– A Study by Nenad M. Djurdjević –
So far orthodox scholarship of the stećak monolithic stones has attempted to situate the
architectural, artistic and religious phenomenon of these monuments in only three different
contexts: Orthodox Christianity and Catholicism (Bosnian Church), the heretic Bogomil doctrine,
and remnants of pagan beliefs of unknown origin. According to academic scholarship, the historical
origin of stećaks has been proposed exclusively as mediaeval.
The intent of this paper is to demonstrate that the architectural, artistic and religious expressions
of the stećaks are deeply rooted in a millennia-old tradition belonging to the Old European culture.
This will lead us to the identification of the “True Spirit” of these sacred stone monuments,
allowing us to rejoin them with their ancestral origin.
