Metravel city quest
City Belgrade: free walking route “quest: the white city on two rivers” along the sights. 10 points. Approximately 2 h 30 min. Quests and legends - straight
This city has an unusual habit: it keeps disappearing and returning. Over two millennia, the rock above two rivers' meeting has held a Celtic settlement, Roman Singidunum, a Byzantine fortress, a Serbian capital, a Turkish fortress on the road to Istanbul, and a Serbian city again. Almost every new ruler stormed, burned and rebuilt it. The name Belograd first appears in a pope's letter to a Bulgarian ruler in 838. It literally means ‘white city’, but you will discover why at the very end, at a viewpoint overlooking the place behind that name.
We start in the bohemian quarter rather than the fortress. In the 1830s, Roma encampments settled on waste ground by the walls. By 1854, brick houses of artisans and small traders replaced the shelters; in 1872, the street was named Skadarska after the old Serbian town of Skadar. Its bohemian character emerged around the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries. When the legendary Dardaneli tavern was demolished in 1901, where the National Museum stands now, its regular writers and actors moved into Skadarlija's kafanas. By the early 20th century, about fifteen such establishments worked here.
What to do: 1) Read the story and task at each stop. 2) Find the place on the map and walk to it. 3) Look around and answer the question.
This walking route is about two and a half kilometres long, from Skadarlija through Republic Square and Knez Mihailova to Kalemegdan Fortress. We begin beside the bronze poet Đura Jakšić, sitting on a bench at the beginning of Skadarska Street. He too was a regular in these kafanas. Let's go!
The route points in order — what these places are and why they are interesting. Tasks and answers stay inside the quest.
Đura Jakšić, a leading Serbian poet and painter of the 19th century, spent almost every evening in these kafanas. Sculptor Jovan Soldatović's bronze figure on a bench outside his former home was placed here in 1990.
Republic Square is five minutes west from Skadarlija. Once Theatre Square, it received its present name in 1946.
From the square, head north along pedestrian Knez Mihailova, the city's main street. It follows an old Roman road into ancient Singidunum and took its present name in 1870, a year after Prince Mihailo's murder, in his honour.
Turn from Knez Mihailova towards the cathedral. On the corner is a low white house with wooden shutters, Belgrade's oldest surviving tavern.
Directly opposite the ‘?’ kafana stands Belgrade's main Orthodox church. A church existed here earlier: German traveller Stephan Gerlach described it in the 1570s.
A few steps aside from the cathedral stands a low house with a broken roofline, Princess Ljubica's Residence. Hadži Nikola Živković from Edessa, the first master builder of rebuilt Serbia working for Prince Miloš, constructed it in 1829–1830.
The Istanbul Gate forms part of the Upper Town's system of passages. Movement slows between the walls: a fortress could not be entered in one broad stride.
The Military Museum operates inside the old fortress structures. This is an optional stop: you can plan a separate independent visit to its displays using information from the museum.
The Roman Well's name predates many modern city habits, but the structure itself dates from the first half of the 18th century. This is a place to reflect on how names acquire lives of their own.
A few steps bring you to the fortress plateau's edge, with a nude bronze man on a tall Doric column. This is Ivan Meštrović's Victor, cast in 1913 but only installed in 1928, standing 14 metres high, commemorating Serbia's victories over the Ottoman and Austro-Hungarian empires in the Balkan Wars and the First World War.
This route is part of Metravel city quests. Below are the other quests in this city and cities with quests nearby.