Lab (river)

Lab (Llap, Лаб)
The Lab in Podujevo
Main source	Kopaonik mountain, Kosovo[lower-alpha 1]
River mouth	Sitnica river, south of Vučitrn, Kosovo
Size	950 km²
Physiognomy
Length	72 km

The Lab (Albanian: Llap, Serbian: Лаб/Lab) is a river in the north-eastern part of Kosovo.^{[lower-alpha 1]} The 72 km (45 mi) long right tributary to the Sitnica river, it is the main river in the Malo Kosovo depression. Near its origin are remains of medieval palace of Serbian king Milutin (1282-1321) called Vrhlab (Serbian: Врхлаб, which means origin of the Lab).

Name etymology

The etymology of the river's name is derived from a pre-Slavic form Alb that underwent linguistic metathesis within Slavic giving the final form as Lab.^[1]

Gornji Lab

The Lab originates from the Kopaonik mountain, between the Pilatovica and Bela Stena peaks, on the border of Kosovo and Serbia. The river flows southward, through the region of Gornji Lab (Upper Lab), by the villages of Marince, Bela Stena, Murgula, Brece and Metohija, receives several smaller streams from the Kopaonik and after it passes the village of Donja Pakaštica, the Lab enters the Malo Kosovo field.

Malo Kosovo

Malo Kosovo is located between the mountains of Kopaonik (north) and Prugovac (south) and, unlike the Gornji Lab, it is densely populated. After the villages of Dobri Do, Bajčina, Perane and Letance, the Lab reaches the town of Podujevo. At this point, the river bends gently to the southwest and its valley becomes the route for the regional road and railway Niš-Pristina. After the larger village of Glavnik, the Lab receives from the left the Batlava river at the village of Lužane, and from the right its major tributary, the Kačandolska reka by the village of Donje Ljupče.

Veliko Kosovo

At Vrani Do and Besinje villages, the Lab slowly turns west, passing the villages of Raškovo, Miloševo, Prilužje, and Reka, where it empties into the Sitnica. The Lab drains an area of 950 km² (367 sq mi), belongs to the Black Sea drainage basin and it is not navigable.

Notes and references

Notes:

1. Kosovo is the subject of a territorial dispute between the Republic of Kosovo and the Republic of Serbia. The Republic of Kosovo unilaterally declared independence on 17 February 2008, but Serbia continues to claim it as part of its own sovereign territory. The two governments began to normalise relations in 2013, as part of the Brussels Agreement. Kosovo has been recognised as an independent state by 108 out of 193 United Nations member states.

References:

1. Županić, Niko (1936). Značenje barvnega atributa v imeny ,,Crvena Hrvatska’’. Etnolog. p. 362. "Na ozemlju Dukljaninovic Bete Hrvatske se je namreč nahajalo mesto Lab, a stara srbska država Raša se je po njem razprostirala ad Lapiam et Lap, kar gotovo meri na župo in reko Lab, pritok Sitnice na Kosovem polju. Tu je menda nastopila znana slovanska likvidna metateza alb > lab, ali je treba pripomniti, da so ti koreni predslovanski, morda celo predindoevropski, kakor n. pr. pri Labi na severu (Albis). [In the territory of Croatia's Dukljaninovic has a place located called Lab, but the old Serbian state Raša is after stretching to Lapi or Lap, which certainly is measured at the region and the Lab river, a tributary of Sitnica in Kosovo Polje. There is apparently a known Slavic metathesis alb> lab, or it should be noted that these pre-Slavic roots, perhaps even in pre Indoeuropean as n. pr. the Elbe in the north (Albis).]"

• Mala Prosvetina Enciklopedija, Third edition (1985); Prosveta; ISBN 86-07-00001-2
• Jovan Đ. Marković (1990): Enciklopedijski geografski leksikon Jugoslavije; Svjetlost-Sarajevo; ISBN 86-01-02651-6

External links

Coordinates: 42°45′19″N 21°01′02″E / 42.7553°N 21.0172°E