Banat

Home of the Danube Swabians for over 200 years

The old (“undivided”) Banat comprises areas of present-day western Romania, north-eastern Serbia, and southern Hungary, with a total area of 11,013 square miles. It was an Ottoman province from 1552 to 1718, when it became part of Habsburg Austria. Planned colonization by the Habsburg emperors brought large numbers of German settlers from the western regions of the Empire to the Banat. By 1910 there were 388,000 ethnic Germans (locally called Swabians, later Danube Swabians) in the undivided Banat. By the Treaty of Trianon (1920) about two-thirds of the Banat became Romanian; almost a third became Serbian/Yugoslavian; only a small area around Szeget remained within Hungary. 

BANAT COORDINATORS:  Nick Tullius –  Alex Leeb –  Jody McKim Pharr

Last updated: 07/26/2025