Draft:Ratko Brajkovic

Ratko Brajković also written as Rathcus Braichovich.(Serbian Cyrillic: Ратко Брајковић; around 1400 - after 1472) was a Ragusa Vecchia builder and stonemason, originally from Njeguši, but who worked mostly in Ragusa from 1432 to 1469, the time of early Renaissance architecture.

Biography

Originally, the Brajković family came from Old Serbia (Stara Srbija) to Montenegro, then changing hands between Kingdom of Hungary and the Republic of Venice and then Ratko left for the Republic of Ragusa, where he is mentioned in ancient texts as a stonemason working both independently and also in collaboration with his contemporary countrymen (Marko Andrijić, Andrija Marković, Đurađ Vukojević, Radonja Grubačević, Živko Utješenović, Đurađ Utješenović, Radivoje Bogosalić, Paskoje Miličević Mihov, Radosav Radmanović, Jakov Radmanović, Tomkuša Vlatković, Đurađ Vukojević, Radoje Pribilović, Sandalj Hranić, Radič Ostojić).

He would often change places of residence because that was his calling to visit towns and quarries on the Adriatic islands, where he prepared stone materials for his commissions.

With Radivoje Bogosalić, he created a wall wash basin decorated with reliefs for a commoner's house in 1432. The following year, Ratko himself completed the fence of the terrace for the Friers Minor (commonly called Gray Friars) of the Franciscan friary in Ragusa. Years later, the decorated portal overlooking the beginning of the Placa (the main street of the Ragusan fortress) was sculpted in 1498 in Gothic style by the workshop of the Kotorean brothers Leonard Petrović and Petar Petroviċ.

In those years, Ratko had a workshop in Ragusa and accepted young men from the area as apprentices, namely Stanac Stojšić of Nevesinje and Rade Radošić of Ston. At the same time, in 1437, Brajković built the middle floor of the bell tower of the cathedral in Korčula with his associates Hranić Dragošević, Rajko Ivančić, Marko Andrijić and architect-stonemason Andrija Marković, who did the corbels in the Dominican sacristy as well as the aedicula on Paskoje Miličević Mihov's Pile Gate bastion and then with Ratko Ivančić he sculpted the capitals for the arcades in the nave. According to the contract dated 6 May 1437, he undertook to build three fireplaces with figural decoration and the owner's coat of arms for Natal Dobrić in his new house in Ragusa. As a skilled craftsman, the Ragusan governing body commissioned him to build the stairs for the Rector of the Republic of Ragusa from plans and instructions of the state architect Onofrio della Cava of Naples. Then, in 1442, Ratko built the vaults of the ground floor on the same building, and in 1444, he again undertook to build an altar in the cathedral in Korčula, which was removed in the 16th century during the extension of the northern side. He maintained ties with Korčula because of the quality quarries where he worked with Radivoje Bogosalić in 1445. At the end of the decade, Ratko accepted the construction of the Rector's Palace in Šipan, on the condition that the superiors procure all the carved parts for him.

In 1451, he moved to Brač and received orders from Juraj Dalmatinac in the quarries, preparing and shipping stones for the staircase of the church of St. Francis in the Republic of Ancona. Eight years later, he processed the thresholds for the staircase of the Church of St. John the Baptist in Šibenik, which was built by Ivan Pribislavić in 1460; and from 1462 he supplied stone for the cathedral there. He worked on its construction site under the leadership of Juraj Dalmatinac in 1463 and 1465/66 and in 1469, constantly with the experienced Radivoje Bogosalić. In the meantime, together with him and Radoje Grubačević he worked on the window frames on the first floor of the Rector's Palace in Ragusa under the obvious influence of Giorgio da Sebenico

Rajko had a brother Jakša Brajković (Јакша Брајковић), who was a merchant and later became a judge. Their father was Brajko Boroević.

Literature

• D. Frey: Der Dom von Sebenico und sein Baumeister Giorgio Orsini. Jahrbuch des Kunsthistorischen Institutes der k.k. Zentralkommission für Denkmalpflege (Wien), 7(1913) 34, 158–159.
• P. Kolendić: Stube na crkvi Sv. Ivana u Šibeniku. Starinar, 1(1922)(1923!) str. 90.
• C. Fisković: Korčulanska katedrala. Zagreb 1939, 20–21, 23, 43, 45, 70, 71.
• Isti: Naši graditelji i kipari XV. i XVI. stoljeća u Dubrovniku. Zagreb 1947, 25, 61, 85, 86, 100, 125. — Isti: Prvi poznati dubrovački graditelji. Dubrovnik 1955, 125, 128, 130.
• Isti: Dubrovački i primorski graditelji XIII–XVI stoljeća u Srbiji, Bosni i Hercegovini. Peristil, 1962, 5, str. 40, 42. — Isti: O starim dalmatinskim kaminima. Bulletin JAZU. 1981, 1(51) str. 39, 40, 42, 43.
• I. Fisković: Neki vidovi umjetničkog rada Jurja Dalmatinca u Šibeniku i Splitu. Radovi Zavoda JAZU u Zadru, 27–28(1981) str. 125, 156, 164.