Fisković Cvito: Spomenička baština Boke Kotorske

 Cvito Fisković: Monumental Heritage of Boka Kotorska

Fisković's texts, gathered in the book "Monumental Heritage of Boka Kotorska", which the author published in various magazines and anthologies, in the period from 1941 to 1986, reconstruct the spiritual and life reality of the Boka Kotorska Bay, from the Middle Ages to the beginning of the 19th century.

The author's first Boka theme it was a baptistery from the 8th century in the Kotor Cathedral of St. Tripuna. Fisković considers this baptistery to be a rare monument of its kind from the period when artists connected the art of late antiquity with the art of the early Middle Ages.

Of the oldest of our baptisteries from the end of the 8th or beginning of the 9th century, only the Nin baptistery with the name of Prince Višeslav carved on it is preserved in the Museum of Croatian Archaeological Monuments in Split.

Fisković's extensive study "On the artistic monuments of the city of Kotor", published for the first time in 1953, included at the beginning of the book, it is considered the most comprehensive unit in which all segments of Kotor's artistic heritage are treated, especially the Cathedral of St. Tripuna.

"Fisković's method of cross-describing and his skill to illuminate the entirety of the past with the help of details could be an exemplary example of presenting the fullness of life in today's ghostly deserted Perast, the ruins of Dobrot palaces and churches, the neglected Prčanje", writes the editor of the book Radoslav Tomić in the introductory text "Boka Kotorska in the work of Cvit Fisković".

As an art historian, apart from the artistic mild, Fisković dealt with maritime themes - the battle of Bokelje with pirates and Turks, the clash of Josip Bronze from Peraštan with Algerian warships, the arrival of Russians in Perast to study naval skills, then the folk custom of "shooting kokot" in Boka, Budva, Dalmatinska zagora and Orebići.

Shooting with a gun or a cannon at a live pike attached to a board in the middle of the sea waves occurred for the first time in Perast 1754, on the occasion of the celebration of the centenary of the victory over the Turks on May 15, 1654.

The last work in Fisković's book is "Boka Kotorska in Fedor Karacsay's watercolors from the first half of the 19th century". This Austrian colonel made a hundred watercolor drawings, among which the most numerous are Boka Kotorska, and they, according to Fisković, have "a special significance for our cultural history".