P8VP+VWQ, Soko, Bosnia and Herzegovina
The medieval town of Soko (Sokol), located on a rocky hill in the village of the same name seven kilometers north of Gračanica, dates back to the Middle Ages, that is, the period of the medieval Bosnian state. What characterizes the old town of Soko today is that, although it was declared a national monument of BiH in 2003, it is in very poor condition. Day by day, the medieval town is falling into ruin, and it is even considered the national monument most at risk of disappearing in Bosnia and Herzegovina. In the Middle Ages, the town was located in the parish of Usora. Two different records of the first mention of Soko in history are found in the literature. It is first mentioned in historical sources on June 19, 1449, in a deed of gift concluded before the chapter house in Buda by Prince Radivoj Vrandučki, brother of the Bosnian king Thomas, and his son-in-law, the Slavonian feudal lord Nikola Velički from Požega County. In this deed, both pledged to cede parts of their possessions to each other in the Bosnian and Hungarian kingdoms. Of Radivoj’s possessions, only the town of Soko is directly mentioned, which suggests the assumption that it was the capital of this prince and a prominent member of the Kotromanić dynasty. Radivoj, by the way, was one of the most politically influential figures of the medieval Bosnian state in the 15th century, having twice claimed the Bosnian crown.
It is reliably known that the town was established at least a decade earlier, possibly during the era when Radivoj, with Ottoman support, tried to obtain the Bosnian crown. There are also assumptions that it was built in the second half of the 14th century, during the reign of King Tvrtko I, as one of the fortifications protecting Bosnia’s northern border.
After the political collapse of medieval Bosnia in 1463, Soko briefly came under Ottoman rule, and then, along with neighboring Srebrenik and some other towns in the area, was captured in the autumn of 1464 by the Hungarian king Matthias Corvinus, who established the so-called Banovina of Srebrenica as an advanced military territory intended to stop Ottoman incursions into the original Hungarian territory.
The Banovina of Srebrenica was conquered by the Ottomans in 1512. With the fall of Srebrenica, the entire territory between the lower courses of the Bosna and Drina rivers, Spreča, and Sava, which included 12 fortified towns, became part of the Ottoman Empire. Soko finally came under Ottoman rule between 1512 and 1520. After that, it was restored and turned into a military fort. It lost its strategic importance after the Battle of Mohács in 1526, when the border was moved far to the north, but a small garrison still remained. After the Vienna War, when the border again approached the Sava River (and in the next war was temporarily moved to a two-hour march south of the Sava), the importance of Soko, part of the Gradačac Captaincy, increased.
From 1528, there is the first census book listing the mounted soldiers of the Soko garrison. According to the 1533 census book, that year the fortress garrison received a permanent garrison. In the 1770s, the city captain Mehmed carried out repairs in the town. It is also recorded that in 1833 there were 7 cannons in the town. The fortress was finally abandoned around 1840. However, even at the beginning of the 20th century, the town was mentioned as "well-preserved castle ruins" with recommendations for tourists and day-trippers to visit it.
The fortress is built in the form of an elongated oval about 30 meters long. Two semicircular arched towers adjoin the southeast wall, and to the northwest adjoins a suburb protecting the main entrance. In the southwest part of the enclosure are the foundations of a residential house. The northeast wall was partially destroyed in 1949 when stone from it was used to build the local school. During the last war, this monument was targeted several times by artillery shells, which damaged the southwest outer surface of the wall.
Soko was built from unworked and only roughly pressed limestone pieces of uneven size on the face side of the wall. The builders tried to lay the stones in layers, but they did not manage to implement this everywhere. The corners of the walls are sharply cut. The old town of Soko was declared a national monument of Bosnia and Herzegovina. In 2020, an access road to the town was built.
Sources:
https://bs.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soko_(tvrđava)
https://balkans.aljazeera.net/teme/2017/8/13/soko-srednjovjekovni-grad-koji-propada
