Happy TravellerWelcome to Sarajevo, the capital and largest city of Bosnia and Herzegovina. With a population of 275,524 in its administrative limits and 555,210 in the Sarajevo metropolitan area, this city is a prominent center of culture in the Balkans. Sarajevo is surrounded by the Dinaric Alps and situated along the Miljacka River in the heart of the Balkans, a region of Southern Europe. Due to its long history of religious and cultural diversity, Sarajevo is sometimes called the Jerusalem of Europe or Jerusalem of the Balkans. It is one of a few major European cities to have a mosque, Catholic church, Eastern Orthodox church, and synagogue within the same neighborhood.
Sarajevo has a rich history that dates back to ancient times. One of the earliest findings of settlement in the Sarajevo area is that of the Neolithic Butmir culture. The discoveries at Butmir were made on the grounds of the modern-day Sarajevo suburb Ilidža in 1893 by Austro-Hungarian authorities during the construction of an agricultural school. The areas richness in flint was attractive to Neolithic humans, and the settlement flourished. The settlement developed unique ceramics and pottery designs, which characterize the Butmir people as a unique culture.
During the Middle Ages, Sarajevo was part of the Bosnian province of Vrhbosna near the traditional center of the Kingdom of Bosnia. Though a city named Vrhbosna existed, the exact settlement in Sarajevo at this time is debated. Various documents note a place called Tornik in the region, most likely in the area of the Marijin Dvor neighborhood. By all indications, Tornik was a very small marketplace surrounded by a proportionally small village, and was not considered very important by Ragusan merchants. Other scholars say that Vrhbosna was a major town in the wider area of modern-day Sarajevo. Papal documents say that in 1238, a cathedral dedicated to Saint Paul was built in the area. Disciples of the notable saints Cyril and Methodius stopped in the region, founding a church near Vrelo Bosne. Whether or not the town was somewhere in the area of modern-day Sarajevo, the documents attest to its and the regions importance.
Sarajevo has gained international renown several times throughout its history. In 1885, it was the first city in Europe and the second city in the world to have a full-time electric tram network running through the city, following San Francisco. In 1914, it was the site of the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand by a local Young Bosnia activist Gavrilo Princip, a murder that sparked World War I. This resulted in the end of Austro-Hungarian rule in Bosnia and the creation of the multicultural Kingdom of Yugoslavia in the Balkan region. Later, after World War II, the area was designated the capital of the communist Socialist Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina within the republic also known as Second Yugoslavia, leading to rapid expansion of its population and businesses with investment in infrastructure and economic development. In 1984 the socialist republic hosted the 1984 Winter Olympics, which marked a prosperous era for the city. However, after the start of the Yugoslav Wars, the city suffered the longest siege of a capital city in the history of modern warfare, for a total of 1,425 days, from April 1992 to February 1996. This was during the Bosnian War and the breakup of Yugoslavia, under nationalist ethnic passions that tore families apart and resulted in genocide and massacres.
With continued post-war reconstruction in the aftermath, Sarajevo is the fastest growing city in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The travel guide series Lonely Planet ranked Sarajevo as the 43rd best city in the world. In December 2009, it recommended Sarajevo as one of the top ten cities to visit in 2010. In 2011, Sarajevo was nominated as the 2014 European Capital of Culture. It was selected to host the European Youth Olympic Festival.
