The Spirta House (Serbian: Спиртина кућа / Spirtina kuća) is a building located in Zemun, Belgrade, the capital of Serbia. Built in 1855, today is the location of the Zemun Home Museum (Serbian: Завичајни музеј Земуна, romanized: Zavičajni muzej Zemuna). Since 1965 has been protected as the cultural monument. The house is the only preserved representative of the Gothic Revival architecture in the wider Belgrade area.
Spirta family The Spirta family is of Aromanian origin. They lived in the village of Katranisa (today Pyrgoi) in modern Western Macedonia region of Greece and emigrated north of the Sava and Danube rivers, into the Austria, in 1739. Petar Spirta distinguished himself during the Serb Uprising of 1848–49. They settled in Zemun in the late 18th century and, pursuing several successful business enterprises, soon became a well known and a wealthy family. Their importance was confirmed by the charter of the Austrian Emperor Franz Joseph I by which he bestowed the noble title and the coat of arms to Pavle Georgije Spirta in 1856. Dimitrije Spirta, who built the house, lived in it only for a short while, before moving to Pančevo, where he died in 1885, and was buried in the Vojlovica Monastery. The final family member who owned the house was Đorđe Spirta, who bequeathed the house to his wife Sofija, née Georgijević. After he died in 1909, Sofija built a mausoleum to Đorđe on the Gardoš cemetery before she died in 1916 in Switzerland. Apart from this house, the Spirta family owned a vast properties in southern parts of the Austrian Empire. They included numerous farms and houses in Zemun, Pančevo, Novi Bečej, etc.
History
Family house The house was finished in 1855 at number 9 in the Zemun's main street, Glavna and is situated in the neighborhood of Donji Grad. The construction was funded by Dimitrije Spirta and the house was projected by the Austrian architect Heinrich von Ferstel. The house became the "Garni" hotel in the late 19th century. During the World War I it was used by the Austro-Hungarian military. After Zemun became part of Yugoslavia, the house was the location of the "Institute for the blind and deaf" Serbian war invalids (1919-1920). During the Allied bombing of Belgrade in 1944, the house was severely damaged, but was restored after the war. The only remaining item of the once vast wealth of the Spirta family is one glass, made of pink crystal, used by Sofija Spirta.
Museum The Zemun Home Museum was founded in 1954, on another location, and administratively annexed to the Belgrade city museum in 1968. The museum shows the history of Zemun from its foundation to 1945. The Spirta House was thoroughly adapted in 1968-70 and on 4 March 1971 the opening ceremony was held which also marked the relocation of the museum into the house. In 2002 the museum was closed due to the impending reconstruction but the works, estimated to last only for 65 days, dragged on. In 2012 it was announced that the house will be reopened in the spring of 2013 but that failed, too, thanks to the lack of funds and apparently low quality reconstruction in the 1960s. The hallmark of the house, the parquet, dried and cracked due to the radiators being placed in the rooms. The specific parquet can only be found in several houses in Europe. The original wallpapers have been conserved and the walls of the corridors repainted. But as of 2017 the museum was still closed "because of the reconstruction and preparation of the new permanent collection". The museum was temporarily opened for two exhibitions: "A voice of Zemun" in 2014, and "Secession in the Old Core of Zemun" in November 2017. It was announced that the reconstructed museum will be opened in April or May 2022, but the deadline was moved to September 2022.
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