In which modern country was Nikola Tesla born?

Nikola Tesla was born in what is now Croatia. He was born on 10 July 1856 in Smiljan, a village in the Lika region that is today part of Croatia.

The modern-country answer differs from the historical political setting. At Tesla’s birth, Smiljan was within the Austrian Empire’s Military Frontier, not an independent Croatian state. Later references may place his birthplace in Austria-Hungary, which was created in 1867, or describe Tesla as Serbian because he was born into an ethnic Serb family.

Tesla’s father, Milutin Tesla, was a Serbian Orthodox priest, and his mother, Georgina Mandić, came from another Serbian Orthodox family. Tesla later moved through Central Europe before emigrating to the United States in 1884 and becoming an American citizen in 1891.

The village of Smiljan remains associated with Tesla’s legacy. His restored birth house and a Serbian Orthodox church form part of the Nikola Tesla Memorial Centre there. Thus, for a question asking for the modern country, Croatia is the canonical answer.