Resnik (, ) is an urban neighborhood of Belgrade, Serbia. It is located in Belgrade's municipality of Rakovica.
Location
Resnik is located in the southern section of the municipality and makes the southernmost point of the urban Belgrade City Proper. Originally a village distant from Belgrade, it developed between the valleys of the creek of Rakovički potok and the Topčiderka river. The creek of Pariguz flows through the southern parts of Resnik before it empties into the Topčiderka. The settlement is roughly triangularly shaped and bordered by the settlements of Sunčani Breg, Jelezovac, Straževica (north), Petlovo Brdo and Kijevo (north-west) which make Resnik's urban connection to the rest of Belgrade. The other three sides are still not urbanized (fields of Klik, Mandrine, Hladna Voda, Pašinac, etc.).
Kadinac creek flows into the Topčiderka west of the neighborhood. As it grows, Resnik almost makes a continuously built-up area with Rušanj on the south, and Pinosava on the south-east. As a large settlement, Resnik stretches over numerous geographic localities, like Ladne Vode, Arap-Čair, Gaj, Ciganske Njive, etc. Parts of Resnik are prone to downhill creep.
Resnik is the southernmost point of Belgrade's urban proper.
History
According to the folk legend, the name comes from the catkins of formerly abundant walnut, and especially hazel trees, which are called in Serbian.
The village of Resnik was mentioned in Ottoman defter from 1528. This census of Belgrade nahiyah described the location of Resnik as suitable for living thanks to the fertile land, meadows, forests, water springs and geographic position. It had 17 houses in 1713 and 33 in 1718. The first school was opened in 1842. In 1870 it was seated in the house of the Stojanović family, later moving into the house of the Lazarević. Building of the present elementary school, "Kosta Abrašević", was built in the early 1970s.
In the 1865 Topography dictionairy by Alimpije Bogić, the official scribe of the Vračar srez described Resnik as a "village in Posavlje above the Rakovica monastery, three hours from Belgrade". Anthropogeographer Risto Nikolić wrote in the 19th century that "the oldest families are Jeličić and Ćalić (today named Petrović), then Zarkulović (who died out), followed by Aleksić (today Nedeljković), Paunović, Manojlović and Đurđević, then Rnjić (today Matić), Životić, etc".
Central gathering point during the Interbellum was "Agricultural, Consumers and Credit Cooperative". Non-agricultural economy employed many workers in the Kijevo quarry, while workers later began to work in the developing industry of Rakovica. Resnik became a station on the Belgrade-Niš railway in 1884, and with the extension to Mala Krsna in 1924, the settlement began to spread in the direction of the railways. Resnik's railway stations proved to be strategic in both world wars, as they were outside of the reach of the initial artillery attacks, so it was used by the military and especially for the transport of refugees.
Resnik was a separate village and had its own municipality from 1832 until the 1959/1960 administrative reform, when it became part of the Čukarica municipality. In 1972, it lost a separate settlement status and became part of the Belgrade urban proper. When municipality of Rakovica was reconstructed in 1974 from part of Čukarica, Resnik became part of it. It continued to be the seat of the local community, a sub-municipal administrative unit. By the 1981 census it was divided in two (Resnik and Avala Grad) and in 2010 two new local communities were created: Železnička Stanica Resnik and Sunčani Breg.
In 1942, in the Zelenjaka ravine, the occupational German forces executed over 100 people and kidnapped 29 Romanies which then disappeared. In 1944, almost all young males were sent to the Syrmian Front by the Partisans, the majority of whom were killed in action.
Until 1948, the train (ćira, the steam locomotive) was the only transportation connection with Belgrade. The first public bus transportation line to Belgrade was introduced in 1957. In this period the waterworks grid was built, and electricity was introduced. Cultural Center was opened in 1969. Football club "Pobeda" was founded in 1937, becoming FK Resnik in 1956.
When the neighboring Kijevo lost its separate settlement status in 1959, the majority of its area was attached to the village of Kneževac, but one small part became a cadastral part of Resnik.
On 4 January 1964 there was a rail accident in the Jajinci railway station, which is located in the northeastern section of Resnik, rather than in the neighborhood of Jajinci itself. A local passenger train hit the parked express train, killing 66 people.