The Curse of Queen Teuta

Monika is a Ukrainian from Odessa who, after the beginning of the Russian aggression against her country, immediately sought her happiness in Montenegro in March 2022. She settled in Risna, where she runs a beauty salon for women, where they also cut men's hair, since there are no barbers in this small town. With sadness in her voice, she told me how difficult it was for her to watch the destruction of her hometown on TV.

I spent a few days in this small town of Bokele, somewhat unfairly neglected because of its famous neighbor Perast, and on that occasion I discovered that Risan hides a lot that cannot be seen when passing by the highway.

photos: robert čoban

To begin with, there is Gabella street (Italian gabella - customs house), located in the old town, a few minutes' walk from the coast. It is considered the oldest street in Montenegro, created in this form during the Ottoman Empire. The street can be reached by a narrow path from the gate of the Orthodox church in the park in the center of town. Goods were mostly transported between the Risan port and the continental hinterland by Gabel. That is why it was said that Kotor was a Montenegrin market, and Risan a "Herzegovinian market".

Gabela has a unique street surface made of large river pebbles, divided diagonally into numerous fields, while the narrow sidewalks on both sides are made of carved white limestone slabs. Gabela has 31 addresses, with the oldest houses dating from the 17th and 18th centuries. It was unbelievable to me that in such an old and beautiful street there is almost nothing, not a single souvenir shop, gallery, cafe. It is possible that this will change after the reopening of the "Teuta" hotel and the presence of a larger number of tourists in the place.

And Risan itself had a turbulent history - it was under the Venetians until the fall of the Venetian Republic. The Russian nobleman and progenitor of the Tolstoy dynasty, Petar Andreyevich Tolstoy, was passing through Risan in 1698 and noted that Serbs of the "Greek faith" lived in the village, that their houses were made of stone, that they had plenty of food, that they were hospitable to Russians, and that they were similar to the Don Cossacks in all aspects. Lazar Tomanović praised the Rišnjans as great Serbs, but resented their attitude towards women as slaves, which is a remnant of Turkish influences (that a woman does not leave the house, not even go to church...).

Just when I was staying in Risno, I was writing a report about Feketić for the series "By bike through Vojvodina" and that's when I came across the name of the national hero Nikola Đurković, who was named after the elementary school in that village, and who was born in Risno in 1908.

He studied law in Paris and Montpellier, got his doctorate there and returned to Yugoslavia. A lawyer and a free man, Nikola Đurković deeply believed in the idea of ​​the left and the revolutionary struggle for a better and more just world. He was admitted to the Communist Party of Yugoslavia in 1933, and three years later, in the elections in his native Risno, he defeated the regime's candidate and became the mayor of the municipality. A plaque on the old house at the beginning of Gabela Street says that Đurković held a meeting of the people of Boka against the pro-fascist government of Yugoslavia in that place "in the summer of 1936". Due to these activities, in the fall of 1937, he was removed from the position of the president of the municipality of Risan. Although the police constantly followed him and harassed him in various ways, he worked tirelessly to strengthen the party organization and the labor movement. One of the organizers of the Thirteenth of July Uprising, Nikola Đurković was the first political commissar of the Krivošija Company, which was formed during the days of the 1941 uprising, and the first political commissar of the later formed Orje Battalion.

After betrayal in the field, when a fascist mercenary discovered the shelter of Bokele illegals and denounced it to the Italians, Đurković died on January 21, 1943 in Podi, a village above Herceg Novi, along with three other war comrades, the national hero Savo Ilić and the first-time fighters Danilo Pavičić and Šćepo Šarenc. Surrounded by nearly 300 Italian fascists, Chetniks of the Grahovsky Battalion and the Anti-Communist Battalion "Orjen", the four revolutionaries fought bravely until the last shot. Their deaths were especially celebrated by the Chetniks, who on the main square in Herceg Novi, around the blood-stained clothes of the fallen fighters, played a circle that the people later called the "Bloody Circle". Partisan sympathizer photographer Luka Cirigović recorded and permanently immortalized this morbid act through the window shutters. Torture and humiliation did not end there - they brought two sisters and a brother of Nikola Đurković from the camps on Mamula and Prevlaka to confirm that they had killed him. They sent them back three times, but these brave young men did not make a single gesture to show them that one of the best and most educated people of that time from the Boka area was lying in front of them. After a few days, the heart of Nikola's sister Ana broke from the pain of her brother and she passed away. Nikola Đurković was declared a national hero by decree of the AVNOJ Presidency on July 11, 1945.

In the center of Risno, in the park, there is the already mentioned Orthodox Church of St. Peter and Paul, which was built by the inhabitants in 1601 and rebuilt more than a hundred years later. The temple was finally completed in 1796, and its final appearance was given by the Italian architect Antonio Costa, who died when the vault collapsed. Above the church is a small Orthodox cemetery, typically Mediterranean with many monuments dedicated to captains. A day later was St. Peter's Day, so we came to see the procession that was organized in the church gate.

photo: Robert Choban

Not far from the church are the Risan mosaics, an archeological site that is covered, similar to Sirmium in Sremska Mitrovica. An entrance fee of six euros is also charged. In his complex, the most famous villa with floor mosaics from the 2nd century AD is considered a representative example of Roman provincial architectural creativity in this part of the Adriatic.

Ten years ago, the remains of the foundations of the palace where, presumably, the last Illyrian queen Teuta lived, were discovered in Risno. It revived the legends about her life and reign, and especially about her mysterious end and the magical disappearance of her vast treasures.

According to legend, after the death of her husband Agron, Teuta settled in the fortress she built above Rhysn. She was very rich - she collected treasure in the numerous raids of her pirate fleet in the Ionian, Aegean and Adriatic seas. However, since she began to threaten the interests of the Roman Empire with her power, the Roman legions occupied Risan, but did not find Teuta there.

According to one version, Teuta threw herself off the rock of the Orjen hill above Risn, while according to another, she continued to live in the hills above the city. From time to time she went out to the shore of the bay to steal the color of the sea and refresh the color of her eyes.

According to tradition, it is precisely because of her curse that Risan has no port today. There is also a strong local belief that inside the Spila cave above Risno is a huge treasure that she hid there.

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