Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
Although Croatia regained a large parts of its territories by the peace treaty of Srijemski
Karlovci (1699), it failed to get back some of its historical lands. That was, primarily, the area
between the Una and Vrbas rivers - the area between the new and the old border. A number
of cartographers, along with the new border drew in the old one as well. Some of the
examples are already discussed Vitezović's Map of the whole Kingdom of Croatia (1699)
(see Figure 4) and Müller's Map of Hungary (1709) [19]. There are cases where the
inscription, either a general one like “
Croatia”
, or a more specific one like “
Turkish Croatia”
cover the interfluves territory that is beyond the new actual border, but integral part of the
historical Croatian territory. On Weigl's Map (see Figure 3) for instance, the inscription
“
Croatia”,
regardless of the actual borderline, is written more easterly across the river Una,
over the Ottoman territory. Coronelli (1732) [19], although of different imperial and
cartographic affiliation, used the color, the line and the text to differ the interfluves from the
rest of Bosnia (Ottoman territory) as well as from the rest of Croatia, lying under the
inscription of
“Croacie
”. The example of Schimek's map of 1788 (Figure 6), representing
Viennese cartography, also shows the clear distinction of “
Turkisch Croatien
”.
There is quite a number of maps of different political backgrounds and cartographic
traditions that are equally sharing the same image of Turkish Croatia, i.e. J. von Reilly's map
(1790), map edited by Artaria and Comp. (1807), J. Szeman's map (1826), E. Zuchery's map
(1848), Halavanja's map (1851) [19, 20].
“Reading between the lines” and searching for metaphors will lead us to the perception of
temporality of border fluctuation in these centuries of their frequent changes. Consequently,
the territory of Turkish Croatia reveals an image of the interfluves as integral Croatian
territory in spite of the newly established border. This is an image of the new borderline as a
temporary condition in relation to the “real historical” border. The image include the
awareness of a temporality of the borders and understanding and appreciation of the
continuity of Croatian territoriality (Turkish
CROATIA;
emphasized by the author). At the
other hand, the image reveal the distinction of territorial otherness (
TURKISH
Croatia,
emphasized by the author) that is grounded in the distinction of “Turkish”/Muslim as Other
and the distinction of Christian Croatia versus Muslim Croatia. Thus, the image is pointing
out to the awareness of different religious identities of the twofold region.
The example of Turkish Croatia opens two levels of reading: old and new border as real
historical border versus temporary border; distinction of different religious and cultural
identities, Christian versus Muslim Croatia. The consciousness of the otherness and
uniqueness as related to the territoriality is leading to the creation of regional identity. These
elements are formative elements of regional identity and the regional concept in both
examples: in Morlacchia as well as in Turkish Croatia [11,16].
5.4. Reflections
Still, the development and reflection of these regional concepts are different. Turkish Croatia
has undergone the process of conceptual translation. By the mid 19
th
century it has changed
