Montenegro in the Works of Patrick Mac Swiney de Mashanaglass

Abstract

This article analyzes texts about Montenegro of the Catholic Irish publicist Patrick Mac Swiney de Mashanaglass, who visited the country in 1899. He published two works about his experience and the information he collected: a travel account and a historical overview. The article discusses the motive for his arrival on the eastern Adriatic coast, the historical, political, and cultural context of this visit, and the factors that influenced the creation of a certain image of Montenegro in his works. Special attention is paid to the issues of the relationship between Montenegro and the Holy See, which Swiney analyzed from various standpoints, and which contributed to the growing interest in Catholic circles in the small Balkan principality. The key events in that sense were the signing and implementation of the Concordat between Montenegro and the Holy See, the first legal act of this type signed between the Vatican and an Orthodox country, and the political-religious problem that emerged around an institute in Rome dedicated to St Jerome.