§ All translations into English are my own, unless otherwise indicated. Translations were made to ensure the paper is coherent

T.Ewertowski 

18 

Вестник Карагандинского университета 

The Serbian traveller Ljubomir Nenadović

*

 described the ruins of the Roman Forum, using the idea of 

historical punishment: 

Rimski forum, gde su se tolika istorijska dela svršila, gde je ugovaran rat i mir; forum, gde se sudbina 

sveta rešavala, leži u razvalinama i sada se zove «kravlja pijaca»« (…) Grabež i pljačka su i osnažili Rim, 

grabež i pljačka oborili su ga i pretvorili u ruine. Ko sabljom seče, od sablje pogine. Što su Goti, Vandali i 

Huni ostavili uspravo, došli su Normani i oborili. Opljačkani narodi po dalekim krajevima Azije, Afrike i 

Jevrope davno su osvećeni.Na ognjištu njihovih tirana, na forumu starih Rimljana, goveda plandu-

ju.(Nenadović, 1907, p. 97–98). 

The Roman Forum, where so many historical deeds took place, wherewar and peace were negotiated, 

where the fate of the world were decided, now lays in ruins and is called ‘cows’ market’ (…) A pillage and a 

plunder strengthened Rome, a pillage and a plunder overthrew and turned it into ruins.He who lives by the 

sword shall die by the sword. What the Goths, the Vandals and the Huns had left, was destroyed by the Nor-

mans. Robbed nations from far-away lands of Asia, Africa and Europewere avenged a long time ago. In the 

heart and home of their tyrants, at the old Roman Forum, cattle grazes. 

Later, Nenadović compared the fate of ancient Rome and other ancient cities to the future of capitals of 

modern empires: 

A o čemu bi drugom nego o prošlosti mogao čovek misliti na razvalinama Koloseuma, pored koga taj 

Rim, taj veliki balsamirani mrtvac, leži. I za varoši, i za države, priroda ima svoje zakone. I one imaju svoju 

mladost, svoju starost, svoju smrt. Niniva i Memfis, one velike varoši, oko kojih se jedva za dan i noć obići 

moglo, poznaju se danas po kamenim stubovima što vire iz zemlje; a London, sabor i magacin sveta, podigao 

se na onom mestu, gde su divlji zverovi svoje pećine imali. Rim pao i postao nejak; Mars preselio svoje 

dvorov u Pariz. — Pa koliko miliona godina treba, da tako jedna varoš, kao što je Niniva i Memfis, poraste 

do najvišeg stupnja, i da se svim svojim stanovništvom, sa svim svojim bogovima i oltarima, i sa svojom 

slavom, propadne? Ni pune sve hiljade godina! (…) Doći će vreme, kada će putnici dolaziti na obale reke 

Sene i Temze, i kopati zatrpano kamenje, da pronađu gde je Pariz i London. Uništenje ovako velike 

varoši, i rasturiti jedan mravinjak, za prirodu je sve jedno(Nenadović, 1907, p. 116, emphasis mine). 

About what else than the past could man think on the ruins of the Coliseum, around which Rome, that 

great embalmed corpse, lays. Nature has its laws for cities and states, too. They also have their youth, their 

old age, their death. Nineveh and Memphis, those great cities, which could be barely walked around in a day 

and night, are today recognized only by stone columns protruding from the ground; whereas London, the 

world’s council and warehouse, grew on the place where wild beasts had had their caves. Rome fell and be-

came weak; Mars moved his court into Paris. But how many millions of yearsare needed for such a city like 

Nineveh and Memphis to grow to the highest level and to vanish with all its population, with all its gods and 

altars, with all its glory? Even not a thousand years (…) The time will come, when travelers will approach 

the banks of the Thames and Seine, and dig stones to find where Paris and London are. Destroying such a big 

city and destroying an anthill, for nature it is the same. 

It seems obvious that Nenadović looked at the ruins of Rome from the standpoint of the philosophy of 

history.The current state of Forum Romanum is a sign of punishment. Although he used a quote from the 

Bible, his concept of history wasnot religious. It wasbased on the idea of metamorphose as a basiclaw of na-

ture. 

The Polish poet Zygmunt Krasiński

†

 also describedthe ruins of Rome, based on a similar philosophical 

idea of historical punishment. However, his general conclusion was different. Firstly, Nenadović referred to 

the laws of nature, whereas Krasiński wrote about God as a factor in history (about Krasiński’s philosophy of 

history, see (Janion, 1962; Waśko, 2001). In the poem dedicated to his wife Eliza, the Polish poet useda rep-

resentation of the ruins of Rome to show his ideas on history: 

*

Ljubomir Nenadović [1826-1895] was a Serbian writer, diplomat and politician. He came from the famous Nenadović family,

which played a key role in Serbian politics and culture of the 19

th

 century. He published a lot of poems; however, in the history of 

Serbian literature he is important as the author of travel writings (Pisma iz Italije, Pisma iz Nemačke, Pisma iz Švajcarske, Pisma o 

Crnogorcima) (Popović, 1972, p. 233–272). He travelled to Italy in 1851 and 1852 and described his travels in the book Pisma iz 

Italije (‘Letters from Italy’). 

†

 Zygmunt Krasiński [1812-1859] is one of the most important Polish poets of the Romantic period. Heis called a prophet-poet 

(wieszcz in Polish, an equivalent of Latin vates), along with Mickiewicz and Juliusz Słowacki. He belonged to an aristocratic family 

and his outlook on the world was more conservative and catholic than those of other important Polish romantic poets. He lived for 

many years in Rome. He is best known for his works Nie-Boska komedia, Irydion (the drama is set in ancient Rome), Przedświt. 

Images of Rome in Polish and Serbian literature  ... 

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19 

Biada im wszystkim, ludziom krwawej dłoni,/ Bo Bóg piorunem z świata ich wygoni/ I śladu po nich 

w  świecie nie zostanie!/ Patrz! wokół ciebie na rzymskiej równinie / Co zostało z dumy!/ Pośród pustyni 

mętny Tyber płynie, / Wkoło zwalisk rumy./ I tu chadzali w purpurze i złocie / Niesprawiedliwości -/ A 

dziś ich świątyń marmury śpią w błocie/ Nad prochem ich kości. (Krasiński, 1973a, p. 116, emphasis 

mine). 

Woe betide all the people of a bloody hand,/ Because God will drive them out of the world with ligh-

tening,/ And not a trace will be left./ Look! Allaround you on the Roman plain/ What’s left of the pride!/ 

Through a desert the muddy Tiber flows/ All around rubbles of ruins/ Here they walked [dressed] in purple 

and gold/ Of injustice/ And today marbles of their temples sleep in mud/ Over the dust of their bones. 

Krasiński, as with Nenadović, used the description of Roman ruins to formulate a general conclusion 

about principles of history, whichhe alsoapplied to the political landscape of the 19

th

 century. However, his 

political ideas were different. Nenadović used examples of France and Great Britain as contemporary world 

powers whose greatness would pass away just as the greatness of Rome had passed due to the natural law 

oftemporality. Krasiński used the example of Rome as a harbinger of the fall of the Russian empire, which 

was perceived by him as an embodiment of evil in history(Fiećko, 2005). In Krasiński’s autobiographical 

novel Adam Szaleniec (‘Adam the Madman’), the main character compared Rome and Russia: 

Marzyłem wśród ruin. Świat starożytny, u stóp mych powalony przed krzyżem drewnianym, milczenie 

grobów ponad nim, burze naszego stulecia, wspomnienie mojej ujarzmionej ojczyzny, wszystko mieszało się 

w moim mózgu. Pocieszałem się, patrząc na Rzym leżący wśród gliny i błota; gdyż w dzieciństwie 

poprzysiągłem zemstę innemu Rzymowi i depcąc pierwszy, sądziłem,  że kiedyś deptać  będę drugi. Nocą, 

idąc z Kolizeum do grobu Cecylii, brałem w ręce z uśmiechem ironii złomy porfiru, jaspisu: ciskając je o 

kamienie cieszyłem się, że pryskają w tysiąc okruchów. „Tak będzie kiedyś z dumą Północy». (Krasiński, 

1973b, p. 190). 

I dreamed among the ruins. The ancient worldhas fallen in front of a wooden cross, the silence of tombs 

above it, storms of our age, reminiscence of my subjugated homeland, everything was messed up inside my 

brain. I consoled myself, looking at Rome laying in clay and mud, because in my childhood I had sworn a 

revenge on the other Rome and while I was trampling the first, I thought that one day I would trample the 

other. At night, while walking from the Coliseum to the tomb of Cecilia, I took in my hands chunks of por-

phyry and jasper with an ironic smile. I was throwing them on the stones and was glad to see that they shat-

tered into thousands of fragments. ‘It will happen to the pride of the North someday’. 

In Krasiński’s vision, in the history of Rome and ruins of the Eternal City, the contemporary political 

situation of Poland and Russia and a metaphysical concept of history were mixed. In comparison with Ne-

nadović, some similarities in motives and ideas are clearly visible (ruins as the sign of historical punish-

ment).However, differences in conclusions are striking. The Polish poet, while describing Roman ruins, in-

troduced theChristian philosophy of history and heralded the fall of the Russian Empire. For the Serbian au-

thor, remains of Forum Romanum demonstrated the law of metamorphose in nature, and because of it all 

capitals of modern empires would turn into ruins some day. 

Of course, the fact that the two aforementioned authors’ descriptions of Roman ruins are different could 

be easily explained by a different outlook on the world. The main concept of this paper is based on the notion 

of imaginary geography. According to the theorist of this orientation, a description is always an expression 

of outlook on the world and cultural background of the author. Erazm Kuźma, in reference to Jurij Lotman 

and Roland Barthes, emphasizes that the language of space could also be a language of values and ideas. 

Even basic geographical notions, like the West and the East, very often carry ideological meaning (Kuźma, 

1980). Edward Said introduces the concept of imaginative geography and history: ‘So space acquires emo-

tional and even rational sense by a kind of poetic process, whereby the vacant or anonymous reaches of dis-

tance are converted into meaning for us here (…) For there is no doubt that imaginative geography and his-

tory help the mind to intensify its own sense of itself by dramatizing the distance and difference between 

what is close to it and what is far away’ (Said, 1977, p. 55).Maria Todorova demonstrates connections be-

tween ‘Discovery’, ‘Invention’ and ‘Classification’ on the example of the Balkans. In any description of a 

new place, discovery goes hand in hand with invention of the place, while the imagination of the subject 

plays a key role in the creation of an image of the place. Moreover, new information is ‘classified’ into pat-

terns which do not exist in reality, but which are invented by the perceivers (Todorova, 2009, p. 116–117)

*

. 

*

Compare: Bassin, 1991; Jezernik, 2007; Wolff, 1994.

T.Ewertowski 

20 

Вестник Карагандинского университета 

The aforesaid theoretical concept isapplied in this paper to analyse different images of Rome in Polish 

and Serbian literature of the romantic period. As the cases of Nenadović and Krasiński show, Rome could be 

transformed into an object of ideological discourse. And concepts of imaginative geography help analyse 

such transformation. 

Rome as a palimpsest, Rome as a heterotopia 

Both Polish and Serbian authors quite often wrote about the feeling that Rome is an exceptional place. 

Adam Mickiewicz, in the letter to his daughter Maria quoted above, expressed admiration for the grandeur of 

Rome: 

‘Rzym jest dotąd największą rzeczą na ziemi’ (Mickiewicz, 2005, p. 152). 

Rome has so far been the greatest thing on Earth 

Petar II Petrović Njegoš

*

, in a letter to his friend Dmitrije Vladislavljević, also emphasizes the greatness 

of Rome: 

Ah, Rim, veličestveni Rim! Te razvaline velikoga Rima! (Njegoš, 1981, p. 203) 

Ah, Rome, magnificent Rome! Those ruins of great Rome! 

Why was Rome perceived as a special place? This is not merelya question of magnificent buildings. 

This part of the paper will analyse how cultural heritage and historical legacy influenced the perception of 

the Eternal City as a space of exceptional experience. 

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, the precursor of romanticism, introduced several Italian topics into the 

European literature of the 19

th

-century in his travel report Italian Journey. On pages of that book, huge admi-

ration for Rome is clearly evident.One of the most important feelings is a feeling of visiting aplace that is 

familiar even though it is only being visited for the first time: 

‘All the dreams of my youth have come to life; the first engravings I remember — my father hung 

views of Rome in the hall — I now see in reality, and everything I have known through paintings, drawings, 

etchings, woodcuts, plaster casts and cork models is now assembled before me. Wherever I walk, I come 

upon familiar objects in an unfamiliar world; everything is just as I imagined it, yet everything is new’ 

(Goethe, 1970, p. 129). 

This feeling is common among the 19

th

 century Polish and Serbian writers. Nenadović, while describing 

his first visit to Rome, also madethe claim that he had been visiting a place already well-known. 

Kad stranac prvi put po ulicama Rima ide, čini mu se da ide kroz neku varoš, gde je proveo svoje de-

tinjstvo. Pita za Panteon, za Koloseum, za Kapitol, za forum, kao za kakve stare svoje poznanike 

(Nenadović, 1907, p. 84). 

When a foreigner walks for the very first time on the streets of Rome, it seems to him that he walks 

through a city where he spent his childhood. He asks about the Pantheon, the Coliseum, the Capitol, the Fo-

rum, as if he asks about his old friends. 

Zygmunt Krasiński described his first visit using very pathetic words. The similar feeling of familiarity 

appears however: 

Jest pewne uczucie, które dojeżdżając do Rzymu mimowolnie do duszy się wkrada. Coś jakby 

tchnącego poszanowaniem przed tyloma wiekami sławy, wielkości, zbrodni i nieładu (Krasiński, 1963, 

p. 214).

There is one feeling, which unwittingly creeps into soul while approaching Rome. Something redolent 

of respect for so many centuries of glory, greatness, crime and disarray. 

In this context, Duncan Kennedy is to the point, that ‘Rome visited is always in some sense Rome revis-

ited’ (Kennedy, 1991, p. 19). Kennedy shows how complicated are the relations between time, space and 

narration in writings about Rome. He does not write about Polish and Serbian romantic writers; nevertheless, 

his conclusions are also valid for the authors who are the focus of attention in this paper. 

The experience of history in Rome is very different to that in other places. The subject feels that he is at 

the centre of events. Goethe claimed: ‘It is history, above all, that one reads quite differently here from any-

where else in the world. Everywhere else one starts from the outside and works inward; here it seems to be 

*

Petar II Petrović Njegoš [1813-1851] was the vladika (the political and religious leader) of Montenegro and one of the most

important poets of South Slavic literature. He is considered a great Serbian poet and, nowadays, he is also a key figure of Montene-

grin cultural canon (about this problem, see Zieliński, 2005). His most famous works are Górski wieniec, Luča mikrokozma, Lažni 

car Ščepan mali. He visited Rome in 1851 (Kilibarda, 1999, 2012; Pižurica, 1998), that year in Naples, Italy, he met Ljubomir Ne-

nadović and then travelled for a few months together.  

Images of Rome in Polish and Serbian literature  ... 

Серия «Филология». № 3(71)/2013 

21 

the other way around. All history is encamped about us and all history sets forth again from us. This does not 

apply only to Roman history, but to the history of the whole world’ (Goethe, 1970, p. 148). 

Similar observationshave been formulated by Polish and Serbian authors. Mickiewicz, in a letter to his friend 

Franciszek Malewski, stated that it is very interesting to familiarize himself with the past in Rome, where 

events took place. 

Liwiusz tu na miejscu ma dziwny urok, bo w wieczór można iść oglądać scenę wypadków czytanych z 

rana (Mickiewicz, 1998, pp. 614–615). 

Reading Livius here has a specific charm, because in the evening you may go to see a scene of events 

about which you read in the morning 

Nenadović expressed similar feelings. Rome is so deeply connected with the history of the world that 

visiting it is like visiting the scene of historical events known from books: 

Kada  čovek prvi put ulazi u ovakvu jednu varoš, s kojom je svetska istorija tako tesno skopčana, 

obuzmu ga neka osećanja, o kojima ne može sam sebi računa dati: osvrće se svuda, gde će da vidi one ljude i 

događaje, o kojima je čitao i slušao. Kad smo se približili kapijama Rima, sve što sam iz istorije o 

Rimljanima znao, ponovilo mi se u mislima (Nenadović, 1907, p. 83). 

When a man enters such a city, with which the world’s history is so tightly linked, he is overwhelmed 

by some feelings, which are not easy to describe. He looks back everywhere to see those people and events 

about which he reads and hears. When we were approaching the gates of Rome, all that I knew about the his-

tory of the Romans were repeated in my thoughts. 

The abundance of symbolical meaning makes Urbs Aeterna an exceptional space. The Polish poet Cyp-

rian Norwid

*

, in his short prose Zarys z Rzymu (‘A sketch from Rome’), made a paradoxical statement in 

trying to describe the place of action, negating a sensual attribute of the Eternal City: 

Ten Rzym, miejsce tak mało, tak prawie wcale nie mające zmysłowego miejsca charakteru — 

Rzym to środek, punkt prawie w matematycznym rozumieniu — Rzym to owa kolumna na 

starożytnym forum, na której były zapisane odległości miast państwa, czyli świata…(Norwid, 1973, p. 11). 

This Rome, the place which has few, hardly any traits of sensual qualities — Rome is the centre, almost 

a point in a mathematical sense — Rome is this column on the ancient forum, where distances between cities 

of the state, or the world, were written 

Following Norwid’s remark, the city Rome is the centre of the world, for it rules the state which con-

trols the world. Therefore, the city loses its material character, because it is linked to such a waste of histori-

cal and cultural heritage, that symbolic meanings cover material substance (to be comparedwith Edwards’ 

words about ‘endlessly mobile symbolic life’ in the notion of Rome). Krzysztof Trybuś claims that Rome is 

a model of the world for Norwid(Trybuś, 2000, pp. 68–69). In general, for Polish and Serbian writers from 

the Romantic period, Rome and its history represented a universal value. According to Radosław Piętka, de-

liberations over Roman history were one of the basic approaches to any reflexion on history. Piętka uses a 

very evocative expression: ‘A primer of the philosophy of history’(Piętka, 2007, p. 15). 

At the end of this part, three different terminological concepts will be introduced to describe specific 

qualities of the Eternal City in the literature. Firstly, to emphasize the special characteristics of Rome, it 

could be said that the Eternal City is a heterotopia. According to Michel Foucault, heterotopia juxtaposes 

several spaces and functions in relation to all the remaining spaces (Foucault, 2005). It describes romantic 

visions of Rome — the Eternal City is linked to various other places and events for the romantic writers. 

Secondly, Catherine Edwards uses the term ‘palimpsest’ to describe the multi-layered cultural and historical 

heritage of Rome (Edwards, 1996, p. 28). Thirdly, Kwiryna Ziemba uses the term ‘symbol’ in the sense of 

Paul Ricoeur, in writing aboutthe abundance of Rome’s symbolical meanings in Mickiewicz’s works. The 

city is material for various symbolical senses. Those three terms, ‘heterotopia’, ‘palimpsest’, and ‘symbol’, 

create a perspective for understandinghow and why Rome was so exceptional a place for Polish and Serbian 

romantic authors. 

*

Cyprian Norwid [1821-1883] was a very important poet of the Romantic period in Poland. He belonged to the second genera-

tion of Polish romantic poets and his works are specific. Because of that, he was not recognized during his life and his poetry is quite 

different from other great romantic poets, sometimes he is called a classicist (Fieguth, 2009; Stefanowska, 1993; Trybuś, 2009). Nev-

ertheless, nowadays he is considered ‘the fourth great poet’ of the Romantic period, along with Mickiewicz, Słowacki and Krasiński. 

He spent a few years in Rome and a few of his works are set in the Eternal City (Biliński, 1973). 

T.Ewertowski 

22 

Вестник Карагандинского университета 

The city of ruins 

Ruins are the most important element in the image of Romefrom the 19

th

-century, at least according to 

romantic writers. It should be emphasized that Rome was not a modern metropolis then. The capital of a 

weak and reactionary Papal State was a small city, and a lot of the ancient monuments (e.g. Coliseum) were 

outside the city borders and thus were left unattended.A popular motive in 18

th

 and 19

th

 century paintingswas 

a shepherd on ruins and which evocatively shows the rural character of Roman Campagna(Mocarska-

Tycowa, 2003). As Radosław Piętka insists, for the writers of the romantic period, Rome was ‘the Rome of 

melancholic ruins’ (Piętka, 2003, p. 120). 

Romantic attitude towards the ruins of Rome was full of ambivalence. A very interesting example of 

this phenomenonis the words from Njegoš’s letter, quoted above: 

Te razvaline velikoga Rima. Kada čovjek u njemu dođe, ne znada ali ga udivlenije potpiri u više 

ushićenje, ali mu žalost vše dušu ugasi i opečali nad grobnicom veličija svijetskoga. Doista su se kod mene 

жүктеу/скачать 1,09 Mb.

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