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This paper presents an original analysis and reinterpretation of two documents from 1238 and 1239, which are the first to mention the Koper statutes but have thus far received only sporadic mentions in historiography. The paper is further predicated on the study of archival sources of the Venetian Senate from the Senato Misti collection for the period after the Koper rebellion against Venice in 1348 up until 1394 when the Doge of Venice reconfirmed the Koper statutes. It is established that at least from 1238 the commune of Koper acted according to its already complex statutes. These were, with some further redactions, in force until 1348, when, due to the rebellion of Koper, they were disregarded by the Venetian authorities until 1358, along with the dissolution of the city's Major Council, and all of Koper's city offices were restructured. After 1358, the sources testify that the Venetians restored the Koper City Council and offices to their pre-rebellion state, but not the statutes, although some statutory provisions were taken into account in individual administrative or judicial cases. The Koper statutes officially came into force again in 1394, and a slightly modified redaction appeared in 1423. However, in both cases without the right to exercise criminal justice and the defence of the city, which remained in the exclusive domain of the Venetian podestà and captain until the end of the Venetian Republic in 1797. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper addresses the Koper Captains of the Slavs (Capitaneus Sclavorum Justinopolis), named after the ethnic/linguistic character of the Koper countryside over which they held jurisdiction during the Venetian period from 1349 until the beginning of the nineteenth century. It is certainly, at least in name, a unique position that has thus far been insufficiently researched. The main source for this study is the Book of the Koper Captains of the Slavs from the old Koper archives, kept at the State Archives of Venice (ASVe), which has not yet received a proper presentation, as well as archival sources of some other Venetian institutions. The paper also includes a Slovene translation of this document in the appendix. The book contains various stipulations from 1587 to 1724, especially regarding the collection of taxes, as well as general stipulations on the jurisdiction of the Captain of the Slavs. Its analysis shows that the annual obligations of the 42 Koper villages amounted to 2,605 lire and 8 solidi, of which the Koper Podesta and Captain received a bit over 419 lire, and the Captain of the Slavs a bit over 544 lire. In addition, the villagers had to pay special taxes during the Rižana fair (Assumption of Mary, 15 August), at Carnival, Easter, Martinmas, also some for Christmas and for hunting permits. Furthermore, they had to pay contributions for the wood for the maintenance of the Koper bridge, for the town bell ringer and the town clock. On individual village holidays, the village mayors also had to entertain the Captain of the Slavs and his entourage in addition to handing over the collected special contributions. The village's obligations to the fiscal (provincial) chamber amounted to a bit over 515 lire. In short, the obligations of the Koper villages to their Captain were substantial, especially if we take into account the numerous testimonies of the poverty of these villages at the time. The Koper Captain of the Slavs had a special role especially in the military organization of the Koper commune. He was responsible for the defence in the Koper countryside, oversaw border disputes between village communes, collected taxes, and was also in charge of lower-court matters. In addition, the organization of defence and control of the Venetian-Habsburg (Imperial) border played an extremely important role during various epidemics, as quarantines for travellers coming from infected areas were established in the defence posts manned by peasant soldiers (cernida) under the command of the Captain of the Slavs. From the viewpoint of social history and also for further research and comparisons, the Book of the Captain of the Slavs is very important, because in addition to the position's established centuries-long jurisdictions and role in the Koper commune, it also provides interesting details about the monetary value of contributions, from which we can understand the commune's social pulse, individual village fairs and the role of mayors and, in particular, which economic sectors or, rather, crops important for survival dominated the Koper countryside during the centuries of Venetian rule. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

On the case of the literary tale of Fran Levstik, Martin Krpan (1858), the article illuminates Levstik’s political agenda and literary implementation of the outlaw hero, Martin Krpan, for the needs of Slovenia’s nation-building process, a phenomenon that was characteristic of almost all emerging European nations at the time. An analysis of Levstik’s Martin Krpan reveals a unique phenomenon that was tailored to a specific program: namely, the conscious desire to create a national literary character that would constitute a foundation for both further literary creation and the national political struggle. Levstik was the most prominent writer among the emerging Slovenian intellectual class in the second half of the 19th century. The value of his tale resides in its merging of mythical and literary narratives into a functionally connected organism, the simultaneity of “historical” and “non-historical” elements, and the interaction between symbolic and real ambiguities. Levstik’s structure for both his literary-political program and his tale about Martin Krpan originates in historical realities and cultural memory of the 15th and 16th centuries: economic (transportation), social (peasant revolts), and political (defense against the Ottoman Turks). Levstik combines these elements with the fundamentals of folkloric and ethno-symbolic cultural heritage of that period. In Martin Krpan, Levstik skillfully conceals “historical realities” behind metaphors and symbolism, which is typical of myths. In this way, he provides a path toward the realization of national political ambitions. But the “real” myth Levstik created was more than simply that of Martin Krpan and his adventures. It was more than an argument for the historical origin or vocation of a nation, the defense of the civilization, or the demand for political rights or mimetic narrative prose, i.e. the ability to create a virtual real world. The “real” myth of the literary tale was the elevation of the Slovenian language to the essential distinguishing and constitutive element of the Slovenian nation-building process in comparison with the “Other(s).” [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Franc Miklošič was undoubtedly one of the most educated, internationally renowned and influential Slovene intellectuals of the second half of the nineteenth century and is foremost regarded as a philologist, linguist and one of the founders of Slavic studies. However, Miklošič's intellectual versatility also led to his engagement with history, ethnography, anthropology and law, predicated on interdisciplinary and comparative approaches. Apart from a few translations of Austrian legislation into Slovene, Miklošič did not devote himself to legal matters, with the exception of blood feud in Die Blutrache bei den Slaven (1887), one of the key works on the topic at the time. Although he agreed with the evolutionist and legal positivist views of his time on the State as the pinnacle of civilization, compared to the supposed chaos of prior societies (which continue to remain popular), in Blutrache Miklošič also presented the characteristics of the customary system of conflict resolution in kinship-based societies, which attest to the complexity of social relations in premodern Europe. It is with the help of Miklošič's work that this paper reconstructs the customary ritual of conflict resolution, which was known to all premodern European societies, and presents the attitude of his and later times towar ds blood feud. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Based on a conceptual historiographic and semantic analysis of the fundamental terminology of the ritual of vengeance, this paper presents an attempt to provide researchers with a linguistic, conceptual, and methodological framework for the study of vengeance as the customary system of conflict resolution in premodern Europe. For this purpose the key terminology, which also has abundant synonyms, has been collected in the accompanying septalingual glossary. While predicated on, foremost, European Medieval sources and studies thereof, the dissemination and interrelation of the universal human custom make the paper applicable for other areas and periods. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The documents concerning the feud between the Patriarch of Aquileia and the Counts of Gorizia (1267-1277) are evidence of how written laws show that the ritual forms and gestures of the customary system of conflict resolution were not only maintained but were regularly inserted into the ritual formulas of written law. Above all they document how the customary system of conflict resolution, in its ideal image and through rituals, reflected social values based on the mediation of the community, reciprocity and the propensity to achieve a lasting peace. This is a general structural aspect of conflict, while the local or particular aspect is shown concretely through the struggle for resources, in the interweaving of single circumstances, where those who succeed in forming the greatest number of loyalties, differing and often contrasting alliances, are the ones who prevail. In our case this was clearly better accomplished by the Counts of Gorizia than by the Patriarchs of Aquileia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]