Darda

Darda is a village and a municipality just north of Osijek, Croatia. It is located across the Drava river in Baranja. The population of the village is 5,394, with a total of 7,062 people in the municipality.

Name
In Hungarian the town is known as Dárda, in German as Lanzenau, and in Serbian Cyrillic as Дарда.

History
It was first mentioned in the end of 13th and beginning of 14th century as "Tarda". During the Hungarian administration (13th-16th century), the area was part of the Baranya county. In the 16th-17th century, area was part of the Ottoman Empire and administratively belonged to the Sanjak of Mohaç. Ottoman traveler Evliya Çelebi in 1663 described Darda as an important market place with a strong fortress with towers. According to Çelebi, fortified part of the settlement had 50 houses and one mosque, while part of the settlement outside of the walls had one han and ten shops.

Since the end of the 17th century, area was part of the Habsburg Monarchy and administratively belonged to the Baranya county, which was part of the Habsburg Kingdom of Hungary. Darda was administratively included into the municipality of Branjin Vrh and in 1850 offices of local administration of this municipality were moved to Darda. In the end of the 18th century, Darda was an multi-ethnic settlement, mainly populated by Croats and Germans. In 1910, population included Germans, Croats and Hungarians.

Since 1918, Darda part of the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes (later renamed to Yugoslavia). From 1918 to 1922, it was part of the Novi Sad county, from 1922 to 1929 part of the Bačka Oblast, and from 1929 to 1941 part of the Danube Banovina. From 1941 to 1944, it was occupied by Hungary and was administratively included into Baranya county. It was returned to Yugoslav control in 1944 and was administratively part of Vojvodina until 1945, when it was transferred to the People's Republic of Croatia.

During the Croatian War of Independence (1991–1995), Darda was incorporated, along with some other towns, into the unrecognized breakaway Republic of Serbian Krajina. It was returned to Croatian control after the war, following the short period of UN administration (1996–1998).

The small percentage of Romanians that live in Darda, or surrounding villages, call themselves Roma simply because mostly Croats and Serbs have called them Gipsies for the last 100 years and they accepted the fact that they are Roma when in reality they don't speak a word of Roma. They are in fact of Romanian ancestry and Romanian language is the one they use day-to-day.

Geography
The municipality of Darda includes following settlements:
 * Darda (population 5,394)
 * Mece
 * Švajcarnica
 * Uglješ

Demographics
Largest ethnic groups in the municipality are (census 2001):
 * Croats (51.87%)
 * Serbs (28.43%)
 * Hungarians (8.23%)
 * Romani (0.19%)
 * Romanians (5.2%)