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| Etymology | |
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Main article: Names of the Serbs and Serbia
The name "Serbia" was first mentioned as Greek: Σέρβια, meaning "land of the Serbs". There are many theories regarding the origin of the name of the Serbs. The most likely is that it is derived from the Old Slavic root *serb-, meaning "same".[12] Another proposed etymology is that of the Indo-European root *ser- "to watch over, protect", akin to Latin servare "to keep, guard, protect, preserve, observe".[13]
Tags:Serbs,Rs,Eu,Greek, | |
| History | |
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Main article: History of Serbia
This section may be too long and overly detailed.
Please consider summarizing the material while citing sources as needed. (June 2011)
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| Early history | |
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Main articles: Prehistoric Serbia and Roman era Serbia
Lady of Vinča, ~5000 BC
The Neolithic Starčevo and Vinča cultures existed in or near Belgrade and dominated the Balkans (as well as parts of Central Europe and Asia Minor) 8,500 years ago.[14][15] Some scholars believe that the prehistoric Vinča signs represent one of the earliest known forms of writing systems (dating to 6,000 – 4,000 BC).[16]
Around 1000 BC, the Paleo-Balkan peoples known as Thracians, Dacians, Illyrians were developing in the Balkans. Ancient Greeks expanded into the south of modern Serbia in the 4th century BC, the north-westernmost point of Alexander the Great's empire being the town of Kale-Krševica.[17] The Celtic tribe of Scordisci settled throughout Serbia in the 3rd century BC and built several fortifications, including Singidunum, present-day Belgrade.
Felix Romuliana (UNESCO)
Roman complex of palaces and temples,
built by Emperor Galerius (305–311).
The Romans conquered parts of Serbia in the 2nd century BC; in 167 BC when conquering the west, establishing the province of Illyricum, and the rest of Central Serbia in 75 BC, establishing the province of Moesia Superior. Srem was conquered in 9 BC and Bačka and Banat in 106 AD after the Dacian wars. Despite its small size, contemporary Serbia extends fully or partially over several Roman provinces such as Moesia, Pannonia, Praevalitana, Dalmatia, Dacia and Macedonia. The chief towns of Serbian Upper Moesia (and wider) in the principate were: Singidunum, Viminacium, Remesiana, Naissus and especially, Sirmium which served as a Roman capital during the Tetrarchy.[18] Seventeen Roman Emperors were born in Serbia, second only to Italy.[19] The most famous of these was Constantine the Great, the first Christian Emperor, who issued religious tolerance throughout the Empire. When the Roman Empire was divided in 395, the region remained under the East, Byzantine Empire. After the 520s, Slavs appeared in the Byzantine Empire in great numbers.[20]
Tags:Central,Belgrade,Vinča,Neolithic,Starčevo,Vinča Cultures,Balkans,Asia Minor,Vinča Signs,Writing Systems,Paleo-balkan,Thracians,Dacians,Illyrians,Alexander The Great,Kale-krševica,Singidunum,Felix Romuliana,Galerius,Moesia Superior,Roman Provinces,Moesia,Pannonia,Praevalitana,Dalmatia,Dacia,Upper Moesia,Viminacium,Remesiana,Naissus,Sirmium,Roman Capital During The Tetrarchy,Constantine The Great,Religious Tolerance Throughout The Empire,Byzantine Empire,Slavs, | |
| Middle Ages | |
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Main article: Serbia in the Middle Ages
The Serbs, as Slavs in the vicinity of the Byzantine Empire, lived in so-called Sklavinia ("Slav lands"), territories initially out of Byzantine control and independent.[21] In the 8th century, the Vlastimirović Dynasty established the Serbian Principality. In 822, Serbia "stretched over the greater part of Dalmatia",[22] and Christianity was adopted as state-religion in ca 870.[23] In the mid 10th century the state had emerged into a tribal confederation that stretched to the shores of the Adriatic Sea by the Neretva, the Sava, the Morava, and Skadar.[24] The state disintegrated after the death of the last known Vlastimirid ruler – the Byzantines annexed the region and held it for a century, until 1040 when the Serbs under the Vojislavljević Dynasty revolted in Duklja (Pomorje).[25] In 1091, the Vukanović dynasty established the Serbian Grand Principality, based in Rascia (Zagorje).[25] The two halves were reunited in 1142.[26]
Serbian Empire in 1355 A.D.
In 1166, Stefan Nemanja took the throne, marking the beginning of a prospering Serbia, henceforth under the rule of the Nemanjić Dynasty.[27] Nemanja's son Rastko (posth. Saint Sava), gained autocephaly for the Serbian Church in 1217 and authored the oldest known constitution, in the same year Stefan II was crowned King, establishing the Serbian Kingdom.[28]
The Serbian Empire was established in 1346 by Dušan the Mighty, during which time Serbia reached its territorial, spiritual and cultural peak, becoming one of the most powerful states in Europe and the most powerful in the Balkans. Dušan's Code, a universal system of laws and constitution, was enacted. The reign of his son Tsar Stefan Uroš V saw the Serbian Empire fragment into a confederation of principalities. Tsar Uroš died childless in December 1371, after much of the Serbian nobility had been destroyed by the Turks in the Battle of Maritsa earlier that year. The royal Houses of Mrnjavčević, Lazarević and Branković ruled the Serbian lands in the 15th and 16th centuries. Constant struggles took place between various Serbian kingdoms and the Ottoman Empire. After the fall of Constantinople to the Turks in 1453 and the Siege of Belgrade, the Serbian Despotate fell in 1459 following the siege of the provisional capital of Smederevo. After repelling Ottoman attacks for over 70 years, Belgrade finally fell in 1521, opening the way for Ottoman expansion into Central Europe. The Republic of Venice expanded into the coastal areas of the Balkans.
Tags:Ottoman Empire,Sklavinia,Vlastimirović Dynasty,Adriatic Sea,Neretva,Sava,Morava,Skadar,Vojislavljević Dynasty,Duklja,Pomorje,Vukanović Dynasty,Rascia,Nemanjić Dynasty,Rastko,Autocephaly,The Oldest Known Constitution,Stefan Ii,Dušan's Code,Turks,Battle Of Maritsa, | |
| Ottoman and Austrian rule | |
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See also: History of Ottoman Serbia, Great Serb Migrations, Kingdom of Serbia (1718–1739), and Koča's frontier
Siege of Belgrade of 1456, unknown author, XIXth century
After the loss of independence to the Kingdom of Hungary and the Ottoman Empire, Serbia briefly regained sovereignty under Jovan Nenad in the 16th century. Three Austrian invasions and numerous rebellions, such as the Banat Uprising, constantly challenged Ottoman rule. Vojvodina endured a century long Ottoman occupation before being ceded to the Habsburg Empire in the 17th–18th centuries under the Treaty of Karlowitz. As the Great Serb Migrations depopulated most of Kosovo and Central Serbia, the Serbs sought refuge across the Danube river in Vojvodina to the north and Military Frontier in the West where they were granted rights by the Austrian crown under measures such as the Statuta Wallachorum of 1630. The Ottoman persecutions of Christians culminated in the abolition and plunder of the Patriarchate of Peć in 1766.[29] As Ottoman rule in the Pashaluk of Belgrade grew ever more brutal, the Holy Roman Emperor Leopold I formally granted the Serbs the right to their autonomous crownland following several petitions.[30]
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| Revolution and independence | |
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Main articles: Serbian revolution, Principality of Serbia, and Kingdom of Serbia
See also: Serbian Vojvodina and May Overthrow
The quest for national emancipation was first undertaken during the Serbian national revolution, in 1804 until 1815. The liberation war was followed by a period of formalization, negotiations and finally, the Constitutionalization, effectively ending the process in 1835.[31] For the first time in Ottoman history the entire Serbian Christian population had risen up against the Sultan.[32] The entrenchment of French troops in the western Balkans, the incessant political crises in the Ottoman Empire, the growing intensity of the Austro–Russian rivalry in the Balkans, the intermittent warfare which consumed the energies of French and Russian Empires and the outbreak of protracted hostilities between the Porte and Russia are but a few of the major international developments which directly or indirectly influenced the course of the Serbian revolt.[32]
Serb revolutionarry flag of Đorđe Petrović- Karađorđe
During the First Serbian Uprising, or the first phase of the revolt, led by the Great Karađorđe Petrović, Serbia was independent for almost a decade before the Ottoman army was able to reoccupy the country. Shortly after this, the Second Serbian Uprising began. Led by Miloš Obrenović, it ended in 1815 with a compromise between the Serbian revolutionary army and the Ottoman authorities. German historian Leopold von Ranke published his book "The Serbian revolution" in 1829.[33] They were the easternmost bourgeois revolutions in the 19th-century world.[34] Likewise, Serbia was second nation in Europe, after France, to abolish feudalism.[35]
The Convention of Ackerman in 1826, the Treaty of Adrianople in 1829 and finally, the Hatt-i Sharif, recognized the suzerainty of Serbia with Miloš Obrenović I as its hereditary Prince.[36][37] The struggle for liberty, a more modern society and a nation-state in Serbia won a victory under first constitution in the Balkans on 15 February 1835. It was replaced by a more conservative Constitution in 1838. In the two following decades, temporarily ruled by the Karadjordjevic dynasty, the Principality of Serbia actively supported the neighboring Habsburg Serbs, especially during the 1848 revolutions. Interior minister Ilija Garašanin published The Draft (for South Slavic unification), which became the standpoint of Serbian foreign policy from the mid-19th century onwards. The government thus developed close ties with the Illyrian movement in Croatia-Slavonia region that was a part of the Austria-Hungary. Following the clashes between the Ottoman army and civilians in Belgrade in 1862, and under pressure from the Great Powers, by 1867 the last Turkish soldiers left the Principality. By enacting a new constitution without consulting the Porte, Serbian diplomats confirmed the de facto independence of the country. In 1876, Serbia declared war on the Ottoman Empire, proclaiming its unification with Bosnia. The formal independence of the country was internationally recognized at the Congress of Berlin in 1878, which formally ended the Russo-Turkish War; this treaty, however, prohibited Serbia from uniting with Bosnia by placing it under Austro-Hungarian occupation.[38]
From 1815 to 1903, Principality of Serbia was ruled by the House of Obrenović, except from 1842 to 1858, when it was led by Prince Aleksandar Karađorđević. In 1882, Serbia became a kingdom, ruled by King Milan. In 1903, following May Overthrow, the House of Karađorđević, descendants of the revolutionary leader Karađorđe Petrović assumed power. Serbia was the only country in the region that was allowed by the Great Powers to be ruled by its own domestic dynasty. During the Balkan Wars lasting from 1912 to 1913, the Kingdom of Serbia tripled its territory by reacquiring parts of Vardar Macedonia,[39] Kosovo, and parts of Central Serbia. The 1848 revolution in Austria lead to the establishment of the autonomous region of Serbian Vojvodina. By 1849, the region was transformed into the Voivodeship of Serbia and Banat of Temeschwar.
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| Balkan Wars and World War I | |
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Main articles: Balkan Wars and Serbian Campaign (World War I)
Serbian soldiers on parade in Paris to celebrate the end of the First World War.
The Balkan Wars took place between 1912 and 1913. The First Balkan War broke out when the member states of the Balkan League attacked and divided Ottoman territories in the Balkans in a seven-month campaign, resulting in the Treaty of London. For the Kingdom of Serbia, this victory enabled territorial expansion into Raška and Kosovo. The Second Balkan War soon ensued when Bulgaria, dissatisfied with its gains, turned against its former allies, Serbia and Greece. Their armies repulsed the Bulgarian offensive and counter-attacked, penetrating into Bulgaria, while Romania and the Ottomans used the favourable time to intervene against Bulgaria to win territorial gains. In the resulting Treaty of Bucharest, Bulgaria lost most of the territories gained in the First Balkan War, with Serbia annexing Vardar Macedonia. Serbia enlarged its territory by 80% and its population by 50% within just two years; it also suffered high casualties on the eve of World War I, with around 20,000 dead.[40]
Retreat across Albania; more than 1,000,000 Serbs died during World War I.
On 28 June 1914 the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria in Sarajevo by Gavrilo Princip, a Serbian Nationalist and member of the Young Bosnia organization, led to Austria-Hungary declaring war on Serbia.[41] In defense of its ally Serbia, Russia started to mobilize its troops, which resulted in Austria-Hungary's ally Germany declaring war on Russia. The retaliation by Austria-Hungary against Serbia activated a series of military alliances that set off a chain reaction of war declarations across the continent, leading to the outbreak of World War I within a month.[42]
Serbia won the first major battles of World War I, including the Battle of Cer and Battle of Kolubara – marking the first Allied victories against the Central Powers in World War I.[43] Despite initial success, it was eventually overpowered by the joint Tags:Romania,Bulgaria,Albania, | |
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