The House of Pejačević or Pejácsevich is an old Croatian noble family, remarkable during the period in history marked by the Ottoman war in the Kingdom of Croatia and Austro-Hungarian Empire respectively. Notable members of the family were politicians, clerics, artists, senior military officers, Bans (viceroys) of Croatia and other high state officials. They were very potent and influential in the political, social, economic and cultural life of the country, and especially distinguished in the region of Slavonia.
Family origin The origin of the family dates back to the 14th-century territory of southeastern Croatia and the neighbouring medieval Bosnia and Herzegovina. There are sources that connect the ancestors of the family with the Bosnian king Stjepan Dabiša (English: Stephen Dabisha), who ruled from 1391 to 1395, and his son Parčija (English: Parchia). Parčija's descendants used to be called Parčević (Parchevich). One of several family branches that came out of them later (in the 16th century) was the Pejačević family.
The 59th volume of the "Archive for the Austrian History" issued by the Imperial Academy of Sciences in Vienna in 1880 includes a long chapter about Baron Petar Parčević (1612–1674), the archbishop of Marcianople, a town in eastern Bulgaria. The text of that chapter is based on the researches made by Count Julijan Pejačević (1833–1906), a chronicler of the family. Despite the doubts of some historians, later analyses mostly showed and confirmed that he had a history-based approach and his theses had been proven. This refers particularly to the research of Bulgarian historiography, including those conducted by Bojan Penev and Boris Jocov in the 1920s and 1930s. The research dealt with the connected families of Parčević and Pejačević (as well as some other related families) during their residence in the territory of today's Bulgaria (then occupied by the Ottoman Empire). Particular facts have been described in Encyclopedia Bulgaria (1981-1997) (Енциклопедия България), issued in Sofia, in detail.
Bulgarian period The Parčević family settled in the second half of the 14th century in Bulgaria. Encyclopedia Bulgaria specifies that Parčija arrived there with his family along with Ragusan merchants. The reason for that migration has not been determined with certainty, but it was most probably caused by disputes and conflicts among the noblemen in southeastern Croatia and Bosnia, where Parčija had his estates.
Having lived the first years in Veliko Tarnovo (until 1399), the Parčević family moved to the west of the country and settled in a little town named Chiprovtsi. This is why some historians believe that the Pejačević family originated from there. At that time Chiprovtsi was a mining and metalsmithing centre, developed by German (Transylvanian Saxon) miners, who arrived in 13th and 14th century. Ragusan merchants and Bosnian Franciscan priests came there as well. They were all Roman Catholics, and a mixture of nationalities and religions was created in Chiprovtsi at that time. The Ottomans, who conquered that region soon after that, made this ethnic mixture even more various.
The branches of Parchevich family lived not only in Chiprovtsi, but also in the neighboring villages, even founding some new ones, like Kneže (Knezhe), Pejakovo or Pejačevo (Pe'yachevo) and Čerka (Cherka). Some of the branches of the family later took the names of these places, creating family names like Knežević, Pejačević and Čerkić.
Genealogy of the first family members Parčija, mentioned in 1386.
Nikola I Parčević, son of Parčija Andrija I Parčević, son of Parčija Petar I Parčević, son of Andrija I, died after 1423. Nikola II Parčević, son of Petar I, mentioned between 1437 and 1470. Gjoni Parčević, son of Nikola II, mentioned in 1481, had sons: Ivan I Parčević, mentioned in 1563 Stjepan Knežević Tomislav "Tomo" Tomagjonović Dmitar Pejačević, mentioned between 1561 and 1563. The first to call himself Pejačević. Nikola I Pejačević Juraj I Pejačević, baron, married Margareta Parčević. Marko I Pejačević Matija I Pejačević, married Agata Knežević. Died in c. 1688.
Connections with Franciscans During the long period of their residence in Bulgaria, the Pejačević family was continually connected with the Franciscan order of the Province of Silver Bosnia. The Franciscan members had arrived to Bulgaria earlier, somewhere in the mid-14th century. This has been specified by Vitomir Belaj, PhD from the Faculty of Philosophy in Zagreb in his work "Act Bulgariae ecclesiastica from Father Eusebius Fermenjin as ethnologic source" published in Miscellany for the works of the scientific conference "Life and work of the father Eusebius Fermenjin" in 1998. The author has written that the catholic Franciscans had arrived from medieval Bosnia in western Bulgaria at the time of Bosnian vicar Bartul Alvernski (Bartholomew of Alverno), who himself originated from Italy, in 1366.
Contact between the ancestors of the Pejačević family and members of the Franciscan order must have been started at the very beginning, but they were intensified by the end of the 16th century, when the Catholic enclave in Chiprovtsi was visited by missionaries sent by the pope. Clement VIII (1592–1605), for example, sent to Bulgaria his visitator Petar Zlojutrić, a Bosnian Franciscan, better known as Petar Solinat (born in the town of Soli in medieval Bosnia, today's Tuzla). Solinat did not come back to Rome, but stayed in Bulgaria and in 1601 became the first Catholic bishop of the new diocese of Sofia, situated in Chiprovtsi. He succeeded in achieving permission from the Ottoman authorities to open some new Catholic monasteries, parishes and even a new school.
Pejačevićs and their related families were affiliated with Franciscans through schooling of their children or entering of their members into the Franciscan order. One of the best examples was already mentioned Petar Parčević, the Franciscan, writer and archbishop, born in Chiprovtsi and educated in Italy.
Facts about Croatian origin There are many facts to prove the Croatian origin of the Pejačević family. It is indisputable that a great deal of Bulgarian Catholics, especially those in the Chiprovtsi enclave and its surroundings, originated from medieval Croatian and Bosnian territory, and particularly from the Republic of Ragusa (present-day Dubrovnik). Not only the tight connection between the Bulgarian Catholics and Franciscans itself, but the organizational belonging of the monks to the Franciscan Province of Silver Bosnia prove that. There are historical documents related to Bulgarian Catholics, originating from several different regions of Bulgaria (e.g. Chiprovtsi, Sofia, Targovishte, Rakovski etc.), among which many private letters, that are written in Italian, Latin, German and Croatian language as well. Vitomir Belaj has specified that some documents have been written in Croatian Ikavian accent, the others in Dubrovnik speech, both however influenced by the Bulgarian language. It is interesting that the language of Ragusan merchants, who had lived in Bulgaria for several generations, in some documents is called "Bosnian" and in others "Illyrian".
Chiprovtsi Uprising in 1688 The Habsburg imperial army, supported by some European states, penetrated deep into the Ottoman territory in south-eastern Europe, which encouraged the Chiprovtsi Catholics in 1688 to rise up against the occupiers in order to free Bulgaria.
The leaders of the uprising were brothers Ivan and Mihail Stanislavov together with Bogdan Marinov, all ethnic Bulgarians. Đuro II (Bulgarian: Georgi; English: George) Pejačević (1655–1725), a son of Matija I, joined the leadership, too. After heavy fighting, the Ottomans managed to suppress the uprising by the end of 1688 and destroyed Chiprovtsi and neighboring villages like Klisura, Zhelezna and Kopilovtsi. The surviving inhabitants, including Đuro's brothers Marko II (Mark), Ivan (John) and probably Nikola (Nicholas), together with their families, fled to the north, until they reached the Habsburg controlled territories in Banat.
Rise of the family in Slavonia and Srijem
First years
Pejačevićs were one of the Catholic families from Chiprovtsi in Bulgaria that moved, most probably through Wallachia and Transilvania, to the Hungarian town of Pécs and soon after that to Osijek in Slavonia, a northeastern Croatian province, in the Kingdom of Hungary. Josip Bösendorfer, PhD, Croatian historian, wrote in the scientific journal "Narodna starina" (English: Folk Art Antiquities), published in 1932 in Zagreb: Those Chiprovtsians came to Osijek from Pecs, because they escaped from Rákóczi's uprising. Hence, they occurred in the first decade of the 18th century. All the families were connected through marriages, they witnessed each other's public documents, they were godparents and marriage witnesses, and testified in court and law procedures as well.Bösendorfer listed the families coming from Chiprovtsi that settled in Osijek, describing them and giving their family trees, in this order: Margićs, Gegićs, Stejkićs, Čerkićs, Frankolukins, Nikolantins, Lekićs, Adamovićs, Pejačevićs.
Affirmation of baronage On June 10, 1712, the Holy Roman Emperor and the Croato-Hungarian King Charles III of Habsburg acknowledged the Pejačević brothers as Barons on behalf of the old title their ancestors received in Bulgaria.
While some family members stayed in Osijek (e.g. brothers Marko II (1664–1727) and Ivan (1666–1724)), the others settled in Srijem and Bačka, two provinces at the frontier of Croatia. In her work "Pejačević family and Virovitica", published in 2006 as a part of the Miscellany of works for the international symposium titled "725 years of Franciscans in Virovitica" (under auspices of HAZU – Croatian Academy of Sciences and Arts), professor Silvija Lučevnjak, the director of Našice Heritage Museum, wrote that Đuro Pejačević left the army service in 1696 and started to work as manager of a post office in Bač district. Like his brothers, he was very skilful in commercial matters as well, and he gained more and more property. Pejačevićs traded real estates, houses, cattle and cereals, doing business up to Austria and northern Italy.
Nikola II Leopold Pejačević (1706–1732), one of Đuro's sons, became manager of the duke Odescalchi's estate in Ilok (1728–1730). In that lucrative business he had the help from his brother Đuro III and cousin Marko III Aleksandar, a son of Ivan Pejačević.
At the beginning of the 1730s, the family strongly increased its power and property. It bought estates in Orahovica and Feričanci (1730), Našice and Podgorač (1734), and soon after that (1745) a great Mitrovica estate. In 1745 Marko III Aleksandar (1694–1762) was appointed administrator of the newly formed Srijem county, and in 1751 he was announced the grand iupanus (župan) of that county.
Gaining the Virovitica estate In the meantime (1747), a part of Mitrovica's demesne land had been included into the Military Frontier, so Marko III Aleksandar was given the right to buy Virovitica and Retfala estates. The rest of Mitrovica's estate in his ownership got a new district seat – Ruma.
On August 29, 1749, the Holy Roman Empress and the Croato-Hungarian Queen Maria Theresa of Habsburg-Lothringen granted the Virovitica estate to Baron Marko III Aleksandar Pejačević, and it became the most significant property of the family in the second half of the 18th century. Marko's heirs kept it for the following 92 years, until 1841.