The secret of the Blonde Tisza

The two most famous rivers in Hungary are the Danube and the Tisza. The latter is the longest tributary of the Danube and the second largest in Hungary. Poets, writers and painters were seized by the Tisza to such an extent that they were recorded.

Every Hungarian knows the name of the river Tisza, and during our school studies we also learn about its origin and work, but we certainly don't know everything.

When a group of people called agathyss and signa settled in the Iron Age where Szeged and its surroundings are located today, the word tijah was used for the river, which means exactly a river. Presumably, the origin of the name of the river Tisza satisfies this explanation the most. As another explanation, the name Tihsa was once used, which is derived from the word tiha. However, the meaning of this is calm, quiet.

The well-known marker of the Tisza is the blonde. And its blondeness suggests that the color of the river is indeed lighter because of the grains of sand and mud floating in the water.

When man did not want to control everything, he did not interfere in the flow of the Tisza either, then its total length was 1419 kilometers. As nature allowed the water to pass, it meandered, and this meant that the Tisza was dotted with a lot of tributaries and bends wherever it went. It also caused floods many times, which endangered the lives and property of the people living there, so Count István Széchenyi tamed the river and in the summer of 1846 river regulation began. Due to this, the length of the Tisza decreased to less than 1000 km. In addition, backwaters and new beds were made for the blonde river.

River regulation in 1846 was not a one-time and definitive intervention, and has since been done in several places to reduce the chances of flooding.

The Tisza was born as a merger of the Black and White Tisza, all of which begin in the territory of Ukraine and flow into the waters of the Danube in Serbia.

Mór Jókai called the Tisza the most Hungarian river, but the water is the master, so the more Hungarian river wreaked havoc where it left its bed. The most famous flood was in Szeged, when in 1879 it almost completely destroyed the city.

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(Source: marmalade.co.hu | pictures: pixabay.com | video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WZRyh23B_K0, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1tUmpAKJ5gs)