Danube once appears as the mother of Vrtra, "a dragon blocking the course of the rivers." The Finnish word for Danube is Tonava, which is most likely derived from the word for the river in Swedish and German, "Donau". Its Sámi name "Deatnu" means "Great River". It is possible that "dānu" in Scythian as in Avestan was a generic word for "river": "Dnieper" and "Dniestr", from "Danapris" and "Danastius", are presumed to continue Scythian "*dānu apara" "far river" and "*dānu nazdya-" "near river", respectively. The river was known to the ancient Greeks as the "Istros" (Ἴστρος) a borrowing from a Daco-Thracian
Steamboats on the Danube Steamboats on the Danube The Danube Steamboat Shipping Company, Donaudampfschiffahrtsgesellschaft was a shipping company founded in 1829 by the Austrian government for transporting passengers and cargo on the River Danube. In 1880, the DDSG was the world's largest river shipping company with more than 200 steamboat ships and about 1000 cargo tubs. Steamboats on the Danube were, by the end of the 19th century, dominated by the Austrian-based DDSG. A new organisation was formed in 1896, based in the Hungarian part of the Habsburg empire, which was to become a significant player in both the freight haulage and passenger businesses.