Serbia

Serbia is split into north and south by the Danube and the Sava, which meet beneath the fortress of Belgrade. To the north, Vojvodina lies on the flat black soils of the Pannonian Plain, broken by the vineyard hills of Fruška Gora. South of the rivers, Šumadija, the ‘wooded land’, rolls down to the Morava valley, and beyond rise Zlatibor and Tara above the Drina canyon. The Danube exits by the Iron Gates, a deep gorge.

Mesolithic fishers at Lepenski Vir, on the Danube, carved boulders into faces half human, half fish. Constantine the Great was born at Naissus, the modern Niš. Stefan Nemanja founded a dynasty in the twelfth century, Saint Sava made the Serbian Church independent in 1219, and Stefan Dušan was crowned emperor in 1346. Ottoman rule followed from 1459 until uprisings from 1804 won autonomy, and independence came in 1878. In 1918 Serbia joined the kingdom that became Yugoslavia, which broke apart in wars during the 1990s; Serbia stood alone from 2006.

Serbian Orthodox families keep a slava, the feast of its own patron saint, with a candle, boiled wheat and a braided loaf. Brass bands blast through Guča each August. Ivo Andrić, author of The Bridge on the Drina, was awarded the Nobel Prize in 1961. Ćevapi come with kajmak and ajvar, a roasted-pepper relish, and guests are greeted with šljivovica, plum brandy. Arilje raspberries are frozen for export, cars are built at Kragujevac, and copper is mined at Bor.