Chiar n-a văzut nimeni când s-a rupt stânca Babacaia?

Stânca Babacaia la 1963, forografie făcuă dinspre partea de nord-est (Fortepan / Nándor Drobni)

IN ENGLISH

MAGYARUL

Stânca Babacaia este parte dintre cele mai marcante peisaje dunărene. Voit nu o numesc insulă, pentru că se deosebește deplin de imaginea generală creata insulelor dunărene. Dar atunci ce este? Este un grind? Este o stâncă? La urma urmei nici nu contează, ceea ce contează mai mult este că mulțumită poziției sale speciale dispune de o bine documentată arhivă de imagini, unele chiar cu mult dinainte de apariția tehnicii fotografice. Dacă ne apucăm să analizăm în ordine cronologică imaginile cu stânca putem observa un fapt interesant. Parcă în prezent ea pare mai scundă și mai puțin groasă. Prima remarcă se explică ușor prin ridicarea nivelului apei odată cu construcția hidrocentralei Porțile de Fier I., Dunărea a acoperit „trena” din sudul grindului, dar ce s-a întâmplat cu masa principală a stâncii, care în trecut se prezenta cu capătul despicat în două vârfuri din care azi se mai vede doar unul?

Stânca Babacaia fotografiată de la Coronini (cetatea Sf. László), adică de la est.

În mare parte inofensiv (citez titlul volumului lui Douglas Adams din 1992) – puteau spune navigatorii despre stânca Babacaia. Se prezintă ca un deget aratător ridicat deasupra apei, care atrage de departe atenția asupra pericolului la care pot fi supuse ambarcațiunile (44.672954, 21.677079). Sunt, adică mai bine zis erau, grinduri incomparabil mai pericuolase pe Dunăre, ascunse direct sub luciul apei, dar acestea au fost desființate, împreună cu multe altele, de destul de drastica reglementare regională a albiei fluviului. Stânca Babacaia, împreună cu ruina cetății Sf. László și cu ceva mai bine păstrata cetate Golubovăț păzesc în trei acest segment al Dunării, unde din ambele maluri se înalță dealuri direct din fluviu. Aceste repere de lângă Babacaia ajută la identificarea exactă a situației, bunăoară stânca este în fluviu, se poate naviga de jur îmrejurul ei și din această cauză imaginile cu aceasta sunt executate din varii direcții. Pe unele imagini poate apărea și cu reflexie în luciul apei, multiplicând senzația de distorsiune în spațiu.

Vârful actual, singular, al stâncii Babacaia, fotografiat din partea de est.

Masa calcaroasă a singuraticei stânci Babacaia s-a transformat din sedimentele acumulate în marea jurasică în rocă carbonatică. Dimensiunea ei trebuie să fi fost inițial mult mai mare dar a fost îmbrățisată de Dunăre și a fost supusă forțelor externe ale vântului, ale apelor pluviale, ale procesului de îngheț/dezgheț, și astfel suprafața calcaroasă s-a corodat în timp. Literatura care face referire la stâncă menționează în general că în perioada romană sau turcă putea găzdui un turn de veghe, dar este mai degrabă neverosimil întrucât militarilor postați aici ar fi trebuit să li se asigure constant proviziile. Locul nu dispune nici măcar de apă curată, dar mai presus de asta, din cauza dimensiunii reduse, stânca ar fi devenit mai degrabă închsioare pentru ei. Suprafața actuală se încadrează aproximativ într-un cerc cu diametrul de 15 metri, în funcție de nivelul apei, suprafață care înainte de înființarea lacului de acumulare varia puternic. La nivel scăzut al apei, la sud de stânca principală, adică în direcția sensului de curgere a fluviului, se prezenta un mal de piatră unde se putea debarca foarte ușor, mai mult decât atât, conform imaginilor vremii, se înrădăcinaseră o serie de arbuști, dar cel mai probabil aceștia erau nevoiți să existe în condiții deosebit de vitrege. 

Ruptura proaspătă fotografiată dinspre nord.

Babacaia  se poate escalada cel mai usor din partea din vest, aici avem cea mai domoală pantă, dar și aici înclinarea este de minim 60 grade, față de partea nordică și estică unde stânca iese aproape vertical din Dunăre. Aceste două fațete ale stâncii se disting însă cu usirință. Partea dinspre est este afectată de intemperii, acoperită de pete, în mai multe locuri s-au înrădăcinat mușchi și licheni în timp ce partea de nord pare aproape netedă prin comparație. Din punct de vedere geologic vedem aici rocă proaspătă, ceea ce dezvăluie evident o suprafață de rupere recentă, unde forțele externe încă nu au reușit să își lase amprenta. Starea geologică indică evident prăbușirea recentă a stâncii, ceea ce este evidențiat și de imaginile pe care le avem la dispoziție. Existența vârfului bifurcat al stâncii Babacaia este evidentă și până pe la mijlocul secolului XX. În pofida faptului ca este un secol destul de bine documentat și chiar mai mult de atât, construcția hidorcentralei a concentrat o atenție deosebită în zonă, nu am putut afla când și de ce a dispărut coloana nordică a stâncii.

Stânca Babacai cu mitră, fotografiată din partea de sud. Kajtor I./MTI

Cert este că, în luna august a anului 1969, cele două vârfuri ale Babacaiei încă au putut fi fotografiate de Kajtor I. iar imaginea a putut fi publicată în Buletinul Hidrologic. Pare plauzibil ca stânca să se fi prăbușit în lacul de acumulare deja existent. Din păcate nu am putut descoperi când s-a întâmplat asta. În prima imagine, cea din 1963, se poate bănui deja o crăpătură lată, între vârful bifurcat si până la bază. Posibil că celălalt vârf să se fi surpat din cauza lucrărilor de la hidrocentrală, ori din cauza ridicării nivelului apei, ori din cauza înghețului, eventual niște turiști neatenți s-au aventurat prea mult pe el, ori cine știe, cineva a dorit sa cioplească și aici figura unui dac. Cineva trebuie să fi observat totuși… mai ales că pe unul din vârfuri era si panou de semnalizare pentru navigație. În orice caz există speranță că s-a documentat surparea și în articolele de presă din limba românâ și undeva, cineva, cândva, va da peste această informație nu prea importantă.

Mulțumiri lui Attila Gyulai pentru ajutor și traducere!

Picturesque Danubian Photochrom Collection

6336. Wien, Franz Josefs Kai, the Donaukanal is visible on the right side with the overarching Salztorbrücke. 

MAGYARUL

Photo? Postcard? A painting? It's hard to know exactly which category the images from the Zurich-based Photoglob AG (originally Photochrom Zurich) series of images of Europe and, to a lesser extent, North America fall into. The Zurich-based company was founded by the Orell Füssli Institute of Arts and used lithographic printing techniques to produce colour images from black and white photographic originals, a process developed by the Swiss lithographer Hans Jakob Schmid. Between 1896 and 1906, the company published a monthly magazine in French and German language, featuring their new images. Printing rights were also sold abroad, for example to the Detroit Publishing Co. The company's prosperity came to an end when demand for such pictures fell during the First World War. 

What is certain is that the ink-based photolithographs, which depict nearly six thousand locations, are easily distinguishable from contemporary photographs, postcards and landscapes, whether it is Ragusa in Dalmatia or Königsberg in eastern Prussia, by their colours and gold lettering. These pictures were reproduced and sold as souvenirs all over the world, each with a unique serial number. 

They depict in landscape detail the characteristic features of a settlement or landscape (mountain, valley, river, gorge, coast, etc.), often capturing street scenes and everyday life. The collection of the US Library of Congress includes a large number of images of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, although fewer of them are of the Hungarian territories. The Western provinces and Dalmatia are well represented, but there is also a fine series on the Danube Valley, which, as far as I know, no one else has collected. 

From Engelhartszell to the island of Ada Kaleh, covering 1250 river kilometres of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the collection contains a total of 24 pictures, of which 15 are for the Austrian section and 9 for the Hungarian section. Most of them are urban views, but there is also a strong emphasis on castle ruins, and even a few Danube islands, the value of which lies in the fact that most of them have been eradicated by river regulation. There is no doubt that we are looking at a series of documents, which are arranged in the following order, downstream on the Danube:

9214. Engelhartszell, 2201 river kilometer (rkm). A view on the Austrian town, from the former ferry crossing, which was not far from the Dandl creek, representing the German border. From here downstream, both sides of the Danube belong to Austria.

9218. Ottensheim, 2145,5 rkm. Panorama of the Ottensheim castle from the opposite side, Wilhering. The former Habsburg castle is private property nowadays, since the picture was taken, the castle got a new tower.

1731. Linz, 2136 rkm. Outlook on Linz from the west, presumably from the Franz-Josefs-Warte. The huge building in the middle of the picture is the Castle of Linz, next to it the Nibelungen bridge overarches the Danube to the northern suburb Urfahr Beyond the bridge there we see the former forested Strasser Island.

9212. Grein, 2079 rkm. The castle of Grein has been build on a granite cliff over the Danube at the entrance of the Strudel gorge, an old adversary of the shipmen of the Danube. Greinburg is now a property of the House of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, between its walls there is Maritime Museum.

9207. Wörth and Werfenstein, 2077 rkm. The wild Strudel gorge-szoros has been tamed by a hydroelectrical power plant, which raised the water level on the upstream reservoir, reducing the relative height of the steep cliffs, crowned by the castles of Wörth and Werfenstein.

9219. Persenbeug, 2060 rkm. "Patrick Leigh Fermor has arrived exactly 80 years ago, in late January, 1934 to the Austrian town Persenbeug. After having supper in the town inn and filling his journals for the day he made a sketch of the innkeeper's daughter. And he's been talking to an old polymath aristocrat till late night. About the Danube, its fish, especially the catfish, the kraken of the Danube, about hydroelectric dams, Romans, Markomanns, archaeology, flora and fauna, about Hans, ritter of Ybbs, the Tartars, Schubert, Wagner and about the Dodo bird of Mauritius." "Progress" altered much the landscape since then, the author of the picture would stand today underwater in the locks of the Ybbs-Persenbeug dam, on the exact same place.

9211. Marbach and Maria Taferl, 2050 rkm. Maria Taferl, with 291 inhabitants, is a famous place in Austria, its church was built next to a roadside sanctuary to the Virgin Mary between 1660 and 1710 and has since dominated the Danube. It is Austria's second largest and most important pilgrimage site after Mariazell. The picture was taken near Wallenbach on the right.

9224. Weitenegg, 2039 rkm. This castle ruin has a sad history, having fallen into disrepair in the 1700s, but the eastern part was demolished to expand the local ultramarine blue dye factory. On the far right bank is Melk Abbey, with several Danube islands in the foreground, the largest of which is Weitenecker Au, which ends to the right of the castle tower.   

9223. Schönbühel, 2032,5 rkm. Monastery and castle dominate the two cliffs over the Danube north of Melk in the Wachau. Despite river regulation works, if not an island, then by some miracle a large rocky reef still juts out in the middle of the river below the distinctive towered castle, which is still inhabited by an Austrian noble family. 

9226. Spitz a. d. Donau, 2019 rkm. Perhaps Wachau's most famous vineyard, the Tausendeimerberg, rises terraced above the town, where the main grape varieties are Riesling and Neuburger, the latter a cross between the local speciality, red Veltelini and green Riesling. The "Austrian Danube bend" is also famous for its apricots, which are sold in almost every form from dumplings to brandy. Behind the "Thousand bucket hill" you can see the ruins of Hinterhaus castle, at the foot of which the Danube bends eastwards. 

9217. Dürnstein, 2009 rkm. The "Dry Rock" is one of the iconic spots in Wachau in Lower Austria. It was here that King Richard the Lionhearted of England was imprisoned, and for four winter months he could watch the Danube flowing below him, before the ransom he paid was used to launch Ostmark's largest infrastructure development. 

9222. Greifenstein, 1949 rkm. The fact is that the Danube below Greifenstein no longer looks like this, and here too the river has been turned into a canal by the river regulation works, destroying 99% of the islands in the Tulln Danube basin. The Greifenstein castle is still there, privately owned, and is being renovated. 

6441. Wien, Kahlenberg (in the back) and the Leopoldsberg (in front), 1936 rkm. The village of Kahlenbergerdorf can be seen between the two hills, from the Schwarze Lacken Au opposite (now completely built up Au). The village is now part of Vienna's 19th district, but has nevertheless avoided urbanisation largely due to its topography. If you were to look across to the other side today, the artificially shaped, elongated Danube island would largely obscure everything. 

9210. Hainburg, 1884 rkm. View of the town from the Weisser Thurn Haufen on the other side of the river. Between the parish church of Philip and James and the huge building of the old tobacco factory, which closed in 1964, rises the Hainburg hill, mentioned in the Nibelungenlied.

9216. Dévény/Theben/Devín, 1880 rkm. View of Devín to the northeast, from an island in the Danube, half of which belonged to Austria and the other half to Hungary. The column of the Hungarian Millennium Monument is not yet visible, so the picture must have been taken before 1896.

9205. Pozsony/Preßburg/Bratislava, 1869 rkm. View from Pozsonyligetfalu/Engerau/Pertzalka. The castle, which burnt down on 28 May 1811, presumably set on fire by the soldiers stationed here, towers above the crowning temple of numerous Hungarian kingsn. It is not known whether the Franz Joseph Bridge, which was opened in 1890, was already standing at this time, as the picture was taken to the west of the bridge. 

9215. Esztergom, 1718 rkm. The Castle Hill of Esztergom with the Basilica, the ship bridge below and the northern, urbanised tip of the Prímás Island. There is no evidence of the construction of the Maria Valeria Bridge, so the picture must have been taken before 1894. 

9203. Visegrád, 1694 rkm. A well-known view of the Salamon Tower and Visegrád Citadel from near the Nagymaros crossing. To the left is Sibrik Hill, the ancient roman Pone Navata fort, but unfortunately the northern tip of Szentedrei Island is just missed. 

9213. Vác, 1678 rkm. The picture was probably taken in the Bolhavár (Flea fort, a common Hungarian name for roman watchtowers) area, on Szentendre Island, opposite the Hétkápolna (Seven Chapels), with a view of the five downtown churches of Vác, with the main mass of Nagyszál as a background silhouette. Unfortunately the Pokolcsárda (Hell's Inn) or the Vác ferry didn't appear on the picture, but let's not be insatiable.  

9613. Budapest, 1646 rkm. View from the Castle District of Buda, from the area of Matthias Church towards the south. It is most likely that the picture was taken in 1895 or 1896, as the Fisherman's Bastion has not yet been built in the picture, it was started when the Ferenc József Bridge was already standing. 

16531. Orsova, 955 rkm. Interestingly, unlike many larger Hungarian cities, the border town of Orsova has two pictures in the collection. They were taken from two different locations, on the Serbian side, on the hillside above Tekija. In this picture you can see the town's ship harbour and a detail of the Cerna Valley (right).

16530. Orosva, 955 rkm. Visszapillantás Jeselnica és Ogradena felé, azaz keleti irányban, Orsova filmdíszletnek felhasználva lerombolt és vízzel elárasztott központi és nyugati városrészeivel. A look back towards Jeselnica and Ogradena, and Orsova eastwards, which latter was demolished as a film scene of a Romanian II. World War movie, before the ruins were completely flooded. 

16532. Ada Kaleh, 950 rkm. Although the famous Turkish Danubian island of Ada Kaleh was not officially part of the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy at the time, we conclude this series with this picture. In the distance, the Danube winds its way between the Serbian and Romanian river banks, slowly emerging from the mountain range where ther river is much more Ister than Danubius onwards.

The link to the complete collection on the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy: https://www.loc.gov/search/?q=views+of+the+austro-hungarian+empire&sp=1

Translated with DeepL.com (free version)

Has Anyone Seen The Babacai Rock Crack?

The Babacai Rock in 1963, photographed from the northeast (Fortepan / Drobni Nándor)

MAGYARUL

româneşte

The Babacai rock is one of the most prominent places on the Danube. I would deliberately not write island, as it could not be more different from the general concept of islands in the Danube. But then what is it? A reef? A cliff? In the end, it doesn't matter, the point is that, due to its characteristic position in the Danube, there is a particularly well-documented visual representation of it, even from before the time of photography. If you start to browse through the images of the rock from the past to the present, you will notice something interesting. It is as if today it appears both lower and thinner. The obvious explanation for the former is the dammed reservoir effect of Iron Gate I hydroelectric power plant. The raised level of the Danube covered the lower parts of the cliff, a rocky reef that gradually descended towards the south, but what happened to the main mass of the cliff, which used to have two distinct peaks, only one of which is visible today? 

The Babacai rock seen from the Romanian (eastern) side of the Danube.

Mostly harmless - the h̶i̶t̶c̶h̶i̶k̶e̶r̶s̶ sailors of the Lower Danube might say of the Babakai rock, since it is like a raised index finger, towering above the water, signalling the danger lurking ahead (44. 672954, 21.677079). There are, or were, much more treacherous reefs on the Iron Gates, hiding just below the water's surface, but these have been eradicated, along with many others, by regional, somewhat drastic river regulation. The Babakai rock, with its ruined Coronini Castle and the slightly better preserved Golubac, are the trio that guard the section of the Iron Gates gorge where mountains now rise on both banks, right next to the river. These points along the Babakai help to identify its exact position, as the cliff stands in the river and can be navigated around, so typically pictures of it are taken from very different directions. In some photographs it may even appear to be reflected, adding to the spatial uncertainty.

The Babacai rock's single peak photographed from eastern direction.

The limestone mass of the lonely Babakai rock has been transformed into carbonate rock from sediments accumulating in Jurassic seas. Its size may originally have been much larger, but since it was surrounded by the Danube for a long time, it has been constantly eroded by the wind, water, ice and precipitation, and its limestone surface has been eroded and weathered. Most literature on the rock mentions that in Roman and Turkish times it may have been a watchtower, but this is highly unlikely, as the soldiers stationed here would have had to constantly transport supplies, as there is no clean water, and the size of the rock would have made it more of a prison. Its current footprint is the equivalent of a circle about 15 metres in diameter, depending on the water level, which fluctuated a lot more before the construction of the dam. At low water, a flat rocky outcrop emerged to the south of the main mass of the cliff, i.e. downstream, where it was possible to land from a boat and, according to contemporary pictures, trees and bushes could settle, although they probably had to live in very harsh conditions. 

The fresh surface of the crack photographed from the north.

From the west, it is worth climbing Babacai, this side is the least steep, although it also has a slope of at least 60 degrees, while the northern and eastern sides of the cliff rise almost vertically from the Danube. However, these two stone walls are easily distinguishable to the naked eye. The eastern face is weathered, mottled, with several areas of vegetation, mosses and lichens, while the northern face is almost smooth, with geologically intact rock, clearly a fresh fracture surface, not yet ready to be eaten away by the iron teeth of external forces. The geological condition of the rock clearly shows that it has been rock-cut, as confirmed by the photographs available to us. The double peaks of the Babakai rock, which can be seen in postcards and photographs, was clearly still there at the turn of the 20th century. Despite the fact that it is a fairly well documented century, and despite the attention paid to the area due to the construction of the power station, it is not clear when and why the northern rock pillar disappeared.

The double summit of the Babacai rock, seen from the south. Kajtor I./MTI (source)

What is certain is that Kajtor I. was able to photograph the two peaks of Babakai in August 1969 and the picture could appear in the Hydrological Bulletin, so it seems that the unstable rock had already collapsed into the newly created reservoir. Unfortunately, I have not been able to find out the exact date. In any case, the first photo of this post, taken in 1963, shows a wide crack between the two peaks, running down to the base of the cliff. It is possible that the second peak collapsed during work on the power station, or that it was cracked by rising water levels or ice, or that careless tourists ventured too far, or that someone wanted to carve a portrait of a Dacian prince. Someone must have noticed... if there were navigation signs on one of the peaks. In any case, there is hope that Romanian-language newspaper articles documented the rockfall and that someone, somewhere, will stumble across this perhaps not-so-important piece of information. 

Translated with DeepL.com (free version)

The First Photo of Ada Kaleh And The Last Photo of Fort Elisabeth

MAGYARUL

"Progress has now placed the whole of this landscape underwater", as Partick Leigh Fermor writes in his epilogue in his book "Between The Woodsa and the Waters, from the Iron Gate gorge, at a table in a submerged café in Orsova. The laconic realistic pessimism of the final sentence could not better express what has happened here: "and everything has fled". There are many ways of expressing the loss, but if only one image were needed to illustrate it all, one could look no further than Amand Helm's photograph from the same place from sometime in 1867. 

Ada Kaleh and Fort Elisabeth before 1868. Source: Bibliothèque Nationale de France.

On the Donauinslen blog, a single photo can sometimes get a special article if it is unique enough. By unique, we mean that the section of the Danube or the riverine landscape depicted has some additional meaning that not only details the landscape, but also has the chance to make the post a book-length long, with background information explained in diversified train of thoughts. The photograph of the fortress of Ada Kaleh (Fort Island in Turkish) by the Austrian photographer Amand Helm (1831-1893) shows the western tip of the island with the entrance to the Iron Gate gorge in the background, photographed from the Hungarian side, Orsova, and opposite the island a fortress on the Serbian coast, Fort Elisabeth, which, like the island, was most probably under Turkish rule at the time the photograph was taken. 

Amand Helm's original collection of his Danubian photographs from 1868, called the "Donau Album" compilation, from which this photograph originally came, costs nowadays for around a million Hungarian forints (€2500).  Moreover, the price is not for the whole album, from source to the delta, but for a single section of the series. Some of Helm's photographs are also available online, but this particular image is not among the Danube images in the Albertina collection in Vienna.

Born in Teplitz-Schönau (Teplice) in the Czech province of the Habsburg Empire, Amand Helm opened his first photographic studio in St. Wenceslas Square in Prague, but from the mid-1860s he worked in Vienna and Lower Austria, sometimes photographing railway construction projects such as the Crown Prince Rudolf railway. In 1868-69, he photographed the most notable sites along the Danube from source to the delta, from which he compiled the Donau-Album series mentioned above. In his photographs, the landscape appears like a painting, capturing almost the last natural, often ancient, moments before the effects of the Industrial Revolution, which arrived belatedly in Central Europe. 

However, there is another twist to the story of the exceptional picture, which belonged to the French geographer Élisée Reclus (1830-1905), who donated it to the Bibliothèque Nationale de France in 1886.

Forced into exile by his activism during the Paris Commune, he wrote his monumental 19-volume series 'La Nouvelle Géographie universelle, la terre et les hommes', published by Librairie Hachette, during his stay in Clarens, Switzerland, which consists the photo of Ada Kaleh in the third volume, called the "Central Europe, Austria-Hungary, Germany, 1878."

Fort Elisabeth was built in 1736 on the right bank of the Danube, not far from today's Tekija, when the Serbian side of the Danube was also under Habsburg rule after the Peace of Pozsarevac, according to Serbian historian Professor Miloš Petrović. The construction work was led by Johann Andreas von Hamilton, a Scottish-origin military officer, as commander and military governor of the Timis Banat, and the eponym was none other than the wife of King Charles III of Hungary, the most beautiful woman of her time, Queen Maria Theresa's mother, Princess Elisabeth Christine of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel. 

Fort Elisabeth was probably part of a complex of forts built on the island of Ada Kaleh to control the Danube border and the shipping traffic through it. It had several levels, the central part of the fortress being at the level of the Danube, with a watchtower built on the steep hillside above it. According to the usual superstitious beliefs about the Danube, an underwater tunnel connected it to the island of Ada Kaleh, but if not a tunnel, a temporary bridge might have connected the two fortresses. Fort Elizabeth continued to exist and expand after its transfer from Austrian to Ottoman hands, and was regularly depicted on maps of the Lower Danube, most recently on the section of the Second Military Survey dated 1858. Although the area around the fortress became part of the Serbian Principality in 1833, it remained under the direct administration of the Ottoman Empire, with some 500 Turkish soldiers stationed there until the mid-19th century.

What man has created, man has also destroyed around here. Fortress Elizabeth was demolished by the newly independent Serbian state in 1868 at the Turkish request. The ruins were dismantled by the local population, then further destroyed by the construction of a road, and the ruins of the lower parts were submerged at the same time as the neighbouring Ada Kaleh Island, after the construction of the Iron Gate I hydroelectrical power plant.The water level of the Danube was raised by about 30 metres in this stretch, and the flooded coastal road was built that much higher, cutting irreparable wounds in the landscape on the sides of the mountains that tower in the background. 

Finally, if the significance of Amand Helm's unique photograph were to be summed up in a single sentence, it is the very first photograph of Ada Kaleh Island that we know of, and the last and only known photograph of Fort Elizabeth. 

Translated with DeepL.com (free version)

The Danubian Crocodile That Died Young

MAGYARUL

Correction! 

In our article published on the Danubian Islands blog on 10 June 2024 (Island in the Sea of Nettles), we falsely claimed that the name of the Danubian island at the foot of the Felső-Öreghegy hill in Dunaföldvár, Hungary was the Felső-Öreghegyi Island. On the contrary, the reality is that the geographical name Krokodil Island is shown on a Danube site plan from 1910. We apologise to all our readers and will henceforth use the name Crocodile Island as a word of honour, because it is much cooler.  

A crocodile and a loess hill combined on a postcard from Dunaföldvár.

For our readers used to TikTok videos, to recap: the Felső-Öreghegy Island Crocodile Island in Dunaföldvár first appeared as a sandbar on a map in 1850, after less than four decades it was connected to the right bank by a cross dyke, after which a massive sedimentation started, which resulted in the Crocodile being quite difficult to approach today. Our readers, who are used to longer texts are warmly welcome to continue with the next paragraph:  

The Crocodile Island and the cross dyke beneath the barren loess hills

At Dunaföldvár, the Danube cuts sharply into the right bank, gradually destroying the loess hill called Öreghegy (Old Mountain). Over time, erosion caused this hill to split into two parts, the Upper and Lower Öreghegy, and Dunaföldvár was able to settle in the valley between the two. The erosive impact of the Danube is well illustrated by the steep loess walls of the height and steepness of the castle walls, although most of these are obscured by the recent growth of floodplain forest.  

Crocodile Island was first depicted as an unnamed sandbar on 12 May 1850. It is possible, of course, that an even older map will come to light, but what is certain is that the earliest maps from the 1850s to the 1860s all depicted it as a long, narrow sandbar, whether they were maps showing the location of ship mills, the situation of the riverbed or maps of 19th century land use. The northern tip of the sandbar stretched from the westernmost point of the Danube for almost a kilometre to the church of St. Ilona in Dunaföldvárr. In addition, there was a lower sandbar in the middle of the Danube at Dunaföldvár, roughly in the section of the present day Beszédes József bridge, which was later dredged away because it was an obstacle to navigation.

12 May 1850. The ship mills and the sandbars are both important features of the Danubian maps near Dunaföldvár. (source) 

Crocodile Island was first depicted as a sandbar in 1910, but the geographical name appeared in the local press earlier, in 1889, and was associated with mostly wildly fictious stories. It was first mentioned in the Szekszárd Vidéke periodical, but the esoteric article published here reveals little of the island's history other than the geographical name, and the fact that the island was already known by that name:

"There is also talk of a witches' castle near the shipyard, in the vicinity of the Crocodile Island in the Danube. Here, on quiet summer nights, children's cries can be heard and occasionally flames rise from the water. Next time Pepi Etl will bring along a heart-strengthening spirit from Szekszárd, as he intends to blow it up..." (source) 

Ten years later, the death of a tinker's lad adds to our hydrological knowledge of the curiously named island: 

Vilmos Szavalovics, a 26-year-old tinker, fell victim to an unwise act of recklessness in the town of Dunaföldvar. Although he and several of his companions went swimming in the Danube in a rather drunken state, and although he was not a good swimmer, he took to the water in the most shallow part of the Danube to reach the so-called "Crocodile" island. But he paid for his courage with his life, for he was swept away by the tide and buried by the waves before help arrived. His body was recovered on 27 July [1899] in Dunaföldvár. (source) 

1910. The only mention of the Crocodile Island on a map

From the description it is likely that in the summer of 1899 the T-shaped embankment on the island had not yet been completed, as the tinker apprentice would obviously not have chosen to swim, even when drunk, if it is possible to walk onto the island on dry feet through a stone dam. We also learn that at this time the drift line was still at the base of the loess walls, making it very difficult for those attempting to swim along the shore of the island. But the most surreal account of the island was published in 1911, when it was last mentioned in written form as 'Crocodile':

Crocodile in the Danube. This somewhat unbelievable news is reported from Dunaföldvár: the employees of the timber merchant Sándor Schvarcz were busy removing sleepers from the Danube when a huge crocodile emerged from the plank. At first the workers were frightened by the teeth-gnashing reptile, but when the restless crocodile lunged at them, they beat it to death with their axes. Interestingly, in this very part of the Danube where the crocodile adventure took place, there is an island that has been called 'Crocodile Island' for years. It is thought likely that the dangerous reptile escaped from a transport of animals that had recently passed through the area. (source) 

The case of the tragically extinct crocodile, if it happened years earlier, might explain the strange name of the island of Dunaföldvár, but in that order it is a very astonishing story, the like of which we have never even read before. Subsequently, the geographical name 'Krokodil' disappears from sources and maps alike. 

1930. An island is growing on both sides of the "T"-shaped dyke 

At the time of the "Crocodile Incident", there was already a T-shaped dyke connecting the island to the right river bank, which soon sealed the fate of the island, but prevented further lateral erosion of the Upper Öreghegy. The drift line of the river was moved away from the already thoroughly undercut loess slopes and the bed, narrowed by the stone dyke, began to deepen. In 1930, the cross-dam appeared to have forced the water of the tributary back into the main branch partly through the reef, resulting in the splitting of Crocodile Island. At this time, the entire island must have been about 400 metres long.

 28th September 1959. 

At the low water level of 181 centimetres measured in Budapest on 28 September 1959, the riverbed formations whose reforestation is currently defining the island's appearance are already visible. The shallow sandbar formation starting at the northern tip and the filling below the cross-dam can be observed. On the aerial photograph, the island is still divided into two distinct parts, a similar situation as a few years later on the map of the Danube, the only map other than the 1910 map to include any name for the island. 

The upper and lower sandbars around 1963.

This map of the Danube must have been made sometime in the first half of the 1960s. It provides detailed information on the state of the Danube at that time and is the first to show the island in the form of an ice-cream broken in half. The handle is the Lower sandbar and the core of the ice-cream is the Upper sandbar. Blue crescents mark the mostly water-covered bar formed in the riverbed opposite the 1562 river kilometre marker. The shape depicted on the map does not in the least resemble a naturally formed island.

15th September 1966.

Although the T-shaped dyke was marked on the 1930 map, the river regulation structure was probably covered by the Danube even at medium water levels, as shown on the 1966 aerial photograph. The river fills the bed up to the base of the loess walls, just as it did before the regulation. The Hungarian Hydroinfo archive records a water level of 385 centimetres in Budapest at the time, and there is nothing between the island and the shore to break the grey monotony of the water surface, just as the barren monotony of the island is punctuated by a few trees. 

The forested Crocodile island in 2005. 

Comparing the situation in 1966 with the present situation, the expansion of vegetation is striking. This process has occurred in a similar way almost everywhere along the Hungarian stretch of the Danube: the lowering of the riverbed due to river regulation has led to the drying up of certain riparian areas, allowing vegetation to establish and succession to take place. This was no different in the area of Dunaföldvár, where one of the largest river bed subsidence events in Hungary took place. Since the process is irreversible, just as the crocodile that was beaten to death could not have been brought back to life by the dock workers in 1911, it is unlikely that Crocodile Island will ever be a real Danube island again, as it never really was. But this is not necessarily a problem, as the sea of nettles that has grown up on the floodplain preserves a Danube jewel box of unique natural value.

Preferably for a long time to come. 

Translated with DeepL.com (free version)

Island in the Sea of Nettles

 

MAGYARUL

In summer, the defence mechanisms of the Danube islands are activated. The wildlife puts the most beautiful floodplain landscapes under strict protection, drawing a smokescreen of insects, spiders and bloodsuckers, installing mine barriers of impenetrable soot and blackberry bark, forming barbed wire barriers of man-high nettles, and if all this were not enough, the flooding due to heavy rainfall overwhelms the remaining paths in the riverine forests. Even the best armour, long-sleeved shirts, thick trousers, hats, mosquito repellent and rubber boots won't help, there are simply some islands where access through ditches and bushes is impossible. One such place is the former sand bar at the foot of the loess wall in Dunaföldvár, which has been given its own name, Felső-Öreghegyi Island. 

In Dunaföldvár, the Felső-Öreghegy is a loess hill, which is thoroughly dug into by the Danube from the east. The middle section of the ridge is missing from the NNE-SSE line of hills, which is the  characteristic tectonic direction of the Transdanubian Mezőség plains, and therefore it breaks off with a steep slope towards the Danube, which is also characteristic of the eastern border of the Mezőség. The inner curve of this bend formed a sand bar, which soon became an island as a result of the subsidence of the average river level due to river regulation, the construction of a cross barrier prevented further erosion of the bank, but this ultimately meant that the island is now unrecognisable from the bank, from the main branch and even from the József Beszédes bridge. The same can be said of the huge Felső Island of Dunaföldvár on the left bank, which is adjacent to the half-broken ice-cream-shaped Felső-Öreghegyi Island at river kilometer 1562. 

This strange shape is due to the fact that the island's part south of the cross dam is a stone dyke, while the upper part widens considerably at the expense of the tributary. The name tributary is an exaggeration, as the former riverbed is divided into two sub-basins, or oxbow lakes, of which the northern one is the larger, longer and has the larger open water surface. On the morning of 2 June 2024, at a water level of 107 centimetres at Dunaföldvár gauge at the time of rising water level, there was no connection between the two sub-basins, but it was not long before the water broke through the unrecognisable cross-barrier, which was particularly difficult to find because of the circumstances described in the first paragraph. Its position could be determined by the crop stones that had emerged in a wild boar's pit at the foot of the riverbank, which in many places is steep as a castle wall, but the soil had almost completely buried it. Traces of rainfall destroying the loess wall could be observed in several places, with the material deposited almost immediately entering the tributary, constantly filling it.

The unseen Felső-Öreghegyi Island seen from the top of the Dunaföldvár loess wall.

The southern tip of the island, at rising water level.

The oxbow lake surrounded by the sea of nettles.

View of the cross dam, buried and overgrown beyond recognition.

The steadily rising water level is submerging the riparian vegetation.

Remnants of the cross dam near the loess wall.

The open water surface of the upper lake.

Still life with nettles.

View from the cross dam towards north.

At this water level, the cross dam is the only possible way to enter the island, but the man-high nettle forms an impenetrable barrier on the island's steep slopes, effectively preventing more detailed documentation of the island. The presence of the large nettle is an indicator of the abundant nitrogen content of the soil, both on the island and in the riverine forest, and has even obliterated the path leading to the island. It is therefore definitely worth returning here at lower water levels, well away from the growing season. 

Translated with DeepL.com (free version)