Dubnica nad Váhom

Dubnica nad Váhom (until 1927 in Slovak "Dubnica"; German Dubnitz an der Waag , Hungarian Máriatölgyes - until 1902 Dubnic ) is a city in north-western Slovakia with 23,550 inhabitants (as of December 31, 2019). It is the largest Slovak city that is not also the seat of an okres, instead it belongs to the Okres Ilava , part of the Trenčiansky kraj .

geography

Part of the city center of Dubnica nad Váhom

The city is located in the Ilavská kotlina basin , geomorphologically a part of the Považské podolie valley landscape , between the White Carpathians northwest and the Strážovské vrchy southeast of the city, near the border with the Czech Republic . It is traversed by the Dubnický creek , a left tributary of the Waag . In addition, the Kočkovský kanál canal runs through the municipality. The municipal area of 49.137 km² includes, in addition to the built-up areas in the valley basin, agriculturally used soil and water areas, also rich forests in the Strážovské vrchy, which make up about half of the municipal area. The center of the village is at an altitude of 242 m nm and is seven kilometers from Ilava , 14 kilometers from Trenčín and 143 kilometers from Bratislava .

The climate is warm and humid with mild winters, the annual average temperature is between 8 ° C and 9 ° C, the annual rainfall is around 700 mm.

In addition to the actual place Dubnica nad Váhom, the place Prejta (incorporated in 1973) also belongs to the city.

Neighboring municipalities are Bolešov and Kameničany in the north, Slavnica in the northeast, Ilava (including the Klobušice district ) in the northeast and east, Horná Poruba , Dolná Poruba and Omšenie in the southeast, Nová Dubnica and Trenčianska Teplá in the southwest, Nemšová in the west and Borčice in the northwest.

history

Marian column from the 18th century at Námestie Matice slovenskej

Today's municipal area was settled in the Stone Age, from the Bronze Age there are remains of a settlement of the Aunjetitz culture , a settlement and an urn field of the Lusatian culture and a settlement of the Puchau culture from the Young Bronze Age. The Slavic ancestors settled in the area towards the end of the Great Migration and had settlements in the districts of Pred Kvášovec and Malý Kolačín from the 10th and 11th centuries, ie after the end of the Moravian Empire .

The town was first mentioned as Dubnicze in 1193 and was then the inheritance of the brothers Vratislav and Piskin , who received the estate as a reward for contributing to a war in Galicia. In 1276 the place belonged to a certain Oltuman, from this year the first mention of the church dedicated to St. James comes. In 1439, after the previous landowners had died out, the village became part of the Trenčín Castle estate . In 1538 there were a total of 46 portals , in 1609 49 farms and 54 inns, two mills, a brewery, a farm, a restaurant and three butchers and blacksmiths each.

In 1639 and 1730 Dubnica became a town and received market rights. In 1683 it was sacked by Jan Sobieski's army. In the 18th century the Illésházy family acquired the estate. In 1728 the town had 28 farmhouses and 26 inns, a farm, a distillery, two restaurants, a distillery and a brickworks. In 1828 there were 189 houses and 1,868 inhabitants who lived from agriculture and handicrafts; In 1835 the estate was sold to Baron Sina. After the abolition of serfdom, Dubnica was a predominantly rural small town with a few traders (100 in 1900) and small industries (two distilleries and brickworks in 1900).

Until 1918/19 the place in Trenčín County belonged to the Kingdom of Hungary and then came to Czechoslovakia or now Slovakia. In 1928 the construction of a factory of the Škoda works began near the town, which after its completion in 1937 gradually changed the town. During the Second World War there was a branch of the Flugmotorenwerke Ostmark in Dubnica from 1944 . He was in a huge, multi-storey bunker (320 × 125 m). Before 1938 the Czechs had planned to use the bunker to relocate weapons production in the event of a German attack . Also during the Second World War, the authorities of the Slovak state set up a labor camp for “politically undesirable” people in 1942, which in 1944 was converted into an all-Slovak collection center for Slovak Roma. The city was occupied by a Soviet-Romanian army group on April 28, 1945.

After the Second World War, the Škoda factory was repaired and put back into operation in 1950, but the repair of the town itself took several more years. The brick factory, which opened in 1957, was closed again in 1962 due to a constant lack of fuel. The factory underwent numerous renaming and reorganization during the communist era, such as in 1953 when it was divided into two organizational parts, which in the 1980s were named Závod všeobecného strojárstva (ZVS for short, literally General Mechanical Engineering) and Závody ťažkého strojárstva ( ZŤS for short, literally heavy machinery structures). The ZVS manufactured electronics for the textile industry, while the ZierteS focused on the manufacture of hydraulic and pump mechanisms and most recently focused on the armaments industry, so that in 1988 it was one of the most important Czechoslovak armaments manufacturers.

However, the political change in 1989 and the transition to a market economy brought both plants into difficulties; Numerous companies emerged on the factory premises. Some of them are still related by name to ZVS and ZŤS; the former extent is no longer achieved. The city itself is trying to reorient itself from the mechanical engineering industry to services.

population

According to the 2011 census, Dubnica nad Váhom had 25,305 inhabitants, including 21,669 Slovaks , 189 Czechs , 38 Moravians , 33 Magyars , 15 Roma and 10 Bulgarians , Germans and Russians each ; all other residents either belonged to an ethnic group with fewer than ten members or to another ethnic group not listed in the statistics. 3,277 residents did not provide any information. 15,928 residents committed to the Roman Catholic Church , 489 residents to the Evangelical Church AB , 66 residents to the Greek Catholic Church , 42 residents to the Apostolic Church , 35 residents to the Jehovah's Witnesses , 28 residents to the Congregational Church, 19 residents to the Orthodox Church , 12 residents to the Evangelical Methodist Church , 11 residents to the Czechoslovak Hussite Church and 10 residents to the Reformed Church ; all other residents either belonged to a denomination with fewer than ten members or to another denomination not listed in the statistics. 4207 inhabitants were without a denomination and the denomination was not determined for 4308 inhabitants.

According to the 2001 census, the city had 25,995 inhabitants.

According to nationalities:

96.62% Slovaks
1.40% Czechs
0.22% Roma
0.18% Magyars

According to religion:

76.74% Roman Catholic
16.38% not religious
3.45% no information
2.45% Protestant

Buildings

Roman Catholic Church of St. James, originally mentioned as a Gothic church in 1276, redesigned in 1754 in Baroque style
Country castle from 1642, first built in the Renaissance style, redesigned in Baroque style in 1719–1720 and 1790. On the west wing there is a chapel of the Assumption of the Virgin Mary from 1730
Country castle from the first half of the 17th century

Sports

The football club MFK Dubnica , which previously competed in the Corgoň liga (the highest Slovak division) and has played in the 2nd division since 2011/2012 , and the ice hockey club MHK Dubnica , which has played in the extra league for several years, are based in Dubnica .

Since 2003, the athletics meeting Atletický most has been held every August at the municipal football stadium .

traffic

Cesta I. triedy 61 runs through the city from Bratislava and Trenčín to Žilina . Road No. 57 from the Czech Republic ends southwest of the city . However, through traffic has been using the D1 motorway since 1998 , the nearest junctions are Nemšová (138) west and Ilava (145) northeast of the city.

Dubnica nad Váhom has a train station on the Bratislava – Žilina line , where (as of the 2014/2015 timetable) several local trains stop, but no express or IC trains (next train station is Trenčianska Teplá or Trenčín). The city is well served by local bus routes and there are several long-distance connections in town.