Hey, Slavs
| English: Hey, Slavs | |
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National anthem of  Yugoslavia Serbia and Montenegro Slovakia (1939–45)
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| Also known as | Hej, Slovenci Hej, Słowianie |
| Lyrics | Samuel Tomášik, 1834 |
| Music | Composer unknown (Oskar Danon, according to Lordan Zafranović's Tito – the Last Witnesses of the Testament - part 8) |
| Adopted | 1977 (by law, temporary) 1988 (by the Constitution) |
| Relinquished | 1991 2006 |
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Hey, Slavs is an anthem dedicated to the Slavic peoples. Its lyrics were first written in 1834 under the title Hey, Slovaks (Hej, Slováci) by Samuel Tomášik and it has since served as the anthem of the Pan-Slavic movement, the Sokol physical education and political movement, the SFR Yugoslavia and as the transitional anthem of the State Union of Serbia and Montenegro. The song is also considered to be the unofficial second anthem of the Slovaks. Its melody is based on Poland Is Not Yet Lost, which has also been the anthem of Poland since 1926, but the Yugoslav variation is much slower, more accentuated and does not repeat the last 4 lines as it repeats the last two lines.
In Serbo-Croatian, which used both the Latin and the Cyrillic alphabets, the title Hej, Slaveni was written:
In Macedonian the song is Ej, Sloveni (Еј, Словени), and in Slovene, it is Hej, Slovani. The original title in Slovak was Hej, Slováci.
The song was written by the Slovak Lutheran pastor, poet and historian Samuel Tomášik while he was visiting Prague in 1834. He was appalled that German was more commonly heard in the streets of Prague than Czech. He wrote in his diary:
He soon altered the lyrics to include all Slavs and Hey, Slavs became a widely known rallying song for Slav nationalism and Pan-Slavic sentiment, especially in the Slavic lands governed by Austria. It was printed in numerous magazines and calendars and sung at political gatherings, becoming an unofficial anthem of the Pan-Slavic movement.
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