Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Crişana & Banat Highlights
Getting a riveting history lesson at the Permanent Exhibition of the 1989
Revolution (
Click here
)
in Timişoara
Indulging in a lazy day in Timişoara (
Click here
)
, starting at the outdoor
pool, then an evening at the opera, and finally a nightcap on Piaţa Victoriei or Pi-
aţa Unirii
Taking in the stunning but crumbling art nouveau grandeur of Oradea (
Looking at the ancient stalactites and stalagmites in the magnificent Bear
Cave (
Click here
)
Hiking around or simply gazing at the western Apuseni Mountains (
Click
here
)
Glimpsing ice from the Ice Age at the appropriately named Ice Cave (
Click
here
)
History
The western Romanian regions of Crişana and Banat have traditionally played the role of
stepping stone between east and west. The area was first settled in the 6th century BC, and
by AD 106 had become part of the Roman province of Dacia. The two regions fell under
Hungarian rule around the end of the 9th century and remained part of the Hungarian
kingdom until the Ottoman conquest of Crişana and Banat in 1552.
The Turks ruled these parts for around 150 years, finally losing control of Crişana and
Banat to the Austrian Habsburgs in 1716 after the Turks were defeated in battle by Habs-
burg prince Eugene of Savoy. Two years later, the regions formally became part of the
Habsburg Empire, ruled from Vienna.
Austria lost no time in shoring up the regions against any possible return of the Turks,
building state-of-the-art military fortresses in Arad, Oradea and Timişoara - that remain
standing to this day. As a way of furthering their claims to the Banat, the Austrians
opened the area to settlement, and today you still come across small scattered communit-
ies of ethnic Czechs, Croats, Slovaks and others, living much as they did 100 years ago.
The anti-Habsburg bourgeois uprisings of 1848 were felt keenly in these parts.
Independence-seeking Hungarians fought to make the areas part of a newly formed Hun-
