The Hungarian Puszta () is a temperate grassland biome of the

Alföld The Great Hungarian Plain (also known as Alföld or Great Alföld, hu, Alföld or ) is a plain occupying the majority of the modern territory of Hungary. It is the largest part of the wider Pannonian Plain. (However, the Great Hungarian plain ...

or Great Hungarian Plain. It is an exclave of the Eurasian Steppe, and lies mainly around the River

Tisza The Tisza, Tysa or Tisa, is one of the major rivers of Central and Eastern Europe. Once, it was called "the most Hungarian river" because it flowed entirely within the Kingdom of Hungary. Today, it crosses several national borders. The Tisza be ...

in the eastern part of Hungary, as well as in the western part of the country and in the

Burgenland Burgenland (; hu, Őrvidék; hr, Gradišće; Austro-Bavarian: ''Burgnland;'' Slovene: ''Gradiščanska'') is the easternmost and least populous state of Austria. It consists of two statutory cities and seven rural districts, with a total of ...

of Austria. It covers a total area of about . The characteristic landscape is composed of treeless plains, saline steppes and salt lakes, and includes scattered sand dunes, low, wet forests and freshwater marshes along the floodplains of the ancient rivers. It is strongly associated with traditional Hungarian breeds of domestic animal including the Hungarian Grey breed of cattle, the

Mangalitsa The Mangalica (also Mangalitsa or Mangalitza) is a Hungarian breed of domestic pig. It was developed in the mid-19th century by crossbreeding breeds from the nearby Romanian Salonta (Hungarian: ''Nagyszalonta'', colloquially ''Szalonta ...

breed of woolly pig, the Nonius breed of horse and the Racka breed of horned sheep, and also with the traditions of the csikós mounted herdsmen.

Name

The adjective has meanings including 'abandoned', 'bare', 'bleak', 'deserted' and 'uninhabited'.

History

From the late

Pleistocene The Pleistocene ( , often referred to as the ''Ice age'') is the geological epoch that lasted from about 2,580,000 to 11,700 years ago, spanning the Earth's most recent period of repeated glaciations. Before a change was finally confirmed in ...

era the landscape of the

or Great Hungarian Plain consisted in large part of arid alkaline grasslands devoid of trees – the puszta. The extent of the puszta over much of the Alföld was drastically reduced by the extensive drainage and irrigation works carried out during the nineteenth century, and it survives principally in the

Hortobágy National Park Hortobágy () is an 800 km2 national park in eastern Hungary, rich with folklore and cultural history. The park, a part of the Alföld (Great Plain), was designated as a national park in 1973 (the first in Hungary), and elected among the W ...

, established in 1972 in eastern Hungary and centred on the village of

Hortobágy Hortobágy is a village in Hajdú-Bihar County in eastern Hungary. It lies on the banks of the river, which is crossed at Hortobágy by the Nine-arched Bridge, one of the principal man-made monuments of the Hortobágy National Park. The park c ...

Hajdú-Bihar County Hajdú-Bihar ( hu, Hajdú-Bihar megye, ) is an administrative county (comitatus or megye) in eastern Hungary, on the border with Romania. It shares borders with the Hungarian counties Szabolcs-Szatmár-Bereg, Borsod-Abaúj-Zemplén, Jász-Nag ...

Climate

The climate is continental. Landscape is widely cultivated, the original Puszta landscape now being found only in a few places, for example in

Agriculture

Most of Hungary's vegetable and grain crops are grown on the Great Plain. The region has a sandy soil and is sunny; the city of

Szeged Szeged ( , ; see also other alternative names) is the third largest city of Hungary, the largest city and regional centre of the Southern Great Plain and the county seat of Csongrád-Csanád county. The University of Szeged is one of the m ...

is often called ''City of Sunshine'' (). In addition to cattle, sheep, and pigs, the region also produces poultry and foie gras.

Fauna

Three hundred species of birds are found here.

References

{{Reflist, refs= .n.(2021)
Puszta
''Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia'', sixth edition. New York: Columbia University Press. Accessed January 2022. István Kiséry (editor) (2006)
''Magyar angol kisszótár'' = ''Hungarian-English Dictionary''
Budapest: Akadémiai Kiadó. {{isbn, 9789630583589. Peter Haggett, Graham Bateman (1993)
''Encyclopedia of World Geography: Eastern Europe''
New York: Barnes & Noble; Abingdon, Oxfordshire: Andromeda Oxford. {{isbn, 9781566192910 Cesare Della Pietà, Mariella Bussolati, Hans Silvester (May 1987). La puszta di Hortobágy (in Italian). ''Silva''. I (2): 70–85. Hortobágy National Park - the ''Puszta''
UNESCO World Heritage Centre. Accessed January 2022. Ward Chesworth (2008)
''Encyclopedia of Soil Science''
Dordrecht; Berlion; Heidelberg; New York: Springer. {{isbn, 9781402039959.

External links

Eurasian Steppe Geography of Hungary Plains of Hungary Natural regions