Last modified: 2023-04-22 by rob raeside
Keywords: despotovac | eagle: double-headed (white) | ring (white) | stefan lazarevic |
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image by Željko Heimer, 29 August 2004
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The flag of Despotovac is quartered red and blue and bears in the middle a white fimbriated red disk containing a white double-headed eagle. It was designed by the Serbian Heraldry Society.
Željko Heimer, 29 August 2004
The roundel on the flag of Despotovac is charged with
the coat of arms of the medieval Serbian Kingdom, later
Empire and eventually Despotate:
Gules an eagle double-headed displayed argent.
In circular form, it was used as an ornament on royal robes, buildings
built by the rulers etc. and that is the reason why it
appears on the flag in the same form. The white
fimbriation was also used in the Middle Ages to make
the roundel more distinctive if necessary, otherwise
it is not the part of the original blazon. The field
is quartered red and blue; together with white from
the roundel, these make the colours of the modern flag
of Serbia, but red and blue are also the colours of
the oldest described flag of Serbia from XIIIth century, which
also may have provided the inspiration for this flag's
design.
Source: D. Samardžić. Vojne zastave Srba do 1918. Beograd: Vojni muzej, 1983
Tomislav Todorović, 25 March 2006
image by Tomislav Šipek, 1 November 2021
The flag of Despotovac with big coat of arms is white with the arms centered.
Source:
https://www.novosti.rs/c/srbija/vesti/930245/epidemioloska-situacija-despotovcu-opstinski-stab-vanredne-situacije-doneo-odluku-pojacanoj-kontroli-sankcionisanju
Tomislav Šipek, 1 November 2021
image by Dragomir Acović, 29 August 2004
The Despot after whom Despotovac was named is Stefan Lazarević (reigned 1389-1427). This is evident from the coat of arms of the municipality.
The dexter supporter is obviously the Despot himself: a crowned man in Byzantine-style royal robe, with a golden aureole around the head - despot Stefan is canonized by the Serbian Orthodox Church and celebrated on 1st August (19th July Old Style). He is also holding the model of a church building in his dexter hand - the church of the Manasija monastery, situated off Despotovac, which he founded and where he is buried.
The shield is charged on the chief with the coat of
arms attributed to Despot Stefan by most of the
so-called "Illyrian armorials", a series of apocryphal
armorials created from XVth to XIXth centuries. This
coat of arms is blazoned as:
Argent on a pale between two fleurs-de-lis gules a cross of the field.
Many of the "Illyrian" blazons are completely fictional, but
the above one is only partly such, as some of Despot
Stefan's seals contain a similar coat of arms, which
is charged with a bend between two fleurs-de-lis. In
the Armorial of Fojnica, one of the "Illyrian
armorials", Despot Stefan's coat of arms is
blazoned as:
Argent two pallets between two fleurs-de-lis gules,
which is a bit more similar to
the coat of arms on the seals. The tinctures of the
authentic medieval Serbian coats of arms are nowadays
reconstructed after the "Illyrian" blazons, so the
real coat of arms of Despot Stefan may have been:
Argent a bend between two fleurs-de-lis gules.
This
has much similarity with the coat of arms of medieval
Kingdom of Bosnia (also used by the Republic of Bosnia
and Herzegovina 1992-1996) and, just like that one, it
was possibly derived from the coat of arms of the
Angevin Kings of Hungary, to denote the Despot as the
vassal of King Zsigmond (Sigismund) of Hungary, who
probably granted him the coat of arms in 1402 or 1403.
Before Despot Stefan was granted the above coat of
arms, he had used the old coat of arms of medieval
Serbia:
Gules an eagle double-headed displayed argent.
In circular form, this was put in the centre of the
flag of Despotovac. Despot Stefan has
inherited this coat of arms from his father, prince
Lazar Hrebeljanović (reigned 1372-1389) and it seems
that he kept using it even after 1403, together with
the one granted by the king of Hungary and perhaps
even more than that one. The tinctures of the later
Despot's coat of arms may have been derived either
from those of the earlier one or from those of the
coat of arms of Hungary (or both). Despot Djuradj
Branković (reigned 1427-1456), Despot Stefan's nephew
and successor, has also used these coats of arms but
eventually replaced them with some different blazons
and his successors seem not to have been using them at
all. By the time when the first of the "Illyrian
armorials" were created, correct blazons were largely
forgotten; that is why these armorials contain only
different incorrect versions of the blazon.
The Despot Stefan's coat of arms from the "Illyrian armorials" was attributed to his father as well, as the coat of arms of the "Hrebeljanović family". It can be seen, together with their pre-1403 coat of arms, on the Srpska Politika website.
Source: D. Spasić, A. Dušan Palavestra and D. Mrdjenović. Rodoslovne tablice i grbovi srpskih dinastija i vlastele. Beograd: Bata, 1992.
Tomislav Todorović, 25 March 2006