1. _Literature of the Servians of the Oriental or Greek Church_.
However small the circuit of country, properly called Servia, is in
proportion to the whole extent over which the southern Slavi are
spread, the name of Servians nevertheless appears to modern
philologists as the best adapted for being employed as the common name
of them all. Dobrovsky thinks it even appropriate to become the
general appellation for all Slavic nations. Although of obscure
derivation, it is at least sufficiently ascertained that it is of pure
Slavic origin; glorious associations are attached to it; it is
moreover still a living name, while the learned appellation of
_Illyrians_, formerly more in use, is dead; and that of _Bosnians_,
preferred by some Dalmatian writers, rests upon no satisfactory
grounds. The name of Servians, however, was never, till recently,
applied to the Dalmatians. It is indeed still rejected by themselves;
and they continue to call themselves _Illyrians_.
Under the present head, besides the Servians proper, of whom great
numbers have emigrated in early times to Hungary, are also strictly
comprised the Bosnians, the greater portion of the inhabitants of
Herzegovina, the Montenegrins or Czernogortzi, and the Slavonians of
the Greek Church.
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