[Until 1335: a disputed territory]
[1335-1809: the Habsburg Empire]
[1809-1914: the Illyrian Provinces, "Unified Slovenia" and the Austro-Hungarian Empire]
[1914-1918: World War I]
[1918-1929: the postwar period and the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes]
[1929-1945: Yugoslavia and World War II]
[1945-1990: the Tito government and post-Tito Yugoslavia]
[From 1990: the end of the struggle and independent Slovenia]
Until 1335: a disputed territory
Archaeological foundings prove the existence of human life in the present territory of Slovenia since more than 250 000 years ago. Among those foundings is that which is considered the oldest musical instrument in the world, a flute which was carved from the femur of a bear circa 50.000 years ago. The peoples who lived in the territory until the 4th and 3rd centuries b.C., whose ethny hasn't been identified, left a rich historical and archeological heritage in the region, from fortifications dating from the Bronze Age to a wide range of objects, mostly weapons.
In the 4th and 3rd centuries b.C. the Celts arrived and created a state called Noricum. Some city names (like Bohinj, for example) and rivers (like the Sava and the Drava, the most important rivers in Slovenia) date from that time. In the 1st century b.C. Noricum was annexed by the Roman Empire and roman cities were developed in Slovenia - the most important ones were Emona (Ljubljana), Celeia (Celje) and Poetovia (Ptuj). When the Roman Empire was divided in the 5th century a.d, Slovenian ethnic territory stayed, along with Croatia, in the west part.
In the same century the territory which today is Slovenia was invaded by the Huns and the Germanic. However, they stayed there for a very little period of time, and in the 6th century the Slavs, which are the people who the Slovenes really descend from, arrived in the land. They created the first Slavish state, which would be the cradle of the Slovenian nation: the Duchy of Carantania, in the zone which today is Carinthia.
In the middle of the 8th century the Duchy was added to the Bavarian Empire, which was, in 788, conquered by Charlemagne, the king of the Franks. So the Duchy of Carantania passed to the hands of the Franks, who introduced feudalism, spread Christianity and replaced the Duchy's princes by Franks.
When the Frankish Empire was divided by the Treaty of Verdun, in 843, the territory was ruled by the dukes of Bavaria. At that time, a Slavish prince called Pribina received the territory as a feud, and later, in 869, his successor prince Kocelj established an independent state, which lasted for only 5 years. In 907 it was the Magyars who invaded the land, but more or less half a century after that they were beaten and established in the territory of which is now Hungary.
The Freising manuscripts (Brizinski spomeniki), which are not only the oldest texts written in the Slovenian language but also the oldest Slavish manuscripts, date from this time (10th century). "Freising" is the name of the place - in Bavaria, present-day Germany - where the manuscripts were found. They are liturgical texts, with prayers written in the latin alphabet, and are now kept in the Munich archives.
Since this time, the Slovenes developed in four provinces under German colonization - Styria (Stajerska), Carinthia (Koroska), Carniola (Kranj), and Gorizia (Goriska).
a name="1335-1809: the Habsburg Empire">1335-1809: the Habsburg Empire
In 1335 most of that territory fell under Habsburg rule. The Counts of Celje, a very important feudal family, kept being the lords of their feud, but when the last member of this dynasty - the last feudal dynasty in Slovenia - died in 1456, their lands were inherited by the Habsburgs. Before that, in 1348, the territory suffered a strong earthquake.
In the 15th century the Turk tribes which were established in the territory of Bosnia and Serbia tried to invade the Habsburg Empire several times through the Southeast, there is, through Slovenia. The peasants which had to defend the land and lived in terrible conditions started organising revolts which lasted until the XVII century. The biggest revolt happened in 1515 (four years after another devastating earthquake) with the participation of peasants from the entire Slovenian territory; almost 50 years later they organised a revolt together with Croatian peasants.
The situation was hard in the land of today's Slovenia when the Protestant Movement, created in Germany, was brought to Slovenia in the 16th century. The leader of the Movement in Slovenia was Primoz Trubar, who wrote the two first books in the Slovenian language, Katekizem and Abecednik in 1551. Also at that time, Juri Dalmatin translated the Bible to Slovene and Adam Bohoric wrote the first grammar of the Slovenian language. Many other books were released and that had a decisive impact in the maintenance of the Slovenian language and identity. However, in the end of the 16th / beginning of the 17th century the Counter-Reformation started: many books were burned and the Protestants were forced to become Christians or leave the territory. And so hundreds of aristocrat families left the territory of Slovenia.
In the end of the 17th century the Turks left Bosnia and Serbia and so there was no need for the Slovenes to constantly defend themselves anymore.
The 18th century was a prosper time in the region. Commerce was developing and in 1717 the Adriatic sea was opened to navigation. With the rise of Maria Theresa there were great changes at economic, social and cultural level: roads were built; Trieste became the most important port in the north of the Adriatic, also becoming the biggest city in the Slovenian land and therefore absorbing the extra labour force from the fields; elementary and secondary schools were created; and German was established as official language. This last change woke the Slovenes' nationalist conscience, and Anton Tomaz Linhart published an ethnic study where he established that the Slovenian people lived between the Drava and the Adriatic sea. Besides that, economical prosperity led to the emergence of a middle-high socio-economic class whose sons studied in great centres such as Vienna and Paris and came back with knowledge about the Enlightenment and about their Slavish history and identity. In the late 18th century father Valentin Vodnik, an excellent poet who wrote in Slovene, founded the first Slovenian newspaper.
1809-1914: the Illyrian Provinces, "Unified Slovenia" and the Austro-Hungarian Empire
In 1809 Napoleon's troops invaded the territory. Almost all of today's Slovenia was integrated, together with a part of Croatia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Serbia and Montenegro in what Napoleon called "Illyrian Provinces" of which Ljubljana was the capital. The French made their own laws (one of them made the Slovenian language obligatory in schools), but because of the high taxes they set, the people resisted massively, and in 1813 the French were not in the territory anymore, and it went back to the hands of the Habsburgs.
One can say that Slovenia's struggle for independence began at this time. A group of intellectuals, among whom was France Preseren, defended the nationalist conscience and - and here Preseren had the leading role - the Slovenian language. The struggle's highlight happened in March 1848, when the first political programme in Slovenia, called "Zedinjena Slovenija" ("Unified Slovenia") was released. This programme demanded that all Slovenes should belong to a state called Slovenia, where the official language would be Slovene and which would be an autonomous province of the Habsburg Empire. In the same year feudalism was abolished.
In 1867 emperor Franz Josef granted political autonomy to Hungary and the Empire became the Austro-Hungarian Empire. After the occupation of Bosnia in 1878 and its annexation in 1908, Slavish hopes in a tripartite monarchy (Austrians-Hungarians-Slavs) grew, but that never happened. In the end of the 19th century the great majority of the population still lived from agriculture, which was going through a crisis, and iron works, which was also a very important economic activity in the territory, wasn't in its best times either. That caused many Slovenes to leave their homeland and look for a better life in Western Europe or even, as the majority chose, in the United States of America. Around this time three political parties were created in Slovenia: the Conservative, the Liberal and the Social Democrat, which was the weakest.
1914-1918: World War I
In the beginning of the 20th century there were secret societies and nationalist groups in Serbia who defended pan-Slavism, (or, in other words, the union of all Slavs) and who were supported by Russia, which saw in that idea a gret opportunity to reach the desired Adriatic coast. On June 28th 1914 the Austro-Hungarian archduke Franz Ferdinand (the heir to the throne) and his wife Sofia paid an official visit to Sarajevo, capital of Bosnia, which is near the Serbian border. In spite of having been warned by the Serbian government not to go to Sarajevo, even because it was an important day in the History of Serbia, Saint Vitus Day, the Habsburg archdukes didn't do it.
A young Bosnian student called Gavrilo Princip had been, together with three other Bosnians and four others who joined them AFTERWARDS, called by a secret Serbian organisation called "Unity Or Death", also known as "Black Hand", and trained in Belgrade to kill the archduke. On June 28th 1914 Princip's shots at Franz Ferdinand and his wife were fatal.
When this happened, the Austro-Hungarian Empire demanded Serbia to suppress secret societies, to close down anti-Austrian newspapers and to dismiss Serbian officials who had connections with terrorists. Serbia didn't do it, and, on August 1st 1914 Austria declared war on Serbia.
It was the excuse Europe was waiting for to start a war that everybody knew was coming, since there were great tensions between the continent's main powers for many reasons. The declarations of war came one after another WITH an incredible speed. Russia declared war on Austria-Hungary Empire to defend Serbia and Germany, which ASSUMIU to be in Austria's side, declared war on Russia. France mobilized its troops and Germany declared war on France, saying they would invade the country through Belgium. The violation of the Belgian neutrality caused the United Kingdom to declare war on Germany. In less than a week Europe was at war. Italy joined Germany and the Austro-Hungarian Empire forming the Triple Alliance, while France, the United Kingdom and Russia formed the Triple Entente. Gradually, many other countries joined both sides. Portugal joined the Triple Entente in 1915, the same year when Italy changed sides (due to a secret agreement with England, who promised Italy would receive part of the Austro-Hungarian land if they won) and two years later the United States joined France, the United Kingdom and Russia. The entrance of the USA into the war would be decisive in the way it would end.
Slovenia suffered a lot in World War I, mostly after Italy attacked Austria in 1915. Since a great part of the Italy-Austria border was in Slovenia, it was there where, for two years, the bloodiest battles were fought between Italians and Austro-Hungarians. There were twelve battles on the banks of the river Soca, along 90 km. Eleven were started by the Italian army and the last one was a joint Austro-Hungarian-German initiative which was fatal to the Italians. That battle was called "the miracle of Kobarid".
The Soca front (also known as the "Isonzo front" - Isonzo is the Italian name for river Soca) was one of the bloodiest in the war and also one of the hardest, since it took place in great mountains and valleys where the Winter is hard and there are meters of snow on the ground. And the greatest proof that war doesn't make any sense and that those who die and get hurt, whether they are civilians or not, are innocents, is that, as a part of the Slovenian ethnic territory belonged to Italy, there were Slovenian soldiers in both armies, so they fought against each other.
1918-1929: the postwar period and the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes
In 1918 the conflict was over and the Triple Entente won. The Austro-Hungarian Empire fell and many countries were created in the territory: Hungary, Poland and Czechoslovakia. The pan-Slavists were also able to do what they wanted: unite all the South Slavs in a sole and sovereign state, the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes, which also included Bosnia-Herzegovina, Macedonia, Montenegro and the provinces of Vojvodina and Kosovo.
However, the establishment of the borders of the kingdom wasn't based in the ethnic borders, but in the political interests of the European powers. An example of this situation is Trieste and other cities in the Adriatic coast which used to belong to Slovenia and Croatia but fell in the hands of Italy because of the secret agreement with the united kingdom, in which some land from the Austro-Hungarian Empire were promised to Italy so that it would change sides in 1915. Besides, claiming that they never received all that was promised in the London agreement, the Italian army constantly invaded the Slovenian territory. This matter was settled in 1920 with the signing of the Treaty of Rapallo, which was bad for Slovenia, who lost something like one third of its territory to the Italians. In the North, it was Austria who claimed the province of Starjeska, but Major Rudolf Maister, a Slovenian official who used to belong to the Austro-Hungary army, became a national hero by winning this fight and keeping Starjeska in Slovenia. But there were more conflicts with neighbouring countries because of the artificial borders of the kingdom of the Serbs, Croats and Slovenes: the Bulgarians, the Greeks and the Hungarians also claimed parts of the territory of the kingdom.
This new state included six nations (Serbians, Croats, Slovenes, Macedonians, Montenegrins and Muslims), three religions (Catholics, Orthodoxism and Islamism), three languages (Slovene, Macedonian and Serbo-Croat) and even two alphabets (Cyrillic and Latin). In spite of being South Slavs, these peoples had had very different histories, and that originated disparities that were impossible to ignore.
For this reason, the creation of the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes was never totally pacific: there were pro-independence and even pro-Austrian movements in many of the nations included in the new country. Besides all this, there was an important discussion about the form of the state: Serbia defended centralism, while the other nations demanded a federal state. The Serbian will was respected and the governors of the new state were the members of the Serbian Karadjordjevic dynasty. The other peoples strongly opposed to the excessive power given to Serbia.
1929-1945: Yugoslavia and World War II
All this caused a great instability which became unbearable, mostly when terrorism intensified and some governors were killed. This situation caused the king Alexander to dismiss the parliament and declare a dictatorship. He also changed the organisation of the country, creating nine administrative provinces called Banovines - the Slovenes lived in "Dravska banovina" - and even the name of the country: the kingdom was now called Yugoslavia - land of the South Slavs. This name reminded the peoples of what they had in common with the objective of uniting them. The dictatorship was officially over in 1931.
Looking for international support king Alexander intensified the relationships with the Little Entente (group created in 1920/21 including the Kingdom of the Serbs, Croats and Slovenes, and Romania) and with France. And it was in an official visit to France in 1934 that the king, together with the French Foreign Affairs Minister, was killed by Croat extremists. His son Peter II was only 11 years old, so his cousin Paul took over the kingdom until 1941, when he signed a treaty with the Axis. The people didn't like that and proclaimed Peter II, who was already 18 years old, as their king.
In the same year the Second World War came to Yugoslavia, with the German-Italian invasion, and Peter II didn't have any choice but to capitulate. His territory was divided between the invaders (Germany and Italy), Bulgaria and Hungary. In Croatia, the Ustachi (the most important extremist group), who shared right-wing ideology and thus were supported by the Germans and the Italians, proclaimed independence. They established a military dictatorship which had many forms of censorship, including concentration camps where thousands of Serbians, Jews, Muslims, Gipsies and even Croats who opposed to the system were eliminated.
The king Peter II exiled in London and constituted a government in exile. In Slovenia, the Germanization was more and more intense, and the Liberation Front (Osvobodilna fronta) was created by the Slovenian people to fight against that situation. In the other republics of Yugoslavia there were two great resistence movements: Mihajlovic's Chetniks and a group of communists, also called the Partisans, whose leader was Jozip Broz (who would later be known as "Tito"). In spite of the will to create a common resistance force, the two movements never reached an agreement, because Mihajlovic's group was made of Serbians only, supported by the government in exile and their intention was to restore Serbian dominance, while Partisans were from different parts of the country and were willing for a federative Yugoslavia, and the non-Serbian were pleased with the idea. Tito's movement reached much more success than that of Mihajlovic and then it started accepting non-communists as its members, all reaching for a common goal: the liberation of Yugoslavia. The Partisans, who had USSR's support since the beginning, also received the support of the United Kingdom and the USA, who began to consider them as their allies.
1945-1990: the Tito government and post-Tito Yugoslavia
The war ended in 1945 with the victory of the Allies which was a victory also for the Partisans and Tito was appointed prime minister by the king Peter II. In the same year there was an election which the opposition boycotted by not presenting any candidate list and the communist party obtained the majority of the votes (it's also important to say that this was the first election in which women were allowed to vote). The Federal Republic of Yugoslavia was created, including the Socialist Republics of Serbia, Croatia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Slovenia, Montenegro and Macedonia. This was the beginning of Tito's dictatorship and also of a strong censorship: Mihajlovic was arrested and condemned to death (for betrayal to his motherland), the non-communists which left the Partisan movement were also arrested and many people who opposed to communism were put on trial and lost their citizenship so that they would not vote (this started happening even before the 1945 elections).
Tito adopted a socialist economic system and by 1947 all private property had already been nationalized. In that same year, because of a peace treaty in which the Allies imposed some restrictions on the countries that lost the war, Yugoslavia (more exactly Croatia and Slovenia) received back the territory they had lost to Italy at the end of the First World War.
Tito's communism was very different from the USSR communism and Yugoslavia was getting politically closer to the West; in 1953 a ratification of the Constitution was a clear rupture with the other communist countries, and the USSR didn't like that: Stalin accused Tito of leaving the Marxism-Leninism ideals behind and Yugoslavia was expelled from the Koninform (union of the communist parties of many countries).
In 1956 Tito founded, together with other leaders from around the world, the Non-Alignment Movement. At that time, life conditions in Yugoslavia were not as good as in Western Europe countries, but much better than those in the other Eastern Europe countries. Tito's "national communism" was reaching good results. However, censorship continued and opposing intellectuals continued being chased.
Slovenia was the most prosper republic in Yugoslavia, and for many times its riches was used to support the other republics. Its production was 2,5 times bigger than the national average, and that helped to deepen the Slovenes' nationalism.
In 1963 the federation changed its name to Federal Socialist Republic of Yugoslavia (and Slovenia became Socialist Republic of Slovenia) and in 1974 Tito established a collective leadership system with rotating presidency, so that every republic would have the chance to be the country's president. Tito died in 1980 and Yugoslavia continued the rotating presidency system until the end of the 80s, which can be considered the decade of nationalism of all of the peoples included in Yugoslavia. In Slovenia that nationalism could be seen in magazines such as Tribuna, Mladina, Problemi and Nova revija. In Nova Revija No. 57, in 1987, a group of intellectuals clearly expressed the country's desire for independence.
Instability reign all through Yugoslavia, mostly because in Serbia Slobodan Milosevic was chosen as president in 1989 waving the banner of Serbian nationalism. Willing to unite all Serbians in a sole state - the Great Serbia - he took Kosovo and Vojvodina's autonomy and answered with violence to the Kosovars' protests against it.
From 1990: the end of the struggle and independent Slovenia
In 1990 there were free elections for the first time in Yugoslavia, and all the republics, except for Serbia and Montenegro, chose non-communist presidents. In Slovenia, a right-winged parties coalition called DEMOS won the election, and Milan Kucan became president. On December 23rd of the same year 88% of the Slovenians voted for independence in a referendum. The result was presented 3 days after the referendum and that is now the date - December 26th - when the Slovenians celebrate Independence Day.
There was no reason not to leave Yugoslavia as soon as possible, and six months after, on June 25th 1991 Slovenia declared independence. After the declaration there were tem days of war (June 27th to July 7th), won by Slovenia, which became the first independent ex-Yugoslavian republic. On October 25th the last Yugoslavian soldier leaves the Slovenian territory, and at that time Slovenia had already established its own national currency and put border posts in its borders. On December 23rd 1991 the first Slovenian Constitution was approved.
International recognition of the new independent country came immediately afterwards. In January 1992 the European Union officially recognized Slovenia as an independent state, and two months after that Slovenia became a permanent member of the United Nations. Today, Slovenia belongs to the International Monetary Found, Counsil Of Europe, World Trade Organization, World Bank, NATO's Partnership for Peace, Organization for European Security and Co-operation and in 1997 it was chosen a non-permanent member of the Security Counsil, having successfully accomplished that mission. In 2004 Slovenia joined the European Union, in a historical enlargement that raised the number of member states to 25.
This is the history of Slovenia until the present day. It's a story of courage, struggle, suffering, and, above all, a story of love. The story of the love of a people for itself, the story of the love between a people and a culture, between a people and an identity, between a people and a country that was never really a country until 10 years ago. That love for something which cannot be seen, but only felt, gave the Slovenian people the courage to fight for what they believed in. And that is almost magic; it's like a fairy tale. And like all the other fairy tales, it had a happy ending. An ending which, after all, is nothing but a new beginning... For a nation that lived its nationhood so intensily it was able to conquer its own state, all the doors will open and everything good can happen in the century now beginning.
