The Volga
The Volga is the longest river in Europe at 3,690 km. It runs entirely within Russia, flowing southward from the forests northwest of Moscow to the Caspian Sea. It is so central to Russian history and culture that Russians traditionally call it "Mother Volga". Eleven of the twenty largest cities in Russia sit on its banks, and the Battle of Stalingrad in World War II was fought along its course.
- Length3,690 kmLongest river in Europe
- CountryRussiaEntirely within one country
- SourceValdai HillsA small stream northwest of Moscow
- MouthCaspian SeaA landlocked sea in central Asia
- Drainage basin1.36 million km²About a third of European Russia
- Cities on the river4 of Russia's 12 biggestPlus 7 others over half a million
The Volga among Europe's great rivers
The Volga is much longer than any other river in Europe. It is also the only one to empty into a landlocked sea rather than an ocean.
What is the Volga?
The Volga rises as a small stream in the Valdai Hills, northwest of Moscow. It then flows in a great curve eastward and then southward across European Russia, eventually emptying into the Caspian Sea (a giant landlocked saltwater lake, not connected to any ocean). The river drops gently over its long course; for most of its length it is broad and slow-moving. The basin covers about a third of European Russia and is home to around 60 million people.
The Volga Cascade
In the mid-20th century the Soviet Union built a series of huge dams along the Volga, turning much of the river into a chain of long lakes called the Volga Cascade. There are eight major hydroelectric dams along the river. The reservoirs they created are some of the biggest in the world: the Kuybyshev Reservoir, for example, is bigger than Wales. The dams provide hydroelectric power and let large boats travel the length of the river.
The dams also caused huge problems. Entire towns were flooded and tens of thousands of people had to be relocated. Sturgeon (which used to swim from the Caspian Sea up the Volga to breed) can no longer reach their spawning grounds, and several Caspian sturgeon species are now critically endangered.
Cities and culture
Many of Russia's biggest cities sit on the Volga: Tver, Yaroslavl, Nizhny Novgorod, Kazan, Samara, Saratov and Volgograd. These cities are linked to Moscow and Saint Petersburg by canals and rivers, so a boat can travel from the Baltic Sea via Saint Petersburg, through inland waterways, down the Volga, and out to the Caspian Sea, all without going to sea.
The Battle of Stalingrad
The Volga was the setting of one of the most terrible battles in human history. In 1942 and 1943, the German army tried to capture the city of Stalingrad (now called Volgograd) on the western bank of the Volga. The Soviet defenders held on through five months of brutal urban fighting, supplied across the icy river. The German army was eventually surrounded and forced to surrender in February 1943. Around 2 million soldiers and civilians died at Stalingrad, making it one of the deadliest battles of all time. The battle was a turning point of World War II.
Deeper dive: Volga geography, the Caspian Sea and the Volga-Don Canal
The Volga drains an enormous, almost flat plain in European Russia, with very little drop in elevation over its 3,690 km. The source at the Valdai Hills is just 228 metres above sea level. The mouth at the Caspian Sea is actually below sea level, because the Caspian itself sits approx. 28 metres below global sea level. The river's average drop is only approx. 7 cm per kilometre, which makes the Volga slow-moving and prone to freezing solid in winter. Most of the river is frozen for three to four months a year.
The Caspian Sea, where the Volga ends, is the largest inland body of water on Earth, about the area of Japan. It is salty (about a third the salinity of the ocean) and home to unique species including the Caspian seal (the only seal species in a landlocked sea) and the famous beluga sturgeon. The Caspian sits in a deep tectonic basin that was once connected to the Black Sea but became isolated approx. 5.5 million years ago. The Volga provides approx. 80% of the Caspian's freshwater inflow.
The Volga-Don Canal, opened in 1952, connects the Volga to the Don River at the point where the two rivers come within 100 km of each other. Through the Don, the Volga is connected to the Black Sea, the Mediterranean, and from there to the world ocean. The full inland-waterway network across Russia ("Unified Deep Water System of European Russia") allows boats to travel between five seas (the Baltic, White, Black, Azov and Caspian) entirely through rivers and canals, a route of around 6,000 km in total.
The country is Russia. The river that flows through ten European countries is the Danube.