Jabuka

Jabuka (Јабука) is a village in Serbia. It is situated in the Pančevo municipality, in the South Banat District, Vojvodina province.

Name

Name "Jabuka" means "apple" in Serbian. The Hungarian and German names for the village have same meaning. In Hungarian, the village was known as "Torontálalmás" ("Alma" means "apple" in Hungarian) and in German as "Apfeldorf" ("Apple village"). The German population called the village "Jabuka", named after a former destroyed village founded by Slavic fishermen; it was named "Apfeldorf" when the German army occupied the area in World War II.

History

The village was founded by Slavic fishermen in the end of 17th and beginning of the 18th century. They found a big apple tree and hence named their settlement "Jabuka" ("apple"). In the first half of the 18th century there were about 15 houses in the village. After the peace treaty with the Ottomans in 1726, Claudius Florimund Graf von Mercy, a man with Lorraine origin, took control of the administration of the Military Frontier. He ordered the inhabitants of Jabuka to be members of the border battalion (Grenzbezirkshauptmannschaft) Opovo - Pančevo. The census from 1733 recorded 19 Slavic (i.e. Serb) families in the village.

The small number of Serb border police was insufficient to control the border. Therefore the captain of the border police, Graf Engelshofer, called for reinforcement from Germany for the border settlements Jabuka, Glogonj, Sefkerin and Opovo at the Janitscharen insurgencies in 1755 - 1756. The German population started to settle here since 1764, and Hungarian since 1766. In the same year (1766), some Slavic inhabitants left Jabuka and settled in Crepaja and Dolovo. This old village named Jabuka was destroyed about 1770.

The new settlement was founded 11km north of Pančevo on the left side of the Tamiš river from 1772 - 1774 near the place of formerly destroyed old Jabuka. In 1774, the population of the village numbered 88 families and this was time when Romanians started to settle in the village. In 1789, many Serbs left Jabuka and settled in Sefkerin. The laying of the foundation stone of the Catholic church was on 14 November 1833, replacing the ramshackled former church. In 1901, the Romanians founded their Orthodox church dedicated to Saint Dimitrije.

In 1921, the population of the village numbered 3,265 inhabitants, including 2,918 Germans, 348 Romanians, 73 Hungarians, 20 Serbs and Croats, 2 Slovenes, 2 Russians, and 1 Englishman.

During the World War II, the village was under Axis occupation. After the defeat of Axis Powers, in 1944, all the remaining Germans of the village (2,109 people of German origin)became victim of excessive revenge of the Tito´s partisans. They were partially shot, tortured to death or sent to concentration camp in Rudolfsgnad Knićanin that existed until 1948.26 of them where shot on the 16 October 1944 in Pančevo, and 15 more where shot on the 15 November 1944 in Pančevo. 423 German civilians from Jabuka did not survive the concentration camp.

After the war, 571 families originating mostly from Kriva Palanka Macedonia, were brought to Jabuka. According to 1971 census, ethnic Macedonians comprised 61.48% of population.

Population

The village has a Serb ethnic majority and its population is 6,312 (2002 census). Besides Serbs (numbering 3,224 people), the village also have a large ethnic Macedonian minority (numbering 2,054 people). There are also members of other ethnic groups as well. Some people with German ancestors still live in the village (10-20). They were not sent to concentration camp in Knićanin like the rest of the German population that remained in the village after defeat of German army because they were married to Serbs.

ee also

*List of places in Serbia
*List of cities, towns and villages in Vojvodina
* [http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jabuka_(Banat)] German

External links

* [http://66.218.69.11/search/cache?p=jabuka+srbi&prssweb=Search&ei=UTF-8&fr=FP-pull-web-t&x=wrt&u=www.jabuka.org.yu/jabuka_s.htm&w=jabuka+srbi&d=RIQHw5IFNpWI&icp=1&.intl=us Jabuka]