Bukovica (region)

Typical landscape of Bukovica (here with the ruins of the keep or fortress of the Keglević family near the village of Mokro Polje in the northeast of Bukovica)

The Bukovica (in German Bukowitza ) is a Croatian historical-geographical area ( microregion ) in the karst sub-Mediterranean hinterland of northern Dalmatia .

Surname

The name Bukovica (Croatian: Bukva = the beech) means roughly beech land , as it was originally an area covered with beech trees . In the meantime the large beech forests have disappeared due to the grazing of cattle and the spread of agriculture , but the name stuck.

location

The Bukovica is a jagged, uneven, flat-undulating plateau (250-300 m above sea level), which extends roughly between the towns of Benkovac in the southwest, Obrovac in the northwest and Knin in the east. It borders in the north on the Zrmanja River , in the east and south-east on the Krka , in the west on the Karin Sea , and in the south and south-west on Ravni kotari and the railway line Knin- Zadar . It is divided into the Upper or Obrovacer Bukovica and the Lower or Kistanjer Bukovica. Administratively, the western part belongs to the Zadar County and the eastern part to the Šibenik-Knin County .

history

As in all of Dalmatia , the Illyrians were the first Bukovica settlers. The Romans came and subjugated the whole area in the 2nd century BC. BC, and Bukovica became part of the Roman province of Dalmatia . The Croatians settled Bukovica in the 7th century AD and it became one of the core areas of the medieval Croatian state . In the first half of the 16th century it passed to the Ottoman Empire , but was liberated in the course of the Great Turkish War towards the end of the 17th century. It came first under Venetian sovereignty and later, after the fall of this republic, under the Habsburg monarchy . After the First World War Bukovica was in the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes (later called "Kingdom of Yugoslavia"), during the Second World War in the Independent State of Croatia (supported by Italian and German armed forces), and after the war in socialist Yugoslavia . After all, since 1991 it became part of the territory of the present Republic of Croatia .

population

The ethnic composition of the Bukovica population has changed fundamentally several times in the course of history due to the wars that the area had to endure. After the Ottoman retreat, the Croats and Serbs make up almost the entire population. In some villages today the majority of Croatians live, in others the Serbs. The inhabitants are basically oriented towards cattle breeding , less towards agriculture . In general, Bukovica is an economically undeveloped and demographically almost depopulated area, with no large settlements. The largest town is Kistanje (approx. 1750 inhabitants), followed by Kruševo (1080), Obrovac (1050), Gornji Karin (860), Ivoševci (360), Đevrske (250), Ervenik (230), Radučić (220), Medviđa (200) etc.

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