engleski

Petar Iveljić Grgurić Ohmućević: A Man with Three Surnames and Three Homelands

Based on data drawn from older and more recent historiography, along with the previously known and to a large extent newly-discovered documentary and narrative sources of Spanish and Ragusan provenance, the paper seeks to provide an insight into the life and career of Petar Iveljić Grgurić Ohmućević, Ragusan shipowner and captain. Born around 1552 in the townlet of Slano—a century and a half after Primorje, formerly the territory of the medieval County of Hum, had become part of the Dubrovnik Republic—Petar, according to his own account, felt "Bosnian by descent, now Ragusan". Convinced to have originated from the ancient nobility of the Bosnian Kingdom, he embarked upon the reconstruction of the history of his lineage that traced back to the thirteenth century and linked the Grgurići of Slano to the legendary figures from folk narratives and family tradition, such as Relja Krilatica and his father Grgur Ohmutina, after whom to his patronymic Iveljić and the name of the Grgurić lineage Petar also added the lineage "surname" Ohmućević. Having amassed considerable wealth by sailing the Mediterranean as shipowner and captain in the service of the Spanish Crown, Petar was determined to confirm his status on the international scene by joining the most prestigious European orders of Christian knights. However, his efforts to substantiate the nobility of his ancestry were strongly frowned upon by the Ragusan patrician circles, which ultimately led to the filing of criminal charges against him. The plaintiff, Đonko Matov Gradi, in 1584 accused Petar (in absence) of a series of grave criminal offences, starting with the forgery of records in the official registers, contempt of his feudal lords, as well as the claim to a status to which by Ragusan laws he was not entitled. Since Petar deemed that the due proceedings would not be concluded in his favour, never again did he return to Dubrovnik. He died in Lisbon in 1596. Participating in the actions of the Spanish navy, by the end of the 1580s he was granted Spanish citizenship, and in 1590 signed a contract with King Philip II for the building of twelve ships which, manned by Ragusan crew under the name Esquadra Illyrica, were to sail as part of the ocean division of the Spanish navy. Due to serious international implications of his engagement in the royal fleet—acting against the Ottoman navy in the Mediterranean and their French and English allies in the Atlantic—finally, Dubrovnik Republic decided to deprive Petar of citizenship.

Dubrovnik Republic ; townlet of Slano ; 16th century ; maritime history ; Mediterranean

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