Hear it pronouncedSerbs
| Serbs Срби / Srbi |
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| Saint Sava · Tsar Dušan · Karađorđe · Nikola Tesla · Nadežda Petrović | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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12,500,000-13,000,000 |
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| Serbian | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| Serbian Orthodox Christian | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Other Slavic peoples; South Slavs; especially Montenegrins |
Serbs (Serbian: Срби or Srbi) are a South Slavic people living in the Balkans and Central Europe, mainly in Serbia (including Kosovo), Montenegro, Bosnia-Herzegovina, and, to a lesser extent, in Croatia. They are also a significant minority in two other republics of the Former Yugoslavia- the Republic of Macedonia and Slovenia. Serbs are an officially recognized minority in both Romania and Hungary (mostly in Banat). There is a sizeable Serbian diaspora in Western Europe (predominantly concentrated in Germany, Switzerland and Austria), as well in North America: the United States and Canada.
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Ethnogenesis
Byzantine sources report that part of the White Serbs, led by the Unknown Archont, migrated southward from their Slavic homeland of White Serbia (Poland) in the late sixth century and eventually overwhelmed the Serbian lands that now make up Serbia, Macedonia, Montenegro, Bosnia, Herzegovina and Dalmatia. After settling on the Balkans, Serbs mixed with other Slavic tribes (which settled during the great migration of the Slavs) and with descendants of the indigenous peoples of the Balkans: Greeks, Thracians, Dacians and Illyrians.
Afterwards, overwhelmed by the Ottoman wars in Europe which ravaged their territories, Serbs once again started crossing the rivers Sava and Danube and resettling the previously abandoned regions in Central Europe which are today's Vojvodina, Slavonia, Transylvania and Hungary proper. Apart from the Habsburg Empire, thousands were attracted to Imperial Russia, where they were given territories to settle: Nova Serbia and Slavo-Serbia were named after these refugees. Two Great Serbian Migrations resulted in a relocation of the Serbian core from the Ottoman-dominated South towards the developed (Christian) North, where it has remained ever since.
Population
The majority of Serbs live in Serbia, Montenegro and Republika Srpska (in Bosnia and Herzegovina). The Republic of Serbia is their state, they are a constituent nation in Bosnia and Herzegovina and a recognized people in the Republic of Montenegro where they have lived since their arrival. Large indigenous population also lived in Croatia, where they were a constituent nation before 1990 and today a recognised national minority. Much smaller Serb autochthonous minorities exist in the Republic of Macedonia (mainly in Kumanovo and Skopje), Slovenia (Bela Krajina), Romania (Banat), Hungary (Szentendre, Pécs, Szeged) and Italy (Trieste- home to about 6,000 Serbs)[27]. Many Serbs also live in the diaspora, notably in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, France, Russia, Brazil, Canada, the US and Australia.
The largest urban populations of Serbs in the former Yugoslavia are to be found in Belgrade ( 1,700,000), Novi Sad (c. 300,000), Niš (c. 250,000), Banja Luka (in Bosnia-Herzegovina) (c. 220,000), Kragujevac (c. 175,000), East Sarajevo and Prijedor (in Bosnia-Herzegovina) (c. 130,000). All the capitals of the former Yugoslavia contain a strong historical Serbian minority - 10,000 strong and over (taking up anywhere between 2%- 3% of the population - Zagreb, Skopje - through Ljubljana and Sarajevo, and finally, Podgorica - over 26%).
In Europe, 6.4 million Serbs constitute about 66% of the population of Serbia, thus including Kosovo, which has declared itself independent from Serbia since 2008. Another 1,5 million used to live in Bosnia and Herzegovina [3] and 200,000 in Croatia (600,000 prior to the war), with another 200,000 in Montenegro following its independence. In the 1991 census Serbs consisted 36% of the overall population of former Yugoslavia; there were around 8.5 million Serbs [4] in the entire country.
Abroad, Vienna is said to be home to the largest Serb population followed by Chicago (and its surrounding area) with Toronto and Southern Ontario coming in third. Los Angeles is known to have a sizable Serbian community, but so does Istanbul and Paris. The number of Serbs in the diaspora is unknown but it is estimated to be up to 4 million according to Ministry for Diaspora Republic of Serbia. Smaller numbers of Serbs live in New Zealand, and Serbian communities in South America (Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil and Chile) are reported to grow and exist to this day. According to official figures, 5000 Serbs live in Dubai but the unofficial figure is estimated to be around 15,000. [28] Many of the Serbs living in Dubai are actively involved in the service industry.
Culture
Serbian culture refers to the culture of Serbia as well as the culture of Serbs in other parts of the former Yugoslavia and elsewhere in the world. The nearby Byzantine Empire had a strong influence in the Middle Ages while the Serbian Orthodox Church has had an enduring influence. However, one must note that the first Serbian kings were crowned by the Vatican, not Constantinople, and that prior to the Ottoman invasion Serbs have had a strong Catholic element within them, especially in the coastal areas (Montenegro, Croatia). Austrians and Hungarians have highly influenced Serbs of Vojvodina, Croatian Serbs and Bosnian Serbs to smaller extent, while Republic of Venice influenced Serbs living on the coast (Bay of Kotor for example). Serbian culture was also influenced by three centuries of rule under the Ottoman Empire. Following autonomy in 1817 and latter formal independence, there was a resurgence of Serbian culture in today's central Serbia in the nineteenth century. Prior to that Habsburg Vojvodina was the cultural bastion of the Serbian national identity. Socialist Realism was predominant in official art during the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia but recent decades have seen a growing influence from the West as well as traditional culture.
Famous Serbs
- See also: List of Serbs
Serbs have played a significant role in the development of the arts and sciences. Prominent individuals include the scientists Nikola Tesla, Michael I. Pupin, Jovan Cvijić, and Milutin Milanković; the renowned mathematician Mihailo Petrović and controversial co-author of Theory of Relativity Mileva Marić (Albert Einstein's first wife); the famous composers Goran Bregovic, Stevan Mokranjac and Stevan Hristić; the celebrated authors Borislav Pekić, Ivo Andrić and Miloš Crnjanski; the prolific inventor Ogneslav Kostović Stepanović; the polymath Đura Jakšić; the famous sports stars like Ana Ivanović ; actors Karl Malden (Mladen Sekulovich), Rade Šerbedžija and the actress Milla Jovovich. Famous directors like Dušan Makavejev, Peter Bogdanovich and Emir Kusturica. The Serb ruler during the Middle Ages (see List of Serbian rulers), Stephen Nemanja, and his son, Saint Sava, founded the monastery of Hilandar for the Serbian Orthodox Church, one of the greatest and oldest Orthodox Christian monuments in the world. Famous singers "Weird Al" Yankovic, Željko Joksimović and Marija Šerifović are of Serbian origin.
The mother of the last (Eastern) Roman Emperor, Constantine XI Paleologos Dragases, was a Serbian princess, Helena Dragash (Jelena Dragaš), and she liked to be known by her Serbian surname of Dragaš.
Mehmed-paša Sokolović a 16th-century Ottoman Grand Vizier. Born in an Orthodox Serb family in southeast Bosnia, Sokolović was taken away at an early age as part of the devshirmeh system of Ottoman collection of young boys to be raised to serve as janissaries or in the imperial administration.
According to the National Enquirer, author Ian Fleming patterned James Bond after Duško Popov, a real life Serbian double agent nicknamed "Tricycle".
Gavrilo Princip, a Bosnian Serb, assassinated Archduke Franz Ferdinand on 28 June 1914, precipitating the crisis between Austro-Hungary and Serbia that led to the World War I.
Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, himself a Russian, composed the Slavonic March (Marche Slave) in 1876, known at first as the “Serbo-Russian March”, based on the Serbian folk melody “Come, my Dearest, why So Sad this Morning?”.
Language
Most Serbs speak the Serbian language, a member of the South Slavic group of languages. While the Serbian identity is to some extent linguistic, apart from the Cyrillic alphabet which they use along with Latin alphabet, the language is mutually intelligible (Almost identical) to the standard Croatian and Bosnian (see Differences in standard Serbian, Croatian and Bosnian) and some linguists still consider it part of the common Serbo-Croatian language.
There are several variants of the Serbian language. The older forms of Serbian are Old Serbian and Russo-Serbian, a version of the Church Slavonic language.
Some members of the Serbian diaspora do not speak the language (mostly in the US, Canada and UK) but are still considered Serbs by ethnic origin or descent.
Non-Serbs who studied the Serbian language include such prominent individuals as Johann Wolfgang von Goethe and J. R. R. Tolkien; see list of Serbian language speakers, learners, etc.
Surnames
Most Serbian surnames have the surname suffix -ić (pronounced [itʲ] or [itɕ], Cyrillic: -ић). This is often transliterated as -ic. In history, Serbian names have often been transcribed with a phonetic ending, -ich or -itch. This form is often associated with Serbs from before the early 20th century: hence Milutin Milanković is usually referred to, for historical reasons, as Milutin Milankovitch.
The -ić suffix is a Slavic diminutive, originally functioning to create patronymics. Thus the surname Petrić signifies little Petar, as does, for example, a common prefix Mac ("son of") in Scottish and O' in Irish names. It is estimated that some two thirds of all Serbian surnames end in -ić but that some 80% of Serbs carry such a surname with many common names being spread out among tens and even hundreds of non-related extended families.
Other common surname suffixes are -ov or -in which is thee Slavic possessive case suffix, thus Nikola's son becomes Nikolin, Petar's son Petrov, and Jovan's son Jovanov. Those are more typical for Serbs from Vojvodina. The two suffixes are often combined.
The most common surnames are Nikolić, Petrović, and Jovanović.
Religion
