Editing Miloš Obilić (section)

===Serbian traditions===
Miloš Obilić is a major hero of the Serbian legend of Kosovo, whose central part is the [[Battle of Kosovo]]. According to the legend, Miloš was married with the princess [[Jelena Lazarević|Jelena]], daughter of the Serbian [[Lazar of Serbia|Prince Lazar]]. A quarrel broke out between his wife and her sister who was married to [[Vuk Branković]], about superiority in valour of their respective husbands. As a consequence of this, Branković took offence and picked a fight with Miloš. Filled with hate, Branković maligned Miloš to Lazar, saying that he conspired with Turks to betray the prince. At Lazar's supper on the eve of the battle, the prince reproached Miloš for disloyalty. To prove his loyalty, Miloš went into the Turkish camp feigning defection. At a favourable moment, he stabbed and killed the Turkish Sultan Murad, whose attendants then executed Miloš. The legend then goes on to describe events regarding the battle.<ref name=redjep>{{Citation| last=Ređep| first=Jelka| year=1991| title=The Legend of Kosovo| journal=[[Oral Tradition (journal)|Oral Tradition]]| volume=6| issue=2–3| publisher=Center for Studies in Oral Tradition| place=Columbia, Missouri| issn=1542-4308| url=http://journal.oraltradition.org/issues/6ii-iii/redep| mode=cs1}}</ref>

There are two main views about the creation of the Kosovo legend. In one view, its place of origin lies in the region in which the Battle of Kosovo was fought. In the other view, the legend sprang up in more westerly Balkan regions under the influence of the French ''[[chansons de geste]]''. Serbian philologist Dragutin Kostić stated that the French chivalric epics had in fact no part in the formation of the legend, but that they "only ''modified'' the already created and formed legend and its first poetic manifestations".<ref name=redjep/> The nucleus from which the legend developed is found in the [[Cult (religious practice)|cultic]] literature celebrating Prince Lazar as a martyr and saint, written in [[Moravian Serbia]] between 1389 and 1420. Especially important in this regard is the ''Discourse on Prince Lazar'' composed by Serbian Patriarch Danilo III. The legend would gradually evolve during the subsequent centuries.<ref name=redjep/>

The tale of the maligned hero who penetrated the Turkish camp and killed Sultan Murad, is found in the ''Life of Despot Stefan Lazarević'' written in the 1430s by [[Konstantin the Philosopher]]. The hero's name is not mentioned in this work. The theme of the quarrel between Lazar's sons-in-law was first recorded in [[Herzegovina]] in the mid-15th century. Lazar's supper on the eve of the battle and his reproach of Miloš are mentioned in texts from the 16th century. The argument between Lazar's daughters over the valor of their husbands was first recorded by [[Mavro Orbin]] in 1601. The fully developed legend of Kosovo, with all of its elements, is recorded in the ''Tale of the Battle of Kosovo'' composed around the beginning of the 18th century in the [[Bay of Kotor]] or [[Old Montenegro]]. This was a very popular text, whose copies were continuously produced for some 150 years in an area stretching from the south of ex-Yugoslavia to Budapest and Sofia. The ''Tale'' played a notable role in the awakening of national consciousness of the Serbs in the [[Habsburg monarchy]], which began in the first half of the 18th century.<ref name=redjep/>
[[File:Miloš Obilić posle zavere pred šatorom Muratovim, Pavle Čortanović i Adam Stefanović.jpg|thumb|Miloš Obilić at the tent of Sultan Murad.]]

The first author to refer to Murad's killer by his full name is [[Konstantin Mihailović]], a Serbian [[Janissary]] from the village of Ostrovica, near [[Rudnik (mountain)|Rudnik]], who wrote his ''Memoirs of a Janissary'' or ''Turkish Chronicle'' in ca 1497. In a passage intended to infer a moral lesson about disloyalty from the Serbian defeat at Kosovo, Mihailović identifies Miloš Kobila{{Cref2|B}} as the knight who on the fateful last Friday of the battle slew Murad.{{sfn|Emmert|1996|p=154}} The next time a name is given in the sources is three decades later, in 1530, when the (Slovene) monk [[Benedikt Kuripečič]] (Curipeschitz) wrote memoirs of his travels through the [[Balkan Peninsula]]. His visit to Murad's tomb in [[Kosovo Polje]] provides the occasion for the story of the knight whom he names Miloš Kobilović.{{sfn|Emmert|1996|pp=154-155}} Kuripešić elaborates on the humiliation and fall out favour which Miloš endured before the battle, his last dinner with Lazar and his nobles, his admittance to Murad's tent, the brutal murder and his own death on attempting to escape on horseback.{{sfn|Emmert|1996|pp=154-156}} The monk, though not explicit about his sources, writes that Miloš was a celebrated figure in the popular traditions of [[Serbs]], who sing about his heroic exploits on the border.{{sfn|Emmert|1996|pp=154-157}} He recorded some legends about the [[Battle of Kosovo]] and mentions epic songs about Obilić in regions far from Kosovo, like [[Bosnia (region)|Bosnia]] and [[Croatia]].<ref name="Ivić1996">{{cite book|author=Pavle Ivić|author-link=Pavle Ivić|title=Istorija srpske kulture|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=r3FpAAAAMAAJ|year=1996|publisher=Dečje novine|page=160|isbn=9788636707920 |quote=Бенедикт Курипечић. пореклом Словенаи, који између 1530. и 1531. путује као тумач аустријског посланства, у свом Путопису препричава део косовске легенде, спомиње епско певање о Милошу Обилићу у крајевима удаљеним од места догађаја, у Босни и Хрватској, и запажа настајање нових песама.}}</ref> In his 1603 work [[Richard Knolles]] described the [[Serbian epic poetry|"country songs" of Serbs]] about the Battle of Kosovo and refer to Obilić as "Cobelitz".<ref>{{cite book|title=Serb World: 1979–1983|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=WnbxAAAAMAAJ|year=1979|publisher=Neven Publishing Corporation|page=4|quote=Richard Knolles, writing in 1603, refers to the 'country songs' of the Serbs which tell of the alleged duplicity of the ...In 1603, the English historian Richard Knolles called lim 'Cobelitz'}}</ref>

In Serbian epic poetry and song (e.g. "Radul-bey and Bulgarian King Šišman" and the song "Dušan's Wedding"), Miloš Obilić is often grouped along with other literary creations like [[Karadjordje]], [[Vuk Karadžić]] and [[Njegoš]] as Serbs of [[Dinarides|Dinaric origin]] who distinguished themselves as the great moral and/or intellectual minds of the past in contradistinction to Bulgarian contemporaries, who could claim no such status.<ref>{{harvnb|Gavrilović|2003|p=722}} citing Cvijić.</ref> In the poem "Obilić Dragon's Son", Miloš is given a mythical ancestry as the son of a dragon to emphasise his superhuman strength on a physical and spiritual level; in this, he joins the ranks of many other heroes of Serbian poetry who fought against Turkish oppression and are claimed to have been descendants of a dragon.<ref>{{harvnb|Gavrilović|2003|pages=721, 725}}</ref> Jelka Ređep, a scholar of [[Serbian folklore]] and [[epic poetry]], argues that Miloš Obilić’s story developed significantly through oral transmission, shaping him into a symbolic embodiment of [[Serbian national identity|Serbian cultural identity]] and heroic ideals.<ref>{{cite journal |last=Ređep |first=Jelka |year=1991 |title=The Legend of Kosovo |url=https://journal.oraltradition.org/wp-content/uploads/files/articles/6ii-iii/11_redep.pdf |journal=Oral Tradition |volume=6 |issue=2–3 |pages=255–257}}</ref>