The Country with Fluid Boundaries

In 1930, the country of Jugoslavia was celebrating its ten-year anniversary.  Jugoslavia, or "Yugoslavia," as we know it today, is directly across the Adriatic Sea from Italy, bordered on the south by Albania and Greece, on the north by Austria and Hungary, and on the east by Rumania.  The map has surely changed since then; it will be interesting to see how the political and geographic events unfold.

"After the World War, Slovenia, Croatia, Slavonia, Bosnia, Hercegovina, Dalmatia, part of Banat, and the Kingdom of Montenegro were added to Serbia to compose a kingdom of 96,000 square miles with a population of 13,000,000" (photo caption, p. 264).  This was the Jugoslavia of 1930. 

Note: All the National Geographic Magazine articles of this era referred to "The World War."  We would refer to it as WWI, since there was a WWII.  Obviously, the people of the 1930s did not learn the cruel lessons of war.  Have we??

For now, let's visit "Jugoslavia - Ten Years After," the first article in the September, 1930, issue of National Geographic Magazine.  Melville Chater is the author and our tour guide.

Chater "lingered over our breakfast coffee" with friends in the city of Dubrovnik.  They reminisced about the scene immediately after peace and Armistice ten year prior. There were "hysterical parades, champagne nights, looming revolutions, wholesale kissing, and rumors of old States dissolving, of new States being born" (p. 257).

Chater and party wanted to visit the interior of the country.  The Karst region was desolate mountain land.  Here again is a country of "waterways and largely undeveloped water power.  The Danube (River) and its branches alone give her almost 1,000 miles of navigable routes, this in a State slightly smaller than Wyoming" (pp. 264-265).

The city of Sarajevo has a large Moslem population.  The author considered the city to be "the westernmost of oriental cities" with many mosques and minarets, and citizens who "remain draped, veiled, and fezzed as of old" (p. 265).

Mr. Chater noted that in the city of Skoplje, there is also a sizeable number of Mohammedans who, with the Christians there, "experience little difficulty in living together haroniously" (photo caption, p. 276).

In the Kosovo region, donkeys were used for transportation and as pack animals. "Agricultural machinery is almost unknown in south Jugoslavia" (photo caption, p. 268).

Although for most of the trip, Mr. Chater traveled by chauffeured car, he and his companions "caught the northbound Orient Express" to Belgrade" (p. 284).  After seeing the American mystery movie, "Murder on the Orient Express," it seemed to me that a trip on the train would be romantic and adventurous but also very expensive.  (Dare I entertain that thought?)

Beograd (Belgrade) was the capital of Jugoslavia in 1930.  "The spectacle of Beograd reconstructing herself is symptomatic of a nationwide process of exchanging old ways for new" (p. 285).  At that time, most of the country women wove their own cloth, and were expert embroiderers.  It is doubtful that artistry survives today, don't you think?

In Jugoslavia, so close to Italy, were the expected Roman ruins of buildings and aqueducts.  Mr. Chater felt that in the region of Bosnia, its "enduring charm lies in its sheer wildness of woodland and water course.  Often one has to remind oneself that he is not traveling in some virgin country, but in one which has known settlement and conquest since the days of the ancient Thracians" (p. 291).  At one point, the party heard of nearby "baths," brought towels and bath salts but couldn't find them.  A local gent then told them, yes, there were Roman baths, but they "hadn't been in working order for 2,000 years" (p. 296).

Croatia was the country's industrial province with products based on "timber, chemicals, iron, and sugar beet," yet "retarded by her lack of fuel" (p. 296).  These products plus "live stock, cereals, bauxite, and cement form Jugoslavian exports" (p. 296).

At the end of their journey, the Chater group found a spa, modern, and well-equipped, and stayed there for two days.

After reading this article, I wanted to see what the country of present Yugoslavia looks like on the map.  I was shocked to find (in Google) the boundaries have been changed several dozen times since 1930.  Perhaps, if you or I had lived there for many years, we would have to ask, "What country are we today!"