Baia Mare, Maramureș County, Transylvania, Romania

🇷🇴 Baia Mare is a municipality along the Săsar River, in north-western Romania; it is the capital of Maramureș County. The city lies in the region of Maramureș, a subregion of Transylvania. It is situated about 600 km (373 miles) from Bucharest, 70 km (43 mi) from the border with Hungary, and 50 km (31 mi) from the border with Ukraine.

Located south of Igniș and Gutâi Mountains, The city administers four villages: Blidari (Kőbánya), Firiza (Felsőfernezely), Valea Borcutului (Borpatak) and Valea Neagră (Feketepatak).

History The city's development on the middle course of Săsar River, in the middle of a plateau with a warm Mediterranean-like climate, has facilitated living conditions since the Palaeolithic.

Ancient times During the Bronze Age the region was inhabited by Thracian tribes. Later, it was included in the Dacian Kingdom formed by the King Burebista when the mining exploration began, as the area is rich in gold and silver.

History: Middle Ages Baia Mare is first mentioned in written documents released by Charles I of Hungary in 1328 under the name of Rivulus Dominarum (English: Ladies' River). In 1347 the town was identified in documents by Louis I of Hungary as an important medieval town with a prosperous mining industry. Its rules of organisation were characteristic of the "free towns" of that time. In 1411 the town and its surrounding areas, including the mines, were transferred into the property of the Hunyadi family by Sigismund, King of Hungary (later also Holy Roman Emperor), who recognised Janos Hunyadi's contribution to stop the Turkish invasion of Europe.

The town went into a period of prosperity, during which the St. Stephen Cathedral was built. Today the cathedral tower is one of the best-known of the town's historic landmarks (see Stephen's Tower). The first school, named Schola Rivulina, was opened in Baia Mare in 1547 by the Reformed Church following the Protestant Reformation.

Modern period In 1703 Pintea Viteazul and his band managed to free the town for a short period of time from the German Imperial rule, under which it belonged the royal treasury. Since then Pintea is considered an important figure in the town's history, representing the idea of freedom. The Budești Church has Pintea's chain mail shirt and a helmet, reportedly worn by him in his battles. The Museum of Baia Mare displays his weapons and their harness.

In 1748 the city's mining industry made a leap forward when the Austrian authorities created the headquarters of "Superior Mining".

In the late nineteenth century, Simon Hollósy, István Réti, János Thorma, Béla Iványi-Grünwald, and Károly Ferenczy were among numerous young Hungarians who left the area to study the arts in Munich, as Hungary lacked an academy of art in those times. Simon Hollósy, the young Hungarian painter, was teaching in his studio new western European techniques.

Some of those young painters decided to settle down together in Baia Mare, then called Nagybánya, to work on art. They persuaded Hollósy to join them and founded the Nagybánya artists' colony, working on naturalism and plein air painting. The artists' colony became known later on for influencing the development of twentieth-century Hungarian and Romanian art. Works by each of these important painters is held by the Hungarian National Gallery in Budapest, which in 2009 opened the exhibit, Munich in Hungarian, Hungarian Artists in Munich 1850-1914, 2 Oct 2009 - Jan 2010. In addition, in 1966 the museum held a major exhibition of their work: The Art of Nagybánya. Centennial Exhibition in Celebration of the Artists' Colony in Nagybánya.

Following World War I, the Austro-Hungarian Empire was dissolved, and in 1920, Baia Mare officially became part of the Kingdom of Romania. It became part of Hungary again between since 1940 by the Second Vienna Award, until the end of World War II. Near the end of that period, the city hosted the Baia Mare ghetto. After the war, the city was returned to Romania. Shortly after World War II in postwar development, the town of Baia Mare started to grow both in population and inhabited area. In the late 1970s and early 1980s, a new town centre was developed with modern architecture buildings and structures.

On 30 January 2000, Baia Mare was the site of what has been considered Europe's worst ecological disaster since Chernobyl, which took place at gold mining company Aurul, a joint-venture of the Australian company Esmeralda Exploration and the Romanian government. The tailing dam at the gold processing plant broke and 100,000 m3 (3,531,467 cu ft) 70 tons of toxic cyanide and heavy metal-laced waste water escaped into the River Tisza and into Hungary, making its way into the Danube and affecting Romania, Hungary, Ukraine, Serbia, and Bulgaria. More than 1,400 tons of fish, numerous eagles, storks and otters died. Scientists fear the release may have led to the ultimate extinction of at least five fish species. Despite the accident's happening in Romania, much of the adverse effects were suffered in Hungary. The accident prompted Hungary to ban the use of cyanide in gold processing and it has urged the rest of Europe to do the same.

Since 2013, local romani businessman Daniel Boldor has been operating out of the CUPROM mine and refinery outside of Baia Mare, selling what he claims are under-extracted Ore concentrate shipments to international metal traders in China, South Korea, Thailand, and the United States. Based on claims that the material was, in fact, worthless mining sludge, the public prosecutor's office in Constanța filed an indictment against Boldor in June 2018 on charges of money laundering, customs fraud, document forgery, the collection and transport of hazardous waste, and tax evasion.

Geography The city is situated in the vicinity of the Gutâi and Igniș Mountains. Altitudes reach 1400 meters in some peaks. The area is famous for its outstanding landscapes, and the mountains are easily accessible from the city, famous routes being: Igniș (1307 m), Mogoșa (1246 m), Gutâi (1443 m), Creasta Cocoșului (1450 m), Piatra Soimului (839 m), Plestioara (803 m), Dealul Bulat (683 m), Murgau (633 m), Dealul Crucii (500 m) etc.

The city is situated in the Baia Mare valley and is encircled on all sides by hills and mountains, which makes the climate in the city milder than the rest of the surrounding area. Proof of this is that the outskirts of Baia Mare are the only areas where you can find chestnut trees that usually need Mediterranean climate to grow. This is the northernmost reach of the chestnut tree. However, abrupt temperature changes take place and, during the winters, the temperatures may occasionally drop below -20 degrees Celsius.

The summers are mild, cooler than in the rest of the country. The precipitations in this area are quite high, due to the mountains in the north and east which do not allow the air masses to pass beyond the region's limits, the average rainfall being almost 1000 mm/year. The city of Baia Mare is the most populous of northern Romanian cities (Satu Mare, Suceava, and Botoșani), with a population of approximately 124,000. It also has a high level of culture and education, being home to theatres, schools, museums and art galleries.

Not far from the city there are a few very important natural reservations, among them Creasta Cocoșului, Cheile Tătărului, Lacul Albastru etc. Because of its privileged location in the Eastern Carpathian mountains it is considered one of the most picturesque cities in Romania.

Demographics The ethnic composition of the city is as follows: • Romanian: (84.11%) • Hungarian: (12.25%) • Roma: (2.76%) • Germans (i.e. Zipser Germans): (0.24%) • Ukrainian: (0.16%) • Jews: (0.02%)

and 642 others, including Greeks, Turks, Italians, Lipovans, Poles, and Slovaks.

Baia Mare metropolitan area has an area of 1,395.38 square km (538.76 sq mi), and includes the municipality of Baia Mare, five towns (Baia Sprie, Cavnic, Seini, Șomcuta Mare, and Tăuții-Măgherăuș), and 13 communes (Cernești, Cicârlău, Coaș, Coltău, Copalnic-Mănăștur, Dumbrăvița, Groși, Mireșu Mare, Recea, Remetea Chioarului, Satulung, Săcălășeni, and Valea Chioarului).

Economy The economic activity of Baia Mare has been based on the mining activities located in the surrounding areas. However, after the 1989 Revolution and industrial changes, such mining declined considerably. They have been replaced with several activities which have improved the city's economy in recent years. Baia Mare has become one of the most economically evolved cities in the region. As a result, several supermarkets have been built in the city as well as one of the biggest shopping malls in over 100 km (62 mi) radius. The largest sofa manufacturing plant in Eastern Europe, Italsofa, is located near the Baia Mare city highway ring.

The city has a mainline (and branch) passenger and freight railway service provided by CFR, the national railway carrier.

Culture In Baia Mare there is one library (with a few branches), 6 museums, one planetarium and observatory, 2 theaters, 2 cultural centres, one art school and one popular university. • "Petre Dulfu" County Library • County Museum of History and Archeology Baia Mare • Museum of Mineralogy Baia Mare • Planetarium and astronomical observatory Baia Mare • Arts centre Baia Mare- Art Museum • Ethnography and folk art Museum Baia Mare • Municipal Theater Baia Mare • Puppet Theater Baia Mare.

Education In Baia Mare there are 23 schools, 34 kindergartens and 18 highschools. Higher education is represented by: • Northern University • Bogdan Vodă University from Baia Mare • "Vatra" University of Arts from Baia Mare • "Vasile Goldiș" Western University Baia Mare.

National highschools from Baia Mare: • Gheorghe Șincai National College • Emil Racoviță Theoretical Highschool • Vasile Lucaciu National College • Mihai Eminescu National College • Arts College • "Nicolae Titulescu" Economics College • Highschool of Sports • "George Barițiu" Technical College • "Anghel Saligny" Technical College • "C.D. Nenițescu" Technical College • "Németh László" Theoretical Highschool.