CHAPTER XXIX.
A Memoir of Kara Georg.
The Turkish conquest was followed by the gradual dispersion or
disappearance of the native nobility of Servia, the last of whom, the
Brankovitch, lived as _despots_ in the castle of Semendria, up to the
beginning of the eighteenth century; so that at this moment scarcely a
single representative of the old stock is to be found.[22]
The nobility of Bosnia, occupying the middle region between the sphere
of the Eastern and Western churches, were in a state of religious
indifference, although nominally Catholic; and in order to preserve
their lands and influence, accepted Islamism _en masse_; they and the
Albanians being the only instances, in all the wars of the Moslems, of
a European nobility embracing the Mohamedan faith in a body. Chance
might have given the Bosniacs a leader of energy and military talents.
In that case, these men, instead of now wearing turbans in their grim
feudal castles, might, frizzed and perfumed, be waltzing in pumps; and
Shakespear and Mozart might now be delighting the citizens assembled
in the Theatre Royal Seraievo!
The period preceding the second siege of Vienna was the spring-tide of
Islam conquest.
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