Vitez Витез
—  Town  —
Location of Vitez within Bosnia and Herzegovina.
Country	Bosnia and Herzegovina
Government
• Municipality president	Vlado Alilović (HDZ BiH)
Area
• Total	159 km2 (61 sq mi)
Population (1991 census)
• Total	27,859
Time zone	CET (UTC+1)
• Summer (DST)	CEST (UTC+2)
Area code(s)	+387 30
Website	http://www.gradvitez.info

Vitez (Cyrillic: Витез) is a town and municipality in central Bosnia and Herzegovina. It is administratively part of the Central Bosnia Canton of the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Name[link]

The word "vitez" literally means knight in the South Slavic languages, Bosnian; Croatian; Slovenian; Serbian and Macedonian, it is also used in Hungarian. The Russian cognate is Vityaz.

Demographics[link]

1971[link]

20.628 total

• Croats - 10.196 (49,42%)
• Bosnian Muslims (i.e. Bosniaks) - 8.527 (41,33%)
• Serbs - 1.502 (7,28%)
• Yugoslavs - 178 (0,86%)
• Others - 225 (1,11%)

1991[link]

In 1991 the population of the Vitez municipality was 27,859, of which were 45,49% Croats (12.675), 41,32% Muslims by nationality (i.e. Bosniaks) (11.514), 5,38% Serbs (1.501), 4,94% Yugoslavs (1.377), 2,87% others and unknown (792).

The population of the town itself was:

total: 7,200

• Bosnian Muslims (i.e. Bosniaks) - 2,647 (36.76%)
• Croats - 2,607 (36.20%)
• Yugoslavs - 937 (13.01%)
• Serbs - 741 (10.29%)
• others and unknown - 268 (3.72%)

History[link]

The first settlements belonged so called "Butmir's culture". One of the most famous artifacts found from that age in Veliki Mošunj, is a "Big Bronze Sword", uniquely crafted. During Roman time, the first urban settlements are being built. Through the river Lašva valley there were communication routes in which the caravans, armies, missionaries, etc. used to travel. On Castoriusovoj Tabuli Peutingeriani, there were caravan's routes from which the important one goes through this valley to connect from Pannonia at the North to Aegnatia at the South. U lower levels of the valley there were findings and lots of tombs, foundations, ... According to excavated articles from the middle age significant findings are discovered in Zabilje, Počulica, Kremenik, Gačice, Večeriska, Preočica etc.. During Big Migration in Europe, caused by the decay of Roman Empire, in this region the Slavs begin to come from nowadays Ukraine and Poland, and are organizing their first states. At nearby Bilino Polje (Zenica) the great Bosnian ruler Kulin Ban left the oldest written document of all South Slavic states (April 8, 1203)written in Bosancica (Old Bosnian Alphabet) in which the borders of Bosnia were described. (From river Sava at the North, River Drina at the East and river Una at the West). During his rule Kingdom of Bosnia enjoyed peace and prosperity. In the time of Ban Stjepan Kotromanić there was a census in which old Bosnia had 7 counties. It is also known that Vitez was part of Bosnia until the decay of Bosnia when Ottoman empire occupied this region. This was the period in Vitez got its name. It is known that the first settlement in nowadays urban area was formed around the mosque, built in 1590. Knowing that mosques are being erected in urban areas, it is logical to say that this settlement existed even before. Vitez is mentioned once again during an uprising against Turks led by Husein-kapetan Gradaščević, when he defeated Turkish Army at Kosovo, after which he was named for Bosnian de-facto ruler (Vezir). According to the Austrian officer Božića (1785), Vitez had 18 houses, mosque and Motel (Han). After many centuries under the Ottoman rule, 1878 Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Vitez got occupied by Austro-Hungary Monarchy, and later 1908 annexed. During this time there were many changes in Bosnian society, both political and economical. For a short period they built many roads, railroads, mines,... But, unluckily only with goal to exploit Bosnian natural resources. At the place of old Turkish wood plant, Austrian entrepreneur Guido Rütgers built the enterprise for mechanical wood processing which was a milestone in a development of urban area. In 1879. Vitez had 510 inhabitants. Other companies existed as well, but were all owned by foreigners. It this period many people from parts of Monarchy came to work in Vitez, especially from Slovenia, Croatia, Czechoslovakia, Hungary , Switzerland.

Sport[link]

The town is home to the football club NK FIS Vitez, FK Vitez , basketball club HKK Vitez Paladij, handball club R.K. Vitez, table tennis club STK Vitez,STK CM Vitez.

References[link]

• Official results from the book: Ethnic composition of Bosnia-Herzegovina population, by municipalities and settlements, 1991. census, Zavod za statistiku Bosne i Hercegovine - Bilten no.234, Sarajevo 1991.

See also[link]

Sasha Skenderija

External links[link]

• http://www.vitez.info/
• http://vitezani.com/
• http://www.nisvet-hrustic.com
• http://www.vitezani.com
• http://www.fis-bih.com
• http://www.ambyenta.com
• http://www.gsbih.com
• http://www.am2000vitez.com
• http://www.eko-fis.com.ba

v t e Municipalities of the Central Bosnia Canton Bugojno Busovača Dobratići Donji Vakuf Fojnica Gornji Vakuf-Uskoplje Jajce Kiseljak Kreševo Novi Travnik Travnik Vitez

v t e Political divisions of Bosnia and Herzegovina v t e Entities of Bosnia and Herzegovina Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina Republika Srpska v t e Cantons of the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina      Una-Sana  Central Bosnia  Posavina  Herzegovina-Neretva  Tuzla  West Herzegovina  Zenica-Doboj  Sarajevo  Bosnian Podrinje  Canton 10 v t e Districts of Bosnia and Herzegovina Brčko distrikt v t e Municipalities in Bosnia and Herzegovina Capital Sarajevo Municipalities of the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina Banovići Bihać Bosanska Krupa Bosanski Petrovac Bosansko Grahovo Bugojno Busovača Bužim Čapljina Cazin Čelić Centar, Sarajevo Čitluk Drvar Doboj East Doboj South Dobratići Domaljevac-Šamac Donji Vakuf Foča-Ustikolina Fojnica Glamoč Goražde Gornji Vakuf-Uskoplje Gračanica Gradačac Grude Hadžići Ilidža Ilijaš Jablanica Jajce Kakanj Kalesija Kiseljak Kladanj Ključ Konjic Kreševo Kupres Livno Ljubuški Lukavac Maglaj Mostar Neum Novi Grad, Sarajevo Novo Sarajevo Novi Travnik Odžak Olovo Orašje Pale-Prača Posušje Prozor-Rama Ravno Sanski Most Sapna Široki Brijeg Srebrenik Stari Grad, Sarajevo Stolac Teočak Tešanj Tomislavgrad Travnik Trnovo (FBiH) Tuzla Usora Vareš Velika Kladuša Visoko Vitez Vogošća Zavidovići Zenica Žepče Živinice Municipalities of Republika Srpska Berkovići Bijeljina Bileća Brod Bratunac Čajniče Čelinac Derventa Doboj Donji Žabar Foča Gacko Grad Banja Luka Grad Istočno Sarajevo Gradiška Han Pijesak Istočni Drvar Istočna Ilidža Istočni Mostar Istočni Stari Grad Istočno Novo Sarajevo Jezero Kalinovik Kneževo Kostajnica Kozarska Dubica Kotor Varoš Krupa na Uni Kupres Laktaši Ljubinje Lopare Milići Modriča Mrkonjić Grad Nevesinje Novi Grad Novo Goražde Osmaci Oštra Luka Pale Pelagićevo Petrovac Petrovo Prijedor Prnjavor Ribnik Rogatica Rudo Šamac Šekovići Šipovo Sokolac Srbac Srebrenica Teslić Trebinje Trnovo Ugljevik Višegrad Vlasenica Vukosavlje Zvornik

Coordinates: 44°9.51′N 17°47.31′E / 44.1585°N 17.7885°E / 44.1585; 17.7885

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Antoine Vitez
Born	20 December 1930 Paris, France
Died	30 April 1990 Paris
Nationality	French
Field	Theater director, stage director
Training	National Conservatory of Dramatic Art, Paris

Antoine Vitez (20 December 1930–30 April 1990) was a French actor, director, and poet. He became a central character and influence on the French theater in the post-war period, especially in the technique of teaching drama. He was also translator of Chekhov, Vladimir Mayakovsky and Mikhail Sholokhov.

Early life[link]

Antoine Vitez was born in Paris and trained to be an actor, finding his first acting job at the age of 19 in Ils attendent Lefty at the Théâtre Maubel. He left the National Conservatory of Dramatic Art in Paris in 1950 without graduating and became a Communist activist, which he continued until 1979, when he left the Communist Party following the invasion of Afghanistan by the USSR. He met Louis Aragon in 1958 and became his private secretary from 1960 to 1962. He worked in the theater Balachova Tania, and wrote reviews published by Jean Vilar in the magazine Théâtre populaire. Vitez also found work reading on the radio and voice-dubbing in films. He had his first opportunity as director with Sophocles' Electra at the Maison de la Culture de Caen in 1966.

Career[link]

Vitez' production of Electra was successful and he continued directing with Russian and Greek repertoire, directing Mayakovsky's Les Bains in 1967, Eugene Schwartz's Le Dragon in 1968, and Chekhov's La Mouette in 1970. After this initial period, he began working more with French and German repertoire, directing works by Racine, Jakob Lenz, Goethe and Brecht. He later expanded his work to both traditional and classical theatrical repertoire, including Sophocles, Shakespeare, Molière, Marivaux, Paul Claudel, Vladimir Mayakovsky, Pierre Guyotat, Jean Metellus and Jean Audureau.

Vitez became a professor at the National Conservatory of Dramatic Arts in 1968, and in 1972 he founded the Théâtre des Quartiers d'Ivry. In the same year, he founded the Ateliers d'Ivry workshop, where amateurs and professionals could share a common theatrical practice. He became director at the Chaillot National Theatre in 1981, and was appointed deputy head of the Comédie-French in June 1988, a post he held until his sudden death in Paris in 1990.^[1]

In 1978, Vitez' workshop sessions were recorded by film-maker Maria Koleva, who made five films on different workshop sessions.^[2] She also completed additional documentary films on his work.

Aesthetic[link]

This unreferenced section requires citations to ensure verifiability.

Vitez often presented his plays in locations with non-theatrical elements and without any descriptive function, employing an aesthetic of "free play" and "association of ideas," according to Georges Banu. Vitez' work required thought on the part of the audience, more than the reality of a set. He saw the theater as a "force field" and demanded an "elitist theater for all." He defended the great classical texts as "sunken galleons," works that were remote, archaic and mythological.

Main collaborators[link]

• Yannis Kokkos (Set Designer)
• Pierre Debauche (actor, director)
• Caroline Marcadé (Choreographer)

References[link]

This article does not cite any references or sources. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (November 2011)

The original cover to János Vitéz, by Soma Orlai Petrich.

János Vitéz (Sir John) is a poem written in Hungarian by Sándor Petőfi and a musical by Pongrác Kacsóh adapted from the poem. The poem was written in 1845, and is notable for its length, 370 quatrains divided into 27 chapters, and for its clever wordplay. It has gained immense popularity in Hungary, and is today considered a classic of Hungarian literature. In 1904 it was adapted into a hugely popular musical; in 1973, it was adapted into an animated feature film, the first of its kind in Hungary.

Synopsis[link]

Kukorica Jancsi ("Johnny Corn") is found abandoned in a corn field as an infant; he is taken in by a peasant landowner, and by his adolescent years, is a shepherd for his master. He is in love with an orphan girl, Iluska, who is being raised by her wicked stepmother. Jancsi and Iluska hope to be married, but once, while they are spending time together, many of Jancsi's sheep wander away, and he is chased from the village by his master. Dejected, he joins a company of hussars, who are en route to France to fight the Turkish invasion there. The Hussars journey from Hungary to France (crossing the many, heavily fictionized countries in between, such as Italy, Poland and India), where they arrive just in time for the battle. Jancsi saves the French princess from capture, and the king in gratitude offers him her hand in marriage and the kingdom to rule. Jancsi turns the offers down, telling the king about his love for Iluska; the king then gives him a reward of gold, and names him János Vitéz ("Sir John").

János travels back to Hungary by boat, only to learn that Iluska was worked to death by her stepmother. In memory of her, he plucks the single rose growing from her grave and keeps it. He then sets off on a series of increasingly more dangerous adventures, hoping to end his life in some glorious feat. He reaches the Land of the Giants, where he kills the king and has all the giants pledge fealty to him. Later, in a pitch dark forest, he finds a coven of witches; as they prepare for an occult ritual, he gathers and burns their brooms, then calls on his giant vassals to crush them. As each witch dies, the forest becomes a little brighter, and János notices that one of them is Iluska’s stepmother. She is the last to be killed, leaving the forest in full daylight.

After several years of further wandering, János finally emerges at the end of the world, the coast of the Óperenciás sea (a traditional uncrossable ocean in Hungarian folklore). He again calls a giant, this time to wade across with him on his shoulder. They arrive at an island after two weeks, which turns out to be the Land of the Fairies. János, unable to feel happy without Iluska, wants to kill himself in a small lake, and tosses the rose in first. At this moment, it turns out that the lake contains the Water of Life: the rose changes into the form of Iluska. Reunited, the two lovers get married at once, and the fairies proclaim them king and queen. They live happily ever after.

Musical adaptation[link]

Pongrác Kacsóh was a composer and lyricist who had previously set a folk tale to music (Csipkerózsika). In 1904, he wrote János Vitéz, an adaptation of Petőfi’s poem, which was to become his greatest success.

The musical differed from the poem in several important ways. Most of all, it had a much stronger Hungarian nationalist undercurrent, revealed most explicitly in the ending.

• A new character is introduced: Bagó, a friend of Jancsi and his would-be rival for Iluska’s heart. As Iluska makes her choice extremely clear, the sorrowful Bagó joins the hussars at the beginning of the story.
• Jancsi is made less responsible for the disaster that leads to his exile. In the book, he is neglecting his duties to spend time with Iluska, and the herd wanders off on its own. In the musical, the stepmother hires another shepherd to lead the herd to stampede.
• Petőfi was a Francophile, and the French in János Vitéz are portrayed as a noble country which simply happens to be under siege. In Kacsóh’s adaptation, they are extraordinarily cowardly and effeminate, to comic effect: the army is in constant retreat, and the king throws a tantrum when he cannot find his smoking pipe. The princess, the only person of any courage, sings a song about how she would love to be a man so that she, at least, could ride into battle.
• It is Bagó who delivers the news of Iluska’s death to János, during the middle of the victory celebration; he and János sing a sorrowful duet about the rose. They then go off together to find her, be she “in heaven or in hell.”
• The giants and the witches are entirely left out. Instead, the two wanderers have a run-in with the devil in the middle of a forest, who has no luck leading them away from their quest.
• The wanderers discover the Spring of Life in the middle of a seemingly endless forest after seven years of searching; the Óperencian ocean is entirely left out. Nearby lives Iluska’s stepmother, who tries to dissuade them from discovering the fountain’s true nature; they discover that she is a witch, and she flies away.
• After Iluska’s resurrection, the two lovers are wed by the fairies, and rule as king and queen. The only caveat is that if they should ever leave the kingdom, they will never be let back in. Bagó, who cannot share in the couple’s mutual happiness, decides to return to his village. The celebrations are interrupted by the sound of Bagó’s flute-playing as he begins his journey back (mirroring the interruption of the French victory celebration). The sound mesmerizes János, who is at first unsure what he is hearing; when Iluska tells him that it is only Bagó, János delivers the musical’s last soliloquy: “It calls me – and you! Do you not hear it? Do you hear? It is the sound of the sheep – the song of the harvesters. It calls me home. I must go!” Iluska decides to go with János, and they depart for their homeland.

The ending is the most obviously different, as János decides to abandon immortality, eternal bliss, and even Iluska to return to his village. The sacredness of the Hungarian homeland was a common motif in art of the time, designed to keep nationalism alive in Hungarians under the yoke of Habsburg rule. While it is a clear departure from Petőfi’s original, it is not entirely out of line with the rest of the poet's body of work, who was himself a fiery nationalist (having started, and died in the Hungarian Revolution of 1848).

External links[link]

• János Vitéz, by Petőfi Sándor (full text, in Hungarian)