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Cattaro, Montenegro, 1801

Dodwell, Edward: A classical and topographical tour through Greece, during the years 1801, 1805, and 1806. London, Rodwell & Martin, 1819, 2 vol.

Three weeks before our arrival at Cattaro they had had some skirmishes with the Turks, and had brought home several of their heads, which were added to the heap before the bishop’s house. The laws of the Czerna-Goriotes, or Montenegrines, are of disproportionate severity: if credit may be given to the accounts I received, their women are treated little better than slaves, and adultery is generally punished with death, and murder only with a fine ; the former crime is sometimes atoned for by the loss of the nose and ears of the offenders; the fine for murder is two or three hundred ducats for the first offence; something more for the second; and the third time the culprit is shot, his house razed, and all his cattle and property confiscated. After a Montenegrine is buried, all the friends and relations of the deceased assemble, and make merry with dancing, singing, and feasting. They are of the Greek church, their language Illyrian, or Sclavonian; but many of them speak Greek.

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