History of Macedonia

16 December 2002

The geographic name Macedonia, commonly indicating the ancient kingdom of Alexander the Great, today refers to three different regions: Vardar, Aegean and Pirin. Only the first one corresponds to what nowadays is conceived as the Former Yugoslavian Republic of Macedonia (FYROM), while the other two constitute regions of the bordering countries Greece and Bulgaria respectively.

The Kingdom of Macedonia was founded in the sixth century BC in a landlocked mountainous position at the crossroads of the Balkans. From the sixth century AD Slavic populations started a progressive settlement slowly replacing the original inhabitants as major community in the area. Throughout the centuries, even after the arrival of the Bulgarians (between the ninth and the twelfth century) and the Ottoman occupation, the population remained a melting pot of cultures with different origins. National consciousness gained relevance among Macedonians during the nineteenth and twentieth century, but expectations of recognition remained frustrated for a long time.

The formal recognition of a Macedonian political entity in modern times is, in fact, quite recent. The Macedonian Republic was created as a further State within the Yugoslav Federation under the auspices of the COMINFORM (the International Communist Forum) for the will of Josep Stalin and Marshal Josep Broz Tito on 2 August 1944. Thereafter, the Yugoslav leader started an era of strong state-building prompting the reinforcement of a Slavic Macedonian nation. The widespread adherence to the idea of Yugoslavia inside the new republic, probably instrumental to overcoming the evident internal divisions, was highly eased by the attitude of the Federal authorities searching for local support to delegitimise eventual claims from neighbouring States.

Following the path shown by Slovenia and Croatia, centrifugal forces prevailed: Macedonian citizens voted for independence in a national referendum on 8 September 1991, in which 75% of the population voted, with 95% in favour.