The process of changing the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia's name has come to an end. Athens and Skopje first agreed on the name change in a landmark deal in June 2018.
The amendment that changed the country's name became law with its publication in the official gazette, a month after the parliament approved the move.
North Macedonia also formally notified the United Nations about the name change, the government said.
The move ends a long-running dispute between North Macedonia and its southern neighbor, Greece, and has opened a path for Skopje to join the NATO military alliance and the European Union.
Athens had blocked its northern neighbor from joining either bloc because it claimed "Macedonia" and the name's historical associations for one of its northern provinces.
Greece only allowed Skopje to join the UN in 1995 as the "Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia," a reference to the country's former membership of Yugoslavia.
Both countries' leftist governments eventually agreed on the compromise "North Macedonia" in June 2018 and won parliamentary approval in Skopje and Athens for the deal in January.
The naming dispute between Greece and North Macedonia has roots that go back to antiquity. The country's borders have moved about a bit over time, while ethnic changes have also made a mark.
Image: Robert Atanasovski/AFP/Getty Images
Present day
As well as Greece and North Macedonia, the geographic region of Macedonia extends into Albania, Bulgaria and Serbia as well as small areas of Kosovo (which you can't quite see here).
Greek origins
The ancient kingdom of Macedonia – or Macedon – was a relatively small part of the present day Greek province of Macedonia. It first expanded under King Perdiccas I, then widened to take in other areas.
A Roman province
After the fall of the Greek Empire, the Romans – who admired Alexander – used the old name Macedonia for the province encompassing much of northern Greece and the area north of it – including much of the modern-day North Macedonia.
A shift to the east
With the breakup of the Roman Empire into East and West, this region was overrun by the Slavic invasions. An entirely new province far to the east, including part of Thrace in modern-day Turkey, was named Macedonia by the Byzantine Empress Irene of Athens.
Ottoman roots for current concept
The geographic region known as Macedonia today roughly equates to the part of the Ottoman Empire known as Ottoman Vardar Macedonia. It included Greek and Slavic areas and was split into three administrative units, but the concept of Macedonia persisted. This remained the case for centuries and so this concept – of what Macedonia is – has stuck.
Let's put that all together...
...and there's certainly a fair bit of overlap — and room for confusion.
Small matter of empire
Of course, Macedonia's King Alexander the Great's realm stretched all the way to India — but it would be a bit of a stretch to call that Macedonia
As if it weren’t complicated enough, there’s another meaning of the word Macedonia. In Greece and many Latin-language-speaking countries, it’s also a fruit salad. The name is thought to have ben popularized at the end of the 18th century, referring to either the ethnic diversity of Alexander's vast empire or the ethnic mix of Ottoman Macedonia.
