Tesla Ignites a Feud, and It Has Nothing to Do With Cars

BELGRADE—This summer, the governor of Serbia’s central bank is taking an aggressive position on a foreign currency: Trying to stop inventor Nikola Tesla appearing on Croatia’s coins.

Though dead for 78 years, Mr. Tesla still raises temperatures between these two Balkan neighbors over which one has bragging rights to the pioneering electrical engineer, after whom Tesla Inc.’s electric vehicles were named.

Mr. Tesla was an ethnic Serb and grew up in a part of the Austrian empire that is in modern-day Croatia. In 1884, at 28 years old, he emigrated to the U.S., where he pioneered how to make alternating current work on a grand scale, electrifying the world.

For years, Serbia and Croatia have competed over Mr. Tesla’s legacy, naming buildings, monuments and streets after the inventor. In July, the Croatian public voted to have Mr. Tesla on the country’s new euro coins, when it joins the common currency, as scheduled, in 2023, in a poll held by its central bank. That would potentially put a Croatian Tesla coin in the pockets of 340 million Europeans, further promoting the country’s claim to the inventor.

Jorgovanka Tabaković, the governor of the National Bank of Serbia, promised to “take appropriate steps” with the European Commission, sparking retaliatory comments from Croatian officials. Mr. Tesla already appears on Serbia’s 100 dinar note and it has issued commemorative coins related to anniversaries.