Slovakia History

Orava Castle

It was the Celts who had settled down in modern day Slovakia back in 500 BC. The Slavic tribes settled in Slovakia about the 6th century and it was during the 7th century that Slovakia became the very heart of Samo’s Empire. But during the next century grew the Principality of Nitra which was a Slavic state and it was at this time that the first Christian church was built in Slovakia.

Later on it was this principality and the neighboring Moravia that joined to form the very core of the great and the famous Moravian Empire. It was earlier into the 10th century that even the Moravian Empire disintegrated and it was then the Hungarians added this present territory along with their own region.

Slovakia became less and less important during the 17th century when the Turks gradually began to withdraw from Hungary. Back in the year 1918 Slovakia along with parts of Moravia and Bohemia formed Czechoslovakia and in the following year when slovakia was attacked by the Hungarian Soviet Republic a third of Slovakia became the Slovak Soviet Republic temporarily.

It was in the year 1939 that under the severe pressure of Nazi Germany, the first Slovak Republic declared itself to be independent from Czechoslovakia. A lot of bloodshed followed this event and most of the Jewish population of Slovakia was sent to the German concentration camps. It was in 1993 that Slovakia separated from Czech Republic and in the year 2004 Slovakia became a member of NATO as well as of the European Union.