Srbija - nacionalna revija - broj 55 - engleski - niska rezolucija

The first heraldic insignia of Belgrade
are mentioned by the history at the
time of Despot Stefan Lazarević, who
received the city in 1403 from Sigismund of
Luxemburg, king of Hungary. A testimony of
the golden seal of the city was given by Constantine
the Philosopher in his most famous
work The Life of Despot Stefan Lazarević: “...
And he (Despot) gave them the golden seal,
which had the image of the City, and for those
who want to make any kind of purchase in
any part, would provide the book with the
seal proving he is a resident of that city, so
would never have to pay customs or toll”.
If we take the phrase “had the image of
the City” literally – that it is the panoramic
view of the City walls, we come to the reconstruction
of the seal created by prof. Dr. Milos
Ćirić, well-known Serbian graphic artist. We
should not forget that Belgrade had previously
been in the territory of Hungary, where
the oats of arms of settlements appear during
the 18 th century, so it is not impossible that the
city had previously had such insignia.
After the death of Despot Stefan in 1427,
Belgrade was, under the contract, returned to
the Hungarians.
The earliest known image of Belgrade coat
of arms is in Fugger’s Mirror of Honor from
1555. In this work, which contains more than
30,000 coats of arms, and was named after the
Fugger family, the famous family of merchants
and bankers, and later a family of a prince, the
coat of arms of Belgrade is presented with a
tower between two Patriarchate ( double)
crosses and with two beams that symbolize
two rivers, the Sava and the Danube. The earliest
information about this coat of arms was
presented by great Aleksa Ivić who says about
it: “This coat of arms is a heraldic combination
of coat of arms of the old and new Hungarian
states with a tower that represents the
city of Belgrade.”
With minor changes, mainly in the form of a
shield, this coat of arms survived until Belgrade
fell into Turkish hands in 1521 (today it used by
Stari Grad, as the oldest Belgrade municipality).
It is well-known that for a long time the Ottomans
did not recognize coats of arms as part of
the national and state heritage, and with their
arrival the heraldic history of Belgrade was interrupted
for the next two centuries.
IN THE SHADOW
OF FOREIGN WINGS
In the turbulent history of the Serbian
capital, the year 1717 was a new milestone,
when the Turks took over the city from the
Austrians. The Austrian military government
then introduced a new coat of arms, featuring
three mosques with the imperial black
double-headed eagle flying over its minarets.
There is also the slogan: “Sub umbra alarum
tuarum” (“In the shadow of your wings”,
Psalm of David, 17/8). In 1910, in the Vienna
archive, Aleksa Ivić discovered the heraldic
description of that coat of arms from 1721,
and the appended stamp. The circular inscription
on the seal was: “Gross insigl. dor Statt
Belgrad in Servien 1721.”
In 1724, the imperial governor in Belgrade
Aleksandar Wuerttemberg filed to the Viennese
court working council two proposals for
The large
coat of arms
of Belgrade
Medium
and small
coat of arms
of Belgrade
SERBIA • N O 55 • 2016
51