Old House, Pirot

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Old House
Native name
Serbian: Stara kuća - Hristin konak
Pirot Konak Malog Riste.JPG
LocationMuseum Old House, Nikole Pašića 49, 18300 Pirot, Serbia
Coordinates43°9′42.8345″N 22°35′19.023″E / 43.161898472°N 22.58861750°E / 43.161898472; 22.58861750Coordinates: 43°9′42.8345″N 22°35′19.023″E / 43.161898472°N 22.58861750°E / 43.161898472; 22.58861750
Built1848
TypeCultural Monument of Exceptional Importance
Reference no.СК

The Old House is located at 49 Nikola Pašića street, , Pirot.[1] Built in 1848, it was placed under protection of the Serbian state in 1953. In 1979 it became a Monument of Culture of Exceptional Importance for Serbia.[2] After that, the Old House became a museum. It is Pirot's best preserved example of traditional architecture from the mid-19th century. It belonged to respectable trader Hrista Jovanović.

History[]

The house is said to have taken two years to construct and was completed on April 5 1848, as confirmed in an engraving on building's floor. Hrista Jovanović needed permission from the Turkish authorities to build it, as he intended for it to be large, with two floors. Thus, he built one of Pirot's most luxurious Christian houses in the mid-nineteenth century on the outskirts of the town.

Unfortunately, no information currently exists about the craftsmen who built it. To this day, it's still unclear who designed it – whether it was "Little Rista" who dreamed it up while traveling through the Ottoman Empire for trade purposes, or skilled builders who planted their own dreams and craftsmanship into the building's fabric.

Hrista Jovanović lived in this house with his family and then it was passed down to his descendants, whose surname changed from Jovanović to Hristić. After World War II, the building was turned into a museum by the municipality of Pirot.[3]

Construction and layout[]

The house was built in the Balkan Oriental style, which you can see in both its features and its layout. The harmony of its interior and the grandeur of its facade and roof make it particularly noteworthy. Its masterful construction and use of half-timbering give it a sense of lightness and ease. With a symmetrical, almost square-shaped foundation with a cross-shaped hall, it is laid out over two floors and a basement.

The building is crowned by a unique, gazebo-style roof, while wooden window frames and decorated lathes on the building's corners add features to its bright white facade. Enter through the porch and you arrive in the hall, which features a fireplace and storage for flour and wood. This room is flanked by two bedrooms.[4] A wooden staircase leads to the spacious upstairs living room, which is divided into:

  1. A central section with shelves and a fireplace
  2. The "divanhana" (men's room)
  3. The women's room

Various uniquely-named rooms lead off the hall: the bedroom, the Kandil (Thurible) Room, the Great Room, the Treasury, and the Sar'k Room.

While the ground floor was used day-to-day by the house's residents, upstairs was reserved for receiving prominent guests. A staircase leads up from the second floor to a viewing platform on the roof. The roof has wide eaves that are lined with shingle and form a wreath of archivolts over the windows at the front and sides of the house. This unique roof design is unusual even in the Balkans.

There are several engraved cabinets in the house. The best work is on the ground floor and is attributed to a craftsman of the famous Debar school. The ceiling of the divanhana is also engraved, while the Great Room features a plaster stucco ceiling. Typical of Serbian architecture of this period, the house also has a secret passage and a special "Kandil" (thurible) Room. The secret passage was accessed from behind the downstairs cabinet and led under the staircase to house's rear entrance. In the Kandil room, an iconostasis adorned the eastern wall and a thurible would be burnt during religious holidays.[3]

Trivia[]

Movies[]

A large part of "Zona Zamfirova" was filmed in the Old House, which was the setting for Hadzi Zamfir's residence. "Ivkova slava," another cult Serbian movie, was also filmed almost entirely in the house's grounds and interior.

Hrista Jovanović - Little Rista[]

Hrista Jovanović better known as Čučuk Rista or Mali Rasta, in his lifetime was a prominent merchant in Pirot and throughout the Ottoman Empire. He was originally settled in the Zavoj village, which submerged under lake in the second half of the 19th century. Later he settled near Pirot in 1830. In the period when he lived in the Zavoj village, he was not a merchant but he chose that profession when he settled near Pirot and his progress and success in that was very fast. Based on his resourcefulness in business he became Kalauz which means that his duty was to collect taxes in cattle and butter for Vidin pasha, and he became all that only after the proposal of the Çorbacı and Turkish authorities from Pirot in 1840. He worked for some time for Usein pasha on the area of Pirot district and after that he became independent. At that time, he gained an great wealth from commerce via Ottoman Empire. He traveled to Niš, Leskovac, Vidin, Sofia, Carigrad with purpose to sell his goods. In 1845. he gets permission to build a house and construction works were finished after 3 years in 1848. After that, this house was known as a quarter of Little Rista, later better known as Old House. However, he was known as greedy and he sold same goods over and over to the Turkish army, and because of that, he was expelled from Pirot by Sadrezam pasha. Exile was the final chapter of Little Rista's life, and that was a finale of a story about respectable merchant Hrista Jovanović.[3]

Little Rista's room[]

In Pirot, that time, Serbs were forced to obey to the Turkish authorities and so, Little Rista decided to make some changes about that. He came to idea to force Turkish authorities to bow to him, but how to ask that? Little Rista was a short man, almost like a dwarf, so he made one room in the Old house, just for him, with very low ceiling. In that room, where he was sleeping and receiving guests, the Turkish authorities like Pasha, who was very tall, had to bend down if they want to enter the room. When the authorities questioned him "What is this all about?", Little Rista simply answered "I'm a short man, so my room is smaller, it is made only for me", so they could not arrest him for disrespect. In that way, he made to force Turkish authorities to obey to him, which in that time was unthinkable.[3]

See also[]

References[]

  1. ^ "Cultural heritage of Pirot district". Archived from the original on 2013-10-16. Retrieved 2013-10-12.
  2. ^ Monuments of Culture in Serbia: Стара кућа (SANU) (in Serbian and English)
  3. ^ a b c d "Pirot Museum". Archived from the original on 2013-10-15. Retrieved 2013-10-12.
  4. ^ Muzej Ponišavlja u Pirotu

External links[]

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