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Ajka () is a city in
Hungary Hungary is a landlocked country in Central Europe. Spanning much of the Pannonian Basin, Carpathian Basin, it is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine to the northeast, Romania to the east and southeast, Serbia to the south, Croatia and ...
with about 35,000 inhabitants. It is situated in the hills of Bakony.


History

Around 1000 BCE, the area was inhabited by
Celts The Celts ( , see Names of the Celts#Pronunciation, pronunciation for different usages) or Celtic peoples ( ) were a collection of Indo-European languages, Indo-European peoples. "The Celts, an ancient Indo-European people, reached the apoge ...
. By the second century CE, the territory was conquered by the Romans. The Hungarians occupied the area in the early 10th century. The village Ajka was named after the Ajka clan, which, in turn, got its name after its ancestor, a knight named Heiko, who was a member of the retinue of Gisela, Princess of
Bavaria Bavaria, officially the Free State of Bavaria, is a States of Germany, state in the southeast of Germany. With an area of , it is the list of German states by area, largest German state by land area, comprising approximately 1/5 of the total l ...
, wife of King St. Stephen in the early 11th century. The village itself was first mentioned in 1214, when it was already about 100 years old. The village slowly developed during the next few centuries. Real prosperity came only in the second half of the 19th century, when coal resources were found nearby. In the 1930s, vast
bauxite Bauxite () is a sedimentary rock with a relatively high aluminium content. It is the world's main source of aluminium and gallium. Bauxite consists mostly of the aluminium minerals gibbsite (), boehmite (γ-AlO(OH)), and diaspore (α-AlO(OH) ...
resources were found, too. In 1937, the world's first
krypton Krypton (from 'the hidden one') is a chemical element; it has symbol (chemistry), symbol Kr and atomic number 36. It is a colorless, odorless noble gas that occurs in trace element, trace amounts in the Earth's atmosphere, atmosphere and is of ...
factory was built near Ajka. During the industrialization wave of the Socialist Communist era, Ajka was a natural choice to build a new industrial town. The new town – like several other industrial cities and towns – came into existence with the unification of several villages. Today's Ajka was created on January 1, 1960, by the unification of four villages (Ajka, Bódé, Tósok, and Tósokberénd). In the following decades, four additional villages (Csékút, Bakonygyepes, Padragkút, and Ajkarendek) were annexed to the town. At the time of the unification, Ajka had 15,375 residents. Many workers came to Ajka to find new jobs and homes there. Most of the population is working class. At the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century, Jews lived in the village. In
1840 Events January–March * January 3 – One of the predecessor papers of the ''Herald Sun'' of Melbourne, Australia, ''The Port Phillip Herald'', is founded. * January 10 – Uniform Penny Post is introduced in the United Kingdom. * Janu ...
, 93 Jews lived in the village and there was a
Jewish cemetery A Jewish cemetery ( ''beit almin'' or ''beit kvarot'') is a cemetery where Jews are buried in keeping with Halakha, Jewish tradition. Cemeteries are referred to in several different ways in Hebrew, including ''beit kevarot'' (house of s ...
there. Some of them were murdered in the
Holocaust The Holocaust (), known in Hebrew language, Hebrew as the (), was the genocide of History of the Jews in Europe, European Jews during World War II. From 1941 to 1945, Nazi Germany and Collaboration with Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy ...
. In 2010 the
Ajkaceratops ''Ajkaceratops'' (pronounced "oi-ka-sera-tops") is a genus of ornithischian dinosaur described in 2010. It lived during the Late Cretaceous in the western Tethys Ocean, Tethyan archipelago, in what is now Europe. The type species, ''A. kozmai'', ...
was named in honor of the town, where it was discovered.


Main sights

* Roman Catholic Church of Tósokberénd (late baroque, 1807–1808) * Roman Catholic Church of Ajka (late baroque, 1788) * Reformed Church of Ajka (late baroque, 1783) * Evangelical Church of Ajka (late baroque, 1786–89) * House of the Steward (manor house, 18-19th centuries) * Museum of Mining (industrial heritage site) * Crystal Glass Factory


Ajka alumina plant accident

A flood of bauxite tailings occurred in 2010, releasing of red caustic toxic industrial sludge, which affected some ; 10 people were killed and 150 were injured.


Twin towns – sister cities

Ajka is twinned with: *
Cristuru Secuiesc Cristuru Secuiesc (; , ) is a town in Harghita County, Romania. It lies in the Székely Land, an ethno-cultural region in eastern Transylvania. The town administers two villages: Betești (''Betfalva''), part of Mugeni until 2004, and Filiaș (' ...
, Romania * Donghai County, China *
Rovaniemi Rovaniemi ( , ; ; ; ) is a city in Finland and the regional capital of Lapland (Finland), Lapland. It is located near the Arctic Circle in the northern interior of the country. The population of Rovaniemi is approximately , while the Rovaniemi su ...
, Finland * Unna, Germany *
Weiz Weiz () is a town in the eastern part of the Austrian state of Styria Styria ( ; ; ; ) is an Austrian Federal states of Austria, state in the southeast of the country. With an area of approximately , Styria is Austria's second largest state, ...
, Austria


Sport

* FC Ajka, association football club


References

;Notes


External links

* in Hungarian
Aerialphotgraphs of Ajka

Extinct volcano locality
{{Authority control Populated places in Veszprém County Socialist planned cities Planned communities in Hungary