Bihor
County
The first traces of human existence in Bihor county date back to the
Palaeolithic (ca 50000-35000 BC) and they were discovered in several
caves in the Crisul Repede Valley, at Vad. Some Neolithic settlements
were also discovered on the territory of Bihor county, the oldest
copper and gold artefacts discovered dating back to that same historical
period. During the Bronze Age, a considerable growth of population
was registered in the area showing not only in the ever greater number
of settlements, but also in the remarkable progress and development
of the material culture in these establishments. During the early
Iron Age, the art of pottery knows a considerable evolution and improvement
of technique, the pottery decorated by grooving standing proof thereto.
As anywhere else in north-west Dacia, archaeological discoveries prove
the Dacian people living in the Bihor territories actually made the
history of free Dacia during the reigns of Buerebista and Decebal.
After the Romans conquer Dacia, present-day Bihor territories included,
the free Dacians living along the Cris rivers and the Barcau enhance
and brace their economic and cultural relations with the Roman world,
with the Dacian-Roman people of Roman Dacia. The rich discoveries
of coins attest to the free Dacians participation in the economic
and cultural life of the Roman settlements along the Danube, in the
Carpathians and along the Black Sea coast, as well as to their Romanisation
within the larger framework of the Dacian-Roman rural world. On the
Bihor territories, the Romanian communities of the 7th-11th centuries,
despite the biasing migration of several groups of Slavs, preserve
their identity and build a state-like structure, the principality
of Menumorut with its seat in the Biharea fortress, a strong bastion
of the Romanians living in Crisana region. This is a period when the
Romanian settlements and the Romanian material culture resume and
continue the Dacian-Roman material and spiritual civilisation. Despite
the opposition of the Romanian population, the territories of present-day
Bihor become a county within the territories conquered by the feudal
Hungarian kingdom, the first suchlike county being attested at 1111.
The Tartar invasion of 1241 strikes a blow at and brakes the feudalisation
process in Bihor, weakening the Hungarian rule and favouring thus
the consolidation of the autochthonous dimension in the area. The
cultural life of Oradea and other settlements flourishes in Bihor
county during the Enlightenment (1790-1830), the cultural effervescence
materialising in the set-up, at the court of Samuil Vulcan, of the
first Romanian Academy of Sciences, as it was named by Nicolae Iorga.
Samuil Vulcan harboured, in Oradea, the leaders of Scoala Ardeleana
(Transilvanian School), offering them moral and material support.
The famous libraries in Oradea still have in their book stocks important
writs, books, literary manuscripts and political documents of that
time. After the 1821 Revolution, capitalist elements are ever more
evident in the economy of the Romanian Principalities. The constitution
of the Romanian national state and its joining the free European nations
is, undoubtedly, essential and has a great influence on the national
movement of the Romanians living under the foreign rules of the neighbouring
countries. The set-up of a famous gymnasium at Beius in 1828 an
educational institution playing an essential role in training the
Romanian intellectuals who were to become fighters for freedom is
a very important cultural and political event of that time. The institution
was masterminded by the scholar Samuil Vulcan, a supporter of the
Enlightenment.
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Geographical
Outline
Bihor county is located in the north-west of Romania and is bordered
by Satu-Mare county to the north, Cluj county to the east, Arad county
to the south and Hungary to the west. Bihor county, stretching over
7,544 sq. km and with a population of 625,830 inhabitants, places
sixth in terms of area and 13th in terms of population in the hierarchy
of the 41 Romanian counties. One-third of the county inhabitants live
in Oradea, the Bihor county seat. Oradea, the largest town in Bihor,
is ten km away from Bors, the most important frontier check point
on the western Romanian border, and ten km away from Episcopia Bihor,
a railway frontier check point. Oradea also has an airport allowing
the operation of international cargo flights and daily flights to
Bucharest. Its location to the eastern Romanian frontier, the industrial
development of the region, a well-shaped infrastructure and available
work force skilled in different branches are as many reasons for choosing
Bihor as business location in Romania. Bihor county has one municipality,
nine towns and 86 communes with 436 villages. Out
of a total 754,400 hectares, the farming land accounts for 499,500
hectares, of which 302,500 arable land. Cereal, pea, bean, hemp, sunflower,
sugar beet, potato, vegetable and fruit are the major crops in the
area. The county population numbered, on 31 December 1997, 625,830
inhabitants (fixed residents), of which 48.9 per cent men and 51.1
per cent women. Out of total population, 49.5 per cent live in towns
and 50.5 per cent in rural localities. Population on 31 December 1997
showed the following pattern (main localities): Oradea 221,469 inhabitants;
Alesd 11,142 inhabitants; Beius 12,025 inhabitants; Marghita
18,673 inhabitants; Nucet 2,771 inhabitants; Salonta 20,262 inhabitants;
Stei 9,351 inhabitants; Valea-lui-Mihai 10,688 inhabitants; Vascau
3,120 inhabitants. Water supply exists in 120 localities, while
23 settlements have 535 km sewer system. Likewise, there are 12 localities
connected to the gas supply system (the network measures 66 km). Out
of a total 660 km town public roads, 52 per cent is modernised. Oradea
Municipality and the towns in Bihor county have 320 hectares of gardens
and greens, i.e. 10 sq. m per inhabitant. There are 15 hospitals with
5,593 beds, 182 health centres, 17 polyclinics, an orphanage accommodating
450, 18 day nurseries accommodating 710. The public health-care system
employs 947 doctors, 140 stomatologists and 3,610 nurses and other
medium-trained health-care personnel. The private sector is represented
by 129 consulting rooms, 85 dental cabinets, four medical labs and
26 dental technique labs. 18 medical doctors and eight stomatologists
work exclusively in the private health-care sector. Out of a total
156 pharmacists, 128 work in the private sector. In 1997, the following
ratios were registered in the relevant sector: 648 inhabitants / one
doctor and 8.9 hospital beds / 1,000 inhabitants. Public and private
education develops in 4,032 classrooms and school cabinets, 467 school
labs and 142 gyms. The training system has 1.063 educational units,
of which 466 kindergartens, 512 primary and secondary schools, 43
high-schools, 30 vocational training facilities, a public university
with several departments, two colleges and two private higher education
institutions. 128,216 persons were included in the 1997-1998 academic
year in Bihor county, of which 19,684 children in kindergartens, 65,146
pupils in primary and secondary schools, 23,462 high-school students,
8,656 students following vocational and technical courses, and 11,268
students, of which 10,629 at the University and 639 at the two private
higher-education institutions. The teaching staff
numbers 8,850 persons, of which 1,305 employed in kindergartens, 6,944
in the primary, secondary, high-school and vocational institutions,
and 601 in the higher-education institutions. The county also has
16 cinemas, two theatres, two puppet-show theatres, a philharmonic
orchestra, a folk band and 11 museums. The 414 libraries opened in
the county have a book stock of 3,990,000 volumes. Out of the total,
three are university libraries, 267 are opened in schools, 95 are
public libraries and 49 are specialised ones.
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Touristic
Information
Situated
in the North-Western part of Romania, the Bihor county has a surface
of 7.544 sq.km. Its population is of 633,629 inhabitants of which
310,944 live in towns and 322,685 in the countryside. Administratively
the Bihor county has a municipality Oradea which is also its capital
city and has 223,405 inhabitants and eight towns: Alesd, Beius,
Marghita, Nucet, Salonta, Stei, Vascau and Valea lui Mihai. The
neighbors of the Bihor county are tile counties of Hajdu-Bihar and
Bekes in Hungary having a frontier zone more than I 50 km where
there are the frontier points: Valea lui Mihai, Bors, Episcopia
Bihor and since April 1996 the one from Salonta-Micherechi. The
Bors frontier point is the main road gate from the West-Europe to
Romania. To meet its guests. the Bihor county has 24 hotels with
8,043 places as well as a lot of inns, villas, chalets and camping
grounds with 2,405 place. The most important place tourist interest
in the Bihor county is Baile Felix. a spa with over 7.200 places
(it is out 1 0 km far from Oradea). The Stana de Vale mountain Spa,
situated at 1,100 m above sea level, with more than 250 places is
also a point of attraction for Romanian and foreign tourists. Additionally
to these, Tinca and Pestera Ursilor Spas in the Apuseni Mountains
have to be mentioned. The municipality of Oradea offers many attractive
places like: the Fortress of Oradea, built in 1114-1131, destroyed
by Tartars; "Tara Crisurilor" Museum situated in the baroque
Palace built in 1750-1789 as a replica of the Belvedere Palace from
Vienna; the Roman-Catholic cathedral which is the biggest Baroque
monument in Romania.The
road network of the Bihor county is of 2,4911 of which 580 km are
modernized.
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Economy
Profile
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