Jimbolia

Sister cities

• Pusztamérges
• Dunajská Streda
• Kikinda

History

The ancient history of the town began to be documented in 1332–1333, when a papal census of the lands of Banat for the establishment of taxes (tithe) took place. In these papal registers, the name Chumbul appears. From the researches of Hungarian historian , it appears that originally it was a Cumano-Vlach locality, a fact proved by the existence of a Romanian parish. This Chumbul is also mentioned in Hungarian documents from 1489, which speak of the existence of the communes of Chumbul Mare ("Great Chumbul"), Chumbul Mic ("Little Chumbul") and Chumbul Intern ("Inner Chumbul"), most likely owned by the Csomboly family. The last document from this period, recorded by historian , shows that in 1520 there was a certain Mihai of Chumbul, a close man of the king. After this appearance in documents from the beginning of the Middle Ages, nothing is said about this locality in documents from the Turkish rule of Banat. The historical thread is resumed after the conquest of Banat by the Austrians, but for a period it does not appear to be inhabited. Only in 1766 was the new town born, by colonization with German population from Mainz, Trier, Sauer, Pfalz, Lorraine, and Luxembourg. It originally consisted of two separate areas, Landestreu and Hatzfeld, a little further west, but two years later the two merged under the name Hatzfeld, a name given in honor of Empress Maria Theresa's prime minister, Carl Friedrich Hatzfeldt zu Gleichen (1718–1793). The conditions to which the first settlers were subjected were particularly harsh: because of the swamps surrounding the settlement and the unsanitary conditions, 168 people died in the first year of establishment alone. A plague epidemic ensued in 1770 that killed no less than 553 people. In 1781 Hatzfeld was leased to , then sold to…

Geography

Jimbolia is located in the west of Timiș County, from the county seat, Timișoara, which is connected by the county road DJ59A and the Kikinda–Jimbolia–Timișoara railway. It lies in the Banat Plain, at the contact between the Timiș Plain and the Mureș Plain. An alignment of villages marks the boundary between the two relief units: Checea–Cărpiniș–Satchinez. The average altitude of the town is . It is located at the intersection of some roads that connect Romania and Serbia, being also a rail and road border point at the frontier between the two countries. Jimbolia's climate is characterized by average temperatures of and average rainfall of per year. The vegetation consists of steppe meadows largely replaced by agricultural crops. The soils are very fertile and belong to the category of chernozems.