Draft:Jovan Petrovic Kovac

Jovan Petrović or Petronijević Kovač (Svojnovo, 1772 - Zemun, 11 July (Julian Calendar) or 23 July (Gregorian Calendar) 1837) was the most famous blacksmith in the First Serbian Uprising.

Biography

Jovan Petrović Kovač was born in the second half of the 18th century, in 1772, in the village of Svojnovo, in Jagodina Nahija (now Paraćin municipality). At the age of 15, he moved to Srem to learn blacksmithing. There he studied and plied his trade in the freikorps, in which he enrolled in order to fight against the occupiers of his ancestral country.

He participated in all conflicts from 1788 to 1790, including the famous attack on Belgrade's Donji Grad, under the command of Radič Petrović.

Later he settled in Zemun and perfected his craftsmanship. In 1798, Petronijević opened a blacksmith and shoemaker's shop, but he also dealt with livestock. Therefore, he was counted among the first practitioners of veterinary medicine in Serbia.

Jovan Petronijević was a good, but ordinary craftsman, a "master of Sikiraskova", as they used to say in Serbia. He was not allowed to make finer items. However, when he repaired a carriage for a person from Vienna, the latter sent him a master's diploma and a deed from Vienna that gave him the "right to all fine blacksmithing jobs". How good a craftsman Petronijević was is evidenced by the fact that during the first arrival of the steamship in Zemun, only this self-taught expert was able to repair a breakdown on the ship.

After the outbreak of the First Serbian Uprising, Jovan moved to Serbia and made himself available to the insurgents. He repaired weapons, forged cherry cannons and cast new, metal ones. He also forged and mounted the first church bells in Belgrade. He was extremely successful and became widely known.

No one called him anything other than Jovan Kovač, Jovan the Blacksmith. In one suit, the rooks began to give way. The leader immediately sent for Kovač to attend to them. Jovan Petronijević mastered the cannons risking his life, Karađorđe scolded him "for being reckless with his life when knowing that he's still needed".

The collapse of the uprising in 1813 took Kovač across the Sava to Zemun, to his old workshop. During the time of Prince Miloš Obrenović, Jovan maintained ties with the Serbia, often crossing the river for business, especially around Belgrade.

He also made crosses and bells for churches, as well as other more delicate products.

On Bela nedelja, 1830, for the first time in a long time, the Cathedral bell rang over Belgrade. The bells were cast and installed by Jovan Petronijević. When they told him that at that sound the Turks could shoot from the fortress, because the Orthodox have been forbidden to use bells since Sultan Suleiman the Magnificent, in 1521, Jovan replied: "It's mine to ring and let the pasha shoot if he is shot!"

In the same year, this skilled craftsman created the official Serbian coat of arms and presented it to the prince of the autonomous principality of Serbia. Jovan refused the award, replying that "He is doing favours for the Family and the Fatherland, and that the greatest reward for him is that the Most High allowed him to experience it more honourably."

Prince Miloš Obrenović ordered Jovan Petronijević to list and inspect cultural monuments with Dimitrije Davidović. He reluctantly accepted it, because he was a great lover of books, a "people's enlightener", a regular subscriber of Serbian books, the owner of a large home library and a benefactor of the Slavonic Serbian Library of Zemun, founded in 1825.

He was in contact with many public workers in Serbia and Serbs in Austria, namely Vuk Karadžić, Metropolitan Stefan Stratimirović, bookseller Gligorije Vozarović and others.

Until the end of his life, Petronijević stayed in Zemun, occasionally crossing the Sava on business. He died on 11 July 1837 in his house in Zemun.

In his native Svojnovo, the villagers later erected a monument in his likeness.