• January 1993 •

Europe is a geographical entity, a continent bordered by the seas and the Urals. For long centuries, it was the entire world for the civilization which developed in it. Right in the middle, almost at the same distance from Lisbon, North Cape and the Urals, live the Slovenes. Our emperors were Charles the Great, Napoleon and Franz Josef. Austrian Emperor, Maximilian I., who defended Europe against the Turks and populated the borderland of Croatia with the Serbs, spoke Slovene. His teacher, later a bishop in Constance, was a Slovene, Tomaž Prelokar from Celje. Jurij Slatkonja from Ljubljana was a court chaplain, Bishop of Vienna and founder of the Vienna Opera under the same Emperor.

Gustav Mahler gave a concert in Ljubljana. The Russian, Prussian and Austrian Emperors, the Holy Alliance, met in the Slovene capital to discuss how to repress revolutionary Europe. And, had the Count of Celje, Ulrich, who was perfidiously assassinated in Belgrade, had a son, history might have known a Celje monarchy instead of the Habsburg Monarchy. Like all great empires before it, the Austro-Hungarian Empire fell, and by a stroke of fate, Slovenes ended up under the Karadžordžević family in the Europe designed at Versailles.

It took us seven long decades to free ourselves from the firm Balkan grip. Now we stand in front of the closed door of our historical home, and – offended – try to prove that we are not newcomers, but have always lived here.

A Slovene tale tells about a modest salt smuggler who, at the Emperor’s request, fought with a Turkish giant Brdavs whom the best of the Vienna knights could not defeat. Martin Krpan – this was the name of the lad from Vrhnika – attacked the horrifying knight, who had killed dozens of noble young men, with a lime wood club and a butcher’s axe. When Brdavs’ sword cut into the soft lime wood it got stuck. While the Turk tried to pull it out in vain, Krpan cut his head off. For those who cannot pride themselves on either wealth or power, reason is the only weapon.

Although a hundred years ago Slovenes were as numerous as the Danes, there are now only two million of us. Despite this, we have founded two universities. All over the world, at European and American universities and institutes, there are so many Slovene professors that we could easily establish a third.
A nation which does not have kings or conquering warriors has poets and scholars as its aristocracy.

We do not knock on the European door barefoot or in muddy boots. In the mosaic of European culture, knowledge and spirit, there are definitely a few stones from the southern side of the Karavanke Mountains. Many windows and doors have closed in fear of the fire raging in the Balkans. The thought that a new, this time Slovene, borderland might emerge at the Alpine gate, is not alien. However, only a fire brigade can defeat fire; bolts on doors and shutters on windows will not keep it away.

Jure Apih