Statehood Day of Republic of Croatia

Croatia, country located in the northwestern part of the Balkan Peninsula. It is a small yet highly geographically diverse crescent-shaped country. Its capital is Zagreb, located in the north. The present-day republic is composed of the historically Croatian regions of Croatia-Slavonia (located in the upper arm of the country), Istria (centred on the Istrian Peninsula on the northern Adriatic coast), and Dalmatia (corresponding to the coastal strip). Although these regions were ruled for centuries by various foreign powers, they remained firmly Western-oriented in culture, acquiring a legacy of Roman law, the Latin alphabet, and western European political and economic traditions and institutions. A part of Yugoslavia for much of the 20th century, Croatia suffered considerably from the disintegration of that federation in the early 1990s. The European trajectory of Croatia was finally realized in 2013 when it joined the European Union. As the Croatian Canadian scholar Tony Fabijančić writes, Croatia’s tumultuous first years as an independent country also have obscured its centuries-long history: Croatia (Hrvatska) is an ancient nation, yet a very young nation state. Once a formidable kingdom under Tomislav in the tenth century, a naval power in the sixteenth and seventeenth, and an awakening national entity in the nineteenth, it had to endure a thousand years of foreign meddling, subjugation, incursions, and outright wars before being recognized in 1992 as a distinct entity. Land The upper arm of the Croatian crescent is bordered on the east by the Vojvodina region of Serbia and on the north by Hungary and Slovenia. The body of the crescent forms a long coastal strip along the Adriatic Sea, and the southern tip touches on Montenegro. Within the hollow of the crescent, Croatia shares a long border with Bosnia and Herzegovina, which actually severs a part of southern Croatia from the rest of the country by penetrating to the Adriatic in a narrow corridor. Relief Croatia is composed of three major geographic regions. In the north and northeast, running the full length of the upper arm of the Croatian crescent, are the Pannonian and para-Pannonian plains. To the north of Zagreb, the Zagorje Hills, fragments of the Julian Alps now covered with vines and orchards, separate the Sava and Drava river valleys. To the west and south of the Pannonian region, linking it with the Adriatic coast, is the central mountain belt, itself part of the Dinaric Alps. The karst plateaus of this region, consisting mostly of limestone, are barren at the highest elevations; lower down, they are heavily forested. The highest mountain in Croatia, Dinara (6,007 feet [1,831 metres]), is located in the central mountain belt. The third geographic region, the Croatian littoral, is composed of the Istrian Peninsula in the north and the Dalmatian coast extending south to the Gulf of Kotor. Wedged between the Dinaric Alps to the east and the Adriatic Sea to the west, its 1,100 miles (1,800 km) of coastline are fringed by more than 1,100 islands and islets. Drainage Of the 26 rivers that flow for more than 30 miles (50 km) in Croatia, the Sava and the Drava, coursing through the Pannonian and para-Pannonian plains, are of particular importance—both because of their length and because, along with the Kupa River, they are in large part navigable. The Sava originates in Slovenia, passes Croatia’s capital city of Zagreb, and then forms most of the border between Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina along the inside of the Croatian crescent. The Drava enters Croatia from Slovenia and forms all but a small section of the border with Hungary before joining the Danube, which in turn forms most of the border between Croatia and the Vojvodina province of Serbia. The Kupa, which forms part of the frontier between Slovenia and Croatia, and the Una River, which meanders along part of the border between Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina, both flow into the Sava. In Dalmatia the Krka and Cetina rivers are of particular importance because of their hydroelectric potential and because they flow into the Adriatic Sea. In addition, a great deal of water circulates in underground rivers and pools in the karstic regions of the central mountain belt and the littoral. These waters account for many of the unique geologic formations and the picturesque landscape of central and western Croatia. Soils The Pannonian and para-Pannonian plains are enriched with alluvial soil deposited by the Sava and Drava rivers. These plains are the most fertile agricultural regions of Croatia and form the country’s breadbasket. The soil of the central mountainous belt is rather poor but offers some cultivable land in the fields and meadows and some grazing land in the plateaus. The Croatian littoral is mostly mountainous and barren, with rocky soil and poor agricultural land. Climate Two main climatic zones dominate Croatia. The Pannonian and para-Pannonian plains and the mountain regions are characterized by a continental climate of warm summers and cold winters. In the plains, temperatures average in the low 70s F (low 20s C) in June and in the low 30s F (around 0 °C) in January—although they can range from a low of −5 °F (−20 °C) in the winter to a high of 105 °F (40 °C) in the summer. The central mountain regions of Lika and Krbava have slightly cooler summers and cold winters, with a milder climate in the valleys. The average temperature range is between about 65 °F (about 18 °C) in June and the upper 20s F (about −2 °C) in January. Considerable rainfall, turning to snow in winter, is characteristic of the region. The Dalmatian coast, Istria, and the islands have a mild Mediterranean climate. In southern Dalmatia, where the sirocco winds (known there as the jugo) bring a moderating influence from Africa, summers are sunny, warm, and dry, and winters are rainy. In the north the winters are drier and colder as a result of the cold northeast wind known as the bora (bura). In the summer the mistral wind has a cooling effect on the coast and the islands. The average temperature ranges from the low 40s F (about 5 °C) in January to the low 70s F (low 20s C) in June. Rainfall is moderate and occurs mainly in the winter. Reflecting the country’s diverse geography, the flora and fauna of Croatia are highly varied. On the Dalmatian coast, grapes and olives are grown to produce wine and oil, while Istria is dominated by firs, and Slavonia has many oak forests. In terms of animal life, lizards are found on the coast, while wolves and even bears can be found in the inland forests. Hares, foxes, boars, wildcats, and mouflons (wild sheep) also inhabit Croatia. Sea life in the Adriatic is rich as well, with many coral reefs and underwater caves serving as habitats. People of Croatia - Ethnic groups and religions A variety of ethnic groups coexist within the republic. Croats constitute about nine-tenths of the population. Serbs make up the largest minority group; however, their proportion fell dramatically as a result of the 1990s war of independence—from more than one-tenth of the population before the war to less than half that figure in 2001. In addition to the Croats and the Serbs, there are small groups of Bosnian Muslims (Bosniaks), Hungarians, Italians, and Slovenes as well as a few thousand Albanians, Austrians, Bulgarians, Czechs, Germans, and other nationalities. It has been estimated that the number of Croats living outside the borders of Croatia is comparable to the number living inside the country. Many ethnic Croats reside in Bosnia and Herzegovina, where Croats have lived since the Slavs first migrated to the western Balkan Peninsula in the 6th and 7th centuries ce. Although there has traditionally been a yearning for unification with Croatia among the Croats of Herzegovina (a region contiguous to Dalmatia), this sentiment has not generally been shared by Croats within Croatia or even by Croats in Bosnia. Many of the Serbs in Croatia are descendants of people who migrated to the border areas of the Holy Roman Empire between the 16th and 18th centuries, following the Ottoman conquest of Serbia and Bosnia. There is traditionally a close correlation between ethnic identity and religious affiliation. The Croats are overwhelmingly Roman Catholic and more Western-influenced than the Serbs, who are overwhelmingly Eastern Orthodox. A small minority of people are nonreligious or atheist. Bosniaks constitute most of the Muslim population. Languages Croats speak Croatian, a South Slavic language of the Indo-European family. Croatian is quite similar to Serbian and Bosnian, but political developments since the collapse of Yugoslavia have encouraged the three ethnic groups to emphasize the differences between their languages. The clearest distinction between the Croatian and Serbian variants of what was previously called the Serbo-Croatian language is the script, with Croatian written in the Latin alphabet and Serbian in the Cyrillic. Distinctions of grammar and pronunciation also occur, as do more striking differences in vocabulary, which result partly from differential historical patterns of foreign domination. For Croats, this has resulted in a sprinkling of German, Hungarian, and (in Dalmatia and Istria) Italian vocabulary, while the Serbs’ speech shows Turkish and Russian influences. In addition, there have been various movements to “purify” the Croatian language, which have led to further differences. Another linguistic distinction, reflecting the legacies of history as well as the effects of geography, can be heard in the colourful medley of regional dialects and subdialects that survive to this day. The standard Croatian literary language, based on the Shtokavian dialect, emerged in the second half of the 19th century as a result of an effort to unite all South Slavs. Although all three major branches of Serbo-Croatian (Shtokavian, Chakavian, and Kajkavian) were spoken by Croats (as they still are today), the Shtokavian dialect was the most widely heard in Croatian regions of eastern Slavonia, the Adriatic littoral from Makarska to Dubrovnik, and Herzegovina, as well as Montenegro and Serbia. It was therefore adopted by leading Croatian national intellectuals of the 19th century. More … https://www.britannica.com/place/Croatia

2025/06/25

Luxembourg let’s make it happen

Welcome to the official portal of the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg. Discover a multicultural and multilingual country located right at the heart of Europe.

2025/06/25

This is Slovenia - 2020

Beautiful Slovenian landscape footage made during COVID-19 lockdown. I am so glad I am stuck in my home country.

2025/06/24

Visit Mozambique WEB.mov

2025/06/24

Croatia Full Of Life - new promotional

Take a Tour of Champions in the Tiny Country Which Dared to Dream: http://bit.ly/2nSwsqv Visit the city where Marin Čilić found his love! Visit and discover Mario Mandžukić’s Slavonia and its tremendous food and wine Visit the National Parks approved by Ivan Rakitic

2025/06/24

Saint John the Baptist Day

Hospitallers, also spelled Hospitalers, also called Order of Malta or Knights of Malta, formally (since 1961) Sovereign Military and Hospitaller Order of St. John of Jerusalem, of Rhodes, and of Malta, previously (1113–1309) Hospitallers of St. John of Jerusalem, (1309–1522) Order of the Knights of Rhodes, (1530–1798) Sovereign and Military Order of the Knights of Malta, or (1834–1961) Knights Hospitaller of St. John of Jerusalem, a religious military order that was founded at Jerusalem in the 11th century and that, headquartered in Rome, continues its humanitarian tasks in most parts of the modern world under several slightly different names and jurisdictions. Heraldic flagsBanner: The blazon of the shield is applied to the whole surface of a square or a vertically or horizontally oriented rectangular flag. This is the Royal Banner of Scotland, which follows the blazon of the second quarter of the Royal Arms of the United Kingdom. Although it is the banner of the sovereign, it is widely but incorrectly used today as the national symbol.Fork-tailed pennon: Shown here is that of the Sovereign and Military Order of the Knights of Malta, in heraldic terms gules a cross argent.Standard: The Cross of St. George at the hoist identifies this as English. The profusion of badges, the diagonally placed motto, and the border of alternating tinctures are typical. This is the standard of Sir Henry Stafford, c. 1475. Drawing by Wm. A. Norman, Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc. The origin of the Hospitallers was an 11th-century hospital founded in Jerusalem by Italian merchants from Amalfi to care for sick and poor pilgrims. After the Christian conquest of Jerusalem in 1099 during the First Crusade, the hospital’s superior, a monk named Gerard, intensified his work in Jerusalem and founded hostels in Provençal and Italian cities on the route to the Holy Land. The order was formally named and recognized on February 15, 1113, in a papal bull issued by Pope Paschal II. Raymond de Puy, who succeeded Gerard in 1120, substituted the Augustinian rule for the Benedictine and began building the power of the organization. It acquired wealth and lands and combined the task of tending the sick with defending the Crusader kingdom. Along with the Templars, the Hospitallers became the most formidable military order in the Holy Land. When the Muslims recaptured Jerusalem in 1187, the Hospitallers removed their headquarters first to Margat and then, in 1197, to Acre. When the Crusader principalities came to an end after the fall of Acre in 1291, the Hospitallers moved to Limassol in Cyprus. In 1309 they acquired Rhodes, which they came to rule as an independent state, with right of coinage and other attributes of sovereignty. Under the order’s rule, the master (grand master from c. 1430) was elected for life (subject to papal confirmation) and ruled a celibate brotherhood of knights, chaplains, and serving brothers. For more than two centuries these Knights of Rhodes were the scourge of Muslim shipping on the eastern Mediterranean. They constituted the last Christian outpost in the East. By the 15th century the Turks had succeeded the Arabs as the protagonists of militant Islam, and in 1522 Süleyman the Magnificent laid final siege to Rhodes. After six months the Knights capitulated and on January 1, 1523, sailed away with as many of the citizens as chose to follow them. For seven years the wandering Knights were without a base, but in 1530 the Holy Roman emperor Charles V gave them the Maltese archipelago in return, among other things, for the annual presentation of a falcon to his viceroy of Sicily. The superb leadership of the grand master Jean Parisot de la Valette prevented Süleyman the Magnificent from dislodging the Knights from Malta in 1565 in one of the most famous sieges in history, which ended in a Turkish disaster. What was left of the Turkish navy was permanently crippled in 1571 at the Battle of Lepanto by the combined fleets of several European powers that included the Knights of Malta. The Knights then proceeded to build a new Maltese capital, Valletta, named after la Valette. In it they built great defense works and a hospital of grand dimensions that attracted many physically and mentally ill patients from outside Malta. Thereafter the Knights continued as a territorial sovereign state in Malta but gradually gave up warfare and turned wholly to territorial administration and to medical care. In 1798, however, their reign in Malta came to an end, when Napoleon, on his way to Egypt, occupied the island. The order’s return to Malta was provided for in the Treaty of Amiens (1802) but eliminated by the Treaty of Paris (1814), which assigned Malta to Great Britain. In 1834 the Knights of Malta became permanently established in Rome. From 1805 they were ruled by lieutenants until Pope Leo XIII revived the office of grand master in 1879. A new constitution containing a more precise definition of both the religious and the sovereign status of the order was adopted in 1961, and a code was issued in 1966. Although the order no longer exercises territorial rule, it issues passports, and its sovereign status is recognized by the Holy See and some other Roman Catholic states. Membership is confined to Roman Catholics, and the central organization is essentially aristocratic, being ruled chiefly by a primary class of “professed” knights of justice and chaplains who can prove the nobility of their four grandparents for two centuries. More …. Score: https://www.britannica.com/event/Siege-of-Rhodes

2025/06/24

National Day. Birthday of the Grand Duchess of Luxembourg Charlotte von Nassau-Weilburg

Luxembourg, country in northwestern Europe. One of the world’s smallest countries, it is bordered by Belgium on the west and north, France on the south, and Germany on the northeast and east. Luxembourg has come under the control of many states and ruling houses in its long history, but it has been a separate, if not always autonomous, political unit since the 10th century. The ancient Saxon name of its capital city, Lucilinburhuc (“Little Fortress”), symbolized its strategic position as “the Gibraltar of the north,” astride a major military route linking Germanic and Frankish territories. Luxembourg is a point of contact between the Germanic- and Romance-language communities of Europe, and three languages are regularly employed in the grand duchy itself: Luxembourgish, German, and French. The peoples of Luxembourg and their languages reflect the grand duchy’s common interests and close historical relations with its neighbours. In the 20th century Luxembourg became a founding member of several international economic organizations. Perhaps most importantly, the grand duchy was an original member of the Benelux Economic Union (1944), which linked its economic life with that of the Netherlands and of Belgium and would subsequently form the core of the European Economic Community (EEC; ultimately succeeded by the European Union). Land - Relief and soils The northern third of Luxembourg, known as the Oesling (Ösling), comprises a corner of the Ardennes Mountains, which lie mainly in southern Belgium. It is a plateau that averages 1,500 feet (450 metres) in elevation and is composed of schists and sandstones. This forested highland region is incised by the deep valleys of a river network organized around the Sûre (or Sauer) River, which runs eastward through north-central Luxembourg before joining the Moselle (or Mosel) River on the border with Germany. The Oesling’s forested hills and valleys support the ruins of numerous castles, which are a major attraction for the region’s many tourists. The fertility of the relatively thin mountain soils of the region was greatly improved with the introduction in the 1890s of a basic-slag fertilizer, which is obtained as a by-product of the grand duchy’s steel industry. The southern two-thirds of Luxembourg is known as the Bon Pays, or Gutland (French and German: “Good Land”). This region has a more-varied topography and an average elevation of 800 feet (about 245 metres). The Bon Pays is much more densely populated than the Oesling and contains the capital city, Luxembourg, as well as smaller industrial cities such as Esch-sur-Alzette. In the centre of the Bon Pays, the valley of the northward-flowing Alzette River forms an axis around which the country’s economic life is organized. Luxembourg city lies along the Alzette, which joins the Sûre farther north. In the east-central part of the Bon Pays lies a great beech forest, the Müllerthal, as well as a sandstone area featuring an attractive ruiniform topography. The country’s eastern border with Germany is formed (successively from north to south) by the Our, Sûre, and Moselle rivers. The slopes of the Moselle River valley, carved in chalk and calcareous clay, are covered with vineyards and receive a substantial amount of sunshine, which has earned the area the name “Little Riviera.” Besides vineyards, the fertile soils of the Moselle and lower Sûre valleys also support rich pasturelands. Luxembourg’s former iron mines are located in the extreme southwest, along the duchy’s border with France. Climate Luxembourg has a mild climate with considerable precipitation. The north is slightly colder and more humid than the south. The mean temperatures in Luxembourg city range from the mid-30s F (about 0.7 °C) in January to the low 60s F (about 17 °C) in July, but in the Oesling both extremes are slightly lower. The Oesling receives more precipitation than the Bon Pays, but the greatest amount, about 40 inches (1,000 mm), and the least, about 27 inches (about 685 mm), fall in the southwest and southeast, respectively. The sheltered valley of the Moselle River benefits from a gentler and sunnier climate than does the rest of the duchy. People - Ethnic groups, languages, and religion Luxembourg has been one of the historic crossroads of Europe, and myriad peoples have left their bloodlines as well as their cultural imprints on the grand duchy. The Celts, the Belgic peoples known as the Treveri, the Ligurians and Romans from Italy, and especially the Franks were most influential. The language spoken by Luxembourg’s native inhabitants is Luxembourgish, or Lëtzebuergesch, a Moselle-Franconian dialect of German that has been enriched by many French words and phrases. Luxembourgish is the national language; German and French are both languages of administration. There is a strong sense of national identity among Luxembourgers despite the prevalence of foreign influences. The great majority of Luxembourg’s native citizens are Roman Catholic, with a small number of Protestants (mainly Lutherans), Jews, and Muslims. Lxembourg has a high proportion of foreigners living within its borders. This is chiefly the result of an extremely low birth rate among native Luxembourgers, which has led to a chronic labour shortage. Nearly half of the total population is of foreign birth and consists mainly of Portuguese, French, Italians, Belgians, and Germans. Among the foreign workers are many in the iron and steel industry, and numerous others work in foreign firms and international organizations located in the capital. Settlement patterns Northern Luxembourg is sparsely populated compared with the heavily urbanized and industrialized south. The north’s rural population is clustered in villages of thick-set stone houses with slate roofs. The urban network in the south is dominated by the capital city, Luxembourg, which rises in tiers, with the upper (and older) section of the city separated from the lower-lying suburbs by the gorges of the Alzette and Petrusse rivers. A newer quarter housing many European organizations nestles in a picturesque site carved into the river valley’s sandstone cliffs. The second largest city in Luxembourg, Esch-sur-Alzette, lies in the extreme southwest and is a traditional iron- and steel-making centre. Its growth, like that of the neighbouring iron and steel centres of Pétange, Differdange, and Dudelange, has slowed since the shrinkage of those industries in western Europe in the late 20th century. The remainder of the country’s population lives in towns and villages of relatively small size. Many of Luxembourg’s villages date from ancient Celtic and Roman times or originated in Germanic and Frankish villages after about 400 ce. In addition, many medieval castle villages continue to thrive, centuries after the castles themselves fell into ruin. More : Score: https://www.britannica.com/place/Luxembourg

2025/06/23

Seychelles Government Official Portal.

Skip Navigation Links Home ... Information. About Seychelles Weather & Climate.

2025/06/20

VISIT ICELAND PLAN YOUR ICELAND ADVENTURE

Promote Iceland is a public-private partnership established to improve the competitiveness of Icelandic companies in foreign markets and to stimulate economic growth through increased export. The objective is to strengthen Iceland’s image and reputation, enhance the competitive position of Icelandic undertakings on foreign markets and to attract foreign investment and tourists to the country.

2025/06/19