April 16, 2018
April 16
In 2003 The Treaty of Accession was signed in Athens. On May 1 2004, when the treaty entered into force, this meant the largest enlargement of the European Union so far. Ten Eastern European countries joined the Union, among them, Slovenia.
Julio Reis, Kolja 21, Creative Commons, CC BY-SA 2.5
April 17
In 1952 the career criminal Željko “Arkan” Ražnatović was born in Brežice, into a military family. Moving around Socialist Yugoslavia, Ražnatović landed in a juvenile detention center near Belgrade for the first time in 1966 for stealing women’s purses, and in 1969 he was repatriated from France due to several burglaries. He soon became a protegee of Stane Dolanc, a chief of the Yugoslav secret police and family friend, which protected him from the law and hence allowed him to fully develop into a professional criminal. Eventually his involvement in the Balkan War led Arkan to be indicted on 24 charges of crimes against humanity, although this only became public after his assassination on January 15 in 2000 in the lobby of a hotel in Belgrade. He was married to Svetlana Ražnatović Ceca, Serbia’s most popular turbo-folk singer.
Arkan and his "Tigers", posing to the war photographer Ron Haviv with a tiger cub
April 18
In 1941 Ljubljana’s most famous mayor, Ivan Hribar, drowned after the city was occupied by Italian forces. He became mayor in 1896, a year after the earthquake devastated the city. He is known for renovating the city and introducing much novel infrastructure such as an aqueduct, electric plant, gas plant, electric railway, first public bathhouse and Dragon Bridge. Hribar committed suicide at the age of 90 while coming from a meeting with the Italian Fascists who had just asked him to run the city for them.
Hribarjevo nabrežje, a place where he jumped into the river wrapped into a Yugoslav flag, is named after him.
Hribarjevo nabrežje, Ljubljana
April 19
In 1911 Ivan Grohar died in Ljubljana. Among the four Slovenian masters of impressionism (Rihard Jakopič, Matej Sternen, Matija Jama in Ivan Grohar) Grohar was the most famous. Born in 1867, Grohar died from tuberculosis at just 43 years old.
Ivan Grohar, The Sower (1907)
April 20
In 1713 Pragmatic Sanction of 1713 was issued by Hapsburg Emperor Charles VI, which allowed for women to succeed the thrown if there was no male heir. The Sanction allowed his daughter Maria Theresia to gain the throne following his death in 1740.
April 21
In 2001 the Slovenian national ice hockey team won 16:0 against Estonia in Tivoli Hall in Ljubljana, and thus qualified for the first time for the World Ice Hockey Championship.
April 22
In 1878 Zofka Kveder, one of the first Slovenian female writers, was born. Her first book, Mystery of a Woman (Misterij Žene) was published in 1900. In her books, which she wrote in several languages, including German and Czech, she mostly dealt with social and women’s issues.
