Over-time Population Changes in Lika Province (Udbina Area), Croatia

The book Udbina i njena sela (Udbina and her villages), provides some information on the Serbian Orthodox population in the area around Udbina (including Kurjak).  The book is set up with each village getting a chapter.  The information in this post is drawn from those chapters.

A few things are worth noting before presenting the data.  First, the population data is drawn from lots of sources.  From what I can tell it was not necessarily collected as part of systematic censuses.  Second, we are missing some data that would be really interesting (e.g., populations before and after WWII).  Third, the purpose of the book is to specifically track the Serbian Orthodox population, not the Croatian Catholic population.  This is important because in the 1990s conflict, both groups in the area were displaced by the other group at one point (first the Croatians and then the Serbs).  While the data shows the rise and decline of the Serbian population in the area, the conflicts and other forces have also negatively affected the ethnic Croatian population.  The area is still very much in disrepair.

Now the data...

Here is a "map" that shows the rough location of the villages that were covered in the book.  The locations are based on the latitude and longitude of the villages (as given in Bing maps). Kurjak and Komich are in the southwestern corner of the area.

The Location of Villages from Udbina i njena sela

Here is a graph that tracks the population changes over time in these villages.  The earliest record is from around 1600 and the figure ends in 1995, before the military operations in August 1995 (I cover the changes following 1995 below).  Each figure in the line represents a separate village.  

Change in the Population of the Villages Over Time

Between 1700 and 1900 there was a clear upward growth with lots of the villages going from 500 people to closer to 2,000.   Since the late 1800's there has been a clear decline.  It would be great to have more data points in order to see exactly when that occurred.  I might try to track that down on my own later...  I am interested to know how much occurred because of immigration in the early 1900s (including Andrew and Jovo!) and how much was because of the deaths and displacement during WWII.

The one part of the book that is systematic is the number of people who were living in the villages prior to August 1, 1995, and the number who returned afterwards.  Again, I think the data in the book is just focused on the Serb population.  As the numbers show, there was a massive decline in the Serbian population.  Here is a graph that just shows the population decline across all of the villages (each line representing a different village):

Here's another way of showing the same data.  In this case, each the villages has two circles.  The circles are meant to display the size of the population pre- and post- the 1995 cut point.  The larger circle is the population pre-conflict, and the smaller circle is the population post-conflict.  Here are two pictures, one with the city names labeled and one without the labels so you can see the change between the two circles:

Komich, which is where Stana (Andrew's mom) came from, is one of the cities that was hit the hardest.  Based on my visit to there, Komich really has seen better days.  But really all of the villages have had a hard time.  The Serb population in these villages was around 3,750 pre-1995 and, according to the book, dropped down to around just 550 (so only about 15% of the pre-conflict size).

Finally, here's the raw data that I gleaned from the book (again, this is based on my reading of the Serbian, so I may have missed a few things...):

City	Year	Households	Population
Choiljuk	1995	13
Choiljuk	1996	5
Joshan	1712		589
Joshan	1880	176	1842
Joshan	1883	173	1933
Joshan	1897		2474
Joshan	1995	86	257
Joshan	1996	37	62
Klapavitse	1995	23	69
Klapavitse	1996	3	4
Komich	1712		386
Komich	1880	112	1150
Komich	1883	115	1186
Komich	1897		1514
Komich	1995	90	540
Komich	1996	7	9
Krchana	1995	14	49
Krchana	1996	1	2
Kurjak	1995	49	201
Kurjak	1996	10	26
Mekinjar	1712		632
Mekinjar	1995	106	346
Mekinjar	1996	12	25
Mutilich	1605		327
Mutilich	1712		496
Mutilich	1880	191	1677
Mutilich	1897		1897
Mutilich	1995	35	112
Mutilich	1996	15	36
Ondich	1995	34	124
Ondich	1996	10	15
Podlapacha	1834	100	1295
Podubina	1995	16	60
Podubina	1996	5	8
Politse	1995	40	180
Politse	1996	3	6
Rebich	1995	23	53
Rebich	1996	4	10
Srednja Gora	1880	148	1539
Srednja Gora	1883	148	1547
Srednja Gora	1897		1794
Srednja Gora	1995	80	240
Srednja Gora	1996	17	27
Svarchkovo Selo	1880	199	1640
Svarchkovo Selo	1883	215	1684
Svarchkovo Selo	1897		2403
Svarchkovo Selo	1995	72	208
Svarchkovo Selo	1996	11	22
Tolich	1995	21	51
Tolich	1996	2	3
Udbina	1712		527
Udbina	1995	293	956
Udbina	1996	63	155
Visuch	1712		633
Visuch	1880	168	1744
Visuch	1883	168	1893
Visuch	1995	113	320
Visuch	1996	55	140