Balkans

The Balkans is a geographical region in Southeast Europe, which partially coincides with the Balkan Peninsula. It takes its name from the Balkan Mountains,^[1] which run through the center of Bulgaria.

A topographical map of the Balkan peninsula

A geographical map of the Balkan Peninsula

A map of the Balkans region, according to the broadest definitions

Definitions

Balkans comes from the Turkish language meaning “chain of wooded mountains” or 'swampy forest'.

Geography

The Balkan Peninsula is bordered by water on three sides: the Black Sea to the east and branches of the Mediterranean Sea to the south and west (including the Adriatic, Ionian, Aegean and Marmara seas). The peninsula is bordered on the north by the Danube, Sava, and Krča rivers.

History

Shortly before the Middle Ages in the 5th and 6th centuries AD, the Balkans were invaded by the Romans. The Romans were said not to be like other conquerors. They were said to be very powerful and robust. They won and spread the Roman culture through the Balkan peninsula. The Balkan peninsula was completely under Roman control by 100 AD.^[2]

Member countries

Countries in the Balkan region are:

• Albania
• Bosnia and Herzegovina
• Bulgaria
• Croatia
• Greece (sometimes)
• Hungary (sometimes)
• Kosovo
• Montenegro
• Moldova (sometimes)
• North Macedonia
• Romania (sometimes)
• Serbia
• Slovenia (sometimes)
• European Turkey

Related countries

Other countries that are not in the Balkan region but that are close to it and/or play or have played an important role in the region's politics, culture and history:

• Austria (see also Austrian Empire, Assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria)
• Cyprus (see also Cyprus dispute)
• Italy (see Trieste and History of the Republic of Venice)

Central European Free Trade Agreement (CEFTA)

  members

  former members, joined the EU

Central European Initiative (CEI) member states

Population composition by nationality and religion

Ethnic map of the Balkans prior to the First Balkan War

Ethnic map of the Balkans, 1992

The region's principal nationalities include:

• Albanians (5 million)
• Bosniaks (4.5 million)
• Bulgarians (6.6 million)
• Croats (4.5 million)
• Greeks (10.7 million)
• Hungarians (9.6 million)
• Kosovans (1.59 million)
• Macedonians (1.3 million)
• Moldovans (2.5 million)
• Montenegrins (0.3 million)
• Romanians (22 million)
• Serbs (8 million)
• Slovenes (2 million)
• Turks (80 million)
• others (Roma, Gorani, Pomak, Torbesh...)

The most common religions in the Balkans are Eastern Orthodox, Catholic Christianity and Sunni Islam. Many different specific kinds of each faith are practiced, with each of the Eastern Orthodox countries having its own national church with its own patriarch.

Religious map of the Balkans (in French)

Eastern Orthodoxy is the principal religion in the following countries:

• Bulgaria (Bulgarian Orthodox Church)
• Greece (Greek Orthodox Church)
• Montenegro (Serbian Orthodox Church or uncanonical Montenegrin Orthodox Church)
• Moldova
• North Macedonia (Serbian Orthodox Church or uncanonical Macedonian Orthodox Church)
• Romania (Romanian Orthodox Church)
• Serbia (Serbian Orthodox Church)

Roman Catholicism is the principal religion in the following countries:

• Croatia
• Hungary
• Slovenia

Islam is the principal religion in the following countries:

• Albania
• Bosnia
• Kosovo
• Turkey/East Thrace

Bosnia and Herzegovina is a special case - 50% are Muslim Bosniaks, 31% are Serbian Orthodox, and 15% are Catholic Croats (therefore 46% are Christian). The remaining 4% adhere to other denominations of Christianity, other religions, or are irreligious. In Bulgaria, Dobruja in Romania, North Macedonia and West Thrace in Greece, a high Muslim Minority of different Ethinicity like Turks, Tatars, Torbesh, Pomak and Xoraxane Roma live there.

Alternative nomenclature

From the 1990s onwards, in part due to the negative historical and political connotations of the term Balkans,^[3] especially since the wars and massacres of the 1990s in Yugoslavia in the western half of the region, the term Southeast Europe is becoming increasingly popular.^[4][5]