The Hilandar Charter of Despot Stefan Lazarević from the year 1405 is written in script on parchment (55.5 x 42.5 cm). It begins with the sign of the cross, and the signature is made in red ink. It is preserved in the Hilandar Monastery under number 77. Ed. MS 331-333.
By the grace of my great Lord Jesus Christ, through the intercession of the most holy Theotokos and the prayers of my holy lords, and fathers, and forefathers, and the founders Simeon and Sava,1 the faithful despot Stefan, lord of all Serbs and the Danube region, and ktitor2 of the great imperial Serbian monastery in the Holy Mountain of Athos and internal;
I, from my youthful age and young nails – when God with His gaze made everything for my benefit -, was subjected to many malicious and unbearable temptations, even deadly ones, witnessed and heard by the celestial elements and almost the entire universe. And from all these, the Lord has delivered me, and continues to deliver.
However, in this that was to be and that I wished to suffer, I will say, in these dark clouds, like the brightest rays, virtues, I say, of my father and lord, my holy prince, I and those in my domain barely and with difficulty fixed our eyes, for even if we strived to emulate him, it was with difficulty and beyond meekness, out of vanity. For ‘God loves a cheerful giver,’ as the divine apostle said.
And now the hiding places of the great treasures of God’s mercy have opened up to us, and we have humbled ourselves and found rest, and the dark clouds have dispersed and the sun has shone upon us. And let us say with the apostle: “Behold, now is the accepted time; behold, now is the day of salvation!”
And the islands were renewed, and a new heaven and a new earth for me, according to Isaiah.
And I, grateful to God, have been and will be, with the help of the grace of the Holy Spirit, for I am the autocrat and lord over the ancestral lot and the expanses of the Serbian Land, trusted by God, I have been crowned.
And, emulating the virtues of our ancestors, being in such a state and arrangement, at that time, the most venerable among the monks from my honorable monastery, the elder Kir Joan, and the most venerable among the priest-monks, Father Kir3 Theodor, came to me and mentioned the income from Novo Brdo, which was contributed and fulfilled with joy to the monastery my parent and lord, the holy prince.
And as I considered this empire of mine, I did not find it pleasing to deprive my holy monastery of the Novo Brdo abundance that the land of my kingdom, by divine command, richly bestows and I decided that the monastery shall receive annually one hundred litras of silver4 in glory and honor of our most pure Lady, the Theotokos of Hilandar, and our venerable and God-bearing fathers, Simeon and Saint Sava, whose intercession and prayers of the holy fathers living in the Holy Mountain of Athos may the all-merciful God calm and comfort us with abundant consolation. Amen! And as I considered this empire of mine, I did not find it pleasing to deprive my holy monastery of the Novo Brdo5 abundance that the land of my kingdom, by divine command, richly bestows and I decided that the monastery shall receive annually one hundred litras of silver in glory and honor of our most pure Lady, the Theotokos of Hilandar, and our venerable and God-bearing fathers, Simeon and Saint Sava, whose intercession and prayers of the holy fathers living in the Holy Mountain of Athos may the all-merciful God calm and comfort us with abundant consolation. Amen!
But also that which is customary for chrysobulls to say, both with a plea and with a command. Whomever God chooses to reign over the Serbian Land, be it a brother, or a son, or a grandson, or anyone from our kin, close or distant, or, due to our sins, even a stranger to our tribe, I beseech all in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ not to destroy what has been inscribed and bestowed upon us, but rather to fulfill it even more, expecting the same reward from the reward-giving God as we do.
If anyone dares to destroy this, may the Lord God destroy all his good beginnings, both here and in the future age, and may the Most Pure Mother of God be his avenger on the day of dreadful judgment, that he may not have part with our great luminaries and ktitors, the myrrh-streaming6 Simeon and the archbishop Sava, in whom we place our hope, but may he have his portion with all those who have destroyed divine, apostolic, and patristic traditions. Amen!
By the grace of God, lord of all Serbs and the Littoral, Despot Stefan
Translated by Books of Jeremiah
- Tran. note: Stefan and Rastko Nemanjić, who took the names Simeon and Sava when they took monastic vows. Father and son, founder of the Nemanjić dynasty and the first Archbishop of the independent Serbian Orthodox Church. ↩︎
- Tran. note: From Greek "ktetor" (κτήτωρ), meaning a founder or someone who contributed to reconstruction, expansion or artistic redecoration. ↩︎
- Tran. note: From Greek, meaning "mister" or "lord". ↩︎
- Tran. note: Based on a load of silver that ended up in Venice in 1426 via Dubrovnik (Ragusa), one litra of silver from Novo Brdo was worth 7.5 Venetian ducats (gold pieces). Kovačević Kojić, Ćuk, Ćirković, Staro srpsko rudarstvo, p.105-107 ↩︎
- Tran. note: One of the most important silver mining towns in Europe at the time., producing around 5-6 tons of silver annually, with the a lot of the ore containing up to 33% gold, as well as lead, iron etc. Bertrandon de la Broquière assessed that the Serbian ruler gained around 200 000 ducats annually from the town, when he passed through Serbia in 1433. The remains of the medieval fortress are still visible, with the town which developed from the settlement under the fortress still there. ↩︎
- Tran. note: One of the signs of sainthood is the production of myrrh by the remains after the death. ↩︎
