Buziaș

About

Buziaș (also known as Băile Buziaș or Buziaș-Băi; Hungarian: Buziásfürdő; German: Busiasch; Serbian: Бузјаш, romanized: Buzjaš) is a town in Timiș County, Romania. Thanks to its healing springs, it was once one of the most famous bathing places in Hungary and then in Romania; it has appeared in several international catalogs and has often been referred to as the "Pearl of Banat" or the "Bad Nauheim of Banat". Called Ahibis by the Romans, Buziaș was first mentioned by Charles I of Hungary in a document from 1321. Until the early 19th century, it was an insignificant village away from the main routes. It owes its reputation to the healing effects of local mineral springs, which were first analyzed in 1811. In 1911 it was officially declared a spa resort of national interest. It administers two villages: Bacova and Silagiu.

Kisch proposed that the Romanian name may derive from boz (from the Slavic boz, meaning "elder tree") combined with the suffix -iaș, where the unstressed o shifted to u. Iordan classified this toponym under Boz, a name possibly of Hungarian origin—or at least influenced by Hungarian—while noting that Petrovici supported a Slavic root bŭzŭ, reflected in the Romanian boz. The folk form Bâzâieș suggests the presence of an ă or a similar vowel following the initial B-, a feature also found in Bulgarian forms like бъз/ bŭz and бъзей/ bŭzeĭ.

Buziaș is located in western Romania, about 35 km (22 mi) from Timișoara and 25 km (16 mi) from Lugoj, being connected to both by county road DJ592 and the Timișoara–Buziaș–Lugoj railway. The town lies on the upper terrace of the Timiș River, at the contact between the Eastern Banat Plain and the Banat Hills. Buziaș has an area of 104 km 2 (40 sq mi) and borders Racovița to the north, Darova and Boldur to the east, Chevereșu Mare and Nițchidorf to the west, and Caraș-Severin County to the south.

The 9-kilometre-long (5.6 mi) Salcia stream, along which the town lies, springs from the Dumbrava Forest, being a tributary on the left of the Șurgani River. In the Buziaș area, Salcia receives a series of tributaries: the Pârporii, Silagiului, and Strâmba streams. Apparently insignificant waters, during the rainy periods they produced floods, such as those of 1926 and 1966, which led to the elaboration of a program of hydrographic arrangement of the area. This is how two accumulation lakes were created nearby:

- one in the Salcia Valley, with an area of 20 ha (49 acres) during rainy periods and 1 ha (2.5 acres) in the rest of the year, and

- another in the Silagiului Valley, with an area of 26 ha (64 acres) during rainy periods and 1 ha in the rest of the year.

Buziaș is characterized by a moderate temperate continental climate, with transitional characters between the continental and the Mediterranean climate, under the influences of the air masses propagated from the Mediterranean. Due to the favorable natural conditions, with rich mineral springs but also with a mild climate, Buziaș has been recognized as a potential spa resort by the existence of carbon dioxide springs.

The average annual temperature is between –2 and 21.5 °C. The average annual rainfall varies between 600 and 650 mm, the maximums being recorded in June and November. The snow cover reaches a thickness of between 0.9 cm (November) and 18 cm in January. The relative humidity has annual values of 75.7% and, due to the evaporation of CO 2 -laden water, the absolute humidity is lower in the morning and higher during the day. The average annual cloudiness measures 5.6 tenths and is higher in winter. The prevailing winds in the cold seasons are those that come from the south and bring warm air, which makes the autumn and winter milder.

Due to the climate and topography, the area is characterized by steppe vegetation with isolated deciduous forests.

The agricultural area has the largest extent in the Buziaș area; maize, wheat and sunflower are grown here. The hilly and sub-hilly parts around Silagiu and Buziaș correspond to an arboreal vegetation formed by deciduous forests: pedunculate oak, sessile oak, hornbeam, ash and, less commonly, linden, aspen, wild cherry, crab apple and other species. The existence of these forests from ancient times is demonstrated today by the secular oak from Silagiu, in Măgironi Valley, with a base diameter of 1.8 m and an estimated age of over 500 years. Frequent shrubs of these forests are: hawthorn, privet, Tatar maple, hazel, blackthorn, dog rose, cornel, elder, etc. 4 km east of the town is the 1821-ha Dumbrava Forest, consisting mainly of oaks, which has been declared a Natura 2000 site.

An important area is occupied by vines, on the northern slope of the Silagiu Hill, which has a maximum altitude of 324 m (1,063 ft). There are also planted fruit trees, but on small areas. The wine region of which it is part is one of the five wine centers of Banat. The most famous wines in this region are Blaufränkisch, Merlot and Welschriesling. If in 1919 Silagiu had about 579 ha (1,430 acres) of vines, today 849 ha (2,100 acres) are cultivated with vines.

The town park is characterized by the presence of ornamental species from around the world such as conifers ( fir, cedar, pine ), deciduous trees ( plane, linden, Turkish hazel, maple, birch, poplar, oak, elm, willow ) and flowers ( tulip, gladiolus, primula, pansy, Canterbury bells, carnation, peony, hyacinth ).

The fauna around Buziaș is varied, according to the existing landforms.

The two forest bodies (Silagiu and Dumbrava) have a varied fauna, there being an area of interference between the fauna descending from the Semenic Mountains, the steppe and forest-steppe fauna and its own fauna:

- mammals: squirrel, hare, deer, wolf (rarely), fox, wild boar, wildcat, badger, hamster, ground squirrel, etc. In the past, many squirrels lived in the town park, which had become the mascots of the park, but now their population is quite small.

- birds: blackbird, tit, grey partridge, woodpecker, jay, pheasant, leaf warbler, starling, turtle dove, wild goose, wild duck, goshawk, eagle-owl, etc.

The 9-kilometre-long (5.6 mi) Salcia stream, along which the town lies, springs from the Dumbrava Forest, being a tributary on the left of the Șurgani River. In the Buziaș area, Salcia receives a series of tributaries: the Pârporii, Silagiului, and Strâmba streams. Apparently insignificant waters, during the rainy periods they produced floods, such as those of 1926 and 1966, which led to the elaboration of a program of hydrographic arrangement of the area. This is how two accumulation lakes were created nearby:

- one in the Salcia Valley, with an area of 20 ha (49 acres) during rainy periods and 1 ha (2.5 acres) in the rest of the year, and

- another in the Silagiului Valley, with an area of 26 ha (64 acres) during rainy periods and 1 ha in the rest of the year.

Buziaș is characterized by a moderate temperate continental climate, with transitional characters between the continental and the Mediterranean climate, under the influences of the air masses propagated from the Mediterranean. Due to the favorable natural conditions, with rich mineral springs but also with a mild climate, Buziaș has been recognized as a potential spa resort by the existence of carbon dioxide springs.