Rade Vujisic

My wish was to collect material concerning Štitarica in order to preserve its rich history, life and customs. Readers should decide if I succeeded. Approaching my work I was aware of its size, complexness and responsibility. Especially the responsibility I was taking. In the past, various people inhabited Štitarica and because of this, even though we are dealing with village chronicle, we had to get familiar with their past as well. Same difficulties occurred while writing this book, mainly because it was hard to find written documents concerning Štitarica, especially the ones reflecting events that took place further in the past.
Tales and stories were also hardly found because elderly people that had been carefully preserving them perished. collecting information and facts about recent inhabitants was hard enough because many of them relocated across Yugoslavia and worldwide.
Although aware of difficulties I started my work for I feel truly attached to my origins. I was also committed by my need to keep away from oblivion glorious and rough history of our land . I actually felt obligated to and being so I dared to put down on paper everything I have heard about Štitarica. During my work on this chronicle, my aim was to talk to as many people as I could, especially elder persons so that they would share their and their ancestors’ memories with me.

I had the luck to hear one of the most respected people from Štitarica, Novak Vukoviæ recite. He was born and lived for over two decades in 19 century, then there is Milivoje Vukoviæ, Nikola Boškov Rakoèeviæ, Vido Krgovac, Milovan Rubežiæ, Mijailo Vukoviæ, Djoko Rakoèeviæ and many others that recited and told stories about this area very well and all of them were born in 19 century. I have heard stories from warriors that took part in many wars and have shared with me their memories and their ancestors’ memories which I have accepted as one and only reliable source, which I had to trust because there were no other sources. Unfortunately, I was not able to find written documents about Štitarica before 1089., which would help me determine its name and inhabitants after Rakoèeviæ family moved there from Moraèa. After this date nothing was written about it for along time except for sparse version of an event that took place in Štitarica. It was like this until 1886, when Turks were dislodged and had to leave. Still, I did my best to find out more about this area and for I was missing written documents I relied on memories. I wrote them down just as I have heard them from their tellers. I wanted to discover who were Štitarica’s inhabitants, their origins and their further migration. I hope I managed to enlighten some of these mysteries. I have discovered migrations for it is known that, especially in second half of 19 century many families from Montenegro, Moraèa, Rovci and Uskoci moved to Raška, Metohija and farther and some of them would stop for a while and settle in Štitarica and then, after some time they would move again in search for happier and better life. In all this confusion it is highly possible to forget some families but I can assure you that it was not my intention. I made special effort to describe well the period I remember for which I had data and proofs from people that lived in that period. But also here is possible to overlook some information which I hope you will not mind. Thais could happen because people gave me information form their point of view . In the end, I would like to say that all this could have been more compact with many more data and stories. I did as much as I could and I am convinced that it is better to do something not so well than not to do it at all. I will be thankful and consider this book greatly successful if it becomes encouragement for Štitarica’s explorers to come.