On Monday it will be 638 years since Ban Tvrtko I was crowned as the king of Bosnia on October 26, 1377, which marked the establishment of the Independent Kingdom of Bosnia, and Tvrtko I Kotromanić became the first Bosnian King.
Tvrtko was crowned the King of Bosnia at the locality of Mile near Visoko (present-day settlement Arnautovići), which is a crowning place of all later Bosnian kings.
During the reign of Tvrtko I, Bosnia was the most powerful in the history of its existence. Political stability of Bosnia was achieved, as well as significant cultural and spiritual progress, which made the country the strongest South Slavic country and Tvrtko the greatest ruler in the history of medieval Bosnia, and even later.
During Tvrtko’s reign, Bosnian cities are developing, trade and mining as well, and the first golden money in the South Slavic region is being coined. The heraldic symbol of lily, which will later become the sign of Bosnian kings, appeared for the first time on that money.
After the death of the Hungarian king in 1382 riots broke out in the areas of the Dalmatian coast, and the King Tvrtko took that opportunity to send the Bosnian army in that part of Dalmatia and take full control over the entire Dalmatia, together with islands, thus annexing Split, Trogir, Šibenik, and the islands of Brač, Korčula and Hvar to Bosnia.
In the last decade of his reign King Tvrtko was faced with incursions of the Ottomans in Bosnia, for the first time in autumn of 1386 and then in the summer of 1388 near Bileća, where Bosnians led by the Duke Vlatko Vuković beat the Ottomans.
Tvrtko I suddenly died on March 10, 1391. He was succeeded by his cousin, Stjepan Dabiša. However, after Tvrtko’s death in 1391 an unstable political climate reappears in Bosnia, partly caused by the Hungarian-Byzantine rivalry which has been dividing the Bosnian nobility for the umpteenth time. Following was the period of frequent changes of Bosnian kings.
(Source: novovrijeme.ba/ photo bportal)
