The term
Pannonian Plain refers to the lowland parts of the Pannonian Basin as well as those of some adjoining regions like
Lower Austria,
Moravia, and
Silesia (
Czech Republic and
Poland). The lands adjoining the plain proper are sometimes also called
peri-Pannonian. In English language, the terms "Pannonian Basin" and "Carpathian Basin" may sometimes be used synonymously, although the latter holds an
irredentist Hungarian connotation. The name "Pannonian" is taken from that of
Pannonia, a province of the
Roman Empire. The historical province overlapped but was not coterminous with the geographical plain or basin, as only the western part of the territory (known as
Transdanubia) of modern Hungary formed part of the ancient Pannonia, while the
Great Hungarian Plain was not part of it: The term
Carpathian Basin is used in
Hungarian literature, while the
West Slavic languages (
Czech,
Polish and
Slovak), the
Serbo-Croatian,
German and
Romanian languages use
Pannonian Basin (in
Hungarian the basin is known as
Kárpát-medence; in
Czech,
Panonská pánev; in
Polish,
Panoński Basen; in
Slovak,
Panónska panva; in
Slovenian and Serbo-Croatian,
Panonski bazen/Панонски базен; in
German,
Karpatenbecken/Pannonische Tiefebene; and in
Romanian,
Câmpia Panonică or
Bazinul Panonic). The
East Slavic languages, namely
Ukrainian, use the terms
Tysa-Danube Lowland or
Middanubian Lowland ()
Pannonian Basin vs Carpathian Basin Hungarian literature often gives preference to the term Carpathian Basin, not least due to the irredentist concept of the historical
Kingdom of Hungary being the organic result of a landscape-determined
ethnogenesis in a region defined by its natural, mountainous boundaries, the corollary being that the current national borders are not natural and defy historical and economic logic.
Hungarian arguments in favour of "Carpathian Basin" The territory of present-day Hungary only overlaps with the ancient Roman province of
Pannonia only in
Transdanubia (a traditional Hungarian term for the area bordered by the Danube River to the north and east, the
Drava and
Mura rivers to the south, and the foothills of the Alps toward Austria to the west); however the
Great Hungarian Plain was not part of Pannonia province. Transdanubia comprises less than 29% of modern Hungary, therefore Hungarian geographers avoid the terms "Pannonian Basin", and especially the "Pannonian Plain", due to them being considered not only unhistorical but also topographically erroneous. Because the term "Pannonian" has historically not applied to 80% of the basin's territory, Hungarian geographers and historians use what they consider to be the more accurate term "Carpathian Basin". The topographical problem with the Pannonian "Plain" term is that with the exception of the
Little Hungarian Plain (which is only around 15% of the territory of ancient Pannonian Transdanubia), hills and mountains dominate the landscape, so real plains are very rare on that territory. The largest plain of the Roman Pannonia province is located in
Slavonia in Croatia and Voivodine in modern Serbia.
Roman province of Pannonia •
Pannonia Inferior covered much of the western half of the basin, being bordered by the
Danube to the east. •
Pannonia Superior included the western fringe of the basin as well as part of the
Eastern Alps, as far as
Virunum. The southern fringe of the basin was in
Dalmatia and
Moesia. • The eastern half of the basin was not conquered by the Romans and was considered part of
Sarmatia, inhabited by the
Iazyges. Likewise, the parts north of the Danube (now in western Slovakia) were not in the empire; they were considered part of
Germania, inhabited by the
Quadi. ==Etymology==