Two Muslim Eid holidays occupy a special place in the Islamic tradition of Bosniaks and are an inseparable part of the identity of Muslims in these areas. The ways of celebrating them in the past resulted in a rich array of customs that we can be proud of.
Eid cannons, bodies, drummers, Eid suits and fezzes, giving gifts to children, kissing the hands of the elderly, Eid sofres, visiting cemeteries are just some of the many customs that are deeply rooted in our tradition and as such faithful testimonies that the Eid holidays are not holidays, days without work, empty and relieved of daily obligations, but periods filled with deep meaning and meaning for the people here.
One of the customs, which is deeply rooted in our tradition, is announcing and announcing Eid by means of cannons, drums, talambas, bajrak and recitation of takbeer.
This tradition was recorded in the territory of Bosnia and Herzegovina during the time of the Ottomans, when the qadis, i.e. Sharia courts, issued a special murasela which regulated the celebration of Eid. As an example, we can cite the undated mural of the Sharia Court in Zvornik, addressed to the dizdar-aga of the Zvornik fortress, which orders him to announce the performance of the first day of Ramadan Bajram on Wednesday after Asr prayer with cannon fire, or the mural of the Sarajevo Qadi from 1819, which orders the dizdar and the deputy chief gunner of the Sarajevo fortress to fire three shots from the baljemez cannon (cannons of a larger caliber) tomorrow, Wednesday, after Asr prayer, to announce the beginning of Eid al-Adha, one shot when the time for Eid prayer arrives, and five from baljemez and 10 from chess cannons (cannons of slightly smaller caliber compared to the baljemez cannon) after prayer.
Furthermore, the gunner is instructed to fire three shots from the baljemez and two shots from the shahi cannon during the entire Eid after the evening meal, at noon and in the afternoon. Between 1828 and 1833, 250 grains of black powder were used in the Bihać kadiluk alone for the purposes of advertising Eid festivities.
Therefore, the Muslims of these regions announced the end of the month of fasting and the onset of Shawwal, i.e. the arrival of the Eid al-Fitr, by firing a cannon from the city’s Tabiya, after performing Asr prayer on the last day of Ramadan.
In the text in which he described the Ramadan customs of village Muslims, Hifzija Hasandedić notes that in this place the cannon was sounded even after Eid prayer and that on that occasion “everyone who had a firearm loaded it in the morning and fired the tefik”.
The use of weapons for the purpose of expressing special joy, happiness and satisfaction in Eid days was recorded by the Sarajevo chronicler Mula Mustafa Bašeskija, who recorded an interesting incident in his Chronicle: “9th Zilhijja 1186 (l. III 1773) on the occasion of the celebration of Kurban Bayram a boy fired a rifle from the window and wounded in the back the wife of the calligrapher Ahmed, the imam of Atmejdan. This woman was good and noble, so she declared that she would submit to fate and that she would not file lawsuits, but would be patient.”
Top – used to mark the beginning and end of fasting during the month of Ramadan and during the celebration of two Eids, 19th century, from the museum collection of the Gazi Husrev-bey library.
In addition to announcing the arrival of Eid by firing a cannon in these areas, it was customary for the Ramadan drummers after the Eid prayer, accompanied by a column of children, to visit our villages, courtyards and alleys again, but not this time to wake up the world at Sehur, as they used to do in the past month of Ramadan, but to charge the world for their Ramadan efforts.
And so the drummer, according to Hasandedić, “went from house to house and played the drums enthrallingly, and one of the most valuable among the children in front of him carried a flag. Everyone gave the drummer gifts, some with money, some with food, and some even with an embroidered mahram”, and when would come to the house where there was a girl about to get married, he would stop and sing in a loud voice.
Announcing and announcing the beginning and end of the Eid days by firing a cannon is also recorded in folk proverbs, and one of them reads “the cannon fires, Eid has passed”.
That proverb probably originated at the time when cannon shots, on the third day of Eid al-Fitr and the fourth day of Eid al-Adha after Asr prayer, announced the end of the Eid holidays, and thus the parting with something dear and lovely.
“The tradition of announcing Eid by firing cannons in most places fell silent at the end of the Second World War, but, thank God, it was revived again in the nineties of the last century, and cannons in a significant number of our cities announce the time of Iftar and the arrival of Eid.”
The author of the text is MA Meho Manjgo, a librarian/archivist working on special collections in the Gazi Husrev Bey Library in Sarajevo – announced MINA.
