Kovács Attila: Földreform és kolonizáció a Lendva-vidéken a két világháború között (Lendva, 2004)

XVII. Summary

tions regulating colonisation only supported the creation of holdings the size of 5 ha (8.77 cadastral acres) at most.

The authorities controlling the land reform first divided large estates falling under the effect of the agrarian reform into rentable lots according to the decree allowing the four-year lease of large estates, and later, in accordance with the 1931 “Act on the termination of the land reform on large estates”, distributed them as property. The difficulties emerging during the reform were attempted to be somewhat reduced by the act allowing the facultative redemption of lands allotted during the land reform. After the act was approved in 1925, however, redemption did not evolve to a great extent, since most of those who got land did not have enough money for redemption. Colonisation took place parallel to the land reform in the Lendva region. During the colonisation of the examined region, ethnic reasons were primarily taken into consideration. The state, via colonisation, on the one hand, strived to establish a reliable Slavic stratum on the Lendva region section of the Hungarian-Yugoslavian state border and, on the other hand, the aim was to dissect the compact Hungarian settlement network located there. During colonisation 7 colonist settlements and settlement parts were created where, according to Public Record Office sources, 254 colonist families were settled with a total of 1,305 family members, among whom 1,912 cadastral acres and 5,451 square metres of agrarian land was distributed. The detailed analysis of record office sources enables the presentation of the place of origin of the colonists. From the information it can be seen that from the coastline (including Istria) 111 families, from the Mura region 120, while from other parts of Slovenia 23 families arrived in the Lendva region.

In the Lendva region - similarly to the whole of Yugoslavia - the people acquiring land during the land reform and colonisation can be separated into six groups according to status:

those with local agrarian interests,

colonists with general rights,

optant-colonists,

dobrovoljaces,

autocolonists,

refugees.

The least land was given to those with local agrarian interests who were provided locally, that is, with land near their domicile during the agrarian reform.

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