Šahy

Šahy (until 1927 "Ipolské Šiahy", Hungarian: Ipolyság, rarely German: Eipelschlag) is a town in southern Slovakia, The town has an ethnic Hungarian majority and its population is 7,971 people (2005), with an average age of 42.5. It is located at the eastern reaches of the Danubian Lowland on the river Ipeľ at the Hungarian border, on the E77 road from Budapest to Kraków. Besides the main settlement, it also has two "boroughs" of Preseľany nad Ipľom (4 km (2.49 mi) west of centre, annexed 1980) and Tešmák (3 km (1.86 mi) east of centre, annexed 1986). From 1980 to 1996 it also had now independent village of Hrkovce. The first written mention is from 1237 in a document of King Béla IV under name Saag. It got character of a small town in...