Tagus

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

(Redirected from Tagus River)

Tagus
Spanish: Tajo, Portuguese: Tejo
View over the Tagus River from Almourol Castle in Portugal
Countries	Spain, Portugal
Length	1,038 km (645 mi)
Watershed	80,100 km² (30,927 mi²)
Source	Fuente de García
- location	Albarracín mountains, Teruel Province, Aragon, Spain
Mouth
- location	Atlantic Ocean at Lisboa, Portugal

Tagus (Latin Tagus, Spanish Tajo, Portuguese Tejo, pron. IPA: ['tɛʒʊ]) is the longest river on the Iberian Peninsula. It measures 1,038 kilometers in length, 716 km of which are in Spain, 47 km as border between Portugal and Spain and the remaining 275 km in Portugal. It drains an area of 80,100 km² (the second largest in the Iberian peninsula after the Douro). It follows a very constricted course for much of its length, but after Almourol it enters a vast alluvian valley prone to flooding. Today the Alcantara Dam regulates much of the river's flow.

The source of the Tagus is the Fuente de García, in the Albarracín mountains. It ends in the Atlantic Ocean by Lisbon in a wide inverted estuary. The largest bridge across the river is the Vasco da Gama Bridge (in Lisbon, Portugal) with a total length of 17.2 km. It is also the largest bridge in Europe. The Pepper Wreck is the name of a shipwreck located and excavated at the mouth of the Tagus River between 1996 and 2001.

The main cities it passes through are Aranjuez, Toledo and Talavera de la Reina in Spain, and Santarém and Lisbon in Portugal.

The Portuguese regions of Alentejo and Ribatejo take their names from the river. Alentejo, from Além-Tejo (beyond the Tagus), and Ribatejo, from Arriba-Tejo (on the banks of the Tagus). There is a transvasement between the Tagus and the Segura River.