Maramureș ( ; ; ; ) is a geographical, historical and cultural region in northern

Romania Romania is a country located at the crossroads of Central Europe, Central, Eastern Europe, Eastern and Southeast Europe. It borders Ukraine to the north and east, Hungary to the west, Serbia to the southwest, Bulgaria to the south, Moldova to ...

and western

Ukraine Ukraine is a country in Eastern Europe. It is the List of European countries by area, second-largest country in Europe after Russia, which Russia–Ukraine border, borders it to the east and northeast. Ukraine also borders Belarus to the nor ...

. It is situated in the northeastern

Carpathians The Carpathian Mountains or Carpathians () are a range of mountains forming an arc across Central Europe and Southeast Europe. Roughly long, it is the third-longest European mountain range after the Urals at and the Scandinavian Mountains ...

, along parts of the upper

Tisza River The Tisza, Tysa or Tisa (see below) is one of the major rivers of Central and Eastern Europe. It was once called "the most Hungarian river" because it used to flow entirely within the Kingdom of Hungary. Today, it crosses several national bo ...

drainage basin; it covers the Maramureș Depression and the surrounding Carpathian mountains. Alternatively, the term ''Maramureș'' is also used for the

Maramureș County Maramureș County () is a county (județ) in Romania, in the Maramureș region. The county seat is Baia Mare. Name In Hungarian language, Hungarian it is known as ''Máramaros megye'', in Ukrainian language, Ukrainian as Мараморо́щ ...

of Romania, which contains the southern section of the historical region.

Name in other languages

Alternative names for Maramureș include (''Marmaroshchyna''), (''Maramoroš''), (''Marmarosh''), , and . In Yiddish it is מאַרמאַראָש.

Geography

Maramureș is a valley enclosed by the Oaș, Gutâi, Țibleș and Rodnei mountains (the northern section of the

Inner Eastern Carpathians Divisions of the Carpathians are a categorization of the Carpathian mountains system. Below is a detailed overview of the major subdivisions and ranges of the Carpathian Mountains. The Carpathians are a "subsystem" of a bigger Alps-Himalaya S ...

) to the west and south, the Maramureș Mountains and the central section of the Outer Eastern Carpathians to the east and north. The valley is drained through a narrow opening, the Khust Gate, at Khust. Several dozen small mountain rivers and creeks flow into the river Tisa. It is forested and not easily accessible. The limits of the region are between the parallels of 47°33' N and 47°02' N and the meridians of 23°15' E and 25°03' E. Maramureș represents one of the largest depressions in the Carpathians, covering an area of about 10,000 km². Its length from Khust to Prislop Pass is about 150 km and width from North to South is up to 80 km. The main mountain passes linking Maramureș with the neighboring regions are high and in the past were hardly accessible in the winter. The Prislop Pass (1,416 m high) links the east of the region with Moldavia, Dealul Ștefăniței (1,254 m) links the south to Transylvania, the Pintea Pass (987 m) towards Baia Mare, Fărgău (587 m) in the west links the region to Oaș Country, while Frasini Pass ( Yasinia; 931 m) links the north of the region to Galicia. The mountains surrounding this region occupy more than half of the area. A few peaks reach above 2,000 m, such as Pietrosul (2,303 m) in the

Rodna Mountains Rodna Mountains (, ) are a subdivision of the Inner Eastern Carpathians in northern Romania. The name comes from the nearby Rodna Veche village. At , is the highest peak in all of the Eastern Carpathians. The main ridge of the Rodna Mountain ...

to the south and Hovârla (2,061 m) in Muntele Negru (Cernahora) to the north. The heavy forested mountains sustain many protected species of plants, such as yew (''Taxus baccata''),

larch Larches are deciduous conifers in the genus ''Larix'', of the family Pinaceae (subfamily Laricoideae). Growing from tall, they are native to the cooler regions of the northern hemisphere, where they are found in lowland forests in the high la ...

(''Larix decidua''), Swiss pine (''Pinus cembra''), edelweiss (''Leontopodium alpinum''); and animals, such as

lynx A lynx ( ; : lynx or lynxes) is any of the four wikt:extant, extant species (the Canada lynx, Iberian lynx, Eurasian lynx and the bobcat) within the medium-sized wild Felidae, cat genus ''Lynx''. The name originated in Middle Engl ...

(''Lynx lynx''),

chamois The chamois (; ) (''Rupicapra rupicapra'') or Alpine chamois is a species of Caprinae, goat-antelope native to the mountains in Southern Europe, from the Pyrenees, the Alps, the Apennines, the Dinarides, the Tatra Mountains, Tatra to the Carpa ...

(''Rupicapra rupicapra''), alpine marmot (''Marmota marmota''),

golden eagle The golden eagle (''Aquila chrysaetos'') is a bird of prey living in the Northern Hemisphere. It is the most widely distributed species of eagle. Like all eagles, it belongs to the family Accipitridae. They are one of the best-known bird of pr ...

(''Aquila chrysaetos''), and

capercaillie ''Tetrao'' is a genus of birds in the grouse subfamily known as capercaillies. They are some of the largest living grouse. Feathers from the bird were used to create the characteristic hat of the bersaglieri, an Italian ace infantry formation. ...

(''Tetrao urogallus''). The last

wisent The European bison (: bison) (''Bison bonasus'') or the European wood bison, also known as the wisent ( or ), the zubr (), or sometimes colloquially as the European buffalo, is a European species of bison. It is one of two extant species of bi ...

from present-day Romania territory, a symbol of Maramureș, was hunted to extinction in 1852. Lostrița, a local variety of salmon, still live in the mountain rivers. Several protected areas have been created in Maramureș. The Rodna Mountains National Park was designated in 1990, the Maramureș Mountains Natural Park in 2004, and there are many other caves, gorges, cliff formations, and lakes which are officially-protected areas.

History

Maramures Josephinische Landesaufnahme 1782-1785 Background

In ancient times, this area was settled by

Celts The Celts ( , see Names of the Celts#Pronunciation, pronunciation for different usages) or Celtic peoples ( ) were a collection of Indo-European languages, Indo-European peoples. "The Celts, an ancient Indo-European people, reached the apoge ...

Dacians The Dacians (; ; ) were the ancient Indo-European inhabitants of the cultural region of Dacia, located in the area near the Carpathian Mountains and west of the Black Sea. They are often considered a subgroup of the Thracians. This area include ...

Sarmatians The Sarmatians (; ; Latin: ) were a large confederation of Ancient Iranian peoples, ancient Iranian Eurasian nomads, equestrian nomadic peoples who dominated the Pontic–Caspian steppe, Pontic steppe from about the 5th century BCE to the 4t ...

Germanic peoples The Germanic peoples were tribal groups who lived in Northern Europe in Classical antiquity and the Early Middle Ages. In modern scholarship, they typically include not only the Roman-era ''Germani'' who lived in both ''Germania'' and parts of ...

and Akatziri. In the first century BC, it was part of the Dacian Kingdom under Burebista, while in the early Middle Ages, it was ruled by the

Hunnic Empire The Huns were a nomadic people who lived in Central Asia, the Caucasus, and Eastern Europe between the 4th and 6th centuries AD. According to European tradition, they were first reported living east of the Volga River, in an area that was pa ...

, the Kingdom of the Gepids, the Kingdom of the Avars, the White Croatia,

Hungarians Hungarians, also known as Magyars, are an Ethnicity, ethnic group native to Hungary (), who share a common Culture of Hungary, culture, Hungarian language, language and History of Hungary, history. They also have a notable presence in former pa ...

and even the

Kievan Rus' Kievan Rus', also known as Kyivan Rus,. * was the first East Slavs, East Slavic state and later an amalgam of principalities in Eastern Europe from the late 9th to the mid-13th century.John Channon & Robert Hudson, ''Penguin Historical At ...

. The territory was part of the

Kingdom of Hungary The Kingdom of Hungary was a monarchy in Central Europe that existed for nearly a millennium, from 1000 to 1946 and was a key part of the Habsburg monarchy from 1526-1918. The Principality of Hungary emerged as a Christian kingdom upon the Coro ...

from the 11th century and was nominally divided between the Gyepű border region, comitatus of Szatmár and comitatus of Borsova. Initially, the Romanian inhabitants of the region were allowed to preserve their political organization, the Voivodeship of Maramureș, divided into many small autonomous areas. The King long struggled to convince the

Voivode Voivode ( ), also spelled voivod, voievod or voevod and also known as vaivode ( ), voivoda, vojvoda, vaivada or wojewoda, is a title denoting a military leader or warlord in Central, Southeastern and Eastern Europe in use since the Early Mid ...

s to accept the title of

Count Count (feminine: countess) is a historical title of nobility in certain European countries, varying in relative status, generally of middling rank in the hierarchy of nobility. Pine, L. G. ''Titles: How the King Became His Majesty''. New York: ...

, with the implied loss of independence in political and financial matters. During the

Middle Ages In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or medieval period lasted approximately from the 5th to the late 15th centuries, similarly to the post-classical period of global history. It began with the fall of the Western Roman Empire and ...

, the people in many mountain villages, where each family by definition had a considerable domain, were called ''nameși'', meaning free peasants taking pride in their family. The origin of the word is disputed: in the Kingdom of Hungary, free people possessing land were called in Hungarian. In Romanian means extended family, but this name's root is better explained as deriving from the

Greek Greek may refer to: Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor of all kno ...

verb , meaning to divide something (mainly land) into parts and give it to (people with the right to use it, either to rent it or use it for free; singular ). The region was reorganized to Máramaros County in the 14th century. In the 16th century, the Kingdom of Hungary was invaded by the

Ottoman Empire The Ottoman Empire (), also called the Turkish Empire, was an empire, imperial realm that controlled much of Southeast Europe, West Asia, and North Africa from the 14th to early 20th centuries; it also controlled parts of southeastern Centr ...

, and the area came under administration of the semi-independent Ottoman Principality of Transylvania. Later (in the late 17th century) it came under the administration of the

Habsburg monarchy The Habsburg monarchy, also known as Habsburg Empire, or Habsburg Realm (), was the collection of empires, kingdoms, duchies, counties and other polities (composite monarchy) that were ruled by the House of Habsburg. From the 18th century it is ...

(which became the

Austrian Empire The Austrian Empire, officially known as the Empire of Austria, was a Multinational state, multinational European Great Powers, great power from 1804 to 1867, created by proclamation out of the Habsburg monarchy, realms of the Habsburgs. Duri ...

in 1804). During Habsburg administration, the region was initially part of the lands of the Habsburg Principality of Transylvania, but was later (in 1732) transferred to the Habsburg Kingdom of Hungary. In 1867, the Austrian Empire was transformed into the dual monarchy of

Austria-Hungary Austria-Hungary, also referred to as the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the Dual Monarchy or the Habsburg Monarchy, was a multi-national constitutional monarchy in Central Europe#Before World War I, Central Europe between 1867 and 1918. A military ...

and the region was included in the Transleithanian or Hungarian part of the Monarchy. After the

First World War World War I or the First World War (28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918), also known as the Great War, was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War I, Allies (or Entente) and the Central Powers. Fighting to ...

, the region was divided between Romania and the Czechoslovakian region of

Carpathian Ruthenia Transcarpathia (, ) is a historical region on the border between Central and Eastern Europe, mostly located in western Ukraine's Zakarpattia Oblast. From the Hungarian Hungarian conquest of the Carpathian Basin, conquest of the Carpathian Basin ...

, with the border following that of the short-lived Hutsul Republic. In March 1939

Hungary Hungary is a landlocked country in Central Europe. Spanning much of the Pannonian Basin, Carpathian Basin, it is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine to the northeast, Romania to the east and southeast, Serbia to the south, Croatia and ...

annexed Carpathian Ruthenia and in August 1940 annexed the region of

Northern Transylvania Northern Transylvania (, ) was the region of the Kingdom of Romania that during World War II, as a consequence of the August 1940 territorial agreement known as the Second Vienna Award, became part of the Kingdom of Hungary (1920-1946), Kingdom ...

, which included southern Maramureș, from Romania; the territories remained under Hungarian control until 1944. After

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

, the southern section returned to Romania and is now part of

; the northern section was incorporated into the

Soviet Union The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...

as part of the

Ukrainian SSR The Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic, abbreviated as the Ukrainian SSR, UkrSSR, and also known as Soviet Ukraine or just Ukraine, was one of the Republics of the Soviet Union, constituent republics of the Soviet Union from 1922 until 1991. ...

and is now part of

Zakarpattia Oblast Zakarpattia Oblast (Ukrainian language, Ukrainian: Закарпатська область), also referred to as simply Zakarpattia (Ukrainian language, Ukrainian: Закарпаття; Hungarian language, Hungarian: ''Kárpátalja'') or Transcar ...

of independent

People

In the southern area, the majority of the population are

Romanians Romanians (, ; dated Endonym and exonym, exonym ''Vlachs'') are a Romance languages, Romance-speaking ethnic group and nation native to Central Europe, Central, Eastern Europe, Eastern, and Southeastern Europe. Sharing a Culture of Romania, ...

. There are also some

Rusyns Rusyns, also known as Carpatho-Rusyns, Carpatho-Russians, Ruthenians, or Rusnaks, are an East Slavs, East Slavic ethnic group from the Carpathian Rus', Eastern Carpathians in Central Europe. They speak Rusyn language, Rusyn, an East Slavic lan ...

Ukrainians Ukrainians (, ) are an East Slavs, East Slavic ethnic group native to Ukraine. Their native tongue is Ukrainian language, Ukrainian, and the majority adhere to Eastern Orthodox Church, Eastern Orthodoxy, forming the List of contemporary eth ...

Zipser Germans The Zipser Germans, Zipser Saxons, or, simply, just Zipsers (, , , ) are a German-speaking (more specifically Zipser German-speaking as native dialect) sub-ethnic group in Central- Eastern Europe and national minority in both Slovakia and Roma ...

Jews Jews (, , ), or the Jewish people, are an ethnoreligious group and nation, originating from the Israelites of History of ancient Israel and Judah, ancient Israel and Judah. They also traditionally adhere to Judaism. Jewish ethnicity, rel ...

, and Roma. In the northern area, the majority are

, with smaller Romanian, Hungarian and German communities. In the northern area most people speak

Hutsul The Hutsuls (Rusyn language, Hutsul/; ; ) are an East Slavs, East Slavic ethnic group spanning parts of western Ukraine and northern Romania (i.e. parts of Bukovina and Maramureș). In Ukraine, they have often been officially and administra ...

dialect of Rusyn language, while in the southern area most speak Romanian, which is why the region was split into two parts. Since the 1940s there have been villages cut in two by the state border. There are some villages in the north (within Ukraine) that have a sizeable Romanian population, as well as some villages in Romania that have a sizeable Ukrainian and/or Rusyn population.

Gallery

File:Claie de fân Borșa.jpg, Haystacks Borșa Rodna Mountains National Park File:Valley, Pop Ivan, Maramures.jpg, Maramureș Mountains Natural Park File:Lala Mare.JPG, Lala Mare Lake, Rodna Mountains File:The white road. (25987238058).jpg, Winter landscape File:Baia Sprie, Romania - panoramio (15).jpg, Baia Sprie File:Erdőd várkastély.JPG, Fortress of Ardud File:Borsa, Maramures. (49101678577).jpg, Borșa File:Ethnographic Museum in Baia Mare - frontal view.tif, Ethnographic Museum in Baia Mare File:Muzeul Etnografic3.jpg, Ethnographic Museum of the Oaș Country File:Overview of Bârsana monastery, Bârsana, 2017.jpg, Bârsana Orthodox Monastery File:Romania Rohia Monastery Wooden Church.jpg, Rohia Orthodox Monastery File:Săcel 437290, Romania - panoramio (4).jpg, Moisei Monastery File:SzaploncaFotoThalerTamas2.jpg, Merry Cemetery in Săpânța File:Baia Mare, Romania - panoramio (15).jpg, Village Museum in Baia Mare File:Curtea Veche Sighet.JPG, The Curtea Veche in Sighet File:Máramarossziget, Börtön múzeum.JPG, Memorial of the Victims of Communism File:Nagybánya, a Piac tér a Felsőbányai út felől - panoramio.jpg, Baia Mare File:Bastionul Măcelarilor (Turnul de muniţii) - Baia Mare.jpg, Bastion of Baia Mare File:Casa Degenfeld din Baia Mare 01.jpg, Degenfeld House in Baia Mare File:Cascada cailor.jpg, Horses Waterfall File:Quartz-Rhodochrosite-mun05-146b.jpg, Quartz Rhodochrosite from Cavnic Mine File:Fluorite-Quartz-215546.jpg, Fluorite Quartz from Boldut Mine File:Mocănița de pe Valea Vaserului.JPG, Mocăniță Railway File:Raul Iza la Rozavlea.JPG, Iza River

References

External links

Things to do when visiting Maramureș

{{DEFAULTSORT:Maramures Historical regions in Romania Historical regions in Ukraine