“On August 28, 1898, all church bells in Solin rang when the deciphered letters revealed the name Jelena on the excavated sarcophagus,” writes Don Frane Bulić in his work In the Footsteps of Croatian Rulers. It was a significant day for Croatian history and archaeology, in which Don Frane Bulić actively participated.
Next to today’s Solin church of Our Lady of the Island, he found the foundations of an old Croatian basilica (with three aisles and square pillars measuring 23m x 10m) and a broken sarcophagus in its vestibule. With great effort, he managed to assemble 90 fragments of the sarcophagus and, in collaboration with J. Barač and Dr. I. Križanić, decipher the inscription on it.
The discovery of Queen Jelena’s sarcophagus confirms the claims of Tomo Arhiđ.” ”In this tomb rests Queen Jelena, renowned (or servant of God), wife of King Mihajlo, and mother of King Stjepan. She renounced the royal splendor on the eighth day of October, and was buried here in the year of our Lord 976, in the fourth indiction…” they spin the fifth cycle of the monthly events, the seventeenth epact, the fifth circle of the sun, which falls with the sixth. Look, this is the woman who was a mother to the kingdom in life, and then became a mother to the orphans and a protector of widows! Come on, man, look over here and say: God have mercy on her soul!”
The discovery of the sarcophagus opened up the question of who Queen Jelena was.
There is very little information about Croatian history in the 10th century. It is the century when Croatia becomes a kingdom under King Tomislav.
The names on Queen Jelena’s sarcophagus clarified the genealogy of the Trpimirović dynasty.
The successors of Tomislav in the 10th century were:
Trpimir II (928 – 935)
Krešimir I (935 – 945)
Miroslav (945 – 949)
Mihajlo Krešimir II (949 – 969)
Stjepan Držislav (969 – 997)
Queen Jelena, allegedly from the most powerful Zadar patrician family at the time, the Madijevacs, was the wife of King Mihajlo Krešimir II (949 – 969) and the mother of Stjepan Držislav (969 – 997).
“Not only was she a courageous queen, but she also left a significant impact on the welfare of the kingdom and its people.” “She was not only devout but also wealthy,” writes Don Frane Bulić. She had large estates – vineyards, meadows, mills, and her own court. All sources agree that she had two churches built. The Church of St. Stephen was intended to be the tomb of Croatian kings, while the Church of St. Mary was a coronation basilica. Because of her relationship with the people, she was beloved and was called Jelena the Glorious. After the death of Mihajlo Krešimir II, she ruled as regent for her underage son Stjepan Držislav. At the end of her life, she withdrew to a monastery of Benedictine nuns and devoted herself to prayer and good deeds.
She was rightfully called the “mother of the poor and protector of widows”. According to some interpretations, such wording on her epitaph not only proves the queen’s virtue but also shows that the Croatian state was part of the contemporary world at the time, as it applied the norms of Roman and Byzantine law. Don Lovro Katić, in his work “At the Gates of Croatian History,” interprets the same wording as follows:
The park of Queen Jelena Madijevka in Zadar.
In 1976, the one-thousandth anniversary of the death of Croatian Queen Jelena, the most famous woman in early medieval Croatian history, was celebrated at the Church of Our Lady of Otok. In her memory, there is a garden named after Queen Jelena Madijevka in Zadar.