Serbia marks Statehood Day

Serbia marks Statehood Day

Statehood Day coincides also with the Orthodox Christian holiday of Candlemas (Sretenje), after which it was named.

The First Serbian Uprising collapsed in 1813, but was followed two years later by another. The achievements of both, known collectively as the Serbian Revolution, made it possible for Prince Miloš Obrenovic to lay the foundations of the modern Serbian nation and state.

Statehood Day also honors another milestone in the struggle to renew the Serbian state: the adoption of the Sretenje Constitution on February 15, 1835, in the yard of an Orthodox church in Kragujevac, then the capital city.

Serbia's statehood served first as the foundation of the post-WW1 Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes, later renamed to Kingdom of Yugoslavia, and after the Second World War, of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (SFRJ).

Serbia reintroduced Sretenje as its national holiday in 2002.

Sretenje is a two-day holiday, and since this year it falls on a weekend, Monday, February 17, will be a non-working day in the country.