Záhorie

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Coordinates: 48°33′N 17°05′E / 48.55°N 17.083°E / 48.55; 17.083

"Erdőhát" redirects here. For the Romanian village of Dumbrava, called Erdőhát in Hungarian, see Pestişu Mic.

Záhorie (Hungarian: Erdőhát)^[1]^[2] is a region in western Slovakia bordered by the Little Carpathians in the east and the Morava River in the west. Although not an administrative region in its own right, it is one of the 21 official tourism regions in Slovakia. Záhorie lies in the area of three administrative regions: Bratislava Region (Malacky District plus Záhorská Bystrica in Bratislava), Trnava Region (Senica and Skalica districts) and Trenčín Region (southern part of Myjava District). The region also creates the borders between Slovakia, the Czech Republic and Austria.

A military district of the same name is located around Malacky.

[edit] Name

The word "Záhorie" means "(The land) behind the mountains", referring to the Little Carpathians mountains that separate Záhorie from the rest of Slovakia.

[edit] Geography

In the middle of the region is Záhorská nížina, a plain between Senica and Malacky towns. The most of the area is forested because of its sandy subsoil that is not suitable for farming. The forested area is used as testing range for military vehicles, especially tanks and artillery. The testing range is called Vojenský technický skúšobný ústav Záhorie (Military technical testing institute), and it contains the testing range, Kuchyňa airbase, and the village Záhorie that was built for the workers of the testing range. Headquarters are located in the village Záhorie and contains storage facilities and research facilities. The west border of the region represents the river Morava. The east border is Carpathian Mountain Range. On the north side is Chvojnická pahorkatina. Through the region flows the river Myjava. Almost every village has a dam or a lake.

[edit] Climate and agriculture

The region is a plain behind mountains, so the climate is much drier than on the rest of Slovakia. The region is well known for its wide yellow fields of rapeseed and red wine. Other grown corps are corn, sunflowers and grain.

[edit] Population

The population in the area is around 170,000. Towns in the region are Gbely, Holíč, Malacky, Senica, Skalica, Stupava and Šaštín-Stráže.

The people here were for many years in the past farmers, so there are no big towns, most of the people lived in small villages not far from each other. The average distances between the villages are less than 3 km. Between the villages are very often small settlements, especially around Myjava and Brezová pod Bradlom, called kopanice, osady or samoty.

This region is well known for producing high quality wines, espetially in the regions around the town Skalica. This town is well known for an typical cuveé - Skalicky Rubin (Skalica Carbuncle), a composition of three sorts of red wine - Noir de Franconie (subsort Lampart)+Portugais Bleu+Saint Laurent (Skalicka Frankovka, Modry Portugal, Svätovavrinecké) and also a typical subsort of Noir de Franconie redwine - Lampart.

The region specific production of alcoholic beverages is typically known with wine brandy and various fruit spirits (pear, apple, plum...) with higher volume of alcohol, 40% and more, especially slivovica, a popular local speciality.

Because the region was separated from the rest of the Slovakia, the people are Moravians rather than Slovaks so they speak distinct dialect of Slovak language similar to the Moravian one and they are referred to as "Záhoráci". They are the target of frequent region-specific jokes from the rest of Slovaks, in a similar way that e.g. the Irish are mocked by the British, and the people from Appenzell, Switzerland are being laughed at by the rest of the Swiss.

[edit] Environment and ecology

Some parts of Záhorie are protected by Záhorie Protected Landscape Area, the first lowland protected landscape area in Slovakia. The Landscape Area takes 275.22 km² (106.3 mi²) and is divided into two separate parts – north-eastern and western. The Little Carpathians Protected Landscape Area and Biele Karpaty Protected Landscape Area are partly situated in Záhorie.

Largest part of Záhorie takes Záhorie Lowland, which is divided into Bor Lowland and Chvojnica Hills. Bor Lowland (slov.^[3]) is named after big artificial forest called Bor (eng. Pinewood (?)). The forest was planted with Scots Pine in 18th century on the largest blown sands of Slovakia.