The Dniester ( ) is a transboundary river in

Eastern Europe Eastern Europe is a subregion of the Europe, European continent. As a largely ambiguous term, it has a wide range of geopolitical, geographical, ethnic, cultural and socio-economic connotations. Its eastern boundary is marked by the Ural Mountain ...

. It runs first through

Ukraine Ukraine is a country in Eastern Europe. It is the List of European countries by area, second-largest country in Europe after Russia, which Russia–Ukraine border, borders it to the east and northeast. Ukraine also borders Belarus to the nor ...

and then through

Moldova Moldova, officially the Republic of Moldova, is a Landlocked country, landlocked country in Eastern Europe, with an area of and population of 2.42 million. Moldova is bordered by Romania to the west and Ukraine to the north, east, and south. ...

(from which it more or less separates the breakaway territory of

Transnistria Transnistria, officially known as the Pridnestrovian Moldavian Republic and locally as Pridnestrovie, is a Landlocked country, landlocked Transnistria conflict#International recognition of Transnistria, breakaway state internationally recogn ...

), finally discharging into the

Black Sea The Black Sea is a marginal sea, marginal Mediterranean sea (oceanography), mediterranean sea lying between Europe and Asia, east of the Balkans, south of the East European Plain, west of the Caucasus, and north of Anatolia. It is bound ...

on Ukrainian territory again.

Names

The name ''Dniester'' derives from

Sarmatian The Sarmatians (; ; Latin: ) were a large confederation of Ancient Iranian peoples, ancient Iranian Eurasian nomads, equestrian nomadic peoples who dominated the Pontic–Caspian steppe, Pontic steppe from about the 5th century BCE to the 4t ...

''dānu nazdya'' "the close river". (The

Dnieper The Dnieper or Dnepr ( ), also called Dnipro ( ), is one of the major transboundary rivers of Europe, rising in the Valdai Hills near Smolensk, Russia, before flowing through Belarus and Ukraine to the Black Sea. Approximately long, with ...

, also of Sarmatian origin, derives from the opposite meaning, "the river on the far side".) Alternatively, according to Vasily Abaev ''Dniester'' would be a blend of Scythian ''dānu'' "river" and Thracian ''Ister'', the previous name of the river, literally Dān-Ister (River Ister). The

Ancient Greek Ancient Greek (, ; ) includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the classical antiquity, ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Greek ...

name of Dniester, ''Tyras'' (Τύρας), is from Scythian ''tūra'', meaning "rapid". The names of the Don and

Danube The Danube ( ; see also #Names and etymology, other names) is the List of rivers of Europe#Longest rivers, second-longest river in Europe, after the Volga in Russia. It flows through Central and Southeastern Europe, from the Black Forest sou ...

are also from the same

Iranian Iranian () may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to Iran ** Iranian diaspora, Iranians living outside Iran ** Iranian architecture, architecture of Iran and parts of the rest of West Asia ** Iranian cuisine, cooking traditions and practic ...

word ''*dānu'' "river". Classical authors have also referred to it as ''Danaster.'' These early forms, without -''i''- but with -''a''-, contradict Abaev's hypothesis.

Edward Gibbon Edward Gibbon (; 8 May 173716 January 1794) was an English essayist, historian, and politician. His most important work, ''The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire'', published in six volumes between 1776 and 1789, is known for ...

refers to the river both as the Niester and Dniester in his '' History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire''. In Ukrainian, it is known as ( translit. ''Dnister''), in Romanian as , in Russian as ( translit. ''Dnestr''), in Polish as ''Dniestr'', in

Yiddish Yiddish, historically Judeo-German, is a West Germanic language historically spoken by Ashkenazi Jews. It originated in 9th-century Central Europe, and provided the nascent Ashkenazi community with a vernacular based on High German fused with ...

as ''Nester'' נעסטער; in Turkish as ''Turla'' (), and in Lithuanian as ''Dniestras''.

Geography

The Dniester rises in

, near the city of Turka, close to the border with Poland, and flows toward the

. Its course marks part of the border of Ukraine and

, after which it flows through Moldova for , separating the main territory of Moldova from its breakaway region

. It later forms an additional part of the Moldova-Ukraine border, then flows through Ukraine to the Black Sea, where its

estuary An estuary is a partially enclosed coastal body of brackish water with one or more rivers or streams flowing into it, and with a free connection to the open sea. Estuaries form a transition zone between river environments and maritime enviro ...

forms the Dniester Liman. Transnistrienfortress

Along the lower half of the Dniester, the western bank is high and hilly while the eastern one is low and flat. The river represents the ''de facto'' end of the

Eurasian Steppe The Eurasian Steppe, also called the Great Steppe or The Steppes, is the vast steppe ecoregion of Eurasia in the temperate grasslands, savannas and shrublands biome. It stretches through Manchuria, Mongolia, Xinjiang, Kazakhstan, Siberia, Europea ...

. Its most important tributaries are Răut and Bîc.

History

During the

Neolithic The Neolithic or New Stone Age (from Ancient Greek, Greek 'new' and 'stone') is an archaeological period, the final division of the Stone Age in Mesopotamia, Asia, Europe and Africa (c. 10,000 BCE to c. 2,000 BCE). It saw the Neolithic Revo ...

, the Dniester River was the centre of one of the most advanced civilizations on earth at the time. The Cucuteni–Trypillian culture flourished in this area from roughly 5300 to 2600 BC, leaving behind thousands of archeological sites. Their settlements had up to 15,000 inhabitants, making them among the first large farming communities in the world. In antiquity, the river was considered one of the principal rivers of European Sarmatia, and it was mentioned by many Classical geographers and historians. According to

Herodotus Herodotus (; BC) was a Greek historian and geographer from the Greek city of Halicarnassus (now Bodrum, Turkey), under Persian control in the 5th century BC, and a later citizen of Thurii in modern Calabria, Italy. He wrote the '' Histori ...

(iv.51) it rose in a large lake, whilst

Ptolemy Claudius Ptolemy (; , ; ; – 160s/170s AD) was a Greco-Roman mathematician, astronomer, astrologer, geographer, and music theorist who wrote about a dozen scientific treatises, three of which were important to later Byzantine science, Byzant ...

(iii.5.17, 8.1 &c.) places its sources in Mount Carpates (the modern

Carpathian Mountains The Carpathian Mountains or Carpathians () are a range of mountains forming an arc across Central Europe and Southeast Europe. Roughly long, it is the third-longest European mountain range after the Ural Mountains, Urals at and the Scandinav ...

), and

Strabo Strabo''Strabo'' (meaning "squinty", as in strabismus) was a term employed by the Romans for anyone whose eyes were distorted or deformed. The father of Pompey was called "Gnaeus Pompeius Strabo, Pompeius Strabo". A native of Sicily so clear-si ...

(ii) says that they are unknown. It ran in an easterly direction parallel with the Ister (lower

), and formed part of the boundary between

Dacia Dacia (, ; ) was the land inhabited by the Dacians, its core in Transylvania, stretching to the Danube in the south, the Black Sea in the east, and the Tisza in the west. The Carpathian Mountains were located in the middle of Dacia. It thus ro ...

and Sarmatia. It fell into the

Pontus Euxinus The Black Sea is a marginal sea, marginal Mediterranean sea (oceanography), mediterranean sea lying between Europe and Asia, east of the Balkans, south of the East European Plain, west of the Caucasus, and north of Anatolia. It is bound ...

to the northeast of the mouth of the Ister, the distance between them being 900 stadia – approximately – according to Strabo (vii.), while (from the '' Pseudostoma'') according to Pliny (iv. 12. s. 26). Scymnus (Fr. 51) describes it as of easy navigation, and abounding in fish.

Ovid Publius Ovidius Naso (; 20 March 43 BC – AD 17/18), known in English as Ovid ( ), was a Augustan literature (ancient Rome), Roman poet who lived during the reign of Augustus. He was a younger contemporary of Virgil and Horace, with whom he i ...

(''ex Pont.'' iv.10.50) speaks of its rapid course. Greek authors referred to the river as ''Tyras'' (). At a later period it obtained the name of ''Danastris'' or ''Danastus'', whence its modern name of Dniester (Niester), though the Turks still called it ''Turla'' during the 19th century. The form is sometimes found. According to Constantine VII, the Varangians used boats on their trade route from the Varangians to the Greeks, along Dniester and Dnieper and along the Black Sea shore. The navigation near the western shore of Black Sea contained stops at Aspron (at the mouth of Dniester), then Conopa, Constantia (localities today in

Romania Romania is a country located at the crossroads of Central Europe, Central, Eastern Europe, Eastern and Southeast Europe. It borders Ukraine to the north and east, Hungary to the west, Serbia to the southwest, Bulgaria to the south, Moldova to ...

) and Messembria (today in Bulgaria). From the 14th century to 1812, part of the Dniester formed the eastern boundary of the

Principality of Moldavia Moldavia (, or ; in Romanian Cyrillic: or ) is a historical region and former principality in Eastern Europe, corresponding to the territory between the Eastern Carpathians and the Dniester River. An initially independent and later auto ...

. Between the World Wars, the Dniester formed part of the boundary between Romania and the

Soviet Union The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...

. In 1919, on Easter Sunday, the bridge was blown up by the

French Army The French Army, officially known as the Land Army (, , ), is the principal Army, land warfare force of France, and the largest component of the French Armed Forces; it is responsible to the Government of France, alongside the French Navy, Fren ...

to protect Bender from the

Bolshevik The Bolsheviks, led by Vladimir Lenin, were a radical Faction (political), faction of the Marxist Russian Social Democratic Labour Party (RSDLP) which split with the Mensheviks at the 2nd Congress of the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party, ...

s. During World War II, German and Romanian forces battled Soviet troops on the western bank of the river. After the

Republic of Moldova Moldova, officially the Republic of Moldova, is a landlocked country in Eastern Europe, with an area of and population of 2.42 million. Moldova is bordered by Romania to the west and Ukraine to the north, east, and south. The unrecognised ...

declared its independence in 1991, the small area to the east of the Dniester that had been part of the Moldavian SSR refused to participate and declared itself the Pridnestrovian Moldavian Republic, or

, with its capital at Tiraspol on the river. In Moldova, the Dniester Day () is celebrated every year in the last Sunday of May.

Tributaries

From source to mouth, right tributaries, i.e. on the southwest side, are the Stryi (), (), (), Bystrytsia (101 km), Răut (), (), Bîc (), and Botna (). Left tributaries, on the northeast side, are the Strwiąż (), Zubra, Hnyla Lypa (), Zolota Lypa (), Koropets (), Strypa (), Seret (), Zbruch (), Smotrych (), (), (), (), Murafa (), (), (), and Kuchurhan ().Dnister River
Encyclopedia of Ukraine, accessed 15 December 2022

Notes

References

General

External links

* * Volodymyr Kubijovyč, Ivan Teslia
Dnister River in the Encyclopedia of Ukraine, vol. 1 (1984).

Dniester.org: a trans-boundary Dniester river project

eco-tiras.org
{{Authority control Moldova–Ukraine border Ramsar sites in Moldova Ramsar sites in Ukraine Rivers of Transnistria Rivers of Lviv Oblast Rivers of Ivano-Frankivsk Oblast Rivers of Ternopil Oblast Rivers of Chernivtsi Oblast Rivers of Khmelnytskyi Oblast Rivers of Vinnytsia Oblast Rivers of Odesa Oblast