Matija Antun Relković (also Reljković; 6 January 1732 – 22 January 1798) was Habsburg military officer and a Croatian writer. Early life and military career Born in the village of Davor in Kingdom of Slavonia (today a part of Croatia) as a son of a Military Frontier officer, Relković too enlisted in the Austrian army at the age of 16. He fought in the Seven Years' War until he was captured by Prussians in Wrocław (Breslau), and spent a few years of rather "relaxed" imprisonment at Frankfurt (Oder). Relković's prison years became his Lehrjahre, his educational period: a voracious but unsystematic reader, he studied many works by leading Enlightenment writers (Voltaire, Bayle, Diderot), as well as Polish poet Jan Kochanowski's didactic epic Satir- which became the model for his most famous work. After the release, Relković spent a few more years on war campaigns (this time Bavaria), but eventually sated and bored with military life, he asked and got pension from Austrian emperor Joseph II in the rank of captain, as well as the title of hereditary noble. Having spent the rest of his life as a writer and social reformer, Relković died in Vinkovci, Croatia. Bibliography Considering the deplorable state of Slavonia after the liberation from the Ottomans, Relković is, bearing in mind general backwardness of the area, extremely versatile and prolific writer. This Slavonian polymath has left indelible marks on Croatian philology, literature and general culture. Of course, almost all of his works are now only of historical interest (he possessed no authentic literary talent, nor even ambition), but, they have become so integrated in Croatian general culture that further generations of writers and philologists frequently adopted many Relković's idioms and phrases without even being conscious of it. His popular dithyrambic verses on Slavonia are, in a way, the region's motto. Relković wrote numerous works, among which the following should be mentioned: "Nova slavonska i nimačka gramatika"/New Slavonian and German grammar, published posthumously in 1860s "Nek je svašta iliti sabranje pametnih ričih"/Collection of wise adages, 1795, a hybrid polygraphy of aphorisms, mainly in the spirit of Rationalism and didacticism "Satir iliti divji čovik"/Satir or savage man, 1762, extended edition 1779, his most famous work, one of the Croatian Enlightenment bestsellers His "Satir" is a patchwork of didactic poetry, prose, quasi-dramatic dialogues, soaked in common sense wisdom of Enlightenment and consisting mainly of pragmatic counsels on agriculture, small manufacture