The tragic prelude to Stjepan's reign unfolded in January 1458, when the life of the Serbian despot Lazar Branković unexpectedly came to an end.
Serbia, already bleeding from years of conflict, was immediately plunged into a whirlwind of palace intrigues.
The pro-Ottoman faction at the court in Smederevo attempted to seize power by proclaiming the military commander Mihailo Anđelović as the new ruler — a man whose own brother served as a vizier to Sultan Mehmed II the Conqueror himself.
However, the inhabitants of the capital, supported by the pro-Hungarian faction, firmly resisted this creeping coup.
Anđelović was thrown into prison, and the blind Stefan Branković was placed on the unstable throne.
At this moment, the Bosnian king Stjepan Tomaš, the father of our protagonist, intervened decisively in the Serbian dynastic conflict.
Taking advantage of the turmoil, he launched a lightning offensive and, by February 22, 1458, captured Srebrenica and several strategically important towns along the Drina River.
Harboring an ambitious plan to place his son Stjepan Tomašević on the Serbian throne, the king arranged a dynastic marriage, deciding that he should marry Jelena, daughter of the deceased Despot Lazar.
At the same time, Tomaš engaged in an exceptionally complex diplomatic game.
He reached an agreement with the powerful Hungarian king Matthias I Corvinus, recognizing Hungarian suzerainty in exchange for support for the unification of Bosnia and Serbia.
However, the Ottoman Empire had no intention of silently watching its enemies unite.
Upon learning that the Bosnian king had departed for negotiations in Hungary, the Turks launched a preemptive offensive, besieging the key Bosnian fortresses of Vranduk and Bobovac.
The young prince Stjepan, accompanied by his uncle Radivoj, was forced to secretly escape from the besieged Bobovac and flee to Smederevo.
On March 21, 1459, upon arriving in the Serbian capital, Stjepan Tomašević was officially proclaimed Despot of Serbia.
The blind Stefan Branković, unable to accept the transfer of power to the Bosnian dynasty, permanently left Serbia on April 8.
Meanwhile, King Tomaš, seeking to consolidate his son's authority, launched a desperate offensive against the Ottoman garrisons in Bosnia without allied assistance.
He even managed to burn the town of Hodidjed, taking its inhabitants into slavery.
But the balance of power was catastrophically unequal.
Hungary had become engulfed in internal disputes, while numerous desperate appeals sent to the Pope remained unanswered.
To make matters worse, a powerful Ottoman vassal, Stjepan Vukčić, Duke of Hum, rebelled against Tomaš.
The final outcome came swiftly.
When an enormous Ottoman army approached the walls of Smederevo, Stjepan Tomašević found himself in a hopeless position.
Surrounded by external enemies and lacking firm support within the country, he was forced to surrender the last stronghold of Serbian statehood on June 20, 1459.
The Turks showed mercy: they allowed the deposed despot, his family, and his entourage to leave the city unharmed and return to Bosnia.
In helpless fury, the Hungarian king accused Tomašević and his uncle Radivoj of treason, although defending the despotate without military assistance from the West had been physically impossible.
On that day, June 20, 1459, the centuries-long history of medieval Serbia finally came to an end.
From then onward, the title of "Despot" became merely a symbolic dignity, bestowed by Hungarian monarchs upon noble Serbian émigrés until the beginning of the 16th century.
Having lost the Serbian throne, Stjepan returned to his homeland, where an even heavier crown would soon fall upon his shoulders.
On August 20, 1461, news of King Stjepan Tomaš's death reached Venice, and Stjepan Tomašević ascended the Bosnian throne.
In fairness, it is worth mentioning a dark legend recorded by the 16th-century Croatian chronicler Ivan Tomašić.
According to this account, on July 10, near Orihovica at the source of the Una River, King Tomaš was allegedly murdered by his own brother Radivoj and his son Stjepan.
However, responsibility for this unverified rumor rests entirely with the chronicler.
The new king, recognizing the mortal danger hanging over his country, desperately searched for salvation.
His first success was a reconciliation with his father's longtime enemy, Duke Stjepan Vukčić.
Other influential feudal lords also recognized his authority, although relations with the Croatian Ban Pavao Sperančić remained hostile.
Nevertheless, the Bosnians managed to defend the strategically important Dalmatian town of Klis.
Stjepan placed his greatest hopes in assistance from Catholic Europe.
On October 17, 1461, he sent a desperate letter to Rome, filled with foreboding of the approaching catastrophe:
"I have been informed that the Turkish emperor Mohammed intends to attack me with his army next summer... Alone, I cannot overcome such a force... If the Bosnians know that they will not be entirely alone in the war, they will fight more courageously, and even the Turks will not dare to attack my country... In this way Bosnia may be saved; otherwise, it will perish..."
Pope Pius II responded to the appeal with spiritual support.
In November, the papal legate Nicholas of Modruš arrived in Bosnia, bringing the long-awaited royal crown.
This event provoked strong dissatisfaction from the Hungarian monarch Matthias Corvinus, who regarded Bosnia as part of his sphere of influence.
However, in 1462, through the mediation of the Pope, the conflict was resolved.
Stjepan swore allegiance to Matthias as his vassal, promising to support him in his struggle against Holy Roman Emperor Frederick III.
The solemn coronation took place on November 7, 1461, at the Church of Saint Mary in the town of Jajce.
In the presence of the highest Bosnian nobility, Stjepan Tomašević was crowned king.
He entered history as the first and last King of Bosnia to be crowned with the official blessing of the Pope.
Shortly afterward, on November 23, the king sent a charter to Dubrovnik, wisely reaffirming all commercial privileges and freedom of movement for merchants from Dubrovnik within Bosnia.
In doing so, he attempted to strengthen the country's economy on the eve of war.
Encouraged by his diplomatic successes and false hopes of creating a powerful Western anti-Ottoman coalition, Stjepan took a fatal step — he stopped paying the ruinous tribute demanded by the Turks.
The reaction was immediate.
In February, the king was still sending warnings to the Pope and Venice about the approaching danger, but by March, devastating Ottoman raids had begun in Herzegovina.
The promised assistance from Europe never arrived.
Bosnia was left alone to confront the conqueror.
Realizing that the West had abandoned him, Stjepan attempted to save the situation in the spring by sending ambassadors to the Ottoman court, pleading for a fifteen-year truce.
Mehmed II left the request unanswered and soon personally led an enormous campaign against Bosnia.
The Ottomans crossed the Drina River, overwhelmed the territories of local dukes, and advanced toward the heart of the country.
The seemingly impregnable fortress of Bobovac, the former capital, fell, spreading uncontrollable panic among the Bosnians.
The Turks encountered little serious resistance.
The king was forced to flee toward the Hungarian border, seeking refuge in the town of Ključ, in the region known as Donji Kraji.
However, betrayal was not long in coming.
The monarch's location was revealed to the Ottoman advance guard commanded by Mahmud Pasha.
The pasha entered into negotiations and solemnly promised to spare the king's life in exchange for his personal surrender and the capitulation of the remaining fortresses.
Terrified and trapped in a hopeless situation, Stjepan accepted these terms and ordered the garrisons to lay down their weapons.
Interestingly, the 15th-century Ottoman historian Tursun Beg left a vivid portrait of the defeated monarch, describing him as a man of enormous stature who was excessively fond of wine.
Meanwhile, at Zvečaj Castle, northeast of Ključ, the king's uncle Radivoj Ostojić was also captured.
The captive monarch was brought to the sultan's headquarters near the already conquered town of Jajce.
At that moment, witnessing the collapse of his world, Stjepan uttered a bitter but profound observation:
"The nobility, abandoned by the people, cannot endure for long."
Mehmed II the Conqueror, angered by the king's inconsistency and his attempts to rely on the West, refused to honor the guarantees given by Mahmud Pasha.
The Ottoman chronicler Aşıkpaşazade recorded the sultan's reasoning: allowing the king to retain even a small portion of his territories would inevitably become the cause of another war.
The fate of the last king was decided by the renowned Quranic scholar Ali al-Bistami, also known as Musannifek.
Pronouncing the death sentence, he issued a stern fatwa:
"A believer will not be bitten twice from the same hole."
With these words, Musannifek personally drew his saber and beheaded Stjepan Tomašević.
Following his nephew, Prince Radivoj was also beheaded.
To justify this betrayal before future generations, Mehmed II ordered the words of the fatwa to be carved into stone above the main city gate of Jajce.
The execution at Carevo Polje, near Jajce, took place sometime between May 29 and June 10, 1463.
It is reliably known that on May 29, Radivoj was still requesting gunpowder from Dubrovnik for the defense of Kreševo, while by June 10, news of the monarch's death had reached Venice.
By June 17, the sultan had already left Bosnia and was in Skopje.
Stjepan's death gave rise to a dark popular legend.
It was said that the sultan ordered the Janissaries to bury the executed king's body on a hillside from which the entire town of Jajce could be seen, but from which the grave itself would remain invisible to anyone inside the town.
The purpose was to make this unseen burial mound loom eternally over the inhabitants as a reminder of their terrible defeat.
For centuries, the burial site, located in the village of Zastinje, at a place known as Borovi, was marked only by a solitary, smooth stećak — a massive medieval tombstone measuring 160 × 92 × 50 centimeters.
The site became popularly known as Kraljev Grob, or "The King's Grave."
The mystery was finally investigated in 1888, when the Croatian archaeologist Ćiro Truhelka conducted extensive excavations there.
Deep beneath layers of dark soil, stone, and clay, archaeologists discovered a male skeleton.
The remains lay along a west-east axis. The deceased man's arms were folded across his chest, while his skull rested beside his torso.
The bones of his left leg had been severely fractured.
Near his feet, the investigators discovered a forged iron hook from a set of shackles, while two silver coins dating from the reign of King Louis the Great of Hungary lay upon his chest.
Anthropologists confirmed that the bones belonged to a mature man of large stature, fully consistent with the historical descriptions of King Stjepan Tomašević.
These sorrowful relics, the last material testimonies of independent Bosnia, were subsequently transferred with great care to the Franciscan Monastery of Saint Luke in Jajce.
There, they were placed in a glass sarcophagus bearing the inscription:
"Stjepan Tomašević, by the grace of God King of Bosnia. Reigned from 1461 to 1463..."
The tragic history of his remains continued into modern times.
During the bloody Bosnian War of 1992–1995, the remains had to be evacuated to Split, Croatia, to protect them from destruction.
Only on September 13, 1997, were they solemnly returned to the monastery in Jajce.
In 2004, the king's original burial site, Kraljev Grob, together with his remains, was officially declared a Monument of National Importance.
Thus, the memory of the monarch whose fate became a requiem for two great Balkan states was preserved for future generations.
