Balkan Entente, loose alliance formed in 1934 by Yugoslavia, Romania, Greece, and Turkey to safeguard their territorial integrity against Bulgarian revisionism. It thus was in harmony with the...

Balkan Wars, 1912–13, two short wars, fought for the possession of the European territories of the Ottoman Empire. The outbreak of the Italo-Turkish War for the possession of Tripoli (1911) en...

Balkan Peninsula, southeasternmost peninsula of Europe, c.200,000 sq mi (518,000 sq km), bounded by the Black Sea, Sea of Marmara, Aegean Sea, Mediterranean Sea, Ionian Sea, and Adriatic Sea. ...

Rumelia or Roumelia, region of S Bulgaria, between the Balkan and Rhodope mts. Historically, Rumelia denoted the Balkan possessions (particularly Thrace and Macedonia, and excluding Bosnia) of...

Iskŭr, river, c.250 mi (400 km) long, rising in the Rhodope Mts., W Bulgaria, and flowing generally NE past Sofia and through the Balkan Mts. to the Danube River. The gorge of the Iskŭr is one...

Teasel, common name for some members of the Dipsacaceae, a family of chiefly Old World herbs found mostly in the Mediterranean and Balkan areas but ranging to India and to S Africa. Species of...

Horse chestnut, common name for some members of the Hippocastanaceae, a family of trees and shrubs of the north temperate zones and of South America. The horse chestnut tree, Aesculus hippocas...

Illyria and Illyricum, ancient region of the Balkan Peninsula. In prehistoric times a group of tribes speaking dialects of an Indo-European language swept down to the northern and eastern shor...

Constantinople, Latin Empire of, 1204–61, feudal empire established in the S Balkan Peninsula and the Greek archipelago by the leaders of the Fourth Crusade (see Crusades) after they had sacke...

Macedonia, region, SE Europe, on the Balkan Peninsula, divided among Greece, Bulgaria, and the Republic of Macedonia. Corresponding roughly with ancient Macedon, it extends from the Aegean Sea...