Numerous legends that speak of love idylls usually speak of their tragic endings.
They are often inspired by real historical events and personalities, as is the case with Teresa and Otto’s love story, but unlike most love stories, it has no unfortunate ending. It is a story of great love between Tereza Kurjaković from the Slavonian town of Cernik and the elegant imperial officer Otto Krifke from Vienna, who resisted the customs and the inexorable tradition of the time that required marriage with members of her class.
It was written down in 1998 by the historian Feliks Valentić in the "Novogradiška scrapbook" and it begins at the moment when at the turn of the 20th century a young officer Otto Krifke received a transfer from occupied Bosnia to Nova Gradiška.
The beginning of love:
Coming to the Slavonian Krajina town was a great relief for him, so one Sunday morning he walked through the park of Novi Grad and listened to a concert of the regimental imperial music.
Suddenly, he noticed a young, beautiful girl walking towards the church. Otto was taken aback by her beauty and approached her, asking where she was from and what her name was. Confused and a little frightened by the unexpected encounter, she replied that her name was Teresa and that she was from nearby Cernik. It was love at first sight, which, however, could not have happened without the difficulties they soon fell into.
The next Sunday, Otto met Teresa again and confessed his love for her. He told her he couldn't live without her anymore and unexpectedly proposed to her. Teresa rejected him briefly and succinctly: "I can't love a man I don't know, a stranger."
Otto, on the other hand, was not ready to give up just like that, so he sent a letter to her parents asking them for their daughter's hand and asking permission to access the house. The father was angry, but the wise mother had different plans. She asked the Cernik guardian and teacher for advice, who suggested that they accept the proposal and receive young Beclija for an interview in her home.
So they did, but Otto's parents were holding him back from marriage. He was told that Teresa was too young — she was only 16 years old, of rural descent, and that she was not up to the elegant and wealthy Viennese gentleman and imperial officer. But the enamored Otto stayed on his own and in the end the deal fell compromise; Teresa will head to Vienna where Otto will pay for education and upbringing for the lady. After that, he will get married.
Agreement and compromise:
The word of Otto's love reached the highest Viennese court circles, who in their malice agreed that the marriage should be prevented. Otto, however, was a member of the upper class and his marriage to a provincial woman was not desirable. At the request of the evil courtiers, the emperor moved the young officer to distant Kotor, and during that time the beautiful Teresa grew into a beautiful girl and a posh Viennese lady whose education was taken care of by Otto's aunt Hilda.
Teresa attended the school of etiquette, dance, foreign languages and zither playing. She graduated from the School of Cosmetics and Porcelain Painting in Switzerland, and many prominent Viennese young men began to fight for her favor. Finally, almost four years later, the emperor approved Otto's marriage to the beautiful Teresa of Cernika, but not in Vienna but in Cernik.
When it became known in the Slavonian village that there would be a wedding - the locals behaved as befits any Slavonian village and got involved in organizing a wedding that the end has not yet experienced. When that day came, about twenty full carriages with newlyweds and guests from Vienna passed through the streets of Cernik, through the procession all the way to the Franciscan church.
Immediately after the wedding, Otto and Teresa returned to Vienna, where the Cernika beauty soon became the most famous beautician of the "city on the blue Danube". With her, court ladies and imperial princesses were beautified. She soon opened a company and became famous for the beauty creams she made herself. Thus, some of her original recipes are still preserved in the Viennese archives. And so life went on in Vienna full of glamor which soon came to an end.
In the last days of the First World War, Vienna ceased to be the center of a great monarchy. High society came to an end, there was no longer an emperor or a court where a young married couple looked down from such a height until recently.
Tereza and Otto returned home to Cernik in those days and brought a little Viennese charm and way of life there, which soon became famous in Zagreb. They lived so happily, until one day decades later, Otto passed away. Three years later, Teresa also passed away, and the newspaper reported: "Teresa was a beauty from Cernik who was not ashamed of Vienna either." They were buried next to each other in the cemetery in Cernik.
Their great and happy love immediately after the deaths of Otto (1937) and Theresa (1940) entered the legend of the Cernika area. From the traces of happy love, there is a saying about a beautiful woman from Cernika who is described as "beautiful as Terezija Kurjaković".
Unbelievably beautiful story! I enjoyed reading.