Skip to main content

10 Famous... Croats

Someone reminded me the other day that I had not done a 10 Famous... Croatians.

Rather a surprise, since Croatia is a place where I have many friends and also a place which I have visited probably more often than anywhere in Europe, apart from the Baltic and Poland.

Apart from being a spectacularly beautiful country it is also home to 4 million of the most individualistic and passionate people in Europe. The near fanaticism with which they view the sporting world means that I could simply make a list of sportsmen and women and many Croats would probably consider that would be enough! The country of Zvonimir Boban, Goran Ivanisevic, of Cibona for basketball or Hajduk or Dynamo for football certainly provides plenty of sporting heroes.

The European Union is certainly going to be a more interesting and probably more fun place with the accession of Croatia, which will hopefully take place within the next couple of years.

In the end though, after careful thought, I have with difficulty narrowed down the list to ten. I have probably offended all my many Croat friends, but I am sure that they will convey their personal selections to me in the distinct and determined way that Croats do- which is why I have such affection for them.

1. Andrija Mohorovicic- The pioneer of seismology, after whom the "Moho" discontinuity is named
2. Leopold Ruzicka- Winner of the Nobel Prize for Chemistry for his discoveries in hormones, mentor of Vladimir Prelog
3. Miroslav Krleza- A writer against tyranny- and possibly the greatest writer in Croatian.
4. Stjepan Radic- Courageous leader of the dispossessed Croatians- assassinated on the floor of the Yugoslav Parliament
5. Janica Kostelic- The greatest female skier of her generation- winner of six Olympic medals and five world championships.
6. Marko Polo- the first western explorer of China- most likely from the isle of Korcula, then part of the Venetian Republic.
7. Josip Broz, Tito- heroic Partizan leader, milder Communist than most
8. Ban Josip Jelacic- Successful general and campaigner for Croatian rights under the Austrian Empire
9. Ivan Mestrovic- Superb religious sculptor, mentor of Oscar Nemon
10. Tomislav- First King of a unified Croatia after he defeated the Hungarians and the Bulgarians

Labels

Labels:

Comments

Joe Otten said…
Not forgetting golden boot winner Davor Suker.
11:54 am
Nenad Bach said…
Dear Cicero,

This is just a starting point. Thank you for your compliments and you are right... individualistic ones. We are learning how to act collectively, more and more.

Here is the link to the street names in an analysis by prof.dr. Slaven Letica on CROWN Croatian World Network, which may give you another perspective of fame in Croatians

http://www.croatia.org/crown/articles/9663/1/Dr-Slaven-Letica-If-Streets-Could-Talk-Kad-bi-ulice-imale-dar-govora.html

You can find many interesting people on www.croatia.org from history and present times. Feel free to be in touch or even contribute.

Check as well www.croatianhistory.net and www.studiacroatica.org and www.croatia.org/forum

Svako dobro

Nenad Bach
letters[at]croatia.org
4:02 pm
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Concert and Blues

Tallinn is full tonight... Big concerts on at the Song field The Weeknd and Bonnie Tyler (!). The place is buzzing and some sixty thousand concert goers have booked every bed for thirty miles around Tallinn. It should be a busy high summer, but it isn´t. Tourism is down sharply overall. Only 70 cruise ships calling this season, versus over 300 before Ukraine. Since no one goes to St Pete, demand has fallen, and of course people think that Estonia is not safe. We are tired. The economy is still under big pressure, and the fall of tourism is a significant part of that. The credit rating for Estonia has been downgraded as the government struggles with spending. The summer has been a little gloomy, and soon the long and slow autumn will drift into the dark of the year. Yesterday I met with more refugees: the usual horrible stories, the usual tears. I try to make myself immune, but I can´t. These people are wounded in spirit, carrying their grief in a terrible cradling. I try to project hop...
Post a Comment
Read more

One Year On

  Head vabariigi iseseisvuspäeva! Happy Estonian Independence Day! It is one year since I stood outside the Estonian Parliament for the traditional raising of the national flag from Tall Hermann tower. Looking at the young fraternities gathered with their flags, I was very sure that Estonia too would soon be facing the aggression of the criminal Russian regime. A tragic and dark day. 5 eyes intelligence had been clear: an all out invasion was going to happen, and Putin´s goals included- and still include- "restoration" of Russian imperial power across Europe, even to the Atlantic. Yet there was one Western intelligence failure: we all underestimated the guts of the Ukrainian armed forces, the ZSU, and its President and people. One year on, Estonia, and indeed all the front line states against Russia, knows that Ukraine saved us. Estonia used that time to prepare itself, should that "delayed" onslaught ever be unleashed, but equally the determination of Kaja Kallas, ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Liberal Democrats v Conservatives: the battle in the blogosphere

It is probably fair to say that the advent of Nick Clegg, the new leader of the Liberal Democrats, has not been greeted with unalloyed joy by our Conservative opponents. Indeed, it would hardly be wrong to say that the past few weeks has seen some "pretty robust" debate between Conservative and Liberal Democrat bloggers. Even the Queen Mum of blogging, the generally genial Iain Dale seems to have been featuring as many stories as he can to try to show Liberal Democrats in as poor a light as possible. Neither, to be fair, has the traffic been all one way: I have "fisked' Mr. Cameron's rather half-baked proposals on health, and attacked several of the Conservative positions that have emerged from the fog of their policy making process. Most Liberal Democrats have attacked the Conservatives probably with more vigour even than the distrusted, discredited Labour government. So what lies behind this sharper debate, this emerging war in the blogosphere? Partly- in my ...
20 comments
Read more