Piperi Clan - History

History

Piperi was first mentioned in Venetian documents at the beginning of the 15th century. Mariano Bolizza recorded in 1614 that the Piperi had a total of 270 houses, of Serbian Orthodox faith. The 700 men in arms were commanded by Radoslav Božidarov. Giovanni Bembo, the Doge of Venice (1615–1618), had defeated the Serb pirates (Uskoks), whom the Austrians had employed against the Republic of Venice; they were forced to take refuge at Nikšić and Piperi, and established themselves in the villages and tribes, under the later presidence of the Petrović-Njegoš family that held the office of Serbian Orthodox Metropolitan of Cetinje (later Vladika, Prince-Bishop) after 1694. They fought Osman Pasha in 1732, and Mahmut Pasha in 1788. They are mentioned as a "Serbian Orthodox clan" in a historical and geographical survey from 1757 and a letter sent by the Clan federation to Russia from 1789. In 1796 they fought Mahmut Pasha again, in the Battle of Martinići (in modern Danilovgrad). They fought Tahir Pasha around 1810.

Prince-Bishop Petar I (r. 1782-1830) waged a successful campaign against the bey of Bosnia in 1819; the repulse of an Ottoman invasion from Albania during the Russo-Turkish War led to the recognition of Montenegrin sovereignty over Piperi. Petar I had managed to unite the Piperi, Kuči and Bjelopavlići into his state. A civil war broke out in 1847, in which the Piperi and Crmnica sought to secede from the principality which was afflicted by a famine, and could not relieve them with the rations of the Ottomans, the secessionists were subdued and their ringleaders shot. Amid the Crimean War, there was a political problem in Montenegro; Danilo I's uncle, George, urged for yet another war against the Ottomans, but the Austrians advised Danilo not to take arms. A conspiracy was formed against Danilo, led by his uncles George and Pero, the situation came to its height when the Ottomans stationed troops along the Herzegovinian frontier, provoking the mountaineers. Some urged an attack on Bar, others raided into Herzegovina, and the discontent of Danilo's subjects grew so much that the Piperi, Kuči and Bjelopavlići, the recent and still unamalgamated acquisitions, proclaimed themselves an independent state in July, 1854. Danilo was forced to take measurement against the rebels in Brda, some crossed into Turkish territory and some submitted and were to pay for the civil war they had caused.

Petar II Petrović-Njegoš founded the police force (gvardija) throughout the Prince-Bishopric of Montenegro, as part of his transformation from a tribal federation to a proper state; 26 existed in Piperi.

Jovan Erdeljanović, a renowned Serbian ethnographer, stated that the four main bratstva (clans) of Rogami (a region corresponding to ancient Duklja), the Rajkovići, Stamatovići, Vučinići and Vukanovići, had become pobratim (blood brothers) and that they all venerated Archangel Michael as their patron saint (the Serbian Orthodox tradition of slava).

Piperi was one of the tribes that constituted the "Greens" (Zelenaši), a political faction that saw the unification of Montenegro to Serbia as the annexation of Montenegro (although they declared themselves as ethnic Serbs), and instead supported an independent Montenegro, though the unionist side (The "Whites", in favor of unification with Serbia) won at the Podgorica Assembly. The Greens, backed by the Kingdom of Italy, instigated the Christmas Uprising on January 7, 1919.

During World War II the majority of the tribe supported the Yugoslav Partisans.