Carniola [key], Croatian Kranj, historic region, in Slovenia. The history of this largely mountainous area is closely linked with that of Slovenia. The first known inhabitants, a Celtic tribe called the Carni, were displaced by the Romans, who made Carniola part of their province of Pannonia. Slovenes settled Carniola in the 6th cent. Charlemagne later incorporated it into his empire. The region became a march, or margraviate, under Bavarian suzerainty in the 10th cent. and in 1269 was acquired by Bohemia. It passed to the Austrian Hapsburgs in 1282 and was made (1364) a titular duchy. In 1849 its status was raised to a crown land. Ljubljana was its chief city. After World War I, Carniola was divided between Italy and Yugoslavia, but the Italian part passed to what was then Yugoslavia's constituent republic of Slovenia in 1947.
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