Serbia facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Republic of Serbia
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Location of Serbia (green) and the de facto independent Kosovo (light green) in Europe (dark grey).
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| Capital and largest city
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Belgrade 44°48′N 20°28′E / 44.800°N 20.467°E |
| Official languages | Serbian |
| Ethnic groups
(2011)
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| Demonym(s) | Serbian |
| Government | Unitary parliamentary constitutional republic |
| Aleksandar Vučić | |
| Ana Brnabić | |
| Legislature | National Assembly |
| Formation | |
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• Medieval principality
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late 8th century |
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• Medieval kingdom/empire
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1217/1346 |
| 1459–1556 | |
| 1815 | |
| 1878 | |
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• National unification
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1912–1918 |
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• Independent republic
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5 June 2006 |
| Area | |
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• Including Kosovo
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88,361 km2 (34,116 sq mi) (111th) |
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• Excluding Kosovo
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77,474 km2 (29,913 sq mi) |
| Population | |
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• 2017 estimate
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7,040,272 (excluding Kosovo)  (104th) |
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• Density
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91.1/km2 (235.9/sq mi) (121th) |
| GDP (PPP) | 2018 estimate |
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• Total
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$112.475 billion (78th) |
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• Per capita
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$16,063 (excluding Kosovo) (83rd) |
| GDP (nominal) | 2018 estimate |
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• Total
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$42.378 billion (86th) |
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• Per capita
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$6,052 (excluding Kosovo) (88th) |
| Gini (2013) | 29.6 low |
| HDI (2015) |  0.776high · 66th |
| Currency | Serbian dinar (RSD) |
| Time zone | UTC+1 (CET) |
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• Summer (DST)
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UTC+2 (CEST) |
| Driving side | right |
| Calling code | +381 |
| ISO 3166 code | RS |
| Internet TLD |
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The Republic of Serbia (Serbian: Република Србија / Republika Srbija), or usually just Serbia (Serbian: Србија / Srbija), is a country in Central Europe. The capital city is Belgrade. To the north of Serbia is the country Hungary. To the east of Serbia are the countries Bulgaria and Romania. To the south of Serbia are countries North Macedonia and Kosovo. To the west of Serbia are the countries Montenegro (the country that was once united with Serbia), Bosnia and Herzegovina and Croatia.
Contents
History
The oldest form of writing comes from an ancient civilization which inhabited Serbia called the Vinča culture and the symbols are called the Vinča script. Serbia is also home to the earliest known copper smelting sites and the birth of the Copper Age which lead humanity out of the Stone Age and into regular use of metallurgy. The same culture contains the earliest evidence of tin alloy bronze which replaced the much weaker arsenic bronze.
Medieval history
White Serbs, an early Slavic tribe from Northern Europe, came to Northern Greece in the 6th century. By the 8th century they had created the Serbian Principality, a Serbian country, in the Balkans. The Serbs became Christian around the 10th century. For 200 years, the Nemanjić dynasty ruled. They made Serbia a kingdom, built new towns, monasteries, and forts, and made Serbia bigger. In 1371 the Nemanjic Dynasty died out. Serbia became unsafe and local leaders fought each other for control. In 1389 the Ottoman Empire invaded Serbia. They fought against Serbia, Bosnia, the Knights Hospitaller, and the forces of many other local leaders, and won. The Turks fought the Serbs for 70 years until in 1459 the Ottoman Turks conquered Serbia.
Ottoman period
Once the Ottomans conquered Serbia, they got rid of the Serbian upper class. Most Serbs worked as farmers on land owned by Turks. They had to pay high taxes to the Turks. Some Serbs were forced to become Muslims. But the Serbs had their own laws in the Ottoman Empire through the millet system. During the 19th century Serbia gradually became independent. During World War I Austria conquered Serbia but lost the bigger war. Serbia joined other Balkan countries to form Yugoslavia.
Geography
Serbia is found in the Balkan peninsula and the Pannonian Plain. The Danube passes through Serbia. The Šar Mountains of Kosovo form the border with Albania. Over 31% of Serbia is covered by forest. National parks take up 10% of the country's territory. Serbia has 5 national parks and 22 nature reserves.
Economy
Serbia is classed as an upper-middle income economy.
The major processed vegetable crops in Serbia are potatoes, tomatoes and pepper. Serbia is one of the biggest world producers and exporters of raspberries. They are a leading exporter of frozen fruit.
There are five international airports in Serbia: Belgrade Nikola Tesla Airport, Niš Constantine the Great Airport, Morava International Airport, Vršac International Airport and Pristina International Airport.
89% of households in Serbia have fixed telephone lines. There are over 9.60 million cell-phones users. This is larger than the number of the total population of Serbia itself by 30%.
Culture
Serbia has a total of eight sites on the UNESCO World Heritage list: The Early Medieval capital Stari Ras and the 13th-century monastery Sopoćani, and the 12th-century monastery Studenica, and the endangered Medieval Monuments in Kosovo group, comprising the monasteries of Visoki Dečani, Our Lady of Ljeviš, Gračanica and Patriarchate of Peć (former seat of the Serbian Church, mausoleum of Serbian royalty) and finally the Roman estate of Gamzigrad–Felix Romuliana. There are two literary memorials on UNESCO's Memory of the World Programme: The 12th-century Miroslav Gospel, and scientist Nikola Tesla's valuable archive.
The most prominent museum in Serbia is the National Museum of Serbia. It was founded in 1844. It houses a collection of more than 400,000 exhibits, over 5,600 paintings and 8,400 drawings and prints, and includes many foreign masterpiece collections, including Miroslav Gospel.
The official language, Serbian, is written in both the Cyrillic and Latin alphabets.
Composer and musicologist Stevan Stojanović Mokranjac is said to be one of the most important founders of modern Serbian music.
In the 1990s and the 2000s, many pop music performers rose to fame. Željko Joksimović won second place at the 2004 Eurovision Song Contest. Marija Šerifović won the 2007 Eurovision Song Contest. Serbia was the host of the Eurovision Song Contest 2008.
Sports
The most popular sports in Serbia are football, basketball, volleyball, handball, water polo and tennis.
The three main football clubs in Serbia are Red Star and Partizan, both from the capital city of Belgrade, and Vojvodina from Novi Sad.
Novak Djokovic, a multiple Grand Slam-winning tennis player and current number one, is from Serbia. Other tennis players from Serbia include Ana Ivanovic and Jelena Jankovic.
Related pages
Images for kids
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Remnants of the Felix Romuliana Imperial Palace, a UNESCO World Heritage Site; as many as 18 Roman emperors were born in modern-day Serbia
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The Serbian Empire, a medieval state that emerged from the Kingdom of Serbia. It was established in 1346 by Dušan the Mighty
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The Battle of Kosovo (1389) is particularly important to Serbian history, tradition and national identity.
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The Great Migrations of the Serbs, led by Patriarch Arsenije III Čarnojević
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Great Serbian Retreat in 1915 led by Peter I of Serbia. As the part of Entente Powers during WW I, Serbia lost about 850,000 people, a quarter of its pre-war population.
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Great Assembly of Serbs, Bunjevci, and other Slavs proclaimed the unification of Vojvodina region with the Kingdom of Serbia in Novi Sad in 1918
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Mothers with children in the Croatian Ustaše Stara Gradiška concentration camp, a camp for Serbs and Jews in the Independent State of Croatia during WWII.
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The principle of non-alignment was the core of Yugoslav and later Serbian diplomacy. The First Non-Aligned Movement Summit Conference took place in Belgrade in September 1961
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Protest in Belgrade on 7 July 2020
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Topographic map of Serbia including Kosovo
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The Iron Gates, Đerdap National Park.
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Picea omorika is a species of coniferous tree endemic to the Tara mountain in western Serbia.
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Uvac Gorge, one of the last remaining habitats of the griffon vulture in Europe.
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The Church of Saint Sava in Belgrade is one of the largest Orthodox churches in the world.
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Map of Serbian language - official (dark blue) or recognized as minority language (light blue).
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Building of the Military Medical Academy in Belgrade
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NIS headquarters in Novi Sad
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Serbia is among the world's largest producer of plums as of 2018; plum is considered the national fruit of Serbia.
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The Fiat 500L is manufactured in the FCA plant in Kragujevac.
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Đerdap 1 Hydroelectric Power Station, the largest dam on the Danube river and one of the largest hydro power stations in Europe
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Serbian motorway network: In service Under construction Planned
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Air Serbia's airplane taking off from Belgrade Nikola Tesla Airport
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The Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts, founded in 1841
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The National Museum of Serbia.
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Mileševa monastery's White Angel fresco (1235) was in the first Europe-to-America satellite broadcast.
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Performance artist Marina Abramović
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Miroslav's Gospel (1186) is a 362-page illuminated manuscript on parchment listed in UNESCO's Memory of the World Register.
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Ivo Andrić, Yugoslav writer and the 1961 winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature, in his home in Belgrade
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Filip Višnjić sings to the gusle by Sreten Stojanović
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Exit Festival in Novi Sad, proclaimed as the Best Major European festival at the EU Festival Awards
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Serbia won the Eurovision Song Contest 2007.
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A Serbian Christmas meal with roast pork, Russian salad and red wine.
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Gibanica, a Serbian pastry usually made with cottage cheese and eggs.
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Tennis player Novak Djokovic, who has won 21 Grand Slam men's singles titles, including a record nine Australian Open titles.
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Nikola Jokić, Two-time NBA MVP and four-time NBA All-Star. Serbia is one of the countries with the largest number of NBA players and with the greatest success in FIBA international competitions.
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Serbia men's national water polo team held Olympic Games, World Championship, European Championship, World Cup and World League titles simultaneously in period from 2014 to 2016.
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See also
In Spanish: Serbia para niños
