The Timiş (Romanian: Timiş; Serbian: Tamiš or Тамиш; German: Temesch; Hungarian: Temes) is a 359 km long river rising in the Semenic Mountains, southern Carpathian Mountains, Caraş-Severin County, Romania. It flows through the Banat region and flows into the Danube near Pančevo, in northern Serbia.

Characteristics

Drainage area covers 13.085 km² (in Romania 8.085 km², in Serbia 5.000 km²). Through Danube, it belongs to the Black Sea drainage basin.

After entering Banat, river becomes slow and meandering, causing floods in rainy years and especially devastating were floods of 2005, when villages of Boka and Jaša Tomić were badly damaged.

In it's lower course, river is regulated, and for the last 53 km it is navigable. Most important port is heavily industrialized Pančevo. In some parts of the low, marshy areas created by the floods, several huge fishponds are created, most notably are Banatski Despotovac, Uzdin, Sakule and Slatina.

Tributaries

Known in Antiquity as Tibiscus and Tibisis, river flows through Romania for 241 km, receiving on it's course many smaller tributaries: Râul Rece, Slatina, Valea Mare, Rugiu, Pârâul Lung, Armeniş, Sebeş, Bistra, Şurgani, Timişana, Pogăniş, Timişul Mort and Vena Mare. In it's 118 km course through Serbia it has only one tributary, albeit the longest one, Brzava.

Settlements

Major cities in its Romanian course are Caransebeş and Lugoj, smaller places include Armeniş, Slatina Timiş, Căvăran and Rudna after which it enters Serbia and passes through Jaša Tomić, Boka, Sečanj, Neuzina, Botoš, Tomaševac, Orlovat, Idvor, Farkaždin, Sakule, Opovo, Sefkerin, Glogonj, Jabuka and Pančevo.

One of major Romanian cities, Timişoara, even though its name indicates it, is not settled on the river, but on another one Romanian-Serbian river, Begej.

Pančevački Rit

River's old mouth into the Danube was some 40 km to the north-west, between villages of Čenta and Surduk, thus it was shorter. Canal Karaš (Cyrillic: Караш) remained marking old river bed, and area bounded by old and new river beds and the Danube, is called Pančevački Rit (Marches of Pančevo, Cyrillic: Панчевачки Рит). 400 km² large wetland was constantly flooded, but since World War II it has been drained part by part and almost half of it is turned into a very fertile patch of land, suitable especially for cultivating grains and vegetables. It is managed by Serbian largest agricultural company, "PKB Beograd", which almost exclusively provides food for 2 million people in wider Belgrade area, thus Pančevački Rit is commonly nicknamed Granary of Belgrade. Stockbreeding is also very intensive, so are fishery and hunting.

Many meandering canals and bogs remained in the marsh: slow streams of Vizelj, Dunavac, Sibnica, Butuš, Rogoznica, Buk, Belanoš and Sebeš, and large bogs of Reva, Veliko Blato (2 km²), Sebeš and Široka bara. In the south, area ends with a river island (ada) Kožara (0,44 km²).

After being almost uninhabited before 1945, today its population density is above average for Serbia as a whole, since some of the fastest growing suburbs of Belgrade (Borča, Padinska Skela and Krnjača) are built there. Whole area of Pančevački Rit belongs administratively to Belgrade's municipality of Palilula.

References

• Mala Prosvetina Enciklopedija, Third edition (1985); Prosveta; ISBN 86-07-00001-2
• Jovan Đ. Marković (1990): Enciklopedijski geografski leksikon Jugoslavije; Svjetlost-Sarajevo; ISBN 86-01-02651-6

Rivers of Romania | Banat | Rivers of Serbia | Geography of Vojvodina | Tributaries of the Danube

Tamiš | Tibisko | Temes (folyó) | Timiş (rivier) | Timiş (Râul)