The Slavic Peoples are an ethnic and linguistic branch of Indo-European peoples, living mainly in central and eastern Europe. From the early 6th century they spread to inhabit most of the Central and Eastern Europe and the Balkans. Many settled later in Siberia and Central Asia or emigrated to other parts of the world.Over half of Europe's territory is inhabited by Slavic-speaking communities.

 Modern nations and ethnic groups called by the ethnonym Slavs are considerably genetically and culturally diverse and relations between them are varied, ranging from a sense of connection to feelings of mutual hostility. 

Ethnonym

 The word "Slav" is derived from the Middle English word sclave, which was imported from Medieval Latin sclavus and Byzantine Greek σκλάβος sklábos (variant of σλάβήνος sklabēnos; plural: σλάβήνοι sklabēnoi), which originated in Proto-Slavic slověninŭ. Excluding the ambiguous[clarification needed] mention by Ptolemy of tribes Slavanoi and Soubenoi, the earliest references of "Slavs" under this name are from the 6th century AD. The word is written variously as Σκλάβήνοι Sklabenoi, Σκλαύηνοι Sklauenoi, or Σκλάβίνοι Sklabinoi in Byzantine Greek, and as Sclaueni, Sclavi, Sclauini, or Sthlaueni in Latin. The oldest documents written in Old Church Slavonic and dating from the 9th century attest Словѣне slověne to describe the Slavs around Thessalonica. Other early attestations include Old Russian Словене slověně "an East Slavic group near Novgorod", Slavutich "Dnieper river", and Croatian Slavonica, a river.