Later Years and Death
Pilar moved to Zagreb in 1920. He was not actively engaged in politics any more. While working as a lawyer, he continued writing. In 1921, he was tried together with Milan Šufflay and other members of the Party of Rights in a fake political trial for high treason, for their alleged contacts with the Croatian Committee, a Croatian nationalist organization that was based in Hungary at the time. He was brought to court without any concrete accusation, since his accusers simply resented his unmasking of Greater Serbian ambitions in his book South Slavic Question, and he successfully defended himself. Despite the lack of evidence of wrongdoing, Pilar was given a two month prison sentence and a one year of probation.
He published expert and scientific works about philosophy and history (e.g. about the Bogumils). In 1933, he published the essay Serbia Again and Again in German, under the pseudonym of Florian Lichttrager, since he feared for his life.
Soon after that essay was published, Pilar was found killed in his apartment. The press in Belgrade claimed it was a suicide, but the open window of his apartment and the fact that Pilar never owned a weapon make his death suspicious. Even today, there are two theories about his death: the first, that Pilar was so depressed by the Yugoslav dictatorship that he killed himself; the second, that he was killed by Serbian secret agents like other Croatian patriots such as Milan Šufflay in 1931.
Pilar is buried in Mirogoj Cemetery.
The Institute for Social Sciences in Zagreb was named after him.
Read more about this topic: Ivo Pilar
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