Narodne umotvorine: iz Dervente i okolice
Folk Wisdoms: from Derventa and its surrounding

Author(s): Smajl O. Bradarić
Contributor(s): Nirha Efendić (Editor)
Subject(s): Cultural history, Customs / Folklore, Bosnian Literature, Theory of Literature
Published by: Slavistički komitet BiH
Keywords: folk literature; Bosnian literature; Maglaj; lyric-narrative songs;
Summary/Abstract: Over the past 130 years, the National Museum of Bosnia and Herzegovina has become a rich treasury of the cultural and historical heritage of the peoples of Bosnia and Herzegovina. This unique resource allows for a scholarly approach to studying different subjects including aspects of the preserved spiritual heritage. The collection entitled Narodne umotovorine (Folk Wisdom), along with its accompanying introductory paper, has the goal to bring a valuable manuscript of folk poems and songs kept at the Folklore Archives of the National Museum closer to the audience. This manuscript, created by Smajl O. Bradarić (1914-1993), a religion teacher from Maglaj, over the course of ten years of his collecting efforts and containing over one thousand oral lyric works, arrived to the National Museum in the middle of the 20th century. Exactly this period – from the1950s through 1980s – was the period of the greatest abundance of ethno-folkloristic contributions since the Museum was established until today.The manuscript collection created by Bradarić represents the folklore life as it was in the period between 1938 and 1948 in the area of Bosanski Novi, Derventa and Malglaj, as well as along the roads connecting these towns in northern Bosnia. This manuscript portrays the life of people de-scribed through different forms of lyric expression – and although most songs were told by elderly women and a few older community leaders who lived in the area and in the period of collection – it also contains several songs which came to the author through his students, who collected them from different people, often the younger ones. Bradarić’s collection also contains the entire songbook collected by Mihajlo Prosenik, Orthodox Christian church official, who collected it from his closest family members, with whom Bradarić collaborated. It also contains songs recorded in Maglaj, Žepče as well as parts of Central Bosnia, told by – as he puts it –Muslims and Bosnian Catholics, today ethnically labeled as Bosniaks and Croats. As such, this unique collection represents a valuable “treasure chest of the folk’s soul”. It is in fact an example of a folklore idyll collected from persons of different age, sex and religion who Bradarić met, and who were willing to share their songs with him.

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