THE DEATH OF DUSHAN[1]
(Fragment)
STEPAN, the Serbian Tsar, fell sick
In Prizren, place of light and leading.
Sore sick he was and like to die.
When Roxanda, the Tsaritsa, saw it,
She wrote with a pen,
As she had been a man,
Three letters she wrote, yea and four,
And sent them to the four corners of the land,
To the princes thereof each in his degree:
And she summoned all the lords to her, saying:10
"Hearken all ye our princes!
Sore sick is the Tsar Stepan,
Sore sick he is and like to die;
Hie ye therefore to Prizren Castle,
If ye would find the Tsar on live,
And hear what he will ordain,
And to whom he will entrust the Empire."
When the letters were gone forth everywhither,
All the lords understood the writing;
They made such haste as ever men might,20
And came every one to Prizren Castle,
To Stepan the mighty Serbian Tsar,
And they reached the Tsar
While he was yet on live;
And there all the lords were gathered together.
And thither also was come King Vukašin,
He raised the Tsar from his bed of silk,
And upheld him in his silken arms,
- ↑ Dušan: the Croatian alphabet should have been used consistently throughout this translation, but a few of the more familiar names have been inadvertently transliterated. Thus Šarac and Miloš appear some-times as Sharatz and Milosh.
