| Slavic
ancestors of the present-day Slovenians settled
in the area in the 6th century. The Slavic Duchy
of Carantania was formed in the 7th century. In
745, Carantania lost its independence, being largely
subsumed into the Frankish empire. Many Slavs converted
to Christianity.
The Freising manuscripts,
the earliest surviving written documents in a
Slovenian dialect and the first ever Slavic document
in Latin script, were written around 1000. During
the 14th century, most of Slovenia's regions passed
into ownership of the Habsburgs whose lands later
formed the Austro-Hungarian Empire, with Slovenians
inhabiting all or most of the provinces of Carniola,
Gorizia and Gradisca, and parts of the provinces
of Istria, Carinthia and Styria.
In 1848 a strong programme
for a united Slovenia emerged as part of the Spring
of Nations movement within Austria.
With the collapse of the
Austro-Hungarian monarchy in 1918, Slovenians
initially formed part of the State of Slovenes,
Croats and Serbs, which shortly joined the Kingdom
of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes, later renamed (1929)
the Kingdom of Yugoslavia. Following the re-establishment
of Yugoslavia at the end of World War II, Slovenia
became a part of the Socialist Federal Republic
of Yugoslavia, officially declared on 29 November
1945. Present-day Slovenia was formed on 25 June
1991 upon its independence from Yugoslavia. Slovenia
joined NATO on 29 March 2004 and the European
Union on 1 May 2004. Slovenia will hold the Presidency
of the Council of the European Union in the first
half of 2008, being the first "new"
member state to do so.
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