Mačkovec (; formerly also ''Mačkova vas'',''Intelligenzblatt zur Laibacher Zeitung'', no. 141. 24 November 1849, p. 26.''Leksikon občin kraljestev in dežel zastopanih v državnem zboru,'' vol. 6: ''Kranjsko''. 1906. Vienna: C. Kr. Dvorna in Državna Tiskarna, p. 40. german: Katzendorf,Ferenc, Mitja. 2007. ''Nekdanji nemški jezikovni otok na kočevskem''. Kočevje: Pokrajinski muzej, p. 4. sometimes ''Kazendorf'',

Gottscheerish Gottscheerish (''Göttscheabarisch'',Maridi Tscherne: Wörterbuch Gottscheerisch-Slowenisch. Einrichtung für die Erhaltung des Kulturerbes Nesseltal, Koprivnik/Nesseltal 2010. german: Gottscheerisch, sl, kočevarščina) is an Upper German ...

: ''Kotzndoarf''Petschauer, Erich. 1980. "Die Gottscheer Siedlungen – Ortsnamenverzeichnis." In ''Das Jahrhundertbuch der Gottscheer'' (pp. 181–197). Klagenfurt: Leustik.) is a settlement in the

Municipality of Kočevje The Municipality of Kočevje (; sl, Občina Kočevje) is a municipality in southern Slovenia. The seat of the municipality is the city of Kočevje. Today it is part of the Southeast Slovenia Statistical Region. In terms of area, it is the larg ...

in southern

Slovenia Slovenia ( ; sl, Slovenija ), officially the Republic of Slovenia (Slovene: , abbr.: ''RS''), is a country in Central Europe. It is bordered by Italy to the west, Austria to the north, Hungary to the northeast, Croatia to the southeast, an ...

. The area is part of the traditional region of

Lower Carniola Lower Carniola ( sl, Dolenjska; german: Unterkrain) is a traditional region in Slovenia, the southeastern part of the historical Carniola region. Geography Lower Carniola is delineated by the Ljubljana Basin with the city of Ljubljana to the no ...

and is now included in the

Southeast Slovenia Statistical Region The Southeast Slovenia Statistical Region ( sl, Jugovzhodna Slovenija statistična regija) is a statistical region in southeast Slovenia. It is the largest statistical region. The development of this region is largely the result of industry (the au ...

Name

The name ''Mačkovec'' and names like it (e.g., '' Mačkovci'', '' Mački'', etc.) are believed not to derive directly from the Slovene common noun ''maček'' 'cat', as suggested by Simonič, but from the surname ''Maček'' (which is based on that zoonym and remains a Slovene surname today). An alternative theory, considered less likely by Snoj, is that ''Mačkovec'' is derived from the Slovene common noun ''mačkovec'' '

goat willow ''Salix caprea'', known as goat willow, pussy willow or great sallow, is a common species of willow native to Europe and western and central Asia.Meikle, R. D. (1984). ''Willows and Poplars of Great Britain and Ireland''. BSBI Handbook 4. . Des ...

' or ' restharrow'. The alternative Slovene name ''Mačkova vas'' would thus mean 'village where the Maček family lives'. The German name ''Katzendorf'' is believed to derive from the Gottschee German surname ''Kotze'', thus meaning 'village where the Kotze family lives', and not from the German common noun ''Katze'' 'cat'. The surname ''Kotze'' was attested in Gottschee in the 18th, 19th, and early 20th centuries.Schröer, Karl Julius. 1870. ''Wörterbuch der Mundart von Gottschee.'' Vienna: K. u. k. Staatsdruckerei.

History

A prehistoric settlement has been identified near Mačkovec.Savnik, Roman, ed. 1971. ''Krajevni leksikon Slovenije'', vol. 2. Ljubljana: Državna založba Slovenije, p. 231. However, there was no continuity between this early settlement and the modern age.Ferenc, Mitja, & Gojko Zupan. 2012. ''Izgubljene kočevske vasi'', vol. 2 (K–P). Ljubljana: Znanstvena založba Filozofske fakultete Univerze v Ljubljani. In the modern era, Mačkovec was originally a Gottschee German village. In the land registry of 1574, Mačkovec had four full farms divided into eight half-farms, corresponding to a population between 40 and 50. In 1770 there were 18 houses in the village. In 1936 there were 22 houses in the village and it had a population of 93. The local economy was based on farming and peddling. The original residents of Mačkovec were evicted in November 1941. German forces burned the settlement in March 1944 and only two houses remained.

Religious heritage

The local

church Church may refer to: Religion * Church (building), a building for Christian religious activities * Church (congregation), a local congregation of a Christian denomination * Church service, a formalized period of Christian communal worship * Chris ...

, dedicated to

Saint Anne According to Christian apocryphal and Islamic tradition, Saint Anne was the mother of Mary and the maternal grandmother of Jesus. Mary's mother is not named in the canonical gospels. In writing, Anne's name and that of her husband Joachim come o ...

, was built on the top of Hunter's Peak ( sl, Lovski vrh, german: Annaberg 'Mount Saint Anne') north of the settlement. It is also a site of a

prehistoric Prehistory, also known as pre-literary history, is the period of human history between the use of the first stone tools by hominins 3.3 million years ago and the beginning of recorded history with the invention of writing systems. The use of ...

Iron Age The Iron Age is the final epoch of the three-age division of the prehistory and protohistory of humanity. It was preceded by the Stone Age (Paleolithic, Mesolithic, Neolithic) and the Bronze Age (Chalcolithic). The concept has been mostly appl ...

settlement. The pilgrimage church, a 16th-century building that survived the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

, was demolished in 1953 or 1954.Slovenian Ministry of Culture register of national heritage
reference number ešd 11988 A

chapel-shrine A wayside shrine is a religious image, usually in some sort of small shelter, placed by a road or pathway, sometimes in a settlement or at a crossroads, but often in the middle of an empty stretch of country road, or at the top of a hill or mo ...

dedicated to Saint Anne was erected next to the site of the former church in 2003. A chapel dedicated to the

Holy Wounds In Catholic tradition, the Five Holy Wounds, also known as the Five Sacred Wounds or the Five Precious Wounds, are the five piercing wounds that Jesus Christ suffered during his crucifixion. The wounds have been the focus of particular devotions, ...

formerly stood in the village. It was probably built after 1741, and had a vaulted

chancel In church architecture, the chancel is the space around the altar, including the choir and the sanctuary (sometimes called the presbytery), at the liturgical east end of a traditional Christian church building. It may terminate in an apse. Ove ...

and a flat, possibly painted, roof in the nave. Over the entrance there was a wooden

bell-cot A bellcote, bell-cote or bell-cot is a small framework and shelter for one or more bells. Bellcotes are most common in church architecture but are also seen on institutions such as schools. The bellcote may be carried on brackets projecting from ...

, built in 1819 when a bell was purchased. The bell was removed by Austro-Hungarian troops. The chapel had a chalice designed in a Renaissance style. In 1930 three local families—Kofler, Springer, and Stiene—purchased a new 60 kg bell for the chapel. The chapel was destroyed after the village was burned in 1944.

References

External links

*
Mačkovec on GeopediaPre–World War II map of Mačkovec with oeconyms and family names
{{DEFAULTSORT:Mackovec Populated places in the Municipality of Kočevje