Rozafa: The Wife & Mother Half Buried Within The Citadel’s Foundation

[As with Baltic culture, the national origins of this legend are debated among the peoples of former Yugoslavia, Albania, Greece, etc., though I’ve read that the original legend regarding feminine entombment for the structural integrity of a construction project originally derived from India before making its way to Eastern Europe.

The causal factors for maternal sacrifice vary widely between story and culture. Most contemporary versions won’t explicitly give reason, or commonly describe a wise, old man who directs the brothers, while older versions tend to describe paranormal or religious deities, or premonitions in dreams that convince the men to bury a woman in whatever thing they happen to be building.

The earliest written account of the slavic legend,The Building of Skadar, collected by Serbian writer Vuk Stefanović Karadžić, as well as some less academic retellings I’ve heard or read, were used for source material. Geographical terms are mostly in Albanian, while I keep the Serbian term for vila (a nymph) that Karadžić’s Ballad refers to.

Whatever meaning one might give to this legend or it’s thousand variants, I find the recurring motifs of a woman’s expected role of nurturement, crucified almost to mimic her ability to procreate, and an unhealthy hierarchy within the family to be responding to a culture of callousness, seen by those in the narrative as a dark necessity for the continuation of their people.]

Three brothers, King Vukašin, Duke Uglješa, Nobleman Gojko Mrnjavčević, along with three hundred workers, spend three years attempting to build a castle on a hill north of where the Bunë river feeds into the Great Drin in what is now modern day Shkodër.

For three years, what they build of the foundation of their castle during the day is destroyed by a vila living in the nearby mountains overnight.

After the third year of fruitless building, the three brothers hear a thunderous message from the mountaintops:

“Don’t bother wasting your time and material,” the vila says. “You won’t be able to build the foundation of your castle, let alone your city, until you find me a brother and sister by the names of Stoja and Stojan and immure them into the foundation of your castle.”

Upon hearing this, King Vukašin orders his servant, Desimir, to find the two siblings with similar sounding names, either entice or kidnap them, and return them to the river basin, giving him six loads of treasure along with some horses and coaches.

After searching the known world for three years, Desimir returns the king his belongings without the siblings, and the the brothers stubbornly order their workers to continue building feverishly each day only to return to remnants of their labor by next morning.

“There you are,” the vila shouts again from the mountains, “three stubborn brothers of royalty, each with their own faithful wife. Whichever of your loves come tomorrow to bring lunch for the workers, immure her into the bedrock of the castle, only then will the foundation of the castle and city hold.”

The brothers congregate and make a vow to god that they will not tell their wives about the matter, but leave it to fate which wife be unknowingly sacrificed for the strength of their castle, and future of their city, then return to their palace for a large feast before departing off to their respective chambers.

And could you believe, to what great wonder:

“My dear heart,” King Vukašin tells his wife, “do not go to the river tomorrow to the give the workers meat and potatoes, nor bread and cheese, or else, as terrible as it may sound, they will immure you into the foundation of the castle.”

Within the same hour, Uglješa, the duke and second oldest, approaches his wife, holding her tenderly, “my beautiful, good soul,” he tells her, “give the workers lunch tomorrow and you will die young. It’s hard to believe but the workers will encase you in the basement of the castle, for it’s the only way we can assure the castle’s health and stability, so whatever you do, please do not go to that river tomorrow noon.”

The young and naive Gjoka, imbibing in the next room, keeps his vow to god and word to his brothers, kisses his wife, whom he has known since childhood, goodnight, making smalltalk as they begin to fall asleep.

“Our little bear is so big,” Gjoka’s wife is speaking behind his hear. “His belly is starting to look just like his father’s.”

“And what a belly that grape will end up having. Fully-fed, god willing.”

“Yovo should be strong, shouldn’t he, being that he will eventually begin on that castle that we’ve no better than have begun today?”

“I would be glad to continue beginning without end,” Gjoka turns to hold his wife, “only if it wouldn’t impede our aging together, my bird that is so small.”

“Gjoka,” his young wife asks, “are you aware of the bed of flowers that lie near the gorge entryway? Oh, my spirit, how their reds and yellows appear so vividly. Would it be selfish of me if I were to desire, each time I passed, to pluck every bud and rose in that field for myself to keep?”

“I know of the flowers you are talking about, my dear, and I ask you not be so judgmental. Would you consider any one of those flowers as unreasonably selfish for wanting to bloom alongside a beauty that befits her own?”

The queen beckons her sister-in-law the next morning, complaining, “Oh, how I’ve caught a terrible headache. I can not be expected to do much of anything today. My dear sister, second oldest to me, who I love as I would my own blood, could you be so kind as to give the workers their lunch for me?”

“God bless your health,” Uglješa’s wife says, “for my arm is also in bad shape. Let us go now to ask our youngest sister for assistance.”

“I would be glad to help” Gjoko’s wife explains, “but my child of three months is not yet washed nor any of our linen cleaned.”

“Do not worry about any of that, I’ll bathe your child,” the queen assures.

“And I,” Uglješa’s wife adds, “would find no greater joy than to scrub and whiten our linen until it resembles snow.”

By the Bunë, Gjoka views his approaching wife with sad heart, sad for his wife and the toddler that sleep in his bed, soon to be without a mother after only some months of life.

“What has hurt you, Gjoko?” His wife, having walked the distance in silence, asks with quiet tone. “Why do tears fall from your cheek?”

“It’s pure evil,” Gjoko responds, “for a golden apple I had has fallen into the river today. Woe is me, this challenge of the spirit, this unending grief.”

“Fret not,” she, not understanding, responds, “as, with god, any apple you find will eventually turn more gold than the one before.”

As three hundred workers lead her by hand to the basement, her initial laughter becomes prayers.

“God, do not take me now! Use my mother’s money and buy a slave girl! Bury her in the castle instead of me!”

But god didn’t do anything.

They set heavy wood and stone up to her waist, walling her into the wall.

She looks to Rado, the master builder, standing above her:

“Rado,” she pleads, “please think of Yovo, my newborn. Immure me if you must, but leave a window for my right breast so that I can still feed my child. Leave a space for my left hand so that I might caress him. Leave my right foot exposed so I can rock him to sleep. And leave my right eye exposed so I can still see him with one eye.”

Rado, more merciful-seeming than god, is pleased with her prayer and leaves her a view of her white-colored home so that she may watch her young Yovo grow, and when they brought the babe in the cradle, she suckled him from the stone for seven days.

After the seventh day she no longer spoke from inside the foundation, but still her breast milk flows from the limestone of Rozafa, and women with lactation problems can drink from her milk for miraculous mitigation.