FEATURE
BELGRADE
OCTOBER-NOVEMBER 2012
OCTOBER-NOVEMBER 2012
WIZZ MAGAZINE
49
49
T
HE AIR IS COLD AND DANK AS WE DESCEND
into the concrete bunker. Switching on our
torches, we shine the beams into the darkness
and creep along long-abandoned corridors, squeezing
through heavy, rusted doors as we go from room to
room. Frayed black telephone cables dangle from the
ceiling, offering signs of former occupation, but it’s
better to keep our torch beams pointed downwards to
avoid puddles of water on the pockmarked floor.
We pass through one more door and suddenly the
environment changes dramatically as ahead of us lies
a pile of rocky debris. Scrambling up it, we find
ourselves in a vast cave some 20 metres high. Our
voices echo and in the torchlight our shadows unfurl
on jagged rock walls.
We are in the Tašmajdan Caves, deep below
central Belgrade – almost directly below the Serbian
parliament building, in fact. But these subterranean
caverns far predate that institution: they were quarried
by the Romans for stone, and in the 18th Century,
the Austrians mined them for saltpetre, an essential
ingredient in the making of gunpowder. When the
Austrians later bombarded the city during World War I,
families took shelter down here and in World War II
it was the occupying German army that created the
bunker through which we made our entrance. Citizens
huddled down here again as recently as 1999, fleeing
NATO air strikes. This being Belgrade, there have been
some big parties here, too.
Our guide, Goran Markovic´, who runs underground
tours of Belgrade, recalls going to one of those
parties back in the 1990s. He has a lot of stories
to tell because the Tašmajdan Caves are far from
being Belgrade’s only subterranean lair; the ground
beneath the city is riddled with a vast network
of tunnels and deeply buried, occasionally
long-forgotten, chambers.
Across town is Savamala, the dockside district in
the vicinity of the famous Brankow Bridge. It’s an
area experiencing rapid change as formerly vacant
buildings are being made over and reinvented as bars,
restaurants and cultural venues. It also has its own
TUNNEL
VISION
The Serbian capital has been invaded
over 40 times. The result is a maze of
subterranean passages dating back to
Roman times. Indiana Jones, your next
assignment starts here…
Words by James Williams
