The Serbs of Croatia or Croatian Serbs, are a recognized ethnic minority in Croatia. According to data from the 2021 census, the population of ethnic Serbs in Croatia is 123,892, constituting 3.2% of the total population.
In some regions of modern-day Croatia, such as southern Dalmatia, ethnic Serbs have been present from the Early Middle Ages. Serbs from modern-day Serbia and Bosnia and Herzegovina started migrating to Croatia during the Habsburg monarchy's long series of wars against the Ottoman Empire. Several migration waves of Serbs occurred after 1538, when Habsburg Monarchy granted them the right to settle on the territory of the Military Frontier, populating the Dalmatian Hinterland, Lika, Kordun, Banija, and Slavonia. In exchange for land and exemption from taxation, they had to conduct military service and participate in the protection of the border. Following the 1848 revolution and the abolition of the Military Frontier in the 1870s-1880s, rising Croatian national sentiment and the growth of Yugoslav-oriented ideas among some Serb intellectuals led to increasing political tension, culminating in the formation of the Serb Independent Party and growing rivalry with Croatian nationalist movements.
At the beginning of the 20th century, the Croat-Serb Coalition, led by the Croat Frano Supilo and the Serb Svetozar Pribićević, governed the Kingdom of Croatia-Slavonia until the dissolution of Austria-Hungary. After the creation of the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes in 1918 (later renamed to Yugoslavia) and the subsequent interwar period, Serbs initially enjoyed significant political influence; however, growing Croatian demands for autonomy, culminating in the 1939 Cvetković–Maček Agreement that created the Banovina of Croatia, deepened ethnic tensions and radicalized parts of the Serb community. During World War II, Serbs were targeted for extermination as part of genocide by the Ustaše regime in the Nazi German puppet state of Independent State of Croatia. After World War II, Serbs initially held prominent positions in the communist leadership and the new socialist republic; however, from the late 1960s onward, the Croatian Spring and rising Croatian nationalism, followed by Tito’s crackdown and subsequent decentralization of Yugoslavia, gradually fueled mutual grievances that intensified in the late 1980s.
Following Croatia’s proclamation of independence and the breakup of Yugoslavia, Serbs rebelled against the Croatian government, establishing the Republic of Serbian Krajina on portions of Croatian territory, which triggered the Croatian War of Independence. The Republic of Serbian Krajina collapsed after the Croatian Army’s Operation Storm in 1995, leading to the reintegration of the territory into Croatia and the flight of around 200,000 Serbs. In the post-war period, Serbs were exposed to discriminatory measures and rhetoric, including barriers to employment, property rights, and use of the minority languages. Denial of the genocide of Serbs in the Independent State of Croatia has also been a prominent issue at times.
History Middle Ages
In some regions that belong to modern Croatia, the presence of Serbs was attested since medieval times. Interpretation of early historical sources has been the subject of debate among scholars. Such are data from the Royal Frankish Annals, a 9th century source composed by Einhard, that mentions Serbs (under year 822) as holding a large part of Dalmatia. The scope and meaning of the term Dalmatia in that source was interpreted differently by various scholars.
Another highly debated source is the 10th-century De Administrando Imperio, composed by the Byzantine emperor and writer Constantine VII Porphyrogenitus (ruled 945-959). Scholars such as John Van Antwerp Fine Jr. and Sima Ćirković state that the lands of Konavle, Zahumlje and Pagania (which included parts of southern Dalmatia now in Croatia) are described in that source as inhabited by Serbs, who immigrated there from an area near Thessaloniki previously arrived there from the White Serbia. However, scholars Francis Dvornik, Tibor Živković, Neven Budak and Florin Curta, doubt such interpretation and state that a closer reading of the De Administrando Imperio shows that the Constantine VII's consideration about the regional population ethnic identity is based on Serbian political rule during the expansion of Časlav in the 10th century and does not indicate ethnic origin.: He probably saw that in his time all these tribes were in the Serb sphere of influence, and therefore called them Serbs, thus ante-dating by three centuries the state of affairs in his day... It is obvious that the small retinue of the Serbian prince could not have populated Serbia, Zachlumia, Terbounia and Narenta. John Fine and Noel Malcolm state that what is today western and proper Bosnia and Herzegovina was part of Croatia, while the rest was divided between Croatia and Serbia. Some members of the Serbian Vlastimirović dynasty took refuge in Croatia amid dynastic rivalry and war with the First Bulgarian Empire in the 9th and 10th centuries.
Stefan Vojislav (r. 1018–1043) ruled a territory that included the coastal region from Ston in the north down to Skadar by 1040 after his rebellion against Byzantine rule. Mihailo Vojislavljević (r. 1050–1081) built the Church of St. Michael in Ston, which has a fresco depicting him. Croatia entered union with Hungary in the beginning of the 12th century. Serbia also entered close relations with Hungary (Béla II married a Serbian princess, Helena). Beloš, a member of the Serbian royal family, became the "Ban of Croatia and Dalmatia" in 1142. By the early 13th century, the territory of Hum was under the jurisdiction of the Western i.e. Roman Church,Milenko Krešić; (2016) Religious situation in the Hum land (Ston and Rat) during the Middle Ages p. 66; while the Serbian Orthodox Church established the diocese of Hum in 1219, seated at Ston, linking the Pelješac peninsula with Hum which lasted until 1321 when Serbian Orthodox bishop had to withdraw from Ston. Serbia continued to hold parts of southernmost Dalmatia into the 14th century. In 1333 King of Serbia Stefan Dušan sold the Pelješac peninsula and the coastland between Ston and Dubrovnik to the Republic of Ragusa, while Ragusa had to pay an annual tribute and also had to guarantee freedom of worship for Eastern Orthodox believers in this territory.
According to Yugoslav ethnologist Jovan Erdeljanović, members of the Orlović clan settled in Lika and Senj in 1432, later joining the Uskoks. In 1436 on the Cetina, Croats, Vlachs, and Serbs appeared at the same time living on the estate of Ivan Frankopan. Serbs are reported in Hungarian documents as living in Croatia in 1437 (three documents call the Serbs in Syrmia and Slavonia as Rascianos–Rascians) and on 22 November 1447, the Hungarian King Ladislaus V wrote a letter which mentioned: "Rascians, who live in our cities of Medvedgrad, Rakovac, both Kalinik and in Koprivnica".; "Rascianis in castris nostris Medwe, Rakonok, utriusque Kemlek et Caproncza constitutis" Matthias Corvinus complained in a letter from 1462 that 200,000 people during the previous three years had been taken from his country by Ottomans, but this information was mistakenly used in Serbian and other historiographies as a reference for Serb migration to Hungary.Sima Ćirković, Сеоба Срба у Краљевину Угарску у XIV и XV веку, (Migration of the Serbian people to the Kingdom of Hungary in the fourteenth and fifteenth century){"У једном писму Венецијанцима из 1462. краљ се жалио да су у протекле три године, дакле од 1459, Турци из његове земље одвукли више од 200.000 становника. (Овде морам приметити да је услед неспоразума у једној старој мађарској збирци регеста овај број тако употребљен као да се односи на становнике Србије који су прешли у Угарску. Радонић га је у том смислу употребио у својој на француском објављеној краткој историји Срба у Угарској, одатле су је преузели Јиречек, затим Ивић, а касније је безорој пута поновљено, и тешко и споро ће се та грешка отклањати.")..In a letter to the Venetians of 1462, the king complained that the Turks had taken more than 200,000 inhabitants from his country in the past three years, or since 1459. (I have to mention here that due to misunderstandings in the old Hungarian original collection, this number was used as a reference to the Serbs who immigrated to Hungary. Information was taken by Konstantin Jireček, then Aleksa Ivić, and later repeated many times, and this error will be difficult and slowly corrected} https://www.rastko.rs/rastko-hu/istorija/istorija/Cirkovic_Seobe.html After the Ottoman conquests of Serbia and capture of Smederevo fortress in 1459 and fall of Bosnia 1463 different populations of Eastern Orthodox Christians moved into Syrmia and by 1483 perhaps 200,000 Eastern Orthodox Christians moved into central Slavonia and Syrmia. The Turkish conquest of Bosnia also pushed refugees and migrants into eastern Croatia.: "Population movements began in earnest after the Battle of Smederevo in 1459, and by 1483, up to two hundred thousand had moved into central Slavonia and Srijem (eastern Croatia)."
Early modern period
The origins of the Serbs of Croatia in the modern era lie primarily in the historical region of Herzegovina (including Old Herzegovina), from which Eastern Orthodox Christian families who spoke the Eastern Herzegovinian dialect of Shtokavian migrated en masse to the north and westIvić, Pavle (1972). "Balkan Slavic Migrations in the Light of South Slavic Dialectology". In Henrik Birnbaum, Speros Vryonis (ed.), Aspects of the Balkans: Continuity and Change - Contributions to the International Balkan Conference held at UCLA, October 23–28, 1969. De Gruyter Mouton. pp. 66–86. during the 16th and 17th centuries. Scholar Marko Šarić states that the ethnolinguistically Slavic settlers were variously termed by contemporary sources as Rascians, Vlachs, Morlachs, Serbs, or Uskoks. The name Vlach was used not in an ethnic context, but rather to designate "a particular [pastoral] social structure and way of life." The group's ethnogenesis in Herzegovina was the outcome of interactions between Slavs and the original Vlachs, who mixed with the surrounding Slavic-speaking population while other Slavs in the region adopted pastoralism as well.Pijović, Marko (2018). Vlachs in the Ragusan sources until the 14th century, pp. 315-335. The resulting migrant stream was characterized as "heterogenous" in nature.
As many former inhabitants of the Austrian-Ottoman borderland fled northwards or were captured by the Ottoman invaders, they left behind unpopulated areas that were subsequently occupied by newcomers. In the first half of the sixteenth century, settlements of Eastern Orthodox Christians were established in modern-day western Croatia: "In the early sixteenth century Orthodox populations had also been established in western Croatia." as well as the Ottoman part of Slavonia; in the second part of the century, they moved to the Austrian part of Slavonia. In 1550 they established the Lepavina Monastery in northern Croatia. Other "Vlach" settlements in the region included Mali i Veliki Poganac (Poganetz), mentioned in 1610, and Marča Monastery (Eparchy of Marča).