Vuk Brankovic and the meeting of vassals at Serres

Abstract

After the Kosovo battle in the year of 1389 and the new Ottomans' breach into the Serbian lands, the positions of the Serbian provinces founded on the territory of the disintegrated Serbian empire underwent certain geopolitical changes. Unlike prince Lazar's direct successors, the Serbian regional landlord Vuk Brankovic, Lazar's son-in-law, continued to resist the Ottomans strongly opposing resuming the vassal deployment towards sultan Bayezid I. Only after his town of Skopje's fall late in the 1391, or early in 1392 did Vuk start losing his strategic control over the territory being in that way exposed to an even greater Ottoman pressure. Such Balkans' situation denouement forced Vuk Brankovic until the November 1392 to recognize the Ottoman sovereignty that was justified in one charter for monastery Hilandar. By the end of that year, sultan Bayezid I moved from the empire's Anatolian to the European part in order to consolidate his authority and firm the rule. The Byzantine historian Laonikos Chalcocondyles testifies on the measures taken by the sultan regarding subordinating the new Christian vassals and the conquered territories' colonization. These measures might refer to Vuk Brankovic and his province. There is no direct news considering Vuk Brankovic's political steps during the period from the end of 1392 to the spring of 1394. A dramatic meeting of sultan Bayezid I with his Christian vassals in the town of Serres in the fall-winter of 1393/1394 remained noted in the Byzantine sources. The remnant sources unequivocally of the Serbian meeting members mention only Stefan Lazarevic, the later Byzantine despot and Constantin Dragas, the Byzantine emperor Manuel II Palaeologus' father-in-law, though by being imprecise they leave an open space for the probable participation of some other renowned persons from Serbian side. The hitherto Serbian historiography predominant opinion was that Vuk Brankovic did not respond to the invitation addressed to the vassals concerning the Serres meeting. Apart from Vuk, the sources do not name as the meeting participants neither king Marko, nor his brothers Andreas and Dmitar, who may have been present as well. The sultans' resolution to execute the Christian vassals in Serres, withdrawn at the last moment, caused the split of the vassal relations of some Christian aristocracy to Bayezid I. Vuk's activity from the year 1394, and 1395 connected with gaining Venetian citizenship and moving the treasury in Dubrovnik in accordance with the politics of those Christian vassals who denied their obedience to the sultan after the meeting at Serres. Because of Vuks' conduct from the year of 1394 and the provenance of the preserved Byzantine sources asserting the events at Serres, a possibility of Vuk Brankovic's presence a the Ottomans's vassal by the side of the king Vukasin's sons, remains in spite of silence evident in relevant sources.