In the Croatian town of Sinj, horsemen in eighteenth-century dress gallop down a 160-metre track and try to spear a small iron ring hanging on a rope — a knights’ tournament held since the 1700s to remember a victory over an Ottoman army in 1715.

A victory and a Madonna

The alka commemorates the defence of Sinj in the Ottoman–Venetian war: on the night of 14 August 1715, some 700 Venetian soldiers and 100 locals held the town against an Ottoman army of at least 40,000. The people of Sinj believed that the Lady of Sinj drove the Ottomans away, and on the feast of the Assumption, 15 August, horsemen in full regalia parade a painting of Our Lady of Sinj through the streets.

The tournament grew out of knightly competitions held across Venetian Dalmatia in the early eighteenth century. Its oldest written mention is in poems of 1784; it was later held on the emperor Franz Joseph’s birthday, 18 August, and today it takes place in the first days of August. UNESCO inscribed it on its Representative List in 2010.

Hitting the ring

The alka is a target of two concentric iron rings joined by three spokes, hung on a rope above the track. Each rider, an alkar, must cover the 160-metre course at full gallop in under twelve seconds and strike it with his lance: one to three points depending on where he hits, and none for a miss. Between eleven and seventeen alkars compete over three rounds. Only men born in the Cetina valley may ride, and it is a great privilege to do so; their costumes are those of eighteenth-century warriors, and each is accompanied by a squire in old folk dress, armed with yataghan, musket and mace.

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