Lives of the Serbian Saints

tr. Yanich and Hankey, 1921

The Life of the Theophoros Stephen Milutin, King of All Serbia and the Coastlands

This Milutin Theophoros, great in virtue and abounding in mercy, was the younger son of the Serbian king, Urosh I (1242–1276) and Helen, and this Urosh was the third son of Stephen Prvovenchani, called as a monk Simon. Before he came to the throne he was called Milutin, a name he received in Holy Baptism, and after he became king he was named Milutin Stephen Urosh II—Stephen because of the first crowned king, his grandfather, Urosh from the name of his father; and since he lived righteously and his body after death was glorified by our Lord with incorruption, therefore he was called saint.

In his youth his teacher was the blessed Serbian archbishop Daniel, a holy and God-like man, very skilled in spiritual wisdom and the Holy Scriptures, who wrote and handed down for us the genealogy of the Serbian kings down to his own time. When we are mindful of the wisdom and experience of this great teacher, it is easy for us to judge of the disciple, of the qualities of his mind and heart and the way of his spirit. He was meek and gentle, merciful and just, peaceful and courteous. For these qualities all those historians of other lands, who have written the story of the Serbian state, praise him. So Milutin was beloved of all men, both his own people and strangers.

His own brother, Dragutin, from the same mother, Helen, showed great promise, and his parents were careful for him, bringing him up lovingly in the good Faith, in the fear of the Lord, in purity and every virtue. When he grew up it was the desire of the parents that he should marry, and they took for him to be his wife the girl Katharine, daughter of the Hungarian king, Vladislav. Before the marriage took place, King Urosh promised before his death to give the throne to this son Dragutin. Thus he made oath to the Hungarian king, saying, “I will that you give your daughter to my son Dragutin, whom I will name Autocrat and King of all Serbia and the coastlands before the time of my far voyage to my father.” With this condition the marriage came to pass, and Dragutin with his wife, and afterwards his children, lived in the court of his parents, waiting to receive that which had been promised to him.

When the younger son, Milutin, was of an age, his parents desired him to be married also. Now Michael Palæologus, the Greek emperor, knowing that the Serbian King Urosh had a son unmarried, and being in great trouble through the Crusaders who had driven him from Constantinople, hoped to obtain the help of the Serbian army by means of a marriage. Wherefore he sent his youngest daughter, Anna, with the Patriarch and a great company of his court, with the proposal that they should take the imperial child as betrothed. But Urosh the king considered the condition of affairs at that time cunningly, and preferred the peace which was so great a benefit to his state to an emperor who should be his kinsman; so the embassy, with the child, returned with nothing accomplished. Milutin remained unmarried for six years longer and then took to wife Elizabeth the daughter of the Hungarian king, Andrew III, and she bore to him one son, Stephen, afterwards called Dechanski.

While King Urosh was ruling Serbia and the coastlands in peace and with justice, he built a splendid church in the name of the All Holy Trinity at Sopochani. But about this time there rose against him his eldest son Dragutin, demanding that he should fulfil the promise he had made. And when his father would not yield to him the throne, Dragutin obtained an army from his wife’s father and made war against Urosh, joining battle with him at a place called Gatsko, in Herzegovina. Alas! the son was victorious and took his father’s throne by force and shut him up in prison at Durazzo, where he died, in the year 1282, after reigning on the Serbian throne for thirty-five years. His body was brought back and buried in the church of the Holy Trinity, which he built in Sopochani. His wife Helen lived for many years after on the land which Dragutin gave her for her support. When she was very old she was made a nun in Skadar, and not many days after she became very ill and died in the Lord at her palace in Brnyatzi. The godly fathers brought her body to the monastery at Gradatz in the presence of the archbishop, Sava II, and her son Milutin, who alone, with the archbishop and some of the clergy, placed the sarcophagus in the tomb they had made ready.

But the robber of the father’s throne, who had rendered to his father evil for good, was not blessed with a long reign, because he had raised his hand against his father, breaking the word of the Lord, and had spurned that union blessed by nature and by God. Wherefore the All Great and Just Judge of all mankind, who rewardeth all the evil of sinful men here on earth, took his body that He might perchance make his proud heart somewhat less evil and bring him to repentance. For he fell from horseback near the fortress of Jeletch and broke his leg, whereby he suffered great agony. This slight punishment was for him the beginning of a sickness of heart and soul which day by day gave him no ease, his conscience being pricked. When he understood this he said in his heart, “Now do I perceive, O my Lord, that Thou art just and that only what is just maketh for good. I have trespassed, Lord: I pray Thee cleanse me. I am a sinner: do Thou pardon me. I have not followed the commandments of Thy law: for Thou didst say, ‘Whosoever doeth evil to his father or mother must die the death.’ Sinner that I am, I have done this thing, raising my hand against my father, and for this I perish. All that has come upon me is just.” Thus overwhelmed by the pangs of conscience and suffering always in body, he handed over the Serbian kingdom to his brother Milutin, keeping only for himself Sirmie and Machva, which countries he had received for dowry with the daughter of the Hungarian king. At first he went to live at Machva, and later he moved to Sirmie. Some time he was obedient to King Milutin, but afterwards his thoughts changed and he made ready once more to take the throne of his brother. Yet, through the prayers of Archbishop Daniel, he gave way and made peace with his brother. But he had showed once more his rebellious nature. Finally, when he saw that the days of his life were numbered, he asked that he might be made monk; his prayer being granted, he received the name Theoktist. Not many days after he died, on Friday in the third week of Lent, the twenty-first day of March in the year 1317, and his body was brought to the monastery of the great and holy martyr, St. George, in Machva, and there buried. It was this Dragutin who built the monastery of Racha, near the river Drina, and his wife built the monastery of Tronasha, on the slope of Mount Gouchevo.

Stephen Milutin Uroch II ruled as king and autocrat from the year 1285, and took as his second wife the daughter of the Greek Emperor Andronicus, Simonide, who bore to him a son, Constantine. He chose Prizren for his capital. His first war he waged with Michael Palæologus, who wanted to repay the insult he had received when his daughter Anna, whom he had sent to be the wife of Milutin yet unmarried, had been returned to him. The godly king, forced to defend his kingdom with the sword, offerered up this prayer before joining battle: “O Lord, I know that Thou art quick to show pity and rich in grace. Therefore I humbly trust in Thee, because Thou didst help our fathers when they hoped in Thee, and Thou didst deliver them. To Thee they cried and Thou didst keep them. They trusted in Thee and were not put to confusion. My Lord Jesus look upon me, Thy sinful servant, and upon the land which Thou hast given me; preserve me from those who would trouble me and let them not say in their pride, ‘We have slain them, and their memory is utterly perished!’”

Strong in his hope in the Lord, he went forward with his army and destroyed his enemies so utterly that he took Palog, Skoplye, Ovchepole, Zlatovo, Pijachatse, Strumnitza, Seres, Debar, Kichevo and Porach. Then the Emperor Michael took to himself Tartars, Turks and Franks, and came once more against the godly Milutin, but he died suddenly before he had come to the Serbian land. Though the mercenaries, these Tartars, Turks and Franks, still desired to invade the Serbian country for plunder, they were utterly destroyed by the help of the Lord.

And a short while after there rose up against the godly King Milutin, Shishman, a prince of the Bulgarian king Smilatz, who lived in the town Widin on the river Danube, and invaded with his army Hvoctno, not far distant from the Petch patriarchate. But he was vanquished and forced to flee away, so utterly overwhelmed that he was disgraced. When Shishman found himself in such straits, he humbled himself and besought the godly King Milutin to be merciful to him. Then his country was given back to him, and, moreover, he received the daughter of King Milutin, Nada, to be the wife of his son Michael, who became in time the Bulgarian tzar.

After these things which happened with Shishman, Milutin found his greatest foe in Nogie, chief of the Tartars, who now ruled by force of arms the Bulgarian country, and was threatening war against our fatherland. King Milutin, having no hope of overcoming this proud pagan by the power of the sword, made a treaty with him, and to make it sure sent as hostage his son Stephen, who stayed some long while among the Tartars and afterwards happily returned safe. When the Persians came with the Turks against Rumania, plundering the Christians and causing great distress in Constantinople, Milutin besought his father-in-law the Emperor Andronicus to come and help him with his army and to drive the barbarians from his country. After this he made an abiding peace with the Emperor Andronicus and with the Bulgarian king.

So when his state lay at peace on all sides, Christ-loving Stephen Milutin began to build churches and monasteries with the riches which the Lord gave to him. First he pulled down the church at Khilindar to its foundations and built it greater and adorned it, and made for it cells like an emperor’s palace and strengthened it with towers against the enemy. After this he began to help the sick. He built a church and a hospital in Constantinople in the place called Prodrom. And for the rooms of it he gave soft beds for the sick, and provided both doctors and nurses. Likewise in Jerusalem he built a church to the Spirit Powers (the angels). In Salonika he built two churches, to St. Nicholas and to St. George, giving them many splendid palaces. He often sent rich alms to the monastery in Mount Sinai. All these good deeds he did in strange lands. But in the same way and with greater zeal he was a benefactor to the Church of his fatherland also. Thus in Treskavatz he built the church of the Mother of God and gave it gold and silver vessels; in the country of Kuchi he gave the church of the great and holy martyr St. George, together with its costly vessels; in his capital, Prizren, the church of the Falling Asleep of the Mother of God, and many hospitals; on the river Grachanitza the church of the Annunciation, with six towers; in Skoplye three churches, to the Mother of God, to the apostolic Emperor Constantine, and to the great and holy martyr St. George; in Rascia the church at Banyska, where the hot springs are, to the glory and memory of the first martyr and archdeacon St. Stephen; in Sofia the church to the Holy Wisdom, after the manner of the church in Constantinople which Justinian built, from which church the town Shredatz received its name Sofia; in Studenitza the church of the holy and just Joachim and Anna: and in Orohovitza, in the country of Dabar, the church to the great martyr George. They say that this God-loving king made an oath to the Lord that for every year he remained on the throne he would build a church to the Lord. And the All Merciful Lord granted him forty and two years as ruler of Serbia, and he built forty and two churches.

Now the sees of the bishops in his time were as follows: Zeta, Raschia, Hum, Hvostom, Zvechany, Toplitza, Prizren, Budimlye, Liplanye, Skoplye, Dabar, Morava, Branitchevo, Machva, Kontule and Gradatz, And the chief monasteries were: Studenitza, Mileshevo. Sopochany, Banya, Gradatz, Rascia, Kontule, Hvostom, Gostiva, Orahvitza, Nagorichany, and Skoplye. The archbishop of this time was Sava III, and afterwards Nikodim, who, after fasting at Holy Mountain Athos, came back to Serbia and was called to be archbishop by the counsel and consent of the king, and was consecrated on the feast of the Ascension of Our Lord. After his death, Daniel, the Serbian chronicler, was archbishop. While all things were thus ordered and the king was engaged upon these works, dear to God and of good service for the Church of Christ and the spiritual training of her children, in the midst of the deep peace at home and abroad, there came up black clouds threatening a tempest. For the first-born son¹ of the saintly and godly King Milutin, Stephen, after living long time in Zeta with his wife, was led away by the words of the nobles who served him and determined to demand the throne of his father before the lawful time. When his father would have none of this, the ungrateful son began to entice the nobles from his father’s side and to prepare for rebellion. When King Milutin of the godly soul, to whom the peace of the spirit was needful, saw how subtly he undermined the throne, he called his first-born son to him and prayed him with gentle words not to raise his hand against his father but to wait the time which is provided by the Lord. These good words of the father were little to the mind of the foolish son, who being determined to abide by the advice of his nobles, was the more enraged and went away to prepare for war. And when it was no longer possible to keep from civil war—war between father and son, alas!—King Milutin came with his army to Zeta against his rebel son and battle was joined and the vanquished son fled to the farther bank of the river Boyana. He could not escape, however, but was captured, and by order of his father was sent as a prisoner to his father-in-law at Constantinople, the Emperor Andronicus. The guard which took him from Skoplye put out his eyes as they passed through Ovchepole, and so brought him blind to the place appointed.

When this trouble was passed, Milutin, now stricken in years and perceiving that his passage from this transitory life drew near, gave alms to the poor, and falling ill soon after, became weaker very rapidly in his palace of Narodine. And because his sickness was unto death the blessed and godly king prepared himself for everlasting life, purifying his conscience by confession and repentance, strengthening his soul with faith and receiving the Holy Sacrament. With the burden on his soul thus lightened he opened his mouth and spake to those he loved: “My beloved children, you know that the hour of my passing from you is near. Weep not, but praise the Lord with me, that I may receive the lot prepared for the holy.” So died in the Lord this Christ-loving king on the thirtieth day of October. The body of the godly man was brought from Narodine to the church of the holy first martyr and archdeacon Stephen at Banya, and there, when all the rites were performed, it was buried in a tomb in accordance with his wish.

Some of the people also say that the blessed king desired that his body should be buried in the church at Sofia, which is Shredatz, but his nobles would not consent to this, so the remains were brought to Skoplye and there buried in the church of the Falling Asleep of the Mother of God. After three years the Lord glorified the body of his saint with incorruption, and his son Stephen Dechanski, with the archbishops, brought the holy relics to Shredatz and placed them in the church of Holy Wisdom.

Through his prayers, Lord Jesus, grant to Thy people to live in peace, doing Thy holy will. Amen.

Notes

Stephen Dechanski. Compare with this account, pp. 57–58.