Ancient period Prijedor's history as a fortified population centre can be traced back to the end of the 17th century, but the history of the colonization and surrounding culture is much older. Numerous prehistoric, ancient and medieval archaeological sites are evidence of the presence of a variety of different cultures. There are multiple settlements from the
prehistoric period, dating back to 2100 B.C., usually associated with burial sites. In the pre-Roman and
Roman times the area was settled by a large Illyrian tribe, the
Maezaei, In this part of
Bosnia a large number of fortifications were constructed to protect often contested borders with
Austria. Later on, many fortifications were destroyed during the
Austro-Ottoman War as the borders moved towards the east and south in favor of
Austria. The first mention of the city, being referred to as “Palanka Praedor”, was in a Latin written report of an Austrian field marshal about fortified settlements that were burnt between 1693 and 1696. The term
“Palanka” indicates a wooden fortification built on an artificially created island on the river Sana. It is not clear how Prijedor got its name, but there are two theories. One of them refers to the term
“prodor” in the local language, meaning penetration, i.e. penetration of the Sana river, which often flooded the entire area. The second theory concerns a race between a man and a horse (a horse is commonly known as
“Doro”). It is said that the man reached the finish line before the horse, saying in the local language:
“Prije Dore (Before Doro.).". At the same place in the middle of the 18th century, a new fortress appeared, this time built with stone walls, three towers and two clay causeways for the cannons. Archives from
Istanbul dating back to 1745 tells about two town guards crossing over to the newly built
Palanka Pridorska Ada (island). It is the first mention of the fortress on the river Sana where the town later developed. With the emergence of the fortification, the settlement outside of the walls began to develop at the same time. The settlers were probably
Christians who lived in the vicinity and whose settlements rapidly merged with the town as it expanded to the north. Attesting to this is an account of an Austrian secret agent about the existence of the town for the purposes of the Austrian army, in which he described the town in detail and especially emphasized the suburbs in its vicinity. These regions were under Ottoman dominion until 1878. The town began to develop rapidly due to the navigability of the Sana River, the growth of trade and crafts, and later, the construction of the first railway through Prijedor. The first railroad in
Bosnia and Herzegovina was built in 1873 next to Prijedor and went from
Dobrljin to
Banja Luka. The fortress existed as a military base until 1851 when the army left and the walls were demolished by the local population who used the walls to build their own houses. A huge fire in 1882 destroyed 119 houses, 56 big commercial stores, schools, an Eastern Orthodox church, and 140 families lost roofs over their heads. The next year the Austrian authorities opened a large sawmill at the bottom of the mountain
Kozara, which is the first industrial object in the history of Prijedor. The years after the fire there was intensive development of the town, encompassing both private and state-owned structures. The wood was replaced with modern building materials, the streets were designed at the right angles and the first town plan was created. New buildings were built, such as the Serbian elementary school, a Catholic Church, an Eastern Orthodox Church, and a hotel. The first cultural associations appeared in the town as well as libraries, reading rooms and a printing house. The end of the
First World War created a fledgling state—the
Kingdom of Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes—with Bosnia and Herzegovina as a part of it. Prijedor was an important place as the trade and crafts centre of the whole region. The opening of an iron ore mine in nearby
Ljubija in 1916 strengthened the economy of the town. During that period, the mine was one of the biggest and most modern iron ore mines in Europe. From 1929 to 1941, Prijedor was part of the
Vrbas Banovina of the
Kingdom of Yugoslavia.
World War II The memorial centre
Mrakovica at Kozara, the work of the academic artist
Dušan Džamonja, is dedicated to this region's
Yugoslav Partisans and predominantly Serb civilians killed or deported to
Ustaše concentration camps during the
German-
Ustaše-
Hungarian Kozara Offensive from June to July 1942, during
World War II. Some Serb villages around Prijedor and Kozara Mountain suffered the deaths of tremendous numbers of civilians, who were killed by the
Ustaše and taken to different concentration camps during the genocide campaign; one of these was
Jastrebarsko Concentration Camp, where Serb, Jewish and Roma children were imprisoned and killed.
Bosnian war During the
Bosnian War (1992–1995), Prijedor was the site of an
ethnic cleansing campaign committed by the
Bosnian Serb political and military leadership –
Army of the Republika Srpska, mostly against
Bosniak and
Croat civilians. The area near Prijedor housed the
Omarska,
Keraterm, and
Trnopolje camps established in 1992 as part of ethnic-cleansing of the Bosniak and Croat population during the civil war. The population of non-Serbs was drastically reduced: out of a population of 50,000 Bosniaks and 6,000 Croats, only some 6,000 Bosniaks and 3,000 Croats remained in the municipality by the end of the war. Apart from the
Srebrenica massacre, Prijedor is the area with the second highest rate of civilian killings committed during the Bosnian War. According to the
Sarajevo-based
Research and Documentation Center (IDC), 4,868 people were killed or went missing in the Prijedor municipality during the war. Among them were 3,515 Bosniak civilians, 186 Croat civilians and 78 Serb civilians. , 96
mass graves have been located and around 2,100 victims have been identified, largely by
DNA analysis. ==Demographics==