Fratelia

Fratelia is divided from Elisabetin by Gavril Musicescu Street, an L-shaped thoroughfare and one of the longest streets in Timișoara. Gavril Musicescu Street starts near Doina Market, runs a few hundred meters southward parallel to Calea Șagului, then takes a 90-degree turn eastward, stretching past Calea Girocului (Martirilor) before eventually fading out after several kilometers in the new Urseni residential area.

Fratelia was split into two sections: Fratelia A, which lies closer to Calea Șagului, and Fratelia B, situated near Calea Girocului (Martirilor). These two parts are divided by Cercului Street, commonly known as ștrec, a name that refers to the former railway that once ran there. Southwest of Fratelia is Steaua, to the west is Șagului, and to the northeast lies Braytim. Directly south, beyond a vacant lot, is Chișoda.

On the current location of Fratelia were discovered houses and ceramics characteristic of the early Neolithic (Vinča culture).^[5] A Bronze Age cremation necropolis with about 200 graves has also been unearthed nearby.^[6] Some of the funerary urns are on display today in the Museum of Banat.

In the early 1900s, the land on which Fratelia stands today was empty; much of it belonged to Kende family.^[7] The Kendes owned a brickyard. They parceled out the land and gave their workers the opportunity to buy affordable land to build their houses.^[7] Soon, a series of houses with gardens of flowers, fruits and vegetables appeared. The first street called Alleegasse (present-day Bujorilor Street) appeared also at that time.^[7] At first the settlement was called Kendetelep (in Hungarian, telep means "settlement"),^[8] which in 1910 was part of Chișoda.^[9] In addition to brickyard workers, people from neighboring villages who worked in Timișoara built houses here. Later, the Kendes donated land for the construction of a town hall, a school, a church and a cemetery.^[7] In 1919, the new settlement was named Chișoda Nouă and became a commune with its own administration.^[7] In 1930 it had 7,688 inhabitants, of which 3,388 Hungarians, 3,160 Germans and 867 Romanians.^[10] The first attempts to annex the village to Timișoara were between the two world wars, when the tram line was built. On 1 December 1928, Timișoara decided to take over the "sanitary and police measures, as well as the sewerage and lighting" of the suburban communes that were within a 5 km radius of it, including Fratelia.^[11] At the same time, the inhabitants requested to join Timișoara.^[12][13] Fratelia became the 6th constituency of Timișoara only in 1948.^[7] The brick factory, once owned by the Kendes, disappeared in the 1980s when the current thermal power plant was built.^[14]