the United States—a fair breakdown of current international interest in Croatian history).

The collection demonstrates the strengths of the middle and older generation of Croatian historians. From Mirjana Gross and Ljubo Boban, two outstanding political and social historians of the pre-1914 and interwar periods respectively, to Dragovan Šepić and Bogdan Krizman, notable for their diplomatic and political studies, Igor Karaman and Miroslava Despot, significant economic historians, they are all represented here. One should also single out Josip Lučić, historian of medieval Dubrovnik; Ivan Golub, whose research on Križanić and Paštrić has already revised many established opinions about seventeenth-century Croat intellectual history; Trpimir Macan and Nikša Stančić, who reconstructed the directions of Croatian national awakening in Dalmatia; as well as Hrvoje Matković and Ivan Jelić, who made important contributions to the study of interwar political history. All of these scholars demonstrate wide scope methodological sophistication and are ample proof of the great strides made by Croatian historiography since 1945 (though certain scholars, especially medievalists, are unaccountably absent from this collection). They can be justly proud of their work and of the role that Jaroslav Šidak played in its shaping, either directly or through his overall contributions to the field in various mentioned functions.

Nevertheless, one cannot help feeling that Croatian historiography is currently somewhat short of breath. The youngest generation is hardly present in these pages and by all accounts the most gifted students have of late bypassed this paramount humanistic discipline. More importantly, one can foresee a serious crisis in certain fields with the passing of Šidak's generation and the generation who received their degrees in the first postwar decade.

This problem is most acute in medieval and early modern studies. Unlike his distinguished predecessors from Kukuljević, Rački, and Smičiklas, to V. Klaić, Šišić, and Barada, Jaroslav Šidak did not delve into the period of Croat national dynasty, long the most prestigious area in Croatian historiography. But even in the area of the high Middle Ages, especially in Bosnia, and of the sixteenth century, he appears to have practically no successors. This is especially disturbing in that many important parts of this period (for example, the migrations in the wake of Ottoman conquest remain scarcely touched. Unfortunately, one or several gaps in the scholarly generation chain are bound to produce a great deal of chaos in these fields, which have always been particularly open to the mischief of pseudo-scholarly enthusiasts.

One can only hope that the current educational reform will not make matters worse and that this excellent publication will not mark the high point of Croat historiography in this century. Further advancement of historical sciences would be the reward most worthy of Jaroslav Šidak, whose work, warmth, and gentility touched all specialists in Croatian historical studies, including this grateful author.

IVO BANAC

Yale University

Both editors of the Journal of Croatian Studies are greatly indebted to Professor Jaroslav Šidak:

Karlo Mirth was his student in the last three years in the High School in Senj, Croatia. Šidak was also his home-room teacher ("razrednik"). Though Mirth's career took him to different fields and the life to other lands he has never forgotten Šidak's classes in history and the lessons of critical quests in the background of all events, past and present. He gratefully remembers Šidak as his most inspiring and influential teacher he had in his formative years.

Jere Jareb, Professor of History at an American college, who is especially engaged in the research of modern Croatian history, closely follows Šidak's work. Šidak's outstanding contribution to Croatian historiography was of enormous value for Jareb's work and stimulated his own research.