Who are the Croats?

Originally posted by Mixcoatl Croats are a South-Slavic ethnicity. Croats are closely related to Serbs, though Croats and Serbs are bitter enemies. They are so closely related they can easily claim that half the other nations is in fact theirs. Perhaps Croats and Serbs are exactly the same people, who coincidentally have a different religion and writing system.

 

Exactly!!!

as they are very similar the Croats with a great help of Catholic Church and Catholic Austria-Hungary converted many Serbs to Croatdom and occupied 50% of Serb ethnic lands!

It is probably to be understood that the current names of the Serbs and Croats were by origin Iranic, but they themselves were always speakers of what has become southern Slavic.   The earliest attestations of these names have be found in the Ukraine during the Roman period when the region was inhabited by the Sarmatians, an Iranic-speaking group of tribes.  These very names were also found in regions inhabited by western Slavs in Poland and eastern Germany.  Thus we had a White Croatia on the southern Vistula (southern Poland), and a White Serbia on the middle Elbe. 

One of the current theories is that Iranic groups, such as the Alans imposed themselves on the early Slavs and gave names of subtribes to some of these Slavs.  The Antes, another group of Slavs seem to have had a name directly tied to the Alans, themselves.  The Chinese knew of one of the eastern Alanic groups as Antsai. 

When the Huns invaded the Ukraine the Alans joined them in conquering the Empire of the Ostrogoths.  When the Huns were said to have conquered the greater part of eastern Europe, we do in fact find Sarmatian artefacts spread throughout eastern Europe at this time.  It is thus surmised that the Huns appointed the Alans to govern the Slavs of those regions, and thus "western" Croats and Serbs (Sorbs) are found in other parts of eastern Europe, while "eastern" groups remained behind.  Those western groups would later become components of the Polabian and Polish Slavs.

When the Avars conquered most of the Byzantine Illyrian provinces they brought along with them the eastern Slavs.  One of these groups, however, the Croats were said to have originated from White Croatia.  The legend behind this migration does not mention that they were forced into Avar Illyria but rather that when they migrated into Illyria they battled the Avars but ultimately submitted.  The Serbs, on the other hand, seemed to have arrived later.  The Byzantine evidence seems to mark their arrival in the reign of Heraclius, sometime between 610 and 630 and which were settled by the emperor in the southern buffer zone between the Avars and the Byzantines.  In about the latter year, the Croats gained their independence from the Avars.   

With two strong groups of Slavs (or Irano-Slavs) settled on the heels of the first Slavs, it becomes understandable how those two groups were able to impose their names on the mass of the southern Slavs which first settled Illyria.  Those mostly unnamed Illyrian Slavs were apparently one people, speaking one language.  The Serbs and Croats on the other hand originated from different regions, and apparently their migrations weren't large-scale.  It would have become inevitable that while these two strong groups were able to impose their names on the Illyrian Slavs, they inevitably were assimilated by those Illyrian Slavs and adopted their dialect or language. 

 those are bullsh*ts and nonsense , it is well known that 90 % of bosnian serbs are ortdodox converted croats , serbs have never ruled western of drina.

drinu cemo pregaziti a srbiju zapaliti  - hrvatska do zemuna