2007/01/01 by Marko Živković · 1 citation
Arts and Humanities · Social Sciences · #Byzantine Studies and History #Balkans: History, Politics, Society
paper · doi:10.1163/ej.9789004162563.i-211.36
openalex publication_date 2007/01/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2025/11/06
This chapter presents some ways in which the Serbs have been re-imagining their past since the Mexican charlatan paid them a visit in 1985. It distinguishes between several concrete strategies of appropriating or rejecting different pasts that have been used in Serbian discourses on national identity in the past decade. The chapter proceeds by unpacking a series of “revelatory incidents” in which these ideal types of response come together in a particularly condensed and poignant way. It addresses the question: How did official Serbian archaeology respond to all of these theories of Serbian antiquity? The chapter endeavors to show a few glimpses of what that Byzantine heritage could represent to present-day people in Serbia through a few vignettes. Keywords: Byzantine heritage; Mexican charlatan; revelatory incidents; Serbian antiquity