Conclusion

‘It would be fundamentally wrong to consider this deep and I broad Yugoslav peasantry, even sociologically, as a more or less homogeneous mass. This homogeneity is only an optical illusion typical of short-sighted urban perspective.’ ¹ Peasant society is composed of an enormous number of small units, having much similarity in their structure and yet preserving differences which are sufficiently striking when closely examined. In Yugoslav peasant society, this variety is only the more obvious because the Yugoslav lands have for so long been a field of conflict between many different cultural groupings. The land, the rhythm of seasonal work, the strength of the family unit, a certain undefinable Slav temperamental colouring, a longing for self-government: these the observer may postulate as common to most peasant communities in Yugoslavia: beyond that he will chiefly find differences to report. There is the difference between the people of the mountains and the people of the plains. ² Two mountain peoples, the Slovenians and the Montenegrins, have developed on completely different lines; in Slovenia, literature, education and patriotism are closely bound together; in Montenegro Christianity itself became a military religion. It is needless to recapitulate all the variations. The more intimate one’s acquaintance, with peasant reality, the less it is possible to accept the illusion of uniformity.