The Wombat File Is Yours to Keep: The Friday Quiz: Autonomously Yours

So, I've spent most of the evening cleaning and fixing up one of these that some damfool tossed out with the trash for a scavenging and miserly parent to pick up (uh, the chair...not the baby). Lots of steel wool later, I'm too tired to give you all much in the way of a quiz. You'll have to make do with this pathetic excuse for a think-tanker:

An autonomous republic within a larger state, this region was once the homeland for a people who were among the most powerful in the region from the fifteenth through part of the eighteenth century, going so far as to conquer (briefly) the capital city of what later became a great world power. As an ethnicity those people now largely live in another country, the result of a twentieth-century diaspora. Most of the remainder who live in the homeland nation speak their ethnic language and a second language -- not the language of the state of which their autonomous region is a part, but the language of yet another country, which at one time controlled this territory.

Its current economy is largely supported by tourism and agriculture. It is home to the longest electric trolleybus route in the world.

What is the name of the republic? For a bonus point, within what larger state does it exist? For a second bonus, what is the name by which its (now minority) historical population are known?

First correct answer posted to comments wins a "Petraeus 2008 -- A Surge for America" bumper sticker. No Googling and absolutely no surging. One guess per comment, please, but one is the loneliest number that you'll ever do.

Comments

Basque Republic?

Posted by: art | September 14, 2007 10:20 AM

The Iroquois Confederacy.

Posted by: boxjam | September 14, 2007 10:23 AM

Alsace-Lorraine?

Posted by: art | September 14, 2007 10:36 AM

Bavaria?

Posted by: art | September 14, 2007 10:38 AM

Pomerania?

Posted by: art | September 14, 2007 10:39 AM

Nope!

Posted by: BT | September 14, 2007 10:52 AM

Mongolia?
(NICE Stokke, btw, I'm so jealous! We're using a 1970's garage sale special!)

Posted by: bootsy3000 | September 14, 2007 11:07 AM

Nope, on Mongolia.

And don't be too jealous -- the Stokke we found needs a brand-new pad (right now Helena's just perched on bare wood) and really could use a sanding/refinishing.

Posted by: BT | September 14, 2007 11:18 AM

Tibet.

Posted by: boxjam | September 14, 2007 12:08 PM

Belgium?

Posted by: shananan | September 14, 2007 12:55 PM

The Netherlands?

Posted by: shananan | September 14, 2007 01:03 PM

Kazakhstan?

Posted by: bootsy3000 | September 14, 2007 01:12 PM

Uzbekistan?

Posted by: bootsy3000 | September 14, 2007 01:15 PM

(Art will be sad if this one is right) Latvia?

Posted by: bootsy3000 | September 14, 2007 01:16 PM

Nope. You're naming some sovereign states. This is an "autonomous republic" within a sovereign state.

Posted by: BT | September 14, 2007 01:48 PM

Aruba?

Posted by: shananan | September 14, 2007 02:01 PM

Czech Republic?

Posted by: shananan | September 14, 2007 02:27 PM

Are we talking about ethnic Albanians in Kosovo?

Posted by: Jonathan | September 14, 2007 02:30 PM

Quebec?

Posted by: shananan | September 14, 2007 03:40 PM

hey, I'm not sad, I'm Lithuanian! And Autonomous. And so is Jonathan, I believe.

My guess: Kurdistan (or was that another quiz?)

Posted by: art | September 14, 2007 07:44 PM

Lapland?

Posted by: art | September 14, 2007 07:47 PM

(They conquered Santa's Village)

Am I allowed to look up diaspora?

Hm. Did the Phillipines ever conquer Madrid?

I think I would've gotten some sort of carrot if any Amerind tribe's nation was it.

A subcountry of China seemed like a good guess, too, with most going to Taiwan during the 'great diaspora,' but the wombat hasn't said anyone's even close.

How about the new quasi-province in Canada - Nunavat?

Posted by: boxjam | September 14, 2007 07:51 PM

That's why Jesus loves everyone except Laplanders, down to this day.

Posted by: boxjam | September 14, 2007 07:52 PM

Chechnya?

Posted by: art | September 14, 2007 07:54 PM

Posted by: art | September 14, 2007 07:55 PM

I think Art owes himself a Coke.

Balts rule.

Posted by: Jonathan | September 14, 2007 08:12 PM

Art's closer than many of the guesses have been.

Posted by: lewombat | September 15, 2007 07:25 AM