page_title: Names of the Croats and Croatia
section_title: Earliest record
hierarchical_section_title: Names of the Croats and Croatia / Earliest record
caption_attribution_description: Hrvatski: Greda i zabat s natpisom kneza Branimira, 879.-982., Šopot kraj Benkovca, sadreni odljev Gliptoteke, HZ-125 English: Beam and gable with inscription of Prince Branimir, 879-1982, Šopot near Benkovac, plaster cast of Gliptoteka, HZ-125
context_page_description: The name of Croatia derives from Medieval Latin Croātia, itself a derivation of the native ethnonym of Croats, earlier *Xъrvate and modern-day Croatian: Hrvati.
context_section_description: Although in 2005 it was archaeologically confirmed that the ethnonym Croatorum is mentioned in a church inscription found in Bijaći near Trogir dated to the end of the 8th or early 9th century, it is generally accepted that the first attestation of the ethnonym is in the Latin charter of Duke Trpimir from 852, the original of which has been lost. A copy has been preserved in a 1568 transcript; Lujo Margetić proposed in 2002 that the document is in fact of legislative character, dating to 840. In it is mentioned:
  Dux Chroatorum iuvatus munere divino […] Regnum Chroatorum
  The presumably oldest stone inscription is the Latin Branimir Inscription (found in Šopot near Benkovac), where Duke Branimir (879–892) is mentioned:
  BRANIMIRO COM […] DUX CRVATORVM COGIT […]
  The monument with the earliest writing in the Croatian language containing the ethnonym xъrvatъ (IPA: [xŭrvaːtŭ]) is the Baška tablet from 1100, which reads: zvъnъmirъ kralъ xrъvatъskъ ("Zvonimir, king of Croats").
caption: The Branimir Inscription, c. 888
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