From kingdom to republic: Serbia’s story

About From kingdom to republic: Serbia’s story

By the ULTIMATE Belgrade Editorial Team

Kings and uprisings, two world wars, Tito’s Yugoslavia, the wars of the 1990s, the bombing of 1999 and a country finding its place in the world again: the story of modern Serbia, and the places in Belgrade where you can still see it.

Uprisings and a kingdom

For almost four centuries Serbia was part of the Ottoman Empire. Its modern story begins in 1804, when Karađorđe, ‘Black George’, led the First Serbian Uprising, followed in 1815 by a second under Miloš Obrenović, who won autonomy for a Serbian principality. Independence was recognised at the Congress of Berlin in 1878, and in 1882 Serbia became a kingdom.

Two rival dynasties, the descendants of Karađorđe and of Miloš, took turns on the throne. In 1903 the Karađorđević family returned with King Petar I, a liberal and much-loved monarch who had translated John Stuart Mill, and under him Serbia enjoyed a golden age of parliamentary politics, culture and growth.

In little more than a century, Belgrade has been the capital of a principality, two kingdoms, a socialist federation and an independent republic.

Wars and a new country

The Balkan Wars of 1912 and 1913 drove the Ottomans out of most of the Balkans, and in 1914, after the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand in Sarajevo, Austria-Hungary declared war on Serbia, beginning the First World War. Serbia won early victories, but in 1915 its army and king retreated across the mountains of Albania in winter, a march remembered as one of the great tragedies of the war. They fought their way home through the Salonika front in 1918, and Serbia lost a large share of its population in the war.

On 1 December 1918 the South Slav lands were united as the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes under the Karađorđević dynasty, renamed Yugoslavia in 1929. King Aleksandar was assassinated in Marseille in 1934, and in April 1941 Belgrade was bombed and the country occupied. The Second World War in Yugoslavia was a war of occupation, resistance and civil conflict, and it ended with the communist Partisans of Josip Broz Tito in power. In 1945 the monarchy was abolished, and the young King Petar II remained in exile.

Tito’s Yugoslavia

Tito ruled Yugoslavia for 35 years. In 1948 he broke with Stalin, and Yugoslavia went its own way: a socialist country open to the West, whose citizens could travel freely and whose red passport opened doors on both sides of the Iron Curtain. In 1961 Belgrade hosted the first summit of the Non-Aligned Movement, uniting countries that chose neither the American nor the Soviet bloc, and New Belgrade rose as the showpiece of a modern federation.

When Tito died in 1980, his funeral in Belgrade was attended by kings, presidents and prime ministers from across the world. He is buried in the House of Flowers, now part of the Museum of Yugoslavia, which remains one of the most visited places in the city. His legacy is still debated: many older people remember the security and prosperity of those years, others the limits of a one-party state.

The 1990s

After Tito, Yugoslavia’s republics drifted apart, and between 1991 and 1995 the federation broke up in a series of wars in Slovenia, Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina that brought great suffering to all its peoples. Serbia lived through international sanctions and, in 1993, one of the worst bouts of hyperinflation in history.

In 1999, during the conflict in Kosovo, NATO bombed Yugoslavia for 78 days, from 24 March to 10 June. Bridges, factories and buildings across the country were hit, including in central Belgrade, and civilians were among those killed. The ruins of the former army headquarters on Nemanjina Street, left as they were, are a reminder of those weeks. On 5 October 2000, mass protests in Belgrade brought political change, and the country began to reopen to the world.

Serbia today

Serbia became an independent republic once more in 2006, when Montenegro voted to leave their union. It has been a candidate to join the European Union since 2012, and it keeps working ties with the West, Russia and China alike, a balancing act with echoes of Tito’s non-alignment. The question of Kosovo, which declared independence in 2008, remains unresolved.

Today Belgrade is one of the fastest-changing cities in Europe, with new districts, a rebuilt airport, high-speed trains, a metro under construction and EXPO 2027 on the way. The monarchy has returned in a new form too: since 2001 the Karađorđević family has lived again in the Royal Palace at Dedinje, where visitors can join guided tours of the palace and its gardens.

Seeing the story

To understand Serbia’s 20th century, spend a morning at the Museum of Yugoslavia and the House of Flowers, then visit the Royal Compound at Dedinje, the Military Museum at Kalemegdan and, from 2027, the Historical Museum in the old Main Station. Belgraders are generous with their stories, and a coffee in a kafana is often the best history lesson of all.

Serbia’s modern history in brief

A short timeline for visitors. Belgrade’s museums tell each chapter in far more depth.

Opening hours, prices and seasonal openings change, so please check with From kingdom to republic: Serbia’s story before you go.