The Alaska daily empire., 1918-06-29
Kossovo Day Yesterday
 Recalls Much War History
(BY A JUNEAU SERBIAE.)

of the Battle of Kossovo, the great holiday of Serbians. The battle fought on the plain of Kossovo, (plain of the Blackbirds) in 1889 between the Scrbians and the Turks, between Christians and Mo hamedans, was one of the blood jest in the history of the world Not only thousands of Serbians and Turks found death in it, but both the Serbian Tsar Lazar and the Turkish Sultan Murad lost their lives. The battle of Kossovo was al so most Hateful. It meant de- cisive Turkish blow, not only to the Southeast of Europe and to Christ endom. After it the Turks advanced continually to the north reaching at one time Vienna, for centuries keeping Southeastern Europe in subjugation. Yet the Turkish vic tory on the plain of Kossovo was costly even to the then irresistible and fanatic Turks. They were sc hard hit that they subdued Serbia only in 1459, seventy years after the battle.
 The memory of the battle of Kos sovo is deeply rooted in the heart of the Serbian Natoin. From gen. eration to generation the traditions of Tsar Lazar, Milosh Obilich, and other heroes of Kossovo who had died gloriuosly for "the Cross and golden liberty" who had preferred an honorable death to shameful life, have been held dear. The descendants of those who fought there have been proud of their an cestors in spite of the fact that the struggle ended with a Serbian and Christian defeat. Might does not pray" saws a Serbian proverb, the sense of which is that might does whatever it pleases, regardless of right.
 The Turkish might has been stronger on the plain of kossovo than the Serbian right, but the Serbians had done their duty by fighting heroically and, therefore, accodring to the opinion of the Serbian nation, there was not any thing shameful in the tragic is sue. It would have been a national disgrace only if the ancestors had fled from the battlefield, or if they had given up their country and their liberty without a fight with the Turk, as for instance the Bulga- rians had done.
 In this spirit the Serbians hay been educated during the whole tim of Turkish domination, and tn
 feeling of independence has, there
 fore, remained strong among then Far from being especially impresse by the military success of thel conquerors, the Serbs have consic cred them as an inferior brutf
 force which would unavoidably col lapse some day. They therefore fel proud of their nationality and su perior to the oppressor. This heroi attitude of the Serbs, both on tn plain of Kossovo and during tn centuries of Turkish domination was not because of mere chance In the course of the two hundre years preceding the battle of kos sovo Serbia had been a prosperou country, not only in a political an military sense, but also economicall. and culturally. Since the reign C stephen Nemanya G169-1186) wh laid the foundation of the nations unity and strength of the Serbia nation, this prosperity of the Ser bian State had been increasing. An so the first of his successors, hl son Stephen, became the first Ser bia hiking Stephen, the first crown ed Serbian King) while his young est son, St. Sabbas, became the hrs Serbian Archbishop, the founder o the independent Serbian Church ant of Serbian literature, thus occu pying one of the most prominen positions in the history of Serbian civilization. The further descend ants of Nemanya have as a rul' been increasing the national herit age. No wonder then that prom nent foreign dynaties considered privilege to come into closer con tact with them, that one of the Ne manyitchs married a princess of thu House of Anjou and another Greek Imperial princess. But Ser bia reached her zenith only in the fourteenth century. under the reign of the Temanyitch stephen Dou shan (l331-1355). The frontier: of Serbia extended at that time tt the Adriatic Sea in the West, to the River Maritza in the East, and to the Gulf of Corinth in the South Social organization had assumed delnite form and found full expres- sion in the famous Code of Dou- shan, which is generally considered one of the most remarkable monu' ments of mediavel legislation. The main roads from Central Europe and the Adriatic Sea to Constanti- nople and Salonica passed through Serbia and commerce thrived. II is, therefore, quite natural tha Stephen Doushan. giving expression to military. political, economic anf cultural progress. proclaimed him self Serbian Emperor (1346) a