Dubravka is a drama of mythological-pastoral content and allegorical meaning written in the mid-third decade of the 17th century by the Croatian author Ivan Gundulić. It consists of three acts with a total of 28 scenes and 1,696 verses, written in double rhymed dodecasyllables and octosyllables.
Time and set
The plot of the entire play is set in the pastoral Dubrava in a mythical, pagan time of happiness and well-being, at the time that by its nature reminiscent the golden age of mankind. Historians of literature agree that Dubrava allegorically represents the city of Dubrovnik and/or the Republic of Ragusa as a country with a long tradition of independence and freedom, which cultivated since medieval times. Although Dubrava is some mythical country from the distant past, it represents the Republic of Ragusa because it values freedom as the highest human value, the biggest ideal and virtue that man can reach during his transient life.
The story begins at dawn, symbolically at the time of the birth of a new day but the expected day, "gentle solemn day", a day dedicated to freedom and its glory and value, comes only once a year which makes all the characters desperately wanting it. It's a day "in which we here make a shrine to sweet freedom", in which the ideals and virtues are above everyday life and its routine, ordinariness.
In addition to real-time, the play has a lot of connections with the historical background of Gundulić's time. The strongest and most famous connection with historical events is the motive of the Dalmatian fishermen who come from the land occupied by the Venetians, to a free and independent Dubrava, allegorical Dubrovnik, the symbol of Croatian circumstances at the time due to many attacks by the Ottomans, Venetians, Hungarians, Austrians, French and others. Dubrovnik thus becomes an allegorical port of salvation for the Croatian people, but also a role model and an inspiration in the fight against the greedy enemies.
The theme of the play is a fictional old custom according to which every year a day is celebrated in honor of the goddess of liberty. On that day, a wedding is officiated between the most beautiful girl and the most beautiful young men chosen by town judges.
On that eventful day, an old fisherman came from Dalmatia to Dubrovnik. His figure clearly shows the difference between the free Dubrovnik and Venetian-occupied Dalmatia. In addition to the character of fishermen, the drama shows other minor characters: satyrs Divjak (lit. savage) and Vuk (lit. wolf), and shepherdesses Zagorka and Pelinka, who served as an allegory Gundulić used to depict social vices and immorality in Dubrovnik.
Main characters, Dubravka and Miljenko, are nice and noble young couple on whose fate Gundulić builds the dramatic storyline. Instead of the expected choice of Miljenko as the most beautiful young men, judges choose ugly but rich, Grdan (lit. maleficent) who bribed them with gold. Grdan, however, fails in his plan because of the interference of god Lero who causes shakes and thunder and shades flames on the fire just before the wedding ceremony. At the moment in which Miljenko enters the church, shakes and thunder cease, and the fire flares up again which is interpreted as Lero's sign that Miljenko, and not Grdan, should become Dubravka's husband.
In the last scene of the play, on the feast of freedom, priest first offers symbolic votive gift - releasing from a cage birds of the god of love - followed by the appearance of Miljenko with an olive branch and Dubravka with a rose. At the end, characters symbolized disadvantages of Dubrovnik society that threatened the survival of freedom of Dubrovnik - Zagorko, Divjak, Vuk, Jeljenka, Gorštak - in honor of those same freedoms, sacrifice their shortcomings and vices, and their symbols, giving them as a votive offering.
The last six lines of the play feature a hymn to freedom. The hymn's first line, (translated as "Oh beautiful, oh dear, oh sweet freedom) is used as an inscription on the edge of the Croatian €2 coin.