The history of Slovenia chronicles the period of the Slovenian territory from the 5th century BC to the present. In the Early Bronze Age, Proto-Illyrian tribes settled an area stretching from present-day Albania to the city of Trieste. The Slovenian territory was part of the Roman Empire, and it was devastated by the Migration Period's incursions during late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages. The main route from the Pannonian plain to Italy ran through present-day Slovenia. Alpine Slavs, ancestors of modern-day Slovenians, settled the area in the late 6th Century AD. The Holy Roman Empire controlled the land for nearly 1,000 years. Between the mid-14th century through 1918 most of Slovenia was under Habsburg rule. In 1918, most Slovene territory became part of the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes, and in 1929 the Drava Banovina was created within the Kingdom of Yugoslavia with its capital in Ljubljana, corresponding to Slovenian-majority territories within the state. The Socialist Republic of Slovenia was created in 1945 as part of federal Yugoslavia. Slovenia gained its independence from Yugoslavia in June 1991, and today it is a member of the European Union and NATO.
Prehistory to Slavic settlement Prehistory
The area later known as Slovenia has been inhabited since prehistoric times. There is evidence of human habitation from ~250,000 years ago.
The best-known Neanderthal archaeological site in Slovenia is a cave close to the village of Šebrelje near Cerkno, known as Divje Babe. Here the Divje Babe flute was found in 1995, a perforated bone controversially believed to be a flute. It is believed to date from 41000 ± 700 BC. It is possibly the world's oldest known musical instrument.
In 2002, remains of pile dwellings over 4,500 years old were discovered in the Ljubljana Marsh, later protected as a UNESCO World Heritage Site, along with the Ljubljana Marshes Wooden Wheel, the oldest wooden wheel in the world. It indicates that wooden wheels appeared almost simultaneously in Mesopotamia and Europe. In the 1920s and 1930s, Cro-Magnon artifacts such as pierced bones, bone points, and a needle were found n Potok Cave.
In the transition period between the Bronze Age to the Iron Age, the Urnfield culture flourished. Archeological remains dating from the Hallstatt period were found particularly in southeastern Slovenia, with important settlements in Most na Soči, Vače, and Šentvid pri Stični, including situlas in Novo Mesto, the "Town of Situlas".
Ancient Celts and Romans
In the Iron Age, present-day Slovenia was inhabited by Illyrian and Celtic tribes until the 1st century BC, when the Romans conquered the region
During Roman times, the area was divided between Venetia et Histria (region X of Roman Italia in the classification of Augustus) and the imperial provinces Pannonia and Noricum. The Romans established strategic urban posts at Emona (Ljubljana), Poetovio (Ptuj), and Celeia (Celje); and constructed trade and military roads to connect Italy with Pannonia. Important Roman towns there included Emona, Celeia and Poetovio. Other important settlements were Nauportus, Neviodunum, Haliaetum, Atrans, and Stridon.
In 394, the historic Battle of the Frigidus took place in the Vipava Valley, where Eastern Emperor Theodosius I defeated German usurper Eugenius. As the western empire weakened through the 5th and 6th centuries, the area was subject to invasions by the Huns and Germanic tribes during their incursions into Italy. To protect the Italian heartland the Romans built the Claustra Alpium Iuliarum (defensive line of towers and walls).
During the Migration Period (4th-9th century), the region suffered many barbarian invasions, due to its strategic position as the main passage from the Pannonian Plain to the Italian Peninsula. Rome abandoned the region at the end of the 4th century. Most cities were destroyed, while the remaining local population moved to the highland areas, establishing fortified towns. In the 5th century, the region was part of the Ostrogothic Kingdom, and was later contested between the Ostrogoths, the Byzantine Empire and the Lombards.
Slavic settlement
Slavic settlement
The Slavic tribes migrated to the Alpine area after the westward departure of the Lombards (the last Germanic tribe) in 568, and, under intense pressure from Avars, established a Slavic settlement in the Eastern Alps. They came from two directions, North (via today's East Austria and Czech Republic), settling around today's Carinthia and west Styria, and South (via today's Slavonia), settling around what became central Slovenia and became known as the Alpine Slavs.
King Samo From 623 to 624 or possibly 626 onwards, King Samo united the Alpine and Western Slavs against both the Avars and Germanic peoples and established what is referred to as Samo's Kingdom. Following Samo's death around 658, they formed independent geopolitical entities: duchy of Carantania, and Carniola, later duchy Carniola. While the Avars temporarily reclaimed surrounding territories, Frankish King Charlemagne decisively defeated them in 803, bringing the entire region under Western European influence.
Middle Ages Carantania to Carinthia
In 745, Carantania and the rest of Slavic-populated territories, being pressured by newly consolidated Avar power, submitted to Bavarian overrule and were, together with the Duchy of Bavaria, incorporated into the Carolingian Empire. The Carantanians, particularly the Carinthian Slovenes, were the first Slavic people to accept Christianity. They were mostly Christianized by Irish missionaries, among them Modestus, known as the "Apostle of Carantanians". The eastern part of Carantania was ruled again by Avars between 745 and 795.
Carniola, too, came under the Franks, and was Christianized from Aquileia. Following the anti-Frankish rebellion of Liudewit in 818, the Franks removed the Carantanian princes, replacing them with their own border dukes. Consequently, the Frankish feudal system reached the Slovene territory. Under Emperor Arnulf of Carinthia, Carantania, briefly emerged as a regional power, but was destroyed by the Hungarian invasions in the late 9th century.
Carantania-Carinthia rose again as an autonomous administrative unit in 976, when Emperor Otto I, "the Great", after deposing the Duke of Bavaria, Henry II, "the Quarreller", split the lands held by him and made Carinthia the sixth duchy of the Holy Roman Empire in 976, but old Carantania never developed into a unified realm.
In the late 10th and beginning of the 11th century, primarily because of the Hungarian threat, the southeastern border region of the German Empire was organized into so-called "marks" that organized the development of the Carniola, the Styria and the western Goriška/Gorizia. This consolidation and formation continued into the 14th century, led by feudal families such as the Dukes of Spanheim, the Counts of Gorizia, the Counts of Celje and finally the House of Habsburg.
Slovenes as a distinct ethnic group
The first mentions of a common Slovene ethnic identity, transcending regional boundaries, date from the 16th century.Edo Škulj, ed., Trubarjev simpozij (Rome – Celje – Ljubljana: Celjska Mohorjeva družba, Društvo Mohorjeva družba, Slovenska teološka akademija, Inštitut za zgodovino Cerkve pri Teološki fakulteti, 2009).
During the 14th century, most of the Slovene Lands passed under the Habsburg rule. In 1335, Henry of Gorizia, Duke of Carinthia, Landgrave of Carniola and Count of Tyrol, died without a male heir. His daughter Margaret was able to keep the County of Tyrol, while the Wittelsbach emperor Louis IV passed Carinthia and the Carniolan march to Duke Albert II of Austria. Therefore, most of the territory became a hereditary land of the Habsburg monarchy. Carinthia and Carniola remained a semi-autonomous state with its own constitutional structure.
The counts of Celje, a feudal family from this area who in 1436 acquired the title of state princes, were powerful competitors of the house of Habsburg for some time. This large dynasty, important at a European political level, had its seat in Slovene territory but died out in 1456. Its estates fell to the Habsburgs, who retained control until the beginning of the 20th century. Patria del Friuli ruled the western portion of the lands that would later become Slovenia until Venetian takeover in 1420.
Most Slovenes lived in the administrative region known as Inner Austria, forming the majority of the population of the Duchy of Carniola and the County of Gorizia and Gradisca, as well as of Lower Styria and southern Carinthia. Germanization significantly diminished the extent of Slovene-speaking areas..
Slovenes also inhabited most of the territory of the Imperial Free City of Trieste, comprising a minority of its population.Spezialortsrepertorium der Oesterreichischen Laender. VII. Oesterreichisch-Illyrisches Kuestenland. Wien, 1918, Verlag der K.K. Hof- und Staatsdruckerei
At the end of the Middle Ages, the Turkish raids inflicted serious economic and demographic setbacks. In 1515, a widespread peasant revolt enveloped Slovene territory. In 1572 and 1573 the Croatian-Slovenian peasant revolt wrought havoc. Such uprisings, continued throughout the 17th century.
Early modern period
In the 16th century, the Protestant Reformation spread across Slovene lands. The first vernacular books were written by Protestant preacher Primož Trubar and his followers, establishing the basis for standard Slovene. In the second half of the 16th century, a vernacular translation of the Bible was produced by Jurij Dalmatin. During the Counter-Reformation in the late 16th and 17th centuries, led by Ljubljana bishop Thomas Chrön and Seckau Martin Brenner, almost all Protestants were expelled (except in Prekmurje). Nevertheless, their legacy survived, which was partially incorporated in the Catholic Counter-Reformation in the 17th century. The old Slovene orthography, also known as Bohorič's alphabet, developed by Protestants in the 16th century, remained in use until the mid-19th century.
Between the 15th and the 17th centuries, the Slovene Lands suffered many calamities. Many areas, especially in southern Slovenia, were devastated by the Ottoman–Habsburg wars. Ottomans destroyed many flourishing towns, including Vipavski Križ and Kostanjevica na Krki. The Carniolan noblemen's army defeated the Ottomans in the Battle of Sisak of 1593, ending the immediate Ottoman threat, although sporadic Ottoman incursions continued.
In the 16th and 17th centuries, western Slovene regions became battlefields in the wars between the Habsburgs and the Venetian Republic, most notably the War of Gradisca, which was largely fought in Goriška.
After the dissolution of the Republic of Venice in 1797, Venetian Slovenia passed to the Austrian Empire and then joined the French-administered Illyrian Provinces established by Napoleon, the Austrian Empire, and Austria-Hungary. Slovenes inhabited most of Carniola, the southern part of the duchies of Carinthia and Styria, the northern and eastern areas of the Austrian Littoral, as well as Prekmurje in the Kingdom of Hungary. Industrialization was accompanied by construction of railroads, but urbanization was limited.
The late 17th century featured intellectual and artistic activity. Many Italian Baroque artists, mostly architects and musicians, settled there, and contributed to local culture. Artists including Francesco Robba, Andrea Pozzo, Vittore Carpaccio and Giulio Quaglio worked in the Slovenian territory, while scientists such as Johann Weikhard von Valvasor and Johannes Gregorius Thalnitscher contributed to scholarly activities.
Age of Enlightenment to the national movement