Velika Drenova is a village of about 5,000 inhabitants in Trstenik

Trstenik

Trstenik is a town and municipality located in the Rasina District of Serbia. According to 2011 census, the population of the town is 15,329, while population of the municipality was 42,989. It lies on the West Morava. The town is known for its industry of hydraulics and pneumatics company, Prva...

 municipality, Rasina District

Rasina District

The Rasina District expands in the central part of the Republic of Serbia. It has a population of 240,463...

, Serbia

Serbia

Serbia , officially the Republic of Serbia , is a landlocked country located at the crossroads of Central and Southeast Europe, covering the southern part of the Carpathian basin and the central part of the Balkans...

. It is located on the Zapadna Morava River

Zapadna Morava

West Morava , is a river in central Serbia, a 308 km-long longer headstream of the Great Morava, which it forms with the South Morava.- Origin :...

 in the central Serbian area of Šumadija

Šumadija

Šumadija is a geographical region in Serbia. The area is heavily covered with forests, hence the name...

. Velika Drenova is the biggest producer of vine

Vine

A vine in the narrowest sense is the grapevine , but more generally it can refer to any plant with a growth habit of trailing or scandent, that is to say climbing, stems or runners...

 in Serbia and vinegrapes are a major export. Velika Drenova is also known by its grafters which is heard about all over the world. One of the biggest producer of vine is First Grafters Cooperative 1903.

One of the first mentions of Velika Drenova is from the fourteenth century, where is said that, knez Lazar Hrebeljanović, used to stop by and drink water from Drenova's springs. Another, much older, source says that ancient Romans glorified Velika Drenova's grapes and wine

Wine

Wine is an alcoholic beverage, made of fermented fruit juice, usually from grapes. The natural chemical balance of grapes lets them ferment without the addition of sugars, acids, enzymes, or other nutrients. Grape wine is produced by fermenting crushed grapes using various types of yeast. Yeast...

.

Velika Drenova has a long tradition of men's handball

Team handball

Handball is a team sport in which two teams of seven players each pass a ball to throw it into the goal of the other team...

 and football

Football (soccer)

Association football, more commonly known as football or soccer, is a sport played between two teams of eleven players with a spherical ball...

 teams that play despite harsh weather conditions. The women's handball team, coached by Mutavdzic Branislav Baja, used to be one of the best teams in former SFRJ, but it disbanded some time ago.

Velika Drenova is a birthplace of Dobrica Ćosić

Dobrica Cosic

Dobrica Ćosić is a Serbian writer, as well as a political and Serb nationalist theorist. He was the first president of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia from 1992 to 1993...

, writer and former president of SRJ. A former patriarch of Serbian Orthodox Church

Serbian Orthodox Church

The Serbian Orthodox Church is one of the autocephalous Orthodox Christian churches, ranking sixth in order of seniority after Constantinople, Alexandria, Antioch, Jerusalem, and Russia...

German was also born in Velika Drenova.