Boljevci
Celtic-era settlement on Sava's marshy left bank—Boljevci's Slovak minority and fish ponds face suburban pressure from Belgrade's outward sprawl.
Boljevci exists because the Sava River deposited a marshy floodplain—and because someone needed to farm the difficult land. This village 30 kilometers from downtown Belgrade sits in Syrmia, the sub-region of Podlužje on the Sava's left bank. The Scordisci, the Celtic tribe that founded Singidunum (Belgrade), left remains here; the land has been continuously settled since. Today's 3,000-odd residents include a significant Slovak minority—about a quarter of the population—a legacy of Austro-Hungarian migration patterns.
The geography is marginal. West of the village lies the Živača pond, part of the Boljevci fish farm. The surroundings are marshy, flood-prone, and productive mainly for aquaculture. The Nautical Village "Biser"—16 floating bungalows, restaurants, and a 12-hectare forest—represents the modern economy: leisure tourism for Belgraders escaping the city on weekends.
Boljevci had its own municipality until the early 1960s, then was absorbed by Surčin. The 2010 city statute gave suburban municipalities equal status with urban ones, but Boljevci remains peripheral in every sense: a village identity within metropolitan Belgrade, a floodplain economy amid riverfront redevelopment, a Slovak cultural pocket in a Serbian capital. By 2026, pressure from Belgrade's outward expansion will test whether the marshes can be preserved or whether the Sava's left bank becomes another suburban extension.