ROUMANIA, a kingdom in the south-east of Europe between the Carpathians, the Pruth, the Black Sea, and the Danube. The Pruth and the Kilia mouth of the Danube now form the frontier with Russia. West of Silistria the Danube is the boundary between Roumania and Bulgaria, while to the east of that point the boundary is formed by an irregular line passing east by south to the coast about ten miles to the south of Mangalia. The territory thus shut off between the Danube and the Black Sea is known as the DOBRUDJA (q.v.), and differs in its physical features and products from the rest of the kingdom. It was given to Roumania at the close of the last Russo-Turkish War as a compensation for the territory of Bessarabia, east of the Pruth, which was then restored to Russia. The area of the kingdom is estimated at about 49,250 square miles, which is rather less than that of England without Wales. The greatest length of the kingdom is from east to west near the parallel of 45°, along which the length is about 350 miles. The line stretching from north-west to south-east between the extreme points of the kingdom is about fifteen miles shorter.

The crescent-shaped portion of the kingdom lying between the Danube and Pruth and the Carpathians is tolerably uniform in its physical features. The southern part of the area is a plain continuous with that of southern Russia. Towards the interior the surface rises gradually but slowly until we come to the spurs of the Carpathians. The Roumanian frontier on this side runs for the most part along the very crest of the mountains, which have peaks rising to from 6000 to 8000 feet and upwards. The lowest part of this plain is that which stretches along the left bank of the Danube, and this also is the dreariest and least productive. Large tracts of it are marshy and subject to inundation, and even beyond the marshy districts the aspect of the country remains extremely uninviting. Agriculture is neglected; coarse grasses occupy large areas; and the most conspicuous feature in the landscape is probably a rude well, such as is seen in the pusstas of Hungary and some parts of southern Russia, where the general aspect of the country is so like what we find here. Farther inland, however, the appearance of the surface improves: agriculture becomes more general, trees (willows, alders, and poplars) more abundant; on the still higher ground nearer the Carpathians the outward signs of comfort and prosperity become more and more apparent; the vine clothes the hill slopes; plums, peaches, and southern fruits are grown in profusion; large forests of oak, beech, and elm reach to the hill tops, and various minerals form an important addition to the present and prospective resources of the country. At elevations too high for the foliage trees just mentioned these are succeeded by pines and firs, birches and larches, which crown the mountains to a height of 5000 or 6000 feet. Extensive as the plains of Roumania are, 40 per cent, of the entire surface is more than a thousand feet above sea-level, while the greater part of the northern (or Moldavian) half of the crescent varies from 300 to 1000 feet, almost all the rest of Moldavia being still more elevated.

The superficial geology of Roumania, so far as it is Geology, known, is extremely simple, at least on the left bank of the Danube. Quaternary deposits are spread over all the plains. Among these the most important is the yellow loess, which covers such large areas in Hungary also, and which in Roumania attains in places a depth of 150 to 300 feet. In certain parts the black soil of southern Russia extends into Roumania, and is important on account of its richness, though its depth is nowhere above 3 feet. Advancing inland one meets next with Miocene and Eocene deposits, until, in ascending the slopes of the Carpathians, Secondary, Primary, and crystalline rocks are seen to crop out in succession. The desolate plateau of the Dobrudja contrasts with the region on the left of the Danube in its geology as in other respects. Its basis consists of crystalline rocks, but these are covered with sedimentary formations of various ages. On the north this plateau, which is hilly and even mountainous, sinks down rather abruptly to the delta of the Danube, a congeries of alluvial marshes occupied chiefly by aquatic and marsh-loving birds.

Of the rivers of Roumania by far the most important Rivers, is the Danube, which is navigable for large vessels throughout its Roumanian reach, the first obstruction to navigation, the celebrated Iron Gates, occurring just where it enters Roumanian territory. The breadth of the river is of some consequence in view of the fact that it is a frontier stream, and the marshes on the left bank have at least this advantage that they enable it to serve all the more effectually as a natural boundary. The plains on the left are traversed by numerous winding tributaries of the Danube, but of these the only one of importance as a means of communication is the Pruth, which is navigable for small grain-carrying vessels. The others—the Sereth, Jalomitza, Dambovitza, Olta—are sluggish streams, often half-dry, but yet at certain seasons subject to inundations, which unfortunately occur at a time when the crops are so far advanced as to be liable to be much damaged. In consequence of this the Government has bestowed much pains on the regulation of these streams, and the works for this purpose are rendered further serviceable by the fact that the Roumanian rivers can be turned to account for irrigation.

The climate of Roumania is one of extremes as regards temperature. Winter and summer are almost equally-trying. In the former season the thermometer may sink to - 15° Fahr., while in the latter it may rise to from 90° to 95°. The mean temperature of spring at Bucharest is 53°, summer 72J°, autumn 65°, winter 27J°. Spring, how-ever, scarcely exists except in name, the interval between the cold winter and hot summer being very short. The autumn, on the other hand, is long and is the most genial season of the year. It lasts to the end of November. Being continuous with the Russian plain, Roumania is exposed to the bitterly cold wind from the north-east by which southern Russia is also scourged. In Roumania this wind, known as crivets, blows on an average 155 days in the year, while a west or south-west wind, called the austru, equally disagreeable for its scorching heat, blows on an average 126 days. The rainfall is not excessive. The number of rainy days in the year is about 74, or only about two-fifths of the number round London. The summer months are those in which the rains are most abundant. Snow is unfrequent (12 days in the year). As regards salubrity the low-lying plains near the Danube are the worst part of the kingdom. Marsh fever is there prevalent, and the tendency to suffer from disease is increased by the miserable character of the dwellings occupied by the peasantry of that district. The houses are mere pits dug out in the ground and covered over with sloping roofs formed of branches and twigs.

Agriculture. Three-fourths of the population are dependent upon agriculture. The plains covered by loess and black soil are admirably adapted for the growth of cereals, and of these the most important are maize, wheat, and barley. The methods of cultivation are to a large extent primitive and imperfect, but great improvements are taking place through the application of foreign capital to the development of the native resources. Improved agricultural implements of all kinds have been introduced of late years in great numbers. The old plough, which has a share resembling a lance head, which enters the ground horizontally and thus merely scratches the surface, is being rapidly superseded by ploughs of English and Austrian manufacture. These improvements, which have been greatly stimulated by the alteration in the status of the Roumanian peasantry brought about by the law of 1864, and like-wise by the introduction of railways, have resulted in an enormous increase in the amount of the production of cereals. Roumania is one of the principal grain-exporting countries in Europe, and the increase in the production just alluded to is sufficiently well indi-cated by the figures given below relative to the exports of grain to the United Kingdom. The great variations in these figures, though obviously due in part to political causes, likewise serve to illustrate the chief drawback under which Roumanian agriculture labours— namely, the liability to drought.

Besides forming a valuable article of export maize furnishes the chief food of the people. The great body of Roumanians seldom eat meat except on feast days, and the favourite food is a dish called mamaliga, made by boiling maize-meal and flavouring it with a little salt. It thus resembles the hominy of the Americans. In addition to cereals many kinds of vegetables, including garlic, melons, and cucumbers, are grown. Hemp and colza are also important products, and tobacco furnished a considerable article of export until it was made a monopoly of the state in 1872. As already mentioned, wine and numerous fruits are produced on the foot-hills of the Carpathians, but owing to neglect the products are greatly inferior to what they ought to be. Nothing, it is said, but care in the cultivation of the vine and the preparation and pre-servation of the wine is necessary to make Roumania a wine-growing country of the first rank. As it is, vines are estimated to cover only about 250,000 acres, or about r|-g- of the entire surface. From plums the Roumanians extract a strong spirit known as tsuica, and it is chiefly for this that the plum-tree is cultivated.

The rearing of domestic animals is likewise an important industry, but it has not advanced so much of late years as the growth of cereals. The exports of cattle are almost stationary. Oxen are of much more importance than horses, being chiefly used in field labours. Buffaloes also are reared for the purpose, and are much valued for their strength. Sheep and cattle rearing forms the chief occupation of the sparse population of the Dobrudja.

Forests. About one-sixth of the total surface of Roumania is estimated to be covered with forests producing valuable timber trees. Oaks, firs, and beeches are said to be met with having a diameter of more than 8 feet at the height of 33 feet above the ground. The warm summers and cold winters are favourable to the quality of the wood, which is hard and lasting. Unfortunately there is a good deal of recklessness in the way in which the forests are utilized, and they are said to be fast disappearing; but it is to be hoped that the influence of the College of Agriculture and Sylviculture at Ferestreu, 2 miles from Bucharest, will help to put a check upon this improvidence, as it is without doubt contributing greatly to the promotion of Roumanian agriculture.

Minerals. The mineral wealth on the Roumanian side of the Carpathians is considerable, hut at present there are only three minerals that have any great industrial importance. These are rock-salt, petroleum, and lignite. The salt mines are a state monopoly, and two of them, at Ocna-Mare and Telega, are partly worked by convicts. The depth from which the salt is extracted nowhere exceeds 300 feet. The average quantity of salt sold annually is about 62,000 tons. Lignite is important inasmuch as it is used along with wood on the railways, as well as in brick and lime kilns. Coal is also found, in some places even at the surface, but, though one or two mines have been opened, the total production is insignificant. Ozocerite, or fossil wax, is frequently found in association with lignite, but is used only in small quantity by the peasantry. Among other minerals are anthracite, iron, gold, copper, lead, sulphur, cobalt, and arsenic ; and there is little doubt that some of these at least might be made economically valuable if the resources of the country were adequately developed.

Manufactures. So far the manufacturing industries of Roumania are hardly worthy of mention. There are petroleum refineries, one or two sugar refineries,' numerous steam-mills for grinding flour, besides large numbers of floating maize-mills on the Danube ; but in addition to these there are only a few manufactories at Galatz.

Trade. From the account just given of the products of Roumania it follows that the exports of the kingdom consist chiefly of raw produce, and above all of cereals, while the imports are mainly composed of manufactured articles. The countries with which the trade is chiefly carried on are Austria (with about 40 per cent, of the whole trade in 1883), Great Britain (about 30 per cent.), France (about 10 per cent.), Germany (about 8 per cent.), Turkey, and Russia. The foreign commerce of Roumania is centred in Galatz, which is situated at the bend of the Danube where the river once more turns eastward on reaching the northern extremity of the Dobrudja plateau. From this centre there is one line of rail-way leading into Russia, while others pass through the interior of Roumania and connect with the Austrian lines in the north and south of Hungary. The first Roumanian railway was that from Giurgevo to Bucharest, opened in 1869. In 1884 there were about 1000 miles of railway in the kingdom. The internal trade of Roumania is almost entirely in the hands of the Jews. It is greatly hampered by the existence of the octroi in all the large towns, almost all the necessaries of life as well as luxuries being taxed when introduced within the municipal boundaries.

See Samuelson, Roumania, Past and Present (London, 1882); Ozanne, Three Years in Roumania (London, 1878); Kanitz, Donau-Bulgarien und der Balkan (1875); and R. Roesler, Romänische Studien. (G. G. C.)

Statistics. Produce. The approximate proportion of cultivated and uncultivated land in Roumania is given in pogones (= 1J acres) as follows :—
Cereals, gardens, vines 4,945,708
Pasture and hay 7,693,910
Forests 4,029,947
Uncultivated 7,574,336
and exports.

The annual yield of cereals of all kinds is roughly estimated at 15,000,000 quarters. The number of horned cattle in the country is about 3,000,000.

In 1883 the following were the values of the principal articles Imports
of import and export :—

Imports. Exports. Imports. Exports.
Metals £
4,706,063 2,926,576 1,749,674
754,754 713,000 £
248,504 73,196 257,136
323,372 24,080 Minerals, pottery.. £
455,510 874,837 281,377 159,420 62,846 £
12,760 5,992 6,902,280 465,692 171,381
Skins leather
Wood and manu-Exotlc products...
Fruits, vegetables..


The total imports of British home produce, mostly cotton goods, &c, and iron, into Roumania in 1883 amounted to £1,344,619, and the total exports, mostly barley and maize, of Roumania to Great Britain to £3,516,442.

There were in 1884 about 1000 miles of railway complete in the kingdom, and 3000 miles of telegraph lines.

Population. The estimated population of the country is 5,376,000, including about 400,000 Jews and 200,000 Gipsies. About four and a half millions of the population belong to the Roumanian branch of the Orthodox Greek Church, and there are 114,000 Roman Catholics and 13,800 Protestants.

An official analysis of the occupations of the people gives following results (the figures representing heads of families):—
Agriculturists 684,168
Artisans and labourers 83,061
Traders 30,417
Officials 22,811
Professors and teachers 6,066
Medical and legal professions and druggists.. 995
Artists, musicians, and publicists 2,156
Priests, monks, and nuns 18,452
Various 125,815
Total 973,941

Of the larger cities Bucharest (Bucurest) numbered in 1876 221,805 inhabitants, Jassy 90,125, and Galatz 80,763.

Education. In 1883 there were 2742 primary schools with 124,130 pupils, 8 normal schools with 830 pupils, and 54 high schools with 7993 pupils, besides the two universities of Bucharest and Jassy, con-taining 97 professors and readers and 705 students. It is estimated that about 1000 young men receive their university education abroad, mostly at Paris. There is also a ladies' college, called the Asyle Hélène from its founder in its present form, the Princess Helena Cuza, and accommodating 230 girls, many of whom are Learned orphans. Amongst learned institutions the Roumanian Academy institu- claims the first place, and excellent contributions ou subjects of tions. national and scientific interest will be found amongst its proceed-ings (Aimlele Academiei Romane, 1878 sq.). The academy building at Bucharest contains the national library of over 30,000 volumes and a fine archaeological museum containing many Old Dacian antiquities.

Army. The peace strength of the permanent army consists of 1200 officers and 18,532 men, with 180 guns. Besides this, there are the territorial army, consisting of 120,000 men and 84 guns ; the militia, consisting of thirty-two regiments of infantry ; and finally the levée en masse. Every Roumanian, from his twenty-first to his forty-sixth year, is obliged to serve his time in one of the above categories. The total of the Roumanian forces, exclusive of the levée en masse, amounts to about 150,000 men and 288 guns.

Mediaeval and Modem History of Walachia and Moldavia.

Roumania is the name officially adopted by the united kingdom that comprises the former principalities of Walachia and Moldavia. In its native form it appears simply as "Romania," representing the claim to Roman descent put forward by its inhabitants. These call themselves " Romani " or " Rumeni, " but by their neighbours, Slavonic, Greek, Magyar, and German, they are universally known by one or other form of the word "Vlach." As, however, this Vlach or Rouman race occupies a far wider area than that included in the present Roumanian kingdom, it may be convenient to post-pone the vexed questions connected with its origin, migrations, and distribution for more general treatment under the heading VLACHS, and to confine ourselves on this occasion to Roumania proper—the country between the Carpathians, the Lower Danube, and the Black Sea. It may be sufficient here to observe that, according to the concurrent accounts from various sources, the great plains of the later Walachian and Moldavian principalities were first occupied by an immigrant Rouman population coming from the Carpathian lands and the present Transylvania in the early Middle Ages. According to the Russian Nestor and the earliest Hungarian chroniclers, the Carpathian region, including tracts of eastern Hungary, were occupied by a Rouman ("Roman") population at the time of the Magyar invasion in the 9 th century. On the other hand, the meagre annals of the plains that lie on the left bank of the Lower Danube are exclusively occupied till at least the 11th century with Slovenes, Petchenegs, Cumans, and Bulgarians. Whatever title the Carpathian Roumans may have to be considered the descendants in situ of the Romanized pro-vincials of Trajan's Dacia, it seems fairly ascertained that the present extension of this easternmost branch of the Latin peoples over the Walachian and Moldavian plains is due to a colonizing movement from the Alpine regions to the west, effected for the most part in the 12th and succeeding centuries.

Walachia. —For the early history of the Walachian (Valachian, or Wallachian) principality the native sources are late and untrustworthy. These sources really reduce themselves to a single chronicle, a part of which appears to have been drawn up in the 16th century in Bulgaro-Slovene, and of which two Rouman translations Radul have seen the light. This "History of the Rouman land since Negru. the arrival of the Roumans " (Istoria tierei Romanesci de cândU au dcscalicata Romanii) gives a precise account of the founding of the Walachian state by Radul Negru, voivode of the Roumans of Fogaras in Transylvania, who in 1290 descended with a numerous people into the Transalpine plain and established his capital first at Cimpulungu and then at Argish. Radul dies in 1314 and is succeeded by a series of voivodes whose names and dates are duly given ; but this early chapter of Walachian history has been rudely handled by Roesler in his essay on the oldest history of the Walachian voivodeship (Romanische Studien, p. 261 sq.). The so-called " Chronicle of Hurul" is a modern forgery, and our only real authorities for the beginnings of Roumanian history are Hungarian, Polish, and Byzantine.

Hungarian supremacy. In 1330 the voivode Alexander Bazarad or Bassaraba succeeded in inflicting a crushing defeat on his suzerain King Charles of Hungary, and for fourteen years Wallachia enjoyed complete independence. Louis the Great succeeded for a while in restoring the Hungarian supremacy, but in 1367 the voivode Vlad or Vladislav inflicted another severe defeat on the Hungarians, and succeeded for a time in ousting the Magyar ban of Severin and thus incorporating Little Walachia, the country west of the Aluta, in his dominions. Subsequently, in order to retain a hold on the loyalty of the Walachian voivode, the king of Hungary invested him with the title of duke of Fogaras and Omlas, Rouman districts situate in Transylvania, and this investiture seems to have left its impress on the traditional account of Radul Negru.

Under the voivode Mircea (1383-1419), whose prowess is still Mircea. celebrated in the national folk-songs, Walachia played for a while a more ambitious part. This prince, during the earlier part of his reign, sought a counterpoise to Hungarian influence in the close alliance with King Vladislav Jagieilo of Poland. He added to his other titles that of " count of Severin, despot of the Dobrudja, and lord of Silistria," and both AVidin and Sistov appear in his pos-session. A Walachian contingent, apparently Mircea's, aided the Servian Kniaz Lazar on the fatal field of Kosovo ; later he was led by the force of circumstances to ally himself with his former enemy Sigismund of Hungary against Bajazet, and in 1396 shared with him the disaster of Nikopolis. Bajazet subsequently invaded and laid waste a large part of Walachia, but the voivode succeeded in inflicting considerable loss on the retiring Turks, and the capture of Bajazet by Timur in 1402 gave the country a reprieve. In the internecine struggle that followed amongst the sons of Bajazet, Mircea espoused the cause of Musa ; but, though he thus obtained, for a while considerable influence in the Turkish councils, this policy eventually drew on him the vengeance of Sultan Mahomet I., who succeeded in reducing him to a tributary position.

During the succeeding period the Walachian princes appear alternately as the allies of Hungary or the creatures of the Turk. In the later battle of Kosovo of 1448, between Hunyadiand Sultan Murad, the Walachian contingent treacherously surrendered to the Turks, but this did not hinder the victorious sultan from massacring the prisoners and adding to the tribute a yearly contribution of 3000 javelins and 4000 shields. In 1453 Constantinople fell; in 1454 Hunyadi died ; and two years later the sultan invaded Walachia to set up Vlad IV., the son of a former voivode. The Vlad the father of this Vlad had himself been notorious for his ferocity, Impaler. but his son, during his Turkish sojourn, had improved on his father's example. He wTas known in Walachia as " Dracul," or the Devil, and has left a name in history as Vlad the Impaler. The stories of his ferocious savagery exceed belief. He is said to have feasted amongst his impaled victims. When the sultan Mahomet, infuriated at the impalement of his envoy, the pasha of Widin, who had been charged with Vlad's deposition, invaded Walachia in person with an immense host, he is said to have found at one spot a forest of pales on which were the bodies of men, women, and children. The voivode Radul, who was now substituted for this monster by Turkish influence, was constrained to pay a tribute of 12,000 ducats.

The shifting policy of the Walachian princes at this time is State of well described in a letter of the Hungarian king Matthias to Walachia Casimir of Poland. " The voivodes," he writes, " of Walachia and circ. Moldavia fawn alternately upon the Turks, the Tatars, the Poles, 1500. and the Hungarians, that among so many masters their perfidy may remain unpunished." The prevalent laxity of marriage, the frequency of divorce, and the fact that illegitimate children could succeed as well as those born in lawful wedlock, by multiplying the candidates for the voivodeship and preventing any regular system of succession, contributed much to the internal confusion of the country. The elections, though often controlled by the Divan, were still constitutionally in the hands of the boiars, who were split up into various factions, each with its own pretender to the throne. The princes followed one another in rapid succession, and a large proportion met with violent ends. A large part of the population led a pastoral life, and at the time of Verantius's visit to Walachia in the early part of the 16th century the towns and villages were built of wood and wattle and daub. Tirgovist alone, at this time the capital of the country, was a considerable town, with two stone castles. Nagul Bassaraba, who succeeded in 1512, was a great builder of monasteries, and, besides erecting a monastic church at Argish, which he coated with white marble, and a new cathedral at Tirgovist, adorned Mount Athos with his pious works. He transferred the direct allegiance of the Walachian Church to Constantinople. On Nagul's death, however, in 1521, the brief period of comparative prosperity which his architectural works attest was tragically interrupted, and it seemed for a time Turkish that Walachia was doomed to sink into a Turkish pashalic.

The oppressions. Turkish commander Mahmoud Bey became treacherously possessed of JMagul's young son and successor, and, sending him a prisoner to Stamboul, proceeded to nominate Turkish governors in the towns and villages of Walachia. The Walachians resisted desperately, elected Badul, a kinsman of Nagul, voivode, and succeeded with Hungarian help in defeating Mahmoud Bey at Grumatz in 1522. The conflict was prolonged with varying fortunes, but in 1524 the dogged opposition of the Walachians finally triumphed in the sultan's recognition of Badul.

But, though Walachia thus escaped conversion into a Turkish pashalic, the battle of Mohacs in 1526 decided the long pre-ponderance of Turkish control. The unfortunate province served as a transit route for Turkish expeditions against Hungary and Transylvania, and was exhausted by continual requisitions. Turkish settlers were gradually making good their footing on Walachian soil, and mosques were rising in the towns and villages. The voivode Alexander, who succeeded in 1591, and who like his predecessors had bought his post of the Divan, carried the oppres-sion still further by introducing against the capitulations a janizary guard, and fanning out his possessions to his Turkish supporters. Meanwhile the Turkish governors on the Bulgarian bank never ceased to ravage the country, and again it seemed as if Walachia must share the fate of the Balkan states and succumb to the direct government of the Ottoman. In the depth of the national distress the choice of the people fell on Michael, the son of Petrushko, ban of Krajova, the first dignitary of the realm, who had fled to Transylvania to escape Alexander's machinations. Supported at Constantinople by two at that time influential personages, Sigmund Bathori and the English ambassador, Edward Barton, and aided by a loan of 200,000 florins, Michael succeeded in procuring from the Divan the deposition of his enemy and his own nomination.





Michael the Brave. The genius of Michael "the Brave" (1593-1601) secured Walachia for a time a place in universal history. The moment for action was favourable. The emperor Rudolph II. had gained some successes over the Turks, and Sigmund Bathori, prince of Transylvania, had been driven by Turkish extortions to throw off the allegiance to the sultan. But the first obstacle to be dealt with was the presence of the enemy within the walls, and Michael had recourse to the same desperate expedient as the Montenegrins at a later date. By previous concert with the Moldavian voivode Aaron, on November 13, 1594, the Turkish guards and settlers in the two principalities were massacred at a given signal. Michael followed up these "Walachian Vespers" by an actual invasion of Turkish territory, and, aided by Sigmund Bathori, succeeded in carrying by assault Rustchuk, Silistria, and other places on the right bank of the lower Danube. A simultaneous invasion of Walachia by a large Turkish and Crim-Tatar host was successfully defeated ; the Tatar khan withdrew with the loss of his bravest followers, and, in the great victory of Mantin on the Danube (1595), the Turkish army was annihilated, and its leader Mustafa slain. The sultan now sent Sinan Pasha "the Renegade" to invade Walachia with 100,000 men. Michael withdrew to the mountains before this overwhelming force, but, being joined by Bathori with a Transylvanian contingent, the voivode resumed the offensive, stormed Bucharest, where Sinan had entrenched a Turkish detach-ment, and, pursuing the main body of his forces to the Danube, overtook the rearguard and cut it to pieces, capturing enormous booty. Sinan Pasha returned to Constantinople to die, it is said, of vexation, and in 1597 the sultan, weary of a disastrous contest, sent Michael a red flag in token of reconciliation, reinvested him for life in an office of which he had been unable to deprive him, and granted the succession to his son.

Conquest of Transylvania. In 1599, on the definitive abdication of Sigmund Bathori in Transylvania, Michael, in league with the imperialist forces under General Basta, and in connivance with the Saxon burghers, attacked and defeated his successor Andreas Bathori near Hermannstadt, and, seizing himself the reins of government, secured his proclama-tion as prince of Transylvania. The emperor consented to appoint him his " locum tenens per Transylvaniam," and the sultan ratified his election. As prince of Transylvania he summoned diets in 1599 and 1600, and, having expelled the voivode of Moldavia, united under his sceptre three principalities. The partiality that he showed for the Rouman and Szekler parts of the population alienated, however, the Transylvanian Saxons, who preferred the direct government of the emperor. The imperial commissioner General Basta lent his support to the disaffected party, and Michael was driven out of Transylvania by a successful revolt, while a Polish army under Zamoyski invaded Walachia from the Moldavian side. Michael's coolness and resource, however, never for a moment deserted him. He resolved to throw himself on the emperor, rode to Prague, won over Rudolph by his singular address, and, richly supplied with funds, reappeared in Transylvania as imperial governor. In conjunction with Basta he defeated the superior Transylvanian forces at Goroslo, expelling Sigmund Bathori, who had again aspired to the crown, and taking one hundred and fifty flags and forty-five cannon. But at the moment of his returning prosperity Basta, who had quarrelled with him about the supreme command of the imperial forces, procured his murder (August 19, 1601). Thus perished Michael the Brave in the forty-third year of his age, after performing in the course of his short reign achievements which, considering the small resources at his disposal, must place his name beside those of Hunyadi and Sobieski in the annals of eastern Europe. Not only did he succeed in rolling back for a time the tide of Turkish conquest, but for the first and last time in modern history he united what once had been Trajan's Dacia, in its widest extent, and with it the whole Rouman race north of the Danube, under a single sceptre.

Michael's wife Florika and his son Petrushko were carried off Turkish into Tatar captivity, and Serban, of the Bassaraba family, was domina-raised to the voivodeship of Walachia by imperialist influences, tion. On his deposition by the Porte in 1610, there followed a succession of princes who, though still for the most part of Rouman origin, bought their appointment at Stamboul. Walachian contingents were continually employed by the Turks in their Polish wars, and the settlement of Greeks in an official or mercantile capacity in the principality provoked grave discontent, which on one occasion took the form of a massacre. The reign of the voivode Matthias Matthias Bassaraba, who succeeded in 1633, was an interval of comparative Bassa-prosperity, and its length, twenty-one years, forms itself a panegyric, raba. He defended himself successfully against his powerful rival Vasilje Lupul, the voivode of Moldavia, and his Tatar and Cossack allies, and found a golden key to Turkish tolerance. He appears as a lawgiver, translating the Basilica of Jo. Comnenus, and founded many churches and monasteries. His last days were embittered, however, by an outbreak of military anarchy. On his death the Turkish yoke again weighed heavier on Walachia. The old capital Tirgovist was considered by the Divan to be too near the Transyl-vanian frontier, and the voivodes were accordingly compelled to transfer their residence to Bucharest. The mechanical skill of the Walachians was found useful by the Turks, who employed them as carpenters and pontonniers ; and during the siege of Vienna by Kara Mustafa in 1683 the Walachian contingent, which, under the voivode Serban Cantacuzene, had been forced to co-operate with Serban the Turks, was entrusted with the construction of the two bridges Canta-over the Danube above and below Vienna. The Walachian as cuzene. well as the Moldavian prince, who had been also forced to bring his contingent, maintained a secret intelligence with the besieged, an intelligence continued by the voivode Serban after his return to Walachia. The emperor granted him a diploma creating him count of the empire and recognizing his descent from the imperial house of Cantacuzene, Serban meanwhile collecting his forces for an open breach with the Porte. His prudence, however, per-petually postponed the occasion, and Walachia enjoyed peace to his death in 1688. This peaceful state of the country gave the voivode leisure to promote its internal culture, and in the year of his death he had the satisfaction of seeing the first part of a Walachian Bible issue from the first printing-press of the country, which he had established at Bucharest. He had also caused to be compiled a history of Walachia, and had called to the country many teachers of the Greek language, whose business it was to instruct the sons of the boiars in "grammar, rhetoric, and philosophy."

Immediately on Serban's death the boiars, to prevent the Porte Constan-from handing over the office to the Greek adventurer who bid the tine highest, proceeded to elect his sister's son Constantine Brancovan. Bran-The Turkish capidji pasha, then in Bucharest, was persuaded to put covan. the caftan on his head in token of Turkish approval, and the patriarch of Constantinople, who was also present, and the arch-bishop of Walachia, Theodosius, consecrated him together at the high altar of the cathedral, where he took the coronation oath to devote his whole strength to the good of his country and received the boiars' oath of submission. Brancovan, it is true, found it expedient to devote his predecessor's treasure to purchasing the confirmation of his title from the Divan, but the account of his coronation ceremony remains an interesting landmark in the constitutional history of the country. In his foreign relations with the Hapsburg power he displayed the same caution as the voivode Serban. In spite of the victories of the margrave of Baden at Pojarevatz, Nish, and Widin in 1689, it was only by an exercise of force that the imperial troops secured winter quarters in Walachia, and, though after the battle of Pultava in 1709 Brancovan con-cluded a secret treaty with Czar Peter, he avoided giving open effect to it. The tranquillity which he thus obtained was employed by Brancovan as by his predecessor in furthering the internal well-being of the country, with what success is best apparent from the description of Walachia left by the Florentine Del Chiaro, who Del visited the country in 1709 and spent seven years there. He Chiaro's describes the stoneless Walachian plain, with its rich pastures, its descrip-crops of maize and millet, and woods so symmetrically planted tion of and carefully kept by Brancovan's orders that hiding in them was Walachia. out of the question. Butter and honey were exported to supply the Grand Signor's kitchen at Stamboul; wax and cattle to Venice ; and the red and white wine of Walachia, notably that of Pitesti, to Transylvania. The Walachian horses were in demand amongst the Turks and Poles. Near Ribnik and elsewhere were salt-mines which supplied all the wants of the Transdanubian provinces; there were considerable copper mines at Maidan ; and iron was worked near Tirgovist. The Gipsy community was bound to bring fifteen pounds weight of gold from the washings of the Argish. The boiars were many of them wealthy, but the common people were so ground down with taxation that of their ancient Roman valoui; only the name remained." To avoid the extortion of their rulers numbers had emigrated to Transylvania and even to the Turkish provinces. The principal Walachian city was Bucharest (Bucurest), containing a population of about ¡50,000; but, except for two large " hans " or merchants' halls built by Brancovan and his predecessor, and the recently-erected palace, which had a marble staircase and a fine garden, the houses were of wood. The other principal towns were Tirgovist, the old capital, Cernetz, Fokshani, supplied by Brancovan with an aqueduct, Ploiesti, Ghierghitza, Rusi di Vede, and Krajova, the capital of the banat of that name, where a fine han had also been built. At Cimpulungu was a great annual fair. The dress of the men was thoroughly Turkish except for their lambskin caps, that of the women half-Greek half-Turkish. The houses were scrupulously clean and strewn with sweet herbs. Del Chiaro notices the great imitative capacity of the race, both artistic and mechanical. A Walachian in Venice had copied several of the pictures there with great skill; the copper-plates and wood engravings for the new press were executed by native hands. The Walachians imitated every kind of Turkish and European manufacture ; and, though the boiars imported finer glass from Venice and Bohemia, a glass manufactory had been established near Tirgovist which produced a better quality than the Polish. From the Bucharest press, besides a variety of ecclesiastical books, there were issued in the Rouman tongue a translation of a French work entitled " The Maxims of the Orientals" and "The Romance of Alexander the Great." In 1700 Brancovan had a map of the country made and a copper- plate engraving of it executed at Padua.

Fall of Brancovan. The prosperity of Walachia, however, under its "Golden Bey," as Brancovan was known at Stamboul, only increased the Turkish exactions. In 1701 the tribute was increased to 80,500 purses of 500 florins each. In 1703 the voivode was summoned in person to Adrianople, and again must resort to extraordinary means to mollify the Divan. Shortly after, the Walachians were called on to supply masons, carpenters, and other workmen for the fortification of Bender, and, though these and other demands were punctually met and the increased tribute regularly paid, the sultan finally resolved on the removal of his too prosperous vassal. Brancovan was accused of secret correspondence with the emperor, the czar, the king of Pohand, and the Venetian republic, of betraying the Porte's secrets, of preferring Tirgovist to Bucharest as a residence, of acquiring lands and palaces in Transylvania, of keeping agents at Venice and Vienna, in both of which cities he had invested large sums, and of striking gold coins with his effigy, one of which, with the legend CONSTANTINVS BASSAKABA DE BRANCOVAN D. G. VOEVODA ET PRINCEPS VALACHiiE TRANSALPINE, and having on the reverse the crowned shield of Walachia containing a raven holding a cross in its beak between a moon and a star, is engraved by Del Chiaro. They were of 2, 3, and 10 ducats weight. A capidji pasha arrived at Bucharest on April 4, 1714, and proclaimed Brancovan "mazil," i.e., deposed. He was conducted to Constantinople and beheaded, together with his four sons. A scion of the rival Cantacuzenian family was elected by the pasha's orders, and he, after exhausting the principality for the benefit of the Divan, was in turn deposed and executed in 1716.

The Fanariote regime. From this period onwards the Porte introduced a new system with
regard to its Walachian vassals. The line of national princes ceases, The office of voivode or hospodar was sold to the highest bidder at Stamboul, to be farmed out from a purely mercenary point of view.

The princes who now succeeded one another in rapid succession were mostly Greeks from the Fanar quarter of Constantinople who had served the palace in the quality of dragoman, or held some other court appointment. They were nominated by imperial firman without a shadow of free election, and were deposed and transferred from one principality to another, executed or reappointed, like so many pashas. Like pashas they rarely held their office more than three years, it being the natural policy of the Porte to multiply such lucrative nominations. The same hospodar was often reappointed again and again as he succeeded in raising the sum necessary to buy back his title. Constantine Mavrocordato was in this way hospodar of Walachia at six different times, and paid on one occasion as much as a million lion-dollars for the office. The princes thus imposed on the country were generally men of intelli-gence and culture. Nicholas Mavrocordato, the first of the series, was himself the author of a Greek work on duties, and main-tained at his court Demeter Prokopios of Moschopolis, who wrote a review of Greek literature during the 17th and beginning of the 18th centuries. Constantine Mavrocordato was the author of really liberal reforms. He introduced an "urbarium" for the peasants, limiting the days of "angaria," or forced labour for the landlord, to twenty-four, and in 1747 decreed the abolition of serfdom. But the new system could not but be productive of grinding oppression, and the swarms of "hungry Greeklings" who accompanied the Fanariote rulers from Stamboul made their rule doubly hateful. Numbers of the peasantry emigrated, and the population rapidly diminished. In 1745 the number of tax-paying families, which a few years before had amounted to 147,000, had sunk to 70,000. Yet the taxes were continually on the increase, and the hospodar Scarlatti Ghika (1758-61), though he tried to win some popularity by the removal of Turkish settlers and the abolition of the 1' vakarit," or tax on cattle and horses, which was peculiarly hateful to the peasantry, raised the total amount of taxation to 25,000,000 lion-dollars. The Turks meantime maintained their iron grip on the country by holding on the Walachian bank of the Danube the fortresses of Giurgevo, Turnul, and Orsova, with the surrounding districts.

But the tide of Ottoman dominion was ebbing fast. Already, by the peace of Passarovitz (Pojarevatz) in 1718, the banat of Krajova had been ceded to the emperor, though by the peace of Belgrade in 1739 it was recovered by the Porte for its Walachian vassal. In 1769 the Russian general Romanzoff occupied the principality, the bishops and clergy took an oath of fidelity to the empress Catherine, and a deputation of boiars followed. The liberties of the country were guaranteed, taxation reformed, and in 1772 the negotiations at Fokshani between Russia and the Porte broke down because the czarina's representatives insisted on the sultan's recognition of the independence of Walachia and Moldavia under an European guarantee. By the treaty of Kutshuk Kainardji, concluded in Treaty of 1774, Russia consented to hand back the principalities to the Kutshuk sultan, but by Art. xvi. several stipulations were made in favour Kain-of the Walachians and Moldavians. The people of the princi- ardji. palities were to enjoy all the privileges that they had possessed under Mahomet IV.; they were to be freed from tribute for two years, as some compensation for the ruinous effects of the last war ; they were to pay a moderate tribute ; the agents of Walachia and Moldavia at Constantinople were to enjoy the rights of nations, and the Russian minister at the Porte should on occasion watch over the interests of the principalities. The stipulations of the treaty of Kutshuk Kaimardji, though deficient in precision (the Walachians, for instance, had no authentic record of the privileges enjoyed under Mahomet IV.), formed the basis of the future liberties in both principalities ; and, as from this period onwards Walachian history is closely connected with that of Moldavia, it may be convenient before continuing this review to turn to the earlier history of the sister principality.

Moldavia.—The mention of Vlachs on the borders of Galicia in Early 1160 (Nic. Chon., p. 171) gives just ground for believing that a Mol-Rouman population existed in Moldavia at least as early as the first davian half of the 12th century. Under the successive domination, how- history, ever, of Petchenegs, Cumans, and Tatars, it occupied as yet a sub-ordinate position. It was not till 1352 that the Tatars, already weakened by Polish assaults on the Podolian side, were expelled from this Cumanian region by the Transylvanian voivode Andreas Laszkovich. It is in fact to the period immediately succeeding this event that the first establishment of an independent Rouman state in Moldavia is referred by the concurrent testimony of Moldavian, Russian, and Hungarian sources.

According to the native traditional account, as first given by the Moldavian chroniclers of the 17th and 18th centuries (Grigorie Urechie and Miron Costin), Dragosh the son of Bogdan, the founder of the new principality, emigrated with his followers towards the end of the 14th century from the Hungarian district of Marmaros in the North Carpathians. The story is related with various fabulous accompaniments. From the aurochs (zimbru), in pursuit of which Dragosh first arrived on the banks of the Molda, is derived the ox-head of the Moldavian national arms, and from his favourite hound who perished in the waters the name of the river. From the Hungarian and Russian sources, which are somewhat more precise, the date of the arrival of Dragosh, who otherwise appears as Bogdan, in Moldavia appears to have been 1359, and his de-parture from Marmaros was carried out in defiance of his Hungarian suzerain.





In the agreement arrived at between King Louis of Hungary and Rival the emperor Charles IV. in 1372, the voivodate of Moldavia was claims of recognized as a dependency of the crown of St Stephen. The over- Poland lordship over the country was, however, contested by the king of and Poland, and their rival claims were a continual source of dispute Hungary, between the two kingdoms. In 1412 a remarkable agreement was arrived at between Sigismund, in his quality of king of Hungary, and King Jagietio of Poland, by which both parties consented to postpone the question of suzerainship in Moldavia. Should, however, the Turks invade the country, the Polish and Hungarian forces were to unite in expelling them, the voivode was to be deposed, and the Moldavian territories divided between the allies. During the first half of the 15th century Polish influence was preponderant, and it was customary for the voivodes of Moldavia to do homage to the king of Poland at Kameniec or Snyatin.

Stephen the Great. In 1456 the voivode Peter, alarmed at the progress of the Turks, who were now dominant in Servia and Walachia, offered Sultan Mahomet a yearly tribute of 2000 ducats. On his deposition, however, in 1458 by Stephen, known as "the Great," Moldavia became a power formidable alike to Turk, Pole, and Hungarian. Through- out the long reign of this voivode, which lasted forty-six years, from 1458 to 1504, his courage and resources never failed him. In the early part of his reign he appears, in agreement with the Turkish sultan and the king of Poland, turning out the Hungarian vassal, the ferocious Vlad, from the Walaehian throne, and annexing the coast cities of Kilia and Cetatea Alba or Bielogorod, the Turkish Akierman. In the autumn of 1474 the sultan Mahomet entered Moldavia at the head of an army estimated by the Polish historian Dlugoss at 120,000 men. Voivode Stephen withdrew into the interior at the approach of this overwhelming host, but on January 17, 1475, turned at bay on the banks of Lake Rakovietz and gained a complete victory over the Turks. Four pashas were among the slain ; over a hundred banners fell into the Moldavian hands ; and only a few survivors succeeded in reaching the Danube. In 1476 Mahomet again entered Moldavia, thirsting for vengeance, but, though successful in the open field, the Turks were sorely harassed by Stephen's guerilla onslaughts, and, being thinned by pestilence, were again constrained to retire. In 1484 the same tactics proved successful against an invasion of Bajazet. Three years later a Polish invasion of Moldavia under John Albert with 80,000 men ended in disaster, and shortly afterwards the voivode Stephen, aided by a Turkish and Tatar contingent, laid waste the Polish territories to the upper waters of the Vistula, and succeeded in annexing for a time the Polish province of Pokutia that lay between the Car- pathians and the Dniester.

Moldavia circ. 1500. Exclusive of this temporary acquisition, the Moldavian territory at this period extended from the river Milcov, which formed the boundary of "Walachia, to the Dniester. It included the Carpathian region of the Bukovina, literally " the beech wood," where lay Sereth and Suciava, the earliest residences of the voivodes, the maritime district of Budzak (the later Bessarabia), with Kilia and Bielogorod, and the left bank of the lower Danube from Galatz to the Sulina mouth. The government, civil and ecclesiastical, was practically the same as that described in the case of Walachia, the officials bearing for the most part Slavonic titles derived from the practice of the Bulgaro-Vlachian czardom. The church was Orthodox Oriental, and depended from the patriarch of Ohrida. In official documents the language used was the old Slovene, the style of a Moldavian ruler being Natchalnik i Voievoda Moldovlasi, prince and duke (= Germ. "Fiirst" and "Herzog") of the Moldovlachs. The election of the voivodes, though in the hands of the boiars, was strictly regulated by hereditary principles, and Cantemir de- scribes the extinction of the house of Dragosh in the 16th century as one of the unsettling causes that most contributed to the ruin of the country. The Moldavian army was reckoned 40,000 strong, and the cavalry arm was especially formidable. Verantius of Sebenico, an eye-witness of the state of Moldavia at the beginning of the 16th century, mentions three towns of the interior provided with stone walls—Suciava, Chotim, and Njamtz; the people were barbarous, but more warlike than the Walachians and more tena- cious of their national costume, punishing with death any who adopted the Turkish.

Moldavia tributary to the Turks. In 1504 Stephen the Great died, and was succeeded by his son, Bogdan "the One-eyed." At feud with Poland about Pokutia, despairing of efficacious support from hard-pressed Hungary, the new voivode saw no hope of safety except in a dependent alliance with the advancing Ottoman Power, which already hemmed Moldavia in on the Walaehian and Crimean sides. In 1513 he agreed to pay an annual tribute to Sultan Selim in return for the sultan's guarantee to preserve the national constitution and religion of Moldavia, to which country the Turks now gave the name of Kara Bogdan, from their first vassal. The terms of Moldavian sub- mission were further regulated by a firman signed by Sultan Suleiman at Buda in 1529 by which the yearly present or "back- shish," as the tribute was euphoniously called, was fixed at 4000 ducats, 40 horses, and 25 falcons, and the voivode was bound at need to supply the Turkish army with a contingent of a thousand men. The Turks pursued much the same policy as in Walachia. The tribute was gradually increased. A hold was obtained on the country by the occupation of various strongholds on Moldavian soil with the surrounding territory,—in 1538 Cetatea Alba (Akierman), in 1592 Bender, in 1702 Chotim (Khotin). Already by the middle of the 16th century the yoke was so heavy that the voivode Elias (1546-1551) became Mohammedan to avoid the sultan's anger.

The impostor Jacob Basilicus. At this period occurs a curious interlude in Moldavian history. In 1561 the adventurer and impostor Jacob Basilicus succeeded with Hungarian help in turning out the voivode Alexander and seizing on the reins of government. A Greek by birth, adopted son of Jacob Heraklides, despot of Paros, Samos, and other Aegean islands, acquainted with Greek and Latin literature, and master of most European languages, appearing alternately as a student of astronomy at Wittenberg, whither he had been invited by Count Mansfeld, as a correspondent of Melanchthon and as a writer of historical works which he dedicated to Philip II. of Spain, Basilicus, finding that his Aegean sovereignty in partialis was of little practical value beyond the crowning of poet laureates, fixed his roving ambition on a more substantial dominion. He published an astounding pedigree, in which, starting from "Hercules Triptolemus" he wound his way through the royal Servian line to the kinship of Moldavian voivodes, and, having won the emperor Ferdinand and Albert Lasky to his financial and military support, succeeded, though at the head of only 1600 cavalry, in routing by a bold dash the vastly superior forces of the voivode, and even in purchasing the Turkish confirmation of his usurped title. He assumed the style of __________, and eluded the Turkish stipulation that he should dismiss his foreign guards. In Moldavia he appeared as a moral reformer, endeavouring to put down the prevalent vices of bigamy and divorce. He erected a school, placed it under a German master, and collected children from every part of the country to be maintained and educated at his expense. He also busied himself with the collection of a library. But his taxes —a ducat for each family—were considered heavy; his orthodoxy was suspected, his foreign counsellors detested. In 1563 the people rose, massacred the Hungarian guards, the foreign settlers, and finally Jacob himself.

The expelled voivode Alexander was now restored by the Porte, the schools were destroyed, and the country relapsed into its normal state of barbarism. His successor Ivonia was provoked by the Porte's demand for 120,000 ducats as tribute instead of 60,000 as heretofore to rise against the oppressor, but after gaining three victories he was finally defeated and slain (1574), and the country was left more than ever at the mercy of the Ottoman. Voivodes were now created and deposed in rapid succession by the Divan, but the victories of Michael the Brave in Walachia infused a more independent spirit into the Moldavians. The Moldavian dominion was now disputed by the Transylvanians and Poles, and in 1600 Michael succeeded in annexing it to his " Great Dacian " realm. On Michael's murder the Poles under Zamoyski again asserted their supremacy, but in 1618 the Porte once more recovered its dominion and set up successively two creatures of its own as voivodes—Gratiani, an Italian who had been court jeweller, and a Greek custom-house official, Alexander.

As in Walachia at a somewhat later date the Fanariote regime The seemed now thoroughly established in Moldavia, and it became the Fanariote rule that every three years the voivode should procure his confirma- regime, tion by a large backshish, and every year by a smaller one. The prince Vasilje Lupul, however, an Albanian, who succeeded in 1634, showed great abilities, and for twenty years succeeded in maintaining his position on the Moldavian throne. He introduced several internal reforms, codified the written and unwritten laws of the country, established a printing press, Greek monastic schools, and also a Latin school. He brought the Moldavian Church into more direct relation with the patriarch of Constantinople, but also showed considerable favour to the Latins, allowing them to erect churches at Suciava, Jassy, and Galatz.

During the wars between Sobieski and the Turks Moldavia found itself between hammer and anvil, and suffered frightfully moreover from Tatar devastations. The voivode Duka was forced like his Walaehian contemporary to supply a contingent for the siege of Vienna in 1683. After Sobieski's death in 1696, the hopes of Moldavia turned to the advancing Muscovite power. In 1711 the voivode Demetriu Cantemir, rendered desperate by the Turkish Demetriu exactions, concluded an agreement with the czar Peter by which Cantemir. Moldavia was to become a protected and vassal state of Russia, with the enjoyment of its traditional liberties, the voivodeship to be hereditary in the family of Cantemir. On the approach of the Russian army the prince issued a proclamation containing the terms of the Russian protectorate and calling on the boiars and people to aid their Orthodox deliverers. But the iron had entered into the people's soul. The long Turkish terrorism had done its work, and at the approach of a Turkish and Tatar host the greater part of the Moldavians deserted their voivode. The Russian campaign was unsuccessful, and all that Czar Peter could offer Cantemir and the boiars who had stood by him was an asylum on Russian soil.

Cantemir's description of Moldavia. In his Russian exile Cantemir composed in a fair Latin style his Descriptio Moldavia, the counterpart so far as Moldavia is concerned to Del Chiaro's contemporary description of Walachia. The capital of the country was now Jassy, to which city Stephen the Great had transferred his court from Suciava, the earlier residence of the voivodes. It had at this time forty churches—some of stone, some of wood. Fifty years before it had contained 12,000 houses, but Tatar devastations had reduced it to a third of its former size. The most important commercial emporium was the Danubian port of Galatz, which was frequented by vessels from the whole of the Levant from Trebizond to Barbary. The cargoes which they here took in consisted of Moldavian timber (oak, deal, and cornel), grain, butter, honey and wax, salt, and nitre ; Kilia at the north mouth of the Danube was also frequented by trading vessels, including Venetian and Ragusan. Moldavian wine was exported to Poland, Russia, Transylvania, and Hungary; that of Cotnar was in Cantemir's opinion superior to Tokay. The excellence of the Moldavian horses is attested by a Turkish proverb; and annual droves of as many as 40,000 Moldavian oxen were sent across Poland to Dantzic. Moldavia proper was divided into the upper country or T'erra de sus, and the lower country, or T'erra dejosu. Bessarabia had been detached from the rest of the principality and placed under the direct control of the seraskier. It was divided into four provinces :—that of Budzak, inhabited by the Nogai Tatars ; that of Akierman or Cetatea Alba, the Greek Monkastron, a strongly fortified place ; and those of Ismaila and Kilia. The voivodes Officers owed their nomination entirely to the Porte, and the great officers of state, of the realm were appointed at their discretion. These were the Great Logothete (Marele Logofetu) or chancellor ; the governor of Lower Moldavia—Vorniculu de terra de josu; the governor of Upper Moldavia—Vorniculu de t'erra de sus; the Hatman or commander in chief; the high chamberlain—Marele Postelnicu ; the great Spathar, or swordbearer; the great cupbearer—Marele Paliarnicu ; and the treasurer, or Vistiernicti, who together formed the prince's council and were known as Boiari de Svatu. Below these were a number of subordinate officers who acted as their assessors and were known as boiars of the Divan (Boiari de Divanu). The high court of justice was formed by the prince, metropolitan, and boiars: the Boiari de Svatu, decided on the verdict; the metropolitan declared the law; and the prince pronounced sentence. The boiars were able to try minor cases in their own residences, but subject to the right of appeal to the prince's tribunal. Of the character of the Moldavian people Cantemir does not give a very favourable account. Their best points were their hospitality and, in Lower Moldavia, their valour. They cared little for letters and were generally indolent, and their prejudice against mercantile pursuits left the commerce of the country in the hands of Armenians, Jews, Greeks, and Turks. The pure-blood Rouman population, noble and plebeian, inhabited the cities and towns or larger villages ; the peasantry were mostly of Little Russian and Hungarian race and were in a servile condition. There was a considerable Gipsy population, almost every boiar having several Zingar families in his possession ; these were mostly smiths. Continua- From this period onwards the character of the Ottoman domina-tion of tion in Moldavia is in every respect analogous to that of Walachia. Fanariote The office of voivode or hospodar was farmed out by the Porte to regime. a succession of wealthy Greeks from the Fanar quarter of Con-stantinople. All formality of election by the boiars was now dispensed with, and the princes received their caftan of office at Constantinople, where they were consecrated by the Greek patriarch. The system favoured Turkish extortion in two ways : the presence of the voivode's family connexions at Stamboul gave the Porte so many hostages for his obedience ; on the other hand the princes themselves could not rely on any support due to family influence in Moldavia itself. They were thus mere puppets of the Divan, and could be deposed and shifted with the same facility as so many pashas—an object of Turkish policy, as each change was a pretext for a new levy of " backshish." The chief families that shared the office during this period were those of Mavrocordato, Ghika, Callimachi, Ypsilanti, and Murusi. Although from the very conditions of their creation they regarded the country as a field for exploitations, they were themselves often men of education and ability, and unquestionably made some praiseworthy attempts to promote the general culture and wellbeing of their subjects. In this respect, even the Fanariote regime was preferable to mere pasha rule, while it had the further consequence of preserving intact the national form of administration and the historic offices of Moldavia. Gregory Ghika (1774-1777), who himself spoke French and Italian, founded a school or " gymnasium " at Jassy, where Greek, Latin, and theology were taught in a fashion. He encouraged the settlement of German protestant colonists in the country, some of whom set up as watchmakers in Jassy, where they were further allowed to build an evangelical church. Carra, a Swiss who had been tutor to Prince Ghika's children, and who published in 1781 an account of the actual state of the principalities, speaks of some of the boiars as possessing a taste for French literature and even for the works of Voltaire, a tendency actively combated by the patriarch of Constantinople.

The Russo-Turkish War, which ended in the peace of Kutshuk Kaimardji, was fatal to the integrity of Moldavian territory. The house of Austria, which had already annexed Galicia in 1772, pro-fited by the situation to arrange with both contending parties for Cession the peaceful cession of the Bukovina to the Hapsburg monarchy, of Buko- This richly-wooded Moldavian province, containing Suciava, the vina. earliest seat of the voivodes, and Cernautii or Czernovitz, was in 1774 occupied by Hapsburg troops with Russian connivance, and in 1777 Baron Thugut procured its formal cession from the sultan. The Bukovina is still an Austrian province.

Walachian and Moldavian History from the Treaty of Kutskuk Kaimardji in 1774 to the Establishment of the Roumanian Kingdom.

Russian protection. The treaty of Kutshuk Kaimardji was hardly concluded when it was violated by the Porte, which refused to recognize the right of the Walachian boiars to elect their voivode, and nominated Alexander Ypsilanti, a creature of its own. In 1777 Constantine Murusi was made voivode of Moldavia in the same high-handed fashion. The Divan seemed intent on restoring the old system of government in its entirety, but in 1783 the Russian representative extracted from the sultan a hattisherif defining more precisely the liberties of the principalities and fixing the amount of the annual tribute—for Walachia 619 purses exclusive of the bairam and other presents amounting to 130,000 piasters, and for Moldavia 135 purses and further gifts to the extent of 115,000 piasters. By the peace of Jassy in 1792 the Dniester was recognized as the Russian frontier, and the privileges of the principalities as specified in the hattisherif confirmed. In defiance of treaties, however, the Porte continued to change the hospodars almost yearly and to exact extraordinary installation presents. The revolt of Pasvan Oglu in Bulgaria was the cause of great injury to Walachia. The rebels ravaged Little Walachia in 1801-2, and their ravages were succeeded by those of the Turkish troops, who now swarmed over the country. Exaction followed exaction, and in 1802 Russia resolved to assert her treaty rights in favour of the oppressed inhabitants of the principalities. On the accession of Constantine Ypsilanti the Porte was constrained to issue a new hattisherif by which every prince was to hold his office for at least seven years, unless the Porte satisfied the Russian minister that there were good and sufficient grounds for his deposition. All irregular contributions were to cease, and all citizens, with the exception of the boiars and clergy, were to pay their share of the tribute. The Turkish troops then employed in the princi-palities were to be paid off, and one year's tribute remitted for the purpose. The boiars were to be responsible for the maintenance of schools, hospitals, and roads ; they and the prince together for the militia. The number of Turkish merchants resident in the country was limited. Finally, the hospodars were to be amenable to repre-sentations made to them by the Russian envoy at Constantinople, to whom was entrusted the task of watching over the Walachian and Moldavian liberties. This, it will be seen, was a veiled Russian protectorate.

In 1804 the Serbs under Karageorge rose against the Turkish dominion, and were secretly aided by the Walachian voivode Ypsilanti. The Porte, instigated by Napoleon's ambassador Sebastiani, resolved on Ypsilanti's deposition, but the hospodar succeeded in escaping to St Petersburg. In the war that now ensued between the Russians and the Turks, the former were for a time successful, and even demanded that the Russian territory should extend to the Danube. In 1808 the Russians, then in occupation of the principalities, formed a governing committee consisting of the metropolitan, another bishop, and four or five boiars under the presidency of General Kusnikoff. The seat of the president was at Jassy, and General Engelhart was appointed as vice-president at Bucharest. By the peace of Bucharest, however, in 1812, the principalities were restored to the sultan under the former condi-tions, with the exception of Bessarabia, which was ceded to the czar. The Pruth thus became the Russian boundary.

Hetaerist movement. The growing solidarity between the two Rouman principalities " received a striking illustration in 1816, when the Walachian and Moldavian hospodars published together a code applicable to both countries, and which had been elaborated by a joint commission. The Greek movement was now beginning, and in 1821 Alexander Ypsilanti entered Moldavia at the head of the Hetaerists, and prevailed on the hospodar Michael Sutzu to aid him in invading the Ottoman dominions. To secure Walachian help, Ypsilanti advanced on Bucharest, but the prince, Theodore Vladimirescu, who represented the national Rouman reaction against the Fanariotes, repulsed his overtures with the remark " that his business was not to march against the Turks, but to clear the country of Fanariotes." Vladimirescu was slain by a Greek revolutionary agent, but Ypsilanti's legion was totally routed by the Turks at Dragashani, and the result of his enterprise was a Turkish occupation of the principalities. In 1822 the Turkish troops, who had committed great excesses, were withdrawn on the combined representations of Russia, Austria, and Great Britain. The country, however, was again ravaged by the retiring troops, quarters of Jassy and Bucharest burnt, and the complete evacuation delayed till 1824, when the British Government again remonstrated with the Porte. By the convention of Akierman between the Russians and the Turks in 1826 the privileges of the principalities were once more confirmed, and they were again ratified in 1829, under Russian guarantee, by the peace of Adrianople. By this peace all the towns on the left bank Peace of of the Danube were restored to the principalities, and the Porte Adrian-undertook to refrain from fortifying any position on the Walachian ople, side of the river. The principalities were to enjoy commercial free- 1829. dom, and the right of establishing a quarantine cordon along the Danube or elsewhere. The internal constitution of the countries was to be regulated by an ' 'Organic Law," which was drawn up by assemblies of bishops and boiars at Jassy and Bucharest, acting, however, under Russian control. The Organic Law thus elaborated was by no means of a liberal character, and amongst other abuses maintained the feudal privileges of the boiars. It was ratified by the Porte in 1834, and the Russian army of occupation thereupon withdrew.

Movement of 1848. The revolutionary movement of 1848 extended from the Roumans of Hungary and Transylvania to their kinsmen of the Transalpine regions. In Moldavia the agitation was mostly confined to the boiars, and the hospodar Michael Sturdza succeeded in arresting the ringleaders. In Walachia, however, the outbreak took a more violent form. The people assembled at Bucharest, and demanded a constitution. The prince Bibescu, after setting his signature to the constitution submitted to him, fled to Transylvania, and a provisional government was formed. The Turks, however, urged thereto by Russian diplomacy, crossed the Danube, and a joint Rnsso-Turkish dictatorship restored the "Organic Law." By the Balta-Liman convention of 1849 the two Governments agreed to the appointment of Barbü Stirbeiü as prince of Walachia, and Gregoriu Ghika for Moldavia.

On the entry of the Russian troops into the principalities in 1853, the hospodars fled to Vienna, leaving the government in the hands of their ministers. During the Danubian campaign that now ensued great suffering was inflicted on the inhabitants, but in 1854 the cabinet of Vienna induced the Russians to withdraw. Austrian troops occupied the principalities, and the hospodars returned to their posts.

Union of the two principalities proclaimed. Attempt to disunite them. It fails. Prince Cuza.

By the treaty of Paris in 1856 the principalities with their existing privileges were placed under the collective guarantee of the contracting powers, while remaining under the suzerainty of the Porte,—the Porte on its part engaging to respect the complete in-dependence of their internal administration. A strip of southern Bessarabia was restored to Moldavia, so as to push back the Russian frontier from the Danube mouth. The existing laws and statutes of both principalities were to be revised by a European commission sitting at Bucharest, and their work was to be assisted by a Divan or national council which the Porte was to convoke ad hoc in each of the two provinces, and in which all classes of Walachian and Moldavian society were to be represented. The European commission, in arriving at its conclusions, was to take into consideration the opinion expressed by the representative councils ; the Powers were to come to terms with the Porte as to the recommendations of the commission ; and the final result was to be embodied in a hattisherif of the sultan, which was to lay down the definitive organization of the two principalities. In 1857 the commission arrived, and the representative councils of the two peoples were convoked. On their meeting in September they at once proceeded to vote with unanimity the union of the two principalities into a single state under the name of Romania (Roumania), to be governed by a foreign prince elected from one of the reigning dynasties of Europe, and having a single representative assembly. The Powers decided to undo the work of national union. By the convention concluded by the European congress at Paris in 1858, it was decided that the principalities should continue as heretofore to be governed each by its own prince. Walachia and Moldavia were to have separate assemblies, but a central commission was to be established at Rokshani for the preparation of laws of common interest, which were afterwards to be submitted to the respective assemblies. In accordance with this convention the deputies of Moldavia and Walachia met in separate assemblies at Bucharest and Jassy, but the choice of both fell unanimously on Prince Alexander John Guza, thus ensuring the personal union of the two principali-ties (January 1859). A new conference was now summoned to Paris to discuss the affairs of the principalities, and the election of Prince Cuza finally ratified by the Powers and the Porte. The two assemblies and the central commission were preserved till 1862, when a single assembly met at Bucharest and a single ministry was formed for the two countries. The central commission was at the same time abolished, and a council of state charged with preparing bills substituted for it. In May 1864, owing to difficulties between the Government and the general assembly, the latter was dissolved, and a statute was submitted to universal suffrage giving greater authority to the prince, and creating two chambers (of senators and of deputies). The franchise was now extended to all citizens, a cumulative voting power being reserved, however, for property, and the peasantry were emancipated from forced labour.

In 1865 a conflict broke out between the Government and the people in Bucharest, and in February 1866 Prince Cuza, whose personal vices had rendered him detestable, was forced to abdicate.

Prince Charles of Hohenzollern. The chambers chose first as his successor the count of Flanders, but on his declining the office proceeded to elect Charles of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen, who was proclaimed hospodar or Domnu of Roumania April 29, 1866.

New constitution. A new constitution was at the same time introduced. Its provisions secure the universal suffrage of tax-paying citizens, ministerial responsibility, trial by jury, freedom of meeting and petition, of speech and of the press (except as regards breaches of the criminal code), gratuitous and compulsory primary education, and the right of asylum for political exiles. Legislative power is shared between the prince and chambers, but bills relating to the budget and army must originate with the chamber of deputies. There are two chambers— the senate and the chamber of deputies. Both houses are elective, and the election is carried out by means of electoral colleges classified according to property and professional qualifications. For the house of deputies each constituency is divided in this way into four colleges, each of which elects a member. The two highest of these colleges also elect the senators, each senator being elected for a term of eight years. The senate also includes ex officio certain high officials and ecclesiastics, and members for the universities. The senate consists at present of 120 members, the chamber of deputies of 178. The sovereign has a right of veto reserved to him on all measures. The judicial system is based on the Code Napollon, with some modifications.

Roumania in Russo-Turkish War. On the outbreak of the Russo-Turkish war in 1877 Roumania found herself once more between hammer and anvil. Yielding to force majeure the Government of Prince Charles consented to the passage of Russian troops across Roumanian territory, on the understanding that the scene of hostilities was as far as possible to be removed outside the limits of the principality. The Porte, however, refusing to recognize that Roumania had acted under constraint, proclaimed the Roumanians rebels, and the prince's Government accordingly resolved to offer active assistance to the Russians.


Roumanian feats at Plevna. A Roumanian division of 32,000 men under General Cernat, took part in the siege of Plevna, and the Roumanian soldiers distinguished themselves in the opinion of the most competent judges alike for their heroism and endurance. The successful assault by the Roumanian troops on the "indomitable redoubt " of Grivitza formed in fact the turning point of the siege and of the war. In the peace of St Stefano, however, Russia insisted on the retrocession of the strip of Bessarabia that had been restored to Moldavia by the treaty of Paris, giving Roumania "in exchange" the islands of the Danubian delta, and the Dobrudja, whrich had been ceded by the sultan. This territorial readjustment was ratified by the treaty Berlin of Berlin (1878). The high contracting powers at the same time treaty, consented by Art. xliii. to recognize the independence of the principality subject to the provision (Art. xliv.) that all the inhabitants should enjoy complete religious freedom, a clause inserted on account of the Jewish persecutions that had previously taken place, and that foreigners in the country should be treated on a footing of perfect equality. All Danubian fortresses were to be razed, and the jurisdiction of the European commission to regulate the Danubian navigation, on which Roumania now acquired the right of representation, was extended from the mouth to the Iron Gates.

Prince Charles king. The coping-stone to Roumanian independence was set by the proclamation on March 26, 1881, of Prince Charles as king of Roumania, and on May 22 of the same year his coronation took place with the crowned European sanction. The crown placed on King Carol's head was made from the captured cannon of the Plevna redoubts.

Authorities.—As the questions regarding the first appearance of the Roumans north of the Danube are reserved for the article VLACHS, it may be sufficient here to refer the reader to the works of Roesler, especially Romanische Studien; J. Jung, Anfänge der Romanen, and Roemer und Romanen ; Lad.^Pitf, Abstammung der Rumänen ; A. D. Xenopol, Les Roumains au Moyen Age. For the history of the principalities down to the end of the last century J. C. Enge-'s works, Die Geschichte der Walachei and Geschichte der Moldau, are still the most trustworthy authorities. J. A. Vaillant, La Romainie: Histoire, Langue, &c, and A. T. Laurianu, Lstoria Romaniloru, &c, may be consulted for the later history, but a really critical history of the principalities has yet to be written. The materials for it are, however, being rapidly amassed—thanks to the publications of the Roumanian Academy and the documents collected by native scholars; ef. especially Hurmuzaki, Documente privitore la lstoria Romanitor, and Hasdeu, Publicationi istorico-filologice, <fec. For a useful account of the present state of Roumania, see James Samuelson, Roumania Past and Present, 1882. For views of Walachia and Moldavia, as they existed from the 15th century onwards, reference has already been made to the works of Verantius and Del Chiaro, and Cantemir's Descriptio Moldavae. (A. J. E.)



The above article was written by two authors:

(a) Introduction. Geography.
George G. Chisolm, M.A., B.Sc.

(b) Produce. Population. Education. Army. History.
Arthur J. Evans, author of Through Bosnia on Foot.