The
Curonian Spit is a 98 km long, thin, curved sand-
duneIn physical geography, a dune is a hill of sand built by aeolian processes. Dunes are subject to different forms and sizes based on their interaction with the wind. Most kinds of dune are longer on the windward side where the sand is pushed up the dune, and a shorter "slip face" in the lee of the...
spitA spit or sandspit is a deposition landform found off coasts. At one end, spits connect to land, while at the far end they exist in open water. A spit is a type of bar or beach that develops where a re-entrant occurs, such as at cove's headlands, by the process of longshore drift...
that separates the
Curonian LagoonThe Curonian Lagoon is separated from the Baltic Sea by the Curonian Spit. Its surface area is 1,619 square kilometers...
from the
Baltic SeaThe Baltic Sea is a brackish inland sea located in Northern Europe, from 53°N to 66°N latitude and from 20°E to 26°E longitude. It is bounded by the Scandinavian Peninsula, the mainland of Europe, and the Danish islands. It drains into the Kattegat by way of the Øresund, the Great Belt and the...
.
Geography
The Curonian Spit stretches from the Sambian Peninsula on the south to its northern tip next to a narrow
straitA strait or straits is a narrow, navigable channel of water that connects two larger navigable bodies of water. It most commonly refers to a channel of water that lies between two land masses, but it may also refer to a navigable channel through a body of water that is otherwise not navigable, for...
, across which is the port city of
KlaipėdaKlaipėda is a city in Lithuania situated at the mouth of the Curonian Lagoon where it flows into the Baltic Sea. As Lithuania's only seaport, it has ferry terminal connections to Sweden and Germany...
on the mainland of
LithuaniaLithuania , officially the Republic of Lithuania is a country in Northern Europe, the southernmost of the three Baltic states. Situated along the southeastern shore of the Baltic Sea, it shares borders with Latvia to the north, Belarus to the southeast, Poland, and the Russian exclave of...
. The northern 52 km long stretch of the Curonian Spit peninsula belongs to Lithuania, while the rest is part of the
Kaliningrad OblastKaliningrad Oblast , informally called Yantarny kray is a federal subject of Russia situated on the Baltic coast. Population: 968,200 ; ....
,
RussiaRussia , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia . It is a semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...
(see the map). The width of the spit varies from a minimum of 400m in Russia (near the village of Lesnoye) to a maximum of 3,800 m in Lithuania (just north of Nida).
History
According to Baltic mythology, the Curonian Spit was formed by a
giantessThe mythology and legends of many different cultures include monsters of human appearance but prodigious size and strength. "Giant" is the English word commonly used for such beings, derived from one of the most famed examples: the gigantes of Greek mythology.In various Indo-European mythologies,...
, Neringa, who was playing on the seashore. This child also appears in other myths (in some of which she is shown as a young strong woman, similar to a female version of the Greek
HeraclesIn Greek mythology, Heracles or Herakles , Alcides or Alcaeus , was a divine hero, the son of Zeus and Alcmene, foster son of Amphitryon and great-grandson of Perseus...
).
The Curonian Spit was formed about
5,000 years agoThe 3rd millennium BC spans the Early to Middle Bronze Age.It represents a period of time in which imperialism, or the desire to conquer, grew to prominence, in the city states of the Middle East, but also throughout Eurasia, with Indo-European expansion to Anatolia, Europe and Central Asia. The...
. From ca. 800 to 1016, it was the location of
KaupMokhovoye is a settlement in Kaliningrad Oblast, Russia, located at the south-western corner of the Curonian Lagoon, near Zelenogradsk. It was important in early medieval history as a likely starting point of the Amber Route to the south...
, a major
paganPaganism is a word with several different meanings.In its broadest definition, pagan denotes all non-Abrahamic religions, that is to say it denotes all religions other than Judaism, Christianity, and Islam.Other usages are:*Paganism may mean Polytheism: The group so defined includes most of the...
trading centre which has not been excavated yet. The
Teutonic KnightsThe Order of the Teutonic Knights of St. Mary's Hospital in Jerusalem , or for short the Teutonic Order , is a German Roman Catholic religious order. It was formed to aid Catholics on their pilgrimages to the Holy Land and to establish hospitals to care for the sick and injured...
occupied the area in the 13th century, building their castles at
MemelKlaipėda is a city in Lithuania situated at the mouth of the Curonian Lagoon where it flows into the Baltic Sea. As Lithuania's only seaport, it has ferry terminal connections to Sweden and Germany...
(1252),
NeuhausenGuryevsk is a town in Kaliningrad Oblast, Russia, located seven kilometers north-east of Kaliningrad. Population: 10,913 .- History :...
(1283), and at
RossittenRybachy, is a rural settlement in Russia's Kaliningrad Oblast, the northern part of former East Prussia. It is located on the Curonian Spit. Rybachy translates as "Fishers' ", and appropriately employment centers on the fishing boats which dock at the pier on the Courland Lagoon of the Baltic Sea...
(1372).
In the 16th century, a new period of
duneIn physical geography, a dune is a hill of sand built by aeolian processes. Dunes are subject to different forms and sizes based on their interaction with the wind. Most kinds of dune are longer on the windward side where the sand is pushed up the dune, and a shorter "slip face" in the lee of the...
formation began.
DeforestationDeforestation is the clearance of naturally occurring forests by the processes of logging and/or burning of trees in a forested area. There are several reasons deforestation occurs: trees or derived charcoal can be sold as a commodity and used by humans, while cleared land is used as pasture,...
of the spit due to
overgrazingOvergrazing occurs when plants are exposed to intensive grazing for extended periods of time, or without sufficient recovery periods. It can be caused by either livestock in poorly managed agricultural applications, or by overpopulations of native or non-native wild animals...
,
timberTimber may refer to:*Lumber, i.e. wood materials* Timber, Oregon, an unincorporated community in the U.S. state of Oregon* Timber , a 1984 arcade game by Bally Midway* An alternative spelling for Timbre...
harvesting, and building of boats for the siege of
KönigsbergKönigsberg was the capital of eastern Prussia from the Late Middle Ages until 1945. It was founded by the Teutonic Knights just south of the Sambian peninsula in the year 1255 AD during the Northern Crusades and named for King Ottokar II of Bohemia...
in 1757 led to the dunes taking over the spit and burying entire villages. Alarmed by these problems, the
PrussiaThe Kingdom of Prussia was a German kingdom from 1701 to 1918, until the defeat of Germany in World War I, was the leading state of the German Empire, comprising almost two-thirds of the area of the empire...
n government sponsored large-scale revegetation and
reforestationReforestation is the restocking of existing forests and woodlands which have been depleted.Leaves from trees emit oxygen as well as absorb carbon dioxide and other pollutants from our atmosphere. The demand of reforestation is increasing both for quality of human life reasons, biosphere support...
efforts, which started in 1825. Owing to these efforts, much of the spit is now covered with forests. In the 19th century the Curonian Spit was inhabited primarily by
CuroniansThe Kursenieki are a nearly extinct Baltic ethnic group living along the Curonian Spit. "Kursenieki" refers only to inhabitants of former East Prussia that speak a Latvian language dialect, the so-called Curonian language.Autochthonous inhabitants of Palanga in Lithuania call themselves...
(
Kursenieki) with a significant German minority in the south and a Lithuanian minority in the north. The population of Curonians eventually dwindled due to assimilation and other reasons; it is close to non-existent these days and even before 1945, when the spit had become totally ethnic German. Until the 20th century, most people in the area made their living by fishing. The German population was expelled after
World War IIWorld War II, or the Second World War , was a global military conflict which involved a majority of the world's nations, including all great powers, organized into two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
.
After the breakup of the
Soviet UnionThe Union of Soviet Socialist Republics was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. The name is a translation of the , tr. Soyuz Sovetskikh Sotsialisticheskikh Respublik, abbreviated СССР, SSSR. The common short name is Soviet Union, from , Sovetskiy Soyuz...
, tourism flourished; many
GermansThe German people are an ethnic group, in the sense of sharing a common German culture, descent, and speaking the German language as a mother tongue. Within Germany, Germans are defined by citizenship , distinguished from people of German ancestry...
, mostly the descendants of the inhabitants of the area, choose the Curonian Spit (especially Nida, as no visas are needed for Germans in Lithuania) as their holiday destination.
From 2002-2005 local environmentalists in both Kaliningrad Oblast
http://www.ecodefense.ru/pubs_reports_lukoil_eng_3.html and Lithuania
http://www.zalieji.lt/temos/Lukoil protested against
LukoilLukoil is Russia's largest oil company and its largest producer of oil. In 2007, the company produced 96.645 million tons of oil; 1.953 million barrels per day....
's plans to exploit the D6 oilfield, which is in the territorial waters of Russia 22.5 km from the Curonian Spit, due to the possible great damage to the environment and tourism (a vital source of income in the area) in case of
oil leakageAn oil spill is the release of a liquid petroleum hydrocarbon into the environment due to human activity, and is a form of pollution. The term often refers to marine oil spills, where oil is released into the ocean or coastal waters...
. These concerns did not engender support in the government of Russia. They were, however, supported by the government of Lithuania, as the oilfield is just about four km from the boundary of Lithuanian territorial waters and the prevailing northward
currentAn ocean current is a continuous, directed movement of ocean water generated by the forces acting upon the water, such as the wind, Coriolis force, temperature and salinity differences and tides caused by the gravitational pull of the Moon and the Sun...
s means that the Lithuanian coastlines would receive a large part of potential damage in case of leakage. However, the opposition to the exploitation of D6 oilfield met little international support and the oil platform was opened in 2005.
Reforestation may have been 'sponsored' at some point by the Prussian government, but most reports state in the late 1800's George David Kuwert, the owner of a post station in Nida, began the spit’s reforestation.
Current state
The Curonian Spit is home to the highest moving (drifting) sand dunes in
EuropeEurope is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally divided from Asia to its east by the water divide of the Ural Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian Sea, the Caucasus Mountains , and the Black Sea to the southeast...
. Their average height is 35 m, but some attain the height of 60 m.
The largest town on the spit is Nida in Lithuania, a popular holiday resort, mostly frequented by Lithuanian and German tourists. The northern shoreline of Curonian Spit is the site of
beachA beach is a geological landform along the shoreline of a body of water. It usually consists of loose particles which are often composed of rock, such as sand, gravel, shingle, pebbles, or cobblestones...
es for tourists. Both Russian and Lithuanian parts of the spit are
national parkA national park is a reserve of natural or semi-natural land, declared or owned by a national government, set aside for human recreation and enjoyment, and protected from most development...
s.
The settlements of the Curonian Spit (from north to south) are:
- Smiltynė
Smiltynė is a part of Klaipėda city municipality in Lithuania. Smiltynė, with a bit more than 50 residents, is located on the northern tip of the Curonian Spit, next to a narrow strait which connects the Curonian Lagoon to the Baltic Sea. Across the 0.5 km wide strait is the port city of Klaipėda...
- Alksnynė
- Juodkrantė
Juodkrantė with permanent population of about 720 people is a quiet Lithuanian seaside resort village located on the Curonian Spit. A part of Neringa municipality, Juodkrantė is the second largest settlement on Lithuania's part of the spit...
- Pervalka
- Preila
- Nida
- Morskoe
- Rybachy
Rybachy, is a rural settlement in Russia's Kaliningrad Oblast, the northern part of former East Prussia. It is located on the Curonian Spit. Rybachy translates as "Fishers' ", and appropriately employment centers on the fishing boats which dock at the pier on the Courland Lagoon of the Baltic Sea...
- Lesnoye
The first six are on the Lithuanian side, while the last three are on the Russian side. The Russian side of the Curonian Spit belongs to Zelenogradsk district of the
Kaliningrad OblastKaliningrad Oblast , informally called Yantarny kray is a federal subject of Russia situated on the Baltic coast. Population: 968,200 ; ....
, while the Lithuanian side is partitioned among Klaipėda city municipality and
Neringa municipalityNeringa municipality is a municipality in westernmost Lithuania, in the Curonian Spit. In terms of population, it is the smallest municipality of the country. Until the Lithuanian municipality reform, it was known as Neringa city, although there was never a true city there...
.
There is a single road that traverses the whole length of the Curonian Spit. In the Russian side it goes to
ZelenogradskZelenogradsk, is a town in Kaliningrad Oblast, Russia. Located on the Sambian coastline near the Curonian Spit on the Baltic Sea, the town is a popular weekend resort for vacationers from Kaliningrad, located 30 km to the south....
, while on the Lithuanian side it goes to
SmiltynėSmiltynė is a part of Klaipėda city municipality in Lithuania. Smiltynė, with a bit more than 50 residents, is located on the northern tip of the Curonian Spit, next to a narrow strait which connects the Curonian Lagoon to the Baltic Sea. Across the 0.5 km wide strait is the port city of Klaipėda...
. The spit is not connected to mainland Lithuania. Car
ferriesA ferry is a form of transportation, usually a boat, but sometimes a ship, used to carry primarily passengers, and sometimes vehicles and cargo as well, across a body of water. Most ferries operate on regular, frequent, return services...
provide a transportation link between
SmiltynėSmiltynė is a part of Klaipėda city municipality in Lithuania. Smiltynė, with a bit more than 50 residents, is located on the northern tip of the Curonian Spit, next to a narrow strait which connects the Curonian Lagoon to the Baltic Sea. Across the 0.5 km wide strait is the port city of Klaipėda...
, located on the spit, and the port town of Klaipėda.
Since 2000, the Curonian Spit has been on UNESCO's
World Heritage ListA UNESCO World Heritage Site is a site that is on the list that is maintained by the international World Heritage Programme administered by the UNESCO World Heritage Committee, composed of 21 state parties which are elected by their General Assembly for a four-year term.A World Heritage Site is a...
under cultural criteria "V" (
an outstanding example of a traditional human settlement, land-use, or sea-use which is representative of a culture [...], or human interaction with the environment especially when it has become vulnerable under the impact of irreversible change).
Environmental concerns
There are various environmental concerns related to the Curonian Spit, which is often promoted as a refuge of clean nature.
Due to the importance of tourism and fishing for the regional economy, pollution of sea and coastlines may have disastrous effects for the area as both the unique nature and the economy would be damaged. The construction of the oil platform at the D6 oilfield (in the territorial waters of Russia, 22.5 kilometres from the coastline of the Curonian Spit (
exact location)) in 2005 has raised concerns over possible oil spills.
Another concern is that increased tourism destroys the very nature that attracts it. For this reason, various measures have been taken, such as banning tourists from hiking in certain areas of the spit.
Natural hazards are also more dangerous in the Curonian Spit than elsewhere in
LithuaniaLithuania , officially the Republic of Lithuania is a country in Northern Europe, the southernmost of the three Baltic states. Situated along the southeastern shore of the Baltic Sea, it shares borders with Latvia to the north, Belarus to the southeast, Poland, and the Russian exclave of...
or the
Kaliningrad OblastKaliningrad Oblast , informally called Yantarny kray is a federal subject of Russia situated on the Baltic coast. Population: 968,200 ; ....
. For example, storms tend to be stronger here. Due to the importance of trees in preventing soil erosion, forest fires that happen in summer are more dangerous to the ecology.
External links