Sandžak
geographical region in Serbia and Montenegro
Sandžak (Serbian: Санџак; Bosnian: Sandžak) is a historical and geo-political region in the Balkans, located in the southwestern part of Serbia and the eastern part of Montenegro. The Bosnian/Serbian term Sandžak derives from the Sanjak of Novi Pazar, a former Ottoman administrative district founded in 1865. Sandžak is inhabited by a majority of ethnic Bosniaks.
Various empires and kingdoms have ruled over the region. In the 12th century, Sandžak was part of the region of Raška under the medieval Serbian Kingdom. During the Ottoman territorial expansion into the western Balkans in a series of wars, the region became an important administrative district, with Novi Pazar as its administrative center. Sandžak was under Austro-Hungarian occupation between 1878 and 1909 as a garrison, until an agreement between Austria-Hungary and the Ottoman Empire resulted in the withdrawal of Austro-Hungarian troops from Sandžak in exchange for full control over Bosnia. In 1912, it was divided between the Kingdom of Montenegro and the Kingdom of Serbia.
Novi Pazar serves as Sandžak's economic and cultural center and is the region's most populous city. Sandžak has a diverse and complex ethnic and religious composition, with significant Eastern Orthodox, Roman Catholic, and Sunni Muslim populations.
The public source identifies “Sandžak” as geographical region in Serbia and Montenegro. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Sandžak, geographical and region.
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Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 17, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q579132. VIAF identifies the subject as 242274358. Authority coordinates are 43.163, 19.775. 1 of 2 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1865, 1878, 1909 and 1912.
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This entry incorporates text from “Sandžak” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.