Balkan Peninsula

a peninsula in S Europe, S of the Danube River and bordered by the Adriatic, Ionian, Aegean, and Black seas.

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Peninsula, southeastern Europe.

Located between the Adriatic Sea, the Mediterranean Sea, and the Aegean and Black seas, it contains many countries, including Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Macedonia, Serbia and Montenegro, Romania, Bulgaria, Albania, Greece, and European Turkey. From 168 BC to AD 107, part of the area was incorporated into Roman provinces, including Epirus, Moesia, Pannonia, Thrace, and Dacia. It was subsequently settled by Slavic invaders, Serbs, Croats, Slovenes, and Slavonized Bulgars, the last of whom were pushed into the Balkan region in the 6th century. It was gradually organized into kingdoms, many of which were overrun by the Ottoman Turks in the 14th–15th century. The factional strife that occurred there from the early 20th century, provoking the continual breakups and regroupings of different states, introduced the word balkanize into English.

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