Concept

Zvezdara

Summary
Zvezdara (Звездара, zv̞ě̞zdara) is a municipality of the city of Belgrade. The municipality is geographically hilly and with many forests. According to the 2022 census results, the municipality has a population of 172,625 inhabitants. The municipality of Zvezdara is located east of Belgrade and occupied almost the entire eastern urban section of the city. It borders the municipalities of Palilula on the north-west, north and north-east, Grocka on the east and south-east, Voždovac on the south and south-west and Vračar on the west. Historically, Zvezdara hill was known as Great Vračar. Vračаr area at that time occupied much wider area that it does today and was divided into West Vračar, East Vračar and Great Vračar. Turkish source from 1621 describes it as "a hill and a big field". In the 17th and 18th century, the area was covered in vineyards, orchards and lush oriental gardens, a major excursion ground for the wealthy Belgrade Turks which called the hill Ekmekluk (Turkish ekmek, meaning bread) and built their summer houses there. The Ekmekluk occupied the slope which today spreads from the observatory to the Cvetko Market. When Belgrade was occupied in 1717 by Austria, a defense moat was built whose outer section crossed the hill, where the modern Volgina street is today. After Austria re-occupied Belgrade in 1789, the trench was reconstructed by the general Ernst Gideon von Laudon and became known as the "Laudan trench" (Serbian: Laudanov šanac or simply Šanac). Due to the military importance of the hill, its gardens were neglected. Until the 1930s, the Zvezdara hill was known as Veliki Vračar (Great Vračar). In the 19th century the foothills were not urbanized and, being far from the city center, were used by the Belgraders as a resort and picnic area, named Baba Ružin kraj ("Grandma Ruža's neighborhood"). In 1929-32 an observatory designed by Czech-born architect Jan Dubový (1892–1969) was built on top of the hill. The observatory was originally called zvezdara ("star-house") in Serbian, so the hill and the developing suburban area of Belgrade around it was named that way soon.
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