“When a slave sets foot in Serbia, he/she becomes free. Either brought to Serbia by someone, or fled to it by him/herself. Article 118, Serbian constitution, February 15th, 1835

32 comments

  2. The Constitution of the Principality of Serbia, known as the Sretenje Constitution (“Candlemas Constitution”), was the first constitution of the Principality of Serbia, a semi-autonomous state within the Ottoman Empire, adopted in Kragujevac in 1835. It came as a consequence of the [Serbian revolution](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Serbian_Revolution).

    The Constitution divided the power into legislative, executive and judicial branches, which is still considered the standard of democracy and constitutionality today. It also relieved the peasants of all feudal relations.

    It is considered Serbia’s first modern constitution.

    It was suspended after only 55 days under pressure from the Great Feudal Powers (Turkey, Russia and Austria). Today, the original copy of the document is kept in the National Archives of Serbia.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1835_Constitution_of_Serbia

  3. >It was suspended after only 55 days under pressure from the Great Feudal Powers (Turkey, Russia and Austria).

    To their shame

  4. Noice.

    We have/had something similar in France before slavery was forbidden. Oldest account is 1315 under Louis X: “We, considering our kingdom is said to be the kingdom of the Franks (the old name refers to free men or freed slaves in some ways) and wanting to follow the name, command that all servitude become freedom.”

    Translation is loose but you get the gist (the wiki article is only in french also).

  7. Eastern Europeans were always far more civilized than westerners who raped murdered and enslaved tribes who couldn’t defend themselves all over the world.

  9. History is funny. 150 years later ~~workers~~ slaves in Serbia need to wear diapers in factories because they’re not allowed to go to the toilet.

  11. In 1835, there was full-fledged slavery in Romania.

    Around 200.000 Roma/Gypsy people were slaves in Wallachia and Moldavia and they were freed only in 1855 (Moldavia) and 1856 (Wallachia).

  14. King Louis X “the Stubborn” of France did the same in 1315. He used technically correct etymology to proclaim that “France signifies freedom” and that “as soon as a slave breathes the air of France, he breathes freedom” and so abolished slavery and set up a mechanism for serfs to repurchase their freedom (as usual, we were broke).

    We had slavery in colonies because centuries later assholes lawyered their way around that statement.

    He is also the first tennis player known by name to historians.

  15. A similar law in Britain in the Somerset v Stewart case made it so slaves would be free when they arrived in Britain, and it was illegal for any slave which came to Britain to be forced to leave. This was in 1772 (and was one of the reasons for American revolution). Because slavery in Britain had been abolished since the 12th century.

  16. I see that this post also contains every mandatory category of dumb comment that comes on any post regarding Serbia:

    – Serbia bad – 90s

    – East Europe good, West Bad! Bla bla!

    – Fuck East Europe, West is much more civilized

    – Why are you posting about Serbia again!?

    I’ll celebrate the day once a post only has comments like “neat”, and people move on. So many morons on all sides always feel the need bring their baggage here.

    Edit: grammar

  18. “… If you further contact our government through official means about your runaway indentured servant, we will not be able to stress how much of a fuck we don’t give about that.”

  20. That’s not true, my Texan history teacher taught me that America was the first country in history to ban slavery!

  27. Having been enslaved by the ottomans for centuries, they would clearly have a disgusting view of the institution.

  28. It’s important to note that slavery wasn’t just something black people went through in the Mediterranean, the barbery pirates and Ottoman Empire had massive slave networks that included everyone from sub Sahara to Iceland. Most likely this was aimed towards European slaves who escaped

  32. A question for Serbs here. You had a massive head start over all other Western Balkans countries when it comes to most democratic institutions and procedures.

    For example, let’s compare Slovenia and Serbia. The first attempt at constitution was in 1835 in Serbia, in Slovenia (as part of Austria) it was in 1848. The proper constitutional era started in 1838 in Serbia, in Slovenia it began in 1867. Serbia had universal and equal male suffrage in 1888, Slovenia in 1907. Serbia also introduced the parliamentary oversight of the executive in 1888; that was something neither Austria-Hungary nor any of its Crown lands ever introduced, so the first Slovenian experience with that principle was in Yugoslavia in 1921. Croatia lagged even more behind Slovenia, for example it didn’t even have universal male suffrage until Yugoslavia 1. And from 1918 to 1991 we all went through same stuff, which leads me to the question:

    With all that in view, how the hell is democratic process and culture in Serbia today so much weaker than either in Slovenia or Croatia?

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