Two Letters From Hamdija Kreševljaković to Carl Patsch From the Bavarian Main State Archives

Abstract

Goal: By presenting these letters in the current research phase and in the manner presented in this paper, the primary goals, compared to previous research, are to point out in more detail the connection between Kreševljaković and Patsch and to complement knowledge about the problems that accompanied creation in BH and Yugoslav historiography, one of the quite controversial work Poviest hrvatskih zemalja Bosne i Hercegovine od najstarijih vremena do godine 1463 (The history of the Croatian lands of Bosnia and Herzegovina from the earliest times to the year 1463).

Approach: This paper contextualizes and presents two letters that BH historian Hamdija Kreševljaković sent to his colleague archaeologist and historian Carl Patsch in 1939. Through the paper, it was pointed out their cooperation at the beginning of the 20th century, which took place under the auspices of the Institute for the Study of the Balkans, which was founded in Sarajevo by Patsch. Special attention was given to the second letter which was sent by Kreševljaković to Patsch at the end of May in 1939, and in which he offers to write a chapter on the history of Bosnia and Herzegovina in the Roman period for Napredak’s history. The letters are compared with other available sources and literature.

Results: Presented and published letters have not been previously used in research. By publishing the complete text of the letters, they will become more accessible and usable in future research processes. Other research results may be useful when researching the topics that the author glanced upon in this paper

Limits: The aim of this paper is not to offer any major conclusions regarding the intellectual connections between Bosnian and Herzegovinian researchers and foreign researchers in the interwar period, nor to deal in detail with Kreševljaković’s and Patsch’s intellectual profile. Although the letters have a potential for that kind of thing, they should be viewed in the wider context of the preserved correspondence of Kreševljaković and Patsch, but also other contemporaries, which was not done on this occasion.

Originality/value: By publishing and commenting on the correspondence, a better insight is obtained to the intellectual history of the period to which the letters are related. In this sense, the main contribution of this type is precisely directed movement towards larger processing of correspondence, which could ultimately result in major conclusions.