Râmnicu Vâlcea

Sister cities

• Agios Nikolaos
• Kruševac
• Kroměříž

History

The area has been inhabited since Dacian and Roman times, and was the site of a castrum (known as Buridava or Burridava, previously a Dacian town). A new fortress was built on the location during the Middle Ages. Râmnicu Vâlcea was first attested during the rule of Prince Mircea cel Bătrân, as "the princely town of Râmnic" (4 September 1388), and confirmed as the seat of a Vâlcea County during the same period (8 January 1392). The town seal dates to 1505. Cetățuia, the actual fortress, served as the residence of Oltenian Bans and, from 1504, of the Orthodox bishops of the Râmnic Diocese; in 1529, Prince Radu of Afumați was killed in Cetățuia by a boyar conspiracy. During the rules of Matei Basarab and Constantin Brâncoveanu, it became an important cultural center. It was here where the first paper mill and printing press in Romania were built (see Anthim the Iberian). The town was heavily damaged during the Habsburg monarchy's takeover of Oltenia which lasted between 1718 and 1739, and its purpose was again reduced to that of a fortress. During the Wallachian Revolution, on 29 July 1848, Deșteaptă-te, române! (the current national anthem of Romania), with lyrics written by Andrei Mureșanu and music composed by Anton Pann (whose memorial house lies in the center of the town), was sung for the first time in Râmnicu Vâlcea. Gheorghe Magheru gathered his military force in Râureni, now part of the town, in an attempt to face the anti-revolutionary forces of Imperial Russia and the Ottoman Empire. In the 1980s, the town was completely rebuilt in a style combining socialist realism with local vernacular architecture of Brâncovenesc style. The town was the center and peak point of the path of total darkness of the Solar eclipse of 11 August 1999. Around 2005, the town…

Geography

Râmnicu Vâlcea is situated in the central-southwestern area of Romania and is the county capital of Vâlcea County. Set at the foothills of the Southern Carpathians, the town is located at about from the Cozia Mountains and about from the Făgăraș and Lotrului Mountains. The southern limit of the city is formed by the Getic Plateau () and the Olt River valley. The city is crossed by national roads DN7 (part of European route E81), , and . The Râmnicu Vâlcea railway station serves the CFR Line 201, which runs along the Olt River from Podu Olt, Sibiu County, to Piatra-Olt, Olt County. According to Köppen climate classification, the climate of the town is defined as Dfa (humid continental with hot summers) bordering Cfa (humid subtropical). Precipitation amount is higher in the summer, although not high enough in order to be a "Dwa" type climate, winters are not dry enough for Dwa classification, either. There are on average 30.3 days annually with snow depth reaching or exceeding . |source 2 = Meteomanz (extremes since 2021) }}

Most-observed species

• False-acacia

  Robinia pseudoacacia L. · Magnoliopsida
  64
• Californian Burr, Burweed, Cocklebur

  Xanthium orientale L. · Magnoliopsida
  39
• Ragweed

  Ambrosia artemisiifolia L. · Magnoliopsida
  32
• Strigose Fleabane

  Erigeron strigosus Muhl. ex Willd. · Magnoliopsida
  28
• Cherry Plum

  Prunus cerasifera Ehrh. · Magnoliopsida
  24
• Common Chaffinch

  Fringilla coelebs Linnaeus, 1758 · Aves
  21
• Canadian Fleabane

  Erigeron canadensis L. · Magnoliopsida
  21
• Japanese Knotweed

  Reynoutria japonica Houtt. · Magnoliopsida
  19

Most recent

• M 4.3 — 2023-08-20
  3 km S of Stăneşti, Romania
• M 4.9 — 2023-03-20
  2 km SSE of Arcani, Romania
• M 4.4 — 2023-02-16
  0 km NW of Arcani, Romania
• M 5.6 — 2023-02-14
  0 km ESE of Lele?ti, Romania
• M 5 — 2023-02-13
  0 km ESE of Dobri?a, Romania
• M 4.3 — 2020-03-19
  8 km NNW of Glod, Romania