The term Swabian Turkey (german: Schwäbische Türkei, hu, Sváb-Törökország) describes a region in southeastern in Hungary delimited by the Danube (''Donau''), the

Drava The Drava or Drave''Utrata Fachwörterbuch ...

(''Drau''), inhabited by an ethnic German minority, the Germans of Hungary. This present-day minority, the largest German-speaking minority in Hungary, primarily lives in the counties of Tolna (''Tolnau''), Baranya (''Branau''), and Somogy (''Schomodei'') and are regarded as Danube Swabians.

Background

After the Ottoman Empire was defeated in the

Second Battle of Mohács The second (symbol: s) is the unit of time in the International System of Units (SI), historically defined as of a day – this factor derived from the division of the day first into 24 hours, then to 60 minutes and finally to 60 seconds eac ...

in 1687, the

Habsburg monarchy The Habsburg monarchy (german: Habsburgermonarchie, ), also known as the Danubian monarchy (german: Donaumonarchie, ), or Habsburg Empire (german: Habsburgerreich, ), was the collection of empires, kingdoms, duchies, counties and other polities ...

forced the

Ottoman Turks The Ottoman Turks ( tr, Osmanlı Türkleri), were the Turkic founding and sociopolitically the most dominant ethnic group of the Ottoman Empire ( 1299/1302–1922). Reliable information about the early history of Ottoman Turks remains scarce, ...

to leave the Kingdom of Hungary. Because much of the Pannonian Plain had been depopulated during the

Ottoman wars in Europe A series of military conflicts between the Ottoman Empire and various European states took place from the Late Middle Ages up through the early 20th century. The earliest conflicts began during the Byzantine–Ottoman wars, waged in Anatolia in ...

, the

Habsburg The House of Habsburg (), alternatively spelled Hapsburg in Englishgerman: Haus Habsburg, ; es, Casa de Habsburgo; hu, Habsburg család, it, Casa di Asburgo, nl, Huis van Habsburg, pl, dom Habsburgów, pt, Casa de Habsburgo, la, Domus Hab ...

s began to resettle the land with Germans, especially from

Swabia Swabia ; german: Schwaben , colloquially ''Schwabenland'' or ''Ländle''; archaic English also Suabia or Svebia is a cultural, historic and linguistic region in southwestern Germany. The name is ultimately derived from the medieval Duchy of ...

Settlement

German colonization in southeastern Transdanubia began in 1689. While many came from

, the German settlers also came from the Rhenish Palatinate, Hesse, the Westerwald, Fulda (district), Mosel-Saar-Ruwer,

Electorate of Trier The Electorate of Trier (german: Kurfürstentum Trier or ' or Trèves) was an ecclesiastical principality of the Holy Roman Empire that existed from the end of the 9th to the early 19th century. It was the temporal possession of the prince- ...

, Electoral Palatinate, Bavaria, and throughout Franconia. Because of the many Swabian colonists from Upper Swabia, northern

Lake Constance Lake Constance (german: Bodensee, ) refers to three Body of water, bodies of water on the Rhine at the northern foot of the Alps: Upper Lake Constance (''Obersee''), Lower Lake Constance (''Untersee''), and a connecting stretch of the Rhine, ca ...

, upper Danube,

Southern Black Forest The Southern Black Forest (german: Südschwarzwald) is the highest part of the Black Forest, an area heavily transformed by ice age glaciation south of a line roughly from Freiburg im Breisgau to Donaueschingen. The term High Black Forest is no ...

and Principality of Fürstenberg settling on land previously controlled by the Turks, the region of Tolna, Somogy and Baranya counties became known as Swabian Turkey. The settlers were often induced to immigrate to Hungary with the promise of three years without taxes. The vast majority of German settlement was organized by private ventures run by the nobility or the Roman Catholic Church. Most of the German settlement was in pre-existing Slav- or Magyar-inhabited villages, but some new villages were also founded by Germans. The only two German-founded villages remaining in Swabian Turkey that were established by state ventures were Dunakömlőd (''Kimling'') and

Németkér Németkér (german: Kier) is a village in Tolna County, Hungary. It is located at about 100 km south of Budapest. It belongs to the small area Paks. Németkér was founded in 1785 by the Abbey Földvár and German settlers (so-called ''Donaus ...

(''Deutsch-Ker''). Germans also settled extensively in the major towns of Pécs (''Fünfkirchen'') and Mohács (''Mohatsch''). Swabian Turkey is also referred to as Little Hesse, because many of the Germans settlers in the Baranya were from Hesse, especially from

Fulda Fulda () (historically in English called Fuld) is a town in Hesse, Germany; it is located on the river Fulda and is the administrative seat of the Fulda district (''Kreis''). In 1990, the town hosted the 30th Hessentag state festival. History ...

. Their descendants are called Stifolders.https://www.feked.hu/etc/Stifolder_tortenet.pdf

Post-World War II

During the

expulsion of Germans Expulsion or expelled may refer to: General * Deportation * Ejection (sports) * Eviction * Exile * Expeller pressing * Expulsion (education) * Expulsion from the United States Congress * Extradition * Forced migration * Ostracism * Perso ...

after World War II, many Germans from Swabian Turkey were expelled from their homes and replaced with Hungarians evicted from Czechoslovakia; the remaining Germans were often persecuted by the

Communist Communism (from Latin la, communis, lit=common, universal, label=none) is a far-left sociopolitical, philosophical, and economic ideology and current within the socialist movement whose goal is the establishment of a communist society, a s ...

government. After the fall of communism in 1989, the Danube Swabians received minority rights, organisations, schools, and local councils and maintained their own regional dialect of German. However, the Germans are gradually being assimilated.

References

* Krallert, Wilfried. ''Atlas zur Geschichte der deutschen Ostsiedlung.'' Bielefeld: Velhagen & Klasing, 1958.

External links

Swabian Turkey at Genealogy.net

Former German-inhabited villages in Swabian Turkey

Danube Swabian Resources
{{coord missing, Hungary German diaspora in Europe Danube Swabian communities Historical regions in the Kingdom of Hungary

Background

Settlement

Post-World War II

See also

References

External links