Travel Planet: Dalmatia Krka - National Park

• published: 11 May 2015
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Dalmatia (Croatian: Dalmacija, [dǎlmaːt͡sija]; see names in other languages) is one of the four historical regions of Croatia,[3] alongside Croatia proper, Slavonia, and Istria. Dalmatia is a narrow coastal region, stretching from island of Rab in the north to the Bay of Kotor in the south. The hinterland (Dalmatian Zagora) ranges in width from fifty kilometres in the north, to just a few kilometres in the south; it is mostly covered by rugged Dinaric Mountains. 79 islands (and about 500 islets) run parallel to the coast, the largest (in Dalmatia) being Brač, Pag and Hvar. The largest city is Split, followed by Zadar, Dubrovnik, and Šibenik. Name of the region stems from an Illyrian tribe called the Dalmatae, who lived in the area in the classical antiquity. Later it became a Roman province, and as result a Romance culture emerged, along with the now-extinct Dalmatian language, later largely replaced with related Venetian. With the arrival of Slavs to the area in the 8th century, who occupied most of the hinterland, Slavic and Romance elements began to intermix in language and the culture. During the Middle Ages, its cities were often conquered by, or switched allegiance to, the kingdoms of the region. The longest-lasting rule was the one of the Republic of Venice, which controlled most of Dalmatia between 1420 and 1797, with the exception of small but stable Republic of Ragusa (1358–1808) in the south. Between 1815 and 1918, it was as a province of Austrian Empire known as the Kingdom of Dalmatia. After the Austro-Hungarian defeat in World War I, Dalmatia was split between the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes which controlled most of it, and the Kingdom of Italy which held several smaller parts, and after World War II, SFR Yugoslavia took control over the complete area. The entire Dalmatia is now a part of modern Croatia. Rich historical heritage, clean waters of the Adriatic sea, and mild Mediterranean climate make the area a popular tourist destination. The inhabitants of Dalmatia are culturally subdivided into two or three groups. The urban families of the coastal cities, sometimes known as Fetivi,[16] are culturally akin to the inhabitants of the Dalmatian islands (known derogatorily as Boduli). The two are together distinct, in the Mediterranean aspects of their culture, from the more numerous inhabitants of the Zagora, the hinterland, referred to (sometimes derogatorily) as the Vlaji.[16] The latter are historically more influenced by Ottoman culture, merging almost seamlessly at the border with the Herzegovinian Croats and southern Bosnia and Herzegovina in general. The former two groups (inhabitants of the islands and the cities) historically included many Venetian and Italian speakers, many of whom identified as Italians (esp. after the Unification of Italy). Their presence, relative to those identifying as South Slavs, decreased dramatically over the course of the 19th and the first half of the 20th century. There remains, however, a strong cultural, and, in part, ancestral heritage among the natives of the cities and islands, who today almost exclusively identify as Croats, but retain a sense of regional identity. The issue is today a politically polarizing one, as the right-wing Croatian Democratic Union party, which held power for most of the post-Yugoslav period, generally favored the designation of "Littoral Croatia" over a Dalmatian regional identity. A rough political divide separates the natives of the cities and islands from those of the hinterland, with the former leaning towards the left, and the latter to the right of the political spectrum. The Middle Ages in Dalmatia were a period of intense rivalry among neighboring powers: the waning Byzantine Empire, the Kingdom of Croatia (later in a personal union with Hungary), the Bosnian Kingdom, and the Venetian Republic. Dalmatia at the time consisted of the coastal cities functioning much like city-states, with extensive autonomy, but in mutual conflict and without control of the rural hinterland (the Zagora). Ethnically, Dalmatia started out as a Roman region, with a romance culture that began to develop independently, forming the now-extinct Dalmatian language. In the Early Medieval period, Byzantine Dalmatia was ravaged by an Avar invasion that destroyed its capital, Salona, in 639 AD, an event that allowed for the settlement of the nearby Diocletian's Palace in Spalatum (Split) by Salonitans, greatly increasing the importance of the city. The Avars were followed by the great South Slavic migrations.[24] The Slavs, loosely allied with the Avars, permanently settled the region in the first half of the 7th century AD and remained its predominant ethnic group ever since. The Croats soon formed their own realm: the Principality of Dalmatian Croatia ruled by native Princes of Guduscan origin.