A visit to Croatia’s unique Bećarac Museum
- by croatiaweek
- in Entertainment
Bećarac Museum (Photo credit: Domagoj Katić)
Bećarac is a popular genre of music in eastern Croatia, deeply rooted in the region’s cultural heritage. This lively and spirited musical form is celebrated at the Bećarac Museum in the heart of Pleternica.
With over 400 bećarac singers and 200 authentic items, original illustrations and photographs, documentary and animated films, the museum offers a comprehensive look into this vibrant tradition.
At the Bećarac Museum, you can even sing a bećarac song yourself, take a quiz, chat with a bećarac robot, listen to a singing duel between the bećarac singer Pave and the rapper Kandžija.
Bećarac Museum (Photo credit: Domagoj Katić
The youngest visitors won’t want to miss the merry-go-round, while those aged 16 and older will hear the lascivious verses of this unique rhymed ten-line stanza, which has been on UNESCO’s list of intangible cultural heritage since 2011.
Bećarac Museum (Photo credit: Domagoj Katić)
Bećarac Museum (Photo credit: Domagoj Katić)
Part of the innovative World of Graševina project.
In the captivating Bećarac Museum, this song serves as a medium that emotionally explores universal themes such as first love, growing up, sexuality, aging, as well as folk customs…
Bećarac Museum (Photo credit: Domagoj Katić)
The Bećarac Museum is an interpretation centre that opened last year, and it is part of the inspiring story of the World of Graševina, which connects wine tourism with natural, cultural, and traditional heritage.
Bećarac Museum (Photo credit: Domagoj Katić)
Bećarac Museum (Photo credit: Domagoj Katić)
Krauss researched it, and it’s discussed in literature studies.
Although it seems like it’s always been among the Slavonians, bećarac originated with the abolishment of the Military Frontier. It was once sung with bagpipes and a single stringed instrument called sâmica, but today, it is most commonly accompanied by the tamburica.
Bećarac Museum (Photo credit: Domagoj Katić)
It was also studied by Friedrich Salomon Krauss, an ethnologist, folklorist, philologist, and sexologist, a follower and friend of Sigmund Freud. He was born in 1859 in Požega, where he completed high school before going on to study in Vienna. Krauss, the youngest of four children of the Jewish merchant Wilhelm Krauss and Eva Ernestine Hertzog, a native of Pleternica, collected around two thousand bećarac songs with satirical, romantic, or erotic content.
Bećarac Museum (Photo credit: Domagoj Katić)
At the time, bećarac was quite a shocking song, not only because of its content but also because women sang it alongside men on equal footing. Therefore, it is still studied in literature studies as a unique example of 19th-century folk poetry.
Bećarac Museum (Photo credit: Domagoj Katić)
Bećarac Museum (Photo credit: Domagoj Katić
A large number of bećarac songs have been preserved thanks to Krauss’s research work. In gratitude to the most famous Slavonian ethnologist, sexologist, and folklorist, a bronze sculpture of him, created by the academic sculptor Tatjana Kostanjević from Požega, has been placed on Bećarac Square (Trg bećarca) in Pleternica, where the Museum is also located.
Whether you’re a passionate fan or just getting to know this part of Slavonian heritage, the museum provides an enriching and enjoyable experience.
