GIURGEVO (Giurgiu)  , the capital of the department of Vlashca, Rumania; situated amid mud-flats and marshes on the left bank of the Danube . Pop . (1900) 13,977 . Three small islands face the town, and a larger one shelters its port, Smarda, 22 M . E . The rich corn-lands on the north are traversed by a railway to Bucharest, the first line opened in Rumania, which was built in 1869 and afterwards extended to Smarda . Steamers ply to Rustchuk, 22 m . S.W. on the Bulgarian shore, linking the Rumanian railway system to the chief Bulgarian line north of the Balkans (Rustchuk-Varna) . Thus Giurgevo, besides having a considerable trade with the home ports lower down the Danube, is the headquarters of commerce between Bulgaria and Rumania . It exports timber, grain, salt and petroleum; importing coal, iron and textiles . There are also large saw-mills . Giurgevo occupies the site of Theodorapolis, a city built by the Roman emperor Justinian (A.D .

483-565) . It was founded in the 14th

century by Genoese merchant adventurers, who established a bank, and a trade in silks and velvets . They called the town, after the patron saint of Genoa, San Giorgio (St George); and hence comes its present name . As a fortified town, Giurgevo figured often in the wars for the conquest of the lower Danube; especially in the struggle of Michael the Brave (1J93–1601) against the Turks, and in the later Russo-Turkish Wars . It was burned in 1659 . In 1829, its fortifications were finally razed, the only defence left being a castle on the island of Slobosia, united to the shore by a bridge .