About Barsa Land
Source: historical album "Legends" Barsa Land, "author Nicholas Melon, Bogdan Florin Popovici, edit. Brasov Metropolitan Agency.
500 years ago, the travellers called the Land of Bârsa as “another Transylvania” or “the little Transylvania”. Located at borders, “surrounded from all sides by wooded high mountains”, enriched inside by “fertile plains and delightful meadows” and looked over as “a nice cared garden”, the Land of Bârsa is nothing else—compared to Transylvania—but a small stronghold in the mountains. Inside this natural stronghold, at the borders of Eastern and Western, the ways of History and Civilisations crossed, with their astonishing ethnical and cultural infusion, with their enduring movement of peoples and values.
The name “the Land of Bârsa” seems to come from the hydronym “Bârsa”, which is one the main watercourses flowing in the depression of Brașov , a river crossing the Land of Bârsa from South-West to North-East, disemboguing into River Olt near Feldioara. The geographers delimitated this “country” as “the Depression of Bârsa”, which covers the territory between Perșani Mountains (west), Bodoc–Baraolt Mountains (north), Vrancea Mountains (east), Ciucaș–Bârsa–Bucegi–Piatra Craiului Mountains (south). Conversely, the ethnographers extend The Land of Bârsa, including the hydrographical basin of Olt River and Black River, towards Sfântu Gheorghe, and Brețcu respectively. The geological structure of depression of Bârsa is of tectonic origin, created by repeated fractures and immersions of several central fragments of the Carpathians of the Curve. Subsequent to the crash, the waters invaded this hole, creating a lake in which, in the course of the time, gathered sedimentation beddings of hundreds of meters depth. On the very spot of the bygone lake remained beautiful planes threaded like a necklace around the Land of Bârsa. This is way the Land of Bârsa hearth has the resemblance of a vegetal plane, although we are here in the heart of the mountain and the absolute altitude does not descend anywhere under 500 m.
The origin of the toponym “Bârsa” is on dispute. But the version who found the biggest success discovered the origin of the name Burzenland / the Land of Bârsa / Barcaság from the German word Wurzel = “root”. In its historical meaning, as a territorial and administrative area within which, along with the Braşov district of the Land of Bârsa and its subjected villages. At date, on the territory of the Land of Bârsa there are 3 municipalities (Brașov, Codlea and Săcele), three towns (Ghimbav, Râşnov and Zărnești) and a number of 13 communes (Apața, Bod, Bran, Cristian, Crizbav, Dumbrăvița, Feldioara, Hălchiu, Hărman, Măieruş, Prejmer, Sânpetru and Vulcan).
