Beograd

Beograd: see Belgrade, Serbia.

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Belgrade

 Serbian Beograd

City (pop., 2002: 1,120,092), capital of the republic of Serbia. Lying at the juncture of the Danube and Sava rivers, it is one of the Balkans' most important commercial and transportation centres. Inhabited by Celts in the 4th century BC, it was later taken by the Romans and named Singidunum. It was destroyed by Huns in the 5th century. In the 11th century it became a frontier town of Byzantium and in the 13th century came under the rule of Serbia. The Ottoman Empire besieged the city in the 15th century, and the forces of Süleyman I finally took it in 1521; it was held almost continuously by the Turks into the 19th century. It became the capital of the kingdom of Serbia in 1867 and, after World War I, of the new Kingdom of Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes (renamed Yugoslavia in 1929). It suffered severely under Nazi occupation (1941–44). It was damaged by NATO bombers in the Kosovo conflict (1999). When federal Yugoslavia fragmented in the 1990s, Belgrade remained the administrative centre of the rump Yugoslav state, which changed its name to Serbia and Montenegro in 2003; the constituent republics became independent countries in 2006.