Migration of Identity in the Example of Memorials to the Serbian Army at Zejtinlik, Vido, and Kajmakčalan

Abstract

This paper analyzes the memorial spaces of Vido, Zejtinlik, and Kajmakčalan as key topoi in the formation of the martyrological, heroic, and triumphal layers of Serbian identity, and examines how these layers were reshaped within the Yugoslav ideological framework of the interwar period. Special attention is devoted to the architectural and symbolic structures of these memorials, through which the processes of meaning redistribution and the transfer of national memory into a supranational Yugoslav model are materialized. Zeitenlik emerges as a site of state-sanctioned heroism, Vido as a sacral topos of sacrifice, and Kajmakčalan as a mythologized space of victory. Their mutual complementarity reveals the mechanisms of ideological integration through which the Serbian wartime experience was transformed and incorporated into Yugoslav political culture. The analysis of these topoi uncovers the dynamics of identity migration, demonstrating how memorial narratives simultaneously preserved national meanings while adapting them to state interpretations of the past. The study shows that these memorial spaces became paradigmatic examples of the ideological shaping of collective memory and key indicators of identity transformation processes during the interwar era.