Maribor

Maribor (pronounced [ˈmaːɾibɔɾ]; also known by other alternative names) is the second-largest city in Slovenia with about 96,000 inhabitants in 2015. It is also the largest city of the traditional region of Lower Styria and the seat of the City Municipality of Maribor.

Name

Maribor was attested in historical sources as Marpurch circa 1145 (and later as Marchburch, Marburc, and Marchpurch), and is a compound of Middle High German march 'march (borderland)' + burc 'fortress'. In modern times, the town's German name was Marburg an der Drau (literally, 'Marburg on the Drava River'). The Slovene name Maribor is an artificial Slovenized creation, coined by Stanko Vraz in 1836. Vraz created the name in the spirit of Illyrianism by analogy with the name Brandenburg (cf. Lower Sorbian Bramborska). Locally, the town is known in Slovene as Marprk or Marprog. In addition to its Slovene and German names, the city is also known as Marburgum in Latin and Marburgo in Italian.

History

Mediaeval and early modern history

2014–15 NK Maribor season

The 2014–15 season was Maribor's 55th season of football and its 24th consecutive season in the Slovenian PrvaLiga, Slovenian top division, since the league was created in 1991 with Maribor as one of the league's founding members.

After the successful 2013–14 season where Maribor won the PrvaLiga and Supercup titles, the club continued with their dominance in domestic competitions during the 2014–15 season and has managed to add another two titles among club honours; they have won their 13th League and their fourth Supercup title. Unlike the previous season when they were runners-up in the Slovenian Football Cup, this season Maribor was knocked out from the competition one round earlier when Celje defeated them 3–2 on aggregate during the semi-final of the 2014–15 Slovenian Football Cup. The club did particularly well in the UEFA competitions where they went undefeated during six matches of the 2014–15 UEFA Champions League qualifying campaign and, for the first time in 15 years, have managed to secure a spot among the elite 32 clubs in the competition proper. There the club was drawn into a group with Chelsea, Schalke and Sporting, and has managed to drawn each of them once, winning a total of three points in the process. For manager Ante Šimundža this was the second time he had a taste of the elite competition with Maribor, as he was the club's player during their 1999–2000 campaign.