Dr. Andrásfalvy Bertalan: A Sárköz és a környező Duna menti területek ősi ártéri gazdálkodása és vízhasználatai a szabályozás előtt (Vízügyi Történeti Füzetek 6. Budapest, 1973)

Idegen nyelvű kivonatok

The study in its finishing part discusses the history of water regulation and flood control works. Since the stages and canals required a continuous supervision, care and maintenance, the running wild of this territory started already under the battles at the time of the Turkish occupation. It is even more likely that the remaining population was also acclerating this process, because for strangers a pathless world of water became for the inhabitants a natural shelter and hiding place during the campaigns and the plundering of mercenary army. At the end of the eighteenth century, the still functioning "fok"-s and canals were locked on higher order. The unsystematically constructed insecure levees were again and again ruptured by floods but the overtopping water could not find its way back into the river bed. In spite of the protest of the inhabitant peasants, the state and the landowners reconstructed repeatedly the levees. Meanwhile also the natural silting up of the river valley contributed to the fact that the floods destroyed some villages never endangered before. The regime became marshy, worthless and devestated. A change followed only in the second half of the nineteenth century, after the proper construction of levees and the solving of drainage of the excessive surface waters. Thus, several thousand hectares became apt for cultivation, but the flood danger exists even at present and calls for a water management making use also of historical experiences.