One Version of Romania's History

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Regional History

Topics covered in this section:

Introduction

I immediately ran into a difficulty as soon as I began to write about Romania's history. The problem is that Romania's history takes place in three major regions, often referred to as principalities.

Local history sometimes plays out on its own regional "stage," independent of the other two regions. Sometimes events take place in two of the three regions. And sometimes all three regions are involved.

And to complicate matters even further, what happens in neighboring states often affects events inside the current borders of Romania.

Principalities

The three main regions (principalities) are:

• Wallachia is an east-west corridor of open plains in the southern part of Romania between the Danube River (south) and the Carpathian Mountains (north). Currently, the preferred name of this region in Romania is Muntenia, referring to the fact that it lies at the foot of the mountains. Up until the 14th century, Wallachia was little more than a number of small village-oriented "statelets." They were unified in the first decade of the 14th century to become Wallachia. The Ottoman Empire ruled portions of Wallachia for many years.
• Moldavia is a north-south area in the eastern part of Romania. Many Romanians call it Moldova, which is confusing to me, since there's also the Republic of Moldova (which was part of the former Soviet Union and is now part of the Russian Commonwealth of Independent States) just next door and to the east of Moldavia. Both Moldavia and the Republic of Moldova used to be part of a region called Basarabia (or Bessarabia), which belonged to Romania off and on over the years. The Ottoman Empire and the Polish Kingdom ruled portions of Moldavia for many years.
• Transylvania is an oval-shaped area in northwestern Romania. Hungarian nationalists claim that it is their land, "stolen" by Romania. The Austrian-Hungarian Empire ruled portions of Transylvania for many years.

There are other smaller, local regions as well:

• Dobrogea (or Dobrudja) on the Black Sea coastline. Bulgarian tsars ruled Dobrogea for many years.
• Bucovina (or Bukovina) at the northernmost tip of Moldavia. The Austrian Habsburg Empire and the Polish Kingdom ruled Bucovina for many years.
• The Banat flanking Transylvania on the southwest. The Austrian-Hungarian Empire ruled the Banat for many years and was once part of Serbia.
• Crişana bordering Transylvania on the west.
• Maramureş comprising the northern part of Transylvania.
• Wallachia is further subdivided into the local regions of:
  • Oltenia is the western half.
  • Muntenia is the eastern half.

However, historically speaking, the three regions mentioned in the first three bullets above are the chief players.

Sometimes, when describing events in the three principalities, I'll explore a regional event from beginning to end, even though it temporarily causes us to stray from the chronological unfolding of events. This cannot be helped.

My Method of Presentation

There are two basic ways to present the history of Romania. One is to ignore the shifting borders and talk about the region that falls within the present-day borders of Romania, encompassing all three principalities. The other is to tell the history of the combined Romanian people without regard for where the political borders are at any given moment in time.

Generally, I'll adopt the latter approach up until the modern era. After all, when you look beneath the geopolitical surface (where the borders shifted based on which empire was in charge at the moment), you'll find a large group of people who share the same language and culture. They have lived in the region forever (or nearly so). They are, of course, the present-day Romanians and their ancestors.

I'll leave it up to the scholars to debate who their first "ancestors" were and where the borders should "properly" lie.

Peasant Farmers

During Romania's history, scores of immigrants and colonizers settled down to farm the land or to provide grazing for their flocks. All the while, nomadic and semi-nomadic tribes passed through the area, leaving little behind to document their passing. That's to be expected, however, since migratory peoples seldom carry written histories with them on their extensive travels. Books would have been considered excess baggage.

Even those who did settle down left precious little history behind. They were an agrarian society who had little use for preserving their history. They were the poor, the peasants, the serfs, the majority. They were content to live out their lives within the social structure of the villages.

In many cases, the village represented the extent of their political awareness and other than paying taxes to the boyars (the wealthy land-owning class), they had little contact with the elite who mostly congregated in the cities.

And as is so often the case, the historic spotlight seldom focused on the people in the villages. There is an abundance of historical documentation about the conquerors, however. The politicians. The military leaders. The wealthy. But the Romanian people were seldom found in that group.