Životopis
Duje Rendić-Miočević (1916 - 1993) and Salona-Solin A Tribute on the Twentieth Anniversary of Death
Mirjana Matijević-Sokol
; Filozofski fakultet Sveučilišta u Zagrebu, Odsjek za povijest, Zagreb, Hrvatska
Sažetak
Twenty years have passed since the death of the extinguished archaeologist, the Academy Member, Duje Rendić-Miočević, whose professional, but also partly his private, life related to Solin and Salona. Ten years ago and a decade after his demise, the Archaeology Department of the Faculty of Philosophy remembered their Professor with a scientific symposium, its papers being printed in the proceedings Illyrica antique ob honorem Duje Rendić-Miočević. By their very volume, the proceedings illustrate the greatness of work and life of Duje Rendić-Miočević. This year, however, Šibenik will pay homage to this meritorious heritage researcher in a similar way, by entering in the archaeological map the site of Danilo - Municipium Riditarum, as well as the pre-historic, Neolithic, Danilo Culture. The Academy Member, Andre Mohorovičić in the eulogy delivered at his funeral in Zagreb twenty years ago, called D. Rendić-Miočević princeps municipii Riditarum. The time will certainly come for a like gathering to be held in his native city of Split, where Solin, that is, Salona, would also take an important place. In order not to wait the next ten years to continue this sequence of events, with this humble contribution in the new journal of Solin/Salona, Tusculum, on this occasion I am remembering our dear Professor, especially having in mind what Salona and Solin meant to Duje Rendić-Miočević, and what he did for them.
He was born on Split, on 29 June 1916, in a reputable family, his grandfather of the same name having been a Mayor of Split. From 1941 he was employed as a custodian in the Archaeological Museum in Split, in 1949 to have become the Director of this reputable institution. After these years of research and museological work, he moved to the Faculty of Philosophy in Zagreb where, at its Archaeological Department, he spent the years from 1955 till 1983. He was the Head of the Department, but also the Dean of the Faculty of Phylosophy. Simultaneously, from 1966 till 1979, he was the Director of the Archaeological Museum in Zagreb. In 1966 he became an Associate Member of the Croatian Academy of Arts and Sciences (HAZU) - at that time the Yugoslav Academy of Arts and Sciences (JAZU), in 1977 to have become its Regular Member. In the HAZU, he was also the Secretary of its Department of Social Sciences. He was a member of several academies and other outstanding institutions all over Europe. With his Illyrian researches he made himself known in the field of archaeology world wide, and with Salonitan and other topics he continued the way started by his predecessors, Frano Bulić, Mihovil Abramić, Josip Brunšmid, Viktor Hoffiller and others.
Duje Rendić-Miočević has left exceptional and indelible imprint in several archaeological fields. We have already mentioned his contribution to the Illyrian topics. Ahead of these were researches of onomastic, epigraphic and numismatic issues that yielded fresh knowledge, but also opened numerous questions. This is best illustrated by the voluminous book Iliri i antički svijet. Povijest - arheologija - umjetnost - numizmatika - onomastika [The Illyrians and the Classical World. History - Archaeology - Arts - Numismatics - Onamastics], published by Književni krug in Split in 1989, containing papers published in proceedings and magazines of international repute, in the Croatian and several other languages. However, even before this, in 1987, the publisher Splitski književni krug (the then name of the same publisher) published the book Carmina epigraphica. Certainly, the book contained also the inscriptions of Salona. Other Rendić-Miočević's works were collected and published in 2011, in another unique book, Dalmatia Christiana - Opera omnia.
Archaeological field works that marked the professional life of Rendić-Miočević are certainly those performed in Danilo, but also those in Cavtat, Budva, Murter. Yet, Salona was constantly present, in various ways, in the focus of his professional interests. This is why we decided to remind the readers of Tusculum of our dear Professor and his imprints in the topics this magazine deals with.
Salona is a challenge to every archaeologist, especially one who became close to it and who himself lived related to the Diocletian's Palace. Duje Rendić-Miočević was not linked with Salona »ex office«, as curator and director of the Archaeological Museum in Split. The sort of relationship that existed between Duje Rendić-Miočević and Solin was learned also by us, young students from these parts who he kept under his protection, having created in us the love for and interest in the topics that he himself dealt with in the widest sense. These were epigraphy, early Christianity, onomastics, but also the medieval Croatian Solin.
The book Dalmatia Christiana - Opera omnia, where at one place published are all of the most important papers on Early Christianity and other topics, shows the Rendić-Miočević's interest and contribution to researches of Christianity in Salona, the metropolis of the Roman Dalmatia, that became one of the largest and most important localities, after Rome, for studying the Early Christianity period through archaeological heritage. Several works of Rendić-Miočević are dedicated to the localities of Salona in narrower terms, including Basilica urbana, especially its baptisterial complex, or the Marusinac locality, but the Salona's city walls as well. As a collaborator of Ejnar Dyggve, at the time of his work in the Archaeological Museum in Split, he was inevitably involved in his researches. Here, Duje Rendić-Miočević and Salona are inevitably linked through archaeological practice and results that must not be avoided or passed over in the present day researchers' works. Although the moving of Duje Rendić-Miočević to Zagreb to the position of a University Professor also meant separation from active and systematic researching of Salona, this remained present in his lectures in the courses of Early Christian archaeology, epigraphy, numismatics, whereas with his students he occasionally returned to it for field work.
The importance of Salona and its presence in Rendić-Miočević's work and ponderings are best seen at the moments when he rose his voice of an undisputed expert about preservation and valuation of the heritage of Salona. That was in the year 1977 when a cycle of warning lectures was launched, known as The SOS for Heritage. Rendić-Miočević's opinions and appearances were published in the magazines Čovjek i prostor and Arhitektura, in the articles Salona - Prilog valorizaciji njezinog spomeničkog nasljeđa and Antička Salona (Salonae) - povijesno-urbanistički i spomenički fenomen (SOS za baštinu) [Salona - A Contribution to Valorisation of Its Heritage, and The Classical Salona (Salonae) - A Historic-Urban and Monument Phenomenon (The SOS for Heritage)]. These articles are still topical and invigorating, since the solutions have not been found yet. The situation caused by constructing the Solin ring-road in 1987 once again caused Rendić-Miočević's (as of many other influential experts) reaction against devastation of the localities of Salona. He published his opinions in 1988 in the Split magazine Mogućnosti, in an article meaningfully titled (In)felix Salona.
As a collaborator of the Croatian encyclopaedia publishing institute Leksikografski zavod, in the Enciklopedija Jugoslavije, Enciklopedija likovnih umjetnosti and Opća enciklopedija [Encyclopaedia Yugoslavica, Visual Arts Encyclopaedia, General Encyclopaedia], he published several entries on the topics he dealt with, including those on Solin and Roman Salona. As a co author, he published the same entry in the Enciclopedia Cattolica Italiana.
Duje Rendić-Miočević dealt with protohistory and Early Christianity but, as a Classical scholar, did not avoid Classical topics either. However, a step into the Middle Ages he made in 1976 when the Department for Social Sciences of HAZU, the then JAZU, among members of which were several Croatian historians and archaeologists by their birth or work related to Solin - Stjepan Gunjača, Mate Suić, Ljubo Boban and Duje Rendić-Miočević himself, to mention a few - dared to mark the millennial anniversary of the queen Jelena's epitaph with a symposium held on 16 June in Spit. However, the papers presented in the symposium have never been published in a book of proceeds, wherefore Duje Rendić-Miočević published his paper several years later, in 1982, in the Academy's magazine Arheološki radovi i rasprave, titled Neke epigrafsko-onomastičke značajke epitafa kraljice Jelene [Some Epigraphic and Onomastic Features of the Queen Jelena's Epitaph]. As the very title says, Rendić-Miočević focused his dissertation to epigraphic and onomastic features of one of the most important inscriptions in stone of the Croatian Middle Ages, the epitaph of the queen Jelena, found at Otok in Solin in the remains of the royal mausoleum excavated by Rev. Frane Bulić in 1898 following an information conveyed by Archdeacon Toma. The particular value of this paper is it being a little synthesis on the monument, that is, its most comprehensive study at that time, marked, of course, firstly by Rendić-Miočević as an epigraphist and onomastic. More comprehensively than other scientists, he treated the epigraphic aspect of the monument, followed by its chronological features, emphasizing the interesting fact that this is only the third monument dated by the Christian era in the Croatian lands, coming from the time when such dating was not customary even in wider European spaces, but was characteristic for Frankish-Carolingian influences. In other elements of the dating formula and in other syntagmas as well, he noticed analogies to Early Christian monuments belonging to the so called common places (loci communes), but also to the rest of the Croatian medieval epigraphic heritage. Particular attention is paid to antroponimic formulas of the Croatian rulers' intitulations, this invigorated by the fact that the epitaph, besides the very queen Jelena, mentioned two more Croatian kings, Mihael (Mihajlo, Mihovil) and Stjepan.
Finally, I would like to say something personal about my Professor and teacher. We, the archaeology students, implemented several research campaigns in Salona in the early 1970s (1972, 1973, 1974) and led by Duje Rendić-Miočević. We researched the joint of the old Salona's core bulwarks and its eastern part, north of the well known Porta Caesarea gate. It is then that we understood the special connection between Duje Rendić-Miočević and Solin and Salona. But that was also the time and circumstances when we got to know our Professor as a dear man, too. His exceptional academic measuredness that we had known from the lectures in Zagreb was completed with the personal experience of his generosity, nobleness and mere human, almost fatherly goodness shown in his care for us, young students. Although he was even a bit biasedly favourable about us, the Salonitans and Splitians, this did not prevent him to invite to these explorations also other students showing interest in the Salonitan topics, regardless of which part of Croatia they came from. During the normal "Salonitan" heats, we retreated into the shadow of the bulwarks and with great interest listened our Professor's scientific, expert and human reflections. That was an outstanding school that most certainly marked our generation of students. It was most interesting listening to the disputes between our dear Professor and his friend, and another professor of ours, Mate Suić, with who he collaborated at both »his own« and »Prof. Suić's« sites and topics. Always friendly, but often in dispute about some scientific issue. To each other they were like diabolus rotae, questioning and clarifying the opinions they advocated in even more argumented manners. That was the best archaeological, or even general scientific, school that taught and directed us to build our opinions on arguments. But this means the great knowledge that our professors had. More and more often I recall these oral disputes of theirs that found their echoes in their papers as well, but that never disturbed their friendship, because it was invigorating for the works of both of them. Today when I recall such moments, I am most proud that I witnessed this, because they have influenced myself as well. They built, constructed, rather than demolished, destructed, as it is often done in the so called new scientific tendencies and methodologies, accepted hastily and implemented inexpertly and inadequately relative to the sites and topics. Today we are lacking the voice of an authority that would meticulously and critically oppose such »tendencies« and return a science based on expertness, knowledge and arguments. The works and theses of Duje Rendić-Miočević were not built on authority and position he had in the Croatian archaeology, but always contained the message: »I think so because of this and this…«
Professor Duje Rendić-Miočević left without having completed his opus Salonitanum. He did not live to see the congress on Early Christian archaeology that took place in Split once again, after 100 years. He participated in its preparations as the National Board Chairman. Among his last activities in this capacity was the one at the symposium Old-Croatian Solin [Old-Croatian Solin], held in 1992 in Split and Solin, and presentation of the book Starohrvatski Solin in Zagreb. Dear Professor, natus et nutritus in Split, but permanently related to Salona and Solin, rests today in the shadow of cypresses of the Lovrinac Cemetery, keeping vigil over Salona and his Split, also through us, his students.
Ključne riječi
Hrčak ID:
106791
URI
Datum izdavanja:
8.9.2013.
Posjeta: 2.149 *