Slovakia , [ a ] officially the Slovak Republic , [ b ] is a landlocked country in Central Europe. It is bordered by Poland to the north, Ukraine to the east, Hungary to the south, Austria to the west, and the Czech Republic to the northwest.
Slovakia's mostly mountainous territory spans about 49, km 2 19, sq mi , hosting a population exceeding 5. The Slavs arrived in the territory of the present-day Slovakia in the 5th and 6th centuries.
From the late 6th century, parts of modern Slovakia were incorporated into the Avar Khaghanate. In the 7th century, the Slavs played a significant role in the creation of Samo's Empire. When the Avar Khaghanate dissolved in the 9th century, the Slavs established the Principality of Nitra before it was annexed by the Principality of Moravia , which later became Great Moravia.
When Great Moravia fell in the 10th century, the territory was integrated into the Principality of Hungary at the end of the 9th century, which later became the Kingdom of Hungary in The Hungarian declaration of independence in was followed in the same year by the Slovak Uprising through the establishment of the Slovak National Council.
The Hungarian wars of independence eventually resulted in a compromise that established the Austro-Hungarian Empire. During World War I , the Czechoslovak National Council successfully fought for independence amidst the collapse of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and the state of Czechoslovakia was proclaimed in In the lead up to World War II , local fascist parties gradually came to power in the Slovak lands, and the first Slovak Republic was established in as a one-party clerical fascist client state under the control of Nazi Germany.
