Bács-Bodrog

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Bács-Bodrog
County seat in 1910	Zombor (Serbian: Sombor)
Area in 1910	10,362 km²
Population in 1910	812,400
Present country	Serbia, Hungary

Bács-Bodrog (Hungarian: Bács-Bodrog, Serbian: Bačka-Bodrog or Бачка-Бодрог) is the name of administrative county (comitatus) of the historic Kingdom of Hungary. Its territory is presently in southern Hungary and northern Serbia (western Vojvodina). The capital of the county was Sombor (Hungarian: Zombor).

[edit] Name

The county was named after a town of Bač (Bács) and Abodrites (Bodrog in Hungarian, Bodrići in Slavic), an old Slavic tribe that inhabited the region in medieval times.

[edit] Geography

Bács-Bodrog county shared borders with the Hungarian counties Baranya, Pest-Pilis-Solt-Kiskun, Csongrád, Torontál, Szerém, and Verőce (the latter two counties were part of Croatia-Slavonia). The river Danube formed its western and southern border. The river Tisza formed its eastern border, down to its confluence with the Danube. Its area was 10,362 km² around 1910.

[edit] History

Bács county arose as one of the first comitatus of the Kingdom of Hungary, in the 11th century. The county was taken by the Ottoman Empire in the 16th century. During the Ottoman rule, the area of the county was part of the sanjak of Segedin. The Bács county was established again after the Bačka region was captured by the Habsburg Monarchy in 1699. The eastern parts of Bačka were incorporated into Tisa-Moriš section of Military Frontier. After this part of Military Frontier was abolished in 1751, the eastern parts of Bačka were also included into Bács county. The only part of Bačka, which remained within Military Frontier was Šajkaška, but it also came under the civil administration in 1873.

Bács-Bodrog, Szerém, Torontál, Temes and Krassó-Szöreny counties after 1881, the five counties, which were formed in the territory of former Voivodship of Serbia and Tamiš Banat

In 1848/1849 the area of the county was part of Serbian Voivodship, while between 1849 and 1860 it was part of Voivodship of Serbia and Tamiš Banat, a separate Habsburg province. The county Bács-Bodrog was created in the 1860s, when the area was incorporated into the Kingdom of Hungary.

In 1918 county became part of the newly formed Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes (renamed to Yugoslavia in 1929). By the Treaty of Trianon of 1920, territory of the county was divided between the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes and Hungary. Most of the county (including Sombor, Subotica, and Novi Sad) was assigned to the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes, while the northernmost approximately 15% of the county was assigned to Hungary.

Between 1918 and 1922, the southern part of the former Bács-Bodrog county was a county of the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes with seat in Novi Sad. The northern part of the former county was a county within Hungary since 1921. The capital of this smaller Hungarian county Bács-Bodrog was Baja. After World War II Bács-Bodrog was united with the southern part of former Pest-Pilis-Solt-Kiskun county to form Bács-Kiskun county.

The Yugoslav part of the pre-1918 Bács-Bodrog county (the Bačka region) is presently part of Serbia, autonomous region of Vojvodina.

[edit] Demographics

According to the Austrian census from 1715, Serbs, Bunjevci, and Šokci comprised 97.6% of the county's population.

The 1720 census recorded 104,569 citizens in the county. Of those, there were 98,000 Serbs (divided into 76,000 Orthodox and 22,000 Roman Catholics or Bunjevci and Šokci), 5,019 Magyars and 750 Germans. The Serbs (73%) and Bunjevci and Šokci (21%) had an overwhelming majority in the county which seems to have been inhabitted solely by them.

During the 18th century, the Habsburgs carried out an intensive colonisation of the area, which had low population density after the last Ottoman wars. The new settlers were primarily Serbs, Hungarians, and Germans. Because many of the Germans came from Swabia, they were known as Donauschwaben, or Danube Swabians. Some Germans also came from Austria, and some from Bavaria and Alsace. Lutheran Slovaks, Rusyns, and others were also colonized but to a much smaller extent.

There was also an emigration of Serbs from the eastern parts of the region, which belonged to Military Frontier until 1751. After the abolishment of the Tisa-Moriš section of Military Frontier, many Serbs emigrated from north-eastern parts of Bačka. They moved either to Russia (notably to Nova Serbia and Slavo-Serbia) or to Banat, where Military Frontier was still needed.

By 1820 the county had grown to 387,914 in total population. The Serb (including Bunjevci and Šokci) share had dropped to 44% or 170,942 with the number of Hungarians plumetting at 121,688 and Germans at 91,016 or 31% and 23% respectively.

The 19th century saw the rize of nationalism, particularly Hungarian and Magyarization. The policy of massive Hungarian colonization, mostly in the north of Bačka-Bodrog finally gave a Magyar relative majority, but still with a mixed population, as recorded by the 1910 census.

According to the census of 1910, the county had 812,385 inhabitants. Population by language (1910 census):

• Hungarian = 363,518 (44.75%)
• German = 190,697 (23.47%)
• Serbian = 145,063 (17.86%)
• Slovak = 30,137
• Russniak = 10,760
• Croatian = 1,279
• Romanian = 386
• other languages = 70,545 (for the most part Bunjevac and Šokac)

As for the geographical distribution of the three largest ethnic groups in 1910, Hungarians mainly lived in northern parts of the county, Germans in western, and Serbs in the southern parts. Novi Sad, city in the southern part of the county, was the cultural and political centre of the Serb people in the 18th and 19th century.

[edit] Subdivisions

In the early 20th century, the subdivisions of Bács-Bodrog county were:

The towns Baja and Bácsalmás are presently in Hungary; the other towns mentioned are presently in Serbia.