BLOOD FEUDS IN MONTENEGRO

Press, Volume XCI, Issue 27631, 12 April 1955, Page 14

BLOOD FEUDS IN MONTENEGRO

CENTURIES-OLD CUSTOM PERSISTS 1 .. „ BELGRADE, poor but proud mountaineers of Montenegro are defying attempts by ne Jugoslav Government and the fJwuffHinat Party to stamp out the W®hme»-old custom of blood feuds. U'^JS^J? to E ad i_ is being slowly built - fyWie*® blocks as a new modern cap, J? d what used to be Europe’s smallest kingdom, the unwritten law of revenge among families is still rife Mt the mountains. It is even on the increase in some outlying districts particularly near the Albanian fronofficial Titograd newspaper. A? ob l eda recently called on the Jugoslav Communist Party and . Government's mass political organisation, the Socialist Alliance, to be more energetic in combating this mediaeval habit. In accordance with "the rules.” when me family intends to take revenge on mother, the members of the threatened family may be killed as soon as they step over the threshold of their home—although they are immune as long as they remain inside. Threatened men thus live for years inside their homes. In the local Serbo-Croat phrase, they are in “house prison.” At Rec, near the Bojana river, which forms the Jugoslav-Albanian frontier, a lorry accidentally ran over one of 10 Djonovic brothers and killed him. Police established that the driver was not to blame. Nevertheless, the Djonovic family took the dead man’s bloodstained shirt and vowed revenge. ■When a feud starts, the bloody shirt of the dead man is always taken and kept by the oldest woman of his family She brings it out on holidays, at family weddings and other celebrations, saying: “This blood has not been avenged. These stains demand justice to punish the guilty man. It is for you to avenge your dead brother.” A family which does not vow to —takerevenge is despised by the community. No man will marrv one of its daughters. . A? , age .’s W . ritual, still observed, for Izmir ’ or reconciliation beE rom e ! ght to W leadK£.r U . ag S rB . “1 on the d ead man s family to determine whether they will Everyone in the rannty._tneludlng women, must conioioed by 40 to 50 return in proces--1115 youngest He F oes con - tritely up to the head of the dead famihr. who takes him by the «ry head. SSS’ vTL. killed my son as a - -htaJlaS” ay ' th ° U art for me tn killer then kisses the head of i£2 ily D ° n the f°re•n %??? kne ? ~H e goes round —’nembers or the family, kissfogthem and shaking their hand. The ast for ® ver > onc