50 Fun Facts About Volga River

The Volga is the longest river on which continent?

At 3,531 km it is also the longest river in the world to empty into a closed basin.

Into which body of water does the Volga empty?

Because that sea has no outlet, the Volga never naturally reaches any of the world's oceans.

Roughly how long is the Volga?

Its catchment area covers about 1,360,000 square kilometres, almost all of it inside Russia.

What affectionate name does Russian folklore give the river?

In Russian it is Volga-Matushka; the river is widely regarded as the national river of Russia.

The name Volga is thought to derive from a Proto-Slavic word meaning what?

Cognates survive in many Slavic languages, such as Czech vláha, meaning dampness.

By what name did the Turkic peoples living along the river formerly know the Volga?

Modern Tatar still calls it İdel and Turkish İdil.

Ptolemy called the lower Volga by what Scythian name in his Geography?

He wrongly believed the Don and the Volga shared the same upper branch flowing from the Hyperborean Mountains.

Herodotus recorded the Volga under which ancient Iranic name meaning 'broad'?

The Huns' name for the Dnieper, Var, came from the same Scythian root.

In which upland area northwest of Moscow does the Volga rise?

Its source is at the village of Volgoverkhov'e in Tver Oblast, only 225 metres above sea level.

The Volga reaches its sea at what elevation?

The Caspian's surface sits well below the level of the world's oceans.

Which of these is the Volga's most important tributary, joining it near Kazan?

The Oka, Vetluga and Sura are the other major tributaries.

Approximately how many channels and smaller rivers make up the Volga Delta?

The delta stretches about 160 km and is the largest estuary in Europe.

The Volga Delta is the only place in Russia where you can find pelicans, flamingos and which flower?

The lotus is the motif of the flag of the neighbouring Buddhist Kalmyks.

For roughly how many months each year does the Volga freeze along most of its length?

Navigation is nonetheless vital, with grain and oil among the biggest cargoes.

The Volga Delta's 1919 nature reserve is named after which nearby city?

The delta drains into the Caspian about 60 km downstream from that city.

The Volga Delta is best known for which fish?

Catfish and carp are also abundant; the delta's area grew from 3,222 sq km in 1880 to more than 27,000 sq km today.

The linear clay-sand ridges of the Volga Delta are named after which researcher?

The linear clay-sand ridges average about 8 metres high, and how they formed is still debated.

How many of Russia's ten largest cities lie in the Volga's drainage basin?

They include the capital, Moscow, which is linked to the river by the Moscow Canal.

Which reservoir on the middle Volga is the continent's largest by surface area?

It covers 6,450 square kilometres and is informally called the Kuybyshev Sea.

Europe's largest reservoir, informally a 'sea' near Tolyatti, was created by the dam of which hydroelectric station?

It was filled between 1955 and 1957, drowning the old fortress town of Stavropol-on-Volga, which was rebuilt as Tolyatti.

Which historic town was completely submerged to create the Rybinsk Reservoir?

Some 150,000 people were resettled and 663 villages disappeared under water.

When it was built, the Rybinsk Reservoir held what distinction?

Filling began on 14 April 1941, weeks before the German invasion, and continued until 1947.

The 1952 canal joining the river to the Don gives the Volga basin its shortest route to the oceans via which sea first?

From the Sea of Azov ships pass into the Black Sea and on to the Mediterranean.

Which empire tried, and failed, to dig a Volga–Don canal in 1569?

Most historians think about a third of the canal was dug before bad weather ended the attempt.

Which tsar ordered the first Russian attempts to link the Volga and Don after capturing Azov in 1696?

His Petrov Val canal covered a gap of only 4 km but was abandoned in 1701.

Which medieval state flourished at the river's confluence with the Kama?

The Chuvash and Volga Tatars descend from its population.

Who is remembered as the founder of the Bulgar state on the Volga and Kama?

His brother Asparukh led other Bulgars west to the Danube, founding modern Bulgaria.

The Chuvash language, spoken along the middle Volga, is the only surviving language of which branch?

It is often considered an offshoot of the Volga Bulgar language.

The Mongols founded which state in the lower reaches of the Volga?

It later split into the Khanates of Kazan and Astrakhan, both conquered by Russia in the 16th century.

Which 12th-century Russian epic is cited as the start of the Volga's presence in national literature?

Ostrovsky's dramas and Gorky's plays continued the tradition centuries later.

Which empress issued the 1763 manifesto that brought German settlers to the Volga?

The Volga Germans kept their language and churches for generations before Stalin deported them in 1941.

Approximately how many Volga Germans were deported to Siberia and Central Asia in 1941?

They were accused of collective collaboration and forced into the 'Labour Army'; they were officially cleared only in 1964.

Many Volga Germans emigrated to the US, Canada and which two South American countries?

After the Soviet collapse in 1991, many of those who remained moved to Germany.

The city on the Volga's great bend was known by what name from 1925 to 1961?

It had been Tsaritsyn since 1589 and became Volgograd during Khrushchev's de-Stalinisation.

Volgograd's monument to the great 1942-43 battle, The Motherland Calls, stands how tall?

It is the tallest statue in Europe and the second-tallest statue of a woman in the world.

Hitler wanted control of the Volga at Stalingrad partly to reach the oil fields of which peninsula?

The river was, and remains, the vital transport route between central Russia and the Caspian.

The Song of the Volga Boatmen was sung by which workers?

They were called burlaks, and Ilya Repin's famous painting shows them toiling along the bank.

Which composer collected the Song of the Volga Boatmen and published it in his 1866 book of folk songs?

He had recorded it in Nizhny Novgorod around 1860 with just one verse; two more were added later.

Whose jazz arrangement of the Song of the Volga Boatmen hit No. 1 in the US in 1941?

Bill Finegan wrote the arrangement.

Which bass singer popularised the Song of the Volga Boatmen as a concert staple?

Feodor Koenemann arranged the song for him; his recordings appeared in 1922, 1927 and 1936.

Which painter's canvas of men hauling a vessel along the Volga became an emblem of pre-revolutionary hardship?

Barge Haulers on the Volga shows the burlaks straining against their harnesses.

Stravinsky orchestrated the Song of the Volga Boatmen overnight in 1917 to replace which piece at a Diaghilev concert?

Tsar Nicholas II had just abdicated, so the anthem could no longer open the concert.

The northern waterway from the Volga through Lakes Ladoga and Onega reaches which city and sea?

The Volga–Baltic Waterway runs via Lake Ladoga and Lake Onega.

The 1938 Soviet musical comedy named after the river was directed by whom?

Volga-Volga is said to have been one of Stalin's favourite films.

Which 2019 video game features the Volga as one of its main levels?

The game follows survivors travelling across post-apocalyptic Russia by train.

The ship locks on the Volga's dams measure roughly what size?

The dams were built during Stalin's industrialisation and all have large double locks.

Which Russian Civil War leader had military specialists imprisoned on a Volga barge that was then sunk?

The Red Volga Flotilla meanwhile helped drive the Whites eastward from Kazan toward Ufa.

The Volga rises near which village in Tver Oblast?

Its source in the Valdai Hills sits 225 m above sea level, about 320 km southeast of Saint Petersburg.

For at least how many years has the Volga-Oka region been occupied by humans?

Early inhabitants ran a bone and antler industry making arrowheads, spearheads, daggers and awls, using local quartz and imported flint.

Which Red naval force helped drive the Whites east from Kazan towards Ufa in 1918?

Both sides fielded warships on the river during the Civil War; the pursuit ran up the Kama and on to the Belaya.