Ural River

Map of the Ural

Ural between Oral and Atyrau

Catchment area of the Urals with tributaries

The 2428 km long Ural (Russian Урал / Ural; Kazakh Жайық / Schajyq; formerly called Russian Яик / Yaik ) is a Eurasian river in Russia and Kazakhstan. According to the most widely used definition of intra- Eurasian border, it is the border river between Europe (western shore ) and Asia (eastern shore ).

River

The Urals rises in Russia in the northeastern foothills of the Awaljak Ridge (Russian Аваляк ) in the Southern Urals (Russian Южный Урал ), formed in the perpendicular thereto Alabija - back (Russian Алабия ), south-west oriented valley. The source is located in 790 m altitude, 16 km north of the town Burangulowo (Russian Бурангулово ), Rajon Utschaly (Russian Учалинский район ), Republic of Bashkortostan (Russian Башкортостан ), about 150 km north of Magnitogorsk, where the Ural between two running in a north-south direction mountain ranges in the south and by the Iriklinski reservoir to Orsk flows. He bends (at the so-called Uralknie ) in a 90 ° angle to the west and reaches only to Orenburg. After he crossed the border to Kazakhstan, he reached Oral. The now navigable river turns south to flow through the Kazakh lowland steppe and the northern part of the Caspian Sea basin. Approximately 500 km ( straight line ) south of Oral it flows in western Kazakhstan in Atyrau - a marshy reeds and rich estuary forming - in more arms into the Caspian Sea.

River length

Regarding the length of the Urals there seems to be some disagreement. In most cases the length is given as 2428 km, but also 2534 km or 2573 km are much less likely to be found.

Inner Eurasian border

The Ural River forms - together with the eponymous mountain - the defined boundary between Europe and Asia, and thus divided into two unequal size Eurasia continents. For the course of this limit of merging parts of the world see Inner Eurasian border.

Ural near Belorezk (Russia, Baschkortestan )

Catchment area

The catchment area of the Urals comprises 244,280 km ².

Tributaries

The largest tributary of the Urals is the Sakmara, the right-hand side coming accrue to him in Orenburg from the north.

Places

• Magnitogorsk
• Orsk
• Orenburg
• Orally
• Atyrau

Name of the river

The Ural River was called up to the beginning of the reign of Catherine II in the 18th century in Russian Yaik ( Яик ). After the suppression of the uprising Pugatschowschen, in the course of which the flow region extensive fighting had occurred, the Yaik on the instructions of Catherine in Ural ( Урал ) was renamed, probably to wipe out the memory of this uprising. Today Kazakh name of the river, Schajyq ( Жайық ), is the immediate phonetic evolution of the old name Yaik. The old Turkish name of the Ural Yayıq is narrated by Menander in the form of Δαιχ.