The latest (4th) issue of our ethnic map series of the Carpathian basin attempts to draft the changes that have taken place during the past five hundred years in the ethnic structure of Croatia’s Pannonian area as well as to display its present-day state with the help of ethnic maps. The studied area, which is part of Central Europe, constitutes about 56 % of the territory of Croatia (31,800 km2) and accounts for about 68% of its population (3,010,000 persons). As a result of the massive migration throughout the past five hundred years, the population of this area has become heterogeneous from ethnic-religious aspects ? similarly to other parts of the Carpatho-Pannonian region.

The maps which are displayed on the front page are based on ethnic affiliation (1991, 2001) and mother tongue (1941) census data, referring to the Central-European (Pannonian) area of present day Croatia from 1991 and 2001, and in case of the Danubian region, also from 1941. Population-proportional pie-charts provide information on the territorial distribution of ethnic groups (mainly Croats, Serbs, Hungarians, Czechs, Ruthenians, Slovaks, and Germans) and on the contemporary administrative division. When giving the names of the settlements the prevailing official names are given in the first place, then below them — in case of towns — the Hungarian names or in Baranya and Međimurje in 1941 the Croatian names, while in case of other ethnic mixed settlements the locally important minority (e.g. Hungarian, German) names are displayed at all three times.

The ethnic data of the Croatian (2001) and Yugoslav (1991) censuses constitute the main source of data for the maps on the front page. On those territories that returned to Hungary in 1941 we relied on mother tongue data of the Hungarian census of 1941, while in case of Croatian territories we used mother tongue data of the 1931 Yugoslav census and the population estimates of the NDH (Independent State of Croatia) referring to the end of 1941. The eight supplementary maps at the back side show the linguistic-ethnic composition of the present day Pannonian territory of Croatia in 1495, 1784, 1880, 1910, 1931, 1941, 1991, and 2001 respectively. The chart here explores the quantitative and proportional changes of the main ethnic groups’ population between 1840 and 2001. The data referring to the „ethnic-linguistic-origin” structure of the population living there before 1850 can be described as vague and of a rather varied nature — due to the lack of censuses also collecting comprehensive ethnic information. At the time of the Hungarian royal tax registration in 1495, conclusions for a probable absolute or relative „ethnic” majority of the population living in the inhabited area of the observed territory — in the administrative areas of present day settlements — could only be drawn from the given sources through analyzing direct references of „ethnic nature”, in most cases through the lingustic analysis of taxpayers’ names. Populated areas, existing settlements were determined on the basis of Engel P. (2001) [1] in 1495 and on the basis of Neu, J. (1782-84) [2] in 1784. The ethnic majorities of particular settlements were indicated at the end of the 18th century on the basis of Pavičić, S. (1953) [3] primarily and on some other relevant information. In the period between 1880 and 1941 census data of the mother tongue, while in 1991 and in 2001 ethnic data of the censuses are displayed. Due to the limited opportunity of cartographic representation, deriving from scale relations, a simple surface cartographic representation method was used for displaying the absolute or relative ethnic majority of the population on the inhabited territory of the present day settlements. While using this method we unfortunately had to disregard ethnic mixing within individual settlements. The series of maps displays ethnic majorities only in the inhabited areas of settlements mentioned in the particular sources. Uninhabited areas with no permanent settlements are covered with white spots. In order to help better understanding, on the supplementary maps the names of the most important settlements are given in the ever prevailing official (or dominant) form.

On the basis of the tax inventory conducted by Sigismund Ernust, chancellor of the Hungarian Royal Treasury in 1495 [4] and the estimations made by Kubinyi A. (1996) [5] and our calculations 464 thousand inhabitants [6] might have been living on the Pannonian territory of present-day Croatia at that time. An overwhelming majority of the almost exclusively Catholic population were Croatian (371,000 persons, 80%; identifying themselves as Slavonian: „Slovene”, „Slovine”) and Hungarian (84,000 persons, 18%) [7]. The territories with Croatian and Hungarian ethnic majorities might have been adjoining somewhere near the Valpó / Valpovo - Gara / Gorjani - Berzétemonostor / Nuštar - Németi / Nijemci line, which was not considered as a sharp linguistic border but rather as a wide zone of ethnic contact (Map 1.). Talking about major cities of the Hungarian settlement area North of the Drava Baranyavár-Branjin Vrh, while South of the Drava Valpó-Valpovo, Szeglak-Zelčin, Gara-Gorjani, Eszék-Osijek, Hagymás-Aljmaš, Erdőd-Erdut, Boró-Borovo, Valkóvár-Vukovar, Berzétemonostor-Nuštar, Szata-Sotin, Atya-Šarengrad, Újlak-Ilok and Németi-Nijemci can be mentioned. The tax inventories of the landed estates in the above mentioned Danube-Drava region (the Eszék-Osijek, and the Valkó-Vuka plains, the Valkóvár-Vukovar loess plateau) conducted in the second half of the 15th century also give testimony about the predominantly Hungarian character of this territory [8]. In Valkó-Vuka county situated between the rivers Danube and Sava the number of Croatian settlements with a smaller population number was 593, while settlements of greater population and Hungarian ethnic majority amounted to 440 [9]. At the end of the Middle Ages Hungarians lived in significant numbers also outside the territories of actual Hungarian ethnic majority, such as in the middle territories of the Drava region (e.g. Monoszló-Moslavina Podravska, Villyó-Viljevo, Szentmihály-Donji Miholjac, Szentgyörgy-Sveti Đurađ). In Verőce-Virovitica — the seat of the county named after it — Hungarians presumably constituted the majority of population. In the farther areas of basically Croatian-Slavonian character (e.g. in Pozsega-Požega county) they were only represented by a small number of Hungarian (or Hungarianized) nobility. From the end of the 14th century the number of the Catholic Croats, Slavonians started to grow rapidly even on the eastern territories with Hungarian ethnic character. According to medieval documents, 2/3 of the Slavic villages in Valkó-Vuka county appeared over that period of almost 150 years which preceded the battle of Mohács (1526) [10]. This Slavic ethnic expansion in the 15th century could be mostly attributed to those Bosnian Croats, who — withdrawing in front of advancing Ottoman rule — settled mainly in the region between the Sava and Bosut rivers, as well as on the loess plateaus near Diakóvár-Đakovo and Valkóvár-Vukovar. Owing to them and devastations, in the second half of the 15th century in more than 60 ethnic Hungarian settlements of Valkó-Vuka county the majority of the population became Croatian [11]. As a result of this increasing Croatian colonization, in 1469 the proportion of those who had Slavic names among the taxpayers in Eszék-Osijek was 7.5%, the corresponding ratio in case of Baranyavár-Baranjin Vrh was as much as 5.3%. Also in connection with the Ottoman (Turkish) conquest, after the loss of the Sana-valley in present-day Western Bosnia in 1463, the appearance of orthodox Vlach and Serbian refugees should not be excluded either in the South-eastern regions of Zágráb-Zagreb county, i.e. in the area of the Zrinska Gora and the Una valley [12].

In the first half of the 16th century the Ottoman (Turkish) invasion in the Eastern and middle regions of present-day Croatia brought about significant political, social, economic and demographical changes. From the territories East of the Slunj-Sisak-Čazma-Verőce / Virovitica line, occupied by the Turks, crowds of the Catholic Slavonians, Croats and Hungarians fled, heading North and West (i.e. towards Transdanubia and the nearby Austrian provinces). On the basis of the calculations in Turkish „defters” [13] it can be observed that the number of population in the first half of the 16th century dropped by about 60 % [14] both in South Baranya and on the territory of the Požega sanjak (Turkish administrative unit), which latter can be roughly identified with present-day Slavonia. A significant proportion of the remaining — originally Catholic Croatian-Slavonian — population (e.g. 3 of the inhabitants of the Požega basin) [15], mainly nobility and town-dwellers, converted to the Islamic faith due to economic and social advantages. Together with the settling of Bosnian Muslims that lead to the fact that in 1579 the Islamic population in Slavonian towns constituted two thirds of the total population [16]. At the same time on the territory of the Požega sanjak (roughly present-day Slavonia) 42% of the population were Catholic Slavs (Croats), 25% Muslims, 18% Orthodox Vlachs, Serbs and 14% Catholic or Protestant Hungarians [17].

In the first half of the 16th century the population decline affected mainly Hungarians who lived in the vicinity of the Belgarde - Eszék / Osijek - Buda military road (i.e. on the Eszék-Osijek and Valkó-Vuka plains and the Valkóvár-Vukovar loess plateau). They either died, exiled, deported or else they converted to the Islamic faith. That was typical mostly for urban areas, e.g. in Eszék-Osijek, Valkóvár-Vukovar, Szata-Sotin, Újlak-Ilok, Németi-Nijemci [18]. In the farther areas near the Danube and Drava: e.g. in Erdőd-Erdut, Rétfalu-Retfala and Csapa-Čepin; also in the Valkó-Vuka moorlands: Kórógy-Korog, Szentlászló-Laslovo, Haraszti-Hrastin, Dopsza-Dopsin and its neighbourhood, however, a Hungarian population prevailed, retaining their Catholicism, later converting to Calvinism from the second half of the 16th century. The uninhabited areas near Eszék-Osijek and Valkóvár-Vukovar, once populated by Catholic Hungarians, attracted the influx of Orthodox Vlach and Serbian soldiers and shepherds. On the territory of present-day Middle-Slavonia Vlachs and Serbs were settled at the edges of the Požega basin, in the Papuk, Krndija and Dilj mountains, and in the area between the Papuk and Psunj mountains and the river Ilova, which latter was considered as a Catholic-Muslim front line. This territory was called Little-Valachia (Mala Vlaška) at the time [19]. Following this large-scale migration the Serbian Orthodox church began to organize the Diocese of Požega (Slavonia) already in 1557, designating the Orahovica Orthodox Monastery as its seat [20]. On the above mentioned territories, presently Eastern Croatia — under Turkish rule at the time — the medieval Catholic Slavonian-Croatian population remained in significant numbers only in the Drava region, on the plains of the Karašica and Vučica rivers, on the loess plateau of Diakóvár-Đakovo, in the region between the rivers Sava and Bosut, in the Dilj mountains and at their foot, and along river Sava [21]. The Muslim population of Turkish, Bosnian, Croatian, and Hungarian origins, mainly concentrated in towns and fortifications. In 1620, on the basis of the number of houses, Eszék-Osijek and Požega (1,000-1,000), Verőce-Virovitica (400), Pakrac (350), Orahovica, Velika (200-200) and Valkóvár-Vukovar (100) could be considered the biggest settlements of the region [22]. Out of them the bridge-town Eszék-Osijek was of paramount importance, whose inhabitants — mostly converted to the Islamic faith — were basically Hungarians still in 1663 [23].

In the central areas of present-day Croatia (Zágráb-Zagreb and Varasd-Varaždin counties and the Western parts of Kőrös-Križevci county) the local Catholic Slavonian-Croatian population began to take refuge from the first Ottoman waves of intruding and invasion at the turn of the 15th and 16th centuries in the North and North-East (in the Western-Hungarian counties of Vas, Sopron, Moson, Pozsony and also in the Eastern-Austrian provinces: Styria and Lower Austria). The deserted areas (mostly in the vicinity of Banija [24], Kordun, Žumberak) were resettled by Bosnian Orthodox Vlachs and Serbs, particularly over the period between 1530 and 1538 [25]. The Slavonian-Croatian ethnic area retained its medieval continuity in the NW half of Zágráb-Zagreb county and in the Western half of Kőrös-Križevci county as well as in Varasd-Varaždin county and in Muraköz-Međimurje.

That part of the observed area which had been occupied by the Ottomans (Turks) was liberated by Catholic troops under Hapsburg (Austrian) leadership between 1684 and 1688. As a result, the local Muslims (not only those of Turkish origin but also the „renegades”, i.e. Islamized Slavic and Hungarian population) fled to Bosnia. Into the liberated Slavonia, new waves of Croatian settlers from the West and from the South (Croatian-Shokatzes fleeing from Bosnia) soon started to migrate. After 1690 great numbers of Serbs also arrived in Eastern Slavonia, lead by their patriarch, Arsenija Crnojević III, in the wake of the Austrian troops retreating from Serbia and Bosnia. As a result of the devastations of the war at the end of the 17th century, the number of villages with a Hungarian majority fell from 36 to 14, while the number of villages with a Serbian majority reached 5, and that of villages with a Shokatz majority reached 4 between 1591 and 1696 in Southern Baranya [26]. The Hungarian medieval ethnic territory situated South of the Drava and the Danube almost completely ceased to exist and took on a Serbian character, especially in the areas of Eszék-Osijek and Valkóvár-Vukovar. In 1697 only 66 Protestant Hungarian families were registered in the villages hidden in the Vuka moorlands, i.e. in Szentlászló-Laslovo, Kaporna-Koprivna, Haraszti-Hrastin and Kórógy-Korog [27]. The Islamized and Christian Hungarians almost entirely disappeared from the towns (e.g. Eszék-Osijek, Valkóvár-Vukovar, Újlak-Ilok), yielding their places to the new groups of Serbian, Croatian and Shokatz refugees, or to the Germans, who started to settle down (e.g. in the fortress of Eszék-Osijek) immediately after the liberation from the Turks.

After the suppression of Hungarian war of independence led by F. Rákóczi II. (1711) the settling of Bosnian Catholics (e.g. Shokatzes) lead by Franciscans gained new impetus. Owing to Croatian-Shokatz, Vlach, and Serbian refugees arriving mainly at the end of the 17th century, in the period between 1675 and 1739 about 200,000 Bosnian inhabitants [28] moved to the Eastern part of the studied area, which had been liberated from Turkish occupation. Big estates in Southern Baranya and Slavonia [29] and the Royal Chamber continued to settle mainly Catholic Germans and Croats, Shokatzes into these agriculturally extremely precious territories, which had been either deserted or were sporadically populated by Vlach or Serbian soldiers or shepherds belonging to the Orthodox confession. As a result of these migrations, the autochtonous Hungarian population in Southern Baranya in the first half of the 18th century got gradually confined to minority compared to Croats and Serbs [30]. During the 18th century, Germans — most of whom originated from Württemberg, Baden, Hessen, Bayern — settled down in Pélmonostor-Beli Manastir, Dárda, Baranyabán-Popovac, Baranyaszentistván-Petlovac and Keskend-Kozarac in Southern Baranya area, and in Osijek-Novavaroš (Esseg-Neustadt), Novi Vukovar (Neu Wukowar), Vinkovci (Winkowitz) and the surrounding villages in Slavonia and in Western Syrmia.

The settling of Germans was still going on when - during the reign of Joseph II - similarly to Hungary a census was taken here between 1784 and 1787 [31]. In 1785, on the territory of Croatia-Slavonia [32] 1,157,092 inhabitants were registered [33], out of which 52.7% lived on the territory of civilian counties and 47.3% lived in Military Border [34]. The average population density of Croatia-Slavonia (27.6 person/km2) was reasonably exceeded only by the population density (40-55 person/km2) of those North-Western territories which had never been occupied by the Ottomans (Turks) and were populated almost homogeneously by Catholic Croats, i.e. Varasd-Varaždin, Kőrös-Križevci county and Muraköz-Međimurje. In 1787 Eszék-Osijek had the most inhabitants (8,017 people) among the towns of Croatia-Slavonia, outnumbering both Varasd-Varaždin (4,817 people) and Zágráb-Zagreb (2,815 people), the present-day capital. The census did not record ethnic status. Contemporary Austrian sources referred to the Southern Slavic inhabitants in the Slavonian area as „Slavonier” or „Slavinen”; in Croatia as „Kroaten” or „Chrobati”, while Orthodox Southern Slavs were called „Illyrier” [35]. Since the period of national awakening, i. e. the turn of the 18th and 19th centuries, Catholic Southern Slavs so far having been called Slavonian, Shokatz, or Croatian became part of the Croatian nation, while Orthodox Southern Slavs so far having been called Vlachs, Uskoks, Illyrians, Ratz-Serbs became part of the Serbian nation during the 19th century, owing all this to the Croatian Catholic and the Serbian Orthodox churches respectively. Those former Orthodox people who joined the Catholic church („Greek Catholics” or „Uniates”) [36] in the area of Ivanić Grad and Žumberak in bulks during the 17th century, now started their transformation of becoming fully Croatian within the framework of the Croatian Catholic church. This process was completed in the 20th century. During the time of the Joseph II census, 797 out of the total number of almost 4,400 settlements in the observed area, had an Orthodox Serbian, Vlach majority, while both Hungarians and Germans constituted the majority in 14 settlements (Map 2.). The ethnic territory of Serbs, which stabilized during the 19th century and mostly prevailed until the end of the 20th century included the following areas: 1. In the Military Border (Vojna Krajina): Lika, Kordun, Banija, the Western part of the Gradiška regiment, the Southern slopes of Bilogora, the surroundings of Belovár-Bjelovar, the area between Kőrös-Križevci and Kapronca-Koprivnica. 2. In the civilian Croatia-Slavonia: the vicinity of Eszék-Osijek and Vukovar, the mountains surrounding the Požega basin: Psunj, Dilj, Papuk, Ravna Gora. Due to the devastation of wars, the original medieval Hungarian population could preserve its ethnic majority only in 14 villages. In 1784 the newly settled Catholic Germans constituted the majority of population in the central areas of Southern Baranya) and around Eszék-Osijek.

The colonization that was halted by the Napoleonic wars (1796-1815) continued with renewed effort in the first half of the 19th century. Most Germans were not settled from Germany any more, but they moved voluntarily from Bachka and the Southern parts of Transdanubia into districts near the rivers Danube and Drava, where they founded separate villages [37]. German migration on one hand was motivated by the German tradition of undivided inheritance of the peasants’ farmland, which forced the younger heirs to move. On the other hand it was caused by over-population and the consequent increasing demand for farmland and the attraction of cheap landed property in Slavonia. The latter attracted other ethnic groups of the empire as well. Slovaks moved to the area of Našice, Orahovica [38], and Újlak-Ilok from the North-Western parts of Upper Hungary (today Slovakia; often from the Kysuca region). The first waves of Czechs and Moravians headed for the thinly populated Ilova-valley and the neigbourhood of Daruvar [39]. Hungarian settlers from Bachka and Transdanubia began to arrive in significant numbers after the 1820s in the area of Vukovar, Vinkovci and Eszék-Osijek [40]. In this period settling of Ruthenians (coming from Kucura and Ruski Krstur in Bachka) around Vukovar could also be observed [41]. According to Fényes E., in 1840 1,605,730 inhabitants lived on the territory of counties and Military Border South of the Drava (the later Croatia-Slavonia) and on the Hungarian Coast, out of which 67% were regarded Croats, and 31,4% were Serbs [42]. The number of Germans amounted to 13,226, Hungarians to 4,951, Slovakians to 3,558, Jews to 1,559 at that time (Table 1.).

The abolition of feudal serfdom in 1848 and its consequences (e.g. free moving of former serfs, splitting up of large domains) further increased the intensity of migration to Slavonia. In order to make agriculture more effective, to utilize unused economic potential and to gain maximum profits the new owners of the sold domains (e.g. banks, real estate speculators) launched large scale projects for parcelling out land, deforesting large areas and draining moorlands [43]. Farmlands that had been hardly or primitively (extensively) cultivated attracted new manpower — hungry for soil — like magnets. Serbs and Croats, who appreciated money much more than land, developed a feverish trend of selling domains, which made farmland cheaper and cheaper [44]. This „cheapness” alongside with increasing over-population of the areas North of the Danube and the Drava; also the familiarity of the natural and agricultural environment; as well as the opportunity to use familiar methods in agricultural production caused massive flows of poor Hungarian, German, Slovakian, Ruthenian peasants (pioneers) coveting new lands to settle in Slavonia in the second half of the 19th century.

After the Austro-Hungarian Compromise in 1867 and the Croato-Hungarian Compromise in 1868 a gradual economic development started, in the course of which — parallel with the process of terminating the military function of the Croato-Slavonian Military Border between 1871 and 1881 — the population’s spatial mobility increased tremendously. This resulted in important changes also in the ethnic patterns of certain areas. In the last decades of the 19th century and at the turn of the 20th century, the ever growing Hungarian and German population surplus (enterprising small landowners or lacklands) continued to migrate to Slavonia, where they bought cheap neglected farmlands from Serbian and Croatian inhabitants of the terminated Military Border. These Serbs and Croats were mainly former soldiers, who did not have any experience in cultivating land, or were not used to this kind of work. The number of Hungarians (and Germans - in a smaller proportion) was not only increased by the already mentioned Hungarian and German peasants settling down in crowds, but also by agricultural labourers seeking occupation in big manors of the area, as well as industrial workers and civil servants [45]. At the beginning this spontaneous, agrarian migration of Hungarians and Germans from Bachka was confined to the areas in or near the Danube-Drava region, that is to districts like Verőce-Virovitica, Slatina or Vukovar. Later it expanded to the territories of Belovár-Kőrös / Bjelovar-Križevci and Požega counties as well (Map 3.). As a result of the accelerated immigration, the number of Hungarians multiplied by 10 [46], the number of Germans, Slovaks and Ruthenians multiplied by 4, that of the Czechs multiplied by 12 [47], the proportion of non-Croatian and non-Serbian population increased from 3.3% to 12.9% on the territory of Croatia-Slavonia between 1857 and 1910 (Table 1.). Owing to this enormous volume of migration, the number of settlements with Hungarian majority increased from 14 to 139, that of settlements with German majority increased from 14 to 64 and suddenly 30 villages turned out to have Czech, 6 Slovakian and 2 Ruthenian majorities.

By the time of the 1910 census the population of the Kingdom of Croatia-Slavonia reached 2.6 million, out of which 62.5% declared Croatian, 24.6% Serbian, 5.1% (134,000 persons) German, and 4% (106,000 persons) Hungarian mother tongue. By that time the number of Hungarians increased considerably in the following areas: Vukovar, the vicinity of Eszék-Osijek, the Donji Miholjac - Pakrac - Garešnica triangle (Map 4.). Such remarkable increase in the number of non-Southern Slavic population, especially that of Hungarians gave rise to intensifying and harsh nationalistic opposition on behalf of both the Croatian authorities and the local Croatian and Serbian population on the territory of Croatia-Slavonia. This often lead to severe atrocities between the Hungarian newcomers and the local Croats and Serbs. In Southern Baranya — an area belonging to the Kingdom of Hungary, lying North of the Drava — the first half of the 19th century saw changes in the ethnic structure mainly to the advantage of Germans, the second half of the century mainly to the advantage of Hungarians - at the expense of Croats. As a result of this, in 1910 39.5% out of the 51.616 inhabitants of present-day Croatian Baranya considered themselves as Hungarian, 28% as German, 19.2% as Croatian, and 12.1% as Serbian.

At the end of World War I Serbian troops supported by the Allies re-took control of Serbia and Montenegro, then — between 7-14 November 1918 — they occupied Syrmia, Slavonia and Southern-Hungary as far as the Barcs-Pécs-Baja-Szeged-Arad line. The Slovenian-Croatian-Serbian State (founded on the territory of the Austro-Hungarian Empire on 29.10.1918) — seeking support against the Italian troops advancing on Slovenian and Croatian territories, and being threatened by potential Serbian territorial claims (Simović-Antonijević line) [48], in case they should attempt to keep their independence — eventually joined Serbia, which ended the war on the side of the victors. After these events the Kingdom of the Serbs, Croats and Slovenes was declared on 1st December, 1918, whose borders were determined between September 1919 and November 1920. The occupying Serbian authorities immediately started to eliminate all traces of Hungarian statehood and to ruin the Hungarian minority both politically and economically on the former Hungarian territories (e.g. Southern Baranya, Muraköz-Međimurje). On 25. 02. 1919 the expropriation of most latifundiums larger than 500 cadastral acres ? owned mainly by Hungarian and German proprietors ? was ordered. These actions called an „agrarian reform” served nationalistic purposes (aimed at the economic ruining of Hungarian-German landowners directly and Hungarian peasantry and workers indirectly), and also social purposes (satisfying the thirst for land among Southern Slavic, mainly Serbian population). Hungarians were almost completely excluded from the distribution of land, at the same time the former, mostly Hungarian ? and by that time already unemployed ? workers, farm labourers, servants and tenants of the confiscated large estates (e.g. Eltz, Khuen-Belasi, Pejačević) were expelled in order to make room for Serbian and Croatian settlers, „volunteer (dobrovoljac)” and „optant” people [49]. As a result of this, the number of settlements with Serbian majority increased from 771 to 832, that of Croatian majority from 3,143 to 3,201 - while the number of settlements with Hungarian majority dropped from 139 to 59, and in case of German majority settlements it decreased from 64 to 57 between 1910 and 1931. Due to this state level colonization Serbian ethnic space increased especially in Baranya, in the area between Osijek-Eszék and Vinkovci and in the districts of the Drava region (Map 5.). Hungarians expelled from Slavonia after becoming workless in the course of the agrarian reforms either emigrated (e.g. to Hungary, Germany, France and the U.S.A.) or moved to neighbouring towns, where ? as a result of rootlessness and mixed marriages ? they soon gave up their Hungarian identity and Croatized.

These basic changes in the political situation ? resulting in massive migrations of opposite directions ? were also reflected in the results of the 1931 Yugoslav census. In respect of Croatia’s present-day territory, the proportion of Croats and Serbs [50] — out of the total population of 3,785,455 — increased to 69.8% and 16.8% respectively, while the number of Hungarians fell to 69,671 inhabitants, i.e. 1.8% in proportion [51] (Table 1.). As a consequence of fleeing, being expelled, dissimilation of some earlier Magyarized Germans and Croats, also growing linguistic assimilation — „Croatization” — of many (mostly Catholic) Hungarian settlers’ descendants, the 1931 census registered a 43% drop in the number of Hungarian population compared to data from 1910.

Following the coup d’etat that overthrew the German-friendly Yugoslav Cvetković government — having joined the three-power pact — Hitler ordered about the overrunning of Serbian-ruled Yugoslavia with the participation of its neighbours on 27th March 1941. The German and Italian troops began the relatively fast overrunning of the internally very unstable country [52] of heterogeneous ethnic composition on 6th April 1941. The operation officially ended on 17th April with Yugoslav (Serbian) capitulation. In the meantime the Independent State of Croatia (NDH) was declared in Zagreb on 10th April, which meant the disintegration of Yugoslavia. On the following day, 11th April, Hungarian troops entered the practically „no man’s land” territory of Southern Baranya and Bachka, detached in 1918, having a relative Hungarian majority. As a result of immigration and the assimilation of one part of Germans and Croats the number of Hungarians — returning to a dominating status — amounted to 18,648, their proportion rose to 36% in Southern Baranya (Map 6.). In the Muraköz-Međimurje region the number of Hungarians reached 6,334, their proportion increased to 6.1%, which can be attributed to the appearance of Hungarian public servants and military personnel, as well as the „statistical identity transformation” of some urban dwellers of Croatian ethnicity.

The Hungarian authorities treated the Croatian minority with courtesy, due to considerations on foreign affairs. But deriving from the fact that the Međimurje region — which had a clear Croatian ethnic character — was kept under occupation due to strategical reasons (maintaining the railway connection with Italy), the relationship between Hungary and Croatia (NDH) remained very tense between 1941 and 1945, too. Consequently the situation of the politically and culturally oppressed Hungarians in Slavonia, living in a scattered position did not change for the better either. Rather, they were forced to flee in crowds from certain areas due to the Yugoslav partisan war [53].

On the territory of the Independent State of Croatia — which included the historical Croatia-Slavonia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, and most of Dalmatia — the Croatian nationalists (the so called „Ustashas”) took a bloody revenge on the 1.8 million Serbs, accounting for 32% of the total population for the earlier oppression and humiliation of Croats between the two World Wars. 105,000 inhabitants of the Serbian colonies in Slavonia, settled after 1919, were deported by the Croatian authorities [54] between April and June, 1941. In parallel with the elimination of Serbs, the Croatian state started settling Croats from Zagorje into Slavonia. It must be remarked that during this period 33,089 Serbs in Slavonia and 55,547 [55] in Croatian Krajina (Lika, Kordun, Banija-Banovina) fell victim of the war, either in the course of partisan fights or in concentration camps.

The changes of German-Croatian-Hungarian and Soviet-Yugoslav military power and front-lines, taking place between the end of September, 1944 and the beginning of May, 1945 launched large scale migrations, restructuring the ethnic structure. Running away from the approaching Red Army and the Yugoslav (Serbian) partisans, about 52% of Yugoslavian Germans left their homeland between November 1944 and April 1945, either as recruited members of the German military forces, or as evacuated, ousted refugees [56]. The remaining German population was deprived of their wealth and were driven to concentration camps, from where the survivors were later deported to Germany. According to our calculations, in the period between 1945 and 1948 10,323 Croats and 3.585 Serbs moved into the territory of Southern Baranya replacing mostly escaped or deported Germans (and also Hungarians to a smaller extent). 8,204 of these newcomers were settled by the Croatian Ministry of Agriculture between 1946 and 1948 [57]. The Croats settling in the former German villages arrived mainly from the overpopulated Croatian areas of Zagorje, Međimurje, Slavonia, and Dalmatia, while the Serbs arrived mostly from Dalmatia, Banija-Banovina and Slavonia. In Slavonia the Serbs having been expelled in 1941 by Croatian ustashas returned on the one hand, while on the other hand massive Croatian settling was carried out into the land of the displaced or deported Germans and Hungarians (e.g. in the area of Osijek, Vukovar, Virovitica, Bjelovar).

By the time of the 1948 census the total population living on the territory of present-day Croatia fell to 3,779,858 persons, that of Serbs dropped to 545,000, the number of Hungarians and Germans to 51,000 and 10,000 respectively, while the proportion of Croats rose to 78.7% (70.4% in 1941) (Table 1.). These results could be attributed to a series of factors: the Serbs had suffered serious war losses; also a part of the Serbian population living in Krajina had been relocated into Vojvodina; while most Germans and Italians, also a smaller proportion of Hungarians once living in the area had fled or had been deported. Since the end of the 1940s social and spatial mobility increased within the framework of building the Yugoslavian communist society. Economic development based on heavy industry attracted several hundred thousand village dwellers into the towns, industrial centres, causing intense deagrarization and urbanization, also bringing about gradual breaking up of the traditional peasants’ society and closed ethnic rural communities. In urban environment the intense ethnic mixing and mixed marriages of the rapidly growing new urban population — with different lingual and religious backgrounds — intensified natural linguistic assimilation on the one hand and the fading of ethnic identity on the other. This tendency was duly reflected by the rapid growth in the proportion of those ? especially starting from the 1970s ? who could not (or did not want to) define their ethnic affiliation (1961 = 0.4%, 1981 = 8.8%). An overwhelming majority of this population identified themselves only as „Yugoslav”. In 1981 their population reached the greatest share in big cities with vast attraction zones (e.g. Zagreb, Rijeka, Osijek), while their proportionate representation showed the greatest ratios (21-15 %) in the towns of extremely mixed ethnic hinterlands and important industrial centres (Vukovar, Osijek, Sisak etc.) [58]. The above mentioned migrations in connection with industrialization also resulted in ethnic-geographic dispersion and scattering. As a result of this, the Serbian population in Croatia’s ten biggest cities of absolute Croatian majority (e.g. Zagreb, Split, Rijeka, Osijek, Zadar, Pula, Karlovac, Slavonski Brod) multiplied almost by five between 1948 and 1991 (from 31,506 to 144,358). During the socialist era it was the minorities who were especially struck by increasing loss of their ethnic identity, i.e. who got „Yugoslavianized”. By 1991 the number of the Hungarians, Czechs, Slovaks fell to 44-55% of the 1948 data. Besides emigration, the Serbs also lost 7% of their population between 1971 and 1991, due to similar reasons. As a result of colonization favourable for Croats and assimilation (getting „Croatized”), between 1941 and 1991 the number of settlements with a Croatian majority rose from 3,244 to 3,392 — while the number of settlements with a Serbian, Hungarian, German, Czech, and Slovakian majority fell from 797 to 780 (Serbian); from 54 to 15 (Hungarian); from 55 to 0 (German); from 29 to 16 (Czech) and from 6 to 2 (Slovakian).

At the time of the last Yugoslav census conducted on the eve of the war (31.03.1991) 78.1% out of Croatia’s 4,784,265 citizens declared themselves to be Croats, while 12.2% (582,000 persons) to be Serbs (Table 1.). The ethnic space of the latter (Lika, Northern Kordun-Banija, area of the Papuk and Psunj mountains in Western Slavonia) did not change significantly compared to the patterns in the 18th and 19th centuries) (Map 7., front page map). In Southern Baranya and in Eastern Slavonia the Serbs were only represented by some ethnic enclaves of different sizes. The 13 municipalities with Serbian majorities, which accounted for 14.2% of the country’s territory and 5.3% of its total population in 1991, hosted only 29.7% of all the Serbs in Croatia. The rest lived in ethnic Croatian surroundings, scattered mostly in big cities. The total ratio of all the other ethnic minotiries did not even reach 4% of the entire population. The most numerous groups among them — having settled mainly in cities and ports during the previous decades — were the following: Muslims (43 thousand), Slovenes (22 thousand), Albanians (12 thousand); the autochtonous Hungarians (22 thousand), Italians (21 thousand), and Czechs (13 thousand), Ruthenians (6 thousand). Most Hungarians lived in the Eastern part of Southern Baranya and in some East-Slavonian villages South of Osijek-Eszék (e.g. Korog-Kórógy, Laslovo-Szentlászló, Hrastin-Haraszti, Vladislavci-Lacháza, Stari Jankovci-Ójankovác, Opatovac-Apáti, Čakovci-Csák). Czechs were present mainly in the vicinity of Daruvar and Grubišno Polje in Western Slavonia, while Ruthenians mostly lived in the neighbourhood of Vukovar.

The previously described ethnic patterns were drastically reshaped by the Serbian-Croatian war that broke out in the spring of 1991 [59]. Following some sinister events [60] of the summer of 1991, the armed local Serbian minority and some paramilitary troops from Serbia occupied Southern Baranya, Eastern Slavonia, and most of Western Syrmia, and some mountainous, forested areas in Western Slavonia, mainly populated by Serbs. They established the front near the Serbian-Croatian ethnic border in Krajina [61]. Within these territories only a few Croatian towns were able to hold on (Vukovar, Kostajnica, Slunj etc.). The fierceness of fights intensified throughout the autumn. The Serbs persistently sieged the Croatian towns near the front (e.g. Osijek, Vinkovci, Daruvar, Petrinja, Sisak, Karlovac), and also the blockaded ones, out of which Vukovar — becoming a symbol of Croatian national defence — fell on 18th November [62] after the three-month-long siege. Thus 2,500 km2 of East-Croatia’s territory fell under Serbian-Yugoslavian occupation. This area was later declared a demilitarized zone as part of the Serbian Republic of Krajina, and between 10th April 1992 and 15th January 1998 it was controlled by UN troops (the UNPROFOR, and finally the UNTAES). Running away from the Serbian paramilitary troops, 2/3 of Croats and 1/3 of Hungarians fled from Southern Baranya either to Hungary or behind the Croatian front line by March 1992. In Western Slavonia the mountainous forested areas inhabited by Serbs were under Serbian military control. It was this area where ? in the autumn of 1991 ? the Serbs made an unsuccessful effort to occupy the strategically important Novska-Virovitica international main road completely and also to get hold of the nearby towns (Daruvar, Pakrac, Lipik etc.), thus trying to cut Croatia into two parts in the direction of Virovitica and the Hungarian border. Finally the Croats managed to push the Serbs back to the environment of Pakrac-Okučani, which lead to the exile of 17 thousand Serbs from Western Slavonia. At the time of the ceasefire of 3rd January 1993 more than one quarter of Croatia’s territory (approximately 15,000 km2) was under the control of the Serbian Republic of Krajina [63].

The Croatian-Serbian front did hardly move until the beginning of May 1995, when the Croatian army reoccupied the area of the West-Slavonian Okučani („Bljesak” /lightning/ operation). Then between 4-7 August they reoccupied the territory of Northern Dalmatia, Lika, Kordun, and Banija-Banovina („Oluja” /storm/ operation). 200,000 Serbs fled from these areas towards Bosnia and Serbia, a minor proportion of whom settled in Southern Baranya (kept under UN-Serbian control until 1998), Eastern Slavonia and Western Syrmia. 16,000 out of these Serbian refugees returned to their original homeland. i.e. Krajina by the beginning of 1998. The corresponding number for those having taken refuge in Yugoslavia was 19.500 [64]. The original (mainly Croatian) population having fled in 1991 started to return gradually to the regained territories alongside with new Croatian settlers (mainly refugees from Bosnia-Herzegovina) replacing the fleeing Serbs.

The Croatian State Bureau of Statistics (DZS) registered 4,437,460 permanent inhabitants on the territory of the Republic of Croatia at the time of the 2001 census. Only 4,020,025 inhabitants of them did actually stay at their permanent places of residence (resident population). Out of those 406,340 persons (9.2% of the permanent population), who were absent from the place of the census mainly because of studying, working or as a result of being displaced during the war, 180,000 stayed in the country, while 226,000 stayed abroad [65]. Ethnic affiliation was published by the DZS with a reference to the permanent (and not to the resident) population — including those several hundred thousand Croats who did not stay at their permanent places of residence [66]. The DZS — referring to personality rights — also broke the prevailing traditions and published ethnic data only on national, county and municipality (Croatian: općina, ca. “district”) levels. 89.6% of the population declared themselves to be ethnic Croatian, 8.4% to belong to ethnic minorities, while 2% did not make a statement about their ethnic affiliation (Table 1.).

On the studied territory the dominating nation, almost four million Croats, represent the highest proportion in the following counties: Krapina-Zagorje (98.4%), Varaždin (97.7%), Zagreb (96.2%), Koprivnica-Križevci (96%), and Međimurje (95.2%). By now they constitute the absolute or relative majority in 3,819 towns or villages (vs. 3,393 in 1991) out of the 4,332 Pannonian-Croatian settlements - mainly due to war-related migrations. Their ethnic spatial expansion — partly owed to Croatian refugees arriving from Bosnia-Herzegovina, mostly at the expense of Serbs — was especially significant in Krajina (e.g. Banovina, Kordun), in Western-Slavonia and in Southern Baranya (Map 8., front page map)). Out of the major settlements of the above mentioned areas the following ones have recently developed (or returned) a Croatian majority: Glina, Petrinja, Hrvatska Kostajnica, Daruvar, Grubišno Polje, Okučani, Beli Manastir-Pélmonostor and Darda. At present, the most Croats in the Pannonian-Croatian areas live in (thousand persons): Zagreb (632), Osijek (79), Slavonski Brod (54), Sesvete (43), Karlovac (42), and Varaždin (40).

The number and proportion of Serbs [67] in Croatia — once considered a „partner-nation” in former Yugoslavia, now only a minority — fell to 201,631 persons (4.5%), as a result of the war between 1991 and 1995, and also of the migrations related to it. The Serbs managed to endure the turbulent events of the past decade in biggest numbers on the eastern territories, bordering Serbia (the Danube), which returned to Croatian authority at the latest, in 1998 (32 thousand Serbs in Vukovar-Syrmia county, 28 thousand Serbs in Osijek-Baranja county). As a consequence of the war, the counties in Krajina and in Western Slavonia lost 60-75% of their Serbian population [68]. The number of Pannonian-Croatian settlements with a Serbian majority has dropped to 452 by now (it was 780 in 1991) (Map 8., front page map)). On territories in Krajina and Western-Slavonia, the Serbians have been able to retain their ethnic majority mainly in mountainous regions, in villages which are remotely situated and getting depopulated, thus providing less attraction for Croatian settlers. The earlier unity of their ethnic territory remained mostly in the East, in the area between Osijek-Vinkovci-Vukovar. Apart from those 18,000 Serbs in Zagreb, the most populous Serbian communities in Croatia can be found there (in thousand persons): Vukovar (10), Osijek (6), Borovo (4.6).

The number of the second biggest autochtonous minority of the studied area, the Hungarians, amounted only to 16,595 persons by ethnicity, and 12,650 persons by mother tongue in 2001. (The corresponding figures from 1991 were: 22,355 and 19,684). 71% of Hungarians live in Southern Baranya and East-Slavonia, where — in spite of the devastations of war, serious unemployment and migrations — their number has decreased in the past decade to a much lesser extent (-21.7%), than in other regions of the country (-30.9%), where Hungarians live in diaspora under huge pressure of linguistic assimilation. The fact that the number of Hungarian native speakers in Western Slavonia has shrunk to its half since 1991 can be attributed to this pressure. Despite the sometimes disasterous drop in the number of Hungarian population, the number of settlements with Hungarian majorities (15) has not decreased (Map 8., front page map)). At present the settlements that have more than 500 Hungarian inhabitants are the following: Osijek-Eszék, Zagreb-Zágráb; in Southern Baranya Beli Manastir-Pélmonostor, Zmajevac-Vörösmart, Lug-Laskó, Suza-Csuza, Dárda, Batina-Kiskőszeg, and Kopačevo-Kopács. The most populous Hungarian communities South of the Drava can be found in Laslovo-Szentlászló, Korog-Kórógy, Vukovar-Vukovár and Stari Jankovci-Ójankovác.

The number of Czechs (10.510 according to ethnicity, 7,178 according to mother tongue) has also decreased during the past decade by one third - one fifth, due to accelerated assimilation also affecting them. Most of them live in the Ilova basin, mainly in the vicinity of Daruvar and Grubišno Polje, where they constitute the ethnic majority of the population in 15 villages (Map 8., front page map)). Apart from Zagreb the most populous Czech communities can also be found in this region: Daruvar, Končanica, Daruvarski Brestovac, Donji Daruvar, Doljani.

The ethnic minority of the country with the highest natural increase are the Gypsies (Romas), living sporadically, amounting to 9,463 persons by ethnicity (to 7,860 persons by mother tongue). Most of them (1,946) live in Zagreb, Međimurje and Osijek-Baranja counties, near the Hungarian border (eg. Kuršanec, Pribislavec, Držimurec, Osijek, Torjanci) (front page map)).

The number of Slovaks in Croatia, amounting to 10 thousand (according to ethnicity) in 1948, shrunk to 4,712 persons by 2001, (3,993 according to mother tongue). Most of them live in Osijek-Baranja county (around Našice and Đakovo: in Jelisavac, Josipovac, Jurjevac; Osijek) and in Vukovar-Syrmia county (in Ilok on the right bank of the Danube) (Map 8., front page map)).

The majority of the 4,314 (2,855 by mother tongue) Ruthenians and Ukrainians, belonging to the Greek Catholic church, live near the Danube (i.e. near Serbia and Bachka), in Vukovar, Petrovci and Mikluševci. In the latter two villages they constitute the absolute majority of the population (Map 8., front page map)).

Germans in Croatia, constituting an ethnic group of 120 thousand people at the time of World War I, are considered only a tiny minority (2,902 persons) nowadays. Their scattered groups are significant in Zagreb, Osijek as well as in Beli Manastir and Darda in Southern Baranya.