IN a time in which civilization was not as advanced as it is now, three brothers drew up a plan for a walled city. They named it the City of Skadar. It would have high, impregnable walls and would be massive, everlasting, and worth any cost. The three brothers lost no time. They got permission and funds from the ruling monarch. They recruited laborers from the fields. They employed several priests to interpret omens and propitiate the gods.

These three brothers, the architects and builders, were respected citizens. Two of them, the two called Vukasin and Ujesa, were like the men one meets every day. They worked for money and for the admiration of their fellows, They were decent, deliberate, willing to compromise. They had confidence in the value of life's sane pleasures, its comforts. They both married practical women.