Croatia is administratively divided into 20 counties and the City of Zagreb, which has the status of a county. Each county has particular competence for general education, health, land use, economic development, transport and its infrastructure, and the development of educational and cultural institutions.

With 13 entries on UNESCO's Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity, Croatia is, with Spain, the European country with the highest number of entries.

Detail in Croatian Glagolitic of the Reims Gospel (1395), also known as “Texte du Sacre”, upon which the kings of France were wont to swear their coronation oath. It is kept in the Carnegie Library in Reims (France).

Neptune's Fountain at the Trsteno Arboretum, founded in 1498 and the oldest arboretum in the world. According to the World Tourism Organization, with nearly 9.9 million foreign tourists in 2011, Croatia was the 6th Mediterranean tourist destination after France, Spain, Italy, Turkey and Greece.

The Baška Tablet, one of the earliest preserved written monuments in Croatian, dated about 1100. This white limestone tablet, which measures 199 x 99.5 x 9 cm, contains the first mention of the word Croatia in Croatian – in the title given to Zvonimir, 'king of the Croats'.

Major companies

In Croatia there are several large companies under private ownership which play a significant role in foreign trade. Some of them are significant technological innovators ...

Contemporary Croatia

The process of the emergence of the contemporary state of Croatia began with the crisis in Communism in Eastern Europe in the late 1980s, the strengthening of democratic movements and the restoration of multi-party systems. Such movements ...

Emergence of Croatia

The first Slavic tribes arrived in the area which is modern-day Croatia in the 6th and 7th centuries, during the Migration Period. Among them were the Croats, who are mentioned in sources in connection with a wider area, but were ethnically most ...

Did you know?

The tie (cravat), today an essential fashion accessory for men and women, was named after an item in the uniform of Croatian soldiers during the Thirty Years War? As part of their uniform, they tied an eye-catching length of fabric around their necks ...

Climate

Thanks to its position in the moderate climate belt along the 45th parallel, Croatia enjoys a predominantly moderate climate, with four clearly marked seasons. Local climate differences are determined primarily by the diversity of the relief ...

Music

The coexistence of two types of performance in Croatian ecclesiastical music was the outcome of medieval European culture: Gregorian chant (preserved in the late 11th century Neum Codex) developed in Dalmatia and Istria into ...

Judicial power

Judicial power is exercised by the courts, which are autonomous and independent. According to the law, bodies of state authority are obliged to protect the Constitution and laws confirmed by the legal order of the Republic of Croatia and to guarantee the uniform ...

Croatia in brief

Croatia has been present on the contemporary international political stage since its independence from the Yugoslav Federation, i.e. for a little over two decades, but in terms of history and culture, is one of the oldest European countries ...