Lijevče polje - beleške o naseljima i prirodi 15-19. vek

Abstract

Rad posmatra promene naselja i upravne strukture do kojih je dolazilo u periodu srednjovekovne ugarske i bosanske države, a potom Osmanskog carstva na prostoru današnjeg Lijevče polja u Bosni. Na osnovu bosanske, ugarske i osmanske diplomatičke građe, kartografskih prikaza i arheološkog materijala sa ovog područja, prikupljen je obiman toponomastički materijal i identifikovana je nekolicina naselja. Opisi putopisaca pružaju uvid u neke od promena prirodne sredine koje se odvijale na ovom prostoru u predindustrijsko doba.

This article aims to present available data on the changes of environment and settlements that existed in the field of Lijevče, from the 15th until the 19th century. Documentary data, both medieval and Ottoman, are scarce and yield scant evidence. Therefore, we have relied on archeological data and cartographic material. Due to several literary descriptions and travel accounts of Lijevče polje, we have been able to target the beginning of the shaping of present-day landscape. Similar to neighbouring Slavonija, the plain of Lijevče, on the left bank of lower Vrbas river, was densely forested until modern times. Vast forests of oak and beech wood, mixed with poplar and willow trees in flooded areas, represented a very significant natural resource. Settlements, together with the arable land, appeared on the ground of forest clearings, like oases in the 'forest desert'. Through the soft alluvial soil, innumerable water flows interwove, making the imperative that the inhabitants should protect their homes and crops from floods. Therefore they built primitive system of trenches, ditches and earth dams, which served, on one side, as fishing ponds, and on the other, as dry transportation routes. Because of extensive agriculture and drainage, the whole area of Lijevče, with its numerous archeological sites, went though dramatic changes. The travel account of I. Kukuljević - Sakcinski (1858) described the beginning of the deforestation process, which gain on speed after 1878. Today, what are left of immense forests are only shrubs, bushes and similar types of tertiary forest, as the border edges of the land parcels. Settlements are in-lined, i.e. 'straightened', following the magistral road from Banja Luka to Gradiška. Nevertheless, we believe that modern, noninvasive archeological methods would be most helpful in reconstructing the past cultural landscapes. Comparing the settlement data from the Hungarian documents (13th-16th century), one Bosnian charter (1446) and the Ottoman detailed survey defter (1604), one can observe a rather huge population and settlement dynamic. Each state created its own administrative and territorial units. The Hungarian county (comitatus) Vrbas comprised the whole area of Lijevče field, centered in the town of Vrbas, with several other fortified places and more than 30 villages and domains. At the end of the 14th century, the Bosnians conquered this county and formed their unit - župa Glaž, in the eastern part of Lijevče field. According to a donation charter, there were two towns and some 30 villages. Only recently, the location of the town of Glaž has been positively ascertained - it was positioned in the area of today's Sredjani-Vakuf, near the left bank of Vrbas. During the second half of the century, the town of Levač (Lijevče) emerged from a feudal residence place. Due to the cartographic evidence and archeological material, we are able to finally identify this settlement which gave its name to the whole plain. It was located some 8 kilometers in the east from Bosanska Gradiška, and only a couple of kilometers from Sava river, in the area of today's village of Laminci. In the eve of the Ottoman conquest, the name of Lijevče was used as the synonym for the plain of Vrbas (campus Vrbas). The Ottoman authority took it over and named its administrative unit nahiye Lefce, with 34 villages, 20 mahalas and 9 mezraas. The settlement itself went through changes. The wooden fortress was left to detriment, probably soon after the Ottoman conquest of Slavonija (1540). There are no evidence of this settlement in travel accounts or cartographic material, until its end days. One Russian official report stated that the inhabitants of the village Lijevče had deserted this settlement in 1865, and they had gone to Slavonija, but they had left no trace in the new homeland. Several years later began the new wave of German colonization, which again resulted in the change of the place names and settlement pattern. Full-scale industrialization of agricultural practice happened only after the Second World war, but drainage works were performed much later, during the 70-ties and 80-ties.