Svetozar Miletić | Origin of Street Names

Svetozar Miletić (1826 - 1901) was a Serbian lawyer, politician, and orator, who served as the mayor of Novi Sad twice. He was generally regarded as the most prominent advocate for the unification and rights of the Serbian people in the Habsburg Monarchy during the 19th century.

He was born in the village of Mošorin, near Titel, into a poor artisan family. He began his education in his hometown and then moved to Novi Sad, where his exceptional talent earned him a scholarship from influential and wealthier Serbs in the city.

He completed several grades of high school in Bratislava, where, under the mentorship and influence of the Slovak revolutionary Ľudovít Štúr, he became nationally awakened and interested in the fate of his people in the southern part of Hungary at the time.

Svetozar Miletić started his strong activism in the social and political life of the Serbian population in Vojvodina at a very young age. He opposed Serbian participation in wars under the black-yellow monarchy flag, advocated for liberal citizenship, gathered the people, and encouraged liberation ideas through his speeches. He wrote poems and speeches with strong national inspiration and dreamt of a pan-Serbian uprising in the Balkans. With his presence, charisma, and energy, he rallied the masses of the Serbian population, who began to strongly believe in liberation and unification with the homeland. Due to his activism, he became a thorn in the side of the Hungarian authorities, who repeatedly imprisoned him in an attempt to remove him from the public and political scene.

With the wholehearted assistance of Prince Mihailo Obrenović, he completed his law studies and obtained a doctorate in Vienna, after which he returned to Novi Sad as a lawyer. He was elected mayor of Novi Sad on two occasions and served as a long-time representative of the Serbian population in Vojvodina in the Hungarian Parliament.

Sharp-minded and with clear ideas, he utilized the internal conflicts between Vienna and Pest to secure equal status, rights, and privileges for the Serbian people within the Monarchy, similar to those enjoyed by other constitutionally recognized nationalities in the Empire.

Svetozar Miletić was the driving force behind the newspaper Zastava, the most influential publication that significantly contributed to the information and unity of the Serbian people in Vojvodina. During his second term as mayor, the Serbian tricolor flag was hoisted for the first time above the City Hall in Novi Sad.

The character and achievements of Svetozar Miletić were held in such high regard in Vojvodina that he could only be forcefully undermined through arrests and fabricated trials, resulting in Miletić being repeatedly sentenced to lengthy imprisonments. These hardships physically and mentally wore him down. Nevertheless, his cult of personality grew even stronger after his release from prison.

He spent his final years in illness, far away from political and social events. He passed away in Vršac at the age of 75, without witnessing his dream come true - the unification of Vojvodina with Serbia. He was buried in Novi Sad, where a magnificent monument dedicated to him, created by the sculptor Ivan Meštrović, has been located in the main city square since 1939.

In addition to numerous monuments and busts throughout Vojvodina, the name of Svetozar Miletić is now borne by two settlements in Vojvodina - Svetozar Miletić and Srpski Miletić, as well as numerous schools and streets in cities across Serbia.