Page 254 - Encyclopedia Of World History

604 berkshire encyclopedia of world history

Estonia EASTERN EUROPE
Sea Latvia Moscow in 2004
North B altic
Sea Lithuania
Russia
Russia
Belarus
Poland
Warsaw
Kiev Don R.
Prague
Czech Dnieper R.
Republic Ukr aine
Slovakia
Budapest Moldova Caspian Sea
Hungary Sea of
Azov
Romania
Croatia
Belgrade
Bosnia- Danu be R.
Herzegovina Serbia & Black Sea
Montenegro
Bulgaria
Macedonia
Albania

the region: is it an integral part of democratic, capitalist nomic instability, authoritarian politics, and nationalist
Europe, or an area that is “less European”—culturally, tensions.
economically, politically—than its western neighbors?
Defined as the eighteen post-Communist states among Geography and Population
Russia, Germany and Austria, and Italy, Eastern Europe Eastern Europe has no definite geographic boundaries.
is a region of 191 million people and over thirty ethno- The North European Plain stretches from northern
linguistic groups. Diversity of languages, cultures, and France across Poland, the Baltics, and Belarus, and into
religions is a primary characteristic of this region: the the Eurasian steppe. A spine of mountains—running
product of centuries of migrations, interregional trade, from the Alps, through southern Germany and the Czech
expansion of religions, and imperial conquest.These in- lands, to the Carpathians—separates the North European
teractions have had a remarkable influence on the re- and Hungarian plains. South of the Danube, criss-
gion’s history and culture, evident in the painted churches crossing chains of mountains divide the region into
of Romania and the architecture of Dubrovnik, the dis- remote valleys. Coastal areas are limited. The principal
coveries of Nicolaus Copernicus (a Pole) and Nikola Tesla navigable rivers—the Oder, Vistula, Dnieper, Dniester,
(a Serb), the music of Bartók and writings of Kafka, and and Danube—flow to enclosed seas (the Baltic and the
the moral philosophies of Václav Havel and John Paul II. Black). South of the Danube, there are no major water-
Yet, the meeting of these various cultural currents in East- ways, and the Adriatic coast is separated from the arid
ern Europe has had devastating consequences as well. interior by the Dinaric Alps.
The Thirty Years’ War (1618–1648) began in Eastern Riverine and maritime transportation have not been
Europe (in the Czech lands), as did the World Wars I and decisive factors in Eastern Europe’s history, compared to
II. The decades of Communist rule (1947–1991) dam- the western part of the continent; the overland movement
aged the region’s economies, societies, and the environ- of peoples, goods, and ideas has been the essential fac-
ment, and still today Eastern Europe is plagued by eco- tor in the region’s development. As the trunk connecting