Croatia
Incorporating the ancient province of Dalmatia, with its Latin speaking inhabitants, the kingdom of Croatia flourished in the 10th and 11th centuries, after which it was dominated by the Hungarian kingdom. In the 1400s Venice gained control of Dalmatia and ruled it for four centuries.
Vojvodina (Province)
To dilute Siberian hegemony, President Tito (1953 to 1980) promoted greater self-rule for the provinces of Vojvodina and Kosovo, although they remained subordinates to the Republic of Serbia. Though Serbs are the largest group in Vojvodina, ethnic Hungarians constitute a large minority.
Montenegro
Once a part of the Serbian empire, the isolated mountainous kingdom gained fame as a sanctuary for Serbian freedom fighters after the Battle of Kosovo Field. For centuries a theocracy ruled by bishops, Montenegro maintained its autonomy during the Ottoman period.
Macedonia
In this Balkan brew of Slavs, Albanians, Turks, Gypsies, and Greeks, Macedonians are the majority and have their own language. Early in the century this ancient land of Alexander the Great was torn by the bloody Balkan Wars, finally resolved by partition between Greece, Serbia, and Bulgaria. Serbian Macedonia became a republic when the modern Yugoslav state was formed in 1946.
Bosnia & Hercegovina
Religious mavericks, Bosnians once incurred the wrath of popes by following a heretical sect known as Bogomils. Later they and the people of Hercegovina provided the largest number of Slavic converts to Islam during Ottoman rule. Muslims were recognized as an ethnic nationality in 1969. Today the republic is 40 percent Islamic.
Kosovo (Province)
The heartland of medieval Serbia - dirt poor but mineral rich - Kosovo is home to some 1.7 million ethnic Albanians. Predominately Islamic in faith, they are Yugoslavia's fastest growing population and a source of enmity to Serbian nationalists who view Kosovo as a kind of Serbian Palestine.
Serbia
Serbs make up 40 percent of Yugoslavia's population. Determined to maintain national unity and Serbian primacy, Serbs revere the memory of their 14th-century emperor, Stefan Dusan, who extended Serbian rule in the Balkans. Fierce fighters, the Serbs defied Turkish control and preserved the Serbian Orthodox faith through centuries of occupation.
Slovenia
One of the "peasant nations" of the Hapsburg empire, Slovenia emerged in 1918 from six centuries of Austrian rule as Yugoslavia's most westernized republic. Through the centuries its cities were outposts of German culture. That the Slovenian language was preserved is a tribute to continued use by the peasant population and Roman Catholic clerics.
submitted by: Frank Hauser