While small, the Church of the Holy Mother of God is notable for its unusual architectural style, in particular for its high narthex flanked by two sharp-pointed towers. These features, which hint at Hungarian or Transylvanian influences, are highly atypical for medieval Bulgarian church architecture. The church is richly decorated on the inside, with as many as eleven frescoes of historical figures. One of these portraits, captioned as a despot, is variously identified as an eponymous son of Bulgarian tsarMichael Shishman or as an undocumented son of co-tsar Michael Asen IV; earlier speculation that the image depicted Serbian noble Mihailo Anđelović or Michael Shishman himself have since fallen out of favor with art historians. In addition to these early portraits, the interior walls of the church were painted with canonical murals, which can stylistically be assigned to the 14th–15th century. The church was reconstructed in 1958 and has been under Serbian state protection since 1982. (Full article...)
... that Serbian landowner Marija Trandafil spent a single day hungry, but she remembered the experience and became a major philanthropist in Novi Sad?
... that Džuvljarke written by Vera Kurtić includes interviews with members of the LGBT community in Serbia and concludes that Romani lesbian women are often "invisible"?
Novak Djokovic (Serbian: Новак Ђоковић, Novak Đoković, pronounced[nôʋaːkdʑôːkoʋitɕ]ⓘ; born 22 May 1987) is a Serbian professional tennis player who is currently ranked world No. 1 in singles by the Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP). Djokovic has been ranked No. 1 for a record total of 424 weeks in a record 13 different years, and finished as the year-end No. 1 a record eight times. Djokovic has won a record 24 Grand Slam men's singles titles, including a record ten Australian Open titles. Overall, he has won 98 singles titles, including a record 71 Big Titles: 24 majors, a record 40 Masters, and a record seven ATP Finals. Djokovic is the only man in tennis history to be the reigning champion of all four majors at once across three different surfaces. In singles, he is the only man to achieve a triple Career Grand Slam, and the only player to complete a career Golden Masters, a feat he has achieved twice.
Djokovic began his professional career in 2003. In 2008, at age 20, he disrupted Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal's streak of 11 consecutive majors by winning his first major title at the Australian Open. By 2010, Djokovic had begun to separate himself from the rest of the field and, as a result, the trio of Federer, Nadal and Djokovic was referred to as the "Big Three" among fans and commentators. In 2011, Djokovic ascended to No. 1 for the first time, winning three majors and a then-record five Masters titles while going 10–1 against Nadal and Federer. He remained the most successful player in men's tennis for the rest of the decade. In 2015, Djokovic had his most successful season, reaching a single-season record 15 consecutive finals, winning a season-record 10 Big Titles while having a record 31 victories over the top-10 players. His dominant run extended through to the 2016 French Open, where he completed his first Career Grand Slam and a non-calendar year Grand Slam, becoming the first man since Rod Laver in 1969 to hold all four majors simultaneously and setting a rankings points record of 16,950. In 2017, Djokovic suffered from an elbow injury that weakened his results until the 2018 Wimbledon Championships, where he won the title while ranked No. 21 in the world. Djokovic has continued to be a dominant force on the tour since then, winning 12 major titles and completing his second and third Career Grand Slams. Due to his opposition to COVID-19 vaccine, Djokovic was forced to skip many tournaments in 2022, notably the Australian Open and the US Open; two major events he was the favourite to win. One year after the Australian visa controversy, Djokovic made a successful comeback to reclaim the 2023 Australian Open trophy, and shortly after he claimed the French Open to take the outright record for most men's singles majors won in history. (Full article...)
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