The
Zasavica (
Serbian Cyrillic:
Засавица,
pronounced [ˈzâsaʋit͜sa]) is a river in the
Mačva region in west-central
Serbia. It is a 33.1 km-long right tributary of the
Sava River, which flows entirely within the Mačva region. It originates from several streams out of the swamps north of the village of
Salaš Crnobarski, in the
floodplain of the lower course of the
Drina River. The river flows in a north-east direction for 10 km parallel to the flow of the Sava and next to the villages of
Glogovac,
Sovljak,
Crna Bara,
Banovo Polje and
Radenković, where the river crosses the administrative border of
Central Serbia and the province of
Vojvodina, where it flows near the settlements of
Ravnje,
Zasavica I,
Zasavica II,
Noćaj, and
Mačvanska Mitrovica. At village of Banovo Polje, two major headstreams, the Jovača and Prekopac, meet, and from that point the river is called the Zasavica.
Near the village of Zasavica, the river enters the marshy area of the Zasavica bog where the nominally 50–60 meter-wide stream spreads to almost 300 meters and becomes 2 meters deep. It meanders through the middle of the town until flowing into the Sava at Mačvanska Mitrovica, right across the town of Sremska Mitrovica on the Sava. The final section is channeled (Bogaz canal), and the river often floods the surrounding area.
The name of the river could be translated as the “behind Sava”. It actually flows through the typical elongated "mrtvaja" (oxbow), the old (fossil) bed of both the Sava and later, the Drina rivers. Because of the river’s meandering course and the low terrain, a bog was created, while the river itself changes the course depending on how much atmospheric waters it gets during the year.
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