eresy by savage persecution. Basil, its high priest,
was burnt alive. The sect fled westward and Bosnia became its
stronghold. Religion in the Middle Ages was a far greater force than
race. Nationality was hardly developed. Bosnia, into which the
Orthodox faith seems to have penetrated but little, if at all, was
thus cut off from the Serb Empire, for the bulk of the Bosniaks were
either Bogumil or Roman Catholic.

We find a great many monuments of the Bogumils scattered through
Bosnia and the Herzegovina. Huge monolithic gravestones often
curiously carved. The sun, the moon and the cross appear as symbols,
and portraits of warriors kilted and armed with bows and arrows and
a cuirass, which give a good idea of the chieftain of the Middle
Ages. The kilt is still worn by the Albanians.

Of the Bogumil creed not much is known, and that chiefly from its
enemies. Catholic and Orthodox alike regarded the heresy with
horror. But even its enemies allowed the Bogumils to have been an
ascetic and temperate people. They abhorred the use of ikons and
images, and unless the subterranean chapel at Jaitza be one, have
left no church. Their doctrines spread into west Europe, and by the
end of the twelfth century had developed in France into the sect of
the Albigenses which was suppressed by the Roman Church with
terrible ferocity. It is of interest that the rayed sun and the moon
are still found in the armorial bearings of South of France
families.

In Bosnia Bogumilism almost superseded all other faiths. In the
twelfth century the Catholic Dalmatians and Hungarians in vain tried
to suppress it by force. In 1189 Kulin Ban, the ruler of Bosnia,
himself turned Bogumil. He recanted under pressure from Rome, but
soon relapsed again, and in spite of an Hungarian crusade which
ravaged the land, Bogumilism triumphed, the palace of the Catholic
Bishop of Kreshevo was burnt and the Catholic episcopacy banished.
The Bishop of Bosnia had to reside in Slavonia, and Bogumilism
spread into Dalmatia and Croatia.

Bosnia was thus completely divided from the Serb Kingdom of Rashia,
which had meanwhile grown up and thrown in its lot with the Orthodox
Church. The Bans, in fact, preferred the assistance of the Catholics
to the risk of conquest by the Serbs, and in 1340 we find Ban Stefan
declaring himself Catholic and agreeing to the establishment of two
Bishoprics.

Stefan Dushan, Serbia's greatest Tsar, was now at the height of his
power. He succ