Brod-Posavina County
Eight thousand years as a Sava River crossing point—Roman Marsonia, Ottoman garrison, Habsburg frontier, then 1992's bombardment from Bosnia. Population collapsed 18% as the strategic ford became a traumatized border town.
The name tells the story: 'brod' in old Croatian means ford—a river crossing. For 8,000 years, this spot on the Sava has been where people cross between the Pannonian Plain and the Balkans. Archaeological excavations at Galovo uncovered one of northern Croatia's largest Starčevo culture deposits, proving continuous habitation since the Neolithic. The Romans built Marsonia here, where their road forded the river. Every empire that controlled the Balkans had to control this crossing.
The Ottomans held Slavonski Brod from 1536 to 1691, making it a frontier garrison town. When the Habsburgs expelled them, the Treaty of Karlowitz in 1699 drew the border at the Sava—a line that persists today, separating Croatia from Bosnia. The town became part of the Military Frontier's Brooder Grenz-Infanterie-Regiment, its citizens farmer-soldiers guarding the crossing. When the frontier system ended in 1881, the town transformed from military outpost to industrial center. The Đuro Đaković works, founded in the pre-war period, grew to produce railway wagons and heavy machinery, drawing rural migrants until Slavonski Brod's population surged from 16,000 in 1948 to over 58,000 by 1991.
Then the crossing's geography turned catastrophic. During Operation Corridor 92, Serbian forces in Bosnia positioned artillery across the river and bombarded the city—11,651 shells, fourteen Luna-M rockets, 130 bombs. 116 civilians died, including 27 children, in a city whose sin was existing at a strategic ford. Bosanski Brod, the twin city across the river, was ethnically cleansed and renamed simply 'Brod' in 2009.
Today Brod-Posavina County hemorrhages population—from 158,575 in 2011 to 130,267 by 2021, a 17.85% collapse ranking among Croatia's worst. The A3 highway and railway still cross here, connecting Zagreb to Belgrade, but the factories that drew workers have shrunk. By 2026, this ancient ford faces the question every crossing point confronts when borders harden: whether to remain a place people pass through, or become a place people pass by.