Volga River (Волга)
River
The Volga at Ulyanovsk
Country	Russia
Tributaries
- left	Kama River
- right	Oka River
Cities	Astrakhan, Volgograd, Saratov, Samara, Kazan, Ulyanovsk, Nizhny Novgorod, Yaroslavl, Tver
Source
- location	Valdai Hills, Tver Oblast
- elevation	225 m (738 ft)
Mouth	Caspian Sea
- elevation	-28 m (-92 ft)
- coordinates	45°50′30″N 47°58′17″E / 45.84167°N 47.97139°E / 45.84167; 47.97139 [1]
Length	3,692 km (2,294 mi)
Basin	1,380,000 km2 (532,821 sq mi)
Discharge	for Astrakhan
- average	8,060 m3/s (284,636 cu ft/s)
Map of the Volga watershed

The Volga (Russian: Во́лга; IPA: [ˈvolɡə] ( listen)) is the largest river in Europe in terms of length, discharge, and watershed. It flows through central Russia, and is widely viewed as the national river of Russia. Out of the twenty largest cities of Russia, eleven, including the capital Moscow, are situated in the Volga's drainage basin. Some of the largest reservoirs in the world can be found along the Volga. The river has a symbolic meaning in Russian culture and is often referred to as Volga-Matushka (Volga-mother) in Russian literature and folklore.

Nomenclature[link]

The Russian hydronym Volga (Волга) derives from Proto-Slavic *vòlga "wetness, moisture", which is preserved in many Slavic languages, including Ukrainian vológa (воло́га) "moisture", Russian vlaga (влага) "moisture", Bulgarian vlaga (влага) "moisture", Czech vláha "dampness", and Serbo-Croatian vlȁga "moisture", among others.^[2]

The Slavic name is a loan translation of earlier Scythian Rā (Ῥᾶ) "Volga",^[3] literally "wetness", seen also in Avestan Raŋhā "mythical stream" and Sogdian r’k "vein, blood vessel" (< *raha-ka),^[4] and cognate with Sanskrit rasā́h "liquid, juice; mythical river".^[5] The Scythian name survives in modern Mordvin Rav (Рав) "Volga".

The Turkic peoples living along the river formerly referred to it as Itil or Atil "big river". In modern Turkic languages, the Volga is known as İdel (Идел) in Tatar, Idyll in ancient Bulgar^{[citation needed]}, Атăл (Atăl) in Chuvash, Idhel in Bashkir, Edil in Kazakh, and İdil in Turkish. The Turkic peoples associated the Itil's origin with the Kama River. Thus, a left tributary to the Kama River was named the Aq Itil "White Itil" which unites with the Kara Itil "Black Itil" at the modern city of Ufa.

Under the Asians, the river was known by its other Turkic name Sarı-su "yellow water", but Mongols also used their own name: Ijil mörön "adaptation river". Presently the Mari, another Ugric group, call the river Юл (Jul), meaning "way" in Tatar. Formerly, they called the river Volgydo, a borrowing from Old Russian.

Description[link]

The Volga is the longest river in Europe. It belongs to the closed basin of the Caspian Sea. Rising in the Valdai Hills 225 meters (738 ft) above sea level northwest of Moscow and about 320 kilometers (200 mi) southeast of Saint Petersburg, the Volga heads east past Lake Sterzh, Tver, Dubna, Rybinsk, Yaroslavl, Nizhny Novgorod, and Kazan. From there it turns south, flows past Ulyanovsk, Tolyatti, Samara, Saratov and Volgograd, and discharges into the Caspian Sea below Astrakhan at 28 meters (92 ft) below sea level. At its most strategic point, it bends toward the Don ("the big bend"). Volgograd, formerly Stalingrad, is located there.

The Saratov Bridge, running across the Volga, used to be the longest in Europe

The Volga has many tributaries, most importantly the Kama, the Oka, the Vetluga, and the Sura rivers. The Volga and its tributaries form the Volga river system, which drains an area of about 1.35 million square kilometres in the most heavily populated part of Russia. The Volga Delta has a length of about 160 kilometres and includes as many as 500 channels and smaller rivers. The largest estuary in Europe, it is the only place in Russia where pelicans, flamingos, and lotuses may be found. The Volga freezes for most of its length for three months each year.

The Volga drains most of Western Russia. Its many large reservoirs provide irrigation and hydroelectric power. The Moscow Canal, the Volga–Don Canal, and the Volga–Baltic Waterway form navigable waterways connecting Moscow to the White Sea, the Baltic Sea, the Caspian Sea, the Sea of Azov and the Black Sea. High levels of chemical pollution have adversely affected the river and its habitats.

The fertile river valley provides large quantities of wheat, and also has many mineral riches. A substantial petroleum industry centres on the Volga valley. Other resources include natural gas, salt, and potash. The Volga Delta and the nearby Caspian Sea offer superb fishing grounds. Astrakhan, at the delta, is the centre of the caviar industry.

Confluents (downstream to upstream)[link]

Rzhev is the uppermost town situated on the Volga (photographed c. 1910)

A suspension bridge across the Volga in Tver (built 1897)

Volga near Nizhny Novgorod, 2010

Reservoirs (downstream to upstream)[link]

A number of large hydroelectric reservoirs were constructed on the Volga during the Soviet rule. They are:

• Ivankovo Reservoir
• Uglich Reservoir
• Rybinsk Reservoir
• Gorky Reservoir
• Cheboksary Reservoir
• Kuybyshev Reservoir – the largest in Europe by surface
• Saratov Reservoir
• Volgograd Reservoir

Human history[link]

Many Orthodox shrines and monasteries are strewn along the banks of the Volga

The downstream of the Volga, widely believed to have been a cradle of the Proto-Indo-European civilization, was settled by Huns and other Turkic peoples in the first millennium AD, replacing Scythians. The ancient scholar Ptolemy of Alexandria mentions the lower Volga in his Geography (Book 5, Chapter 8, 2nd Map of Asia). He calls it the Rha, which was the Scythian name for the river. Ptolemy believed the Don and the Volga shared the same upper branch, which flowed from the Hyperborean Mountains.

Subsequently, the river basin played an important role in the movements of peoples from Asia to Europe. A powerful polity of Volga Bulgaria once flourished where the Kama river joins the Volga, while Khazaria controlled the lower stretches of the river. Such Volga cities as Atil, Saqsin, or Sarai were among the largest in the medieval world. The river served as an important trade route connecting Scandinavia, Rus', and Volga Bulgaria with Khazaria and Persia.

Khazars were replaced by Kipchaks, Kimeks and Mongols, who founded the Golden Horde in the lower reaches of the Volga. Later their empire broke into the Khanate of Kazan and Khanate of Astrakhan both of which were conquered by the Russians in the course of the 16th century Russo-Kazan Wars. The Russian people's deep feeling for the Volga finds echoes in their culture and literature, starting from the 12th-century Lay of Igor's Campaign.^[6] The Volga Boatmen's Song is one of many songs devoted to the national river of Russia.

Construction of Soviet dams often involved enforced resettlement of huge numbers of people, as well as destruction of their historical heritage. For instance, the town of Mologa was flooded for the purpose of constructing the Rybinsk Reservoir (then the largest artificial lake in the world), and the construction of the Uglich Reservoir entailed the flooding of several monasteries with buildings dating from the 15th and 16th centuries. In such cases the ecological and cultural damage often outbalanced any economical advantage.^[7]

20th-century conflicts[link]

Soviet Marines charge the Volga river bank.

During the Russian Civil War, both sides fielded warships on the Volga. In 1918, the Red Volga Flotilla participated in driving the Whites eastward, from the Middle Volga at Kazan to the Kama and eventually to Ufa on the Belaya River.^[8]

In modern times, the city on the big bend of the Volga, currently known as Volgograd, witnessed the Battle of Stalingrad, possibly the bloodiest battle in human history, in which the Soviet Union and the German forces were deadlocked in a stalemate battle for access to the river. The Volga was (and still is) a vital transport route between central Russia and the Caspian Sea, which provides access to the oil fields of Apsheron. Hitler planned to use access to the oil fields of Azerbaijan to fuel future German conquests. Apart from that, whoever held both sides of the river could move valuable troops and war machines, across the river, to defeat the enemy's fortifications beyond the river.^[9] By taking the river, Hitler's Germany would have been able to move supplies, guns, and men into the northern part of Russia.

For this reason, many amphibious assaults were brought about in an attempt to remove the other side from the banks of the river. In these battles, the Soviet Union was the main offensive side, while the German troops used a more defensive stance, though most of the fighting was close quarters combat, with no clear offensive or defensive side.

Ethnic groups[link]

Volga river at Kazan.

The first people along the upper Volga were the Mari (Мари) and their west ethnic group named Merya (Мäрӹ). In the 8th and 9th centuries Slavic colonization began from Kievan Rus'. The Slavs brought Christianity, and a part of local people took Christianity and gradually became East Slavs; the remainder of Mari people migrated to the west far inland. In the course of several centuries they assimilated the indigenous Finnic population which included Merya and Meshchera peoples. The surviving peoples of Volga Finnic ethnicity include the Maris and Mordvins of the middle Volga.