Janko Mitrović

Did You Know?

• In January 1654, with 100 horsemen and 150 other soldiers, he prevented the Ottoman destruction of Posedarje.
• His family, along with 70 other Žegar families, settled in Budin near Posedarje under Venetian control in 1648.
• He is known in Croatian and Serb epic poetry as Janko of Kotari (Јанко од Котара).

Life

Janko Mitrović was born in 1613 to a man named Mitar, who was born around 1585. The family originally came from either Zelengrad or Žegar in the Bukovica region. Janko had four brothers—Jovan, Stjepan, Pavle, and Andrija—and was likely one of the youngest. Another harambaša in Venetian service, Vukadin Mitrović, may have been a brother or cousin.

In 1646, Janko helped defend Šibenik, and three years later he received a monthly payment of four ducats as a reward. His eldest son, Stojan, fought alongside him and Ilija Smiljanić early in the Cretan War. When the Ottoman army seized their village in 1648, Janko’s family and seventy other Žegar families moved to the small village of Budin near Posedarje, which was under Venetian control. In January 1654, Janko led one hundred horsemen and one hundred fifty other soldiers to stop the Ottomans from destroying Posedarje, and the authorities rewarded him for this.

After Filip Smiljanić died, Janko was named serdar in 1656. He commanded people from Ražanac, Vinjerac, Ljubač, Posedarje, Novigrad, and Krmpoćani, and also controlled two mountain passes at Old Obrovac. In February 1659, near the Cetina River, both Janko and Ilija Smiljanić died from wounds received in battle with the Turks. Janko was buried on February 28, 1659, in the Catholic church of St. Elias in Zadar, which until the mid-18th century belonged to the parish of the Zadar Cathedral, where death records were kept.

His wife was Antonija, and they had three sons—Stojan, Ilija, and Zaviša—and a daughter named Ana. A document noting that many people of the same confession were faithful to the Roman Church suggests that the family were Roman Catholics.