Two Lists of Churches of the Timok Diocese That Were Damaged During the Serbo-Turkish War of 1876–1877

Abstract

The paper presents a critical edition of two lists of churches belonging to the Timok Diocese that suffered destruction or significant material damage during the First Serbo-Turkish War. Both documents are preserved in the State Archives of Serbia (DAS) in Belgrade, within the fonds of the Ecclesiastical Department of the Ministry of Education and Church Affairs (MPS-C), where they were registered in 1882 and 1883. Neither of the two edited lists represents a complete record of diocesan churches damaged in the war of 1876, as they omit those churches that had suffered damage during the conflict but had already been repaired or provided with liturgical items by the time the lists were compiled. Since the available sources indicate that the Ottoman army, within the territory under the jurisdiction of the Orthodox Church in the Principality of Serbia, lying within the state borders, damaged and plundered churches exclusively in the territory of the Timok Diocese, the two edited lists effectively constitute a record of Orthodox churches in Serbia that suffered during the war and had not yet been repaired by the first months of 1883. Consequently, following an overview of the wartime devastation of the territory of the Principality, the introductory section attempts to reconstruct the complete list of Orthodox Church buildings in the Principality of Serbia that suffered damage in the war of 1876, including data on the damage sustained and the subsequent restoration of each church.