Serbian is the standardized variety of the Serbo-Croatian language mainly used by Serbs. It is the official and national language of Serbia, one of the three official languages of Bosnia and Herzegovina and co-official in Montenegro and Kosovo. It is a recognized minority language in Croatia, North Macedonia, Romania, Hungary, Slovakia, and the Czech Republic.
Ileana Cosânzeana is a figure in Romanian mythology. She is represented as a beautiful and good-natured princess or daughter of an Emperor, or described as a fairy with immense powers.
Vatroslav Jagić was a Croatian scholar of Slavic studies in the second half of the 19th century.
The Zmeu is a fantastic creature of Romanian folklore and Romanian mythology.
Ban was the title of local rulers or officeholders, similar to viceroy, used in several states in Central and Southeastern Europe between the 7th and 20th centuries. The most common examples have been found in medieval Croatia and medieval regions ruled and influenced by the Kingdom of Hungary. They often ruled as the king's governmental representatives, supreme military commanders and judges, and in 18th century Croatia, even as chief government officials. In the Banate of Bosnia they were always de facto supreme rulers.
Shtokavian or Štokavian is the prestige supradialect of the pluricentric Serbo-Croatian language and the basis of its Serbian, Croatian, Bosnian and Montenegrin standards. It is a part of the South Slavic dialect continuum. Its name comes from the form for the interrogative pronoun for "what" što. This is in contrast to Kajkavian and Chakavian.
Kajkavian is a South Slavic supradialect or language spoken primarily by Croats in much of Central Croatia and Gorski Kotar.
Bogdan or Bohdan is a Slavic masculine name that appears in all Slavic countries as well as Romania and Moldova. It is derived from the Slavic words Bog/Boh, meaning "god", and dan, meaning "given". The name appears to be an early calque from Greek Theodore or Hebrew Matthew with the same meaning. The name is also used as a surname in Hungary. Bogdana is the feminine version of the name.
Opanci are traditional peasant shoes worn in Southeastern Europe. The attributes of the opanci are a construction of leather, lack of laces, durable, and various endings on toes. In Serbia, the design of the horn-like ending on toes indicates the region of origin, though this specific design is not exclusive to Serbia. The opanci are also considered as the traditional peasant footwear for people in the Balkan region. In Bulgaria they are referred to as "tsarvuli".
The Dacian draco was a military standard used by troops of the ancient Dacian people, which can be seen in the hands of the soldiers of Decebalus in several scenes depicted on Trajan's Column in Rome, Italy. This wind instrument has the form of a dragon with open wolf-like jaws containing several metal tongues. The hollow dragon's head was mounted on a pole with a fabric tube affixed at the rear. In use, the draco was held up into the wind, or above the head of a horseman, where it filled with air and gave the impression it was alive while making a shrill sound as the wind passed through its strips of material. The Dacian draco likely influenced the development of the similar Roman draco.
A Slavic dragon is any dragon in Slavic mythology, including the Russian zmei, Ukrainian zmiy, and its counterparts in other Slavic cultures: the Bulgarian zmey, the Slovak drak and šarkan, Czech drak, Polish żmij, the Serbo-Croatian zmaj, the Macedonian zmej (змеј) and the Slovene zmaj. The Romanian zmeu could also be deemed a "Slavic" dragon, but a non-cognate etymology has been proposed.
Proto-Balto-Slavic is a reconstructed hypothetical proto-language descending from Proto-Indo-European (PIE). From Proto-Balto-Slavic, the later Balto-Slavic languages are thought to have developed, composed of the Baltic and Slavic sub-branches, and including modern Lithuanian, Polish, Russian and Serbo-Croatian, among others.
Shqiptar is an Albanian ethnonym (endonym), by which Albanians call themselves. They call their country Shqipëria.
The Solomonar or Șolomonar is a wizard believed in Romanian folklore to ride a dragon and control the weather, causing rain, thunder, or hailstorm.
The folklore of Romania is the collection of traditions of the Romanians. A feature of Romanian culture is the special relationship between folklore and the learned culture, determined by two factors. First, the rural character of the Romanian communities resulted in an exceptionally vital and creative traditional culture. Folk creations were the main literary genre until the 18th century. They were both a source of inspiration for cultivated creators and a structural model. Second, for a long time learned culture was governed by official and social commands and developed around courts of princes and boyars, as well as in monasteries.
The non-native name of Croatia derives from Medieval Latin Croātia, itself a derivation of the native ethnonym of Croats, earlier *Xъrvate and modern-day Croatian: Hrvati. The earliest preserved mentions of the ethnonym in stone inscriptions and written documents in the territory of Croatia are dated to the 8th-9th century, but it is of an earlier date due to lack of preserved historical evidence as the arrival of the Croats is historically and archaeologically dated to the 6th-7th century. The ethnonym of the Croats with many derivative toponyms and anthroponyms became widespread all over Europe.
Numerous lexemes that are reconstructable for Proto-Slavic have been identified as borrowings from the languages of various tribes that Proto-Slavic speakers interacted with in either prehistoric times or during their expansion when they first appeared in history in the sixth century. Most of the loanwords come from Germanic languages, with other contributors being Iranian, Celtic, and Turkic. Slavic loanwords sparked numerous debates in the 20th century, some of which persist today.
The dialects of Serbo-Croatian include the vernacular forms and standardized sub-dialect forms of Serbo-Croatian as a whole or as part of its standard varieties: Bosnian, Croatian, Montenegrin, and Serbian. They are part of the dialect continuum of South Slavic languages that joins through the transitional Torlakian dialects the Macedonian dialects to the south, Bulgarian dialects to the southeast and Slovene dialects to the northwest.
Slavicisms or Slavisms are words and expressions borrowed or derived from Slavic languages.
