The Ham Nomads

28 Apr 2015. <RS> Niš —

Today, back into Niš again.

Our first port of call, somewhat out of the city centre, and virtually on our path in — the Concentration Camp in the Red Cross city quarter, one of very few preserved German Nazi camps in Europe. It housed over 30,000 Serbian, Romanji and Jewish prisoners during the German occupation of Niš (1941-1944). It was from this camp that the first ever mass escape of prisoners occurred, with 105 escaping on February 12 1942, most of whom joined the partisans to fight against the Germans. In the escape of February 1942, 42 prisoners were killed, and after it the Germans executed 800 in reprisal. Many of the prisoners were shipped onwards to death camps elsewhere, so of the 30,000 inmates of the camp over its period of operation, very few survived. Concentration Camp Niš (Anhaltelager Nisch) is a depressing place, a vivid testimony of man's potential for inhumanity. Since 1969, the camp building was turned into Memorial Complex '12 February'. While we were there, school groups were being taken through — a rather subduing but important lesson in history.

After this we went to another bizarre memorial. In 1809, during the Serbian insurrection against the occupying Ottoman Turks, there was a particularly bloody battle at the hill Cegar (4000 Serban dead, 10,000 Turkish), but the battle was won by the Turks. The Turks sent in a punitive expedition to exact revenge for the uprising. One of the icons of this revenge was a tower built in Niš, a 3-metre cubical structure with 952 niches, with each side of the cube having 14 rows of 17 openings. In each of these openings, the skull of one of the Serbian defenders, removed from the dead body, was mortared in, facing outwards. Most of the skulls have now been removed and reunited with their respective bodies for proper burial, but there are still about 60 skulls left in the tower. In 1878 the tower was fenced in and covered for protection, and in 1892 a chapel was built about the tower. The tower has become a reminder of Turkish barbarism, and of the price Serbs have had to pay for their freedom.

From the macabre to the sublime! We went back into the centre of Niš, first visiting their new Crkva Sv. Cara Konstantina i Carice Jelene (The Church of Saint Emperor Constantine and Empress Helena). This building is still under construction, having been started only in 1999. The exterior will have beautiful clean lines, and the interior is a magnificent open space.

Then we walked round to the old Orthodox Cathedral, built in 1872, and sanctified after the city's liberation from the Turks in 1878. This building is a curious admixture of styles, including Serbian, Byzantine, Islamic, Western Renaissance and Western Baroque, and yet it has a magnificent unity of feel.

We wandered into the old part of town, to Kazandžijsko Sokače — Tinkers Alley — in the early 18th century a famous cobblestoned street of craftsmen, today a street of restaurants. As you walk into this street, you pass a monument to the Serbian writer Stevan Sremac, who lived here from 1879 to 1892. The monument takes the form of two men sitting at an inn table, a dog at their feet — these are Sremac and his literary character, the hunter Kalča and his dog, with Kalča regaling his audience with his imagined heroic deeds!

We then went in to visit the Archaeology Hall of the National Museum. This is a small but important collection, specifically from or about Niš — it was here that we saw a bronze portrait of its most eminent citizen, the Emperor Constantine I.

When we emerged, the rain that had been hanging around all day, had been and gone, and the wet streets were shining in the sunshine.

We went back to our cheeky park at Petrol Station Fontana for a good night's sleep.

Distance driven — today, 22 miles ( 35 km ); to date, 18,996 miles ( 30,571 km )