History · Montenegro

Montenegro: The Black Mountain

A highland redoubt the Ottomans never held, ruled for centuries by warrior prince-bishops — a kingdom, then part of Yugoslavia, then in 2006 the last piece of it to become independent

By Worldlore Editorial · 19 September 2026

A hand-coloured historic print of a small town of low red-roofed houses on a flat valley floor, walled in by bare grey limestone mountains
Cetinje seen from the west in a photochrom print made between 1890 and 1900, from the Library of Congress collection — the old capital on its small plain, ringed by bare mountains. (Photochrom Print Collection, Library of Congress / Wikimedia Commons · Public domain)

A country made by its mountains

Montenegro is a small, extremely mountainous country on the Adriatic — "Crna Gora", the Black Mountain, after the dark forests of Mount Lovćen. It has about 620,000 people, a divided sense of national identity, and a history shaped almost entirely by its terrain: a highland core around the old capital of Cetinje that the Ottoman Empire, which conquered the rest of the Balkans, was never able to hold.

A short history

  1. 11th–12th centuries

    Zeta

    A medieval Serbian principality, briefly a kingdom.

  2. 1493

    The Crnojević press

    One of the world's first state printing presses, at Cetinje.

  3. c. 1516–1852

    The prince-bishops

    Montenegro is a warrior theocracy under Orthodox vladike.

  4. 1830–1851

    Njegoš

    The poet-bishop writes "The Mountain Wreath".

  5. 1852

    Secular rule

    Danilo I becomes a secular prince.

  6. 1878

    Independence

    Recognised at the Congress of Berlin; the state doubles in size.

  7. 1910

    Kingdom

    Nikola I declares himself king.

  8. 1918

    Union with Serbia

    Montenegro loses its dynasty and its statehood.

  9. 1945

    A Yugoslav republic

    The smallest of the six.

  10. 2006

    Independence

    Restored by referendum, the last exit from Yugoslavia.

The redoubt

The medieval principality of Zeta, in what is now Montenegro, was part of the Serbian world; after the collapse of the medieval Serbian empire it was held by local noble houses. The last of them, the Crnojevići, set up a capital at Cetinje and, in 1493, one of the earliest state printing presses in the world. As the Ottomans overran the Balkans, the Crnojevići retreated into the mountains around Cetinje, which became a fastness.

The theocracy

A whitewashed Orthodox monastery with a bell tower, tucked against a bare grey mountainside at Cetinje
Cetinje Monastery, the centre of the Montenegrin prince-bishopric. For over three centuries Montenegro was ruled by celibate Orthodox bishops, the office passing from uncle to nephew. (Desemeus / Wikimedia Commons)
A stark stone mausoleum on a high mountain summit, wrapped in cloud
The mausoleum of Petar II Petrović-Njegoš on Mount Lovćen. The poet-bishop's 1847 epic 'The Mountain Wreath' is a founding text of Montenegrin and Serbian literature. (Ingo Mehling / Wikimedia Commons)

From about 1516 Montenegro was governed by Orthodox prince-bishops — a theocracy over a tribal, clan-based warrior society living by herding, raiding and near-constant war with the Ottomans. The office became hereditary in the Petrović-Njegoš family from the 1690s.

Principality and Kingdom

Danilo I secularised the throne in 1852. Under Nikola I, who reigned from 1860 to 1918, Montenegro roughly doubled in size, gained a stretch of Adriatic coast, was recognised as fully independent at the Congress of Berlin in 1878, and was declared a kingdom in 1910.

A formal portrait of King Nikola I of Montenegro in a decorated uniform
King Nikola I, who married his daughters into the royal houses of Italy, Russia and Serbia. Montenegro joined the Allies in 1914 and was overrun by Austria-Hungary in 1916. (Wikimedia Commons)

Yugoslavia

At the end of the First World War, a contested assembly at Podgorica voted to depose the Petrović dynasty and unite Montenegro unconditionally with Serbia, inside the new Yugoslavia. This split Montenegrins into "Whites", who saw themselves as Serbs and backed the union, and "Greens", who wanted a restored Montenegrin state; a Green uprising in early 1919 was suppressed. Montenegro lost its dynasty, its statehood and, for a time, its name.

Socialist Yugoslavia after 1945 made Montenegro one of its six republics and recognised a distinct Montenegrin nation — a decision that is still argued over. The old capital, Cetinje, was eclipsed by the industrialised Titograd, now Podgorica.

Independence

When Yugoslavia broke up, Montenegro's leaders stayed loyal to Serbia and Slobodan Milošević, and Montenegrin forces took part in the 1991 shelling of Dubrovnik, for which Montenegro later apologised. From the late 1990s, Milo Đukanović — who would dominate Montenegrin politics for some 30 years — broke with Milošević and steered the country toward independence.

A crowd celebrating with Montenegrin flags in the streets after the 2006 referendum
Celebrations after the 21 May 2006 referendum, in which 55.5 per cent voted for independence, just above the threshold the EU had set. Montenegro became independent on 3 June 2006 — the last piece of the former Yugoslavia to leave, apart from Kosovo. (Marko M. / Wikimedia Commons)

Montenegro joined NATO in 2017, over fierce Russian objection and an alleged Russian-backed coup plot, and is now the front-runner for EU membership. In 2020 the long-ruling party lost power for the first time, and in 2023 Đukanović finally lost the presidency, ending his era.

What Montenegro carries

Montenegro's identity was forged in the mountains, in centuries of resistance to the Ottomans under prince-bishops who were also warlords and, in Njegoš's case, a great poet. That heritage is shared with Serbia — the faith, the language, the epic tradition — which is why Montenegro's central modern question is whether it is a nation in its own right or a variant of the Serbian one. The 2006 vote answered it for the state; the society is still divided.

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