ONE LAND · 14 ATLASES
History of Montenegro in maps
Montenegro as it appears in 14 interactive history atlases, from 264 BC to 2015: Illyricum, Zeta, Montenegro, Yugoslavia. Each era below lists who ruled the land and when control changed, linked to the dated map that shows it.
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What was Montenegro before it was Montenegro? Below, every era of this land in the Maps of History atlases — who ruled it, what it was called, and when control changed — each line linked to the dated map that shows it. Modern borders stand in as an honest approximation; every atlas says so on the map itself.
Illyricum (mod. Montenegro) · Ancient Rome
| 264 BC | Tribal peoples & confederations — the opening position |
| Roman territory |
ANCIENT ROME: EVERY CHAPTER AND MAP →
Montenegro · Norse and Aztecs
| Other peoples and states — the opening position |
NORSE AND AZTECS: EVERY CHAPTER AND MAP →
Zeta (mod. Montenegro) · Crusades
| Byzantium (and Latin Constantinople 1204–61) — the opening position |
CRUSADES: EVERY CHAPTER AND MAP →
Zeta (mod. Montenegro) · Mongol Empire
| Other settled powers (Jin China, Christendom, Delhi) — the opening position |
MONGOL EMPIRE: EVERY CHAPTER AND MAP →
Montenegro · Industrial Revolution
INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION: EVERY CHAPTER AND MAP →
Montenegro · Age of Revolutions
| Neutral / uncommitted — the opening position |
AGE OF REVOLUTIONS: EVERY CHAPTER AND MAP →
Yugoslavia (Montenegro) · Meiji Japan and post-Soviet Russia
| Non-aligned or stateless — the opening position |
MEIJI JAPAN AND POST-SOVIET RUSSIA: EVERY CHAPTER AND MAP →
Montenegro · WWI
Montenegro, Serbia’s tiny ally, fought from the first week, covered the Serbian retreat at Mojkovac in January 1916, and was occupied. King Nikola — Europe’s only reigning monarch to flee into exile and never return — was deposed in absentia by the disputed Podgorica Assembly of November 1918, which voted union with Serbia under Allied eyes and against armed “Greens” who fought the annexation into the 1920s. It ended the war absorbed into Yugoslavia — the only Allied state to disappear by winning.
Yugoslavia (Montenegro) · Stalin’s Soviet Union
Yugoslavia liberated itself, which explains its defiance. Tito’s partisans fought the German occupiers and their local allies from 1941 and took power in 1945 with little help from the Red Army. Tito was at first more radical than Stalin wished, but he would not take orders, and in June 1948 Yugoslavia was expelled from the Cominform. It survived Soviet pressure, accepted Western aid and built its own non-aligned communism, the first crack in the Soviet bloc.
| Nazi Germany & its allies — the opening position | |
| Nazi Germany & its allies | |
| Satellites & communist allies | |
| Other states |
STALIN’S SOVIET UNION: EVERY CHAPTER AND MAP →
Montenegro · Road to WW2
| Neutral & unaligned — the opening position | |
| Occupied — held by force |
ROAD TO WW2: EVERY CHAPTER AND MAP →
Montenegro · WW2
| Axis-occupied — the opening position | |
| Axis-occupied | |
| Soviet Union |
Montenegro · Cold War
| Soviet-aligned states — the opening position | |
| Communist, outside Moscow’s bloc | |
| In upheaval / changing sides | |
| Communist, outside Moscow’s bloc | |
| In upheaval / changing sides |
COLD WAR: EVERY CHAPTER AND MAP →
Yugoslavia (Montenegro) · Feminism and the Tunisian Revolution
| Refused: women excluded; ERA never ratified — the opening position | |
| Right won in law | |
| Partial or unequal; treaty signed only; transition | |
| No reform yet / outside this story | |
| Right won in law |
FEMINISM AND THE TUNISIAN REVOLUTION: EVERY CHAPTER AND MAP →
Yugoslavia (Montenegro) · Refugee crises
| Soviet-occupied or communist — the opening position |
REFUGEE CRISES: EVERY CHAPTER AND MAP →
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