THE TERMINOLOGY REFLECTING THE ETHNIC IDENTITY ...rrh.ro/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/05rrh_2019_Spinei.pdf2020/10/05 · române în istoriografia medievală și renascentistă, in

Rev Roum drsquoHist LVIII p 53ndash178 Bucarest 2019

THE TERMINOLOGY REFLECTING THE ETHNIC IDENTITY

OF THE ROMANIAN VOIVODESHIPS

IN THE MIDDLE AGES AND RENAISSANCE

VICTOR SPINEI

Abstract

Before the formation of the Romanian medieval states foreign sources called all

the autochthonous inhabitants north of the Lower Danube by the term Wallachians or

by related names As it had been founded earlier the state entity bordered by the

Southern Carpathians and the Danube should have normally kept the name Valachia

Țara Romacircnească only for itself Due to the fact that the term Valachia had already

been extensively used left of the Danube the Wallachian voivodeship was designated

either by an alternative form or by adding a determinative to it Ungrovlachia

Transalpinum Transalpina Vlachia Transalpina Basarat Bessarabia

For the purposes of avoiding confusions and marking its individuality the

Romanian territory east of the Oriental Carpathians known before the fourteenth

century under the name Valachia or one of its derivatives was called Moldavia As in

Wallachia an important part in imposing the ethnic and geopolitical terminology in the

Romanian-speaking territories on the eastern slopes of the Carpathians was played by

the Patriarchate in the capital of the Byzantine Empire The chancery of the Patriarchate

of Constantinople was directly involved in the organization process of the superior

church hierarchies in Moldavia and imposed the designations Black Wallachia

(Μαυροβλαχία) Russian Wallachia (Ρωσοβλαχία) and Moldavian Wallachia

(Μολδοβλαχία)

The ethnic identity of the two Romanian voivodeships was mentioned in many

categories of internal and external sources In this regard we would like to point to the

syntagmas double the other another Wallachia both the two Wallachias etc

which were attested in a significant number of instances in medieval and Renaissance

narrative and diplomatic sources The respective syntagmas reflect the terminological

duality of the Romanian voivodeships and the ethnic identity of their majority

population

The awareness about the similarity of the ethnic character of the majority population

in the two Romanian voivodeships is equally reflected in the choronyms designating them in

Europe Towards the end of the Middle Ages and at the beginning of the modern era a

Victor Spinei PhD vice-president of the Romanian Academy emeritus professor at the

Alexandru Ioan Cuza University and researcher at the Iași Institute of Archaeology Romania e-mail

vspinuaicro Among other works he authored The Great Migrations in the East and South East

of Europe from the the Ninth to the Thirteenth Century I-II (Amsterdam 2006) and The Romanians

and the Turkic Nomads North of the Danube Delta from the Tenth to the Mid-Thirteenth Century

(Leiden-Boston 2009)

Victor Spinei 2

54

limited circulation was enjoyed by other regional terminological varieties of Wallachia as

well Among them were the names Great Wallachia Little Wallachia Valachia Superior

Upper Wallachia and Valachia Inferior Lower Wallachia

Based on their own experience and or according to bibliographic information

many European scholars politicians prelates and merchants knew that Wallachia and

Moldavia were distinct state entities without territorial and political identity However

it was clear to them that the populations of the two voivodeships were ethnically

identical beyond any doubt The better informed authors especially those who had

settled in the regions inhabited by the Romanians or in their immediate proximity for a

while in their quality as diplomats missionaries members of the military traders etc

after having lived in direct contact to local realities they also noticed the inhabitantsrsquo

cultural and confessional similarities Those with a larger intellectual perspective

acquired by reading scientific treatises or as a result of their connections to renowned

scholars of the time also referred to the ancestry of all Romanians reflected in the idea

of their common descent from Roman colonists

Keywords Wallachia Wallachians Romanians Ungrovlachia Transalpina Vlachia Transalpina Bessarabia Moldavia Moldovlachia double the other another

Wallachia Great Little Upper Lower Wallachia Parathalasia Romanian identity

The configuration of identity intuition in human collectivities represents a

major issue for the historical development of peoples all over the world

because the feeling of belonging to a certain entity with clearly defined features

confers them individuality The awareness about their own specificity the

individual and especially the collective one can lead to the coagulation of the

internal structure of ethnic groups These two specificities are capable of

stimulating the peoplesrsquo adaptation efforts to the environment and to prepare

them for facing antagonistic phenomena arising from the inevitable contacts

with the diverse demographic ensemble in their proximity which generate

mutual prejudice Particularism consists in a varied range of characteristics

acquired during a long evolution cycle and that do not remain unchanged along

the inevitable passing of time but develop as a result of qualitative and

quantitative accumulations of internal factors and influences permeating from

other meridians

It is not at all surprising that especially during the last decades the general

and particular multifaceted aspects in connection with identity constructions have

triggered a special interest in international historiography resulting in theoretical

accomplishments of the most consistent kind which open new epistemological

horizons1 However so far Romanian historiography has manifested a certain

1 W Pohl Telling the difference Signs of ethnic identity in Strategies of Distinction The

Construction of Ethnic Communities 300ndash800 ed by W Pohl H Reimitz Leiden-Boston-Cologne

1998 pp 17ndash69 Idem Archaeology of identity introduction in Archaeology of Identity Archaumlologie

3 The Terminology Reflecting the Ethnic Identity

55

inertia regarding debates on global theoretical issues concerning ethnic and cultural

identity in Antiquity and the Middle Ages The reticence in discussing the general

aspects referring to identity phenomena in the old periods is due not only to the

missing affinity for theoretical elaborations it is also a consequence of the fact that

the narrative information relating to the Danube-Carpathian regions is scarce and

often inconclusive Thus the reconstitutions of historical phenomena face inherent

difficulties and uncertainties that can discourage extensive erudite endeavors and

conclusive interpretations

Under the circumstances in which the uncertainties hindering the clarification

of the unfolding of some events and phenomena persist the efforts for deciphering

at least ab initio the significant factual elements by observing the precepts of

traditional positivist historiography may be natural It is obvious that as soon as

these necessities will have been surpassed a vast interpretative field will open

It will become a vector for helping the resolution of global theoretical issues

As for the process corresponding to the conceptualization of the genetic and ethnic

identity of the Romanians national historiography has paid special attention

to the aspects related to the consciousness of Romanization a field to

which numerous relevant works have been dedicated in the last century2

der Identitaumlt ed by W Pohl M Mehofer Vienna 2010 pp 9ndash23 Idem Von der Ethnogenese zur

Identitaumltsforschung in Neue Wege der Fruumlhmittelalterforschung Bilanz und Perspektiven

ed by W Pohl M Diesenberger B Zeller Vienna 2018 pp 9ndash34 On Barbarian Identity Critical

Approaches to Ethnicity in the Early Middle Ages ed by A Gillett Turnhout 2002 M Metzeltin

Th Wallmann Wege zur Europaumlischen Identitaumlt Individuelle nationalstaatliche und supranationale

Identitaumltskonstrukte Berlin 2010 H Wolfram Sprache und Identitaumlt im Fruumlhmittelalter mit

Grenzuumlberschreitungen in Sprache und Identitaumlt im fruumlhen Mittelalter ed by W Pohl B Zeller

Vienna 2012 pp 39ndash59 P J Geary Political identity ethnic identity genetic identity The danger of

conceptual confession in Neue Wege der Fruumlhmittelalterforschunghellip pp 35ndash41 2 A Marcu Riflessi di storia rumena in opere italiane dei secoli XIV e XV in Ephemeris

Dacoromana I 1923 pp 338ndash386 C Isopescu Notizie intorno ai Romeni nella letteratura

geografica italiana del Cinquecento in Acadeacutemie Roumaine Bulletin de la Section historique XVI

1929 pp 1ndash91 M Găzdaru and D Găzdaru Călători și geografi italieni icircn secolul XVII Referințele

lor despre Țările Romacircnești in Arhiva Iași XLVI 1939 3ndash4 pp 177ndash208 XLVII 1940 1ndash2

pp 77ndash92 Ș Papacostea Les Roumains et la conscience de leur romaniteacute au Moyen Age in Revue

Roumaine drsquoHistoire IV 1965 1 pp 15ndash24 I C Chițimia Ideea latinității poporului și a limbii

romacircne icircn istoriografia medievală și renascentistă in Idem Probleme de bază ale literaturii romacircne

vechi Bucharest 1972 pp 159ndash196 B Daicoviciu Mărturii apusene despre latinitatea și

continuitatea romacircnilor (sec XVndashXVIII) in Acta Musei Napocensis V 1968 pp 203ndash214

A Armbruster Romanitatea romacircnilor Istoria unei idei Bucharest 1972 Idem La romaniteacute des

Roumains Histoire drsquoune ideacutee Bucharest 1977 V Arvinte Termenii romacircn și vlah icircn afirmarea

comunității lingvistice romacircnești in Limbă și literatură IV 1979 pp 323ndash335 A Niculescu Les

bdquodeacutecouvertesrdquo de la Dacia Romana des Roumains in Quaderni di filologia romanza della Facoltagrave di

Lettere e Filosofia dellrsquoUniversitagrave di Bologna 7 1990 pp 91ndash115 I-A Pop Mărturii externe și

interne despre latinitatea limbii romacircne din secolele al XV-lea și al XVI-lea in Eugen Simion 80

ed by L Chișu Gh Chivu A Grigor Bucharest 2013 pp 447ndash454 Idem Istoria și semnificația

numelor de romacircn valah și Romacircnia Valahia (Academia Romacircnă Discursuri de recepție)

Victor Spinei 4

56

This epistemological direction has also been followed in erudite studies elaborated

by foreign researchers3

In the Danube-Carpathian area the extension of the great migrations era into

the second millennium brought important prejudice to the normal evolution of the

local society so that successive dysfunctions were recorded not only in the

demographic economic and cultural areas but also in the political one The

devastating attacks of the foreign tribes in the regions north of the Lower Danube

inherently led to the extermination of some Daco-Roman and Proto-Romanian

communities or to their refuge to territories where the high landform configuration

covered by dense forest vegetation offered certain protection against the migratory

waves but provided more precarious living conditions The destructions caused by

the predatory raids of the populations penetrating from Eastern and North-Eastern

Europe and the dislocations of local collectivities resulted in perturbations of the

way of life and economy disturbing technical and intellectual creativity as well as

obstructing commercial exchange and the circulation of cultural values These

phenomena led to isolation stagnation and implicitly to a delay in the

development of an urban network and state structures

According to certain theories with an obsolete taste promoted in some

scholarly circles for more than a century the obviously delayed dynamics in the

progress of Romanian society by the dawn of the Middle Ages could be explained

by its belonging to the multivalent confessional and cultural complex of Orthodoxy

and Slavonism However the promoters of the respective opinion do not take into

account the achievements in the political field and the cultural accomplishments of

the Byzantine Empire and the Slavic states in South-Eastern and Eastern Europe in

the second half of the first millennium and the first centuries of the second

millennium These state entities were placed on an involutional curb and they lost

their initial robustness not due to their correlation with Orthodoxy and the ethnic

Bucharest 2013 pp 5ndash26 Idem Rolul romanității romacircnilor icircn conștiința medievală in Clio

icircn oglindiri de sine Academicianului Alexandru Zub omagiu ed by Gh Cliveti Iași 2014

pp 307ndash320 Idem Mărturii medievale privind numele romacircnilor și al graiului lor icircn limba romacircnă

in Anuarul Institutului de Istorie bdquoGeorge Barițiurdquo din Cluj-Napoca LVII Series historica 2018

pp 347ndash363 Gh Ghimpu Conștiința națională a romacircnilor moldoveni Chișinău 2002 3 W Bahner Zur Romanitaumlt des Rumaumlnischen in der Geschichte der romanischen Philologie

vom 15 bis zur Mitte des 18 Jahrhunderts in Romanistisches Jahrbuch VIII 1957 pp 75ndash94

G Bonfante Studii romeni Rome 1973 pp 307ndash344 C Alzati La coscienza etnico-religiosa

romena in etagrave umanistica tra echi di romanitagrave e modelli ecclesiastici bizantino-slavi in

Byzantinische Forschungen XVII 1991 pp 85ndash104 J Kramer Sprachwissenschaft und Politik Die

Theorie der Kontinuitaumlt des Rumaumlnischen und der balkanische Ethno-Nationalismus im 20 Jh

in Balkan-Archiv NF 2425 19992000 pp 105ndash163 L Renzi Ancora sugli umanisti italiani e la

lingua rumena in Romanische Forschungen 112 2000 1 pp 1ndash38 S Laitsos Die Konstruktion der

Vlachen von 1640 bis 1720 in Vergangenheit und Vergegenwaumlrtigung Fruumlhes Mittelalter und

europaumlische Erinnerungskultur ed by H Reimitz B Zeller Vienna 2009 pp 205ndash227

M Metzeltin Das Rumaumlnische im romanischen Kontrast Eine sprachtypologische Betrachrung

Berlin 2016 pp 37ndash48


57

Slavic conglomerate but as a consequence of traumas generated by the war

conflicts with peoples of European or Asian origin as well as by the offensive of

the Mongols and the Ottomans which resulted in territorial loss political

enslaving and a decrease in the demographic and economic potentials

Mutatis mutandis the postponed achievements of the Romanians in the cultural

and political fields were not connected with the adoption of Orthodox cult norms and

the use of Old Slavic in the religious service chancery and in church and lay written

works This delay was the consequence of the disturbances caused by the endemic

confrontations with the strong populations and states in their vicinity At the moment in

which the Romanians began to grow politically in Europe the reverberation centers of

Orthodoxy and the Slavophone state entities in the Balkan Peninsula and Eastern

Europe were experiencing a rhythmic retrogression in their vitality and prestige On the

contrary in the neighboring territories appeared populations with different ethnic

origins (Mongols Hungarians and Lithuanians) and various confessional options

these peoples had adopted Shamanism or Christianity of Roman-Catholic rite which

fueled local dissensions

The evolution path of human collectivities in the Danube-Carpathian regions

was not entirely homogeneous because neither the resources of the natural

environment were everywhere the same nor did external factors manifest their

influence in time and space in a balanced manner Due to the fact that the

intra-Carpathian areas were part of the Hungarian Kingdom and the plain regions

north of the Black Sea and the Danube entered the hegemony of nomad steppe

tribes the Romanian population faced great impediments in accomplishing its

political aspirations Partially protected by the mountainous crown of the

Carpathians and organized according to the administrative regulations of the West

Transylvania reached a certain internal stability and a prosperity standard that were

superior to those outside the Carpathian arch influenced by the colonization of the

Saxons as well Dispossessed of their properties and with diminished civil rights

the Romanian communities profited less from these advantages than the

nationalities living on the same territory

Starting with the last decades of the first millennium of the Christian era a

significant part of the regions east and south of the Carpathians and the northern

half of Dobrogea began to be dominated by tribes of Turkish origin namely by

Pechenegs Uzes and Cumans who effectively occupied Budjak and Bărăgan

From there they migrated seasonally towards the nordic regions a fact that created

a climate of insecurity for the agricultural and stockbreeding communities in their

proximity After the Great Mongol Invasion of 1241ndash1242 the territories

previously possessed by the Turkish peoples were subjected to the domination of

the Golden Horde whose ruling precepts resulting from the canons of the

so-called Pax Mongolica offered partial protection to the communities submitted

to the hegemony of the khans In the new institutional framework and under the

circumstances of the progressive decrease in the authority of the Mongols

Victor Spinei 6

58

opportunities for structuring Romanian society and establishing its own state

entities appeared In this regard the continuous contact with the co-nationals

settled inside the Carpathian arch proved beneficial On the one hand the

demographic flux coming from Transylvania strengthened and revigorated

Romanian communities south and east of the Carpathians and on the other hand

contributed to the linguistic homogeneity north of the Lower Danube where the

Daco-Romanian idiom remained unitary4

In this paper we would like to focus upon the sequential aspects in connection

with the identity status of the Romanians in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance

corresponding to the period between the fourteenth and seventeenth centuries which

have been less discussed in scholarly literature We think that it would be interesting to

put together the information referring to the terms used by Romanians for designating

the regions they inhabited We will also discuss the testimonies on the terminological

duality reflecting the ethnic identity of the majority population in the two voivodeships

located south and east of the Carpathians respectively

THE EVOLUTION OF THE TERMS DESIGNATING

THE EXTRA-CARPATHIAN ROMANIAN REGIONS

Following a long development process of a similar kind as the other

neo-Latin peoples the Romanians became a distinct people in the last part of

the first millennium On the verge between the two millennia of the Christian

era and in the first quarter of the second millennium appeared the first

documentary attestations of the Romanians in sources of diverse origin under

the name vlachi volochi or various close forms5 This ethnonym is regarded as

4 A D Xenopol Istoria romacircnilor din Dacia Traiană I Dacia anteromană Dacia romană și

năvălirile barbare 513 icircnainte de Hr-1290 4th ed by V Mihailescu-Bicircrliba Bucharest 1985 N

Iorga Histoire des Roumains et de la romaniteacute orientale II Les maicirctres de la terre (jusqursquoagrave lrsquoan

mille) Bucharest 1937 III Les fondateurs drsquoEacutetat Bucharest 1937 P P Panaitescu Introducere la

istoria culturii romacircnești Bucharest 1969 C C Giurescu D C Giurescu Istoria romacircnilor 1 Din

cele mai vechi timpuri pacircnă la icircntemeierea statelor romacircnești Bucharest 1975 A Armbruster Der

Donau-Karpatenraum in den mittel- und westeuropaumlischen Quellen des 10-16 Jahrhunderts Eine

historiographische Imagologie Cologne-Vienna 1990 Istoria Romacircniei Compendiu coord by

I-A Pop I Bolovan Cluj-Napoca 2004 F Curta Southeastern Europe in the Middle Ages

500ndash1250 Cambridge 2006 Idem Eastern Europe in the Middle Ages (500ndash1300) I

Leiden-Boston 2019 V Spinei The Romanians and the Turkic Nomads North of the Danube Delta

from the Tenth to the Mid-Thirteenth Century Leiden-Boston 2009 Istoria romacircnilor III Genezele

romacircnești 2nd ed coord by R Theodorescu V Spinei Bucharest 2010 Geschichte Suumldosteuropas

Vom fruumlhen Mittelalter bis zur Gegenwart ed by K Clewing O J Schmitt Regensburg 2011 5 A Sacerdoțeanu Consideacuterations sur lrsquohistoire des Roumains au Moyen-Acircge (reprinted from

Meacutelanges de lrsquoEacutecole Roumaine en France VII 1928) Paris 1929 Idem Considerații asupra istoriei

romacircnilor icircn evul mediu Bucharest 1936 T Hagi-Gogu Romanus și valachus sau ce este romanus


59

a derivative of the name of the Celtic tribes Volcae Arecomici and Volcae

Tectosages6 it was used for designating a Romanic population in the German-

speaking and Slavic-speaking linguistic environments and was adopted by

numerous other peoples The respective ethnonym was equally applied to the

Romanians left and right of the Danube For avoiding confusions the forms

vlach and Valachia (Wallachian and Wallachia respectively) received

determinative terms

Due to the fact that the oldest administrative Romanian-speaking entities

coagulated in the Balkan Peninsula on territories of the Byzantine Empire or

on those detached from it the first needs for terminological distinction

appeared in those regions Thus beginning with the thirteenth century from

Balkan Wallachia (Βλαχία) the following more or less official forms resulted

Great Wallachia (Μεγάλη Βλαχία Μεγάλοβλαχία) Little Wallachia (Μικρὰ

Βλαχία) White Wallachia Upper Wallachia and Lower Wallachia which lay

in Thessaly Epirus and in the neighboring regions7 In the fifteenth century

the name Great Wallachia began to be assigned to Wallachia (Muntenia)

sometimes also to Moldavia but without any rigorous consistency The lack of

a stable rule concerning its use was a consequence of the fact that this name

was neither included in the official diplomatic language of the Romanian

voivode chanceries nor in that of the neighboring states that preferred a

different terminology

When evoking the 1241 campaign of the Mongols north of the Danube

Rashid od-Din (1247ndash1318) distinguished between the Wallachians (Ulagh) and

the Black Wallachians (Qara-Ulagh) The great Persian chronicler at the court of

roman romacircn aromacircn valah și vlah Bucharest 1939 A Ciorănescu La tradition historique et

lrsquoorigine des Roumains Bucharest 1942 N Saramandu La romaniteacute orientale Bucharest 2008

pp 21ndash45 J Kramer Romanen Rumaumlnen und Vlachen aus philologischer Sicht in Walchen Romani

und Latini Varitionen einer nachroumlmischen Gruppenbezeichnung zwischen Britannien und dem

Balkan ed by W Pohl I Hartl and W Haubrichs Vienna 2017 pp 197ndash203 Istoria limbii

romacircne I coord by M Sala L Ionescu-Ruxăndoiu Bucharest 2018 pp 273ndash286 (N Saramandu) 6 According to the testimonies of Julius Caesar the Volcae were divided in two categories

Volcae Arecomici and Volcae Tectosages Cf C Iulii Caesaris Commentarii de bello Gallico

ed by J Sofer 11th edition Vienna 1967 pp 83 89 115 C Iulius Caesar Der gallische Krieg

Lateinisch-deutsch ed by O Schoumlnberger 3rd ed Duumlsseldorf-Zurich 2003 pp 288ndash289 320ndash321

388ndash389 7 G Murnu Studii istorice privitoare la trecutul romacircnilor de peste Dunăre ed by

N-Ș Tanașoca Bucharest 1984 passim C Brătescu Vlahia Albă Vlahia lui Asan Romacircnii din

Bulgaria de est a evului mediu (sec XII și XIII) (reprinted from Geopolitica și istoria) Bucharest

1942 G Soulis Βλαχία Μεγάλη Βλαχία ἡ ἑν Ἑλλαδι Βλαχία in Γέρας Ἀ Κεραμοπούλλον Athens

1953 pp 489ndash497 C Poghirc Romanisation linguistique et culturelle dans les Balkans Survivances

et evolution in Les Aroumains (Cahier Centre drsquoEacutetude des Civilisations de lrsquoEurope Centrale et du

Sud-Est 8) Paris 1989 pp 9ndash11 P Ș Năsturel Les Valaques de lrsquoespace byzantin et bulgare

jusqursquoagrave la conquecircte ottomane in ibidem pp 45ndash78 N Caranica Les Aroumains Recherches sur

lrsquoidentiteacute drsquoune ethnie Besanccedilon 1990 pp 339ndash353

Victor Spinei 8

60

the Ilhan Mongols referred to the itinerary followed by the corps commanded by

Boumlchoumlk who ldquowent via Qara Ulagh through the mountains and defeated the Ulagh

peoplesrdquo8 Even if the details provided about the invasion are vague we can

assume that the Qara Ulagh lived outside the Carpathian arch while the Ulagh had

their properties in Transylvania Almost half a millennium later the French scholar

Claude-Charles Peyssonnel with extensive diplomatic service in the Ottoman

Empire wrote that the Turks called the Moldavians Ak Iflak or Ak Wlak that is to

say White Vlachs in order to differentiate them from the ldquoproper Vlachs called

Qara Iflak or Black Vlachsrdquo9 In the absence of links pertaining to a literary

tradition Peyssonnelrsquos remarks cannot be transferred to the ethnonyms mentioned

by Rashid od-Din

The determinative appellative ldquoblackrdquo was attached in many cases to

Bogdania one of the terms used by the Ottoman Turks for designating Moldavia

beginning with the fifteenth century The Ottoman chancery services and the

chroniclers adopted the customs accredited in other European countries according

to which some states were assigned names deriving from their founders or from a

prominent dynasty member As far as we know the oldest documentary record

referring to Black Bogdania (Qara-Boğdan) is contained in the chronicle referring

to the Seljuk of Rucircm composed by Yazicioğlu Ali finished in 827 aH

(=5121423ndash22111424)10 In a work dedicated to Timur Lenk (Tamerlan)

completed in 1435 Ahmed Muhammad ibn Arabshah (1389ndash1450) from

Damascus mentioned a Mongolian horde called Qara Boghdan subordinated to a

certain Jabala son of Ghasan in the first years of the fifteenth century11 Given the

fact that the author did not provide details regarding the respective leader it is

difficult for us to formulate an opinion concerning his supposed connection with

the territory of Moldavia Supposedly this horde resided in the regions of the Prut

and the Dniester rivers a few decades earlier It is significant that at the Ottoman

Court the name of the dynasty member with a major role in the foundation of the

Romanian state east of the Oriental Carpathians was remembered12 although

during the years in which Bogdan ruled the borders of the Ottoman state were far

8 Rashiduddin Fazlullahrsquos Jamirsquoursquot-tawarikh Compendium of Chronicles A History of the

Mongols II transl and ed by W M Thackston Harvard [Cambridge Mass] 1999 p 332 Cf also

Rashīd al-Dīn The Successors of Genghis Khan ed by J A Boyle New York-London 1971 p 70 9 [C-Ch de] Peyssonnel Observations historiques et geacuteographiques sur les peuples barbares

qui ont habiteacute les bords du Danube amp du Pont Euxin Paris 1765 p 214 10 A Decei Problema colonizării turcilor selgiucizi icircn Dobrogea secolului al XIII-lea

in Idem Relații romacircno-otomane ed by M D Popa Bucharest 1978 p 172 11 Ahmed Ibn Arabshah Tamerlan or Timur the Great Amir transl by J H Sanders London

1936 p 85 12 Cronici turcești privind Țările Romacircne Extrase I Sec XV ndash mijlocul sec XVII ed by

M Guboglu and M Mehmet Bucharest 1966 Cronici turcești privind Țările Romacircne Extrase II

Sec XVII ndash icircnceputul sec XVIII ed by M Guboglu Bucharest 1974 passim E Vicircrtosu Bogdania

alt nume dat Moldovei in Anuarul Institutului de Istorie și Arheologie Iași I 1965 pp 155ndash165


61

from the Danube and this state had not established connections with the young

Moldavian voivodeship The terms Bogdania and Qara-Bogdania were adopted

arbitrarily from the Turks in different transcription variants in Byzantium

(Μπογδανία and Μπογδανία ἡ μελαίνη respectively)13 and in other parts of the

continent The attempts for a global deciphering of the meaning of the colors

assigned to the anthroponyms ethnonyms and toponyms in the Danube-

Carpathian area have not led to pertinent results thus far14

An interesting color appellative employed for the Romanian population is

found in a passage of the chronicle of the Venetian Giovanni Giacopo Caroldo (c

1480ndash1538) in which he described the road taken by Attila King of the Huns

After leaving Scythia he crossed the lands of the Cumans and Alans through

Soldaia Russia and the colony of the Black Romans called Wallachians (Attila Re

de glrsquoHeruli ltHunigt partito di Scithia passando per le terre delli Comani et

Alani per la Soldaia Rossia et per la colonia delli Romani negri che dicono

Valacchi) until he reached Transylvania after crossing the Theiss Tisa River15

Besides the involuntary abundance of anachronisms in Caroldorsquos text he registered

the awareness of his contemporaries regarding the Roman origin of the Romanians

Due to the fact that there is no letter acirc in Italian it is possible for the Italian

humanist to have wished to express the similarity between the Black Romanians

and the Wallachians Romanians but this is a supposition that cannot be proved

Before the formation of the Romanian medieval states foreign sources called

all the autochthonous inhabitants north of the Lower Danube by the term

Wallachians or by related names whereas their territories were assigned names

derived from the ethnonyms Once these essential moments in the history of the

Romanians were surpassed the necessity to differentiate the names of the two

voivodeships appeared for avoiding confusions among the neighboring peoples As

it was founded earlier the state entity bordered by the Southern Carpathians and

the Danube should have normally kept the name Valachia Țara Romacircnească only

for itself but this happened only partially Due to the fact that the term Valachia

had already been extensively used left of the Danube the Wallachian voivodeship

was designated either by an alternative name or by adding a determinative to it

Thus in the Old Slavic documents issued for internal needs by the state chancery

13 Laonic Chalcocondil Expuneri istorice ed by V Grecu Bucharest 1958 pp 93 94 158

286 260 14 B Burtea Farbsymbolik zwischen Legende und moderner Geschichtsschreibung in

Archaeligus VIII 2004 1ndash4 pp 61ndash78 15 Giovanni Giacomo Caroldo Istorii venețiene I De la originile Cetății la moartea dogelui

Giacopo Tiepolo (1249) ed by Ș V Marin Bucharest 2008 p 41 Cf also S Iosipescu laquoLa

colonia delli Romani Negri che dicono Valacchiraquo La romaniteacute des Roumains dans la conscience

europeacuteenne du XIVe siegravecle in Revue Roumaine drsquoHistoire XVIII 1979 4 pp 675 677ndash678 680

682 Ș Marin I valacchi nella cronachistica veneziana tra realtagrave e finzione in DallrsquoAdriatico al

Mar Nero veneziani e romeni tracciati di storie comuni ed by G Arbore Popescu Rome 2003

p 113 Idem Studii venețiene I Veneția Bizanțul și spațiul romacircnesc Bucharest 2008 p 238

Victor Spinei 10

62

the term Ungrovlachia was adopted and the official title of the dynasty member

was ldquo(Grand Voivode and) ruler of the entire Country of Ungrovlachiardquo

In documents for

external use generally written in Latin initially the form Transalpinum

Transalpina and later on Vlachia Transalpina had been used At the beginning of

the existence of the Romanian state bordered by the peaks of the Southern

Carpathians and the Lower Danube these terms were used simultaneously with

that of Basarat Besarab Besarabia

The ethnonym Ungrovlachs (Οὐγκροβλάχοι) is attested for the first time in

the chronicle of Ioannes Cantacuzenos John Kantakouzenos (c 1292ndash1383) in

connection with the aid received by Michael Asen III from the Romanians and the

ldquoScythiansrdquo after he was proclaimed czar in Tărnovo in 132316 After being

removed from the throne of the Byzantine emperors and becoming a monk in 1354

Ioannes Cantacuzenos had the leisure to dedicate himself to writing the work in

which he described the events taking place around the period 1320ndash1356 with a

few short remarks reaching the year 1362 The form Ungrovlachia (Οὐγγροβλαχία)

was consecrated upon the foundation of the homonymous metropolitan see under

the patronage of the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople in 135917 the name

of this ecclesiastical entity has been kept without interruption until today In the

documents issued by the patriarchal chancery Țara Romacircnească was designated

by the name Ungrovlachia throughout the entire Middle Ages18 In addition

Ungrovlachia represented the most frequently used form in the titles of the

Wallachian rulers mentioned in the internal documents of the first centuries after

the foundation of the state19

16 Ioannis Cantacuzeni Historiarum libri IV I ed by L Schopen Bonn 1828 p 175 17 Acta et diplomata Graeca Medii Aevi sacra et profana I Acta Patriarchatus

Constantinopolitani I ed by F Miklosich and I Muumlller Vindobonae [Vienna] 1860 no CLXXI

pp 383ndash385 Das Register des Patriarchats von Konstantinopel 3 Edition und Uumlbersetzung der

Urkunden aus den Jahren 1350ndash1363 ed by J Koder M Hinterberger and O Kresten Vienna

2001 no 243 pp 409ndash417 Cf also E Popescu Titulatura și distincțiile onorifice acordate de

Patriarhia Constantinopolului mitropoliților Țării Romacircnești (secolele XIVndashXVIII) București 2010

p 11ndash48 I Albu Double conversions in the fourteenth-century Romanian principality of Wallachia

in Journal of Medieval and Early Modern Studies 48 2018 2 pp 211ndash212 18 Acta et diplomata Graeca Medii Aevihellip I 1860 no CLXXI CCLXXVIII CCLXXIX

CCLXXXI CCCXIX II Vindobonae 1862 no CCCXXXII CCCXXXV CCCXXXVII

CCCXXXVIII CCCXXXXII CCCXXXXIV CCCXXXXV CCCLIII etc Documente grecești

privitoare la istoria romacircnilor 1320ndash1716 ed by N Iorga (Documente privitoare la istoria

romacircnilor collected by Eudoxiu de Hurmuzaki XIV 1) Bucharest 1915 no IIIndashIV pp 1ndash6 etc

Actele patriarhiei de la Constantinopol transl by T Teoteoi in Fontes Historiae Daco-Romanae

IV Scriptores et acta Imperii Byzantini saeculorum IVndashXV Izvoarele istoriei Romacircniei IV Scriitori

și acte bizantine secolele IV-XV ed by H Mihăescu R Lăzărescu N-Ș Tanașoca T Teoteoi

Bucharest 1982 pp 197ndash229 261ndash263 266ndash269 276ndash277 19 534 documente istorice slavo-romacircne din Țara-Romacircnească și Moldavia privitoare la

legăturile cu Ardealul 1346ndash1603 din arhivele orașelor Brașov și Bistrița ed by Gr G Tocilescu


63

The choronym discussed here was used in the Slavic areas of the Balkans

too Thus metropolitan Euthymius of Tărnovo (1375ndash1393) wrote to Antim

Critopoulos metropolitan of Argeș (1381ndash1401)20 addressing him with the phrase

21 In

the first decades of the fifteenth century Constantine the Philosopher mentioned

Bayezidrsquos campaign against the Ugrovlachs (in the year 6903

(=1395)22 Referring to the fratricidal war for succession to the Ottoman throne

after the 1402 disaster in Ankara the same chronicler ndash who was the biographer of

the Serbian despot Stefan Lazarević ndash also mentioned the involvement of the

ldquosovereign of the Ugrovlachsrdquo in the conflict23 thus

referring to Mircea the Elder Constantine the Philosopher was not consistent in

designating the Romanians of Wallachia Muntenia as he called them in

another part of his work24 In the next century Ungrovlachia was mentioned in a

work of Matej Gramatik metropolitan bishop in Sofia25

The juxtaposition of ethnonyms and toponyms for building hybrid forms with

new meanings was a method that was used quite frequently in the Late Byzantine

Empire Besides Ungrovlachia and Rosovlachia this assertion can be exemplified

by means of the terms Bulgaralbanitoblachos and Serbalbanitobulgaroblachos as

well The first one was used by Ioannes Katrari in the Byzantine verses composed

around the middle of the fourteenth century in which he referred to Monk

Neophyt who originated from an ethnically mixed family living next to

Thessaloniki The second one is found in the Chronicle of Ioannina written in

prose by Greek monks from Epirus at the beginning of the fifteenth century

however it discussed events taking place in the second half of the previous

century26

Bucharest 1931 Documente romacircnești icircn limba slavă din mănăstirile Muntelui Athos 1372ndash1658

ed by G Nandriș Bucharest 1937 Documenta Romaniae Historica B Țara Romacircnească I

(1247ndash1500) ed by P P Panaitescu and D Mioc Bucharest 1966 II (1501ndash1525) ed by

Șt Ștefănescu and O Diaconescu Bucharest 1972 III (1526ndash1535) ed by D Mioc Bucharest

1975 IV (1536ndash1550) ed by D Mioc Bucharest 1981 Documente romacircnești din arhiva Mănăstirii

Simonopetra de la Muntele Athos ed by P Zahariuc in collab with F Marinescu and D Nastase

Iași 2016 passim 20 V V Muntean Istoria Bisericii romacircnești (de la icircnceputuri pacircnă icircn 1716) Timișoara 2009

pp 58ndash59 21 Werke des Patriarchen von Bulgarien Euthymius (1375ndash1393) nach den besten

Handschriften ed by E Kałužniacki Vienna 1901 p 240 22 Konstantin dem Philosophen Lebensbeschreibung des Despoten Stefan Lazarević

ed and transl by M Braun Gravenhage-Wiesbaden 1956 p 12 Antologija stare srpske kniževnosti

(XIndashXVIII veka) ed by Đ Sp Radojičić Beograd 1960 p 172 23 Konstantin dem Philosophen p 30 24 Ibidem p 60 25 Antologija stare srpske kniževnostihellip p 241 26Cronica Ianinei in Fontes Historiae Daco-Romanae IV pp 348ndash349 Đ Sp Radojičić

bdquoBulgaralbanitoblachosrdquo et bdquoSerbalbanitobulgaroblachosrdquo ndash deux caracteacuteristiques ethniques du

Victor Spinei 12

64

Among the oldest testimonies on Ungrovlachia is also that inserted into the

manual of diplomatic science the so-called Ἔκθεσις νέα composed at the end of the

fourteenth century and containing short later additions The manual recorded the fact

that in Ungrovlachia two metropolitan bishops had been appointed shortly before27 In

a register of the eparchies subordinated to the Patriarchate of Constantinople at the

beginning of the modern era there was also the Metropolitan See of Ungrovlachia (Ό

Οὐγγροβλαχίας) comprising three bishoprics (Racircmnic Buzău and Argeș) as in

Moldavia (Roman Rădăuți and Huși)28 Not only the Church but also the Greek

chroniclers in the principalities consistently used the name Ungrovlachia for Wallachia

Țara Romacircnească until the eighteenth century and the beginning of the following

one29 The endurance of this term introduced by the Patriarchate of Constantinople is

also due to the fact that an important number of the metropolitans and high-ranking

clergy in Wallachia were of Greek origin30 Two of the alternative forms designating

Wallachia ie and were mentioned in

a document issued in Bucharest on May 1 165831

The term Transalpinum Transalpina (accusative singular masculine and

nominative singular feminine respectively) ndash in Hungarian Havasalfoumllde

Havaselve meaning ldquoterritory state beyond the mountainsrdquo ndash was a toponymic

creation of the Hungarian aulic milieu It was mentioned in documents written

before the years of the great military confrontation between Basarab I and Charles

Robert of Anjou in November 1330 which consecrated the independent status of

Wallachia in relation to the Hungarian Kingdom In his quality as vassal voivode of

Transalpina Basarab was mentioned in the documents of the royal chancery dated

July 26 1324 (hellipBazarab woyuodam nostrum Transalpinum)32 June 18 1325

sud-est europeacuteen du XIVe et XVe siegravecles in Romanoslavica XIII 1966 p 77 O J Schmitt Epirus

in Das Suumldosteuropa der Regionen ed by O J Schmitt and M Metzeltin Vienna 2015 p 684 27 Ἔκθεσις νέα in Σύνταγμα τῶν ϑείίων καὶ ἱερῶν κανόνων V ed by G A Rhalles and

M Potles Athens 1855 p 501 J Darrouzegraves Ektheacutesis neacutea manuel des pittakia du XIVe siegravecle in

Revue des eacutetudes byzantines XXVII 1969 p 46 28 Ταξιισ τῶν θρόνων in Σύνταγμαhellip V p 521 29 C Erbiceanu Cronicari greci care au scris despre romacircni icircn epoca fanariotă Bucharest

2003 pp 66 99 105 113 127 129 206-210 243-244 258 277 283 295 30 A Falangas Preacutesences grecques dans les Pays roumains (XIVendashXVIe siegravecles) Le teacutemoignage des

sources narratives roumaines Bucharest 2009 passim Cf also A I Ciurea Șirul mitropoliților Bisericii

Ortodoxe din Moldova Elemente esențiale biografice și bibliografice in Credință și cultură icircn Moldova II

Credință ortodoxă și unitate bisericească Iași 1995 pp 53ndash94 D I Mureșan Le Chiese ortodosse sotto

la giurisdizione del patriarco ecumenico (1453ndash1780) in Storia del cristianesimo III Lrsquoetagrave moderna

(secoli XVIndashXVIII) ed by V Lavenia Rome 2015 pp 69ndash70 31 Documente romacircnești din arhiva mănăstirii Xenofon de la Muntele Athos ed by

P Zahariuc F Marinescu Iași 2010 no 8 pp 64 67 32 Documente privitoare la istoria romacircnilor collected by Eudoxiu de Hurmuzaki I [1]

1199ndash1345 ed by N Densusianu Bucharest 1887 no CCCCLVII pp 591ndash592 Documenta Romaniae

Historica D Relații icircntre Țările Romacircne I (1222ndash1456) ed by Șt Pascu C Cihodaru

K G Guumlndisch D Mioc V Pervain Bucharest 1977 no 15 pp 36ndash37 Cf also A L Tautu Basarab il

Grande fondatore del primo stato romeno indipendente (1310ndash1352) in Antemurale I 1954 p 57


65

(hellipBozarab Transalpinum)33 and March 27 1329 (hellipBazarab woyuodam

Transalpinum)34 In the following decades and centuries the substantivized

adjectives terra Transalpina and partes Transalpine were consistently used in rare

cases the form Ultraalpina with the same semantic value was preferred35

The officialized designation of the fledgling Romanian state between

the Southern Carpathians and the Danube was also present on its first coin issues

which are supposed to have been struck in Argeș the capital of Vladislav

I ndash Vlaicu (1364ndash13761377) since around 1365 The aforementioned mint issued

several versions of silver ducats and dinars with both Latin and Slavonic legends The

obverse generally presents a marshalled shield and the name of Voivode Vladislav and

the reverse an eagle perched atop a helmet Only the coins with Latin legends show the

inscriptions +TRANS-ALPIN +TRANS-ALPINI or +TRANSA-LPINI on their

reverses36 On the dinars with Latin legends issued by Radu I (13761377ndash1385)

brother and successor to Vladislav I there are similar inscriptions ndash +TRANSALPINI

with small variations in rendering ndash placed both on the obverse and the reverse around

the image of Radu in knightly armor and the eagle on the helmet respectively37 After

an absence of over a quarter of a millennium the choronym Transalpinum

Transalpina reappeared in numismatics The obverse of a coin issued by Mihnea III

(Mihail Radu) (1658ndash1659) contained around the effigy of the Prince an inscription

with multiple abbreviations +IOMICHAEL RAD(V) D(EI)G(RATIA) V(A)L

(ACHIAElig) TR(ANSALPINAElig) PR(INCEPS)38 The tradition of its use carried on until

the age of Constantin Bracircncoveanu (1688ndash1714) who oversaw the issuing of several

types of coins or commemorative medals of silver and gold bearing his name on their

obverses and on their reverses the legend D(EI) G(RATIA) VOIVODA ET

PRINCEPS VALACHIAElig TRANS ALPINAElig or D(EI) G(RATIA) VALACHIAElig

TRANSALPINAElig PRINCEPS ET VOIVODA39

33 Gy Gyoumlrffy Adatok a romaacutenok XIII szaacutezadi toumlrteacuteneteacutehez eacutes a romaacuten aacutellam kezdeteihez II

in Toumlrteacutenelmi szemle VII 1964 2 no IV p 550 Documenta Romaniae Historica D I no 16

pp 37ndash38 34 Gy Gyoumlrffy Adatok hellip no VI p 552 Documenta Romaniae Historica D I no 18 p 41 35 Documente privitoare la istoria romacircnilor collected by Eudoxiu de Hurmuzaki I 2

1346ndash1450 ed by N Densusianu Bucharest 1890 passim Codex diplomaticus Transsylvaniae

Diplomata epistolae et alia instrumenta litteraria res Transsylvanas illustrantia Erdeacutelyi okmaacutenytaacuter

Oklevelek levelek eacutes maacutes iacuteraacutesos emleacutekek Erdeacutely toumlrteacuteneteacutehez II 1301ndash1339 ed by S (Z) Jakoacute

Budapest 2004 ibidem III 1340ndash1359 ed by S (Z) Jakoacute adiuvantibus G Hegyi A W Kovaacutecs

Budapest 2008 ibidem IV 1360ndash1372 adhibitis et completes critice digesserunt G Hegyi

A W Kovaacutecs Budapest 2014 passim 36 O Iliescu Cu privire la problema realizării unui laquocorpusraquo al monedelor feudale romacircnești

in Studii și materiale de istorie medie I 1956 pp 297ndash298 309ndash312 G Buzdugan O Luchian

C C Oprescu Monede și bancnote romacircnești Bucharest 1977 pp 8ndash10 37 O Iliescu Cu privire la problema realizării unui laquocorpusraquohellip p 301 G Buzdugan

O Luchian C C Oprescu Monede și bancnote hellip pp 13 14 16 38 G Buzdugan O Luchian C C Oprescu Monede și bancnote hellip p 33 39 Ibidem p 35

Victor Spinei 14

66

The name of the Wallachian voivodeship was taken from the Angevin Chancery

by the Curia that had already been moved to Avignon when Pope John XXII

addressed Basarab I on February 1 1327 (hellipBazarab voivoda Transalpino)40 and on

April 12 1327 (hellipBazarab veyvoda Transalpino)41 in order to request protection for

the Dominican missionaries and to oppose heretics and schismatics The terms

Transalpinum Transalpina and terra Transalpina were used not only by officials in

the Hungarian Kingdom and Wallachia but in a more restricted manner and

occasionally by those in the surrounding countries too For avoiding eventual

confusions when corresponding with the authorities of Brașov Stephen the Great

designated Wallachia (Țara Romacircnească) by the choronyms terra Transalpina (June

11 1476)42 or Transalpina (April 20 1479)43 In his turn Michael the Brave in the

large memorandum addressed in 1601 to Emperor Rudolf II referred to Wallachia by

using three different terms Transalpina Valachia Transalpina and Valachia The

Voivode signed with the title Michael Vajvoda Transalpinae44

Some authors considered that the state entity Valachia Transalpina in Wallachia

should have a correspondent with a name conveying a close sense but a disjunctive

one This deductive reasoning determined the occasional use of the choronym Valachia

Cisalpina for which there is no correspondent in geopolitical realities This illusive

logic construct was meant to designate Moldavia It is attested among other

documents in a report composed by diplomat Sebeville and addressed to King Louis

XIV on February 13 1684 in which he also referred to the obedient political status of

the two Romanian states helliptoute la Valachie qui est distingueacutee par la transalpine et la

cisalpine et crsquoest seulement cette derniegravere qui srsquoest remise sous lrsquoobeacuteissance du Roi de

Pologne lrsquoautre nrsquoayant pas encore secoueacute le joug du Turc45 Such aleatoric

distinctions have sometimes led to confusions like that of the Polish scholar Samuel

Twardowski (c 1600ndash1661) according to whom Cisalpina designated Wallachia and

Ulterior stood for Moldavia46

40 Acta Ioannis XXII (1317ndash1334) e registris Vaticanis aliisque fontibus collegit A L Tăutu

(Pontificia Commissio ad redigendum Codicem Iuris Canonici Orientalis Fontes Series III VII 2)

Cittagrave del Vaticano 1952 no 92 pp 182ndash183 Gy Gyoumlrffy Adatok hellip no V p 550 Documenta

Romaniae Historica D I no 17 p 39 41 Acta Ioannis XXIIhellip no 92a p 184 42 Documenta Romaniae Historica B Țara Romacircnească XI (1593ndash1600) Domnia lui Mihai

Viteazul ed by D Mioc Șt Ștefănescu et al Bucharest 1975 no CLI p 341 43 Ibidem no CLVI p 353 44 J Kemeacuteny Mihaacutely vajda jelleme s tetteire vonatkozoacute okmaacutenyok (1600 1601) in Magyar

toumlrteacutenelmi taacuter Pest III 1857 pp 174 175 180ndash182 184v 186 188 Cf also A P[apiu] I[larian]

Memoriul lui Michai Vodă cătră Rudolf imperat in Tesaur de monumente istorice pentru Romacircnia I

1862 pp 253ndash254 261ndash263 265ndash267 270 45 Documente privitoare la istoria romacircnilor collected by Eudoxiu de Hurmuzaki XVI

Corespondența diplomatică și rapoartele consulare franceze (1603ndash1824) ed by N Hodoș

Bucharest 1912 no CXXX p 54 46 Samuel Twardowski Descrierea soliei ducelui de Zbaraz 1622 in P P Panaitescu

Călători poloni icircn țările romacircne 2nd ed Iași 1999 p 24 Idem in Călători străini despre Țările


67

For several decades the Romanian state established south of the Southern

Carpathians was alternatively designated also by a name derived from its founder

Basarab This is not the only case in which the name of a Romanian dynasty

member was adopted by the state entity in whose foundation he had played a

decisive part Identical situations were registered in the Balkan Peninsula where

the name Asan one of the leaders of the anti-Byzantine uprising at the end of the

twelfth century was taken by the Wallachian-Bulgarian Czardom called Terra

Assani In the same manner east of the Carpathians Bogdanrsquos name was assigned

by the Turks to the state whose independence he had obtained Dobrogea also

received its name from the dynasty member who ruled over the territory between

the Danube and the Black Sea during the second half of the fourteenth century

Through the illustrious victory obtained against the Angevin armies in the autumn

of 1330 Basarab abolished the hegemony of the Hungarian Kingdom over his

voivodeship According to a graffito written on a wall of the nave of Saint Nicholas

Church (Biserica Domnească) in Curtea de Argeș the respectable voivode

deceased in the year 6860 (13511352)47 this date is considered by most

medievalists as the moment in which his reign ended However in reality some

notifications registered in chronicles and official documents suggest the fact that

Nicholas Alexander had replaced Basarab several years before in 1343 at the

latest As John of Tacircrnave (Kuumlkuumlllei Jaacutenos) the biographer of Louis I of Anjou

stated in 1343 or 1344 voyvoda Transalpinus Alexander son of Basarab accepted

to perform the vassal homage to the King of Hungary48 On October 17 1345 the

same Alexander Bassarati was congratulated with the formula nobilis vir in a Papal

diploma in which his involvement in proselytic actions under the patronage of the

Holy See was praised49 Nevertheless such prerogatives were usually assumed by

the state leader and not by one of his representatives

The oldest mention of the name Bassarabian Country

is found in a commercial privilege granted by Czar

Stephen Dušan to the merchants of Ragusa on September 20 134950 In the

Romacircne IV ed M Holban M M Alexandrescu-Dersca Bulgaru P Cernovodeanu Bucharest

1972 p 502 47 D Onciul Anul morții marelui Basarab Voievod in Idem Scrieri alese ed by

Șt Ștefănescu D N Rusu B-A Halic Bucharest 2006 pp 761ndash763 C Bălan Inscripții medievale

și din epoca modernă a Romacircniei Județul istoric Argeș (sec XIVndash1948) Bucharest 1994 no VII

284 pp 249ndash250 48 Chronicon Budense ed by I Podhradczky Buda 1838 p 268 Chronicon Dubnicense

in Historiae Hungaricae fontes domestici Scriptores III ed by M Florianus Quinque-Ecclessiis

[=Peacutecs] 1884 p 138 Johannes de Thurocz Chronica Hungarorum I Textus ed by E Galaacutentai and

J Kristoacute Budapest 1985 p 162 49 Acta Clementis PP VI (1342ndash1352) e regestis Vaticanis aliisque fontibus collegit A L Tăutu

(Pontificia Commissio ad Redigendum Codicem Iuris Canonici Orientalis Fontes Series III IX) Cittagrave del

Vaticano 1960 no 60 pp 100ndash101 Documenta Romaniae Historica D I no 32 pp 60ndash61 50 Monumenta Serbica spectantia historiam Serbiae Bosnae Regusii ed by Fr Miklosich

Viennae 1858 no CXXVII p 146

Victor Spinei 16

68

confirmation of the privileges stipulated on April 25 1357 by Czar Stephen

Uroš IV this name of Wallachia was written identically51 As attested by

several Serbian chronicles the Romanians of Wallachia (Muntenia) designated

by the ethnonym Basarabi were among the participants in the battle of

Velbužd in June 1330 in which the Bulgarians were catastrophically defeated

This allowed the Serbian Czardom to become the main military force in the

Balkans for several decades In a manuscript of 1453 of the Koporinski

Annals52 and in the Sečenić Annals53 the discussed ethnonym was transcribed

as Басараби in the chronicles of the sixteenth century the following forms

were adopted Басарабы in the Studenić Annals54 and the Vrkhobreznića

Annals55 Басарабе in the Cetinje Annals56 and Bassarabi in the Latin version

of the Brancović Annals57 The contingents from Wallachia that are believed to

have joined the Ottomans together with several Balkan people against Czar

Lazar Hrebeljanović in the battle of Kosovo in 1389 were designated in

Serbian chronicles also by the ethnonym Басарабы58 The veracity of the

information referring to the participation of the Romanians in this conflict on

the side of the Turks was contested by modern historiography59 Given the fact

that all mentioned Serbian sources were completed several decades after the

narrated events it is not really sure whether they implied a terminology that

51 Ibidem no CXLV p 161 52 Čili kopřivnickeacuteho l 1453 in P J Šafařik (ed) Okaacutezky občanskeacuteho pisemnictvi Prague

1870 p 53 Копорињски [летопис] in Л Стоjановић [L Stojanović] Стари српски родослови и

летописи (Сборник за историjи jезик и књижевнст српског народа I Споменици на српсом

jезику XVI) Ср Карловци Sremski Karlovci [Carlowitz] 1927 p 78 53 Čili sečenickeacuteho okolo l 1501 in P J Šafařik (ed) Okaacutezky občanskeacuteho pisemnictvi p 71

Сеченички [летопис] in Л Стоjановић [L Stojanović] Стари српски родослови и летописи

p 199 Сеченички [летопис] in Стари српски хрисовуљи акти биографије летописи типици

поменици записи и др pед Л Стоjановић [ed by L Stojanović] in Споменик (Српска

Краљевска Академија) III 1890 p 131 54 Студенички љетопис старији in В В Вукасовић [V V Vukasović] Стари

студенички зборник in Споменик (Српска Краљевска Академија) XXXVIII 34 1900 p 114

Студенички [летопис] in Л Стоjановић [L Stojanović] Стари српски родослови и летописи

p 79 55 Врхобрезнички [летопис] in Стари српски хрисовуљиhellip 1890 p 98 Врхобрезнички

[летопис] in Л Стоjановић [L Stojanović] Стари српски родослови и летописи p 103 56 V Jagić Ein Beitrag zur serbischen Annalistik mit literaturgeschichtlicher Einleitung

in Archiv fuumlr slavische Philologie II 1877 p 83 Цетињски [летопис] in Л Стоjановић

[L Stojanović] Стари српски родослови и летописи p 79 57 Бранковичев [летопис] in Л Стоjановић [L Stojanović] Стари српски родослови и

летописи p 284 58 Студенички љетопис старији in В В Вукасовић [V V Vukasović] Стари

студенички зборник in Споменик 1900 p 115 Студенички [летопис] in Л Стоjановић

[L Stojanović] Стари српски родослови и летописи p 91 59 P P Panaitescu Mircea cel Bătracircn Bucharest 1944 pp 215ndash223 A Iancu Știri despre

romacircni icircn izvoarele istoriografice sacircrbești (secolele XVndashXVII) in Studii istorice sud-est europene ed

by E Stănescu Bucharest 1974 pp 16ndash17


69

was used at the time the confrontation of Velbužd took place or they

anachronistically made use of the terms corresponding to the fifteenth century

Wallachiarsquos name which derived from Basarab the founder of the state and

dynasty was imposed by the circles around the Serbian Court at a moment in

which the Czardom had accumulated a substantial prestige in South-Eastern

Europe The term Bessarabia was adopted as an alternative designation in Papal

Hungarian Polish and Moldavian diplomacy starting with the last decades of the

fourteenth century Only after reaching certain popularity it was occasionally used

by the Wallachian chancery service as well but not in internal documents only in

those for external destinations This indicates the fact that it did not become part of

the common language used within the state boundaries

The Curia in Avignon used such a choronym for the first time in a document

dated June 16 1372 by which Pope Gregory XI assigned the Franciscan monks in

Bosnia with the right to build religious service constructions in Rascia and

Basarat60 (recte Basarab) this mission was repeated with almost identical terms in

a document dated 1379 issued by Urban VI61 The Royal Hungarian Chancery

used the respective term in a document of 1377 in which the services brought to

Louis I the Great by a certain Nicholas in terra Bazarabi were enumerated62 The

term Bessarabia Bassarabia was used by several categories of Polish sources

dating from the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries which evoked political aspects63

The peace treaty concluded in 1510 between Bogdan ruler of Moldavia and

Sigismund I King of Poland offered an equivalent for this term ie terra

Bassarabia seu Transalpina64

The discussed choronym was occasionally mentioned in a few chronicles

written in the western regions of Russia Thus in the middle part of the Supraslrsquoski

Annals (Supraslrsquoskaia letopisrsquo) dedicated to the events in the history of Lithuania

around the period 1430ndash1446 it was claimed that the authority of the Great Prince

Witold (Vytautas) deceased in 1430 stretched over a large area that also included

the territories ldquoof the rulers of Moldavia and Wallachiardquo (господарь земли

Мольдавскои и Босарабъския)65 This passage was reproduced with slight

60 Documentehellip Hurmuzaki I 2 no CXLII pp 193-194 Acta Gregorii PP XI

(1370ndash1378)hellip no 32 p 65 61 Codex diplomaticus Hungariae ecclesiasticus ac civilis ed by G Fejeacuter IX 5 (1375ndash1382)

Budae 1834 no CLXXVIII p 325 Documentehellip Hurmuzaki I 2 no CCVII p 268 62 Documentehellip Hurmuzaki I 2 no CXC p 243 63 Documente privitoare la istoria romacircnilor collected by Eudoxiu de Hurmuzaki II 2

1451ndash1510 ed by N Densusianu Bucharest 1891 no CXV p 135 no CXVI p 136 N Iorga

Studii istorice asupra Chiliei și Cetății Albe Bucharest 1899 p 74 64 Documentehellip Hurmuzaki II 2 no CCCCLXXXVIII p 629 65 Супрасльская летопись in Полное собрание русских летописей 35 Летописи

белорусско-литовские отв pед Б А Рыбаков зам отв pед В И Буганов состав и pед

Н Н Улащик [chief editor B A Rybakov deputy chief editor V I Buganov ed by

N N Ulashchik] Moscow 1980 p 59 Cf also Супрасльскій списокъ in Полное собраниеhellip

XVII Западнорусскія лѣтописи S-Petersburg 1907 col 66

Victor Spinei 18

70

spelling differences in several Russian-Lithuanian annals The term Basarabia

used for Wallachia was transcribed more or less correctly in fifteenth century

chronicles thus reflecting the geopolitical knowledge of the copyists господарь

земли Молдовьскыи и Басарабь (Slutski Annals Uvarovskii spisok)66 and

господарь земли Молдавьскиа и Босарменьскиа (Academic Annals)67 The

annals written in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries contain almost identical

wordings when referring to the two Romanian states господарь земли

Молдовское и Басарабское ([Count] Krasinski Annals)68 hospodar ziemie

Moladawskiey i Barasabskiey (Olrsquoshevski Annals)69 господарь земли Могдавское

и Басарабское (Rumiantsev Annals)70 A certain exception appears in the late

annals in which instead of ldquothe princes of the Lands of Moldavia and Bessarabiardquo

the formula ldquoprince of the Country of Moldavia and voivode of the Wallachiansrdquo

was preferred господар земли Малъдавское и воевода волоскии (Rachinski

Annals)71 господарь земли Молдавские и воевода волоскии (Evreinov Annals)72

This substitution proves that the anonymous copyists of the chronicle were

acquainted with the referential similarity between Bessarabia and Wallachia Țara

Romacircnească

The Bessarabi (Бессераби) were also evoked in the subchapter dedicated

to the Wallachians Romanians ndash О Волосѣхъ ndash in a West-Russian copy of a

chronicle (kronograph) elaborated by the end of the sixteenth century73 in

which appear the passages taken from the work of the Polish chronicler Marcin

Bielski According to the anonymous author of the kronograph the

Wallachians (Волохи) had come from the Country of the Vloski (Влоские

земли) Blochs (Влохъ) namely of the Italians and their name was derived

from a certain Flacus or from the Blochs When they proliferated they chased

away the Getae Dacians and other peoples and settled along the Danube

greatly keeping the customs and language of the Vlochs Italians At the time

the chronicle was composed the Wallachians split and adopted other names

draguli basarabi multani munteni (едини Драгуле друзіи Бессераби иніи

Мултаны) A part of them from the Semigradskaia Country the Country of

the Seven Fortresses (=Siebenbuumlrgen) were under the domination of the

Hungarians and another part those living in Muntenia (Мултана) were ruled

66 Слуцкая летопись in Полное собраниеhellip 35 p 75 67 Академическая летопись in Полное собраниеhellip 35 p 108 68 Летопись Красинского in Полное собраниеhellip 35 p 141 69 Ольшевская летопись in Полное собраниеhellip 35 p 189 70 Румянцевская летопись in Полное собраниеhellip 35 p 209 71 Летопись Рачинского in Полное собраниеhellip 35 pp 162-163 72 Евреиновская летопись in Полное собраниеhellip 35 p 231 73 Д С Лихачев [D S Likhachev] Русские летописи их культуно-историческое значение

Moscow-Leningrad 1947 pp 454ndash456 В И Буганов [V I Buganov] Отечественная

историография русского летописания Обзор советской литературы Moscow 1975 pp 106ndash120

194ndash199 297ndash307


71

by the Turks The latter stretched up to Chilia and Belagorod (=Belgorod

Cetatea Albă) and even as far as the Pontic Sea into which the Danube flows

Another part was mountainous and included Suceava Soroca and Hotin so it

corresponded to Moldavia and was led by a voivode In the mountains the

Bessarabi or Bassernovi (Бессераби или Бассернове) grazed their goats74 We

can conclude from the summary of this ethnographic and historical presentation

that in West-Russian scholarly environments there were compiled both real

details as well as inaccurate ones about the Romanian regions Among the latter

ones there is also data referring to the Bessarabi The author considered them

different from the Wallachians and seems to localize them in a mountainous

area of Moldavia It is not out of the question for those confusions to or iginate

in the fact that at the time this work was written the notion of Bessarabi was

transferred from Wallachia to the southern part of Moldavia

The Moldavian chancery service adopted the name Voivodeship of

Bessarabia ([]) for Wallachia in the vassal homage document

submitted by Ștefan Mușat (Stephen Mushat) and his boyars to King Wladyslaw

Jagiello and Queen Hedwiga written in Suceava on January 6 139575 In the

well-known commercial privilege awarded on October 8 1408 by Alexander the

Good to the merchants of Lwow composed in Old Slavic Wallachia was

mentioned in three lines as Besarabia and when speaking about

ldquoWallachian waxrdquo the phrase y was used76 The choronym

also appeared in the content of the privilege that was renewed

on March 18 1434 by Stephen II77 June 29 1456 by Petru Aron (Peter Aron)78

and July 3 1460 by Stephen the Great79 It was also mentioned in a document

issued by Petru Aron on April 1 145780 In the correspondence of Stephen the

Great with the Grand Duke of Lithuania Alexander in 149681 and in the treaty

concluded with John Albert (Olbracht) King of Poland in 149982 Wallachia was

referred to by the name (terra Bazarabie in the Latin version

of the treaty of 1499) Close variants of this choronym were used in the inscription

texts of the churches in Milișăuți and Războieni built by Stephen the Great in

74 Русскій хронографъ 2 Хронографъ Западно-Русской редакціи in Полное собраниеhellip

XXII 2 Petrograd 1914 pp 234ndash235 75 M Costăchescu (ed) Documente moldovenești icircnainte de Ștefan cel Mare II Documente

interne Documente externe Iași 1932 no 167 p 612 76 Ibidem no 176 pp 630ndash637 77 Ibidem no 186 pp 667ndash674 78 Ibidem no 231 pp 788ndash796 79 I Bogdan (ed) Documentele lui Ștefan cel Mare II Bucharest 1913 no CXXVIII p 274 80 M Costăchescu (ed) Documente moldovenești icircnainte de Ștefan cel Mare II no 234

p 809 81 I Bogdan (ed) Documentelehellip II no CLXXIII p 308 82 Ibidem no CLXXVII pp 423 439

Victor Spinei 20

72

which war confrontations between the two principalities were shortly evoked83 In

addition the names Bessarabia and Country of Bessarabia appeared in a few

internal documents written at Stephen the Greatrsquos Court84 which is an additional

proof for the fact that the use of these terms in Moldavian diplomacy was not

incidental

After almost half a century since its first mention in Serbian diplomas the

term Basarabia was adopted by Wallachian officials as well a circumstance

confirming once more that in very many cases the ethnic and political terminology

pertaining to a territory was not imposed by the locals but by prestigious political

entities in their proximity The oldest occurrence of the discussed name that has

reached us is found in the vassal homage to the King and Queen of Poland

Wladyslaw Jagiello and Hedwiga respectively signed in Latin by Wlad Woyewoda

Bessarabie in 1396 In the same text the country was also designated by the name

Bassarabia85 which is closer to the Romanian form however this designation was

not going to be accepted internationally as well Regarding the diplomatic approach

to the Polish Kingdom Mircea the Elder accepted the protection of King

Wladyslaw Jagiello postulated in two documents The first one without a date

probably issued in the last years of the fourteenth century and the second one

dated September 23 1403 In the first one his title was ldquoGrand Voivode and

independent Prince of the entire Basarabian Countryrdquo (

[] [] [] )86 and in that of

1403 ldquoBy Godrsquos mercy Voivode Grand Prince of the Basarabian Countryrdquo

)87

Once writings in the local language with the Cyrillic alphabet spread in the

second half of the seventeenth century the use of the name Ungrovlachia

decreased a lot this term was constantly used only for designating the countryrsquos

supreme church institution ie the Metropolitan See Given the fact that the oldest

83 Repertoriul monumentelor și obiectelor de artă din timpul lui Ștefan cel Mare coord by

M Berza Bucharest 1958 no 2 pp 57ndash58 no 14 pp 139 143 84 Documenta Romaniae Historica A Moldavia II 1449ndash1486 ed by L Șimanschi

in collab with G Ignat and D Agachi Bucharest 1976 nr 89 p 127 nr 191 pp 285-286 III

1487ndash1504 ed by C Cihodaru I Caproșu and N Ciocan Bucharest 1980 nr 77 p 151 nr 290

p 516 85 Codex diplomaticvs Regni Poloniaelig et Magni Dvcatvs Litvaniaelig I ed by M Dogiel Vilnaelig

[Vilnius] 1758 p 623 В А Уляницкий [V A Ulianitskii] Матеріалы для исторіи взаимныхъ

отношеній Россіи Польши Молдавіи Валахіи и Турціи въ XIVndashXVI вв Moscow 1887 no 11

p 9 Documentehellip Hurmuzaki I 2 no CCCXVI p 374 86 Documentehellip Hurmuzaki I 2 (Apendice II Documente slavonehellip) no DCLIII p 825

I Ohieumlnko Дві грамоті воєводи валашського Івана Мирчі Великкого in Byzantinoslavica III 2

1931 pp 419ndash420 87 Documentehellip Hurmuzaki I 2 (Apendice II Documente slavonehellip) no DCLII p 824

I Ohieumlnko Дві грамоті воєводиhellip pp 422ndash423 Cf also D P Bogdan Despre cancelaria slavă a

voevodului muntean Mircea cel Mare reprinted from Revista Societății bdquoTinerimea Romacircnărdquo 7 and

8 1934 no 3 p 5


73

annals composed in Wallachia in Old Slavic did not reach us we do not precisely

know how the voivodeship was called in those works The term Ungrovlachia was

used only occasionally in the chronicle of Radu Greceanu (c 1655ndashc 1725)

dedicated to the reign of Constantin Bracircncoveanu The latter was claimed to have

been his inspirer and advisor but with no incontestable proof In the preface of this

work he was called ldquoVoivode and ruler of entire Ungrovlachiardquo and the country

over which he exercised his authority was named Ungrovlahia and Țara

Ungrovlahiei88 Throughout the chronicle this toponym was abandoned in favor of

Țara Rumănească89 whereas the term Țara Muntenească (Muntenia Country

Wallachia) appeared only exceptionally90

In the Wallachian chronicles elaborated at the end of the seventeenth century

and the beginning of the next century the two names were used alternatively In

the Annals of the Băleni [family] (Letopisețul Bălenilor) that discusses the events

assigned to the period 1290ndash1688 the choronym Țara Rumacircnească91 was preferred

to the detriment of Țara Muntenească92 The authorship of this work caused

controversies and there is no consensus omnium in this matter93

The narration in the so-called Cantacuzino Annals (Letopisețul

Cantacuzinesc) begins with the foundation of the Wallachian voivodeship and

covers the events up to the year 1688 including a short addendum until 1690

Naturally more consistent details are found in the history exposition relating

to the second half of the seventeenth century The attempts for establishing

the author of this work ended in controversies which are hard to solve the

majority of the specialists agree merely on the opinion that the author was

probably a member or a close person to the Cantacuzino family The title of this

chronicle indicates the fact that it discusses the history of Wallachia but in its

content this term in the title94 and the name Țara Muntenească (Muntenia

88 Radu Greceanu Incepătura istoriii vieții luminatului și preacreștinului domnului Țării

Rumacircnești Io Costandin Bracircncoveanu Basarab-voievod dă cacircnd Dumnezeu cu domniia l-au

incoronat pentru vremile și intacircmplările ce icircn pămacircntul acesta icircn zilele măriei sale s-au intacircmplat in

Cronici bracircncovenești ed by D H Mazilu Bucharest 1988 p 5 89 Ibidem pp 17 34 38ndash39 42 46 etc 90 Ibidem p 43 91 Letopisețul Bălenilor in Cronicari munteni ed by A Ghermanschi Bucharest 1988

pp 129 135 136 139 140 143 92 Ibidem pp 145 146 93 Șt Ciobanu Istoria literaturii romacircne vechi ed by D H Mazilu Bucharest 1989

pp 313ndash316 P P Panaitescu Cronica Bălenilor in Istoria literaturii romacircne I Folclorul literatura

romacircnă icircn perioada feudală (1400ndash1780) coord by A Rosetti M Pop I Pervain A Piru

Bucharest 1964 pp 424ndash432 D H Mazilu Cronicarii munteni Cacircteva modele de retorică a

povestirii Bucharest 1978 pp 89ndash146 94 Istoria Țării Romacircnești 1290ndash1690 Letopisețul Cantacuzinesc ed by C Grecescu and

D Simonescu Bucharest 1960 pp 3 5 13 23 26 38 54 etc Istoriia Țării Rumacircnești de cacircnd au

descălecat pravoslavnicii creștini (Letopisețul Cantacuzinesc) in Cronicari munteni ed by

A Ghermanschi pp 63 64 70 76 77 87 88 92 93 106 108 111 117 118

Victor Spinei 22

74

Country)95 were used alternatively with an approximately close frequency The

traditional term Ungrovlachia in the rulerrsquos title is found only when the

fictitious or real high offices of some lay and church personalities of the past

are mentioned Thus when evoking the ldquodismountingrdquo of the legendary

Voivode Radu Negru (Radu the Black) from Southern Transylvania in Argeș

his title (tituluș) was mentioned voevod bojiiu milosti gospodariu vseia zemli

Ungrovlahiskiia za planinski i ot Almaș i Făgăraș herțegu accompanied by a

suggestive but not excessively accurate translation ldquoBy Godrsquos mercy Prince

of entire Wallachia dismounted from Hungary and Duke of Almaș and

Făgărașrdquo (voievod cu mila lui Dumnezeu domn a toată Țara Rumacircnească

dentru Ungarie dăscălecat și de la Almaș și Făgăraș herțog)96 In another

passage of the Annals which refers to Macarie the countryrsquos highest hierarch

during the reign of Neagoe Basarab (1512ndash1521) he was called ldquoMetropolitan

Bishop of entire Ungrovlachia Countryrdquo (mitropolit a toată Țara Ungrovlahiei)

or ldquoMetropolitan Bishop of Ungrovlachiardquo (mitropolitul Ungrovlahiei)97 a

name that was kept in the official diplomatic language but not in the

vocabulary of the chroniclers which was certainly closer to the local language

In the extensive historiographic synthesis with baroque nuance of the erudite

High Steward (stolnic) Constantin Cantacuzino (c 1640ndash1716) neither the term

Țara Rumacircnească98 nor Țara Muntenească99 were preferentially used in the text

even if in the title of his work the author opted for the name Țara Rumacircnească In

one of the passages of this opus containing a specific intricate sentence the author

was only partially right when claiming that ldquoseveral peoplerdquo called it Țara

Muntenească and ldquoonly its inhabitants and merely some of the Transylvanians

Romanians call it Rumăneascărdquo (Rumănească numai lăcuitorii ei o chiamă și doar

unii den erdeleacuteni ltardelenigt rumacircni)100 This scholar was the brother of Șerban

and the father of Stephen both rulers of Wallachia He added that only the

Wallachians and the Transylvanians considered themselves Romanians (rumacircni)

whereas the Moldavians called themselves moldovan although ldquothey are of the

same lineage and stirps with themrdquo (că și ei sicircnt de un neam și de un rod cu

ceștia)101 In those times the archaism rod (stirps) had the same meaning as neam

95 Istoria Țării Romacircnești 1290-1690hellip pp 6 14 19 21 33 35 38 40 41 58 60 62 63

etc Istoriia Țării Rumacircnești de cacircnd au descălecat pravoslavniciihellip pp 66 71 73 75 82 86 88

95ndash98 105 96 Istoria Țării Romacircnești 1290ndash1690hellip p 2 Istoriia Țării Rumacircnești de cacircnd au descălecat

pravoslavniciihellip p 64 97 Istoria Țării Romacircnești 1290ndash1690hellip pp 23 40 41 Istoriia Țării Rumacircnești de cacircnd au

descălecat pravoslavniciihellip p 86 98 Constantin Cantacuzino Stolnicul Istoriia Țăricirci Rumacircnești ed by D Mioc Bucharest

1991 pp 57 58 74 90 99 Ibidem pp 62 74 117 100 Ibidem p 74 101 Ibidem p 75


75

(lineage) Constantin Cantacuzino presented a wide range of historiographic

knowledge collected from illustrious scholars who had studied his own peoplersquos

past Like western Renaissance erudites the Wallachian Steward shared the

opinion according to which the Romanians (rumacircnii) were the direct descendants

of the Romans even if foreigners called them vlachi valachi or blachi For him

the Romanians from Ardeal Transylvania the Moldavians and the Wallachians

belonged to the same lineage and they shared the same language (rumacircnii den

Ardeal moldoveacutenii și muntenii sunt tot [de] un neam tot [de] o limbă)102 In

addition his view regarding the neo-Latin communities south of the Danube was

broader than that of other compatriots Thus about the Aromanians designated by

the derogatory name coțovlahi by their neighbors he claimed that when they were

asked about their origin they replied that they are ldquoWallachians that is Romanians

and they call the places they inhabit Wallachiardquo (vlahos adecăte rumacircn și locurile

lor unde lăcuiesc le zic Vlahia)103

Although it was written almost simultaneously with the Cantacuzino Annals

(Letopisețul Cantacuzinesc) and with the chronicle of High Steward Constantin

Cantacuzino in the anonymous chronicle of the Wallachian state referring to the

period 1688ndash1717 the name Țara Rumacircnească was frequently used104 while Țara

Muntenească very seldom105 A clear preference for the term Țara Rumacircnească106

to the detriment of Țara Muntenească107 is found also in the work of Radu Popescu

(c 1655ndash1729) whose father was Greek The former was a high court official

author and compiler of chronicles Towards the end of his life he became a monk

in a monastery in Bucharest

During the ninth decade of the seventeenth century at the court of the

Wallachian ruler scholar Gheorghe Brancovici (1645ndash1711) a descendant of a

Serbian family who had settled in the region of Arad searched information for

elaborating a chronicle in Romanian that was meant to cover a large chronological

span extending from the making of the world until the year 1686108 This work was

mainly dedicated to the history of the Romanians and the Serbians However it

also contained references to the past of other peoples and the events were ordered

102 Ibidem p 87 103 Ibidem p 93 104 Istoria Țării Romacircnești de la octombrie 1688 pacircnă la martie 1717 in Cronicari munteni

ed by A Ghermanschi pp 247 251 253 255ndash259 264ndash266 269 etc 105 Ibidem pp 243 244 106 Radu Popescu Istoriile domnilor Țăracirci Rumacircnești in Cronicari munteni ed by

A Ghermanschi pp 151 154 157 158 161 169 171 172 174 177 180 194 197 199 202 207

215 221 225 234 236 107 Ibidem pp 207ndash209 233 108 N Cartojan Istoria literaturii romacircne vechi ed by D Simonescu Bucharest 1980

pp 471ndash475 P P Panaitescu Gheorghe Brancovici in Istoria literaturii romacircne I pp 432ndash437

M D Cicircrstea Un istoric uitat Gheorghe Brancovici Bucharest 2014 A S(imota) Brancovici

Gheorghe in Enciclopedia literaturii romacircne vechi ed by E Simion Bucharest 2018 pp 133ndash134

Victor Spinei 24

76

chronologically according to the analytical approach In opposition to his

Wallachian peers Gheorghe Brancovici consistently used the choronym Țara

Muntenească109 Rumacircneasca was mentioned only once exactly at the end of the

text in a strange list with the zodiac signs assigned to the states of that time in

which it was placed ldquounder Aquariusrdquo (supt vărsător)110 The ethnonym rumacircni

was not used for the inhabitants of Wallachia only for the dismounters from

Maramureș and Transylvania in Moldavia111 In a few cases a generic sense was

assigned to it with no definite localization112 The following passage that sums up

the reign of Michael the Brave also belongs to this category ldquoRuling with

strenuous bravery he increased the power of the Romanian stirps and by happily

ruling over three Lands that is Transylvania Moldavia and Wallachiardquo (Cu vitejie

vreacutednică otcacircrmuind au lățit puteacuterea neamului rumacircnesc și cu fericire stăpacircnind

măriia sa cacircte trei țări adecă Ardealul Moldavia și Țara Muntenească)113 From

this wording we can indirectly deduce the awareness of the ethnic unity of the three

Lands

On account of having founded an independent state several decades

earlier than the Moldavians the Muntenians felt entitled to reserve the terms

romacircni (Romanians) and Țara Romacircnească (Romanian Country Wallachia) for

themselves For designating their co-ethnics on the left side of the Milcov they

employed the ethnonym Moldavian shortly after the foundation of their

principality in the north-western corner of the land east of the Carpathians

Relevant data in this regard can be obtained from surveying the anthroponomy

appearing in the diplomatic records of Wallachia in the fourteenth-sixteenth

centuries in which the name Moldovan clearly derived from the homonymous

ethnonym was mentioned several times The oldest of these documents

mentioning a certain Groza Moldovan was written in Latin on December 27

1391 in the Princely Chancery of Mircea the Elder114 Several decades later on

April 16 1457 and September 20 1459 Vlad Țepeș issued documents in which

among the witnesses there was a certain Moldovean who held the rank of a

spatharios )115 Other documents dating from the early

109 Gheorghe Brancovici Cronica sloveacutenilor Illiricului mysii cei din sus și cei din jos mysii in

Idem Cronica romacircnească ed by D Mioc and M Adam-Chiper Bucharest 1987 pp 42 52 53

55 59 61 63 64 66 67 69 71ndash74 110 Ibidem p 81 111 Ibidem p 56 112 Ibidem pp 38 45 73 113 Ibidem pp 74ndash75 114 Documenta Romaniae Historica B Țara Romacircnească I (1247ndash1500) ed by

P P Panaitescu and D Mioc Bucharest 1966 no 15 pp 36ndash39 115 Ibidem no 115 p 199 no 118 p 203 Corpus Draculianum Documentele și cronicile

relative la viața și domnia lui Vlad Țepeș (1437ndash1650) 1 Scrisori și documente de cancelarie 1

Cancelarii valahe ed by A Gheorghe A Weber A Șt Anca and G Lazăr Brăila 2019 no 7

p 44 no 16 p 79


77

sixteenth century mentioned a Gypsy slave called Moldoveanul in 1501 and

another one called Mihai Moldoveanul in 1510116 In the following decades in

Wallachia and Transylvania the number of such anthroponyms increased

significantly Among the outstanding cultural personalities who bore this name

or sobriquet was Filip Moldoveanul Philip the Moldavian considered the first

Romanian-language typographer who worked in Sibiu in the first half of the

sixteenth century117 In the following two centuries other learned men of

Moldavian origin particularly copyists and editors settled or temporarily

resided in the Transylvanian and Wallachian centers Varlaam Chiriac

Atanasie Vasile Grigore Vasile Sturza Ștefan Iosif who were all called

Moldoveanul (the Moldavian)118 In the diplomatic documents issued east of the

Carpathians the name Moldovan is attested only starting with the seventeenth

century119 Its delayed adoption is normal since generally personal names were

meant to differentiate between the bearers whereas in a community composed

predominantly of Moldavians an anthroponym similar to the ethnonym was

unwarranted The name Moldovean appeared east of the Carpathians probably

in pluriethnic milieus or was assigned to persons originating from Moldavia

but living in other Romanian regions

When referring to Wallachia the Romanians from Moldavia used

designations employed by the peoples of South-Eastern and Eastern Europe as well

as other ones created by themselves Thus in the Anonymous Annals of Moldavia

(Letopisețul anonim al Moldovei) containing data beginning with the dismounting

of Dragoș in 1359 and continuing until 1507 the author was not consistent when

pointing to Wallachia to which he assigned several names When narrating some

events in 1473 he evoked the voivode prerogatives of Basarab [Laiotă] over the

ldquoBasarabian reignˮ ) and in a further paragraph he

touched on of the plundering raid of the Turks in Muntenia Country Wallachia

)120 Muntenia Country was also brought up in the context of

the data exposeacute regarding the military interventions of Stephen the Great and

116 Documenta Romaniae Historica B Țara Romacircnească II (1501ndash1525) ed by

Șt Ștefănescu and O Diaconescu Bucharest 1972 no 9 p 24 no 11 p 27 no 74 p 158 117 A Huttmann P Binder Contribuții la biografia lui Filip Moldoveanul primul tipograf

romacircn Evoluția vieții culturale romacircnești la Sibiu icircn epoca umanistă in Limba și literatura XVI

1968 pp 145ndash174 A Eșanu V Eșanu Filip Moldoveanul ndash primul tipograf de limbă romacircnă

in A Eșanu V Eșanu Lumina cărții la romacircni (secolele XIVndashXIX) Studii surse și materiale

(Basarabica 8) BucharestndashBrăila 2018 pp 179ndash203 118 A Eșanu V Eșanu Filip Moldoveanulhellip p 179 note 617 119 A I Gonța Documente privind istoria Romacircniei A Moldova Veacurile XIVndashXVII

(1384ndash1625) Indicele numelor de persoană ed by I Caproșu Bucharest 1995 p 472 120 Letopisețul anonim al Moldovei in Cronicile slavo-romacircne din sec XVndashXVI publicate

de Ion Bogdan ed by P P Panaitescu Bucharest 1959 pp 8ndash9 17 Бистицкая летопись

1359ndash1507 гг in Славяно-молдавские летописи XVndashXVI вв состав Ф А Грекул отв ред

В И Буганов ed by F A Grecul chief editor V I Buganov Moscow 1976 p 28

Victor Spinei 26

78

Bogdan on the other side of the Milcov River in 1481 and 1507 respectively121

When the chronicle referred to Radu cel Frumos (the Handsome) (1462ndash1475 with

three interruptions) he was mentioned as ldquoruler of Ungrovlachiaˮ (

)122 While for Wallachia several names were used which

suggests an access to different information sources its population was designated

only by the ethnonym 123

Elaborated at the beginning of the sixteenth century by a German who had

lived in Moldavia for a while the Moldavian-German Chronicle (Cronica moldo-

germană) mentioned the neighboring voivodeship between the Southern

Carpathians and the Danube several times according to the local terminology ie

Muntenia spelled with slight differences Monthan Montenia Montienen

Monthieni Montene Montynen Montenen124 The munteni (the inhabitants of

Muntenia Wallachia) were also designated according to the terminology

employed in Moldavia Monthyen Monthienen Montynen125 In the Annals of

Putna I (Letopisețul de la Putna nr I) the ethnonym Muntenian

)126 was used as well Nevertheless for their ruler Radu

the Handsome the variant was preferred127

Although composed in the same religious institution and showing many

resemblances with the aforementioned chronicle the Annals of Putna II

(Letopisețul de la Putna nr II) contains some differences While the name

Muntenian ()128 was spelled identically for the countryrsquos name the term

Ougrovlachia was not used anymore it was replaced by Muntenia Country

)129 In the Romanian translation of a

version of the Putna Annals made around 1770 the voivodeship right of the

Milcov River was called Țara Muntenească130

In the Moldavian-Polish Chronicle (Cronica moldo-polonă) written in

Polish at the beginning of the second half of the sixteenth century by an

anonymous author settled probably temporarily in the Eastern Carpathian regions

121 Letopisețul anonimhellip pp 10 13 19 22 Бистицкая летописьhellip pp 30 34 122 Letopisețul anonimhellip pp 13 22 Бистицкая летописьhellip p 34 123 Letopisețul anonimhellip pp 9 10 18 19 Бистицкая летописьhellip pp 29 30 124 O Goacuterka Cronica epocii lui Ștefan cel Mare (1457ndash1499) Bucharest 1937 pp 115 117

119 120 124 128 Молдавско-немецкая летопись 1457ndash1499 гг in Славяно-молдавские

летописиhellip pp 38ndash40 125 O Goacuterka Cronica epocii lui Ștefan cel Marehellip pp 119 124 Молдавско-немецкая

летописьhellip pp 40 42 126 Letopisețul de la Putna nr I in Cronicile slavo-romacircnehellip pp 44 45 49 50 Путнянская

I летопись 1359ndash1526 гг in Славяно-молдавские летописи pp 63 64 127 Letopisețul de la Putna nr I pp 46 51 Путнянская I летописьhellip p 66 128 Letopisețul de la Putna nr II in Cronicile slavo-romacircnehellip pp 56 61 Путнянская II

летопись 1359ndash1518 гг in Славяно-молдавские летописи p 69 129 Letopisețul de la Putna nr II pp 58 63ndash64 Путнянская II летописьhellip pp 71ndash72 130 Traducerea romacircnească a letopisețului de la Putna in Cronicile slavo-romacircnehellip p 72


79

who was inspired by the Slavonic annals elaborated in Moldavia the name Țara

Muntenească was transcribed Multansky Moltansky Ziemie or Ziemie Multansky

and munteni became Multany According to medieval Polish linguistic customs

Moldavia Country (Țara Moldovei) was called Wallachian Country (Țara Volohă)

Ziemie Woloskiej Volosky131 Meanwhile in the Serbian-Moldavian Chronicle

(Cronica sacircrbo-moldovenească) that referred to events taking place in the period

1359ndash1512 and that was written in the first half of the sixteenth century for

Wallachia the designations [] and 132 employed in the

Balkan-Slavic regions and in Wallachia were used In the Old Slavic text from the

sixteenth century displayed on the interior wall of the monastery church in

Bucovăț (Coșuna) near Craiova Wallachia was indicated by means of an almost

identical name ie 133

A particular manner for designating the voivodeship south of the River

Milcov is found in the chronicle elaborated in the first years of the second half of

the sixteenth century by Macarie Bishop of Roman who discussed the history of

Moldavia between 1504 and 1551 thoughtfully ldquoso that the things that happened

would not be covered in the tomb of oblivionrdquo134 For Wallachia the high hierarch

used the term ldquoCountry Beyond the Mountainsrdquo )135 a

translation of Terra Transalpina a variant imposed by the Angevin authorities

adopted also by the Wallachian chancery service in the documents with foreign

destinations or for the Catholic communities in this voivodeship Macarie

mentioned Radu the Great (1495ndash1508) as 136 he claims

that the horrible famine during the reign of Ștefan Lăcustă (Stephen Locust)

(1538ndash1540) would have affected ldquothe entire countries of Moldavia and Zagorskrdquo

)137 he registers the fact that after

having received the approval of the Porte to return to the throne of Moldavia Petru

Rareș would have stopped in ldquoBrăila of the Transalpine Wallachian peoplerdquo

)138

Hieromonk Efitimie was the pupil of Macarie and the continuator of the first

part of his chronicle He was assigned by Alexander Lăpușneanu (1552ndash1561

1564ndash1568) with the task of writing down the events that had taken place in

131 Cronica moldo-polonă in Cronicile slavo-romacircnehellip pp 167ndash187 Молдавско-польская

летопись 1352ndash1564 гг in Славяно-молдавские летописиhellip pp 105ndash124 132 Cronica sacircrbo-moldovenească in Cronicile slavo-romacircnehellip pp 190 192 Славяно-

молдавская летопись 1359ndash1512 гг in Славяно-молдавские летописиhellip p 60 133 Cronica murală de la mănăstirea Bucovăț in Cronicile slavo-romacircnehellip pp 195ndash196 134 Macarie Cronica in Cronicile slavo-romacircnehellip p 90 135 Ibidem pp 78ndash79 92ndash93 Славяно-молдавская летопись Макария 1504ndash1551 гг

in Славяно-молдавские летописиhellip pp 76 78 136 Macarie Cronica pp 77 91 Славяно-молдавская летопись Макария hellip p 75 137 Macarie Cronica pp 87 102 Славяно-молдавская летопись Макария hellip p 88 138 Macarie Cronica pp 87 102 Славяно-молдавская летопись Макарияhellip p 89

Victor Spinei 28

80

Moldavia during the period 1541-1554 Eftimie also wrote about the ldquoreign over

Zagorskrdquo ) received by Petrașcu cel Bun (the Good)

(1554ndash1557) following the military intervention of Alexander Lăpușneanu

requested by Sultan Suumlleyman I the Magnificent139 For Wallachia the same

chronicler also used the name ldquoUgrovlachiardquo ) when referring to

the reign of Radu Paisie (1535ndash1545)140 and to the first reign of Mircea Ciobanul

(the Shepherd) (1545ndash1552)141

The same toponymic options were adopted in another official Moldavian chronicle composed in Middle Bulgarian authored by Monk Azarie and elaborated following the order of Petru Șchiopul (Peter the Lame) It continued the complete structure of Macariersquos chronicle and focused on the events between 1551 and 1574

Thus for designating Wallachia the terms ldquoUgrovlachiardquo )142 as

well as ldquoCountry Beyond the Mountainsrdquo )143 were used Mihnea

cel Rău (the Bad) (1508ndash1509) was called 144

The Annals of the Moldavian Country (Letopisețul Țăracirci Moldovei) attributed to Grigore Ureche (c 1590ndash1647) is greatly superior to all the above-mentioned chronicles which are common annals It exceeds them with regard to the amplitude documentation and consistency of its commentaries This work remained unfinished and the original version did not reach us We only have several copies containing interpolations from the second half of the seventeenth century and the beginning of the next century owed to Simion Dascălul (Daacuteskalos Church Singer) Misail Călugărul (the Monk) and Axinte Uricariul (the Clerk) The issue concerning the identity of its author has caused controversies among specialists and it seems like there is no consensus on these views Some of the scholars are inclined to believe that the transmitted version belonged to Nestor Ureche145 Grigore Urechersquos father or to Simion Dascălul146 while others think that Grigore Ureche wrote his work in Old Slavic and Simion Dascălul was his compiler and translator147 thus putting together the first chronicle in Romanian In

139 Eftimie Cronica in Cronicile slavo-romacircnehellip pp 116 125 Славяно-молдавская

летопись Евфимия 1541ndash1554 гг in Славяно-молдавские летописиhellip p 103 140 Eftimie Cronica pp 109 117 Славяно-молдавская летопись Евфимияhellip p 94 141 Eftimie Cronica pp 115 124 Славяно-молдавская летопись Евфимияhellip p 102 142 Azarie Cronica in Cronicile slavo-romacircnehellip pp 134 137 146 150 Славяно-

молдавская летопись Азария 1551ndash1574 гг in Славяно-молдавские летописиhellip pp 133 137 143 Azarie Cronica pp 134 137 145 150 Славяно-молдавская летопись Азарияhellip

pp 132 137 144 Azarie Cronica pp 137 150 Славяно-молдавская летопись Азарияhellip p 137 145 V Eșanu Dimitrie Cantemir cu privire la paternitatea și valoarea informativă a

bdquoHronicului lui Ureche Vorniculrdquo in Istorie și cultură In honorem academician Andrei Eșanu

ed by C Manolache coord by Gh Cojocaru I Cereteu Chișinău 2018 pp 129ndash163 146 C Giurescu Noi contribuțiuni la studiul cronicilor moldovene in Idem Studii de istorie

ed by D C Giurescu Bucharest 1993 pp 173ndash194 147 N A Ursu Letopisețul Țării Moldovei pacircnă la Aron Vodă opera lui Simion Dascălul (I)

and (II) in Anuarul Institutului de Istorie și Arheologie bdquoA D Xenopolrdquo XXVI 1989 1


81

disagreement with the previously mentioned opinions are those of the medievalists who qualitatively differentiate between the supposedly balanced core of the annals and the often unclear and simplistic interpolations of Simion Dascălul which plead for the authorship of Grigore Ureche148 In an attempt to reconcile conflicting points of view a ldquopluristratified characterrdquo of the chronicle was suggested Though usually ascribed to Grigore Ureche the contribution of several generations of scholars predating and succeeding the Moldavian vornic has also been acknowledged149 In the Annals of the Moldavian Country the consistently employed term for the Wallachian voivodeship was Țara Muntenească150 while its inhabitants were constantly called munteni151 At the same time the adjective phrases ldquoWallachian princerdquo (domn muntenesc) and ldquoWallachian armyrdquo (oaste muntenească) were currently used152 The toponym Țara Romacircnească was mentioned only once153 however in Misail Călugărulrsquos interpolations it appeared several times154

For the local majority population outside the Carpathian arch in Grigore

Urechersquos Annals the ethnonyms moldoveni (Moldavians) and munteni (Wallachians)

were used and not romacircni (Romanians) the latter one was employed only for

designating their co-nationals in Transylvania In this regard the work contains merely

two passages The first one mentions considerations pertaining to demographic ratios

ldquoIn the Transylvanian Country there are living not only Hungarians but also Saxons

who are very many and there are Romanians everywhere so that the country is

inhabited rather by Romanians than by Hungariansrdquo (Icircn țara Ardealului nu lăcuiescu

numai unguri ce și sași peste samă de mulți și romacircni peste tot locul de mai multu-i

pp 363ndash379 XXVII 1990 pp 73ndash101 C Chelcu Cultura scrisă icircn limba romacircnă icircn Moldova la

mijlocul secolului al XVII-lea Contribuții Iași 2016 pp 149ndash162 148 S Pușcariu Istoria literaturii romacircne Epoca veche ed by M Vulpe Bucharest 1987

pp 95 99ndash102 N Cartojan Istoria literaturii romacircne vechi ed by D Simonescu Bucharest 1980

pp 267ndash282 P P Panaitescu Introducere in Grigore Ureche Letopisețul Țăracirci Moldovei ed by

P P Panaitescu Bucharest 1955 pp 5ndash54 (republished with small changes in Idem Grigore

Ureche in Idem Contribuții la istoria culturii romacircnești ed by S Panaitescu Bucharest 1971

pp 477ndash531) I C Chițimia Izvoarele și paternitatea cronicii lui Grigore Ureche in Idem Probleme

de bază ale literaturii romacircne vechi Bucharest 1972 pp 197ndash271 I Rotaru O istorie a literaturii

romacircne 1 De la origini pacircnă la Europa Luminilor 2nd ed Galați 1994 pp 168ndash177

D Zamfirescu Prefață și studiu in Varlaam Mitropolitul de Țara Moldovei Carte romănească de

invățătură Bucharest 2012ndash2013 p 206 O Cristea Debutul și cristalizarea istoriografiei umaniste

critice și erudite De la cercetarea originilor la formarea conștiinței istorice la romacircni

in Istoriografia romacircnească coord D Radosav (Civilizația romacircnească 22) Bucharest 2019

pp 23ndash25 149 A Eșanu V Eșanu Caracterul pluristratificat al cronicii lui Grigore Ureche in A Eșanu

V Eșanu Lumina cărțiihellip pp 51-59 150 Grigore Ureche Letopisețulhellip pp 59 60 83 88-91 96 97 120 121 128 etc 151 Ibidem pp 64 96ndash98 142 143 153 196 152 Ibidem pp 68 88 91 98 110 128 129 135 etc 153 Ibidem p 129 154 Ibidem pp 93 94 (Misail Călugărul)

Victor Spinei 30

82

țara lățită de romacircni decacirctu de unguri) The second paragraph reflects the explicitly

exposed awareness regarding the ethnic identity of the neo-Latin populations on both

sides of the Carpathians and their common Roman origin ldquoAll Romanians inhabiting

the Hungarian Country and Transylvania and Maramureș come from the same place as

the Moldavians and all of them come from Romerdquo (Rumacircnii cacircți se află lăcuitori la

Țara Ungurească și la Ardeal și la Maramoroșu de la un loc sacircntu cu moldoveacuteni și

toți de la Racircm să trag)155 On the contrary in an interpolation owed to Simion

Dascălul taken from some lost anonymous Moldavian annals evoking the legendary

foundation of the Romanian state east of the Carpathians the spreading of the Russians

throughout the northern half of the voivodeship as a result of the colonization initiated

by beekeeper Ețco was mentioned It was claimed that the Romanians (rumacircnii) who

were guided by the ldquodismountingrdquo hunters from Maramureș had spread over

its southern half156 According to the wording used by the interpolator the Moldavians

were speaking and writing in Romanian (limba rumacircnească romacircnească)

hellipsă zice rumacircnește157 hellippre limba romacircnească158 The terminology in Romanian (icircn

rumacircneacutește) was also discussed by the Serbian Gheorghe Brancovici159

Miron Costin (1633ndash1691) Grigore Urechersquos gifted successor referred to

Țara Muntenească160 dozens of times throughout his annals dedicated to the history

of Moldavia from Aron Vodă (the Voivode) to the year 1675 and he called its

inhabitants munteni161 Țara Rumacircnească was mentioned only once162 in a

sentence in which the name Țara Muntenească appeared as well so that it is quite

possible for the author to have used the first term for reasons of stylistic accuracy

in order to avoid repetition of the same choronym In another writing authored by

him which is a short excursus concerning the history of Hungary a translation

polished according to the work of Lorenz Toumlppelt (Laurentius Toppeltinus)

(c 1640ndashc 1670) dedicated to Transylvania the voivodeship between the

Southern Carpathians and the Danube was named Țara Muntenească163 The term

Valachia was also mentioned but only in the translation of a letter of Sultan

Suumlleyman I the Magnificent164

155 Ibidem p 124 156 Ibidem pp 64ndash65 (Simion Dascălul) 157 Ibidem p 62 (Simion Dascălul) 158 Ibidem p 164 (Simion Dascălul) 159 Gheorghe Brancovici Cronica sloveacutenilor Illiriculuihellip pp 42ndash43 160 Miron Costin Leacutetopisețulŭ țăricirci Moldovei de la Aaron Vodă incoace in Idem Opere

ed by P P Panaitescu Bucharest 1958 pp 41 43 47ndash52 54 55 62 63 91 92 97 101

105ndash107 113ndash118 120 121 147ndash151 156 168ndash171 174 176 178 179 181 182 184ndash187

190 193ndash195 161 Ibidem pp 97 114 153 199 etc 162 Ibidem p 171 163 Miron Costin Istorie de crăiia ungurească in Idem Opere ed by P P Panaitescu

pp 306 307 311 313 164 Ibidem p 291


83

Even though incompletely and with spelling errors Miron Costin was the

first Romanian scholar who enumerated the ethnonyms assigned to Romanians by

foreigners and he inserted them into a synthesis work on the history of Moldavia

and Wallachia written in Polish One of its initial chapters influenced by the

Saxon scholar Lorenz Toumlppelt contains theses pertaining to the genesis of the

Romanian people which are regarded as axiomatic The ethnonym rumacircn derived

from the Latin word Romanus was the only term by which the Romanians

designated themselves along time in all the three Lands they inhabited Muntenia

Wallachia Moldavia and Transylvania (Multana Wołosza Mołdawa

Siedmiogroacuted) However foreigners named them differently Germans called

Italians Wallios and Moldavians and Wallachians Walaskos Hungarians called

Italians Ołach and Moldavians and Wallachians Ołasz Poles called Italians

Włoch and Moldavians and Wallachians Wołoszyn Greeks called Wallachians

Uhrowłach and Moldavians Bogdanowłach Turks called Wallachians Karawłach

or Ifliak and Moldavians Bogdanami165 The close form of the names assigned to

Italians and Romanians by Germans Hungarians and Poles remarked by several

European scholars including Miron Costin represented a proof for the fact that the

two peoples were considered related This conclusion resulted from the direct

observations expressed by the representatives of the enumerated peoples during

encounters in the neighboring areas they inhabited As revealed by Latin-

Hungarian and Kiev chronicles when the Hungarian tribes entered the Pannonian

Plain and Transylvania they had clashes with the Romanian-Slavic state entities166

and their first incursions westwards regarded Italian and German territories167 This

was an opportunity for observing the linguistic resemblances between these

peoples

Miron Costinrsquos son and successor Nicolae (1660ndash1712) manifested the

same reticence in using the name Țara Rumacircnească like his Moldavian

predecessors in the seventeenth century In the Annals of the Moldavian Country

from the Making of the World Until the Year 1601 (Letopisețul Țării Moldovei de

165 Miron Costin Chronika Ziem Mołdawskich i Multańskich in Idem Latopis Ziemi

Mołdawskiej i inne utwory historyczne transl and ed by I Czamańska Poznań 1998 p 263

Cf also Idem Cronica țărilor Moldovei și Munteniei [Cronica polonă] in Idem Opere ed by

P P Panaitescu p 207 166 Anonymi Bele Regis Notarii Gesta Hungarorum Anonymus notary of King Beacutela

The deeds of the Hungarians ed and transl by M Rady and L Veszpreacutemy in Anonymus and Master

Roger Budapest-New York 2010 pp 58ndash65 Повесть временных лет I Текст и перевод

подготовка текста Д С Лихачева [ed by D S Likhachev] перевод Д С Лихачева и

Б А Романова [transl by D S Likhachev and B A Romanov] под ред В П Адриановой-

Перетц [ed by V P Adrianova-Peretz] Moscow-Leningrad 1950 pp 10 11 31 167 R Luumlttich Ungarnzuumlge in Europa im 10 Jahrhundert Berlin 1910 pp 41ndash170 G Fasoli

Le incursioni ungare in Europa nel secolo X Firenze 1945 pp 91ndash224 G Kristoacute Die

Arpadenynastie Die Geschichte Ungarns von 895 bis 1301 Budapest 1993 pp 19ndash31

M G Kellner Die Ungarneinfaumllle im Bild der Quellen bis 1150 Von der bdquoGens detestandardquo zur

bdquoGens ad fidem Christi conversardquo Munich 1997 pp 16ndash25 97ndash174

Victor Spinei 32

84

la zidirea lumii pacircnă la 1601) this choronym appeared only once168 and in the

annals evoking the events during the years 1709ndash1711 only twice169 although he

lived in exile for a few months at the court of Constantin Bracircncoveanu where this

term predominated in official documents and chronicles The option for the almost

general use of the name Țara Muntenească by Nicolae Costin in his first170 as well

as in his second work171 was also favored by Ion Neculce (1672ndash1746) in his

annals on the Moldavian Country172 Besides this term the chronicler used Țara

Rumănească173 and Țara Romacircnească174 towards the end of his work and

sporadically In the extensive compilation of the Wallachian and Moldavian annals

composed around the middle of the first half of the eighteenth century by Axinte

Uricariul (c 1670ndashc 1733) the name Țara Munteniască was preferred175 but Țara

Romacircniască (seldom spelled as Țara Rumacircniască) was also used quite often176

The repeated quotation of the latter choronym was not favored by contemporary

Moldavian chroniclers and it was the result of adopting the terminology from the

Wallachian sources the author had reproduced or summarized

In the Romanian version of his ambitious synthesis on the origin and history

of his people which he elaborated during his exile in Russia after having written it

in Latin Dimitrie Cantemir (1673ndash1723) observed the same rules for designating

the Wallachian state entity so he obviously preferred Țara Muntenească (including

Muntenia and Țara Munteniei)177 to the detriment of Țara Romacircnească178

However we greatly owe Dimitrie Cantemir the generalization of the term

ldquoRomanian Landsrdquo ie țările romacircne179 for all the regions around the Lower

Danube inhabited by neo-Latin communities In the works written in Latin and

Russian the illustrious scholar used the term Valachia180 and Валахия181

168 Nicolae Costin Letopisețul Țării Moldovei de la zidirea lumii pacircnă la 1601 in Idem

Scrieri I ed by S Korolevschi Chișinău 1990 p 78 169 Idem Letopisețul Țării Moldovei (1709ndash1711) in Idem Scrieri I pp 342 401 170 Idem Letopisețul Țării Moldovei de la zidirea lumiihellip pp 67 68 78 85 94 95 107 136

141ndash146 152 153 179ndash181 190 201 202 225 etc 171 Idem Letopisețul Țării Moldovei (1709ndash1711) pp 337 338 340 345 355 358 etc 172 Ion Neculce Letopisețul Țării Moldovei de la Dabija-Vodă pacircnă la a doua domnie a lui

Constantin Mavrocordat in Idem Letopisețul Țării Moldovei și O samă de cuvinte ed by I Iordan

Bucharest 1955 pp 124 125 127 130 139 140 141 148 149 152 153 155ndash159 162 163

165ndash169 171 172 175 177ndash182 184ndash188 193 etc 173 Ibidem pp 339 347 348 351 174 Ibidem pp 353 382 399 175 Axinte Uricariul Cronica paralelă a Țării Romacircnești și a Moldovei I ed by G Ștrempel

Bucharest 1993 pp 14 15 62 64 65 68 69 75 109 110 118 123 127 128 133 139 144 etc 176 Ibidem pp 1 5 14 15 31 50 55 118 131 136 etc 177 Dimitrie Cantemir Hronicul vechimei a romano-moldo-vlahilor ed by S Toma

Bucharest I 1999 II 2000 passim 178 Ibidem I pp 190 271 II pp 16 158 179 Ibidem I p 158 II pp 33 150 180 Demetrii Cantemiri Descriptio antiqvi et hodierni statvs Moldaviaelig Dimitrie Cantemir

Descrierea Moldovei transl by Gh Guțu Bucharest 1973 pp 50ndash51 60ndash61 74ndash75 88ndash89


85

respectively for designating Wallachia in accordance with the terminology adopted

by the European scholarly world He explained its meaning to readers with a rather

limited cultural horizon as follows ldquoIn our language Valachia is called Țara

Romacircneascărdquo (Valahia carele icircn limba noastră să dzice Țara Romacircnească)182 In

the texts composed in Russian the scholar also used the names Мунтянское

Мултянское кнltяgtжество183 or Мултянское земля184 which are close to the

Romanian terminology We owe Dimitrie Cantemir the first Romanian historian of

international dimension the use of several original ethnonyms as romano-dachi

romano-moldo-vlahi romano-vlahi and vlaho-romani as well as the syntagma

Romano-Moldo-Vlahiia185 All of them are significant for his views regarding the

genesis of the Romanian people which he exposed based on a rigorous and

insightful analysis of the documents Unfortunately due to his exile and the fact

that the majority of his works appeared posthumously and were not elaborated in

the local language they had a limited circulation in the Romanian regions and did

not influence the evolution of historiography in the principalities in which the

increasing Ottoman domination and the seize of the main political positions by the

Phanariote clans created obstacles for the development of national culture

In the documents issued until the end of the seventeenth century by the

Moldavian chancery services there was no consistency in designating the

neighboring Romanian voivodeship The terminological options varied depending

on whether the recipient of the documents was located inside the country or abroad

Already since the last years of the fourteenth century as mentioned before the

term Basarab was used only in documents with external destinations Besides this

starting with the second half of the fifteenth century the name Țara Basarabeană

was employed in external and internal documents

Internal documents reveal a certain preference for the term Țara

Muntenească186 but this province was also called Țara Romacircnească187 In the

100ndash101 140ndash145 162ndash163 194ndash195 302ndash303 308ndash309 366ndash367 372ndash373 Demetrii principis

Cantemirii Incrementorvm et decrementorvm avlae Othman[n]icae sive Aliothman[n]icae historiae a

prima gentis origine ad nostra vsqve tempora dedvctae libri tres ed by D Slușanschi Timișoara 2001

pp 228 248 255 285 290 311 323 340 349 389 391 395 441 458 463 465 473 505 506 181 Dimitrie Cantemir Краткое сказание оltбgt изкоренении Бранковановой и

Кантакузиных фамилий ed by A Lazea Scurtă povestire despre stacircrpirea familiilor lui

Bracircncoveanu și a Cantacuzinilor transl by E Lazea in Idem Opere complete VI II ed by

P Cernovodeanu in collab with A Lazea E Lazea and M Caratașu Bucharest 1996 pp 76ndash101 182 Idem Hronicul vechimeihellip I p 271 183 Idem Краткое сказаниеhellip pp 76ndash77 82ndash83 Idem Уведомления которые донес нам

посланной наш с пашпортом Его Цltаgtрского Величества в Трансилванию 1716 году

сентября 19 дня возвративыйжеся к нам в 1717 году февраля 3 дня in Idem Opere complete

VI II pp 218ndash219 184 Idem Уведомленияhellip pp 218ndash221 185 Idem Hronicul vechimeihellip I II passim 186 Acte din secolul al XVI-lea (1517ndash1612) relative mai ales la domnia și viața lui Petru-Vodă

Șchiopul ed by N Iorga (Documente privitoare la istoria romacircnilor collected by Eudoxiu de Hurmuzaki

Victor Spinei 34

86

summer of 1600 when Michael the Brave united the three Romanian Lands under

his scepter in the few documents issued in Iași in which his prerogatives were

enumerated Wallachiarsquos name was not written in the form preferred in

Moldavia but in the usual one at the rulerrsquos chancery in Tacircrgoviște ie ldquoȚara

Ugrovlahieirdquo ()

) 188 or

189 This intitulatio greatly resembled

that of the documents issued by Michael the Brave in Alba Iulia and Gura Teleajenului

in July August and September 1600190 It is possible that the ruler was accompanied to

the annexed provinces by the personnel of the Wallachian chancery The term

Ugrovlachia (Οὐγγροβλαχία) was used among other instances in a document

concerning a donation for a monastery in Sozopol on the Black Sea coast of Bulgaria

issued in Greek on October 24 1624 by Radu Mihnea during his second reign over

Moldavia191

Occasionally the name Țara Romacircnească is also found in the notes inscribed

on the old books circulating in Moldavia however these had no official character

as was the case with the rulerrsquos documents Dating from the sixteenth and

seventeenth centuries their content includes the following terms

(1575)192 Ungrovlahia (1598)193

(1625)194 [](1629ndash1630)195 Țara Muntiniască (1680)196

XI) Bucharest 1900 p 908 M Costăchescu (ed) Documente moldovenești icircnainte de Ștefan cel Mare II

p 199 note 19 Documente privitoare la istoria orașului Iași I Acte interne (1408ndash1660) ed by I Caproșu

and P Zahariuc Iași 1999 no 108 pp 149ndash150 no 427 p 486 Documente privitoare la istoria orașului

Iași II Acte interne (1661ndash1690) ed by I Caproșu Iași 2000 no 258 p 228 no 455 p 412 Documente

privitoare la istoria orașului Iași III Acte interne (1691ndash1725) ed by I Caproșu Iași 2000 no 5 p 3

Documenta Catholicorum Moldaviae A Documente romacircnești I Fondul Episcopiei Romano-Catolice Iași 1

(1627ndash1750) ed by S Văcaru and A Despinescu Iași 2002 no 17 p 73 Documente romacircnești din arhiva

mănăstirii Xiropotam de la Muntele Athos Catalog I ed by F Marinescu I Caproșu P Zahariuc Iași 2005

no 45 p 41 no 140 p 85 no 144 p 88 D Agache Urice inedite de la Ștefan cel Mare și Petru Rareș

Valoare documentară și valențe istorice I Iași 2018 no VIII 7 (3) pp 313ndash314 187 Documente privitoare la istoria orașului Iași II no 378 p 350 Documente romacircnești din arhiva

mănăstirii Xiropotam hellip no 136 p 83 no 164 p 98 D Agache Urice ineditehellip no VIII 10 (4) p 383 188 Documenta Romaniae Historica B Țara Romacircnească XI no 382 p 529 no 401 p 552

no 408 p 561 189 Documenta Romaniae Historica B Țara Romacircnească XI no 388 p 535 no 389 p 536

no 407 p 560 Documente privitoare la istoria orașului Iași I no 49ndash50 pp 71ndash74 190 Documenta Romaniae Historica B Țara Romacircnească XI no 402 p 553 no 406

pp 559ndash560 no 412 p 564 no 414 no 565 no 418 pp 568ndash569 191 Documente privitoare la istoria orașului Iași I no 158 pp 209ndash210 192 Icircnsemnări de pe manuscrise și cărți vechi din Țara Moldovei Un corpus I (1429ndash1750)

ed by I Caproșu and E Chiaburu Iași 2008 p 87 193 Ibidem p 108 194 Ibidem p 177 195 Ibidem p 184 196 Ibidem p 288


87

Țara Muntenească (1680)197 Țara Romacircnească (after 1682ndash16861687)198

Another note mentions the ldquoMetropolitan Bishop of Ungrovlachiardquo (mitropolitul de

Ungrovlahia) (1682)199

After studying the Wallachian chronicles written in Romanian in the last

decades of the seventeenth century and the beginning of the eighteenth century

we can easily observe the clear preference for the variant Țara Rumacircnească a

name with a local origin deriving from the ethnonym assigned by the locals to

themselves200 This terminology reflects the identity shaping of the Wallachian

communities Being the oldest neo-Latin entity on the left bank of the Lower

Danube with a distinct state the people between the Southern Carpathians and

the Danube was fully entitled to officialize its toponym based on the name of

its ethnicity Given the fact that in Moldavia the annals and chronicles that

have reached us are older than those preserved in Wallachia we know the name

adopted by the Romanians living east of the Carpathians for their brethren on

the right bank of the Milcov River which was partially different already since

the last decades of the fifteenth century In that period there was no

terminological consistency in designating the territories outside the

Carpathians and names of different origins co-existed Thus at certain

moments in the Moldavian annals composed in Old Slavic Wallachia was

named Basarabia Ugrovlahia Țara Muntenească Muntenia Vlaška Zemlia

Țara Romacircnească Zagorskyia Zemlia Once chronicles began to be written in

the national language the Wallachian voivodeship was preferentially

designated by the choronym Țara Muntenească and only seldom by Țara

Romacircnească although the chroniclers in the neighboring country preferred the

latter term In Moldavian chancery documents the terms used for Wallachia

were Țara Muntenească and less frequently Țara Romacircnească while in the

notes written on religious books the toponym Ungrovlachia was kept as well

The Moldavian intellectual circles did not dare to call their own voivodeship

Țara Romacircnească and they were at the same time reluctant to use it for

designating the Wallachians Nevertheless many Moldavian scholars were

certainly aware of the fact that the territory of their state was also a Romanian

Land like Muntenia

197 Ibidem p 289 198 Ibidem p 298 199 Ibidem p 294 200 For other aspects concerning the terminology of Wallachia in the Middle Ages and the

modern era cf M Coman Putere și teritoriu Țara Romacircnească medievală (secolele XIVndashXVI)

Bucharest 2013 pp 52ndash77 D Ursprung Raumvorstellungen und Landesbewusstsein die Walachei

als Name und Raumkonzept im historischen Wandel in Das Suumldosteuropa der Regionen ed by

O J Schmitt and M Metzeltin Vienna 2015 pp 486ndash490 516ndash539 M Metzeltin Rumaumlnien Das

Werden eines Staatsnamens in Walchen Romani und Latinihellip pp 213ndash217

Victor Spinei 36

88

On the account of avoiding confusions and marking its individuality for the


century under the name Valachia or one of its derivatives the term Moldavia was

adopted Its oldest occurrence spelled as terra Moldauana is found in a document

issued on March 20 1360 by Louis I of Anjou according to which Dragoș son of

Gyula received six Romanian villages in Maramureș as compensation for his

services brought to the Crown during the conflicts with the rebellious Romanians

east of the Carpathians201 The name derives from the homonymous river Moldavia

in the northwestern part of the voivodeship in its basin the center of the future

Romanian state was coagulated202 In 1360 this region was called Moldauana

which is close to the German form of this hydronym namely Moldau This is

certainly no accident In medieval chronicles the oldest usage of this name written

as terra Moldaviae appeared in the work of John of Tacircrnava (Kuumlkuumlllei Jaacutenos) (c

1320ndash1393) a member of the clerus and the biographer of Louis I Its text

elaborated during the period 1382ndash1393 was inserted into the chronicles of Buda

(1473)203 Dubnitz (after 1479)204 and into that authored by John of Thuroczy

(Thuroacuteczy Jaacutenos Johannes de Thurocz) (1487)205 The original manuscript was

lost

The circles around the Angevin Court played a decisive part in imposing the

name of this voivodeship at European scale but there are reasons for assuming its

earlier local use When evoking the great invasion of 1241 in Eastern and Central

Europe several Russian206 and Polish207 chronicles dating from the sixteenth and

seventeenth centuries described the passing of the Mongolian hordes through

Moldavia However it is quite doubtful whether this regionrsquos name was already

used since that time The examination of the sources available to the authors of the

respective works leads us to the idea that it is quite probable for them to have

adopted the toponyms used in the times the chronicles were elaborated The use of

201 Documentehellip Hurmuzaki I 2 no XLIV p 61 Documenta Romaniae Historica D I

no 41 p 76 202 Regarding the territorial extension and the forms of administrative organization of

Moldavia during its first rulers cf C Burac Ținuturile Țării Moldovei pacircnă la mijlocul secolului al

XVIII-lea Bucharest 2002 pp 23ndash56 203 Chronicon Budense p 337 204 Chronicon Dubnicense p 91 205 Johannes de Thurocz Chronica Hungarorum I p 196 206 Супрасльскій списокъ in Полное собраниеhellip XVII col 26 Густинская летопись

in Полное собраниеhellip II Sanktpetersburg 1843 p 339 Никифоровская летопись in Полное

собраниеhellip 35 p 27 207 Mathias de Miechow Tractatus de duabus Sarmatiis Asiana et Europiana et de contentis

in eis Матвей Меховский Трактат о двух Сарматиях перевод и коммент С А Аннинский

transl and ed by S A Anninskii Moscow-Leningrad 1936 p 131


89

the terms principatus and terra Moldawiae208 or Moldavia209 is unsure but not

impossible in the sources available to Jan Długosz (1415ndash1480) because in two

different works he described the 1359 battles for the throne They were outlined by

the renowned Polish scholar about a century after the actual events

The adoption of the alternative name for Moldavia by the Chancery of the Apostolic See attested beginning with August 1370 contributed to its

generalization in the diplomatic language of that era In the document of 1370 in which Lațcu the countryrsquos ruler was called dux Moldaviensis partium seu nationis

Wlachie210 the countryrsquos inhabitants were named Wallachians Romanians (vlahi romacircni) while their state entity was designated as Moldavia For avoiding eventual

unclarities regarding the terminology relating to the state only a few decades after its foundation in some documents issued in the first years of the reign of

Sigismund of Luxembourg King of Hungary it was considered useful to highlight the terminological identity between Valachia (Wolachya Walachya Volachia)

minor and terra Mulduana (Moldauia Molduana)211

The Princely Chancery followed the diplomatic language adopted by the Angevin and Papal chanceries so that in the oldest diploma that has reached us

issued on May 1 1384 Petru Mușat (Peter Mushat) entitled himself dux Terre Moldavie212 At the same time the first local coin emissions assigned to the same

ruler contained the following circular inscription SIM PETRI WOIWODI SI MOLDAVIENSIS an abbreviation for Sigillum Petri woiwodi sigillum

Moldaviensis Besides this type of coins there had also been issued a very limited number of coins with legends in German On such pieces issued by Petru and

Ștefan Mușat Moldaviarsquos name was rendered as MOLDERLANG ltrecte MOLDERLANDgt213 an initiative probably due to the German masters working in

208 Joannis Długossii seu Longini canonici Cracoviensis Historiae Polonicae libri XII III

Libri IX X ed by A Przezdziecki (=Joannis Długosz senioris canonici Cracoviensis Opera omnia

ed by A Przezdziecki XII) Cracoviae 1876 pp 277ndash278 Ioannis Dlugossi Annales seu Cronicae

incliti regni Poloniae [V] Liber nonus ed by D Turkowska adiutrice M Kowalczyk Warsaw

1978 pp 299-300 209 Joannes Długosz Vita Sbignei cardinalis et episcopi Cracoviensis ed by I Polkowski and

Z Pauli (=Joannis Dlugosii senioris canonici Cracoviensis Opera omnia ed by A Przezdziecki I)

Cracoviae 1887 p 552 210 Documentehellip Hurmuzaki I 2 no CXXIV p 160 Bullarium Franciscanum VI ed by

C Eubel Romae 1902 no 1096 p 443 211 Documentehellip Hurmuzaki I 2 no CCCIV p 362 no CCCVI p 365 Acte și scrisori din

arhivele orașelor ardelene (Bistrița Brașov Sibiiu) 1358ndash1600 ed by N Iorga (Documente

privitoare la istoria romacircnilor collected by Eudoxiu de Hurmuzaki XV 1) Bucharest 1911 no V

p 4 Documenta Romaniae Historica D I no 81 p 130 no 82 p 130 no 85 p 132 no 86

p 135 no 90 p 144 no 92 p 147 212 M Costăchescu (ed) Documente moldovenești icircnainte de Ștefan cel Mare I Documente

interne Iași 1931 no 2 pp 4ndash5 Documenta Romaniae Historica A Moldavia I ed by

C Cihodaru I Caproșu and L Șimanschi Bucharest 1975 no 1 pp 1ndash2 213 L Bieltz MOLDER LANT ndash o legendă inedită pe monedele emise de Ștefan I ndash 1394ndash1399

in Cercetări numismatice VII 1996 pp 155ndash157 K Pacircrvan Aspects of Moldaviarsquos coinage at the

Victor Spinei 38

90

the mint In the coming decades the coin production was diversified but the Latin inscription on the back of the pieces containing the name of the voivodeship was

kept in most cases even if sometimes the countryrsquos name was misspelled or abbreviated214 The use of the name Moldavia became standard in chancery

documents for internal and external destinations in cartography works as well as in the chronicles written in Old Slavic and in Romanian during the following

centuries215 At the same time in the voivode titles appearing in the inscriptions carved in stone preserved in over twenty churches erected by Stephen the Great216

as well as in those indicating the names of the founders of the sixteenth century

religious buildings217 their high office of ldquoPrince of the Moldavian Countryrdquo (domn al Țării Moldovei) was mentioned The same title appeared in the

inscription of 1479 on an interior wall of Cetatea Albă218 and at the Princely Court in Hacircrlău219 on the stones that Stephen the Great had ordered to be placed on the

tombs of his forefathers and relatives220 as well as on the cover of his swordrsquos handle kept in the patrimony of the Topkapı Museum in Istanbul221

Although the name Moldavia was adopted by influent states in Central and

Western Europe several peoples inhabiting the northwest of this continent (Russians

Poles Lithuanians) continued to designate the area east of the Carpathians by terms

derived from the ethnonym Wallachians volochi wlasi etc These peoples had direct

contacts with the neo-Latin communities living in the region between the Carpathians

and the Dniester River so that they reserved the name Wallachians Romanians for

themselves while adopting other ethnonyms for their co-nationals living in the

neighboring regions This is explained by the fact that the respective name had been

permanently included in the usual vocabulary and in the cultivated literature already

before the foundation of the medieval Moldavian state

end of the fourteenth century in 130 Years Since the Etablishment of the Modern Romanian

Monerary System Bucharest 1997 pp 204ndash214 214 G Buzdugan O Luchian C C Oprescu Monede și bancnotehellip pp 43ndash65

L Dergaciova Monedele moldovenești in Moneda icircn Republica Moldavia coord by A Boldureanu

and E Nicolae Chișinău 2015 pp 133ndash136 147ndash155 215 V Spinei Terminologia politică a spațiului est-carpatic icircn perioada constituirii statului

feudal de sine stătător in Idem Universa Valachica Romacircnii icircn contextul politic internațional de la

icircnceputul mileniului al II-lea Chișinău 2006 pp 297ndash318 Tezaurul toponimic al Romacircniei

Moldavia I 3 Toponimia Moldovei icircn documente scrise icircn limbi străine (exclusiv slavona)

1332ndash1850 ed by M Ciubotaru V Cojocaru G Istrate Iași 2004 pp 104ndash162 D Moldovanu

Toponimia Moldovei icircn cartografia europeană veche (cca 1395-1789) Tezaurul toponimic al

Romacircniei Moldova I 4 Iași 2005 pp 162ndash164 216 Repertoriul monumentelorhellip no 1ndash23 pp 49ndash196 217 G Balș Bisericile moldovenești din veacul al XVI-lea 1527ndash1582 (reprinted from

Buletinul Comisiunii Monumentelor Istorice XXI 55ndash58) Bucharest 1928 passim 218 Repertoriul monumentelorhellip no 35 p 218 219 Repertoriul monumentelorhellip no 41 p 234 220 Repertoriul monumentelorhellip no 52ndash59 pp 248ndash255 no 67ndash68 pp 261ndash262 no 73

pp 267ndash269 no 78 pp 271ndash272 no 80 pp 273ndash274 221 Repertoriul monumentelorhellip no 144 p 388


91

As in Wallachia an important part in imposing the ethnic and geopolitical

terminology in the Romanian-speaking territories on the eastern slopes of the

Carpathians was played by the Patriarchate in the capital of the Byzantine Empire

Despite the irreversible decline of its economic and military potential after the

partitio terrarum imperii Romaniae under the patronage of the Latin Crusaders

which was drastically enhanced by the impetuous Ottoman offensive in the

Balkans the Byzantine state partially kept its authority in the Orthodox world due

to the prestige of the Ecumenical Patriarchate The Constantinople Patriarchate

Chancery was directly involved in the organization process of the superior church

hierarchies in Moldavia and imposed the names Black Wallachia (Μαυροβλαχία)

Russian Wallachia (Ρωσοβλαχία) and Moldavian Wallachia (Μολδοβλαχία) In

the Ekthesis nea (Ἔκθεσις νέα) the consecration of a metropolitan bishop in

Μαυροβλαχία was mentioned an event that took place around 1386222 The name

of the Metropolitan See in Μαυροβλαχία and its leader Jeremiah occured in a

synodal letter of March 1393 signed by Patriarch Antonios and other bishops223 In

the following years the frequency of this name in written documents has increased

The Patriarchate was not consistent regarding the designation of the Metropolitan

See of Moldavia In the documents elaborated in Constantinople beginning with

May 1395 Moldavia also appeared under the name Ρωσοβλαχία for several

years224 The supposition according to which Maurovlachia and Rusovlachia

designated two distinct political units corresponding to the Lower Country (Țara

de Jos) and the Upper Country (Țara de Sus) respectively225 is not based on any

plausible argument The origin of the term Morovlahia remains unclear It is found

in the letter of Sultan Mehmed II dated October 5 lt1455gt in which he

peremptorily demanded from the Prince of Moldavia the annual sum of 2000

golden ducats as warranty for peace In the Slavonic original wording of the letter

Peter Aron was designated as () 226 The name

222 Ἔκθεσις νέα in Σύνταγμαhellip p 502 J Darrouzegraves Ektheacutesis neacuteahellip pp 46ndash47 223 Acta Patriarchatus Constantinopolitani MCCCXV-MCCCCII II ed by F Miklosich and

I Muumlller Vindobonae 1862 no CCXXXV pp 167 170 Actele patriarhiei de la Constantinopol

in Fontes Historiae Daco-Romanae IV pp 232ndash235 224 Acta Patriarchatus Constantinopolitani MCCCXV-MCCCCII II no CCCCLXXXVIII

pp 241ndash245 no DCLXVII pp 528ndash529 Actele patriarhiei de la Constantinopol in Fontes

Historiae Daco-Romanae IV pp 244ndash249 266ndash267 225 P Parasca 600 de ani de la consacrarea Mitropoliei Moldovei in Symposia professorum

(Universitatea Liberă Internațională din Moldova) Seria Istorie Materialele sesiunii științifice din

4ndash5 mai 2001 Chișinău 2001 pp 44ndash46 A Gorodenco Formarea bisericii moldovenești in

Symposia professorum (Universitatea Liberă Internațională din Moldova) Seria Istorie Materialele

sesiunii științifice din 26ndash27 aprilie 2002 Chișinău 2003 pp 92ndash92 226 В А Уляницкий [V A Ulianitskii] Матеріалы для исторіиhellip no 81 p 88

M Costăchescu (ed) Documente moldovenești icircnainte de Ștefan cel Mare II p 801 F Babinger

Cel dintăi bir al Moldovei către sultan in Fraților Alexandru și Ion I Lăpedatu la icircmplinirea vacircrstei

de 60 de ani XIV IX MCMXXXVI Bucharest 1936 pp 29ndash37 Documente turcești privind istoria

Romacircniei I 1455ndash1774 ed by M A Mehmed Bucharest 1976 no 1 p 1 Also see V Panaite

Victor Spinei 40

92

Morovlahia could be an altered form of Μαυροβλαχία as well as a possible

translation of the Turkish name Qara Yiacutelaq likewise designating Black

Wallachia227

The term Μολδοβλαχία was used for the first time by Constantinople Church

Chancery in the text of the synodal decision of July 26 1401 which was of utmost

importance for the reconciliation of the Patriarchate with the Princely Court in

Suceava represented by Alexander the Good228 In this case the chancery service

of Patriarch Matthew proved to be inspired because the word combined the old

name of the territory inhabited by Romanians with that adopted following the

foundation of the state east of the Carpathians It was considered adequate by the

countryrsquos rulers who appropriated it for the official princely title in chancery

documents as early as Alexander the Good229 The prerogatives of the Prince and his

wife were listed in a Slavonic inscription embroidered on the inferior band of a shroud

dating from 1430 which is part of the collections of the Hermitage Museum in

Sankt-Petersburg

[6938]230 (ldquoShroud made in the days of

the devout princes of Moldovlachia Io Alexander Voivode and Marina in the year

1430rdquo)

A more complex title is found in a Greek inscription on a liturgical vestment

(epitrachelion epitrahir) discovered by chance in 1912 in the St Nicholas

Monastery at Ladoga near Novgorod (later handed over to the Alexander Nevski

Monastery in Sankt-Petersburg and transferred to the Hermitage Museum after

World War I) in which Alexander the Good (1400ndash1431) was designated as ldquolord

autocrator of all Moldovlachia (Μολδοβλαχία) and of the Seasiderdquo prerogatives

assigned to his wife Marina too231 A close variant was used for the titles of

Alexander the Good in The Life The Martyrdom of Saint John the New as ruler

over ldquoall of Moldovlachia and Pomoria the Region by the Seasiderdquo

)232 The authorship of this important hagiographic

text which was initially thought to belong to Bishop Gregory Tsamblak Grigore

Pace război și comerț icircn Islam Țările Romacircne și dreptul otoman al popoarelor (secolele XVndashXVII)

Bucharest 1997 pp 152 294 296 399 227 F Babinger Cel dintăi bir al Moldoveihellip p 36 note 1 228 Acta Patriarchatus Constantinopolitani MCCCXV-MCCCCII II no DCXLVII p 494

Actele patriarhiei de la Constantinopol in Fontes Historiae Daco-Romanae IV pp 268ndash273 229 Documenta Romaniae Historica A Moldova I no 41 50 75 93 100 101 195 212 221 230 Н А Маясова [N A Maiasova] Произведения средневекового молдо-влахийского

лицевого шитья в собрании Государственного историко-культурного музея-заповедника

laquoМосковский Кремльraquo in Древнерусское искусство Балканы Русь отв ред А И Комеч

О Е Этингоф [red princ A I Komech O E Etingof] S-Petersburg 1995 pp 528 529 (fig) 231 N Iorga Patrahirul lui Alexandru cel Bun cel dintacirci chip de domn romacircn in Analele

Academiei Romacircne Memoriile Secțiunii Istorice Seria II XXXV 1912ndash1913 p 344 232 Viața Sf Ioan cel Nou de la Suceava ed Melchisedec [Ștefănescu] in Revista pentru

Istorie Arheologie și Filologie II 1884 III p 173


93

Țamblac233 has been contested by newer works234 In a deed dated August 22

1416 outlined in a document kept in the Zographou Monastery at Mount

Athos Alexander the Good and his son Iliaș were mentioned using a termi-

nology close to that employed in the hagiography of Saint John the New

235 however without the

choronym Moldovlachia The confessional duties of the Moldavian Orthodox

higher clergy were naturally exerted in the same territories over which the Prince

had administrative jurisdiction This state of facts was also reflected by the title

attributed to Macarie who was at the helm of the Orthodox Church east of the

Carpathians In an epitaph from 1428 he called himself ldquobishop of Moldovlachia

and Parathalasiardquo236 that is to say ldquoof the Land near the Seardquo in full agreement

with the attributes of voivodal power

The adding of the Pontic coast area to the designation of the country as

found in the princely title was regarded as necessary because the respective lands

had not previously been part of the principalityrsquos initial territory This practice has

similarities to those of dynasts in Central and Western Europe who added the

names of the territories incorporated into their realms throughout time Thus

monarchs of the Arpad and the Angevin dynasties called themselves kings of

Hungary Dalmatia Croatia Rama Serbia Galicia Lodomeria Cumania and

Bulgaria Towards the middle of the eighteenth century Maria Theresia Empress

of the Holy Roman Empire of the House of Habsburg also held the title of Queen

of Hungary Bohemia Dalmatia Croatia Sclavonia Rama Serbia Galicia

233 В Сл Киселковъ [V Sl Kiselkov] Митрополитъ Григорий Цамблакъ Sofia 1943

pp 12ndash13 Ю К Бегунов [Iu K Begunov] laquoМучение Иоанна Новогоraquo Григория Цамблака в

сборнике первой трети XV в из собрания Н П Лихачева in Советское славяноведение 4

1977 pp 48-56 I Petkova Greacutegoire Camblak lrsquoideacutee de lrsquouniteacute orthodoxe in Eacutetudes balkaniques

32 1996 3ndash4 pp 116ndash118 M Cazacu La litterature slavo-roumaine (XVendashXVIIe siegravecles) in Eacutetudes

balkaniques Cahiers Pierre Belon 4 Transmission du patrimoine byzantin et meacutediateacuteurs drsquoideacutentiteacutes

autochtones Paris 1997 pp 89ndash91 Idem Saint Jean le Nouveau son martyre ses reliques et leur

translation agrave Suceava (1415) in Idem Au carrefour des Empires et des mers Eacutetudes drsquohistoire

medievale et moderne ed by E C Antoche and L Cotovanu Bucharest-Brăila 2015 pp 117ndash125 234 P Năsturel Une preacutetendue oeuvre de Greacutegoire Tsamblak bdquoLe martyre de Saint Jean le

Nouveaurdquo in Actes du Premier Congres International des Eacutetudes Balkaniques et Sud-Est

Europeacuteennes VII Litteacuterature etnographie folklore Sofia 1971 pp 345ndash351 (reprinted in Idem

Eacutetudes drsquohistoire byzantine et post-byzantines ed by E C Antoche L Cotovanu I-A Tudorie

Brăila 2019 pp 733ndash740) Șt S Gorovei Mucenicia Sfacircntului Ioan cel Nou Noi puncte de vedere

in Icircnchinare lui Petre Ș Năsturel la 80 de ani ed by I Cacircndea P Cernovodeanu and Gh Lazăr

Brăila 2003 pp 555ndash572 235 Г Р Парпулов Р Клеминсън [G R Parpulov R Cleminson] Румънци и славяни на

Света Гора през 1416 г (Из историята на Сѐлинския скит) in Palaeobulgarica

Старобългаристика XXXV 2011 2 p 60 236 E Turdeanu La broderie religieuse en Roumanie Les eacutepitaphioi moldaves aux XVe et

XVIe siegravecles in Cercetări literare IV 1940 p 203 Șt S Gorovei Icircntemeierea Mitropoliei Moldovei

icircn contextul relațiilor moldo-bizantine in Credință și cultură icircn Moldova II Credință ortodoxă și

unitate bisericească Iași 1995 pp 46ndash47

Victor Spinei 42

94

Lodomeria Cumania Bulgaria as well as that of Archduchess of Austria Mircea

the Elder had done the same therefore at a certain moment his official title was

Voivode of Wallachia Duke of Făgăraș and Amlaș Count of Severin Despot of

the Lands of Dobrotici and Lord of Durostorum237

The merely temporary retention of the name ldquoLand of near the Seardquo

(ldquoParathalasiardquo) in the official title (intitulatio) of the rulers in Suceava during

the rule of Roman Mușat is due to the fact that the area did not represent a

distinct political-administrative entity before it was incorporated into Moldavia

but was only a part of the domain of the Golden Horde The listing of the

coastal tract of land (which basically ensured direct access to the Black Sea)

among the dynastic domains of Roman Mușat and Alexander the Good was

not specific only to the titles of the Moldavian rulers and it reflected an

influence of Slavic West-Balkan diplomacy acquired when geopolitical

realities enabled it

Thus Stephen Nemanja (1166ndash1196) Grand Župan of Serbia the founder of the

Nemanjić dynasty designated himself in a chrysobull granted to the Studenica

Monastery as ldquothe sole ruler of the Country of Serbia and of the Land by the

Seasiderdquo )238 His son and heir

Stephen Prvovenčani (the First-Crowned) Grand Župan and later King of

Serbia (1217ndash1228) appeared in the intitulatio of the official documents

as 239 ldquoThe Land by the

Seasiderdquo etc) was mentioned ndash with small differences

(additions and elisions) ndash in the documents issued in the thirteenth and fourteenth

centuries by the dynasts sitting on Serbiarsquos throne Stephen Vladislav240

(1233ndash1243) Stephen Uroš241 (1243ndash1276) Stephen Uroš II Dragutin242

(1276ndash1316) and Stephen Uroš III Dečanski243 (1322ndash1331) After extending the

kingdomrsquos territories and adopting the title of Tsar Stephen Dušan (1331ndash1355) was

entitled to list other prerogatives in an external document issued in 1345 dei gratia

237 Șt Andreescu Il titolo di Mircea il Vecchio principe di Valacchia qualche appunti in

Laudator temporis acti Studia in memoriam Ioannis A Božilov II Ius imperium potestas litterae

ars et archaeologia ed by I A Biliarsky Serdicae [Sofia] 2018 pp 149ndash155 238 P J Šafařiacutek (ed) Okaacutezky občanskeacuteho piacutesemnictiacute Prague 1870 in Idem Dřevniho

piacutesemnictviacute Jihoslovanův 2nd ed Prague 1873 no I p 93 Зборник средњовековних ћириличких

повеља и писма Србије Босне и Дубровника I 1186ndash1321 приредили В Мошин С Ћирковић

Д Синдик ред Д Синдик [prep of V Mošin S Ćirković D Sindik red by D Sindik] Beograd

2011 no 6 p 62 239 Monumenta Serbicahellip no XVII p 10 В Мошин [V Mošin] Самодржавни Стефан

кнез Лазар и традиција Немањићког суверенитета од Марице до Косова in О кнезу Лазару

ред И Божић В Ј Ћурић [red by I Božić V J Ćurić] Beograd 1975 p 14 16 Зборник

средњовековних ћириличких повељаhellip no 21 p 109 240 Monumenta Serbicahellip no XXXII p 27 241 Ibidem no LXVI LI LII LVII LXII pp 45 47 51 55 65 242 Ibidem no LXXI p 73 243 Ibidem no LXXXIII p 100


95

Serviae Diocliae Chilminiae Zentae Albaniae et maritimae regionis rex244 while in a

Slavonic document of 1348 he simply called himself ldquoTsar and sole ruler of the Serbs

Greeks of the Land by the Seaside and of the Western Countryrdquo

)245

The title previously adopted by Stefan Dušan also contained Bulgaria

while preserving the Land by the Seaside )246 An even more

complete enumeration of the territories under his sway is included in one of the

variants (the Prizren Manuscript transcribed around 1515ndash1525 found in the

collections of the National Library of Serbia in Belgrade) of the famous so-called

Zakonic (Законик) Legal Code written in 1349 at the initiative and under the direct

supervision of the Tsar His title was the following ldquoStefan ltDušangt in Christ our

Lord the blessed Tsar of all Serbs and Greeks and of the Bulgarian parts and of the

entire Western Country of the Land by the Seaside of Frugia and Arbanasirdquo

)247 The same paragraph of the Zakonik also mentioned ldquoŽupan ltStephangt

Uroš III sole lord of the whole Land of Serbia of the Land by the Seasiderdquo

)248

The diplomatic formula of the Serbian dynasts remained for the most part the

same after they were forced to accept Ottoman suzerainty in the last decades of the

fourteenth century In 1378 in a diploma issued in Slavonic Stephen Tvrtko I (Ban of

Bosnia between 1353 and 1377 and King of Bosnia between 1377 and 1391) of the

Kotromanić dynasty was mentioned as 249

while in a Latin documents from 1383 1385 and 1387 he was designated as ldquoKing of

Rascia Bosnia and of the maritime partsrdquo (rex Rassie Bossine maritimarumque

partium)250 (rex Rascie Bossne Marilttimarumque partiumgt)251 (rex Rascie Bosne

244 Acta archivi Veneti Spectantia ad historiam Serborum et reliquorum Slavorum

meridionalium ed by J Schafaacuterik I Beograd 1860 no XVII pp 15ndash16 245 Monumenta Serbicahellip no CXVII p 139 Also see В Мошин [V Mošin] Самодржавни

Стефан кнез Лазарhellip pp 15 17 246 V Gjuzelev Les appellations de la Bulgarie meacutedieacutevale dans les sources historiques

(VIIendashXVe s) in Idem Medieval Bulgaria Byzantine Empire Black Sea ndash Venice ndash Genoa Villach

1988 p 9 247 Codex Imperatoris Stephani Dušani 1349 et 1354 ed and transl by N Radojčić Законик

цара Стефана Душана 1349 и 1354 издао и превео Н Радојчић Beograd 1960 no 201 p 83 248 Ibidem nr 201 p 84 249 Monumenta Serbicahellip no CLXXXI p 190 250 Acta archivi Veneti I no CXLI p 213 251 Д Jечменица [D Ječmenica] Пет писама краља Твртка I Дубровчанима

о Светодмитарском дохотку и могоришу in Граҕа о прошлости Босне 1

ред А Веселиновић Р Михаљчић Т Суботин-Голубовић Ћ Тошић [red A Veselinović

R Mihaljčić T Subotin-Golubović D Tošić] Banja Luka 2008 p 62

Victor Spinei 44

96

Maritimeque)252 just like Stephen Dabiša (1391ndash1395) in 1394253 and Stephen Ostoja

(1398ndash1404 1409ndash1418) in 1404254 In the Slavonic version the King of Bosnia

Stephen Dabiša was called in 1392 just like Stephen Tvrtko I

255 a formula repeated by Stephen Ostoja in

1398 1399256 Stephen Tomašević in 1461257 etc The official terminology of the

high-ranking Serbian Orthodox clerics was a calque after that of the sovereign

Thus the first archbishop of the Serbian Autocephalous Archbishopric Sava (Saint

Sava) (c 1175ndash1235) son of Stephen Nemanja called himself

258 more or less like Archbishop

Sava III259 (1305ndash1316) and Patriarch Spidiron (1380ndash1389) of Peć260 The

selection of examples of the terms

indicates their perpetuity and notable frequency in Serbian

diplomacy starting with the end of the twelfth century and until the beginning of the

fifteenth century Their adoption by the cultural milieu of Moldavia was natural given

that the Slavo-Balkan diplomatic formulation exerted a strong influence over the

Slavo-Romanian one

The term Moldovlachia continued to be used in the following centuries The

Prayer List of the Bistrița Monastery (Pomelnicul Mănăstirii Bistrița) mentioned

that work on the lists with the persons deceased during the year 6915 (=1407) had

started with the intention to enumerate ldquothe princes of the Moldo-Wallachian

Countryrdquo )261 Certainly the respective

term was composed shortly after taking the decision to elaborate the prayer list

that is in the first part of the reign of Alexander the Good The beginning of this list

252 Ibidem p 67 253 Acta archivi Veneti no CLXXXVIII p 288 254 Ibidem no CCXXI 255 Monumenta Serbicahellip no CCVI p 222 256 Ibidem no CCXXIV CCXXV CCXXVI pp 232 235 237 П Драгичевић

[P Dragičević] Повеља краља Остоје Дубровчанима о исплати заосталих дугова краља

Твртка I in Граҕа о прошлости Босне 1 2008 pp 112ndash113 Р Михаљчић [R Mihaljčić]

Повеља Стефана Остоје Дубровчанима in ibidem pp 124 126

257 А Фостиков [A Fostikov] Повеља босанског краља Стефана Томашевића

Дубровнику о дугу краља Твртка II in ibidem p 148 Idem Повеља босанског краља Стефана

Томашевића Дубровачкој општини о дугу његовог оца краља Томаша in ibidem

p 160 С Рудић [S Rudić] Повеља краља Стефана Томашевића којом наређује својим људима

да не ометају дубровачке трговце in ibidem p 166 258 Monumenta Serbicahellip no XXII p 19 Зборник средњовековних ћириличких повељаhellip

no 26 p 128 259 Monumenta Serbicahellip no LXXIII p 77 260 Ibidem no CC p 214 261 Pomelnicul Mănăstirei Bistrița ed by D P Bogdan Bucharest 1941 pp 50 86 Cf also

G Mihăilă Dicționar al limbii romacircne vechi (sfacircrșitul sec X ndash icircnceputul sec XVI) Bucharest 1974

pp 302ndash303


97

was copied during the reign of Stephen the Great and its content was periodically

completed in Old Slavic until by the end of the seventeenth century262

Stephen the Great also entitled himself ldquoPrince of the Moldo-Wallachian

Countryrdquo in documents issued in the voivodal chancery in 1466 1472 1480 1481

and 1500ndash1503263 These voivodal prerogatives are found in almost identical form

in the text of Hieromonk Nicodim imprinted on The Four Gospels (Tetraevanghel)

donated by the ruler in 1473 to the Humor Monastery presently it belongs

to the patrimony of the Putna Monastery Museum264 The title

[][] with regard to Stephen the Great occurs

in the Old Slavic inscription engraved on the marble plate placed at the entry into

the refectory of the Zografu Monastery at Mount Athos built in 1495265 Another

Slavonic inscription dated 1508 on a marble slab located at the top of the entry

to the western side of the Athonite church of Protaton mentioned the son and

heir of Stephen the Great the ldquomost Christianrdquo Bogdan designated as ()

)266 The choronym was employed during the following

centuries but was not widely used In the second half of the sixteenth century a

Slavonic Menaion printed in Moldavia included a note written in 1577 about Voivode

Peter (the Lame) who bore the title of 267

The Greek version of Stephen the Greatrsquos title ndash βοεβόδα Μολδοβλαχίας ndash is

found in a donation of Stephen the Great made to the Gregoriou Monastery at

Mount Athos in 1500268 Maria of Mangop (Maria Asanina Palaiologina) married

Stephen in 1472 thus becoming his second wife she died prematurely in 1477 and

was mentioned as Princess-consort of Moldovlachia in a Greek inscription on an

icon depicting Virgin Mary holding Child Jesus (of the so-called Hodegetria

Pantanassa category) likewise kept in the Gregoriou Monastery at Mount Athos

Rendered in capital letters and without accents the inscription runs on several

262 Pomelnicul Mănăstirei Bistrița pp 19-24 263 I Bogdan (ed) Documentelehellip I no LXI pp 99ndash101 II no CXL pp 315ndash316

no CLVIII pp 356-357 no CLXII pp 361ndash363 no CLXXXVIII pp 467ndash468 264 Repertoriul monumentelorhellip no 144 pp 379 388 265 N Iorga Muntele Athos icircn legătură cu țerile noastre in Analele Academiei Romacircne

Memoriile Secțiunii Istorice Seria II XXXV 1914 p 467 F Marinescu N Mertzimekis Ștefan cel

Mare și Mănăstirea Zografu de la Muntele Athos in Ștefan cel Mare și Sfacircnt Atlet al credinței

creștine Putna 2004 pp 181ndash182 266 G Millet J Pargoire and L Petit Recueil des inscriptions chreacutetiennes de lrsquoAthos I Paris

1904 no 1 p 1 N Iorga Muntele Athoshellip pp 469ndash470 P Ș Năsturel Le Mont Athos et les

Roumains Recherches sur leurs relations du milieu du XIVe siegravecle agrave 1654 Rome 1986 p 295 267 A Eșanu V Eșanu Icircnsemnări de pe codice moldovenești icircnstrăinate (Colecția Pogodin din

Sankt-Petersburg) in A Eșanu V Eșanu Lumina cărțiihellip pp 520ndash521 268 Documenta Romaniae Historica A Moldova III no 249 p 449 Cf also

В Григорович-Барский [V Grigorovich-Barskii] по Святымъ местамъ Востока съ 1723

по 1747 г III под ред Н Барсуков [red N Barsukov] S Peterburg 1887 p 361 (which mentions other

documents issued by the Moldavian princes in the sixteenth century and found in the Gregoriou monastery)

Victor Spinei 46

98

registers and contains the following dagger Δέησισ τῆσ εὺσεβεστάτησ κυρά Μαρίασ

Ἀσανήνασ Παλεολογήνασ κυρὰ τῆσ Μολδοβλαχίας (ldquodagger The prayer of the

most-devout Lady Maria Asanina Palaiologina Lady of Moldovlachiardquo)269 The

absence of dating elements means that the inscription is open to suppositions in the

context in which the icon was sent to the Holy Mountain

The princes who continued the generous donations to the Athonite

establishments (Petru Rareș Alexandru Lăpușneanu) were mentioned in their capacity

as princes of Μολδοβλαχία in several Greek epigraphical texts270 Μολδοβλαχία also

appeared in various historical works by Greek authors composed during the decline

and downfall of Byzantium and in the following decades Among these of particular

interest are the memoirs of Sylvestros Syropoulos (c 1400ndashc 1464) containing his

record of the Council of Ferrara-Florence The high prelate mentioned the preparations

carried out in 1416 at the Patriarchate of Constantinople for investing an unnamed

bishop as metropolitan of Moldovlachia271 In 1423 a member of the imperial family

left for Germany following a route that passed through Asprokastron (Cetatea Albă)272

More information was provided with respect to the participation of the delegation led

by the metropolitan of Moldovlachia at the Council of Ferrara-Florence273 In the

discourse held in the summer of 1434 by the Greek messenger Isidore at the

Ecumenical Council of Basel the Romanian voivodeship east of the Carpathians

was designated by the choronym Moldoblachia274 Significant for the attachment

of the Orthodox clergy to the usage norms of the hierarchical church terminology

is the lay and ecclesiastical title used in a document issued on January 7

1407 Thus while Alexander the Good was mentioned with the title ldquoVoivode and

Lord of the Land of Moldaviardquo the name of the country in which Joseph was

metropolitan was designated by the term Moldovlachia (() )

Ї)275

269 G Millet J Pargoire and L Petit Recueil des inscriptionshellip no 511 p 175 N Iorga

Muntele Athoshellip p 466 Șt S Gorovei bdquoMaria Asanina Paleologhina doamna Moldovlahieirdquo (I)

in Studii și materiale de istorie medie XXII 2004 p 12 Also see В Григорович-Барский

[V Grigorovich-Barskii] по Святымъ местамъ Востокаhellip p 360 270 G Millet J Pargoire and L Petit Recueil des inscriptionshellip no 458 p 158 N Iorga

Muntele Athoshellip pp 479ndash483 271 Sylvestros Syropoulos Vera historia unionis non veraelig inter Graeligcos et Latinos sive

Concilii Florentini exactissima narratio ed by R Creyghton Hagaelig [The Hague] 1660 p 1 Idem

in Fontes Historiae Daco-Romanae IV pp 364ndash367 272 Sylvestros Syropoulos Vera historiahellip p 8 Idem in Fontes Historiae Daco-Romanae

IV pp 368ndash369 273 Sylvestros Syropoulos Vera historiahellip pp 44ndash45 59 etc Idem in Fontes Historiae

Daco-Romanae IV pp 372ndash375 etc 274 E Cecconi Studi storici sul Concilio di Firenze con documenti inediti o nuovamente dati

alla luce sui manoscritti di Firenze e di Roma I Antecedenti del Concilio Firenze 1869 no XXIX

p LXXXVI 275 Documenta Romaniae Historica A Moldova I no 21 p 29


99

The variant Moldovlachia was preferred by the ecclesiastical circles close to

the Constantinople Patriarchate that had issued the term This title survived into the

following centuries though never on a wide scale In the second half of the

sixteenth century a Slavonic menologium printed in Moldavia contained a note

from 1577 in which Voivode Petru [Șchiopul] (Peter [the Lame]) bore the title

276 Among the personalities claiming

their descendance from the members of the dynasties of the Moldo-Wallachian

Country was also Petru Movilă

Peter Mogila277 Metropolitan of Kiev Galicia and entire Russia the son and

brother of a ruler In the preface to the Chosen Triodyon (Triod Tzvetnii) dedicated

by the high hierarch to his brother Moise Movilă Moses Mogila the latter was

called Prince and ldquoheir of the Moldo-Wallachian Landsrdquo278

The choronym Moldovalachia was indeed used but not only in contexts

under the influence of Greek church authorities Spelled as Moldoblachia in the

second quarter of the fifteenth century this term was occasionally used in the

diplomatic documents of the Curia as well An example in this regard is a letter of

Pope Eugene IV dated 1435 in which he expressed his satisfaction that Gregorius

Archiepiscopus Moldoblachie opted for the Roman-Catholic confession279 In

another letter from March 1436 addressed this time directly to the enigmatic high

prelate Gregory the latter was again called archbishop of Moldoblachia while the

Romanians were deisgnated as Valachi and Moldov(l)achi280 In the 1643

correspondence with the cardinals of the Congregation de Propaganda Fide

translated in Rome from Greek into Latin Vasile Lupu occured as Vaivoda totius

Moldo Valachiae and the variant Moldovalachia281 closer to its original form

appeared too Likewise a form related to Moldovlachia ndash Moldavian Wallachia

basically identical from a semantic point of view ndash was used by prelate Alberto de

Crispis in a letter of June 25 1434 in which he described the route taken by the

Byzantine emissaries for reaching Basel They travelled from the Black Sea across

276 A Eșanu V Eșanu Icircnsemnări de pe codice moldovenești icircnstrăinate (Colecția Pogodin din

Sankt-Petersburg) in A Eșanu V Eșanu Lumina cărțiihellip pp 520ndash521 277 О Однороженко [O Odnorozhenko] Родова геральдика Русо-Влахії (Молдавського

господарства) кінця XIV-XVI ст Harkov 2008 p 141 278 P P Panaitescu Petru Movilă și romacircnii in Movileștii Istorie și spiritualitate

romacircnească I Sucevița 2006 p 147 279 Documentehellip Hurmuzaki I 2 no DII p 599 About high prelate Gregory cf E Popescu

Compleacutements et rectifications agrave lrsquohistoire de lrsquoEacuteglise de Moldavie agrave la premiegravere moitieacute du XVe siegravecle

in Idem Studii de istorie și de spiritualitate creștină II Bucharest 2018 pp 722ndash726 280 Annales ecclesiastici ab anno MCXCVIII ubi desinit cardinalis Baronius auctore Odorico

Raynaldo congregationis oratorii presbytero IX ed by Johannes Dominicus Mansi Lucaelig 1752

p 227 281 D Gazdaru O gramatică și un dicționar icircn limba romacircnă scrise de Antonio Maria Sciacca

la anul 1823 icircn Roma in Idem Studii istorico-filologice I (Omagiu profesorului D Gazdaru

Miscellanea din studiile sale inedite sau rare) Freiburg i Br 1974 no XVII p 58

Victor Spinei 48

100

Moldavian Wallachia (in mari maiore procedendo per Walachiam

Moldaviensem)282 In the Greek-speaking circles the hybrid name Vlachobogdania

(Βλαχομπογδανία) was also used as for example in a letter of Andronic

Cantacuzino (Kantacuzenous) addressed in 1593 to the former Prince of Moldavia

Petru Șchiopul283 and in the chronicle of Constantin Daponte (with the monk name

Chesarie) (17131714ndash1784) a Greek who served the Phanariot rulers of the

Romanian principalities and who later became a monk at Mount Athos284

In several chancery documents of the dynasty members from Moldavia and

in other categories of sources some state names appeared associated in a way that

has caused certain confusion Among other instances we would like to consider the

title of Roman Mușat in the homage document dedicated on January 5 1393

to King Wladyslaw Jagiello in which he appeared as ldquoMoldavian Voivode and

heir of the entire Wallachian Country from the mountains to the seashorerdquo

)285 Some medievalists thought that the title of the issuer included two

territorial entities the first one consisted of the incipient core of the state located

in Northwestern Moldavia in the basin of the homonymous river and the second

one was represented by its southeastern regions assigned to the authority of the

local voivodes after the banishing of the Mongols east of the Dniester River286

Archaeological research work and especially that in the numismatic field

performed during the last decades suggest the fact that the retreat of the Golden

282 E Cecconi Studi storici sul Concilio di Firenzehellip no XXVI p LXIV 283 Documente privind istoria Romacircniei Veacul XVI A Moldavia IV (1591ndash1600)

Bucharest 1952 no 121 p 96 284 Chesarie Daponte Cronicul de la 1648ndash1704 in C Erbiceanu Cronicari grecihellip p 7 285 В А Уляницкий [V A Ulianitskii] Матеріалы для исторіиhellip no 8 pp 6ndash7

Documentehellip Hurmuzaki I 2 no DCXLVI pp 815ndash816 (Apendice II Documente slavone din

Archivele Imperiale din Moscova ed by E Kałužniacki) M Costăchescu (ed) Documente

moldovenești icircnainte de Ștefan cel Mare II no 165 pp 607ndash609 Грамоти XIV ст

ред М М Пещак [ed by M M Peshchak] Kiev 1974 no 62 p 120 286 C Cihodaru Constituirea statului feudal moldovenesc și lupta pentru realizarea

independenței lui in Studii și cercetări științifice Istorie Iași XI 1960 1 pp 64ndash66 Ș Papacostea

Aux debuts de lrsquoEacutetat moldave Consideacuterations en marge drsquoune nouvelle source in Revue Roumaine

drsquoHistoire XII 1973 1 pp 143ndash144 Idem La icircnceputurile statului moldovenesc Considerații pe

marginea unui izvor necunoscut in Idem Geneza statului icircn evului mediu romacircnesc Cluj-Napoca

1988 pp 100ndash101 Cf also L Șimanschi and G Ignat Constituirea cancelariei statului feudal

moldovenesc (II) in Anuarul Institutului de Istorie și Arheologie bdquoA D Xenopolrdquo X 1973

pp 134ndash135 L Pilat Intre Roma și Bizanț Societate și putere icircn Moldavia (secolele XIVndashXVI) Iași

2008 pp 59-66 L Bătracircna A Bătracircna Biserica bdquoSfacircntul Nicolaerdquo din Rădăuți Cercetări

arheologice și interpretări istorice asupra icircnceputurilor Țării Moldovei Piatra Neamț 2012

pp 271ndash272 For the assumed precedents of the Moldavian Lower Country during the period before

the foundation of the separate Moldavian state cf Ș Papacostea Moldova desăvacircrșirea unui stat

Țara de Sus și Țara de Jos in Studii și materiale de istorie medie XXIX 2011 pp 9ndash26 A Ioniță

B Kelemen A Simon AL WA Prințul Negru al Vlahiei și vremurile sale Cluj-Napoca 2017

pp 465ndash469


101

Horde administration took place around 1370 when in several urban settlements in

the region between the Prut and the Dniester rivers the circulation of Mongolian

coins had ceased287

The establishment of a Romanian state entity in Budjak and the northern

neighboring areas in the time span between the eastward retreat of the Horde and

authority enforcement of the Moldavian state in the respective area during the reign

of Roman Mușat or even during that of Petru Mușat are completely improbable

given the fact that the demographic potential of the local communities reached very

low levels due to the migration of the Turkish and Mongolian tribes The short time

after the banishing of the Golden Horde did not allow for the steppe territory in

Southeastern Moldavia to be adequately populated and organized in the following

decades This reality was confirmed by internal chancery documents288 as well as

archaeological research289 On the other hand the indication of the double authority

of the ruler in Suceava in the document of 1393 bears a different meaning than that

assumed by some historians In reality the issuers of this document considered

only one and the same state named Moldavia by the local administration entities

and Valachia by Polish royalty However the simple use of a copulative

conjunction instead of a disjunctive one had the capacity to cause inadequate

interpretations We should also note that the seal inscription applied on the homage

document contains only the royal attributes of Roman in relation to the Moldavian

Country (Țara Moldovei) (dagger )290

while Wallachiarsquos name is missing One may deduce that the text of the seal was

dedicated to common documents for internal use which did not need clarifying

additions like the external ones

There is an apparent inconsistency between the terminology employed for

designating the country and that referring to its population in the initial part of another

homage document addressed to the King of Poland sealed on August 1 1404 with the

following content ldquoWe nobleman Alexander [the Good] Voivode of Moldavia and

287 V Spinei La genegravese des villes du sud-est de la Moldavie et les rapports commerciaux des

XIIIendashXIVe siegravecles in Balkan Studies 35 1994 2 pp 251ndash256 288 S Tabuncic Satele din răsăritul Țării Moldovei icircn secolele XIV-XV icircn lumina izvoarelor

diplomatice interne in Revista de Istorie a Moldovei Chișinău 3ndash4 (35ndash36) 1998 pp 62ndash68 and

map no 1 289 Л Л Полевой П П Бырня [L L Polevoi P P Bacircrnea] Средевековые памятники

XIVndashXVII вв (Археологическая карта Молдавской ССР 7) Chișinău 1974 passim S Tabuncic

Habitatul rural din răsăritul Țării Moldovei icircn secolele XIVndashXVI oglindit icircn izvoarele arheologice in

In honorem Demir Dragnev Civilizația medievală și modernă icircn Moldova coord L Zabolotnacirci

Chișinău 2006 pp 34ndash38 41 45 (map no 2) L Bacumenco-Picircrnău Cercetarea arheologică a

așezărilor rurale medievale din răsăritul Moldovei descoperiri și interpretări in Un secol de

arheologie icircn spațiul est-carpatic Concepte metode tendințe ed by V Diaconu L Picircrnău

Brăila-Piatra Neamț 2019 pp 413 442ndash443 448ndash449 454 (map fig no 1) 290 M Costăchescu (ed) Documente moldovenești icircnainte de Ștefan cel Mare II no 165

p 609

Victor Spinei 50

102

our servants Wallachian noblemen boyars Moldavian inhabitantsrdquohellip

)291 As we can see the clerks at the rulerrsquos

chancery called the country Moldavia while the boyars were named Wallachians

Romanians accompanied by the explanation that they were coming from

Moldavia Supposedly this happened because the ethnonym had not already spread

everywhere abroad

In several categories of sources dating back to the fifteenth and sixteenth

centuries the titles of some dynasty members from Moldavia contained two state

entities A hasty interpretation would conclude that this meant a real or only

planned extension of their political prerogatives towards the southwest The oldest

of these documents is the narration of the trips endeavored by Ghillebert de Lannoy

(1386ndash1462) In 1421 he stopped for a few weeks in Moldavia and as he was

received for audience by the countryrsquos ruler Alexander the Good his prerogatives

were stated as follows le wiwoude Alexandrie seigneur de laditte Wallackie et de

Moldavie292 The same apparent territorial enlargement under the scepter of the

ruler in Suceava can be deduced from an unilateral perspective also based on the

chronicle about the reign of Stephen the Great covering the period 1457ndash1499 the

so-called Moldavian-German Chronicle (Cronica moldo-germană) written or

copied in 1502 It was elaborated by a German who had settled in Moldavia he

processed some internal annals written in Old Slavic which he completed with

certain personal additions On the frontispiece of the text appear in German the

year it was written and the specification that it represents a chronicle of Stephan

voyvoda auss der Wallachey Then there is a statement in Latin Cronica breuiter

scripta Stephanus dei gracia voyvoda Terrarum Moldannensis necnon Valachyense

(ldquoThe abridged chronicle of Stephen by Godrsquos mercy Voivode of the Moldavian

and the Wallachian Landsrdquo)293 The respective wording was interpreted as proof for

the sovereignty claims of the Moldavian Voivode over Wallachia294 The rulerrsquos

authority over both Romanian principalities also seems to result from the

correspondence received in 1537 by Emperor Charles the Fifth from the Venetian

Dionisio della Vecchia in which Peter Rareș was called Vaivoda di Moldavia et

Caraboldan ltrecte Qarabogdangt295

291 Documentehellip Hurmuzaki I 2 no DCLIV pp 826ndash827 (Apendice II Documente

slavonehellip) M Costăchescu (ed) Documente moldovenești icircnainte de Ștefan cel Mare II no 173

pp 625ndash626 292 Ghillebert de Lannoy Oeuvres ed by Ch Potvin Louvain 1878 pp 58ndash59 293 O Goacuterka Cronica epocii lui Ștefan cel Marehellip p 109 Молдавско-немецкая летописьhellip

p 36 294 L Șimanschi Ștefan cel Mare ndash domn al Moldovei și Țării Romacircnești in Ștefan cel Mare și

Sfacircnt 1504ndash2004 Portret icircn istorie Putna Suceava 2003 pp 434ndash438 295 A Ciorănescu Documente privitoare la istoria romacircnilor culese din arhivele din

Simancas Bucharest 1940 no X p 18


103

A greater number of chancery documents apparently indicate that during his

first reign Alexander Lăpușneanu (1552ndash1561 1564ndash1568) ruled as a sovereign

over both Romanian principalities In the Polish text of his oath of allegiance to the

Polish King Sigismund II Augustus and the Russian Voivode Nicholas Sieniawski

taken in Bakota on September 5 1552 he was mentioned as wojewoda ziem

Moldawskich i wołoskich296 (in Latin transcription Palatinus Terrarum Moldaviaelig

amp Valachiaelig)297 In another vassalage oath taken in Hacircrlău on June 22 1553 which

reinforced the previous one his title was z laski Bozej woiewoda pan i dziedzicz

ziemi moldawskie i walaskie (ldquoby Godrsquos mercy voivode nobleman and heir of the

Moldavian and Wallachian Landsrdquo)298 In a letter sent to Emperor Ferdinand I of

Habsburg on June 25 1560 Alexander Lăpușneanu was bearing the title

Moldauiae Terrarumque Valachiae legitimus Dominus (1560)299 while in a

document from 1561 written in Polish his title was z łaski Božej wojewoda pan i

dziedzic ziemi moldawskei i wołoskie300 an almost identical wording to the one

used in the vassalage oath taken in 1553

While hosted at the court of Alexander Lăpușneanu John Jacob Heraclid

who was called Despot in Moldavian chronicles a name adopted also by Romanian

historiography as well was certainly familiar with the rulerrsquos official title He

proved this in a letter sent on May 25 1558 to Duke Albert of Prussia (Albrecht

von Preuszligen) in which he called the ruler Moldaviae et Valacchiae Waivoda301

In his quality as pretender to the throne of Moldavia in the documents issued

in Latin Despot also adopted both terms designating the voivodeship east of the

Carpathians Thus in the oath of allegiance taken before Emperor Ferdinand I on

March 3 1560 for his support needed in order to obtain the Moldavian throne he

entitled himself as follows Nos Iacobus Heraclides Basilicus Dej gratia Despotes

Samj Doridos Pari ac caeterarum Insularum Dominus Electus Princeps

Moldauorum ac terrarum Valachiae legitimus haeres et succesor etc302 In the

instructions given to his representative to the imperial court on the same day the

title was reproduced with slight differences303 as in the letter addressed to the

296 Th Holban Documente externe (1552ndash1561) in Studii Revistă de istorie 18 1965 3

p 668 297 Codex diplomaticvs Regni Poloniaelighellip no XIII pp 618ndash619 298 I Corfus Documente privitoare la istoria Romacircniei culese din arhivele polone Secolul al

XVI-lea Bucharest 1979 no 84 pp 166ndash177 299 Documente privitoare la istoria romacircnilor collected by Eudoxiu de Hurmuzaki II 1

1451ndash1575 [ed by I Slavici] Bucharest 1891 no CCCLIII p 378 300 Th Holban Documente externehellip pp 673ndash674 301 N Iorga Nouveaux mateacuteriaux pour servir agrave lrsquohistoire de Jacques Basilikos lrsquoHeacuteraclide dit

le Despote prince de Moldavie Bucharest 1900 no VII p 35 Șt Andreescu Restitutio Daciae

(Relațiile politice dintre Țara Romacircnească Moldavia și Transilvania icircn răstimpul 1526ndash1593)

Bucharest 1980 pp 140ndash141 302 Documentehellip Hurmuzaki II 1 no CCCXLVI p 370 303 Ibidem no CCCXLVII p 371

Victor Spinei 52

104

patricians of Brașov on June 6 1560 (princeps Moldaviaehellip et haeres terrarium

Valachiae)304 and in that dedicated to Ferdinand I in the same year on June 25

(Princeps Moldauacuteiae Terraruacutemque Walachiae legitimuacutes Dominuacutes)305 After he

became prince the title of Despot Vodă Voivode (1561ndash1563) received very little

changes as can be seen in the letter addressed to John Sigismund Zaacutepolya on May

13 1562 In that document this ruler of Moldavia appears with the title Princeps

regni Moldauiae Palatinus Valachiae gentis Vtriusque dominus et haeres with the

particularity that for one state entity the term prince was used and for the other

one the term palatine In medieval hierarchy structures the two high offices were

not of an identical level the former was used both in the lay as well as the

ecclesiastical area and was superior to the latter306 The double title of Despot

became known in the West as well according to the short medallion entitled De

Jacques Heacuteraclide Despote de Moldavie amp Valachie inserted into a brochure

signed by Jean-Baptiste de Racoles which was published in Holland in 1684 its

prolific author designated himself as historiographe de France amp de

Brandebourg307

A presumptuous illusive rank of Muldaviae Rex et Vallachiae Princeps was

self-assigned on April 13 1567 by a Greek nobleman from Peloponnese who was

protected by the court in Naples He signed Ioannes Georgius Heracleus Basileus

when addressing Emperor Maximilian II in order to request his support308 In this

case there were also employed different titles for the two voivodeships The author

of the letter ignored the fact that the official title of the dynasty member leading the

Moldavian Country was not ldquokingrdquo but a more modest one ie voivode prince

The adventurer with princely vocation who claimed to be related to the former

ruler of Moldavia had elaborated an impressive genealogical tree a true collection

uniting members of the imperial families of Rome and Constantinople In his

previous attempts for obtaining financial support made in Genoa he presented

himself among other titles as heir of the princes of Moldavia and Wallachia309

Some of the successors to the throne of Alexander Lăpușneanu and Despot also

adopted double hegemonic attributes Thus in a letter addressed to the authorities of

Bistrița composed in Suceava on October 5 1563 Stephen Tomșa entitled himself

304 Acte și scrisorihellip in Documentehellip Hurmuzaki XV 1 no MXXXI p 560 305 Documentehellip Hurmuzaki II 1 no CCCLIII p 378 306 C Dufresne Du Cange Glossarium ad scriptores mediaelig et infimaelig latinitatis V P-R editio

nova Parisiis 1734 col 50 841ndash847 A Bartal Glossarium mediaelig et infimaelig latinitatis regni

Hungariaelig Lipsiaelig [Leipzig]ndashBudapestini 1901 pp 465 524 307 J B de Racoles La fortune marastre de plusieurs princes amp grands seigneurs de toutes

nations depuis environ deux siegravecles Leyde [Leiden] 1684 pp 134ndash135 Cf also N Iorga

Documents I Une biographie de Jacques Heacuteraclide bdquole Despoterdquo prince de Moldavie in Revue

historique du Sud-Est Europeacuteen IV 1927 4ndash5 pp 124ndash125 308 A Ciorănescu Documente privitoare la istoria romacircnilorhellip no LXXV p 46 309 N Iorga Pretendenți domnesci icircn secolul al XVI-lea in Analele Academiei Romacircne

Memoriile Secțiunii Istorice Seria II XIX 1898 p 226


105

Dei gratia Wayvoda moldaviensis princeps Walachie et cetera310 In 1569 Bogdan

Lăpușneanu together with the members of the Countryrsquos Council and all his subjects

brought the vassalage homage to the Polish King Sigismund II Augustus Therefore

they had to follow the custom that required them to also mention the name of the

country they were coming from Ego Bogdanus Alexandrowicz Palatinus Terrarum

Moldaviaelig amp Valachiaelig cum Consiliariis Maioribus amp omnibus subditis meis

Terrarum Moldaviaelig amp Valachiaelig311 In the segment called intitulatio that is part of an

external document believed to have been issued by Ioan Vodă cel Cumplit (John III

the Terrible) (1572ndash1574) which was reproduced in a work of the Polish chronicler

and theologian Jan Łasicki (Joannes Lasicius) (1534ndash1602) dedicated to some

events in the history of Moldavia the Princersquos name and title were written as

follows Nos (inquit) Iohan Voiuoda terrarium Moldauiaelig amp Valachiaelig dominus

atq haeligres312 A similar way for designating the Romanian voivodeship east of the

Oriental Carpathians was pursued by the Italian humanist Alessandro Guagnini

(Alexander Gwagnin) (1538ndash1614) who settled in Poland where he enjoyed the

protection of the Royal Court When referring to the southern borders of Podolia in

his famous work dedicated to ldquoEuropean Sarmatiardquo published in 1578 he mentioned

its neighbors Moldavia and Wallachia (Podolia Regio amplissima Moldauaelig amp

Valachiaelig agrave meridie finitima est)313 This wording suggests that both ldquopalatinatesrdquo

bordered on the Podolian province annexed by Poland However the geopolitical

horizon of Guagnini Gwagnin was too substantial for such an inadvertency By

placing the copulative conjunction between the two names the scholar observed the

mores of the time which were meant to explain state terminology options that were

not generally accepted A few years later on September 22 1583 also in a letter addressed to the

authorities of Bistrița Petru Șchiopul signed with the title Wayvoda terre Moldavie dominus ac perpetuus heres Valachie314 In a close manner with insignificant spelling differences the double voivode title of Petru Șchiopul was also mentioned in other official documents issued during his last reign on July 26 1584315 April 16 April 27 July 23 1585316 and July 7 1589317

310 Acte și scrisorihellip in Documentehellip Hurmuzaki XV 1 no MLXXXVI p 585 311 Codex diplomaticvs Regni Poloniaelighellip I no XIV p 620 312 Iohannis Lasicii Historia de ingressu Polonorum in Valachiam cum Bogdano Voiuoda (cui

succeszligit Iuonia) amp caeligde Turcarum ducibus Mieloczkie amp Sieniawskio A MDLXXII in Leonhardi

Gorecii Equitis Poloni Descriptio belli Iuoniaelig Voiuodaelig Valachiaelig quod anno MDLXXIIII cum

Selymo II Turcarum imperator gessit huic accessit Io Lasicii historia de ingressu Polonorum in

Valachiam cum Bogdano amp caeligde Turcorum Francofurti 1578 p 153 313 Alexandri Gwagnini Veronensis Sarmatiaelig Evropaelig descriptio quaelig Regnum Poloniaelig

Lituaniam Samogitiam Russiam Masouiam Prussiam Pomeraniam Liuoniam amp Moschouiaelig

Tartariaeligque partem complectitur Cracoviae 1578 p 74 La Descrittione della Sarmatia Europea

del Magnifico Cavalliere Alessandro Gvagnino Veronese in Gio[anni] Battista Ramvsio (raccolta gia

da) Navigationi et viaggi II Venice 1583 p 1 314 Acte și scrisorihellip in Documentehellip Hurmuzaki XV 1 no MCCLXXVIII p 694 315 Ibidem no MCCLXXX p 695

Victor Spinei 54

106

A particular manner for indicating the respective title was used in the correspondence of Petru Șchiopul with the Habsburg Court after he was forced to give up the throne in August 1591318 Thus in a letter written in Latin dated September 24 1591 he signed Petrus Princeps Valachiae Moldaviae319 As we can see in this case between the names of the two state entities with the same syntactic role in the sentence there is no lexical element although as previously shown in external diplomatic language copulative or disjunctive conjunctions were used frequently Even though the imperial chancery was perfectly aware of the political status of the two Romanian Lands in the reply of Rudolph II sent to a request of Petru Șchiopul on October 14 1591 he designated himself in an equivocal manner ie ldquoPrince of Wallachia Moldaviardquo (Valachiae Moldaviae)320 An identical signature with that of September 24 1591 was applied by the exiled ruler on the letter dated May 8 1592 addressed to Archduke Ferdinand in which he expressed his wish to establish his residence in Tirol At the same time the state entity over which he had exercised his domination was called Valachia Moldavia321 However in an Austrian report that registered the requests addressed to the Archduke by Petru Șchiopul the latter was called Woyvoda Fuumlrst der Moldaw unnd Wallachey322

A somehow unusual manner for designating Romanians is found in a document dated August 31 1592 elaborated in Innsbruck it evokes the debates of the Upper Austria authorities concerning the settlement of Petru Șchiopul (Peter Wayvoda) in Tirol The document mentioned the ldquoMoldavian princerdquo (der moldawische Fuumlrst) with this title eight times In addition the text contains a remark that is not at all amiable ist dies Walachisch-Moldawisch ain grobs barbarisch Volckh (ldquothese Wallachian-Moldavians are a rude barbaric peoplerdquo)323 After a closer look at the content of the above-mentioned correspondence one can conclude that the offending appellative pertained only to the Moldavian Romanians Much later towards the middle of the nineteenth century before the unification of the Principalities the term Moldo-Wallachia (Moldo-Valachia) and its corresponding ethnonym ndash Moldo-Wallachians (moldo-valachi) ndash were used quite extensively both by locals as well as foreigners In this case it designated the two segments of the extra-Carpathian Romanians324 The fact that the voivode attributes of the

316 Ibidem no MCCLXXI p 696 no MCCLXXII p 696 no MCCLXXXVI p 697 317 Ibidem no MCCXCIV p 702 318 C Rezachevici Cronologia critică a domnilor din Țara Romacircnească și Moldavia a

1324ndash1881 I Secolele XIVndashXVI Bucharest 2001 pp 450ndash451 D Floareș Petru Șchiopul și epoca

sa Iași 2017 pp 189ndash191 319 Acte din secolul al XVI-leahellip (DocumentehellipHurmuzaki XI) no CCCLXII p 238 320 Ibidem no CCCLXIII pp 238ndash239 321 Ibidem no CCCLXXXVII pp 257ndash258 322 Ibidem no CCCCVIII p 272 323 Ibidem no CCCCIX pp 273ndash275 324 G Le Cler La Moldo-Valachie Ce qursquoelle a eacuteteacute ce qursquoelle est ce qursquoelle pourrait ecirctre

Paris 1866 Gh Platon Lupta romacircnilor pentru unitate națională Ecouri icircn presa europeană


107

Wallachian dynasty members were adopted in the official documents of the Moldavian rulers in the sixteenth century mostly without political aspirations seems to have caused certain confusion in the chancery of the Habsburgs

The mentioning of both voivodeships as subordinated to the Moldavian ruler

was interpreted in the sense that he had temporarily extended his supremacy or

political protectorate over Wallachia or that he had envisioned the unification of

the principalities under a single scepter without being able to accomplish it325 We

regard this point of view as completely unacceptable because no credible

information source can be invoked as a plausible supporting argument326 Stephen

the Great and Alexander Lăpușneanu were involved in actions for imposing some

obedient rulers on the throne of Wallachia However they had no ambitions to

really rule over both voivodeships On the one hand they respected the traditions

of dynasty succession in the neighboring state and on the other hand they would

have had to convince the Ottoman Empire and other powerful states in their

proximity to accept the eventual endeavors for the political union of the two states

The other rulers who included in their titles the name Moldavia as well as that of

Wallachia (Petru Rareș Despot Vodă Stephen Tomșa Bogdan Lăpușneanu Petru

Șchiopul) faced difficulties in keeping the throne of their own country and an

authority extension over the neighboring voivodeship would have been really

utopic Towards the middle of the sixteenth century the sultans had roughened the

hegemonic regime in both Romanian principalities whose external autonomous

initiatives had been drastically limited The despotic appellation formulas of the

sultans addressed to the tributary princes reflect the precariousness of their

positions in the sixteenth century327 when only a few dynasty members had the

courage to oppose the sovereign power with foreign support

The presence of the two high state offices in the title of some princes or

ruling aspirants in Moldavia and the placement of the copulative conjunction

between them has a different explanation than that accredited in scholarly literature

so far As we can see the chancery documents and the other sources with such title

(1855ndash1859) Iași 1974 Gh Cliveti Romacircnia modernă și bdquoapogeul Europeirdquo 1815ndash1914

Bucharest 2018 passim 325 Șt Andreescu Restitutio Daciaehellip pp 140ndash143 I Toderașcu Unitatea romacircnească

medievală I Bucharest 1988 pp 173ndash174 For other hypotheses cf Șt S Gorovei Mușatinii

Bucharest 1976 pp 103ndash104 A Pippidi book review in Studii și materiale de istorie medie X

1983 p 154 C Rezachevici Cronologia criticăhellip p 617ndash618 326 V Spinei Moldova icircn secolele XIndashXIV 2nd ed Chișinău 1994 pp 54ndash55 67 Cf also

A Picircnzar bdquoFomațiuni prestatalerdquo icircn nordul Moldovei O nouă analiză in Analele științifice ale

Universității bdquoAlexandru Ioan Cuzardquo din Iași SN Istorie LX 2014 pp 84ndash86 327 M Berindei G Veinstein LrsquoEmpire Ottoman et les Pays Roumains 1544ndash1545 Eacutetude et

documents Paris-Cambridge Mass 1987 T Gemil Romanians and Ottomans in the XIVthndashXVIth

Centuries transl by R Bejan and P Sanders Bucharest 2009 pp 232ndash261 M Maxim O istorie a

relațiilor romacircno-otomane cu documente noi din arhivele turcești I Perioada clasică (1400ndash1600)

Brăila 2012 passim

Victor Spinei 56

108

variants always had an external destination addressed mainly to partners in the

Polish-speaking and German-speaking areas However in the Polish Kingdom and

partially in a few neighboring countries there already existed a tradition for

designating the East Carpathian area by the term Wallachia while Moldavian

Romanians were officially using the name Moldavia which was adopted by other

peoples as well For avoiding eventual confusions regarding its localization it was

considered useful to nominate the Romanian voivodeship east of the Carpathians in

external documents both with the term accepted by the locals as well as by that

used in certain circles abroad In fact in the Middle Ages this custom existed in

other European countries too In internal documents the respective procedure

made no sense so it was not employed

Regarding the insertion of the copulative conjunction et between the terms

designating the two state entities we have to point out that in the issuing

chanceries it was used quite frequently with a disjunctive meaning as well for

replacing the conjunctions seu and sive (ldquoorrdquo) In the first quarter of the sixteenth

century the chancery service in Suceava used the conjunction et with disjunctive

meaning also when confronted with the terminology that was specific to the

Wallachian voivodeship Eloquent in this regard are the texts of the peace treaties

concluded by Poland and Moldavia in 1517328 and 1518329 in which there are two

names for Wallachia Bessarabia and Transalpina and these toponyms are not

connected by the conjunction seu but by et However in two peace and alliance

treaties agreed upon by the same states in 1510 between Bessarabia and

Transalpina the disjunctive conjunction seu was preferred330 which proves that no

excessively rigorous grammar rules were observed Previously the use of the

conjunction et with a disjunctive meaning appeared occasionally in the chronicle of

Jan Długosz as well when he referred to events taking place in 1474 Wallachia

which he called by its double name ldquoBessarabia and [instead of or] Wallachiardquo

Bessarabia et Montania331

Wallachia was designated by the choronym Basarabia during the fifteenth

and sixteenth centuries as well In that period this term began to be used

simultaneously for the southeastern part of Moldavia contained between the Prut

Danube and Dniester A great part of the specialists consider that this name was

328 Documente privitoare la istoria romacircnilor collected by Eudoxiu de Hurmuzaki II 3

1510ndash1530 ed by N Densusianu Bucharest 1892 no CCIV p 263 M Costăchescu (ed)

Documente moldovenești de la Ștefăniță Voievod (1517ndash1527) Iași 1943 p 505 329 Documentehellip Hurmuzaki II 3 no CCXV p 289 M Costăchescu (ed) Documente

moldovenești de la Ștefăniță Voievodhellip p 511 330 Documente privitoare la istoria romacircnilor collected by Eudoxiu de Hurmuzaki II 2

1451ndash1510 ed by N Densusianu Bucharest 1891 no CCCCLXXXVIII p 629 331 Joannis Długossii seu Longini canonici Cracoviensis Historiae Polonicae libri XII V Liber

XII (XIII) ed by A Przezdziecki (=Joannis Długosz senioris canonici Cracoviensis Opera omnia ed

by A Przezdziecki XIV) Cracoviae 1878 p 609


109

used for the southern region of Moldavia because shortly after the foundation of

the independent state of Wallachia its authority would have stretched towards the

northeast beyond the Siret and Prut rivers in a moment in which the power of the

Golden Horde was decreasing332 This theory seems plausible but unfortunately

there is no source for attesting the eventual extension of Wallachian hegemony to

the northeast or for confirming the moment in which this happened In general a

territory was not assigned a name deriving from an anthroponym except when a

political personality was directly involved in the history of the respective region

over which he had imposed his domination firsthand A Wallachian member of the

Basarab dynasty could have exercised his domination over Southern Moldavia only

after 1370 when the Mongolian administration was forced to retreat east of the

Dniester After this year the throne of Wallachia was taken by Vladislav I ndash Vlaicu

(1364ndashc 13761477) Radu I (c 1377ndash13741385) Dan I (13741385ndash1386)

Mircea cel Bătracircn (the Elder) (1386ndash1395 1397ndash1418) and Vlad I (c 1395ndash1397)

Only during their reigns an extension of the voivodeshiprsquos borders towards the

northeast would have been feasible After Roman I (c 13911392ndash1394)

proclaimed himself in 1393 ldquosole ruler from the mountains to the seardquo333 (it is

possible for Petru Mușat [c 13741375ndash1391] his brother and predecessor to have

already held these prerogatives) such hegemonic tendencies would have been less

successful The limits of the state possessions during the reign of Mircea the Elder

and Radu II Praznaglava (c 1420ndash1422 c 14261427ndash1427) as far as the ldquoTatar

areasrdquo ( 334 ad confinia Tartariae335) which are hard to

localize accurately could partially correspond to the eastern extremity of

Wallachia and the southern end of Moldavia ie to the region that was going to

receive the name Bessarabia336

332 A D Xenopol Istoria romacircnilor din Dacia Traiană II De la icircntemeierea Țărilor Romacircne

pacircnă la moartea lui Petru Rareș 1546 ed by N Stoicescu and M Simionescu Bucharest 1986

p 91 A Boldur Basarabia romacircnească in Idem Istoria Basarabiei ed by V Frunză Bucharest

1992 pp 416ndash417 G I Brătianu La Bessarabie Droits nationaux et historiques Bucharest 1943

pp 17ndash18 I Nistor Localizarea numelui Basarabia icircn Moldavia Transpruteană in Analele

Academiei Romacircne Memoriile Secțiunii Istorice Seria III XXVI 1943ndash1944 pp 2ndash3 Idem Istoria

Basarabiei Chișinău 1991 pp 24ndash25 P P Panaitescu Mircea cel Bătracircn Bucharest 1944 p 227

S Iosipescu Basarabia ndash originile unei țări romacircnești in Revista de istorie militară 2012 3ndash4

pp 9ndash16 333 В А Уляницкий [V A Ulianitskii] Матеріалы для исторіиhellip no 8 pp 6ndash7

M Costăchescu (ed) Documente moldovenești icircnainte de Ștefan cel Mare II no 165 pp 607ndash609 334 Documenta Romaniae Historica B Țara Romacircnească I no 30 pp 66ndash67 no 32 p 70

no 34 p 73 no 38 pp 80ndash81 no 48 pp 95ndash97 335 Ibidem no 15 p 36 In the Romanian translations of some documents issued by Mircea

the Elder and Michael I (1418ndash1420) made in the modern era this syntagma was translated as ldquoTatar

Siderdquo and ldquoTatar Countryrdquo respectively (cf Ibidem no 12 pp 31ndash32 no 43 p 88) 336 For localizing the ldquoTatar areasrdquo cf R Constantinescu Considerații asupra limitelor

cronologice și teritoriale ale stăpacircnirii lui Mircea cel Bătracircn (I) in Revista Arhivelor LXIII vol

XLVIII 1986 3 pp 282ndash284 V Ciocicircltan bdquoCătre părțile tătărăștirdquo din titlul voievodal al lui

Victor Spinei 58

110

After the armies of Bayezid II seized Chilia and Cetatea Albă in 1484 and the

colonization of the Tatars in the steppes north of these two strategic points337 the

southeastern Moldavian territory was removed from under the authority of the

rulers in Suceava thus becoming a separate political entity under the auspices of

Ottoman hegemony As a result of the massive penetration of some allogeneic

elements the region acquired a specific character that separated it politically

ethnically and confessionally from the whole it had belonged to This caused the

need to individualize it in terminological regard

In the era of the great migrations the region between the Danube Delta and

the Dniester Liman was referred to by the Byzantine authors Theophanes

Confessor338 and Nicephoros339 in their works elaborated at the beginning of the

ninth century as Oglos Onglos (Ὄγλος Ὄγγλος) in connection with the

movements of the Bulgarian tribes by the middle of the second half of the seventh

century In medieval Ottoman chronicles this area was called Budjak (Bugeac)

which etymologically means ldquoangle cornerrdquo like Onglos The toponym Budjak

probably inherited from the Turkish tribes of the Pechenegs Uzes and Cumans

was adopted by Romanian too It was frequently used by all the Moldavian

chroniclers (Grigore Ureche Miron Costin Nicolae Costin and Ion Neculce) In

the works of European authors the term Bessarabia Basarabia was preferred It

appeared for the first time on the oldest terrestrial globe that has reached us the so-

called Erdapfel fabricated in 1492 in Nuumlrnberg by the cartographer and local

merchant Martin Behaim (1459ndash1507) The globe has a circumference of 1595

mm and a diameter of 507 mm it is kept in the Germanisches Nationalmuseum in

Nuumlrnberg (inventory no WI 1826)340 Among hundreds of geographical points and

Mircea cel Mare in Anuarul Institutului de Istorie și Arheologie bdquoA D Xenopolrdquo XXIV 1987 2

pp 349ndash355 M Coman Putere și teritoriuhellip pp 161ndash170 337 Menakib-i Sultan Bayezid-han ibn-i Muhammed-han in Cronici turcești privind Țările

Romacircne Extrase I p 137 I Chirtoagă Basarabia de la sud de Codri Unele probleme

controversate in Idem Estul spațiului romacircnesc icircn perioada medievală și icircnceputul celei moderne

Bucharest-Brăila 2018 pp 79ndash81 Idem Icircntărirea otomanilor la gurile Dunării și pe cursul inferior

al Nistrului (1484ndash1590) in Revista de Istorie a Moldovei Chișinău 2019 3ndash4 (119ndash120) pp 5ndash11 338 Theophanis Confessoris Chronographia in Fontes historiae Bulgaricae VI Sofia 1960

pp 262ndash263 Theophanes Confessor The Chronicle Byzantine and Near Eastern History AD

284ndash813 transl by C Mango and R Scott Oxford 2006 p 498 339 Nicephoros Patriarch of Constantinople Short History ed by C Mango Washington DC

1990 chapter 35 Nicephoros in Fontes Historiae Daco-Romanae II Scriptores 2 Ab anno CCC

usque ad annum M Izvoarele istoriei Romacircniei II Autori 2 De la anul 300 pacircnă la anul 1000 ed

by H Mihăescu Gh Ștefan R Hincu V Iliescu V C Popescu Bucharest 1970 pp 626ndash627 340 A Reichenbach Martin Beheim Ein deutscher Seefahrer aus dem fuumlnfzehnten Jahrhundert

Wurzen and Leipzig 1889 pp 38ndash49 A E Nordenskioumlld Facsimile-Atlas to the Early History of

Cartography Stockholm 1889 pp 71ndash74 N Jacques Martin Behaim Seefahrer und Sternenrechner

Berlin 1942 pp 75ndash97 J Willers Die Geschichte des Beheim-Globus in Focus Beheim Globus 1

Aufsaumltze Nuumlrnberg 1992 pp 209ndash216 U Knefelkamp Der Beheim-Globus und die Kartographie seiner

Zeit in ibidem pp 217ndash222 R Schewe Das Gestell des Beheim-Globus in ibidem pp 279ndash288


111

miniatures there are also the names of a few regions and cities in the territories

inhabited by the Romanians sibēburgē [=Siebenbuumlrgen] hermanstadt [=Sibiu]

walachei bucharest bessarabia and moldau341 The fact that Bucharest was

included among the represented urban settlements raises certain suspicions

because at the moment in which this globe was produced it was a center in the

process of urbanization and it was mentioned in documents for the first time as

late as 1459342 Bucharest was far less important than many other cities in

Wallachia even if Vlad Țepeș (the Impaler) had endowed it with a fortress343

Given the fact that the globe was submitted to restorations twice in the first half of

the nineteenth century without specialist supervision the cartographic piece

contains numerous corruptions of locality names and it seems that some of them

were even eliminated Under these circumstances we do not exclude that those

who restored it had assumed some inadequate reconstitutions of the toponyms

Among these could have also been that of Bucharest and it is possible for this

name to have replaced even the capitalrsquos name Tacircrgoviște

Only a few decades later the toponym Bessarabia appeared on several maps elaborated in the fifteenth century by German and Italian cartographers Sebastian Muumlnster (1544) Giacomo Gastaldi (Iacob Castaldi) (1546 1584) Gaspar Vopell (1566) an Italian anonymous author (upon consensus assigned to Livio Sanuto) (1572) Gerhard Mercator (1572) Pseudo-Georg Reichersdorffer (1595) Fausto Rughesi (1597) another Italian anonymous author (map printed by Giacomo Frano at the end of the century)344 As cartography developed in the next century the number of maps containing Bessarabia grew exponentially because these maps were produced not only by German and Italian specialists but also by French (who preferred the variant Bessarabie) and Flemish ones Petrus Bertius (c 1630) Gerhard Mercator and Johannea Janssonius (c 1630) Guilelmus Blaeu apud Gerhard Mercator (c 1630) Nicolas Sanson drsquoAbbeville (1665 1691) Gerard Valck Pieter Schenk (c 1678) Nicolaus Visscher (1680 c 1680 1683) Justus Danckerts (c 1680) Hubert Jaillot (1684) Giacomo Cantelli da Vignola Vincenzo Mariotti (1684 1686) Frederick de Wit (1688) Johannes Hoffmann (1688 1688) Nicolas de Fer (1690) Gerard amp Leonard Valck (1690 1695) Frederick de Wit P Mortier (c 1690) Nicolas Sanson drsquoAbbeville Hubert Jaillot (1693) Philipp Cluumlver (1693) Johann Baptist Homann (1700)345 etc On some of these maps

341 E G Ravenstein Martin Beheim his Life and his Globe London 1908 p 78 Cf also

M Popescu-Spineni Romacircnia icircn istoria cartografiei pacircnă la 1600 I Bucharest 1938 p 107 342 Documenta Romaniae Historica B Țara Romacircnească I no 118 pp 203ndash204 343 L Rădvan Orașele din Țările Romacircne icircn evul mediu (sfacircrșitul sec al XIII-lea ndash icircnceputul

sec al XVI-lea) Iași 2011 pp 256ndash262 344 V Spinei Moldovahellip pp 48 63 64 345 I Țurcanu Descrierea Basarabiei Teritoriul dintre Prut și Nistru icircn evoluție istorică (din

primele secole ale mileniului II pacircnă la sfacircrșitul secolului al XX-lea) Chișinău-Bucharest 2011

pp 335ndash345 fig IVndashXXII Descriptio Bessarabiae Bessarabia in Five Centuries of Cartography

ed by A Năstase M Gribincea and O Dumitru Bucharest 2017 passim

Victor Spinei 60

112

beside Bessarabia the alternative variant of this toponym was also inscribed Budziac (Petrus Bertius c 1630) or Tartaria Budzakieses (Justus Danckerts c 1680) etc346

In order to be more explicit in this regard on one of the maps attached to his

large historical geography work concerning the ldquobarbarianrdquo peoples of the Danube

and Black Sea basins the diplomat and scholar Claude-Charles de Peyssonnel

(1727ndash1790) revealed the equivalence of the two terms by placing a disjunctive

conjunction between them Bessarabie ou Boudgeak347 an opinion which he

reiterated in his treatise on the commerce around the Black Sea La Bessarabie

aujourdrsquohui le Bodjiak348 This equivalence had been previously confirmed by

Dimitrie Cantemir the most competent scholar of the time to rule in this matter In

one of his works which he elaborated during his exile to Russia he claimed that in

those times the Tatars called this region Bugeac Bassarabia hellip Tartaris hodie

Budziak dicta349 Accompanied by an etymological explanation this consideration

is also found in a work written in Romanian Bassarabia iaște carea acmu cu

nume tătărăsc să chiamă Bugiac adecă unghiu (ldquoThis is Bessarabia which is now

called Budjak ie anglerdquo)350 In addition on the map assigned to it printed in

Holland in 1737 it was written Districtus Budzak sive Bassarabiaelig351 The map

elaborated by the illustrious geographer Jean-Baptiste Bourguignon drsquoAnville

(1697ndash1782) between 1771 and 1779 inspired among other sources by the map of

the Moldavian scholar contains the inscription Budzak ou Bessarabie352 It is

almost identical with that on the map of Guillaume Delisle included into the atlas

of Jeremias Wolf printed in Augsburg at the beginning of the eighteenth century

Budziac vel Bessarabia353

Besides cartographic sources the southeastern part of Moldavia designated

by the name Basarabia was mentioned quite frequently in chronicles geographical

works and foreign travel diaries dating from the sixteenth century and obviously

more and more in those of the following centuries In these works Bessarabia was

presented as a part of Moldavia or a different geopolitical entity which it had

346 Descriptio Bessarabiae hellip no 17 pp 94ndash95 no 24 pp 108ndash109 347 [C-Ch de] Peyssonnel Observations historiques et geacuteographiques sur les peuples

barbares qui ont habiteacute les bords du Danube amp du Pont Euxin Paris 1765 map pp 106ndash107 348 [C-Ch de] Peysson[n]el Traiteacute sur le commerce de la Mer Noire I Paris 1787 p 304 349 Demetrii principis Cantemirii Incrementorvm et decrementorvm avlae Othman[n]icae sive

Aliothman[n]icae historiaehellip p 389 Cf also pp 311 and 354 350 Dimitrie Cantemir Hronicul vechimeihellip I p 53 351 G Vacirclsan Harta Moldovei de Dimitrie Cantemir in Academia Romacircnă Memoriile

Secțiunii Istorice series III VI 9 1926 pp 193ndash212 and map I 352 Ibidem map II Cf also D Moldovanu Toponimia Moldoveihellip pp LXXXVIIndashXCI I

Țurcanu Descrierea Basarabieihellip pp 345ndash354 353 L Szaacutentai Atlas Hungaricus Magyarorszaacuteg nyomtatott teacuterkeacutepei 1528ndash1850 Hungary in

the Printed Maps 1528ndash1850 II Budapest 1996 p 701


113

become in fact since the end of the fifteenth century354 This toponym did not have

only geographical relevance it also obtained a political one for it designated the

territory that was administered semi-autonomously by the Budjak Tatar Horde

Given the fact that at a certain moment a territory located left of the Dniester

became subordinated to them the name Bessarabia was extended over that region

as well thus surpassing the traditional perimeter of Budjak a fact registered also in

cartographic works355

After the seize of Chilia and Cetatea Albă by the Turks in 1484 the territory

of Bessarabia Budjak was not unitary in administrative regard In the two

important fortified harbors there were installed garrisons and administrative

structures subordinated to the Porte while in the northern plain area there were

settled groups of Tatars originating from the region north of the Black Sea The

latter ones were under Ottoman hegemony and were meant to contribute to the

protection of those fortresses as well as to sustain war initiatives against the

neighboring Christian states The diverse terminology used for Cetatea Albă in the

Middle Ages has fueled endless historiographic disputes generated by its

apparently paradoxical designation as a result of antonymic chromatic adjectives

black (Maurocastro Moncastro and Maocastro) and white (Akkerman

Asprocastro Bielgorod Albi Castrum Nester Alba Weissenburg etc)

According to a statement of Jan Długosz (1415ndash1480) at the place in which

the Dniester flows into the Black Sea there stood the Black Fortress and the White

Fortress Cetatea Albă (Quarto Dnyesthr cuius fons in Sarmaticis Montibus prope

castrum Sabyen in terra Premisliensi hostia in mare maius inferius Nigrum et

Album Castra)356 Therefore the idea emerged that next to the riverrsquos mouths

there were in reality two fortified cities with two different names The first one

was presumably identified with another fortification on the Dniester called

Czarnigrad mentioned in a Polish royal document dated 1442357 According to

354 N Iorga Studii istoricehellip pp 75ndash76 I Nistor Localizarea numelui Basarabia hellip

pp 16ndash18 V Spinei Moldavia in the 11thndash14th Centuries transl by L Teodoreanu and I Sturza

Bucharest 1986 pp 48ndash49 I Țurcanu Descrierea Basarabieihellip pp 187ndash188

S Iosipescu Basarabiahellip p 8ndash17 M Coman Putere și teritoriuhellip pp 154ndash158 F Solomon

Die Moldau in Das Suumldosteuropa der Regionen ed by O J Schmitt and M Metzeltin Vienna

2015 pp 451ndash452 355 G I Brătianu La Bessarabiehellip pp 40ndash41 L Szaacutentai Atlas Hungaricushellip I 1996

p 369 Д Стоименов Атлас Българските земи в европейската картографска традиция

(IIIndashXIX в) обща ред А Фол А Стаматов D Stoimenov Atlas the Bulgatian Lands in the

European Cartographic Tradition (3rdndash19th Centuries) gen ed A Fol A Stamatov Sofia 2008

no II p 40 356 Ioannis Dlugossi Annales seu Cronicae incliti regni Poloniae [I] Liber primus Liber

secundus ed by I Dabrowski Warsaw 1964 p 75 357 M Cazacu A propos de lrsquoexpansion polono-lituanienne au nord de la mer Noire aux

XIVendashXVe siegravecles Czarnigrad la bdquoCiteacute Noirerdquo de lrsquoembouchure du Dniester in Passeacute turc-tatar

present sovieacutetique Eacutetudes offertes agrave Alexandre Bennigsen Turco-Tatar Past Soviet Present Studies

presented to Alexandre Benninsen (Collection Turcica VI) ed by Ch Lemercier-Quelquejay

Victor Spinei 62

114

another point of view the two supposedly distinct settlements corresponded to the

fortress and city at the Dniester Liman dominated by the Genoese and Moldavians

respectively358 This opinion and the aforementioned one contradict the majority of

the narrative and cartographic information pertaining to the harbor fortress In the

first book of his chronicle Długosz mentioned on two other occasions the place in

which the Dniester River (Dnyestr) flows into the Black Sea In one of these he

stated that the respective point was located near Cetatea Albă (Album Castrum)359

and in the other one that it was situated in front of the Black Fortress whose name

was transcribed as Czyrnyegrod360 We are dealing here with a lack of consistency

in quoting geographical terminology which once again raises doubts regarding the

accuracy of the statement concerning the presence of two urban entities at the river

mouths The Polish chronicler was probably confused by the frequency of double

names assigned to the prosperous center at the Dniester Mouth On the other hand

the very intense digging and terrain research undertaken in the last decades on tens

of kilometers around Cetatea Albă (Belgorod Dniestrovski) have not revealed

vestiges of fortified settlements although the detection of such monuments did not

face any obstacles in a flat plain perimeter

The change in the political status of the southeastern part of Moldavia also

had demographic consequences in the sense that a substantial part of the

Romanian enclaves in this region was forced to retreat towards the north and

northeast where they benefited from the protection of Moldavian state authorities

In fact their numeric proportion was low because agricultural communities were

largely or maybe even totally eliminated from the Budjak Steppes once the nomad

tribes of the Pechenegs Uzes Cumans and Mongols361 successively settled in this

region After the Golden Horde lost its positions on the right bank of the Dniester

for some decades we do not have any narrative and archaeological testimonies

G Veinstein S E Wimbush Louvain-Paris 1986 pp 99ndash122 The hypothesis referring to the

existence of two urban entities at the Dniester mouth is supported also by other followers

Șt S Gorovei Enigmele Cetății Albe in Magazin istoric SN XXVIII 1994 8 (329) pp 51ndash52

M Șlapac Cetatea Albă Studiu de arhitectură medievală militară Chișinău 1998 pp 15ndash19

Eadem Cetăți medievale din Moldavia (mijlocul secolului al XIV-lea ndash mijlocul secolului al XVI-lea

Chișinău 2004 pp 50 52 V Josanu Quelques considerations sur la double denomination de

Cetatea Albă in Eacutetudes byzantines et post-byzantines V ed by E Popescu and T Teoteoi

Bucharest 2006 pp 394ndash395 358 Ș Papacostea Maurocastrum și Cetatea Albă identitatea unei așezări medievale

in Revista istorică SN 6 1995 11ndash12 pp 911ndash915 359 Ioannis Dlugossi Annales seu Cronicae incliti regni Poloniae [I] p 83 360 Ibidem p 99 In the two passages there are two different names for the Black Sea

Euxinum Mare (Ibidem p 83) and mare Ponticum (Ibidem p 99) 361 Gh Postică Evoluția așezărilor din spațiul pruto-nistrean icircn epoca migrațiilor

(sec VndashXIII) in Thraco-Dacica XX 1999 1ndash2 pp 333ndash364 V Spinei The Romanian and the

Turkic Nomads North of the Danube Delta from the Tenth to the Mid-Thirteenth Century

Leiden-Boston 2009 pp 188ndash199 I Popoiu Romacircnii icircn mileniul migrațiilor (275ndash1247) 2nd ed

Iași 2015 pp 367ndash378


115

about an eventual colonization with Romanians This situation confirms the fact

that the displacement of political frontiers frequently attracts changes in the

linguistic borders as well

THE TERMINOLOGICAL DUALITY


The ethnic identity of the two Romanian voivodeships is mentioned in many

categories of internal and external sources In this context we are not interested in

their complete collection which in fact is not at all easy to accomplish However

we would like to point out the syntagmas double the other another Wallachia

both the two Wallachias etc that appear in significant instances in medieval and

Renaissance narrative and diplomatic sources The respective syntagmas reflect the

terminological duality of the Romanian voivodeships and the ethnic identity of

their majority population

A first mention in this regard is included in a historical writing authored by

the French diplomat and author Philippe de Meacuteziegraveres (c 1327ndash1405) elaborated

shortly after the famous battle of Nicopolis in September 1396 After referring to

the political context in the Balkans preceding the battle of Kosovo in June 1389 he

concluded that by taking advantage of the Christiansrsquo confusion Sultan Murad I

and his son had brought under their authority the Empire of Constantinople the

Empire of Bulgaria the Kingdom of Macedonia entire Greece the Kingdom of

Rascia the Kingdom of Serbia the Kingdom of Bosnia double Wallachia entire

Albania most of Moreea and a part of Sclavonia as far as the borders of the

Signoria of Venice and Hungary Et pour briefve conclusion agrave la confusion de la

crestienteacute le dit Amourath et son fils ont soubsmis agrave leur seignourie lrsquoempire de

Constantinoble lrsquoempire de Boulguerie le royaume de Maceacutedoine toute Gregravece le

royaume de Rasse le royaume de Servie le royaume de Bosne et la double

Walaquie toute Albanie la plus grant part de la Moureacutee et une partie

drsquoEsclavonie jusques aux confins de la seignourie de Venise et jusques en Hongrie

auquel royaume Dieu vueille aidier car il est en tregraves-grant peacuteril362

362 [Philippe de Meacuteziegraveres] Eacutepistre lamentable et consolatoire sur le fait de la desconfiture

lacrimable du noble et vaillant roy de Honguerie par les Turcs devant la ville de Nicopoli en

lrsquoEmpire de Boulguerie in Oeuvres de Froissart Chroniques XVI 1397ndash1400 ed by K de

Lettenhove Brussels 1872 p 510 Philippe de Meacuteziegraveres Une epistre lamentable et consolatoire

ed by Ph Contamine and J Paviot with the collaboration of C Van Hoorebeeck Paris 2008 p 215

Cf also N Jorga Philippe de Meacuteziegraveres 1327ndash1405 et la croisade au XIVe siegravecle Paris 1896 p 490

М Динић [M Dinić] Два савременика о боју на Косову in Глас Српске Краљевске Академије

CLXXXII 92 1940 pp 130ndash131 Th A Emmert Serbian Golgotha Kosovo 1389 New York

1990 pp 50ndash51 176ndash177 note 19 Some medievalists erroneously assigned this passage to Jean

Froissart they were surprised that it was reproduced without the authorrsquos name in the volume of the

Victor Spinei 64

116

Philippe de Meacuteziegraveres demonstrated good knowledge regarding the

consequences of the Ottoman expansion because only the inclusion of ldquodouble

Wallachiardquo among the territories under Turkish hegemony is questionable363

Obviously incorrect is the statement according to which Prince Lazar defeated

by Murad I had ruled in the region of the Wallachians (prince des contreacutees de

la Walaquie appelleacute Lazegravere) However the information on the battle lost by

Beyazid I (Baxeth) Muradrsquos son (Amourath) against the Wallachians

(Walaquiens) is correct but the estimation that Turkish losses reached 300000

(or 300500) victims is highly exaggerated364 Under the circumstances of the

highlighted confusing aspects the localization of that ldquodouble Wallachiardquo

(double Walaquie) in the text of the French author raises uncertainties so that

two interpretive hypotheses can be formulated The first one claims that one of

the Wallachias was located in the Balkan Peninsula clearly not in Serbia

where Lazar ruled but in the region of the Epirus Mountains in the perimeter

of Great Wallachia and the other one north of the Danube The second

hypothesis more plausible in our opinion suggests that in the view of Philippe

de Meacuteziegraveres ldquodouble Wallachiardquo corresponded to Wallachia and Moldavia In

another of his works a novel of an allegorical sort the name of Vlachia is

rendered as Abblaquie Ablaquie 365 which shows that a coherent designation

of the major Carpathian-Balkan toponymy had yet to be established on the

French intellectual landscape

chronicler of the Hundred Yearsrsquo War published in 1872 Cf G Stabile Valacchi e Valacchie nella

letteratura francese medievale Rome 2010 pp 167ndash168 363 On the controversies regarding the moment when the Porte imposed tribute and vesselage

status to the Romanian Lands see F Babinger Beginn der Tuumlrkensteuer in den Donaufuumlrstentuumlmern

(1394 bzw 1455) in Suumldostforschungen VIII 1943 pp 1ndash35 T Gemil Romanians and Ottomans

hellip pp 115 139ndash140 187ndash192 291ndash301 M M Szeacutekely Șt S Gorovei Autour des relations

moldo-ottomanes in Medieval and Early Modern Studies for Central and Easern Europe V 2013

pp 148ndash191 A Pippidi Taking possession of Wallachia Facts and interpretations in The Ottoman

Conquest of the Balkans Interpretations and Reasearch Debates ed by O J Schmitt Vienna 2015

pp 187ndash206 364 [Philippe de Meacuteziegraveres] Eacutepistre lamentablehellip p 511 Philippe de Meacuteziegraveres Une epistre

lamentablehellip p 216 365 Idem Songe du viel pelerin ed J Blanchard in collab with A Calvet and D Kahn I

Geneva 2015 pp 206 235 A passage of this allegorical work ndash considered a ldquogenuine Imago Mundi

of the fourteenth centuryrdquo which ldquodeserves a place in the vanguard of medieval literary

masterpiecesrdquo (D M Bell Eacutetude sur le Songe du vieil de Philippe de Meacuteziegraveres (1327ndash1405) Geneva

1955 pp 9 14) ndash tells the story of a Western queen and her attendantsrsquo travel through the Empire of

Constantinople the Empire of Trebizond across the Greater Sea (mer Maour ie the Black Sea)

then through Lathania () along the coast of Greece in the Empire of Bulgaria the Kingdom

of Rascia Albania Dalmania Sclavonia la terre drsquoAlixandre de Balgerat en Abblaquie and

the Kingdom of Russia (Philippe de Meacuteziegraveres Songehellip I p 206) If the identification of the country

of Abblaquie with Walachia is certain the supposition that Alixandre de Balgerat referred

to Nicholas-Alexander Basarab (Ibidem II 2015 p 1510 A Pippidi Documente privind locul

romacircnilor icircn sud-estul Europei București 2018 p 20 note 7) is indeterminate


117

The joint name of the two Romanian voivodeships is also recorded in one of the manuscripts of Johannes Schiltbergerrsquos (also known under the first name Hans) (1380ndashc 1440) travel journal After falling prisoner in the battle of Nicopolis in 1396 he spent six years in Ottoman captivity Then after another equally famous battle namely that of Ankara in 1402 he served several members of Oriental dynasties until 1427 when he returned to his native Bavaria where he wrote down his memoirs preserved in several manuscripts In one of these we encounter the following statement In beiden Wallacheyen in der groszligen sowohl als in der kleinen sind die Einwohner Christen haben eine ihnen ganz eingenthuumlmliche Sprache (ldquoIn both Wallachias in the Great as in the Little one the inhabitants are Christians they have a fully strange characteristic languagerdquo)366 In other manuscripts of this work Great and Little Wallachia (Walachei Walachy) were also mentioned367 but without the syntagma ldquoboth Wallachiasrdquo which suggests that it could belong to a copyist of the original text

A wording that reveals the same concept is contained in a letter addressed by the Grand Lithuanian Duke Witold to the Polish King Wladyslaw Jagiello at the beginning of June 1429 in which besides issues in connection with the actions planned against the Hussites and the Turks the frontier dispute between Bessarabians Wallachians and Moldavians (inter Bessarabitas et Moldwanos) the so-called ldquoboth Wallachiansrdquo (hellipistis duobus Walachis) was evoked according to the manner in which they were named in the document368

The formal inclusion of Transalpina and Moldavia in terra Valachiaelig was explicitly stated in a decree of King Sigismund of Luxembourg dated 1435 in which there was an attempt to establish an equivalence between the old ethnic and regional terminology and that used in the time the document was issued Comania vero dicitur terra Valachiaelig quaelig in habitabatur agrave Comanis nigris quaelig est sita agrave fluuio Olth inter Alpes amp Danubium iacens versus Tartariam quaelig nunc in habitatur agrave VValachis amp nuncupatur pars Transalpinaelig amp Moldauiaelig (ldquoCumania is indeed known as the Land of Wallachia which had been inhabited by the Black Cumans and is located on the Olt River between the mountains and the Danube lying towards Tartaria it is now inhabited by the Wallachians Romanians and regarded as a part of Transalpina and Moldaviardquo)369

366 Schiltbergerrsquos Reise in den Orient und wunderbare Begebenheiten ed by A I Penzel

Munich 1814 p 82 367 Reisen des Jonannes Schiltberger aus Muumlnchen in Europa Asia und Afrika von 1394 bis 1427

ed by K Fr Neumann Munich 1859 p 92 Hans Schiltbergers Reisebuch nach der Nuumlrnberger

Handschrift ed by V Langmantel Tuumlbingen 1885 p 52 Johann Schiltbergers Irrfahrt durch den Orient

ed by M Tremmel Wambach 2006 p 76 Cf also The Bondage and Travel of Johann Schiltberger in

Europe Asia and Africa 1396ndash1427 transl by Buchan Telfer London 1879 p 38 368 Codex epistolaris Vitoldi magni ducis Lithuaniae 1376ndash1430 ed by A Prochaska

(Monumenta medii aevi historica res gestas Poloniae illustrantia VI) Cracoviae 1882

no MCCCLVII p 835 369 Index sev enchiridion omnivm decretorvm et constitvtionvm Regni Vngariaelig ad Annvm

1579 Viennaelig Austriaelig 1581 p AIIJ

Victor Spinei 66

118

The syntagma ldquoboth Wallachiasrdquo appears somewhat surprisingly in the travel notes of Bertrandon de la Broquiegravere (c 1400ndash1459) a nobleman at the

court of Philippe III Duke of Burgundy also called ldquole Bonrdquo (Philip the Good) The former was sent by his sovereign on a pilgrimage at the Holy Places in

1432ndash1433 It seems like the purposes of this trip were not limited only to spiritual aspects because the chosen itinerary and the persons contacted by the

Burgundian court member also indicate informative missions in areas of predictable confrontations with the Ottoman power in vigorous ascension

Quite a long time after his return to Burgundy that is in 1455 Bertrandon was

asked by Philippe le Bon to write down his travel memories probably also because he became animated by the idea of launching a crusade after the fall of

Constantinople and he needed a presentation of the geopolitical context in the Near East This work was finished in the first part of 1457 shortly before

Bertrandon de la Broquiegravere passed away in May of the same year370 In a passage placed after the presentation of the impressions acquired during

visiting the city of Bursa the author approached aspects in connection with the expansion of the Turkish Sultanate towards the remaining parts of the Byzantine

Empire and against the Romanian Lands Et vueult on dire que en icelluy temps toute la Turquie et la Rommenie estoient obeissants agrave lrsquoempereur de

Constantinople et aux Grecz Et avant que je passasse par icelle contreacutee le Grant Turc avoit conquis toutes les deux Vallaquies crsquoest assavoir la grande et la petite

et nrsquoy avoit plus nulle cite ville ne fortresse qui fust en lrsquoobeissance de lrsquoempereur de Constantinople que tout ne fust subgect ou tributaire au Turc (ldquoIt is said that in

past times entire Turkey and Romania were subjected to the Emperor in Constantinople and to the Greeks Before I passed through those countries the

Great Turk had conquered both Wallachias the Great one as well as the Little one

and every citadel town and fortress subjected to the Emperor in Constantinople was subjugated by or paid tribute to the Turkrdquo)371 The statement of the diplomat

employed by Philippe le Bon is not entirely accurate because during the years the former spent in Levant the Romanian Lands had not yet been conquered by the

Turks and only Wallachia had been forced to pay tribute to them Throughout the travel notes the terms Walaquie and Walaques were used for the state entity and

the inhabitants of Wallachia372 as well as for the population of Moldavia373 However more important than these names is the use of the syntagma toutes les

deux Vallaquies ldquoboth Wallachiasrdquo which reflects the awareness that the population of the two voivodeships belonged to the same ethnicity

370 Bertrandon de la Broquiere The Travel to Palestine and his Return from Jerusalem

overland to France during the Year 1432 amp 1433 transl by Th Johnes 1807 Idem [Bertrandon de

la Broquiegravere] Le voyage drsquoOutremer ed by Ch Schefer Paris 1892 371 Bertrandon de la Broquiegravere Le voyagehellip p 149 Cf also G Stabile Valacchi e

Valacchiehellip pp 178ndash179 372 Bertrandon de la Broquiegravere Le voyagehellip pp 190 195 208 224 373 Ibidem pp 197 225


119

An identical conclusion is suggested by a manuscript regarding the structures

of the Byzantine Empire Church in 1435 copied in 1437 and kept in the

Bayerische Staatsbibliothek in Munich The document stated that the spiritual

authority of the Constantinople Church was exercised over the ldquotwo Wallachiasrdquo

with their own language they were two ldquokingdomsrdquo states with two rulers

located next to the borders of Hungary and Russia and all of them were subjected

to the Greek Church hellipItem Ecclesia constantinopolitana habet potestatem in

spiritualibus apud duas Balachias propriam linguam habentes quaelig duo regna

sunt et domini duo per se naturales in metis Ungarie et Russie omnes in

obedientia Ecclesie Grecorum374

The term ldquothe other Wallachiardquo (lrsquoaltra Vlachia Valachia) was mentioned

twice by Ioan Țamblac Ioanis Zamblacho [Ioannes Tzamplakon] messenger of

Stephen the Great in the synopsis presented on May 8 1477 to the Senate of

Venice The pladoyer of the rulerrsquos messenger is said to have been translated from

Greek into Latin but this version has not reached us and we only have an Italian

translation Based on linguistic arguments the editor of this document supposed

that in fact its original was not written in Greek but in Old Slavic because the

rulerrsquos chancery did not use Greek at that time375 The purpose of the mission led

by Ioan Țamblac Ioannes Tzamplakon probably the uncle of the Princersquos wife

was to obtain Venetian help in the case of a predictable repetition of an Ottoman

campaign after that of 1476376 Stephen the Great justified the defeat he had

suffered one year before with the fact that the Turks had received help from the

peoples subordinated to them Ma ello [inamico] ha fato vignir lrsquoaltra Vlachia da

una banda e li Tartari de lrsquoaltra (ldquoAnd he [the enemy] ordered the other Vlachian

Romanian country to join one side and the Tatars the other onerdquo)377 At the same

374 Terre hodierne Grecorum et dominia seculario et spiritualia ipsorum in N Iorga Acte și

fragmente cu privire la istoria romacircnilor III Bucharest 1897 pp 7ndash8 375 I Bogdan (ed) Documentelehellip II no CLIV p 347 G Mihăilă Importanța politică și

literară a corespondenței lui Ștefan cel Mare cu Veneția in Ștefan cel Mare și Sfacircnt 1504ndash2004

Portret icircn istorie Putna Suceava 2003 pp 97ndash103 D Racircpă-Buicliu et al (ed) Ștefan cel Mare și

Sfacircnt 1504ndash2004 Poliptic istoric Galați 2004 pp 66ndash68 376 For the European political context in which the embassy was sent to the Serenissima and

the identity of the leader of Stephen the Greatrsquos mission see G Mihăilă Importanța politică și

literarăhellip pp 86ndash103 Șt S Gorovei M M Szeacutekely Princeps omni laude maior O istorie a lui

Ștefan cel Mare Putna 2005 pp 176ndash182 Cf also I Ursu Ștefan cel Mare domn al Moldovei de la

12 aprilie 1457 pănă la 2 iulie 1504 Bucharest 1925 pp 156ndash158 A Elian Moldova și Bizanțul icircn

secolul al XV-lea in Idem Bizanțul Biserica și cultura romacircnească ed by V V Muntean Iași

2003 pp 78ndash79 L Pilat Moldova și cruciada papei Sixt al IV-lea Context politic și acțiuni

diplomatice in Idem Studii privind relațiile Moldovei cu Sfacircntul Scaun și Patriarhia Ecumenică

(secolele XIVndashXVI) Iași 2012 pp 196ndash198 I-A Pop A Simon Re de Dacia un proiect de la

sfacircrșitul Evului Mediu Cluj-Napoca 2018 pp 157 160ndash162 377 I Bogdan (ed) Documentelehellip II pp 344 348 G Mihăilă Importanța politică și

literarăhellip pp 98 100 Cf also Documente privitoare la istoria romacircnilor collected by Eudoxiu de

Hurmuzaki VIII 1376ndash1650 [ed by I Slavici] Bucharest 1894 no XXVII p 24 (here lrsquoaltra was

spelled laltra)

Victor Spinei 68

120

time the Prince of Moldavia mentioned that during the negotiations with Hungary

some requirements were not met Et pero io ho solicitado de cazar Basaraba

vayvoda de lrsquoaltra Valachia et de metter un altro signor christian zoe el Drachula

per intenderse insieme (ldquoAnd however I had asked for Voivode Basarab [Laiotă]

to be banished from the other Valachian Romanian Country and another

Christian ruler namely Drăculea [Vlad Țepeș ie Vlad the Impaler] to be placed

thererdquo)378 The text of the letter leads us to the conclusion that lrsquoaltra Vlachia

Valachia explicitly refers to Wallachia thus reflecting the opinion of the

Moldavian Prince that his subjects as well as their neighbors were living in

countries with the same ethnic profile indicated by their own names

The terminological identity of the two Romanian states is also confirmed by

the chronicle authored by Filippo Buonaccorsi called Callimachus (1437ndash1497)

who emigrated from Italy to Poland where he enjoyed great prestige According to

the passages in his work dedicated to the war waged by Hungary and Poland

against the Turks between the Danube and the Carpathians lay the Mountainous

Wallachia called Dacia by the ancestors and ldquothe other Valachia called

Moldaviardquo after the river that crossed it represented a part of old Mysia Inferior

(cui inter Danubium et Carpatum adiuncta est Montana Valachia quae a

maioribus Dacia vocabatur [hellip] Altera vero Valachia cui Moldaviae nomen est a

flumine hoc tempore apud antiquos Inferioris Misiae pars fuit)379 In the biography

dedicated to Cardinal Sbigneus de Olenica Zbigniew Oleśnicki the Italian scholar

mentioned the Roman colony Mysia Inferior that was called Wallachia in his time

(hellipa Romanis colonia in Inferiorum Mysiam quae hodie Valachia nuncupatur)380

In agreement with the state terminology used in his adoptive homeland which he

had assimilated Filippo Buonaccorsi called Moldavia by the name of Valachia

Some of Filippo Buonaccorsirsquos opinions are found in the work of his

compatriot and contemporary Antonio Bonfini (1434ndash1503) an illustrious scholar

in the service of the Royal Court in Buda After mentioning the fact that at the

time the mountain area of Dacia was called Valachia Montana he also brought up

ldquoanother Valachiardquo that is Moldavia located between the Istros and the Tyras ie

between the Danube and the Dniester Altera uerὸ Valachia cui Moldauiaelig nomen

est inter Istrum amp Tyram ab Hierasso montanaelig Valachiaelig termino ad Euxinum

usque Pontum extenditur381 The dilemma regarding the first source that expressed

378 I Bogdan (ed) Documentelehellip II pp 344 349 G Mihăilă Importanța politică și

literarăhellip pp 98 100 Cf also Documentehellip Hurmuzaki VIII no XXVII p 24 379 Philippi Callimachi Experientis Historia rerum gestarum in Hungaria et contra Turcos per

Vladislaum Poloniae et Hungariae regem ed by S Kwiatkowski in Monumenta Poloniae Historica

VI Cracow 1893 pp 22ndash23 380 Philippi Callimachi Vita et mores Sbignei cardinalis ed by I Lichońska Varsoviae 1962

p 26 381 Antonii Bonfinii Rerum Vngaricarvm decades tres Basileaelig [Basel] 1543 p 26 Antonius

de Bonfinis Rerum Ungaricarum decades ed by I Foacutegel B Ivaacutenyi L Juhaacutesz I Lipsiae [Leipzig]

1936 pp 38ndash39


121

the quoted ideas was clarified by the bibliographic list (Catalogus avctorvm

qvorum testimonio Bonfinivs in hisce tribus Decadibus) containing the enumeration

of 67 authors and works which was attached to the princeps edition of Bonfinirsquos

historical work This list also included the name Callimachus382 It is not entirely

sure whether the respective list was elaborated by the author himself or it was put

together four decades after his death by the person who edited his work for the

first time

In the description of Transylvania made by Stephanus Brodericus Istvaacuten

Brodarics (c 1470ndash1539) bishop and chancellor of Hungary (inserted into a work

dedicated to the miserable war waged by the Hungarian Kingdom against the

Ottoman Empire) the author borrowed many geographic and historical

considerations from Bonfini and showed that the region was surrounded by ldquothe

two Walachiasrdquo Transalpina Wallachia and Moldavia (Transsylvaniam duae

cingunt Walachiae Transalpina et Moldavia)383 This sentence was also inserted

by the Italian scholar Pietro Bizzari (Petrus Bizarus) into the introductory part of

his work on the conflict between the Austrians and the Turks during the reigns of

Maximilian II of Habsburg and Suumlleyman the Magnificent It was printed by the

middle of the second half of the sixteenth century and its author included a short

description of Hungary into it Hanc duaelig cingunt Vualachiaelig Transalpina amp

Moldauia384

The syntagma ldquothe two Wallachiasrdquo was replaced in an original manner in

the hagiographic writing entitled The Life of Our Holy Father Archbishop Maxim

the New elaborated around 1523 by an anonymous monk from the Krušedol

Monastery in Northern Serbia which had been built a few years before by the

addressee of this work Saint Maxim Branković with the financial support of

Neagoe Basarab Hosted in Wallachia in the first years of the sixteenth century the

Serbian high hierarch enjoyed much appreciation from Radu IV the Great and

when the conflict against Bogdan III cel Chior (the One-Eyed) escalated anew in

1507 he mediated the reconciliation between the ldquovoivodes of the two Daciasrdquo385

The usage of this formulation indicates the fact that the author was aware of the

analogy between the territories of the Romanian Lands and those of the former

382 Antonii Bonfinii Rerum Vngaricarvmhellip page without number placed after the Preface 383 Stephanus Brodericus De conflictu Hungarorum cum Solymano Turcarum imperatore ad

Monach historia verissima ed by P Kulcsaacuter (Bibliotheca scriptorum medii recentisque aevorum

Series nova VI) Budapest 1985 p 31 384 Petrus Bizarus Pannonicum bellum sub Maximiliano II Rom et Solymano Turcar

imperatoribus gestum Basileae [Basel] 1573 p 8 Petri Bizari Sentinatis Bellum Pannonicum sub

Maximiliano II Romanorum et Solymanno Turcarum imperatoribus gestum recognitum et

emendatum in Scriptores rerum Hungaric[arum] veteres ac genuine ed by J G Schwandtner II

Vindobonae [Vienna] 1768 p 345 385 G Mihăilă Viața și slujba lui Maxim Brancovici Momentul 1507 icircn letopisețele romacircnești

in Idem Icircntre Orient și Occident Studii de cultură și literatură romacircnă icircn secolele al XV-lea ndash al

XVIII-lea Bucharest 1999 p 207

Victor Spinei 70

122

province Dacia which had acquired general consensus in the erudite world of that

time The involvement of Archbishop Maxim Branković in the pacification of the

Romanian dynasty members was also evoked in Moldavian chronicles (The

Anonymous Annals of Moldavia Letopisețul anonim al Moldovei386 The

Chronicle of Macarie Cronica lui Macarie387 The Annals of the Moldavian

Country Letopisețul Țăricirci Moldovei by Grigore Ureche388) and Moldavian-Polish

ones (The Moldavian-Polish Cronica moldo-polonă389) The Anonymous Annals

of Moldavia (Letopisețul anonim al Moldovei) is a sixteenth century copy of the

chronicle prototype written at the court of Stephen the Great with a short addition

corresponding to the year 1507 In this work it is claimed that the messenger of the

Wallachian Prince Macsimiian ltMaximgt had implored Bogdan to accept peace

ldquobecause you are Christians and relativesrdquo (понеже есте христіане и

племенници)390 While scrupulously paraphrasing this section Grigore Ureche also

invoked as a reason for reconciliation the fact that the two rulers were ldquoChristiansrdquo

and of the same ldquolineagerdquo391 thus reflecting the explicit awareness of their

confessional and ethnic identity

While spending a longer time as a diplomatic representative at the court of

the Wallachian Prince the Ragusa-born Michael Bocignoli who lived by the end

of the fifteenth century and the first half of the sixteenth century had the

opportunity to learn directly not only political aspects but also specific

characteristics of the life of the inhabitants belonging to various social levels His

observations concerning these details were mentioned in a letter of June 29 1524

written in Latin and addressed from Ragusa to Imperial Chancellor Gerardo Plania

(Geacuterard de Plaines) By stating that the Wallachians Romanians used Italian with

certain flaws (Lingua Itala sed aliquanto contractiore utuntur) Michael Bocignoli

indirectly admitted the Latin character of the idiom that was specific to the

inhabitants of the Wallachian voivodeship An interesting aspect of his letter

resides in the remarks referring to the geographic location of Wallachia and its

adjacency to the ldquoother Valachiardquo Huius Valachiae fines sunt ab oriente altera

Valachia quae Moldovia ab Ungaris appellatur ab antiquis Dacia dicta (ldquoThis

Valachia [Țara Romacircnească] is bordered on the east by the other Valachia which

386 Letopisețul anonim al Moldovei in Cronicile slavo-romacircne din sec XVndashXVI publicate de

Ioan Bogdan ed by P P Panaitescu Bucharest 1959 pp 13ndash14 22ndash23 387 Cronica lui Macarie in Cronicile slavo-romacircnehellip pp 78 91 388 Grigore Ureche Letopisețulhellip p 128 389 Cronica moldo-polonă in Cronicile slavo-romacircnehellip pp 172 182 Cf also S Tomin

Archbishop Maxim Branković Supplement to understanding of Serbian-Romanian relationship at the

beginning of the 16th century in Medieval and Early Modern Studies for Central and Eastern

Europe Iași I 2009 1ndash4 pp 109ndash119 L Pilat O Cristea Le moine la guerre et la paix un

eacutepisode de la rivaliteacute moldo-valaque au deacutebut du XVIe siegravecle in ibidem pp 121ndash140 390 Letopisețul anonim al Moldovei pp 13 and 23 391 Grigore Ureche Letopisețulhellip p 128


123

is called Moldovia by the Hungarians and Dacia by the ancient peoplesrdquo)392 In this

quoted text the wording used in the correspondence of Stephen the Great with the

Venetians was reiterated A significant role in spreading this letter of 1524 was

played by Anton-Maria del Chiaro the Italian secretary of Constantin Bracircncoveanu

(1688ndash1714) who reproduced it in his work dedicated to the description of

Wallachia however he omitted the fragment mentioned above393

In the same year 1524 a letter of Louis II King of Hungary was addressed

to King Henry VIII of England with references to both provinces of the Valachians

Romanians regarded as shields of his state but greatly dominated by the Turks

hellipValachorum quoque provinciis duabus (que ab uno Regni nostra angulo

propugnaculorum vicem prestabant) in eorum potastatem magna ex parte redactis

Turci importunissimi christianae religionis hosteshellip394 Resulting in the occupation

of some territories of the Christians and the fortifications disposed along the

Danube and the Sava Rivers the Ottoman expansion created a serious threat for the

neighboring countries so that the Hungarian sovereign who realized the precarious

situation and anticipated the disaster in Mohaacutecs requested the support of the

English ruler

Like other compatriots from Dalmatia Tranquillo Andronico (Tranquillus

Andronicus) proved to be quite a good connoisseur of Romanian history as he

adhered to the idea that the Wallachians were the successors of the Romans mixed

with locals from Dacia and that they called themselves Romans In 1534 while

speaking about ldquoboth Valachiasrdquo (utrisque Valachis) and the ldquoTransalpine

Valachiansrdquo he designated as Wallachians Romanians both voivodes north of the

Lower Danube Quod autem ad praesentem rem attinet Valachi duo fuerunt

regibus Hungariae subiecti Caeterum Turci postquam coeperunt esse potentes in

Europa occupatis litoribus maris Euxini et ostiis Danubii in suam potestatem

redactis imposuere tributum utrisque Valachis relicta eis facultate vaivodas

eligendi addito ut ab imperatoribus Turcorum confirmarentur Priscis temporibus

omnes Valachi sub uno principe degebant postea divisi sunt et alii regionem

occupaverunt unde Cumani migraverunt in Hungariam ipsi vero Moldavi

appellati sunt et pariter terra Moldavia a flumine eiusdem nominis [hellip] ab ortu et

meridie habet Pontum Euxinum et Transalpinenses Valachoshellip (ldquoRegarding the

392 Michael Bocignoli Ragusaeus Gerardo Plania secretario imperatoris Descriptio Valachiae et

eius incolarum Quomodo Valachia in potestatem Turcarum venerit in Acta et epistolae relationum

Transylvaniae Hungariaeque cum Moldavia et Valachia Acte și scrisori privitoare la relațiunile

Ardealului și Ungariei cu Moldavia și Țara Romacircnească I 1468ndash1540 ed by A Veress

Budapest-Kolozsvaacuter [Cluj] 1914 no 96 p 129 Cf also Michael Bocignoli from Raguza [Descrierea

Țării Romacircnești] in Călători străini despre Țările Romacircne I ed by M Holban Bucharest 1968 I p 175 393 Antonmaria del Chiaro Fiorentino Istoria delle moderne rivoluzioni della Valachia con la

descrizione del paese natura costumi riti e religioni degli abitanti Venice 1718 pp 111ndash117 394 Documente privitoare la istoria romacircnilor collected by Eudoxiu de Hurmuzaki II 3

1510ndash1590 ed by N Densușianu Bucharest 1892 no CCCXXXVII p 485

Victor Spinei 72

124

matter to which our [attention] is drawn both Valachian Romanian [rulers] were

subjected to the kings of Hungary In fact after the Turks started to become

powerful in Europe by occupying the coast of the Euxine Sea and seizing the

power over the Danube Mouths they imposed tribute on both Valachias that kept

the right to choose their voivodes under the condition that they were confirmed by

the emperors sultans of the Turks In past times all Valachians were led by one

prince later on they separated and occupied other regions from which the Cumans

migrated to Hungary these are called Moldavians and the Moldavian Country was

called after the homonymous river [hellip] east and south there are the Pontus

Euxinus and the Transalpine Valachianshelliprdquo)395 The opinions of Tranquillo

Andronico are generally correct except for the assertion regarding the existence of

a Romanian unitary state by the dawns of the Middle Ages from which ldquoboth

Valachiasrdquo had separated this statement is not confirmed by any credible historical

source He used the syntagma ldquoTransalpine Valachiansrdquo (Valachi Tratildesalpinenses)

in another work as well396

The idea of establishing a state named Wallachia in Antiquity and of its

division into the two medieval voivodeships was embraced by numerous scholars

in the Renaissance era Among them was also the Polish chronicler Leonard

Gorecki (c 15251530ndashc 1585) the author of a short biography dedicated to Ioan

Vodă cel Cumplit (John III the Terrible) in whose introduction he inserted a

succinct presentation of the Romanian regions Valachia quae olim Mysia amp

Dacia dicta fuit habet ab ortu Euxinum a meridie Istrum seu Danubium ab

occasu Transyluaniaelig ad Boream Russiaelig seu Roxolanis contermina Tota regio in

partes duas diuiditur in Valachiam Transalpinam ac Moldauiam (ldquoValachia

which in the olden times was called Mysia and Dacia is bordered on the east by

the Euxine Sea on the south by the Istros or Danubius on the west by

Transylvania and on the north by Russia or the Roxolans The whole region is

divided into two parts ie Transalpine Valachia and Moldaviardquo)397 The assertion

claiming that Valachia Transalpina was called Carabogdana minor by the Turks398

is inaccurate because the choronym Carabogdan was assigned in reality to

Moldavia not only by the Ottomans but also by Westerners as a result of their

395 Tranquillus Andronicus Dalmata Traguriensishellip in Acta et epistolaehellip Acte și scrisorihellip

I ed by A Veress 1914 no 203 pp 243ndash244 396 Oratio Tranquilli Andronici Dalmatae ad Germanos de bello suscipiendo contra Turcos

Vienna Pannoniae 1541 [p 8] (our paging) 397 Leonhardi Gorecii Equitis Poloni Descriptio belli Iuoniaelig Voiuodaelig Valachiaelig quod anno

MDLXXIIII cum Selymo II Turcarum imperator gessit huic accessit Io Lasicii historia de ingressu

Polonorum in Valachiam cum Bogdano amp caeligde Turcorum Francofurti 1578 p 10 Cf also

Leonarda Goreckiego szlachcica polskiego Opisanie wojny Iwona hospodara wołoskiego z Selimem

II cesarzem tueckim toczoneacutej w roku 1574 ed and transl by W Syrokomla Petersburg ndash Mohylew

1855 p 1 A P[apiu] I[larian] Goreciu și Lasiciu in Tesaur de monumente istorice pentru Romacircnia

ed by A Papiu-Ilarian III Bucharest 1865 p 209 398 Leonhardi Gorecii Equitis Poloni Descriptio bellihellip p 14


125

influence Regarding the name Valachia Leonard Gorecki observed the

old-fashioned norms established by Enea Silvio Piccolomini by deriving it

according to the pattern Flaccus ndash Flaccia ndash Valachia399

The generic meaning of the name Valachia employed both for Wallachia as

well as for Moldavia also appeared in a letter of December 16 1534 sent from

Vienna by Fabio (Fabius) Mignanelli (c 1486ndash1557) After joining the diplomatic

service of the Papal See Fabio Mignanelli who came from Siena was sent to the

courts of several dynasty members for the purpose of mobilizing them for an

anti-Ottoman crusade In the missions entrusted to him the high hierarch became

familiar with the military potential of the targeted Christian countries in order to

include them in the crusade among these were the Romanian voivodeships too

Due to the fact that they were less known the Italian prelate felt responsible to

insert into the letter some details about them Tutta la Valachia grande e piccola ha

in se luonghi fertilissimi e la piccola egrave signoreggiata dal vaivoda Transalpino e la

grande dal Moldavo e lrsquouno e lrsquoaltro soleva esser tributario delli antichi re

drsquoUngheria Fa tutta la Valachia quaranta in cinquanta mila cavalli al Moldavia

sola 20 in 30 mila (ldquoEntire Valachia the Great and the Little one has very fertile

places and the Little one is dominated by the Transalpine voivode and the Great

one by the Moldavian one both used to pay tribute to the old kings of Hungary

Whole Valachia [is able to provide] between forty and fifty thousand horsemen

and Moldavia alone between 20000 and 30000rdquo)400

The phrase ldquoto the other Valachiansrdquo Romanians also appeared in a

chapter of the renowned work Hungaria authored by scholar Nicolaus Olahus

(1493ndash1568) dedicated to Moldavia Regarding the language of the Moldavians

he explains that it was Latin at some point exactly like that of ldquothe other

Valachiansrdquo originating from a Roman colony Sermo eorum et aliorum

Valachorum fuit olim Romanus ut qui sint coloniaelig Romanorum401 When referring

to the ldquoother Valachiansrdquo Nicolaus Olahus meant both the Romanians in

Transalpina as well as those in Transylvania who were mentioned expressis verbis

throughout his work They were one of the four peoples inhabiting Transylvania

together with the Hungarians the Szeklers and the Saxons It was said that they

originated from a colony of the Romans Valachi Romanorum coloniae esse

traduntur402

399 Ibidem p 12 400 Fabius Mignanelli nuntius cardinali Alexandro Farnese Significatio occupationis

Moldaviae Descriptio Moldaviae et Valachiae Sequelae perniciosae Turcicae occupationis pro

regno Hungarico in Acta et epistolaehellip Acte și scrisorihellip I ed by A Veress 1914 no 249 p 295

Cf also Fabio Mignanelli [Despre Moldavia și Țara Romacircnească] in Călători străinihellip I

pp 464ndash466 401 Nicolaus Olahus Ungaria ndash Atila ed by A Gyoumlngyveacuter Iași 1999 pp 90ndash91 Cf also

Nicolaus Olahus Hungaria ndash Athila ed by C Eperjessy and L Juhaacutesz Budapest 1938 p 23 402 Nicolaus Olahus Ungaria ndash Atila 1999 pp 92ndash95 Nicolaus Olahus Hungaria ndash Athila

1938 p 23

Victor Spinei 74

126

Another indirect way of expressing the ethnic unity of the two Romanian

extra-Carpathian provinces is found in a letter of Monk Albertus de Crispis sent

from Ulm on June 25 1434 The author referred to a Byzantine mission When

describing his itinerary to the West he stated that he ldquopassed through the

Moldavian Walachiardquo procedendo per Walachiam Moldaviensem403

A wording with the same meaning appeared in the substantial description of

the Principality of Moscovia made by the illustrious diplomat and historian

Sigismund (Siegmund) von Herberstein (1486ndash1566) who served the Imperial

Court of the Habsburgs for several decades In the initial part of his work printed

by the middle of the sixteenth century first in Latin in Vienna and in Basel and

then with certain additions in German the limits of the territories inhabited by the

Russian-speaking population were specified At their southwestern border the river

Tyras also called Dniester was mentioned at its mouth lay the locality Alba

[Cetatea Albă] also known under the name Moncastro occupied by the Turks but

that had previously been ldquounder the domination of the Moldavian Valachiansrdquo

(sub ditione Vualachi Moldauiensis)404 The same syntagma valacos moldavos was

used by the famous Spanish philologist Lorenzo Hervaacutes y Panduro (1735ndash1809) in

one of his works405 Also consistent with this terminology is the statement

according to which Moldavia represented a part of Valachia (Moldavia quae est

pars Valachiae) which was included in a report elaborated by a Jesuit leader in

1588406 His lapidary statement proves that in the high ecclesiastical spheres in

Rome where the high Jesuit prelate worked the existence of an ethnic-political

entity named Wallachia on the Lower Danube with two distinct administrative

divisions was a known fact

The usage of the term ldquoMoldaviansrdquo implied the existence of another

category of Wallachians ie those of Wallachia Mutatis mutandis a term with the

same connotation was also used in the case of Vallachia designated with the name

Vallachia Transalpina which implied the simultaneous existence of an East-

Carpathian Wallachia The respective name appears in the titles of the rulers of

Wallachia in external documents written in Latin In addition it was inserted into

the succession of the high offices in the ambitious but illusive title which

Sigismund Baacutethory assigned to himself in internal and external chancery

403 Johannes Dominicus Mansi Sacrorum conciliorum nova et amplissima collectio XXX

Ab anno MCCCCXXXI usque ad annum MCCCCXXXIX Venetiis 1792 col 835 404Rerum Moscoviticarvm comentarij Sigismundi Liberi baronis in Herberstain Neyperg

amp Guettenhag Basileae [Basel] 1571 p 2 Cf also the Italian translation of this text Sigismund in

Herberstain Neiperg amp Guettenhag Commentari della Moscovia et della Russia in Gio[vanni]

Battista Ramvsio (raccolta gia da) Navigationi et viaggi II Venice 1583 p 139 (al dominio di

Vuallacho Moldauusense) 405 E Coșeriu Rumaumlnisch und Romanisch bei Hervaacutes y Panduro in Dacoromania Jahrbuch

fuumlr Oumlstliche Latinitaumlt 3 1975ndash1976 p 121 406 A Veress (ed) Documente privitoare la istoria Ardealului Moldovei și Țării Romacircnești

III Acte și scrisori (1585ndash1592) Bucharest 1931 no 99 p 155


127

documents issued in the period 1595ndash1600 Sigismund Dei gratia Transilvaniae

Moldaviae Valachiae Transalpinae et Sacri Romani Imperii princeps partium

regni Hungariae dominus et Siculorum comes407 This title was adopted in 1599 by

his cousin Andrew Baacutethory during his short reign408 In his turn Michael the

Brave used the formula Valachiae Transalpinae (et Moldaviae) vaivoda in the

intitulatio of some documents written in Latin409

Approximately at the time the work of Sigismund von Herberstein was

printed in an Italian report written in Constantinople on March 9 1553 pertaining

to the disputes regarding the throne of Wallachia an order addressed by the Sultan

to Alexander Lăpușneanu Vaivoda dellrsquoaltra Valachia410 was mentioned The

ldquootherrdquo Valachia corresponded obviously to the Moldavian voivodeship

407 Monumenta Comitialia Regni Transylvaniae Erdeacutely orszaacuteggyuumlleacutesi emleacutekek IV

(1597ndash1601) ed by S Szilaacutegyi Budapest 1878 (XIII Fejezet 1596-1599 Toumlrveacutenyek eacutes iromaacutenyok)

no I p 101 no II p 108 no IV p 113 no VI p 127 no XI p 148 no XIV pp 155-156 no

XXIV p 189 no XXVI p 190 no XXXIV p 242 no XL p 263 (XIV Fejezet 1599 ndash1601

Toumlrveacutenyek eacutes iromaacutenyok) no XXXIX p 492 Ioannis Iacobini Brevis enarratio rerum a serenissimo

Transilvaniae principe Sigismundo anno MDXCV gestarum in Scriptores rerum Hungaricarum

veteres ac genuini ed by I G Schwandtner I Vindobonae 1746 pp 742ndash756 C Isopescu Alcuni

documenti inediti della fine del cinquecento Seconda serie in Diplomatarium Italicum I 1925

no XXII p 407 no XXIII p 408 Szeacutekely okleveacuteltar 1219ndash1776 ed by S Barabaacutes Budapest

1934 nr 179 p 325 C Feneșan Documente medievale bănățene (1440ndash1653) Timișoara 1981 no

33 p 89 no 34 p 91 no 35 p 93 no 39 p 102 Idem Diplomatarium Banaticum II

Cluj-Napoca 2017 no 59 p184 no 62 p191 no 63 p194 For the Italian version of the title see

C Isopescu Alcuni documentihellip no II p 383 no III p 384 A Veress (ed) Documente privitoare

la istoria Ardealului Moldovei și Țării Romacircnești IV Acte și scrisori (1593ndash1595) Bucharest 1932

no 153 p 285 Исторические связи народов СССР и Румынии в XV ndash начале XVIII в

Документы и материалы в трех томах Relațiile istorice dintre popoarele URSS și Romacircnia

icircn veacurile XV ndash icircnceputul celui de al XVIII Documente și materiale icircn trei volume

ed by Ia S Grosul A C Oțetea A A Novoselrsquoskii L V Cherepnin I 1408ndash1632 Moscow

1965 p 213 Mihai Viteazul icircn conștiința europeană 4 Relatări și presă ed by

I Ardeleanu Gh Bondoc V Arimia M Mușat Bucharest 1986 no 49 pp 85ndash86 The high offices

of Sigismund Baacutethory enumerated in a contemporary German chronicle show certain differences in

comparison to those in the chancery documents Fuumlrst in Sybenbuumlrgen Walachey unnd Moldaw

Cf [Conrad Lautenbach] Sybenbuumlrgische Chronica und Kriegszlighaumlndel zu Wasser und Lande

Darinnen auch der Wallachen Moldawer und Podolier Ursprung und herkommen Sitten gewonheiten

Herschaften unnd Reichthummen melding geschicht Wallstatt 1596 pp 34 63 78 75 408 Monumenta Comitialia Regni Transylvaniae Erdeacutely orszaacuteggyuumlleacutesi emleacutekek IV

(XIII Fejezet 1596 ndash1599 Toumlrveacutenyek eacutes iromaacutenyok) no XLVIII p 298 no LIX pp 321 322 325 409 Monumenta Comitialia Regni Transylvaniae Erdeacutely orszaacuteggyuumlleacutesi emleacutekek IV

(XIV Fejezet 1599 ndash1601 Toumlrveacutenyek eacutes iromaacutenyok) no V p 418 no IX p 429 no XX p 452

no XXXVI p 486 no LV p 520 no LVI p 520 I Lupaș Documente istorice transilvane I

no 1 p 1 no 2 p 2 no 4 p 6 no 6 p 15 no 9 p 20 no 10 p 24 no 11 p 25 no 12 p 28

no 13 p 33 no 20 p 44 no 21 p 49 no 22 p 51 no 24 p 53 no 26 p 62 no 27 p 64

no 28 p 66 no 29 p 66 C Feneșan Diplomatarium Banaticum II no 67 pp 201ndash202 no 69

pp 204ndash205 410 Documents concerning Rumanian history (1427ndash1601) ed by E D Tappe The Hague

1964 p 32

Victor Spinei 76

128

One of the prestigious scholars of the Middle Ages Marcin Bielski (c 1495ndash

1575) the first Polish chronicler who gave up Latin in favor of the vernacular

language considered that Dacia extended into the regions that in his time were

inhabited by the Wallachians (Wołoszy) Transylvanians (Siedmigrodzaacutenie) and

Serbians (Racowie) In his view the Wallachians Romanians split later on into

two state entities and they had two voivodes that is of the Wallachians and the

Moldavians respectively In the beginning they were ruled by only one voivode

who was either a Wallachian (multańskiego) or a Moldavian (wołoskiego) voivode

because the country was not divided Only the part bordering on the Transylvanian

Country was called Țara Muntenească and the region towards the Polish Lands

was known as [Țara] Volohă ltMoldoveneascăgt Wołosza zasię dzieli się na dwoje

i teraz ma dwu wojewodoacutew multańskiego i wołoskiego acz pierwej pod jednym

tylko wojewodą byla i tegoż abo multańskim abo wołoskim wojewodą zwano bo ta

ziemia dystynkeyej tej przedtem nie miała lecz dzisia tę część ktoacutera się

siedmiogrodzkiej ziemie dotyka multańską ziemią właśnie zowią a ową ktoacuterą

nas wołoską411 As we can see the Polish chronicler considered that in the past

the Romanians living in the extra-Carpathian area had a unitary state led by a

single ruler He claimed that later this state was divided which is a remark that is

not confirmed by any credible medieval source However the quoted fragment

shows that Marcin Bielski like some of his compatriots was well-informed since

he believed that the Wallachians and Moldavians shared the same ethnicity

The biography of Despot Vodă (Voivode) (1561ndash1563) written in Latin in

1566 by the Italian scholar Antonius Maria Gratianus (Antonio Maria Gratiani)

(1537ndash1611) contains some considerations concerning the semantic duality of the

term Wallachia Born in Tuscany its author had served as a secretary of High

Prelate Giovanni Francesco Commendone and afterwards of Pope Sixtus V so he

had the opportunity to visit many European countries including Northern

Moldavia Elaborated upon the request of the Polish nobleman Mikołaj Tomicki

(Nicolaus Tomicius) the work pertaining to the audacious and controversial ruler

benefited from information collected from the eyewitnesses of the events taking

place in the voivodeship located east of the Carpathians Gratiani used the terms

Valachia for designating Moldavia412 as well as ldquobothrdquo (utraque) Romanian Lands

The second meaning was employed only in the first book of this work Est

Valachia quam Dacos olim et Getas incoluisse arbitrantur in duas divisa partes

quarum altera quae ad meridiem vergit montana et aspera Transalpina

411 Kronika polska Marcina Bielkiego I ed by K J Turowski Sanok 1856 p 404 Cf also

Kronika Marcina Bielkiego (Zbior dziciopisow Polskich we czterech tomach I) Warsaw 1764

pp 196ndash197 412 Antonio Maria Graziani Viața lui Ioan Heraclid Despot principele moldovenilor

in Johannes Sommer Pinensis Antonio Maria Grazianus Viața lui Despot Vodă ed and transl

by T Diaconescu Iași 1998 pp 108ndash109 116ndash117 122ndash125 128ndash129 140ndash141 154ndash155

158ndash159 166ndash167 170ndash171 174ndash175 178ndash179 194ndash195 206ndash211


129

appellatur altera plana agro virisque opulentior ad septentrionem spectans

Moldavia dicitur utrique vaivodae imperant (sic enim ipsi suos regulos appellant)

utraque Turcarum vectigalis (ldquoValachia about which historians believe it was

inhabited in the olden times by the Dacians and the Getae is divided into two parts

of these one stretches southwards is mountainous and rough and is called

Transalpina the other one is flat rich in land and men is oriented northwards and

is called Moldavia over both rule voivodes (for this is how they call their small

kings) and both pay tribute to the Turksrdquo)413 When presenting some economic

administrative and legal aspects characteristic of Moldavia Antonio Maria

Gratiani also added some details generally regarding the ethnogenesis of the

Wallachians Romanians probably taken from Polish intellectual circles Lingua

utuntur sua eaque haud magnopere latinae dissimili Latinorum enim coloniae

post devictam a Trajano imperatore gentem eo deductae fuerunt (ldquoThey make use

of their own language which is not very different from Latin For they were

colonists of the Latins brought there after the people was defeated by Emperor

Trajanrdquo)414

Some of the data registered by Gratiani are also found in a text dedicated to his

protector Giovanni Francesco Commendone (1523ndash1584) whose biography he

authored as well As a secretary of the Holy See papal legate to several countries

and finally a cardinal Commendone accepted the information according to which

ldquoentire Valachia is divided into two parts and two statesrdquo led by voivodes and

paying tribute to the Turks the southern one was called Transalpina and ldquothe other

onerdquo (altera) was named Moldavia Tota vero Valachia in duas partes et duo

scinditur imperia utriusque autem regiminis reguli Vaivoda vocantur qui Turcorum

imperatoribus tributa quotannis pendunt Alteram partem que ad Meridiem vergit et

Danubio flumine terminatur ab occasu vero Transylvaniae fines attingit

Transalpinam appellamus Alteram vero que latius patet et opulentior est ab amne

qui mediam intersecat et ad Pontum usque Euxinum protenditur Moldaviam

vocamus415 Commendone belongs to the long series of humanists who obediently

accepted the theses issued more than a century before regarding the derivation of the

name Valachia from Flaccia thus naturally confirming the Latin origin of the

413 Ibidem pp 128ndash129 Cf also Antonii Mariae Gratiani De Ioanne Heraclide Despota

Vallachorum principe Liber tres et de Iacobo Didascalo Ioannis fratre Liber unus Varsoviae 1759

p 18 Idem De Ioanne Heraclide Despota Vallachorum principe Libri tres in E Legrand (ed)

Deux vies de Jacques Basilicos seigneur de Samos marquis de Paros comte palatin et prince de

Moldavie lrsquoune par Jean Sommer lrsquoautre par A-M Graziani Paris 1889 p 169 Idem (Descrierea

Moldovei) in Călători străini despre Țările Romacircne II ed M Holban M M Alexandrescu-Dersca

Bulgaru P Cernovodeanu Bucharest 1970 pp 380ndash381 414 Antonii Mariae Gratiani De Ioanne Heraclidehellip 1759 p 21 Idem De Ioanne

Heraclidehellip 1889 p 171 Idem Viața lui Ioan Heraclid Despothellip pp 130ndash131 415 N Iorga Documente geografice I (reprinted from Buletinul geografic IV 1899)

Bucharest 1900 pp 14ndash15

Victor Spinei 78

130

Romanian language416 In the correspondence with Cardinal Resticucci his

counterpart Giovanni Francesco Commendone in his capacity as papal legate to the

Habsburg capital briefed the former on October 23 1571 about the war preparations

against the Turks made by ldquothe princes of one and the other Wallachiardquo (vaivodi

dellrsquouna et lrsquoaltra Valachia) encouraged by the Emperor417

The terminological duality concerning both Romanian regions also results from the narration of Andrzej Taranowski about the journey undertaken in 1569 as legate of the Polish sovereign to Constantinople when he had the opportunity to pass through Moldavia (Walachey) and Dobrogea According to his notes that have reached us in German translation the Polish original being lost after leaving the Polish territory he passed ldquothrough the Lands of Wallachia which partially correspond to Dacia at its end the Duna Danube in Latin Danubius flows into the Pontus Euxinus Sea [also known as] the Big Seardquo (Erstlich durch Poln vnd den die Lender der Walachey etwa Dacia zu welcher end die Duna Danubius zu latein in das Meer Pontum Euxinum oder Mare maius fleusset)418 The use of the plural for referring to the extra-Carpathian Romanian voivodeships (die Lender der Walachey = ldquothe Lands of Walachiardquo) indicates the fact that both Moldavia and Wallachia were assigned a joint term

The concept of a global Romanian state core divided between two polities was also hinted at in a 1574 letter by Hubert Languet (1518ndash1581) addressed to Philip Sidney and written in Latin the lingua franca of the age Living briefly in Vienna to serve Emperor Maximilian II the French diplomat learned some information on the Carpathian-Danubian regions which claimed that Transalpina represented ldquothe other part of Wallachiardquo altera pars Valachiaelig419 In a letter dispatched this time from Frankfurt on the last day of March 1578 to the same recipient Languet mentioned Voivode Petru Șchiopul ldquowhose brother Alexander is the Voivode of Transalpine Wallachiardquo cujus frater Alexander est Vaivoda Valachiaelig Transalpinaelig420 The determinative attached to the name Wallachia evinces a distinction operated between the two principalities with related names

416 Ibidem p 14 Giovanni Francesco Commendone Scurtă bdquodescriererdquo a Valahiei odinioară

Flaccia colonie a romanilor in Călători străinihellip II pp 375ndash376 417 Nuntiaturberichte aus Deutschland II Abteilung 1560ndash1572 VIII ed by J Rainer

Vienna 1967 p 122 apud A Pippidi Documente privind locul romacircnilorhellip p 78 418 L Tardy I Vaacutesary Andrzej Taranowskis Bericht uumlber seine Gesandtschaftsreise in der

Tartarei (1569) in Acta Orientalia Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae XXVIII 1974 2 p 225

Cf also Andrei Taranowski transl by A Ciocicircltan in Călători străini despre Țările Romacircne

Supplement II ed by Șt Andreescu Bucharest 2016 p 16 419 Huberti Langveti Epistolaelig politicaelig et historicaelig ad Philippvm Sydnaeligum ed by B and

A Elzevir Lvgd[vni] Batavorum [Leiden] 1646 no XXXVII p 160 A Pippidi Documente privind

locul romacircnilorhellip p 84 420 Huberti Langveti Epistolaelig politicaelig et historicaelighellip no LXIV p 321 In The

Correspondence of Sir Philip Sidney and Hubert Languet ed and transl by S A Pears London

1845 p 141 the translation of the paragraph has omissions and inaccuracies the term Valachia

Transalpina is rendered as Lesser Wallachia


131

A confirmation of the fact that the ethnic homogeneity of the two Romanian

territories was recognized in Europe results from the wording contained in a letter

sent to the Imperial Court in Vienna on January 16 1576 in which ldquoboth

Wallachiasrdquo were called to arms by the Turkish Emperor Sultan der Tuumlrkischer

Kaiser haben beide Walacheien aufboten The mention of the Moldavians and the

Valachians (Moldawer und Walachen)421 in a previous sentence removes any

doubts regarding the meaning that was assigned to the syntagma beide Walacheien

Although Maximilian II had recognized the Ottoman sovereignty over

Transylvania Wallachia and Moldavia the Habsburgsrsquo interest in these Lands had

not faded away so this maintained the vigilance of the Porte

An identical syntagma was used for ldquoboth Wallachiasrdquo by Captain Andreas

Khielman in his letter addressed on September 18 1589 to Archduke Ernst von

Oumlsterreich son of Emperor Maximilian II He learned that a Turkish beglerbeg

beylerbey who had arrived in Wallachia (die grosse Walachei) wished to install

new ldquogovernorsrdquo voivodes ldquoin both Wallachiasrdquo Ich halt dafuumlr er werde im

Durchziehen in beiden Wallacheien Gubernatores einsetzen422

The opinion regarding the common term for designating the extra-Carpathian

voivodeships was also shared by the German scholar Johannes Leunclavius

(Johann Loumlwenklau or Lewenklaw) (c 1541ndash1594) known for his translations of

Greek and Byzantine authors and especially for his synthesis of the history of the

Ottoman Empire He was among the first European scholars who employed

Oriental sources In this latter work the subchapter entitled Valachia

Carabogdania contains more or less correct information on the genesis and

language of the Romanians Thus we find the statement that in the past Dacia was

a very large region that included Transylvania and both Wallachias These

surrounded Transylvania and one of them was called ldquoGreatrdquo and the other one

ldquoLittlerdquo The Great one stretched as far as the Euxine Sea and was called Moldavia

Carabogdania by the Turks ie Black Bogdania or ldquoCountry of Bogdanrdquo whose

name was believed to derive from the ldquoblack wheatrdquo The Little one stretched up to

the bank of the Danube and was also called Transalpina Bonfini called it Montana

Dacia quondam adpellabatur amplissima regio quaelig Transsiluaniam cum vtraque

Valachia continebat Et cingunt ambaelig Valachiaelig Transsiluaniam quarum vna

maioris nomen habet altera minoris Maior ad Euxinum mare se porrigit

amp nostris Moldauia Turcis Carabogdania quasi nigra Bogdania siue Bogdani

regio dicitur a frumento nigro cuius est agerille feracissimus [hellip] Minor propter

Danubij ripas extenditur amp plerumq Transalpina Bonfinio Motildetana quoque sicut

421 A Veress (ed) Documente privitoare la istoria Ardealului Moldovei și Țării-Romacircnești

II Acte și scrisori (1573ndash1584) Bucharest 1930 no 76 p 95 422 A Veress (ed) Documente privitoare la istoria Ardealului Moldovei și Țării-Romacircnești

III no 126 p 198

Victor Spinei 80

132

amp aliis nominatur423 Leunclavius tried to abandon the stereotype regarding the

explanation of the Romaniansrsquo name which dominated European historiography

The derivation of the Wallachiansrsquo name ndash designated as such by the Greeks and

as Iblach or Iflach by the Turks ndash from the Roman Flacci was regarded as

erroneous He considered this ethnonym to have a Germanic origin Nomen

Valachorum non a Flaccis Romanis origine fabulosa quaelig pluribus tamen placuit

sed a Germanis nostris profectum arbitror For sustaining his claim the German

humanist made use of suggestive etymological examples424 which have convinced

many linguists as time went by

In the scholarly circles south of the Alps the terminological similarities

between the two Romanian voivodeships were expressed in an equally explicit way

in several geography treatises composed by the end of the sixteenth century

However their authors did not abandon the old-fashioned idea launched by Enea

Silvio Piccolomini according to which the name Valachia was derived from the

anthroponym Flaccus Among the renowned geographers and theologians of that

time were Giovanni (Gian) Lorenzo drsquoAnania (Johannis Laurentius Anania) (c

1545ndashc 16071609) who lived most of his life in the little town of Taverna in

Calabria He was able to show his scholarly talent only when he was in the service

of Mario Carafa Archbishop of Naples (1565ndash1576) His most notorious scientific

accomplishment was a large geography treatise with a substantial description of all

regions known in those times whose editio princeps appeared in 1573 in the

residence town of his protector It was succeeded by several re-editions published

during his life

The passages about the two Wallachias are the following ones la

Vallachia allaquale pose questo nome che hoggi ritiene corrotto Flacco

manda toui dal Senato con alcune colonie per reprimere le tante genti barbare

doue dimorograve temendosi molto da questa parte onde poi successe la ruina

dellrsquoImperio Arriua questa prouicia nel suo Aquilone entro terra alla Podolia

amp agrave mare alla Tartaria minore toccando nella sinistra la Transeluania amp nel

la destra il mar negro diuisa in due parti lrsquovna laquale egrave posta appresso i

Transeluani la chiamano Vallachia superiore e Transelpina amp lrsquoaltra che

giace gran parte sugrave le onde marine la dimandano Vallachia inferiore e

Moldauia con che contermina la Besarabia e la Sirfia tutte perograve queste due

gratilde regioni fertili di biade e di bestiame hellip425 (ldquo[This name] Vallachia which

today is corrupt was given by Flaccus sent there by the Senate together with

some colonists in order to block the impetus of so many barbaric peoples [and

423 Ioannes Levnclavivs Annales svltanorvm Othmanidarvm a Tvrcis sva lingva scripti

Francofvrdi 1588 p 283 424 Ibidem pp 283ndash284 425 Gio Lorenzo drsquoAnania LrsquoVniversale fabrica del mondo overo Cosmografia Diuisa in

quattro Trattati Venice 1596 p 154


133

he] remained there because a great threat was coming from that part from

which afterwards the fall of the Empire followed This province stretched

northwards to the Podolian Land and towards the Sea as far as Little Tartaria

its left touching Transylvania and its right the Black Sea it is divided into two

parts one of them lies next to Transylvania and is called Wallachia Superior

and Transalpina and the other one which is located mostly towards the Sea is

called Wallachia Inferior and Moldova bordering on Bessarabia and Sirfia

[and] these two large regions are rich in grains and animalshelliprdquo)426 After

offering some details concerning the tribute obligations of Wallachia to the

Porte the author focused again on the neighboring voivodeship which he

designated once more as ldquothe otherrdquo (lrsquoaltra) [region] of Wallachia427

A good reputation was enjoyed by Giovanni Botero and Giovanni Antonio

Magini who were among the famous contemporaries of Giovanni Lorenzo

drsquoAnania They borrowed many details regarding the Romanian Lands from his

Cosmography

Giovanni Botero (c 1540ndash1617) a humanistic scholar was born in Piemont

He became famous as theologian writer and diplomat and also elaborated an

appreciated geography treatise Relationi vniversali consisting of four volumes

that were printed between 1591 and 1596 with a dynamic succession of re-editions

and translations In book I of the first part of this work dedicated to Michel Priuli

Bishop of Vicenza in the subchapter entitled Vallacchia Transalpina Moldauia

the author referred to the terminology concerning the Danube-Carpathian area and

imitated the text of Giovanni Lorenzo drsquoAnania Vallacchia hellip Si diuide in due

cioegrave minore amp maggiore la minore si chiama Transalpina la maggiore Moldauia

(di cui egrave parte la Bessarabia sopra il mare oue egrave Moncastro) quella srsquoaccosta al

Danubio questa al mar negro (ldquoVallacchia hellip is divided into two [Lands] namely

the little and the great one the little one is called Transalpina the great one

Moldavia (in this part there is Bessarabia above the Sea where Moncastro is

located) the former lies next to the Danube the latter [lies next to] the Black

Seardquo)428 The Italian geographer and writer was aware of the Roman origin of the

Wallachians Romanians proved by the use of a more corrupt Latin than that

employed by the Italians Mostrano di tirare origine darsquoRomani nel loro parlare

perche ritengono la lingua Latina ma piu corrotta che noi Italiani429 His

considerations regarding historical geography are also correct La prouincia che

antichi chiamauano Dacia comprende hoggi la Transiluania la Transalpina amp la

Moldauia (ldquoThe province ancient peoples called Dacia today comprises

426 Gian Lorenzo drsquoAnania Sistemul universal al lumii sau cosmografia in Călători străinihellip

IV p 568ndash569 427 Gio Lorenzo drsquoAnania LrsquoVniversale fabrica del mondohellip p 154 428 Giovanni Botero Benese Relationi vniversali Vicenza 1595 p 48 429 Ibidem p 48v

Victor Spinei 82

134

Transylvania Transalpina and Moldaviardquo) On the map attached to the second

edition of this treatise this time dedicated to Charles Emmanuel I Duke of Savoy

the two Romanian extra-Carpathian provinces were written differently namely as

Moldaua and Valachia430 which could suggest that the cartographic representation

was not elaborated by Giovanni Botero but by someone else Besides Relationi

vniversali Botero authored another volume that was also very highly appreciated

reaching the status of an authentic bestseller ie the treatise Della ragion di Stato

published in 1589 According to the authorrsquos view which he exposed in a passage

in the fifth book of his work the Dacians at the time of Aurelianus corresponded to

the Wallachians Moldavians and Transylvanians of his time hellipDaci che sono

oggi i Vallachi i Moldani et i Transilvani431 His opinion corresponds to the

above-quoted statements appearing in Relationi vniversali

The terminological division of Wallachia into two parts was also adopted by

Giuseppe Rosaccio (c 1530ndashc 1620) geographer and cartographer born in

Pordenone Friuli Region He studied in Padua and took a large amount of

information from Giovanni Botero including the paragraphs referring to

Transylvania Moldavia and Wallachia appearing in his treatise of universal

geography Its first edition dedicated to Ferdinand I de Medici Duke of Tuscany

was published in 1595 in Florence and included a rich set of maps On the map

representing Eastern Europe appear Transylvania and Moldavia with the cities

Orșova Scoca (Soroca) and Moncastro but Wallachia is missing432 In chapter 20

of this work entitled Della Vndecima Tauola drsquoEuropa there is the statement that in

ancient times Transylvania was called Dacia and it was separated from Hungary by

the Carpathian Mountains which end in Severin Transiluania che gli antichi

chiamorno Datia egrave diuisa dallrsquoOngaria da monti che si partano darsquo Carpani e

seguono fino a Seuerino After a short description of the urban network and river

courses inside the Carpathian arch there are several remarks on the terminology

linguistic aspects economic life etc concerning the extra-Carpathian regions taken

from his Italian co-nationals without many original elements Vscendo fuori dei

confini di Transiluania si entra nella Valachia oue si vede ancora i vestigi del Ponte

di Traiano i Turchi chiamano questa prouincia Carabogdana perche fa il formento

negro si stende di qui al Nester amp fino al Mar Negro si diuide in due cioegrave

maggiore amp minore la maggiore si chiama Moldauia di cui egrave parte Bessarabia

sopra il mare doursquoegrave Motildecastro ha il nome la Moldauia da vn fiume che gli passa per

mezo la minore ha fatto di se solo queste terricciole cioegrave Ternouiza Brella egrave

Trescorto [Tacircrgoviște Brăila Tacircrgșor ] il resto sono villaggi vicino a Trescorto

430 Giovanni Botero Benese Le relationi vniversali Venice 1596 map 431 Giovanni Botero Della ragion di Stato Despre rațiunea de stat ed by S Bratu Elian

transl by G Buzu Bucharest 2013 pp 238ndash239 432 Gioseppe Rosaccio Il Mondo e sve parti cioe Evropa Affrica Asia et America Florence

1595 pp 122ndash123


135

sorge una sorte di bitume negro che sente di cera dal quale fanno buonissime

candele433 Whereas Wallachiarsquos division in maggiore amp minore reiterates a

customary usage when Giuseppe Rosaccio abandoned this trail and associated

Wallachia with Carabogdana he could not avoid a terminological confusion

Regarding the origin and language of the locals he completely shared Boterorsquos view

claiming that ldquothey originate from the Romans because they understand Latin but

their language is more corruptrdquo mostrano questi popoli tirar lrsquoorigine da Romani

perche intendono la lingua Latina ma piu corrotta434 In the second edition of this

treatise containing less cartographic representations and a restructured index of

contents Rosaccio placed all this data with very few punctuation changes in another

chapter ie no XIIII Della Vndecima Tauola di Europa cioegrave Valachia Ongaria

Transiluania Bulgaria amp Seruia435

A compatriot and contemporary of Giovanni Botero and Giuseppe

Rosaccio Giovanni Antonio Magini (1555ndash1617) was also gifted with

multivalent cultural talents He authored a universal geography that was highly

popular at the time Its editio princeps appeared in Latin in 1596 Venice436

followed in 1597 by a new edition published in Colonia Agrippina [=Cologne]

and a version in Italian translated by Leonardo Cernoti Venitiano printed in the

effervescent metropolis of the Lagunes as well as of many others in the ensuing

years In chapter XXXIII of this treatise entitled Tvrcici Imperii descriptio and

Descrittione dellrsquoImpero Tvrchesco the countries under Turkish domination

were enumerated Hungary Romania Greece Illyria Bosnia Serbia Rascia and

Bulgaria In addition it was claimed that ldquobesides these in Europe until this

year the Turkish Emperor has been receiving tribute from Transylvania one and

the other (both) Wallachias namely Transalpina and of course Moldavia which

however have now left himrdquo Praeligterea tributariaelig regionis fuerunt usq[ue] ad

hunc annum Turcici Imperatoris in Europa Transilvania Valachia utraq[ue]

Transalpina scilicet amp Moldauia quae tamen nunc ab ipso defecerunt437 The

Italian version is almost identical furono tributarie dellrsquoImperadore dersquoTurchi

queste Regioni la Transilvania lrsquovna elrsquoaltra Valachia cioegrave la Transalpina e

433 Ibidem p 131 434 Ibidem 132 The paragraphs referring to the Romanian regions in the 1595 edition of

Giuseppe Rosacciorsquos volume acquired by N Iorga from a Venetian antiquarian were

reproduced with quite many small transcription errors Cf N Iorga Știri noi despre sfacircrșitul

secolului al XVI-lea romacircnesc in Academia Romacircnă Memoriile Secțiunii Istorice series III

XIX 1937 pp 39ndash44 435 Gioseppe Rosaccio Il Mondo e sve parti cioe Evropa Affrica Asia et America Verona

1596 p 156 436 Io Antonio Magino Patavino Geographiae vniversae tvm veteris tvm novae

absolvtissimvm opvs dvobvs volvminibvs distinctvm in quorum priore habentur Cl Ptolemaei

Pelvsiensis Geographicae enarrationis Libri octo Venetiis [Venice] 1596 437 Ibidem p 269

Victor Spinei 84

136

la Moldauia438 Giovanni Antonio Magini was aware that Sigismund Baacutethory

Michael the Brave and Aron Tiranul (the Tyrant) had risen against the Ottoman

Empire in 1594 and had not recognized its authority anymore as they had been

supported by Emperor Rudolf II of Habsburg

The author returned with additional details referring to the extra-Carpathian

principalities in one of the subdivisions of chapter XXXIII suggestively entitled

Valachia dvplex nempe Moldauia amp Transalpina439 and La doppia Valacchia

cioegrave la Moldavia e la Transalpina respectively440 Regarding the limits of

Wallachia which some called Flacia and the others Valagnia Valagna the

author stated that it was bordered by the Danube Tiras [Dniester] Transylvania

and the Euxine or Black Sea that it represented a part of Old Dacia and that

ldquotodayrdquo it was divided in Great and Little [Wallachia] (Hodie in duas partes

distribuitur nimirum in maiorem amp minorem)441 (Ma hoggi vien distribuita in

Maggiore amp in Minore)442 Valachia Maggiore corresponded to Moldauia called

Carabogdania by the Turks that is negra Bogdania (ldquoBlack Bogdaniardquo) to which

Bessarabia belonged as well Lapidary details were provided on the

terminologyreferring to Little Wallachia Minor Valachia appellatur Transalpina

amp aliquibus etiam Montana quam Graeligci Valachiam uocarunt amp haeligc quidem sub

nomine Valachiaelig simpliciter cadit443 La Valachia Minore si nomina Transalpina

amp anco Montana da quelcuno ma darsquo Greci vien detta Valachia Onde questa egrave

quella che semplecemente cade sotto il nome della Valachia444

However the description of Transylvania in chapter XX of this work is more

extensive which is naturally also due to the fact that the author benefited from the

useful information provided by the ldquofamous scholar John Hortilyus Transilvanusrdquo

whom he had met in Padua when he was a student445 He was able to provide him

with precious data regarding the way of life daily customs religious practices and

linguistic particularities of the locals whom he as an indigenous had had the

opportunity to become acquainted with directly Besides this documentary support

like every genuine scholar Magini had also made use of book information taken

from prestigious predecessors but without the possibility to check it which

438 Gio[vanni] Ant[onio] Magini Paovano Geografia cioegrave descrittione vniversale della terra

Venice 1598 pp 196ndash196v 439 Io Antonio Magino Patavino Geographiae vniversaehellip pp 270vndash271 440 Gio[vanni] Ant[onio] Magini Paovano Geografiahellip p 197 N Iorga O descriere a țerilor

noastre pe vremea lui Mihai Viteazul in Revista istorică XI 1925 4ndash6 p 113 Cf also

M Popescu-Spineni Giovanni Antonio Magini și Țările romacircnești sec XVI reprinted from Revista

geografică romacircnă II 1939 1 p 12 441 Io Antonio Magino Patavino Geographiae vniversaehellip p 270v 442 Gio[vanni] Ant[onio] Magini Paovano Geografiahellip p 197 443 Io Antonio Magino Patavino Geographiae vniversaehellip p 270v 444 Gio[vanni] Ant[onio] Magini Paovano Geografiahellip p 197v 445 Io Antonio Magino Patavino Geographiae vniversaehellip p 164 Gio[vanni] Ant[onio]

Magini Paovano Geografiahellip p 164


137

sometimes exposed him to outdated opinions Among other details he erroneously

stated that Transylvania corresponded territorially to Dacia Mediterranea and

Ripensis but he was close to the truth when he considered it to be the most

powerful province (potissima potentissima) of Dacia446

The generic name Walachey assigned to both Romanian principalities was also

mentioned in a work written by Conrad (Konrad Kunz) Lautenbach (1534ndash1595) from

Thuringia who studied in various German centers like Erfurt Frankfurt am Main

Mainz Heidelberg and Strassburg after which he worked as a pastor and librarian in

Heidelberg Strassburg and Frankfurt am Main He published theological literary and

historical works and translated texts from Latin into German In addition he is

believed to be the author of a volume in which the military events taking place towards

the end of the sixteenth century were presented in detail He signed it with the

pseudonym Jakob Franck Iacobus Francus447 At the same time Conrad Lautenbach

was the author of a middle-sized volume on the history of Transylvania and its

neighboring territories namely Wallachia Moldavia and Podolia with references

pertaining to their landscape and riches as well as to the origin and customs of their

inhabitants printed in 1596 The subtitle of this work which does not appear on the

title page only on the workrsquos first page was formulated as follows Kurze und

wahrhafftige Beschreibung deszlig Landts Sybenbuumlrgen und angrentzenden ograverter (ldquoA

short and truthful description of the Transylvanian Country and its neighboring

placesrdquo)448 We cannot explain why the author was not mentioned in this book which

became a real bibliographic rarity along the centuries Its precious information

remained partially ignored by modern historians

Lautenbach mentioned the following information on the terminology and

geographic landmarks of the Romanian territories Die Walachey so vor zeiten

in Lateinischer Sprach Mysia und Dacia genennt worden ligt gegen auffgang

am schwartzen Meer gegen Mittag an der Thonaw gegen Nidergang an

Sybenbuumlrgen gegen Mitternacht aber an Reussen Diese gantze Landschafft

wird in zwey theil getheilet in VValachiam Transalpinam unnd in die Moldaw

(ldquoWallachia which in the olden times was called in Latin Mysia and Dacia

stretches eastwards to the Black Sea southwards to the Danube westwards to

Transylvania and northwards to Russia This entire territory is divided into two

parts in Transalpine Wallachia and Moldaviardquo)449 After some references to

446 Io Antonio Magino Patavino Geographiae vniversaehellip p 160 Gio[vanni] Ant[onio]

Magini Paovano Geografiahellip p 113 447 Iacobus Francus Historicaelig relationis continvatio Warhafftige Beschreibunge aller

gedenckwuumlrdigen Historien Wallstatt 1598 448 [Conrad Lautenbach] Sybenbuumlrgische Chronica und Kriegszlighaumlndel zu Wasser und Lande


Herschaften unnd Reichthummen melding geschicht Wallstatt 1596 p 3 449 [Conrad Lautenbach] Sybenbuumlrgische Chronicahellip p 5 Cf also D Ursprung

Raumvorstellungen und Landesbewusstseinhellip in Das Suumldosteuropa der Regionen ed by

O J Schmitt and M Metzeltin Vienna 2015 p 524 note 168

Victor Spinei 86

138

Transalpina the German scholar provided a few details about ldquothe other part of

Wallachia hellip called Moldavia (Moldaw)rdquo Das ander Theil der Walachy hat

vielmehr Ecker und Wiesen viel Vieh unnd stattliche Pferd wird von dem Fluszlig

Moldava so mitten dardurch fleust Moldavia (Moldaw) genennt (ldquoHowever

the other part of Wallachia has more croplands and fields many cattles and

beautiful horses and it is called Moldavia (Moldaw) from the Moldava River

that flows through its middlerdquo)450 In another paragraph of this book the

syntagma ldquoboth Wallachiasrdquo was used Als aber in vorigen Jahren Ivonia von

den Tuumlrcken betruglicher weiszlig gefangen unnd schaacutendlichen getoumldet wordegrave sind

beyde Walachyen zum Tuumlrckischegrave Reich koḿen (ldquoHowever when in the past

years Ivonia [=John III the Terrible] was captured through treason and killed

by the Turks in a shameful way both Wallachias were included into the

Turkish Empirerdquo)451 In the case of this last statement the author was wrong

when he believed that the status of the Romanian Lands had deteriorated only

after the brutal repression of the Moldavian rulerrsquos revolt by the Turks and the

Tatars Besides the generic form of the name Wallachia applied to both

extra-Carpathian voivodeships they were individualized terminologically

throughout the vast majority of the text as Walachey or Transalpina and

Moldaw or Moldau respectively for avoiding misunderstandings when exposing

political events

Conrad Lautenbachrsquos volume contains many interesting more or less

correct references to the Danube-Carpathian regions some original and others

borrowed from well-known Renaissance scholars as he himself confessed

Antonio Bonfini Stephanus Brodericus Pius II (Enea Silvio Piccolomini)

Johannes Aventinus Martin Cromer452 Several passages of his work convey

the real or illusive influence of Roman civilization on medieval realities In his

opinion the name of Transylvaniarsquos capital Alba Iulia came from Julius

Caesar or more probably from ldquoHiula a king of the Hunsrdquo [recte Giula

leader of the Hungarians] He claimed that before the invasions of the Goths

and the Huns Dacia was inhabited by the Romans and the Sarmatians the

people Walachy originated from the Flacs the term Valachia derived from

Flaccus and designated a territory that had been colonized by the Romans

VVolchos were the Italians named Welschen in German the Wallachians came

from the Roman Empire during the reign of Trajan and they settled in

Transalpina and Moldavia Chieftain Flacc with 30000 warriors under his

command defeated the Scythians and the Tatars453 As we can see Conrad

Lautenbach was entirely aware of the Roman origin of the Wallachians but his

precarious knowledge of ancient history did not spare him some anachronisms

450 [Conrad Lautenbach] Sybenbuumlrgische Chronicahellip p 6 451 Ibidem p 9 452 Ibidem pp 3ndash5 453 Ibidem pp 3 5 7


139

and did not allow him to adequately reconstitute the political context in which

the ethnogenesis of the Romanian people took place In his volume published in

1596 there also appear short opinions regarding the similarities between the

religious ritual of the Romanians and that observed by the Greek and Armenian

Churches as well as remarks about the weaponry the Romanian armies were

endowed with consisting in shields spears helmets javelins and arrows454

The largest part of this work was dedicated to the war conflicts and the

diplomatic relations with the Turks during the reigns of Bogdan Lăpușneanu

Ioan Vodă cel Cumplit Petru Șchiopul Sigismund Baacutethory Michael the Brave

etc The last narrated events were those of March 1596455

The immediate proximity to and the multiple relations with the

extra-Carpathian Romanian territories provided Transylvanian authorities with

good knowledge of their ethnic-demographic structures a fact that was adequately

reflected among other sources in the Hungarian diplomas dating from the

sixteenth and seventeenth centuries We would like to exemplify our assertion by

mentioning a few chancery documents issued by the princes and other

representatives of the local political elite of Transylvania which explicitly reveal

that the rulers and the population of Moldavia and Wallachia were Romanian One

of these documents dated January 4 1588 is the obedient letter of Sigismund

Baacutethory in which he notified Sultan Murad III that he had complied with the order

of allowing young people to serve the ldquotwo olaacuteh Wallachian Romanian voivodes

in Moldavia and Wallachiardquo hogy az mely legeacutenyek az keacutet olaacuteh orszaacutegi Moldaviai

eacutes havasalfoumlldi vajdaacutekhoz szabad akaratjok szereacutent akarnaacutenak be menni azoknak

az be menetelekre szabadsaacutegot engedneacutek456 Five years later on July 11 1593 the

same Prince was assuring Grand Visir Sinan Pasha of his faith and that he was

ldquoready day and night for other jobs as well [hellip] especially for the protection of

these neighboring olaacuteh Romanian Landsrdquo hellipkevaacutelkeacuteppen ez szomszeacuted olaacuteh

orszaacutegoknak otalmazaacutesaacutera457

Another way of recognizing the ethnic similarity of the population living in

the two principalities is found in a decision of the Transylvanian Noble Diet

convoked on November 4 1600 in Leacuteczfalva (Leț presently in Covasna County)

which stipulated punitive measures against the Greek Olah Turkish Dalmatian

Armenian etc merchants and condemned the harsh behavior of Michael the

Brave Elaborated by Stephanus (Istvaacuten) Csaacuteki a military belonging to an old

aristocratic family (in other contemporary documents mentioned as generalis

capitaneus regni Transylvaniae) the decision reminded of the ldquoolaacuteh in the two

454 Ibidem p 10 455 Ibidem pp 12ndash100 456 A Veress (ed) Documente privitoare la istoria Ardealului Moldovei și Țării Romacircnești

III no 70 pp 118ndash119 457 A Veress (ed) Documente privitoare la istoria Ardealului Moldovei și Țării Romacircnești

IV Acte și scrisori (1593ndash1595) Bucharest 1932 no 13 pp 14ndash16

Victor Spinei 88

140

Landsrdquo (az keacutet orszaacutegbeli oacutelaacutehok) a wording revealing knowledge of the

demographic ensemble in the vicinity of Transylvania458

The phrase ldquothe two olaacuteh Romanian Landsrdquo reappears in the

Transylvanian diplomatic correspondence in 1615 in which Gaacutebor Bethlen

exhibited an attitude which could be regarded as inappropriate for his Christian

ruler status The Prince not only provided the Sultan with important strategic

data about the Habsburg armies but he also advised him to attack the Empire

for extending his territories and he offered military cooperation by engaging in

the neighboring voivodeships too Eacutes eacuten is az keacutet olaacuteh orszaacutegiakkal abban nem

kicsint szolgaacutelhatok hatalmassaacutegodnak (ldquoI together with those from the two

olaacuteh Romanian Lands can serve Your Highness as well and not in an

irrelevant mannerrdquo)459 The rulers of Moldavia and Wallachia were also

mentioned under a generic name in a letter of Captain Andraacutes Doczy sent to

Palatine Gyoumlrgy Thurzoacute written on May 26 1616 The sender of this letter

claimed that one of his informers from Transylvania had ldquobrought him the news

that now the Poles have once again greatly defeated both olaacuteh Wallachian

voivodesrdquo ki azt hozta hiről hogy az lengyelek ujonnan most mist az keacutet olaacuteh

vajdaacutet460

The ldquotwo olaacuteh Romanian Landsrdquo were mentioned in several documents

issued under the reign of Gyoumlrgy George I Raacutekoacuteczy (1630ndash1648) In a letter

addressed to the Saxons of Bistrița on July 16 1633 the Prince informed them

about war preparations in the neighboring countries including those undertaken in

ldquothe two Olah Landsrdquo az kett Olah orszagokban461 On August 1 1633 he turned

to the same addressees urging them to protect the borders although ldquothe news and

the state of affairs are not of such sort that we should be afraid of the neighboring

Olah Landsrdquo az szomszed Olah orszagokrol tartanunk kellene462 In a temporary

camp near the Buzău River on October 24 1636 Stephen Istvaacuten Petki expressed

his opinion that ldquoin the two Olah Lands thank God we do not have any scary news

nowrdquo It uram az ket Olahorzaghban Istenek hala mostan bizonj semi felelmes

hireink ninczjenek Then the document shortly describes the image of longue

dureacutee of the autochthonous rural universe ldquoThe people in both Olah Romanian


(XIV Fejezet 1599 ndash1601 Toumlrveacutenyek eacutes iromaacutenyok) no LXV pp 551ndash552 Cf also I Lupaș

Măsuri legislative luate de dietele ardelene contra grecilor in Anuarul Institutului de Istorie

Națională III 1924ndash25 p 538 459 A Veress (ed) Documente privitoare la istoria Ardealului Moldovei și Țării Romacircnești

IX Acte și scrisori (1614ndash1636) Bucharest 1937 no 33 pp 41ndash42 460 Ibidem no 79 pp 90ndash91 461 Acte și scrisori din arhivele orașelor ardelene (Bistrița Brașov Sibiiu) publicate după

copiile Academiei Romacircne 1601ndash1825 ed by N Iorga (Documente privitoare la istoria romacircnilor

collected by Eudoxiu de Hurmuzaki XV 2) Bucharest 1913 no MDCCCLXXXIII p 991 462 Ibidem no MDCCCLXXXVI pp 993ndash994


141

Lands are staying home they plough and seedrdquo Az feoumlld nepe mind az ket Olah

orzaghban othon vadnak zantnak vetnek463

The lull in the Danube-Carpathian regions did not last very long Less than a year after the calming statement of Petki on August 10 1637 George I Raacutekoacuteczy notified the authorities of Bistrița about the necessity of war preparations in reaction to the similar measures observed in ldquothe Turkish camp and the voivodes in the two Olah Romanian Landsrdquo mind az altal az Teoumlreoumlknek s az keacutett Olah orszaacuteghbelj Vaydaknak is orszagunk hatarj keoumlrnyuumll taborozasokot keacuteszuumlleteket latvan464 Concerning these measures in a letter of the Sibiu patricians addressed to those of Bistrița on November 9 of the same year the joint troopsrsquo mobilization to Sighișoara was mentioned Its purpose was to prevent the war between Matei Basarab and Vasile Lupu from extending into Transylvania At the same time an order of the Prince was reproduced Az szomzed Olahorszagokban levouml alapatokra kepest az vigyazas valoba es szuumlkseges keppen kivantattik (ldquoRegarding the situations in the neighboring Olah Lands defense is indeed necessary and usefulrdquo)465 The joint designation form used for the voivodeships in the extra-Carpathian area is also attested in a letter of George I Raacutekoacuteczy dated July 10 1646 sent to the patricians of Brașov in which the Prince expressed his concern about a different issue ldquoWe were notified that not just a few of the brave ones intend to enter the two Olah Romanian Landsrdquo (Ugy informaacuteltatuacutenk az viteacutezleouml rendek koumlzuumll nem kevessen vagiakoznaacutenak az keacutet olaacuteh orszaacuteghra be menni) The exodus of the Transylvanian soldiers who wanted to become employed as mercenaries in Moldavia and Wallachia discontented George I Raacutekoacuteczy who ordered the mountain roads and paths to be strictly guarded so that no one could enter ldquoany olaacuteh Romanian countryrdquo466

ldquoBoth Romanian Landsrdquo were also mentioned in a letter of General Jaacutenos Kemeacuteny (future prince of Transylvania in 1660ndash1662) sent on August 6 1657 from a Tatar camp in Moldavia in which he was kept prisoner The addressees of this letter were Prince Aacutekos Barcsay and the Transylvanian Diet They were informed that ldquothe Khan was ordered by the Porte to change the voivodes in both Romanian Lands and then to turn against Transylvania and there to do the same thingrdquo467 Two days later on August 8 in a letter addressed to the people of Bistrița Aacutekos Barcsay stressed ldquothe necessity to guard the two olaacuteh Romanian Lands after todayrsquos circumstancesrdquo Noha uram az szukseg es az ket olah orszaghra valo vigyazas468 In his memoirs written in 1657ndash1658 Jaacutenos Kemeacuteny

463 Ibidem no MDCCCCXXXVI pp 1027ndash1028 464 Ibidem no MDCCCCXLIX p 1036 465 Ibidem no MDCCCCLIII p 1039 466 Ibidem no MMCXLI pp 1151ndash152 467 I Marțian Acte și documente in Arhiva Someșană Năsăud 6 1926 pp 69 72 468 Acte și scrisori din arhivele orașelor ardelenehellip ed by N Iorga (Documentehellip

Hurmuzaki XV 2) no MMCCCLIX p 1175 Cf also N Stoicescu Unitatea romacircnilor icircn evul

mediu Bucharest 1983 p 134 notes 28ndash32

Victor Spinei 90

142

mentioned ldquoboth Wallachiasrdquo ldquoboth Romanian Landsrdquo in two circumstances when he specified the extent of Michael the Braversquos dominion469 and when he referred to the campaign against the Polish Kingdom prepared by Sultan Osman II (1618ndash1622) who expected the mobilization of ldquothe populace of the two Wallachias and of their voivodesrdquo470 The text also points out that Jaacutenos Kemeacuteny and Aacutekos Barcsay were sent by the Transylvanian Prince George Gyoumlrgy Raacutekoacuteczi II as envoys to Vasile Lupu to whom they delivered ldquotwo letters one in Latin the other in Wallachianrdquo471 On another occasion the Prince of Moldavia preferred to do without the official translators and have a confidential discussion ldquoin Wallachianrdquo with Jaacutenos Kemeacuteny who knew this language472 It is notable that the Transylvanian noble employed a single term for designating the Romanian language spoken across the entire Carpathian-Danubian area which likewise reflects Romanian linguistic unity

All these examples prove the fact that those exchanging letters were

completely aware about the Romanian ethnicity of the two neighboring

voivodeships and that there was an inevitable linguistic concordance among their

inhabitants Due to its territorial proximity to the Romanians who represented the

majority population in modern era Transylvania the Hungarian political elite in the

principality was best informed regarding the ethnic-demographic ensemble in the

Danube-Carpathian space

The ldquotwo Romanian Landsrdquo were also mentioned by Samuel Twardowski

who in 1622 was the secretary who accompanied Duke Krzystof Zbaraski during a

diplomatic mission to the Ottoman Empire On this occasion they passed through

the territory of Moldavia and met Prince Stephen Tomșa The Polish scholar had

remembered that the border between the Lands was a small river that passed

through Focșani However he used inadequate terms for designating the respective

states473

The term ldquodouble Wallachiardquo appears again in the digression on the past and

the political status of the Romanians placed in the history of the Hungarians

composed by the high Hungarian dignitary and diplomat Miklόs Istvaacutenffy

(Nicolaus Istuanfius Pannonius) (c 1538ndash1615) After studying in Bologna and

Padua he became a secretary of Nicolaus Olahus and then he reached the position

of Palatine Governor of Hungary He had the opportunity to pass through the

469 Ioan Kemeacuteny Memorii ndash Scrierea vieții sale ed by Șt J Fay transl by F Pap

Cluj-Napoca 2002 p 34 Cf also N Popea Memoriile lui Kemeacuteny Jaacutenos (Traducerea și adnotarea

pasagiilor privitoare la romacircni) Bucharest 1900 p 12 470 Ioan Kemeacuteny Memoriihellip p 89 471 Ibidem p 258 Cf also N Popea Memoriile lui Kemeacuteny Jaacutenoshellip p 35 472 Ioan Kemeacuteny Memoriihellip p 287 473 Samuel Twardowski Descrierea soliei ducelui de Zbaraz 1622 in P P Panaitescu

Călători poloni icircn țările romacircne 2nd ed Iași 1999 p 24 (here there is the translation error ldquotwo

Moldavian landsrdquo instead of ldquotwo Romanian landsrdquo) Idem in Călători străinihellip IV p 502


143

Danube-Carpathian regions several times as a messenger of the Habsburgs so he

was familiar with the ethnic and cultural realities in this area which he registered

in chapter XIII of his work written in Latin and printed posthumously in 1622

According to Miklόs Istvaacutenffy ldquodouble Wallachiardquo consisted of Moldavia and

Transalpina which together with Transylvania had composed Old Dacia reached

by Roman colonists Even in its corrupt form their language kept the

characteristics of the Roman language sharing similarities with Spanish French

and Italian Duas Valachias quaelig hoc tempore Moldauiaelig amp Transalpinaelig nomine

censentur simul cum Transiluania veteres vno Daciaelig nomine appellabant

fuisseque in eam Romanorum colonias deductas praeligter innumera antiquitatis

monimenta saxis amp marmoribus incisa amp adhuc extantia illud etiam argumento amp

testimonio est quod incolaelig Romana lingua quamquam corrupta vtuntur quaelig

Hispanicaelig amp Gallicaelig atque etiam Italicaelig adeo similis est vt non magno labore ad

mutuum sermonis commercium intelligi queat Moldauia mari nigro vt nunc

vocant seu Ponto Polemoniaco propinquior Transalpina Danubio contermina est

quo etiam agrave Bulgaria separatur amp vtraque Vngarorum regum clientelaelig attributa

ab eo iam olim tempore quo Constantinopoli Imperatores Christiani florebant agrave

quibus Vngaroualachiaelig vulgo nuncupabantur474 The territorial limits of the two

principalities are roughly correct as is the statement that the popular variant of the

term Transalpina was Vngaroualachia Hungaro-Wallachia used mostly in the

ecclesiastical environment after it had been imposed by the Constantinople

Chancery in the fourteenth century Proving critical sense Miklόs Istvaacutenffy was

right when he rejected the old-fashioned idea of the colonization of the Saxons in

Transylvania during the reign of Charlemagne Meritorious as well is the

acknowledgment of the fact that Romanian belongs to the Romanic linguistic

branch from this point of view he shared the opinion of his compatriot Stephanus

Zamosius (Istvaacuten Szamoskoumlzy)475

In the same period another work that used the syntagma ldquoboth Wallachias

Romanian Landsrdquo was authored by Giorgio Tomasi (between the second half of the

sixteenth century and the first quarter of the seventeenth century) whose

biographic profile is scarcely known However we possess the essential detail that

for three-four years he served the Transylvanian Princes Sigismund and Andrew

Baacutethory as a secretary at their residence in Alba Iulia which allowed him to

become familiar with the demographic ensemble and the turn of the political events

in this area In a volume dedicated to the military potential of Hungary and

Transylvania the author exposed data regarding their geographic locations

underground riches urban settlements demographic structure folk costume etc

474 Nicolai Isthvanfi Pannoni Historiarvm de rebvs Vngaricis libri XXXIV Coloniaelig Agrippinaelig

[Cologne] 1622 pp 219ndash220 475 Ibidem p 220 Cf also A Armbruster La romaniteacute des Roumainshellip pp 141ndash142

G Bonfante Studii romeni p 332 E Coseriu Von Genebrardus bis Hervaacuteshellip pp 27ndash28

Victor Spinei 92

144

specific to the intra-Carpathian as well as the extra-Carpathian regions A part of

this information was collected at the court of the Baacutethory family or was taken from

the works of his co-nationals His observations made on the occasion of some trips

are especially relevant Giorgio Tomasi specified the double designation assigned

to the Romanian Lands on the one hand Valacchia and Transalpina and on the

other hand Moldauia and Cisalpina476 Estendendosi tutte le due Valacchie in

spatiose campagne La Transalpina uerso il Danubio amp lrsquoaltra verso il fiume

Nester amp il mare (ldquoBoth Wallachias stretch as some spacious fields do

Transalpina towards the Danube and the other one towards the Dniester River and

the Seardquo)477

The text of the Italian scholar also contains some linguistic remarks

Lrsquoidioma in particolare della Transalpina oue pochi altri habitano che

Valacchi e il latino amp Italiano corrotto Segni veri di essereci stati Collonie

dersquoRomani (ldquoThe language especially that spoken in Transalpina where there

are few inhabitants besides Wallachians is Latin and corrupt Italian which

indeed means that colonies of the Romans existed hererdquo) Also especially

interesting is the observation according to which they perceived the name

Valach as insulting and they did not accept to be called otherwise than

Romanischi Romanians taking pride in the fact that they originated from the

Romans Tengono per ignominia il nome di Valacco non volendo essere

appellati con altro vocabolo che di Romanischi gloriandosi drsquohavere origine

da Romani478 As is known the demonym vlachi valachi gradually received a

derogative meaning after the adoption of the official name romacircni following

the unification of the principalities The testimony of Giorgio Tomasi which

we have no reason to take for inaccurate suggests that this termrsquos meaning

began to change at least a quarter of a millennium earlier It is possible that the

phenomenon was owed to the fact that in medieval Wallachia the term vlachi

designated enslaved peasants namely serfs In some western areas of the

Balkan Peninsula and in those next to the Northern Carpathians this

designation has temporarily conveyed the meaning of shepherds as well which

was a professional category that lacked special prestige on the social pyramid

As humankind advanced towards the modern era the knowledge regarding

the Earthrsquos limits extended and it included farther areas which before had not

interested elevated intellectual circles The notes about the Romanians belonging

476 Giorgio Tomasi Veneto Delle gverre et rivolgimenti del regno drsquoVngaria e della

Transiluania con succesi drsquoaltre parti Venice 1621 p 73 Cf also I Domșa Referințele lui Giorgio

Tomasi despre Transilvania și Țările Romacircne in Anuarul Institutului de Istorie Națională X 1945

p 301 Giorgio Tomasi [Descrierea Țării Romacircnești și a Moldovei] in Călători străini despre Țările

Romacircne III ed M Holban M M Alexandrescu-Dersca Bulgaru P Cernovodeanu Bucharest

1971 p 672 477 Giorgio Tomasi Veneto Delle gverrehellip p 74 478 Ibidem


145

to Jean-Baptiste Gramaye (Jan Baptist Johannes-Baptista Gramayus) (1579ndash1635)

are also in line with this tendency He was a Flemish scholar whose first language

was French and who was a historian writer diplomat high prelate and professor

in Louvain His notes are kept as holograph manuscripts in Brussels at the Royal

Library of Belgium Written in Latin they consist in a chronological enumeration

of the dynasty members of the Romanian voivodeships from their foundation to

the first three decades of the sixteenth century in Wallachia and to the middle of

the fifteenth century in Moldavia respectively Although Antonio Bonfini and

Martin Cromer appear as information sources for the short events he described the

text of Jean-Baptiste Gramaye contains quite many errors and inaccuracies

proving that the works of the mentioned authors had been consulted

superficially479 Among the dynasty members who ruled in Valachia Minor

(Transalpina) there was Stephanus vtriusq(ue) Valachie Vaiuoda 1390 (ldquoStephen

voivode of both Valachias 1390rdquo) about whom it was mistakenly claimed that he

had been defeated by King Sigismund he had requested help from the Turks and

that he had been imprisoned by his compatriots480 The incorrect inclusion of

Stephen [Mușat] among the voivodes of Wallachia is due to the fact that the author

credited the deficient genealogical list elaborated by Johannes Leunclavius who

was wrong once again when he placed Bazaradus (Basarab) on the throne of

Moldavia481 This time Stephen was correctly enumerated among the rulers of

Moldauia (Cara-Bogdania Valachia Maior) by Jean-Baptiste Gramaye the year

he took the throne is also credible Stephanus Vayuoda vtriusq(ue) Valachiae circa

annum 1394 (ldquoStephen voivode of both Valachias around the year 1394rdquo)482

Beyond these more or less accurate dates it is worth keeping in mind that the idea

of the old joint name of the Romanian principalities outside the Carpathian arch

had spread even to the Netherlands

A few decades later Marco Bandini (Marcus Bandinus) (1593ndash1650) named

the Wallachias exactly like Jean-Baptiste Gramaye He was a Bosnian aristocrat

whose original name was Bandulović He was archbishop and apostolic vicar in

Moldavia during the period 1644-1650 and this is also the place in which he

passed away The Roman-Catholic prelate did not only fulfill his ecumenical

mission in 1648 he also elaborated a complex presentation ndash known under the

name Codex Bandinus ndash both of the Catholic community of Moldavia as well as

the region inhabited by it When referring to Jan Zamoyski the absentee leader of

Bacău Diocese Marco Bandini called him ldquobishop of both Wallachiasrdquo utrius(ue)

479 I Toderașcu Icircnsemnări necunoscute de istoria romacircnilor (sec XIVndashXVI) icircntr-un manuscris

occidental in Icircnchinare lui Petre Ș Năsturel la 80 de ani ed by I Cacircndea P Cernovodeanu and

Gh Lazăr Brăila 2003 pp 224ndash243 480 Ibidem pp 228 230 481 Io Leunclavii Amelburni Historiae musulmanae Turcorum de monumentis ipsorum

exscriptae libri XVIII Francofurti 1591 pp 18ndash19 482 I Toderașcu Icircnsemnări necunoscutehellip pp 235 238

Victor Spinei 94

146

Valachiae Episcopo483 The Polish bishop used the same titles in a circular letter

addressed to the Roman-Catholic clerus and parishioners in Moldavia484 The

former Bishop of ldquoboth Wallachiasrdquo (utriusque Valachiae) Bernardino Quirini485

who had been appointed bishop of Argeș (1591ndash1604) with prerogatives also over

the Bishopric of Bacău had received the same title While the canonical duties of

Bishop Jan Zamoyski concerning the other Wallachia ie Țara Romacircnească were

illusive because there confessional jurisdiction was de facto exercised by the

Archbishop of Sardica Sofia when Marco Bandini evoked the authority of

Michael the Brave about fifty years before that calling him ldquoPrince of both

Wallachiasrdquo (Michael Waivoda Princeps utriusq(ue) Valachiae)486 he was

perfectly entitled to do so In another paragraph of the Codex Bandinus there is a

differentiation between the hospitality of the Moldavians versus that of the

Transalpines and ldquothe other Wallachiansrdquo Romanians Sunt hospitales Moldavi

prae Transalpinis et aliis Valachis487 In the same treatise the syntagma Moldavi

Valaci (ldquoMoldavian Valaciansrdquo)488 was used which also indicates the existence of

the category of the Transalpine Muntenian Wallachians As someone who lived

among the Romanians for a long time and was in stable contact with all their social

strata the Bosnian prelate had the opportunity to meet them closely so that his

views on terminology are generally trustworthy

Around the middle of the seventeenth century a Polish anonymous author

elaborated a chronicle of Moldavia that has reached us in its French translation

made a few decades later This manuscript is kept in the Czartoryski Library

which is part of the National Museum in Cracow For the respective author

Wallachia was initially the generic name for both Romanian voivodeships which

confirmed his belief in the ethnic unity of the Romanians An indirect suggestion in

this sense results from the statement that Moldavia like Wallachia represented a

reminiscence of Old Dacia489 The anonymous chronicler wrote that a ldquopartrdquo of

Wallachia was called Moldavia (cette partie de la Vallachie fut appelleacutee

Moldavie)490 and that the Polish used the choronym Vallachie only for Moldavia

while other peoples preferred to use the term Vallachie for Transalpina and

Moldavia for the ldquootherrdquo (lrsquoautre) [Vallachie] located on the banks of the Prut and

483 Marco Bandini Codex Vizitarea generală a tuturor Bisericilor catolice de rit roman din

Provincia Moldavia 1646ndash1648 ed and transl by T Diaconescu Iași 2006 pp 62ndash63 68ndash69

160ndash161 484 Ibidem pp 70ndash73 485 Ibidem pp 358ndash359 486 Ibidem pp 108ndash109 487 Ibidem pp 376ndash377 488 Ibidem pp 378ndash379 489 Cronica Moldovei de la Cracovia Secolul XIII ndash icircnceputul secolului XVII Textul inedit al

unui autor polon anonim ed by C Rezachevici Bucharest 2006 pp 93 129 490 Ibidem pp 94 130


147

the Dniester les autres nations appellent la premiere Vallachie ou Transilpine

ltTransalpinegt et lrsquoautre du Cocirctegrave du Pruth et du Niester Moldavie491

The Polish terminological preferences had been previously acknowledged by

other scholars as well One of them was Martin Cromer (1512ndash1585) whose work

dedicated to the origin and history of his compatriots was printed for the first time in

1555492 and enjoyed large popularity This opinion was also shared by the German

Dominican Martin Gruneweg (1562ndashc 1618) While crossing the border between the

Polish Kingdom and Moldavia on September 18 1582 he wrote in his detailed diary

that Moldavia was called Wallachia in Poland and Moldavia in Hungary hellipMoldaw

welche man hierzulande in Poelen Wallacheye heist unde welches die buecher

Wallacheye nennen das ist jens theiel am Ungarlande wirtt hie wieder die Moldaw

genant493 After having spent his childhood and adolescence in the Polish Kingdom

where he had the chance to enjoy elevated humanistic studies Miron Costin wrote that

the Polish called the Moldavians Wallachians and the Ungrovlachians and the

inhabitants of Muntenia Multani A że na tych gruntach gdzie teraz Mołdawi albo

Włachowie albo jak ich Polacy zowią Wołosza i tam gdzie teraz Uhrowłachowie

albo Muntanie albo według Polakoacutew Multanie494 In one of his posthumous works

Dimitrie Cantemir confirmed the remark of the scholars who preceded him nomine

enim Valachiae Poloni solam Moldaviam intellegunt (ldquounder the name Valachia the

Poles understand only Moldaviardquo)495

In his world geography treatise published in 1660 in two volumes containing

text and maps Giovanni (Giovan) Battista Nicolosi (1610ndash1670) dedicated several

pages to the Romanian regions Born in Sicily the Italian theologian geographer and

writer completed his studies in Rome and after about three years spent in Germany he

returned to the pontifical capital where he elaborated several works including the

mentioned treatise In the subchapter entitled Principe di Transiluania belonging to

the chapter Potenza del Turco (Europa Asia amp Africa) dedicated to the territories

included in the Ottoman Empire the author claimed that the territory was divided into

three regions inhabited by the Szeklers Hungarians Transylvanian Saxons and

491 Ibidem pp 95 131 492 Martini Cromeri De origine et rebus gestis Polonorvm libri XXX Basilae 1555 p 313 493 Die Aufzeichnungen des Dominikaners Martin Gruneweg (1562-ca 1618) uumlber seine

Familie in Danzig seine Handelsreisen in Osteuropa und sein Klosterleben in Polen I Edition des

Manuscripts fol 1ndash726 ed by A Beus Wiesbaden 2008 p 700 Cf also Martin Gruneweg

[Călătoriile prin Moldavia Țara Romacircnească și Dobrogea] transl by A Ciocicircltan in Călători

străini despre Țările Romacircne Supplement I ed by Șt Ștefănescu (coord) M Coman A Ciocicircltan

I Cazan N Pienaru O Cristea T Cojocaru Bucharest 2011 p 77 494 Miron Costin Chronika Ziem Mołdawskich i Multańskich in Idem Latopis Ziemi

Mołdawskiej i inne utwory historyczne transl and ed by I Czamańska Poznań 1998 p 250 495 Dimitrie Cantemir De antiquis et hodiernis Moldaviae nominibus and Historia

Moldo-Vlachica ed and transl by D Slușanschi (Idem Opere complete IX 1 coord by

V Cacircndea) Bucharest 1983 pp 342ndash343

Victor Spinei 96

148

Germans there were also ldquomany Valacchiansrdquo (molti Valacchi) spread among them496

The next subchapter entitled Valacchia Moldauia amp Bessarabia contains the

following statement La Valacchia (sotto nome di Valacchia Magna) si spiega dalla

Transiluania sino quasi allrsquoEusino amp si riparte in Valacchia ograve Transalpina amp

Propria amp Moldauia (ldquoValacchia [under the name Great Valacchia] stretches from

Transylvania to the Euxine and is divided into Vallacchia or actual Transalpina and

Moldaviardquo)497 The Latin version of this volume which was printed one decade later

exactly in the year this scholar deceased maintains the succession of the chapters the

corresponding passage is almost identical Valachia sub nomine Valachiaelig Magnaelig

extenditur agrave Transylvaniatilde feregrave ad Pontum Euxinum vsque amp distribuitur in Valachiam

Propriam sivegrave Transalpinam amp Moldaviam498 As resulting from the above-quoted

passages Giovanni Battista Nicolosi adopted the opinion of his predecessors

according to which the notion of Valachia referred to both principalities in the

extra-Carpathian area but for avoiding misunderstandings the respective term was

assigned only to Transalpina (proper Valachia)

The same was done by the Bulgarian Roman-Catholic missionary Gabriel

Mančić-Tomasij who in a report sent in 1660 to a high Polish prelate in his

[coveted but unattained] capacity as ldquoapostolic vicar of one and the other

Wallachiardquo wrote the following Relatione del Padre f Gabriele Tomasij de min

osservanti vicario apostolico nellrsquouna e lrsquoaltra Valacchia lasciata a Monsignor

nuntio di Polonia sotto li 7 Febraro 1660499 Besides this generic name applied to

both Romanian Lands when referring to one or the other the author of the report

called them Valachia Transalpina or Valachia and Moldavia respectively The

similarities between the two principalities were clearly stated La Moldavia ha

ancora principe come la Valachia di rito scisma costumi lingua et ogni cosa

simile con lrsquoaltra500 (ldquoMoldavia too has a prince just as Wallachia while in

regards to the rite schism costumes language and all things it is similar to itrdquo)

Exactly like other scholars of the time Johannes Troumlster (deceased in

1670) considered that in his time the territory of Trajanrsquos former Dacia was

divided between Transylvania (Siebenbuumlrgen) and the two Wallachias

(Wallachey) consisting of Moldavia or Moldau as well as ldquoanotherrdquo

[Wallachia] located northwards on the Danube called Transalpina Valachia

496 Gio Battista Nicolosi DellrsquoHercole e studio geografico I Rome 1660 p 296 Cf also

M Găzdaru and D Găzdaru Călători și geografi italieni icircn secolul XVII Referințele lor despre

Țările Romacircnești in Arhiva Iași XLVII 1940 1ndash2 pp 78ndash80 497 Gio Battista Nicolosi DellrsquoHercolehellip p 296 Cf also M Găzdaru and D Găzdaru

Călători și geografi italienihellip in Arhiva Iași XLVII 1940 1ndash2 p 80 498 Ioannes Baptista Nicolosi Hercvles sicvlvs sive stvdivm geographicvm I Romae 1670

p 251 499 Monumenta spectantia historiam Slavorum meridionalium XVIII Acta Bulgariae

ecclesiastica ed by E Fermendžiu Zagrebiae 1887 p 268 500 Ibidem p 269


149

Das andere so gegen Mittag an der Donau lieget heisset Transalpina

Valachia501 Besides reiterating the idea that Old Dacia was divided into three

different principalities502 Moldavia and Wallachia were referred to as ldquothe two

Wallachian principalitiesrdquo die zwey Wallachische Fuumlrstenthumer503 As an

inhabitant of Transylvania Johannes Troumlster did not base his considerations

only on bibliographic information but also on his own findings obtained as a

result of his direct contacts with the ethnicities living in this region The Saxon

scholar claimed that ldquothe Wallachians Romanians are remnants of the Roman

colonists they call themselves Romuni and have their own voivodes or

princesrdquo Sie sind Wallachen der Roumlmischen Colonien uumlbrige nennen sich

Romunos haben ihre eignen Wayda oder Fuumlrsten504 These considerations

included in chapter XV of this volumersquos first book are completed by other

ones which are equally eloquent inserted into the first chapter of the fourth

book About the Wallachians in Moldavia Wallachia and the Transylvanian

Mountains he said that they were living like Roman border legionaries505

While this assertion reflects the authorrsquos humanistic education the statement

that the Romanians ldquoare not called Wallachians or Blochs in their language but

Rumuni or Romansrdquo ([Wallachen] heissen sie sich in ihrer Sprach nicht

Wallachen oder Bloch sondern Rumunos oder Roumlmer)506 represents his own

observation made while living next to Transylvanian communities This is of

course a suggestive remark even if it is not an original one

Another prominent figure of the Saxon patricians with historiographic

interests and born in Mediaș was Mathias Miles (1639ndash1686) After studying

in Wittenberg he settled in Sibiu where he was assigned important

administrative tasks In a chronicle dedicated to seventeenth century

Transylvania which he had already composed during his youth and that was

printed in Sibiu in 1670 he succinctly referred to the Romanians as well whom

he believed to ldquopartiallyrdquo descend from those Romans (zum Theil unserer

Walachen Ursprung entstehet) who after several wars managed to conquer the

state of King Decebalus under the leadership of Trajan507 An identical wording

to that used by Johannes Troumlster ndash namely ldquothe two Wallachian Romanian

Landsrdquo (die 2 Wallachische Laumlnder) ndash was employed by Mathias Miles when

501 Johannes Troumlster Das Alt- und Neu-Teutsche Dacia Das ist Neue Beschreibung des

Landes Siebenbuumlrgen Nuumlrnberg 1666 pp 71ndash72 502 Ibidem p 332 503 Ibidem p 324 504 Ibidem pp 71ndash72 505 Ibidem p 338 506 Ibidem p 327 Cf also A Armbruster Dacoromano-Saxonica Cronicari romacircni despre

sași Romacircnii icircn cronica săsească Bucharest 1980 pp 112ndash113 507 Matthias Miles Siebenbuumlrgischer Wuumlrg-Engel oder Chronicalischer Anhang des 15 Seculi

nach Christi Geburth Hermannstadt [Sibiu] 1670 p 2

Victor Spinei 98

150

he mentioned three powerful earthquakes in 1595 felt in Transylvania the

Romanian Lands Turkey and Greece508

The significant syntagma Beyde Wallachische Fuumlrstenthuumlmer (ldquoboth

Wallachian Romanian principalitiesrdquo) is also found in the travel notes of Conrad

Jacob Hiltebrandt (1629ndash1679) in which he recounted fragments of the trips made

in a few Eastern European regions The paragraphs dedicated to Moldavia contain

additional information regarding the terminology origin and way of life of the

Romanians Die Einwohner dieses Landes sind Wallachen und koumlnte Ich diese

gegen die so unter den Siebenbuumlrgen Ungarn und Saxen alszlig Tageloumlhner

zerstreuet leben woll die freye Wallachen nennen gestaltsam Sie die gantze

Moldau und Wallachey allein besitzen darinnen Sie Von Ihren eigenen Fuumlrsten

oder Woywoden beherschet werden Beyde Wallachische Fuumlrstenthuumlmer werden

Von den Romunis oder Wallachen bewohnen aber dem gemeinen Nahmen nach

werden Sie unterschieden Daszlig Fuumlrstenthumb so an dem Donau Uumlffer lieget wird

Wallachey genandt und das andere so an die Buzacker Tartern gegen der

Maeotischen Pfuumltze sich erstrecket heiszliget Moldau doch kahmen Mir die

Wallachen houmlfflicher und verstaumlndiger Vor alszlig die Moldauer Droben habe Ich

gemeldet daszlig die Wallachen Roumlmischen herkommens seyn [hellip] Diese Roumlmische

Wallachen seind nicht der Joten und Dacier Nachkoumlmlinge kommen auch nicht

Von den Sarmatis oder Tartarn her sondern sind uumlberbliebene Von den

Trajanischen Zug Voumllckern (ldquoThe inhabitants of this country are the Wallachians

Romanians and I could call them free Wallachians because they rule alone over

entire Moldavia and Wallachia and in this regard they reign through their own

princes or voivodes unlike those scattered as day laborers among the

Transylvanians Hungarians and Saxons Both Wallachian principalities are

inhabited by Romunis Romanians or Wallachians but they are distinguished by

means of different names The principality located towards the Danube shore is

called Wallachia and the other one stretching as far as the Budjak Tatars towards

the Meotic Swamp [Azov Sea] is called Moldau Moldavia however it seemed to

me that the Wallachians Munteni are more polite and sympathetic than the

Moldavians I mentioned before that the Wallachians Romanians are of Roman

descent [hellip] These Roman Wallachians are neither the descendants of the Goths

and Dacians nor of the Sarmatians or Tatars they are a population that remained

after Trajanrsquos campaignrdquo)509 By sharing the views of the scholars who regarded the

Goths and the Dacians as ancestors of the Transylvanian Saxons Conrad Jacob

Hiltebrandt dispossessed the Romanians of a basic component of their

ethnogenesis ie the Dacian one Nevertheless for re-establishing a balance in the

osmosis of the ethnic structures in the intra-Carpathian space he joined the current

508 Ibidem p 170 509 Conrad Jacob Hiltebrandt Dreifache Schwedische Gesandtschaftreise nach Siebenbuumlrgen

der Ukraine und Constantinopel (1656ndash1658) ed by F Babinger Leiden 1937 pp 78ndash79


151

that strongly claimed the Roman origin of the Romanians Showing a real

attraction to the specificity of their daily life the German scholar was able to verify

and acknowledge the observations of his predecessors regarding the ethnic

homogeneity of the population in the two principalities located south and east of

the Carpathian mountain chain

An intrepid endeavor of Eastern European political history was assumed by the

Italian prelate and diplomat Alberto Vimina (pseudonym of Michele Bianchi) (1603ndash

1667) from Belluno in the region of Veneto He was attracted by the ldquocivil war in

Polandrdquo caused by the rebellion of the Zaporojan Cossacks led by Hetman Bohdan

Khmelnytsky during the period 1648ndash1652 In his work that appeared posthumously

in 1671 Italian readers were provided not only with data about the battle theater but

also with details concerning the border areas of Ukraine mostly about Moldavia

obtained from contemporary information sources or collected from the writings of his

compatriots Especially interesting are the details pertaining to the occupations

traditional costume customs and language of the inhabitants as well as the

environment and the military events east of the Oriental Carpathians510 The division of

Wallachia into two distinct provinces Maggiore e Minore (Great and Little) namely

Moldavia and Wallachia respectively was confirmed by Alberto Vimina as well who

reserved the old name Wallachia for the latter one However the author showed a

certain lack of geographic orientation when claiming that the provinces were separated

by the Moldova River Percioche solamente il secolo transcorso srsquoindende che sia

stata distinta dalla Valachia col prendere il nome dal picciol fiume Moldauo che

diuidea prima tutta la Prouincia in Maggiore amp in Minore restando agrave questa lrsquoantico

nome di Valachia e la Maggiore chiamandosi Moldauia511 More accurate are his

observations referring to the southeastern region of Moldavia When mentioning the

Tatars of Budjak (Bugiac) he showed that in the olden times this region was called

Basarabia (Bessarabia) a part of Moldavia extending as far as the Danube and the

Black Sea (Eussino) its ldquometropolisrdquo was the city called Cetatea Albă (Bialagrod)512

This Italian historian was one of the first scholars and cartographers who was aware of

the double designation of the southern area between the two rivers the Prut and the

Dniester However he was wrong when he thought that the term Budjak was newer

than Bessarabia In reality the two toponyms were used simultaneously and the

Turkish populations preferred the variant Budjak (Bugeac) whereas Europeans that of

Basarabia Bessarabia

The high ecclesiastical Roman-Catholic instances showed special interest in

Romanian confessional regulations They were conscious of the fact that only through

precise information on the demographic and political realities in the Lower Danube

510 Alberto Vimina Bellvnense Historia delle gverre civili di Polonia diuisa in cinque libri

Progressi dellrsquoarmi Moscovite contro Polacchi Venice 1671 pp 219ndash224 Cf also M Găzdaru and

D Găzdaru Călători și geografi italienihellip in Arhiva Iași XLVII 1940 1ndash2 pp 84ndash87 511 Alberto Vimina Bellvnense Historia delle gverre civilihellip p 220 512 Ibidem p 100

Victor Spinei 100

152

principalities their missionary endeavors could become efficient Thus in the

correspondence of the hierarchs of Congregatio de Propaganda Fide who were

reorganizing the Diocese of Bacău there was a reference to Stato delle Provincie

dellrsquouna e dellrsquoaltra Valachia (May 23 1670)513 and the title of the local bishop was

specified che srsquointitola di Moldavia e Vallachia ograve sia dellrsquouna e lrsquoaltra Vallachia

These details were included in a letter sent from Cracow on April 25 1676514 and they

were reproduced almost identically in a letter sent from Rome on June 1 1677515 The

latter one was signed by Urbano Cerri congregation secretary who offered more

details on the nomenclature etymology and localization of the Romanian Lands

Among other things like other erudites of the Renaissance era he claimed that in the

olden times Wallachia and Moldavia had a joint name ie Wallachia and that

together with Transylvania they composed Dacia Afterwards they were divided into

three provinces with different names led by a voivode Wallachia Transalpina or

Montana stretching up to the Danube kept the name Wallachia and the other one

(lrsquoaltra) located towards the Pontus Euxinus took the name Moldavia deriving from

Mollis Dacia This term was created through the juxtaposition of the name of the river

that crosses it with that of the ancient province Credo p-ograve nata q-ta pretensione dal

nome commune di Valachia che anticam-te havea la Moldavia essendo state due le

Valachia che obedivano ad un Pn-pe solo e con la Transilvania costituivano lrsquoantica

Dacia che doppo divise q-te tre Provincie in diversi Regoli chiamati in loro lingua

Vaivodi presero nome differente onde la Valachia Transalpina overo montana verso il

Danubio ritiene il nome di Valachia e lrsquoaltra verso il Ponte Euxino vien chiamata

Moldavia da un fiume che la bagna ben che altri dicano esser detta p le sue pianure

Mollis Dacia e ciograve derivare il corrotto vocabulo di Moldavia As we can see the text

of the letter abounds in abbreviations The Secretary of Congregatio de Propaganda

Fide observed scholarly regulations and indicated the sources he had used for his short

historical excursus Ioannes Sambucus (Jaacutenos Zsaacutemboky) Antonio Bonfini Martin

Cromer and Abraham Ortelius516

In fact Urbano Cerri (deceased in 1679) revealed the extent of his intellectual

capacity when he elaborated a large presentation on the organization level of the

Roman Catholic Church in the entire world Due to the fact that it was translated

into English and French this work largely spread throughout Europe517 When

513 Gh Călinescu Alcuni missionari cattolici italiani nella Moldavia nei secoli XVII e XVIII

in Diplomatarium Italicum I 1925 no XV p 103 The text was attributed to Francesco-Maria

Spera who previously carried out missionary work in both of the Romanian principalities

Cf Călători străinihellip VII pp 201ndash206 514 G Călinescu Alcuni missionari cattolici italiani hellip no XXIII p 121 515 Ibidem no XXVI p 126 516 Ibidem no XXVI p 127 517 [Urbano] Cerri An Account of the State of the Roman-Catholic Religion Throughout the

World written for the Use of Pope Innocent XI transl by R Steele 2nd ed London 1716 Urbano

Cerri Eacutetat preacutesent de lrsquoEacuteglise romaine dans toutes les parties du monde eacutecrit pour lrsquousage du Pape

Innocent X Amsterdam 1716


153

referring to Transylvania Wallachia and Moldavia he discussed almost only

confessional aspects Only when referring to the latter region he added a few

details that are unfortunately based on some errors ldquoMoldavia named as such

from the river flowing through it was taken by Suumlleyman from Stephen the Good

() who had a Catholic wife although he was schismatic She was Hungarian and

made more than just a few favors to our [Catholic] religionrdquo518

The prolific novelist and historian Eberhard Werner Happel (1647ndash1690) born

in Kirchayn in the region of Hessen attempted the elaboration of universal history

syntheses which focused mainly on the events that were contemporary with the author

One of these printed in 1688 comprises short descriptions of Wallachia Moldavia

and Transylvania which are part of a large chapter dedicated to the regions included in

the Ottoman Empire entitled Von dem Gebieth und Landschafften des Tuumlrkckischen

Kaysers The subchapter dedicated to Wallachey begins with the statement that there

were ldquotwo Wallachiasrdquo after which follow a few general considerations about the first

one Es ist eigentlich die Wallachey zweyerley nehmlich inferior oder die Berg-

Wallachey welche anitzo eigentlich diesen Nahmen fuumlhret Diese graumlntzet gegen

Morgen und Mitternacht an den Fluszlig Mysovo gegen Mittag an die Bulgarey und

Donau gegen Abend an Siebenbuumlrgen Die Einwohner reden eine Sprache die von der

Italianischen herkommen sol519 The author provided the following details about the

name and expanse of Moldavia (Moldau) Der andere Theil der grossen Wallachey

heisset Cismontana Major Superior auch wohl Nigra die grosse oder schwartze

Wallachey (ldquoThe other part of Great Wallachia is called Cismontana Major Superior

as well as Nigra Great or Black Wallachiardquo)520

A part of the data registered by Happel and other German-speaking authors

was diligently reproduced in the so-called Curious Description of Moldavia and

Wallachia printed in 1699 In the introduction passages the author who did not

wish to reveal his identity repeated the idea that Moldavia and Wallachia

corresponded to the old territory of Dacia bearing the name Wallachey Along

time this country was divided into two parts Moldavia possessed a larger territory

and Wallachia a smaller one also designated by the name Dacia Transalpina

Montana or Alpestris Dacia Afterwards the hydrographic and territorial limits

surrounding Wallachia were enumerated Danube Black Sea Russia Bulgaria and

Transylvania At the same time the author mentioned that the locals descended

from the colonists settled by Emperor Trajan who arrived together with Prince

Flaccio and that the language they spoke revealed their Italian origin521

518 [Urbano] Cerri An Accounthellip p 40 519 Everhard Gverner Happel Thesaurus Exoticorum oder eine mit Auszliglaumlndischer Raritaumlten

und Geschichten Wohlversehene Schatz-Kammer Fuumlrstellend die Asiatische Africanische und

Americanische Nationes Hamburg 1688 p 4 520 Ibidem p 5 521 Curioumlse Beschreibung von der Moldau und Wallachey worinnen deroselben Zustand und

Beschaffenheit 1699 chapter IV

Victor Spinei 102

154

A certain interest in the political ethnographic and economic realities in the

countries of the Balkans and along the Lower Danube also existed in the Low

Countries where in 1687 an anonymous author published an ample work on this

geopolitical area written in Flemish It included chapters concerning the Romanian

Lands and among the last events referring to this topic was the unfortunate

Moldavian campaign of Jan (John) III Sobieski (1686) In the ldquoDescription of

Wallachiardquo (Bechryving van Walachien) the author discussed the divisioning and

designations of the Romanian regions shared by other Western European scholars

too Zedert dat dit Landschap met dat van Moldavien een Provintie van Dacien

was en Opper en Neder-Walachien wier genoemt is het in twee gedeelt waar van

een de naam van Walachien behouden en het ander die van Moldavien heeft

angenoomen522 (ldquoInitially this region composed together with Moldavia a single

province of Dacia called Upper and Lower Wallachia then it split into two parts

one of which kept the name Wallachia and the other Moldaviardquo) In the chapter

entitled ldquoDescription of the Principality of Moldaviardquo (Bechryving van Het

Vorstendom Moldavien) the idea of Moldavia belonging to Dacia was restated

while claiming that its former designation was groot Walachien (Great Wallachia)

and Cis Alpina Moldaviarsquos name was derived from a homonymous river or

fortress523 In its turn Moldavien wert in tween gedeelt waar van het grootste deel

de eigenste naam behoud en het kleenste dat aan de monden van den Donauw

waar door dezelve in de Swarte Zeacuteeacute valt grenst wert Bes-Arabien genaamt524

(ldquoMoldavia was divided into two parts the larger of which preserved its own name

and the smaller part neighboring the Danube Mouths where it drains into the

Black Sea was called Bessarabiardquo) The anonymous Dutch scholar was clearly

aware of the theories according to which the term Valachia was derived from

Flaccia Falaccia a term rooted in Flaccus een Romens Oversten (ldquoa Roman

captainrdquo) After the Romans defeated the Getae (Geeten) Flaccus founded a colony

of 30000 people525 The author also knew that the Romanians followed ldquoGreekrdquo

Orthodox religious precepts that their language was close to Latin and that they

were descendants of the Romans In support of their Roman ancestry he gave two

Romanian words of Latin origin Apa ltwatergt and Pai526 ltbreadgt

The idea according to which ldquoin the beginningrdquo Eflacirck and Bogdan that is to

say Wallachia and Moldavia respectively formed a single polity that only later

split into two states under the suzerainty of the Sublime Porte was also adopted in

a work composed on the territories under Ottoman domination located north of the

522 N Iorga O descriere olandeză a Principatelor (1687) in Revista istorică XI 1925 1ndash3

p 39 The Romanian translation (Relație anonimă olandeză [1687] in Călători străinihellip VII 1980

pp 520ndash522) is surprisingly flawed and with omissions of important passages 523 N Iorga O descriere olandezăhellip p 39 524 Ibidem p 42 525 Ibidem p 37 526 Ibidem p 38


155

Danube and the Black Sea It was elaborated in 1740 by an anonymous Turkish

author living in Hotin527 The influence of western historiographical traditions also

results from the passage mentioning 30000 ploughmen colonized by Trajan in

Eflak and the claim that the former designation of Bogdania was Dacia528 views

generally ignored by Islamic historiography

Formulations with a close meaning referring to the extra-Carpathian principalities but dating from a later period are also found in chronicles written in Romanian Thus in the work composed according to some opinions in the ninth decade of the seventeenth century by scholar George Brancovici (1645ndash1711) the idea of ethnic unity was also stated by using the syntagma Amacircndoao țăracircle romacircnești (ldquoboth Romanian Landsrdquo) It was used when claiming that ldquothey began to pay tribute to Silim [Selim I 1512ndash1520] the Turkish emperorrdquo (au icircnceput a da haraci lui Silim icircnpăratul turcesc) in the year 7022 ab origine mundi529 which corresponds to the year 1514 post Christum natum however the indicated date is not correct

Approximately in the same period namely by the end of the seventeenth century the so-called Annals of the Băleni [family] (Letopisețul Bălenilor) was elaborated in Wallachia It narrates events taking place between 1290 and 1688 and it naturally focuses on those happening in the second half of the seventeenth century that is during the lifetime of the anonymous author When referring to the organization of the great Ottoman campaign in 1683 among the mobilized vassals meant to support the conquest of Vienna were also enumerated ldquoboth Romanian rulersrdquo (domnii romacircnești ltromacircnigt amacircndoi)530 namely Șerban Cantacuzino from the Romanian Country and George Duca from Moldavia The respective terms clearly express the awareness of the ethnic identity of the voivodes in the two states located outside the Carpathian arch

The widely spread opinion on the existence of a ldquodouble Wallachiardquo featured in a large number of chancery documents and various writings is plainly and suggestively articulated in several cartographic works of the sixteenth-eighteenth centuries Here we are referring to the maps of Central and Eastern Europe drawn by western cartographers in which the two Romanian principalities were depicted with the same color and without a border between them whereas the neighboring countries were individualized with assorted colors Among these maps are those made by Sebastian Muumlnster in 1545531 Rumold Mercator in 1595532 Willem

527 М Губоглу [M Guboglu] Турецкий источник 1740 г о Валахии Молдавии и Украине

in Восточные источники по истории народов Юго-Восточной и Центральной Европы [I] под

ред А С Тверитиновой [red A S Tveritinova] Moscow 1964 p 134 528 Ibidem pp 134 136 529 Gheorghe Brancovici Cronica sloveacutenilor Illiriculuihellip p 72 530 Letopisețul Bălenilor in Cronicari munteni ed by A Ghermanschi p 145 531 Descriptio Bessarabiae Bessarabia in Five Centuries of Cartography ed by A Năstase

M Gribincea and O Dumitru Bucharest 2017 no 3 pp 68ndash69 532 Th Horst Le monde en cartes Geacuterard Mercator (1512ndash1594) et le premier atlas du

monde Brussels 2011 plates

Victor Spinei 104

156

Janszoon Blaeu and Joan Blaeu in 1635533 Nikolaus (Nicolaes) Visscher II (the Son) around 1680ndash1698534 Johann Baptist Homann in c 1700ndash1720535 and Daniel de la Feuille in 1710536 The 1595 map is part of an extensive atlas compiled by Rumold Mercator which comprises various cartographic works made by his father the illustrious mapmaker Gerard Mercator (born Gerhard Kremer 1512ndash1594) In the prototype of the map finished around the middle of the sixteenth century the Romanian Lands were painted with different color backgrounds and separated by a border It is possible that some of the variants of Gerard Mercatorrsquos map were similar to that selected for inclusion into the atlas authored by his son

In the map of the Dutch mapmaker Nicolaes Visscher II along the tract of

land between the Eastern Carpathians and the Dniester runs the inscription

Principatus Valachiae Propriae while the land in-between the Southern

Carpathians and the Danube is labeled Principatus Moldaviae thus switching the

names of the two lands Above both these regions is inscribed in larger fonts the

name Valachia as the common term for both principalities The assiduous German

geographer and cartographer Johann Baptist Homann from Nurnberg who

dutifully replicated the watercourses and legends from Nicolaes Visscher IIrsquos map

either directly or from a common prototype corrected the erroneous display of the

inscriptions Principatus Moldaviae and Principatus Valachiae nevertheless

preserving the all-encompassing title Valachia written in a larger font on top The

names of the two Romanian Lands were also switched by another reputed Dutch

cartographer Carel Allard (1648ndash1709) with Walachia placed east and Moldavia

south of the Carpathians537 The figurative individualization of the two

principalities and their designation with a single choronym did not reflect the

political-administrative realities of the era but revealed the increasingly

widespread perception of the two Lands sharing the same ethnic origin

Of course without claiming comprehensiveness given the fact that our

research was not very extensive after collecting the designations referring to

533 I Principati Romeni e lrsquoEuropa Orientale nella cartografia occidentale dal Rinascimento

allrsquoetagrave dei lumi ed by D Măndescu Bucharest 2015 nos 9ndash10 pp 38ndash39 534 Д Стоименов Атлас Българските земи в европейската картографска традиция

(IIIndashXIX в) обща ред А Фол А Стаматов D Stoimenov Atlas the Bulgarian Lands in the


no III 19 I Principati Romeni e lrsquoEuropa Orientalehellip no 18 pp 54ndash55 Descriptio Bessarabiaehellip

no 25 pp 110ndash111 Historia Transylvaniae Transilvania icircn cinci secole de cartografie ed by

A Năstase I-A Pop and M Gribincea Bucharest 2018 no 36 pp 120ndash121 no 47 pp 140ndash141 535 Д Стоименов Атлас Българските земи hellip D Stoimenov Atlas the Bulgarian

Landshellip no III 23 I Principati Romeni e lrsquoEuropa Orientalehellip no 25 pp 68ndash69 Descriptio

Bessarabiaehellip no 41 pp 142ndash143 no 50 pp 160ndash161 536 Descriptio Bessarabiaehellip no 45 pp 150ndash151 537 Imago Poloniae Dawna Rzeczpospolita na mapach dokumentach i starodrukach w

zbiorach Tomasza Niewodniczańskiego Imago Poloniae Das polnisch-litauische Reich in Karten

Dokumenten und alten Drucken in der Sammlung von Tomasz Niewodniczański I ed and transl by

T Niewodniczański Autoren des Kataloges K Kozica J Pezda Warsaw 2002 no H 271 p 99


157

ldquodouble Wallachiardquo ldquoanotherrdquo and ldquothe other Wallachiardquo ldquoboth Wallachiasrdquo and

ldquothe two Wallachiasrdquo we can conclude that beginning with the end of the

fourteenth century until the last decades of the seventeenth century they

circulated in the cultural environments of several European countries including

in the regions on the left bank of the Lower Danube The expression ldquodouble

Wallachiardquo was used in the last decade of the fourteenth century by the

Frenchman Philippe de Meacuteziegraveres and two centuries later by the Italian Giovanni

Antonio Magini as well as by the Hungarian Mikloacutes Istvaacutenffy The syntagma

ldquoboth Wallachiasrdquo Romanian Lands is found in different works elaborated by

the Germans Johannes Hans Schiltberger Johannes Leunclavius Conrad

Lautenbach Andreas Khielman and Conrad Jacob Hiltebrandt the Frenchman

Bertrandon de la Broquiegravere the Italians Antonio Maria Gratiani Tranquillo

Andronico Antonius Maria Gratianus Giorgio Tomasi the French-speaking

Flemish Jean-Baptiste Gramaye Hungarian King Louis II the Hungarian Jaacutenos

Kemeacuteny from Transylvania and the Bosnian Marco Bandini between the

fifteenth and seventeenth centuries Towards the end of the seventeenth century

the Serbian George Brancovici who lived in a western Romanian environment

used the phrase ldquoboth Romanian Landsrdquo The syntagmas ldquothe other Wallachiansrdquo

and ldquoboth Wallachiansrdquo found in the works of Nicolaus Olachus and in the

Lithuanian diplomatic documents of the first half of the fifteenth century reflect

the same view on the ethnic and political spectrum as that outlined by Johannes

Schiltberger and Bertrandon de la Broquiegravere The expression ldquoanother

Wallachiardquo employed for Wallachia Muntenia as well as for Moldavia was

attested in a letter of Stephen the Great addressed to Venetian officials in the

chronicles and the geography treatises elaborated by Antonio Bonfini Giovanni

Antonio Magini and Johannes Troumlster as well as in a report elaborated by an

Italian living in Constantinople by the middle of the sixteenth century In the

sixteenth and seventeenth centuries the phrase ldquothe other Wallachiardquo appeared in

the chronicles and geography works of Filippo Buonaccorsi called Callimachus

Michael Bocignoli Giovanni Lorenzo drsquoAnania Giovanni Francesco

Commendone Philip Sidney Urbano Cerri Conrad Lautenbach and Gabriel

Mančić-Tomasij as well as in the letters of Michael Bocignoli from Ragusa and

of the Italian Urbano Cerri The expression ldquothe two Wallachiasrdquo appeared in the

works authored by Stephanus Brodericus Petrus Bizarus Johannes Troumlster

Mathias Miles Eberhardt Werner Happel and by an anonymous monk from

Serbia Finally the idea of a joint terminology for the Romanian principalities

south and east of the Carpathians was expressed by designating them with the

plural phrase ldquothe Lands of Wallachiardquo in the travel notes of the Polish Andrzej

Taranowski in the same manner as by differentiating the voivodeships with the

aid of the names ldquoLittle Wallachiardquo ldquoTransalpinardquo and ldquoGreater Wallachiardquo

ldquoMoldaviardquo as done by Giovanni Botero Giovanni Antonio Magini Fabio

Mignanelli etc

Victor Spinei 106

158

The awareness about the similarity of the ethnic character of the majority

population in the two Romanian voivodeships is equally reflected in the choronyms

designating them in Europe

In the last decades of the fourteenth century the name ldquoGreat Wallachiardquo

began to be assigned to Țara Romacircnească and ldquoLittle Wallachiardquo to Moldavia The

oldest attestation of this term employed for the voivodeship between the Southern

Carpathians and the Danube appears in a letter sent from Avignon to the Vicariate

of the Franciscan Order in Bosnia by Pope Gregory XI on July 1 1373 In this

letter the Pope urged the monks to be more efficient in their proselytizing

endeavors in partibus Bosnae et Wlachiae et circa metas Ungariae where the

ldquoschismaticrdquo population predominated and they were allowed to erect worship

buildings and other constructions that were necessary for worshipping ldquonear the

borders of Hungary towards Sebeș [Caransebeș Banat of Timișoara] and Greater

Wallachia and towards the border to Bosniardquo in metis Ungariae circa Sebes et

Maiorem Wlachiam ac circa metas Bosnae538 The same choronym was used in a

text elaborated in 1380 at the Papal Chancery after the return from Avignon to

Rome This text is kept at the Bibliothegraveque Nationale of Paris (Codex lat 4169)

and it presents the main organization aspects of the Roman-Catholic Church To

the enumeration of the dioceses subordinated to the Archbishopric of Kalocsa

(Archiepiscopatus Colocensis) in Hungary a different author than the one who

wrote the entire manuscript added the name Argensem (Argeș) close to Sirmium

He also added a short note proving the involvement of Pope Urban VI (1378ndash1389)

in creating the Bishopric of Argeș in ldquoGreat Wallachiardquo on May 9 1380 the

construction of a cathedral and the appointment of Nicholas Anton belonging to

the Ordo Praedicatorum (of the Dominicans) as diocese head dominus noster

dominus Urbanus papa VI VII Id Maij anno quarto erexit locum de Argos [Argeș]

in Walachia maiori in civitatem et constituit ibi ecclesiam cathedralem cui prefecit

in episcopum fratrem Nicolaum Antonij ordinis predicatorum et vocatur ecclesia

Argensis in provincia Colocensi539 Naturally the qualifying word Great attached

to the discussed toponym required the adjective Little that fulfills the purpose of

538 Bullarium Franciscanum VI ed by C Eubel Romae 1902 no 1273 pp 509ndash510

Acta Gregorii PP XI (1370ndash1378) e regestis Vaticanis aliisque fontibus collegit notisque adornavit

A L Tăutu (Pontificia Commissio ad Redigendum Codicem Iuris Canonici Orientalis Fontes

Series III XII) Cittagrave del Vaticano 1966 no 80 pp 154ndash155 539 Der Liber Cancellariae Apostolicae vom Jahre 1380 und der Stilus palatii abbreviatus

Dietrichs von Nieheim ed by G Erler Leipzig 1888 p 26 Text reproductions by other historians

(N Iorga Histoire des Roumains et de la romaniteacute orientale III Les fondateurs drsquoEacutetat Bucharest

1937 p 302 note 1 Șt Pascu Contribuțiuni documentare la istoria romacircnilor icircn sec XIII și XIV

Sibiu 1944 p 66 note 228) contains numerous small errors word ellisions abbreviations etc that

do not exist in the original manuscript edited in 1888


159

antinomic balance for a neighboring geopolitical entity inhabited by a population

of similar ethnicity as both terms were used simultaneously

The first designation of Moldavia by the term ldquoLittle Wallachiardquo is found in a

pontifical document as well namely in the letter addressed by Gregory XI at the

beginning of 1378 to Prince Petru Mușatrsquos mother Margret [Mușata] of Siret

praised for her attachment to the Catholic confession Dilectae in Christo filiae

nobili mulieri Margaretae de Cereth dominae Valachiae Minoris540 Although it

currently employed the terms Moldavia and Terra Moldavie (with small variations

in spelling) the Chancery of the Hungarian Kingdom promptly adopted this name

as well The oldest documents we know evoked the conflict and the campaign

ldquoagainst Stephen voivode of Little Wallachia or of our country Moldaviardquo (contra

Stephanum Minoris Walachye seu terre nostre Molduane wayuodam) They date

from the first part of 1395 January 30541 February 3542 February 14543 February

18544 March 7545 and March 11546 A few years later in a letter of Pope Boniface

IX dated January 6 1399 which was meant to mitigate interconfessional conflicts

north-east of the Carpathians Valachia Minor was mentioned next to Podolia and

the regions of Tartaria547 Upon the request of the King and Queen of Poland Pope

John XIII residing in Pisa assigned the Bishop of Kamienek on August 7 1413

with the task of finding out whether the foundation of a bishopric in minori

Walachia in civitate Moldaviensi ie in Baia548 was appropriate A longer series

of documents in which Walachia Minor is mentioned was issued during the

pontificate of Martin V In two of them (both dated July 1 1420) there are

540 Acta Gregorii PP XI (1370ndash1378)hellip no 248 p 493 For the genetic profile of Margaret ndash

Mușata see L Bătracircna A Bătracircna Biserica bdquoSfacircntul Nicolaerdquo din Rădăuți Cercetări arheologice și

interpretări istorice asupra icircnceputurilor Țării Moldovei Piatra Neamț 2012 pp 196ndash197 201ndash202

206 359ndash361 541 Documenta Romaniae Historica D I no 81 p 130 Regest in Zsigmondkori okleveacuteltaacuter I

(1387ndash1399) ed by E Maacutelyuzs Budapest 1951 no 3801 p 415 542 Documenta Romaniae Historica D I no 82 pp 130ndash131 Regest in Zsigmondkori

okleveacuteltaacuter I no 3804 pp 415ndash416 543 Documenta Romaniae Historica D I no 85 pp 132ndash133 Regest in Zsigmondkori

okleveacuteltaacuter I no 3823 p 418 544 Documenta Romaniae Historica D I no 86 pp 135ndash136 Regest in Zsigmondkori

okleveacuteltaacuter I no 3833 p 419 545 Documenta Romaniae Historica D I no 90 p 144 Regest in Zsigmondkori okleveacuteltaacuter I

no 3862 p 421 546 Documenta Romaniae Historica D I no 92 pp 147ndash148 Regest in Zsigmondkori

okleveacuteltaacuter I no 3875 p 423 547 Bullarium Franciscanum VII ed by C Eubel Romae 1904 no 268 p 91 Acta Urbani

PP VI (1378ndash1389) Bonifacii PP IX (1389ndash1404) Innocentii PP VII (1404ndash1406) et Gregorii

PP XII (1406ndash1415) e registris Vaticanis et Lateranensibus aliisque fontibus collegit notisque

adornavit A L Tăutu (Pontificia Commissio ad Redigendum Codicem Iuris Canonici Orientalis

Fontes Series III XIII) Romae 1970 no 66 p 131 548 I C Filitti Din arhivele Vaticanului I Documente privitoare la episcopatele catolice din

Principate (reprinted from Revista catolică) Bucharest 1913 p 29

Victor Spinei 108

160

references concerning the wife of Alexander the Good Ringola [Ringala] ducissa

Minoris Valachiae Walachia549 Another few ones of June 20 June 27 (2) July 3

July 4 (3) and July 11 (2) 1421 were addressed to the representatives of the

Franciscan Order (7) or the Archbishop of Gniezno (2) containing

recommendations for handling confessional issues in partibus Rusiae Podoliae et

Walachiae (Valachiae) Minoris in partibus Rusiae Walachiae Minoris et

Podoliae in partibus Walachiae Minoris Rusiae Podoliae et Valachiae

Minoris550

The simultaneous use of qualification adjectives for the two Romanian extra-

Carpathian voivodeships was attested for the end of the fourteenth century shortly

after the Curia had released them In an era full of tensions due to the Western

Schism in which Rome and Avignon disputed their supremacy in the

Roman-Catholic Church Pope Urban VI was also concerned about the

confessional aspects in the Eastern states On April 1 1381 he ordered the Master

General of the Dominican Order to appoint inquisitors for eradicating heresies and

restoring the Pontifical authority in countries with ldquoschismaticrdquo majority among

these were the two Romanian voivodeships Great and Little Wallachia instituendi

auctoritate Apostolica tres personas idoneas amp discretas unam videlicet in

Armenia amp Georgia amp aliam in Gręcia amp Tartaria ac aliam in Ruscia amp

Valachia majori amp minori551 The two states were written identically in a

document issued in 1390 but this time by the Master General of the Dominicans

who focused on raising the numbers of conversions to Catholicism552 At the same

time in the short geography treatise Libellus de notitia orbis composed on the

verge between the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries by the Dominican Monk John

Archbishop of Sultanieh (Johannes Sultaniensis) in North-West Persia there was

the following distinction Volaquia dicitur maior et minor553 The high prelate who

was born in the Orient to an Italian family was aware of the political separation of

the Romanian territories but he was not able to localize them precisely

The Bavarian Johann (Hans) Schiltberger (c 1380 ndash c 1440) proved to be a

lot more rigorous in this regard After spending about three decades in the Oriental

549 Acta Martini PP V (1417ndash1431) e regestis Vaticanis aliisque fontibus collegit notisque

adornavit A L Tăutu (Pontificia Commissio Codici Iuris Canonici Orientalis Recognoscendo

Fontes Series III XIV 1) Romae 1980 no 153 p 347 no 153a p 349 550 Acta Martini PP V (1417ndash1431)hellip no 193a p 473 no 193e p 476 no 193f p 477

no 193h pp 478ndash479 no 193i p 481 no 193l p 483 no 193m p 484 no 193n p 485

no 193o p 488 Cf also Bullarium Franciscanum VII no 1492 p 560 no 1493 p 561 no 1487

pp 556ndash557 no 1488 p 557 551 Bullarium Ordinis ff Praeligdicatorum II Ab Anno 1281 ad 1430 ed by Th Ripoll Romae

1730 p 299 552 R Loenertz Les missioms dominicaines en Orient et la Socieacuteteacute de Fregraveres Peacutereacutegrinants

pour le Christ in Archivum Fratrum Praedicatorum IV 1934 p 44 553 A Kern Der bdquoLibellus de notitia orbisrdquo Johannesrsquo III (De Galonifontibus)

OP Erzbischofs von Sulthanyeh in Archivum Fratrum Praedicatorum VIII 1938 p 103


161

world as a prisoner he wrote down his captivating travel memoirs with itineraries

that passed through the Romanian regions too Regarding the territories north of

the Danube he noted Es ist auch zu mercken das das volgk in der Walachei in

der grossen und clainen Walachei crichischen glauben halten und haben ein

besundere sprach (ldquoIt is also worth mentioning that the people of Wallachia in

Great and Little Wallachia observes the Greek faith and speaks a particular

languagerdquo)554 The statement at the end of his work according to which Suceava

(Sedschopff) was the capital of ldquoLittle Wallachiardquo (Unnd cham dornach mer zu

ainer stat haist Sedschopff und ist hauptstadt in der clainen Walachei)555 clearly

proves that the author used this choronym for Moldavia

The detailed description of the Ecumenical Council of Konstanz during the

years 1414ndash1418 authored by Ulrich von Richental (c 13601365 ndash c 14371438)

was elaborated in the same era While paying attention to register all delegations

the author who originated from the very center that hosted the important

ecumenical conclave also recorded the arrival in January or February 1415 of the

representatives of Grand Duke Witold of Lithuania the despot dukes of Rascia

Danenmur () from Great and Little Wallachia the two Turkish kings and of the

duke of White Russia (Och zugend in bottschaft von hertzog Wytolten von Lutow

von herr Dyspotten hertzoge tzů Ratzen von dem Damenmuumlr uss der groszligen und

klainen Walachy von den tzwain kuumlngen uss Tuumlrggen von dem hertzogen uss

wiszligen Ruumlszligen) Many of them were pagans and a few were schismatics and

moslems they possessed 180 horses altogether556 Before them messengers from

the Emperor in Constantinople had arrived and after them the unnamed

Archbishop of Kiev introduced himself [none other than Gregory Tsamblak] who

represented his own interests as well as those of the Constantinople Patriarch and

the bishops of Greece557 In one of the manuscripts containing the work of Ulrich

554 Hans Schiltbergers Reisebuch nach der Nuumlrnberger Handschrift ed by V Langmantel

Tuumlbingen 1885 p 52 Certain special spelling particularities appear in the manuscript kept in

Heidelberg Es ist och zu mercken das das volk in der grossen und in der clainen Walachy

cristenlichen glauben (ldquoChristian faithrdquo) helt Und habent och ein besunder sprach Cf Reisen des

Johannes Schiltberger aus Muumlnchen in Europa Asia und Afrika von 1394 bis 1427 ed by

K F Neumann Munich 1859 p 92 Cf also Schiltbergerrsquos Reise in den Orient und wunderbare

Begebenheiten von ihm selbst geschrieben transl and ed by A I Penzel Munich 1814 p 82

The Bondage and Travels of Johann Schiltberger a Native of Bavaria in Europe Asia and Africa

1396ndash1427 transl by J Buchan Telfer London 1879 (reprint New York NY 1970) p 38 555 Hans Schiltbergers Reisebuchhellip p 111 Cf also Reisen des Johannes Schiltbergerhellip

p 160 556 Ulrichs von Richental Chronik des Constanzer Concils 1414 bis 1418 ed by M R Buck

Tuumlbingen 1882 p 47 Idem [Ulrich Richental] Chronik des Konstanzer Konzils 1414ndash1418 ed by

Th M Buck Ostfildern 2010 p 33 Cf also Idem [Ulrich von Richental] Das Konzil zu Konstanz

ed by O Feger Starnberg-Konstanz 1964 p 180 (the manuscript used in this work omitted

Damenmuumlrrsquos name and contained small differences in the spelling of common and proper nouns) 557 Ulrichs von Richental Chronikhellip 1882 p 47 Idem [Ulrich Richental] Chronikhellip 2010

p 33 Idem [Ulrich von Richental] Das Konzilhellip 1964 p 180

Victor Spinei 110

162

von Richental some of the most important cities in Great and Little Wallachia (the

latter one referred to as die minder Walachie) were written in a quite altered

manner so that sometimes they cannot be identified This enumeration leads to the

conclusion that the Moldavian cities were located in die groumlsszlige Walachie and the

Wallachian ones in die minder Walachie558 This latter name accompanied the

emblem of Wallachiarsquos representative to this Council Herr Dobermur herr in der

mindren Walachye This emblem was reproduced in some copies of the work of the

Konstanz author559

In the first decades of the fifteenth century there were used many other

official designations for the Romanian voivodeships which observed the

terminology rules elaborated by the Holy See Under the protection of Witold

Grand Duke of Lithuania diplomat Ghillebert de Lannoy from Burgundy had the

opportunity to cross Moldavia in 1421 which he called Wallackie la petite560 The

same name (die Cleine Wolachaye Walachie) was used by Witold in the

correspondence carried out in German with Paul von Rusdorf Grand Master of the

Teutonic Order on May 8 1427561 and August 22 1428 For avoiding eventual

confusions in the second letter he stated that Little Wallachia was also called

Moldavia (Moldaw gennant)562 A few days later on August 25 the Grand Duke

informed his allies about the Turks crossing the Danube into Wallachia which he

referred to by the name ldquoGreat Wallachiardquo (Dornoch czogen di Turcken obir di

Thune in Gros Walachie)563 While narrating the intrepid naval campaign on the

inferior course of the Danube initiated in 1445 by the Burgundian Knight

Walerand of Wavrin his uncle chronicler Jehan of Wavrin observed the

terminological use in this era by calling Wallachia not only Valaquie Vallaquye or

pays des Vallaques but once also la grand Vallaquie564

In chronicles and other categories of Byzantine writings the size-related

names of the North-Danube Wallachias were used relatively seldom because they

were reserved to the enclaves with neo-Latin population in the Balkan Peninsula

(Μεγάλη Βλαχία and Μικρά Βλαχία) older than the medieval states located left of

the Inferior Danube The name ldquoGreat Wallachiardquo (Μεγάλη Βλαχία) for Wallachia

558 Ulrichs von Richental Chronikhellip 1882 p 209 Idem [Ulrich Richental] Chronikhellip 2010

p 198 Cf also C I Karadja Delegații din țara noastră la conciliul din Constanța (icircn Baden) icircn anul

1415 in Academia Romacircnă Memoriile Secțiunii Istorice Series III VII 1927 pp 59v91+IX pl 559 Ulrich von Richental Das Konzilhellip 1964 p 273 560 Ghillebert de Lannoy Oeuvres ed by Ch Potvin Louvain 1878 p 58 561 Codex epistolaris Vitoldi magni ducis Lithuaniae 1376ndash1430 ed by A Prochaska


no MCCLXXXVI pp 770ndash771 562 Ibidem no MCCCXXX p 800 563 Ibidem no MCCCXXXI pp 801ndash802 564 Jehan de Wavrin Anciennes cronicques drsquoEngleterre ed by Mlle Dupont II Paris 1859

p 12


163

is attested by the chronicles of Georgios Sphrantzes565 and Makarios Melissenos566

as well as by some scattered notes in the fifteenth century567 The latter mentioned

events like the subjection of ldquoGreat Wallachiardquo and the killing of Mircea the

Elderrsquos sons by the Turks in 1420568 In 1434 in a speech delivered in Greek and

translated into Latin ldquoGreat Vlachiardquo was listed among the countries with

designations imposed by the Byzantine Church Its identification with Moldavia

can be excluded since the latter appears in the respective list Moldoblachia et ea

quaelig magna Ulachia appellatur569 At the same time for designating Moldavia the

terms Βλαχία Μαυροβλαχία Ρωσοβλαχία Μολδοβλαχία and Μπογδανία

(Bogdania) were usually employed570 Μεγάλη Βλαχία was mentioned as a place of

persecutions suffered by Armenians in 1479 in a letter of the Patriarch of

Constantinople Maximos III addressed in January 1480 to the Venetian Doge

Giovanni Mocenigo571 Unfortunately no other details were provided so that the

identification of Great Vlachia with Wallachia proper (Muntenia)572 must be taken

with a grain of salt given that we know that social unrest between natives and

Armenians arose ndash several decades later ndash not in Wallachia but in Moldavia where

the Armenian community was much larger573

In reworks of The Life of Saint Niphon transcribed in the eighteenth century

into Modern Greek and kept at Mount Athos we encounter the forms Μεγάλη

Βλαχία Μεγάλοβλαχία and Βλαχία which probably featured in the initial

565 Georgios Sphrantzes Memorii 1401ndash1477 ed by V Grecu Bucharest 1966 pp 18ndash19

128ndash129 566 Pseudo-Sphrantzes Macarie Melissenos Cronica 1258-1481 in Georgios Phrantzes

Memorii 1401ndash1477 pp 258ndash259 552ndash553 567 Acta minora Acte minore in Fontes Historiae Daco-Romanae IV Scriptores et acta

Imperii Byzantini saeculorum IVndashXV Izvoarele istoriei Romacircniei IV Scriitori și acte bizantine

secolele IVndashXV ed by H Mihăescu R Lăzărescu N-Ș Tanașoca T Teoteoi Bucharest 1982

pp 340ndash341 568 Acta minora Acte minore in Fontes Historiae Daco-Romanae IV pp 340ndash341 569 E Cecconi Studi storici sul Concilio di Firenzehellip no XXIX p LXXXVI 570 Fontes Historiae Daco-Romanae IV passim 571 Acta et diplomata Graeca Medii Aevi sacra et profana V ed by F Miklosich and

I Muumlller Vindobonae 1887 no XIII p 284 572 P Ș Năsturel Lrsquoattitude du Patriarcat œcumeacutenique envers les Armeacuteniens des Pays

Roumains (fin XIVendashdeacutebut du XVIe siegravecle) in LrsquoArmeacutenie et Byzance Histoire et culture Paris 1996

pp 149ndash150 A Simon The relations between the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople and

Venice in a Venetian document of 1480 in Romacircnii icircn Europa medievală (icircntre Orientul bizantin și

Occidentul latin) Studii icircn onoarea Profesorului Victor Spinei ed by D Țeicu I Cacircndea Brăila

2008 pp 590ndash591 573 Macarie Cronica in Cronicile slavo-romacircnehellip pp 90 105 Славяно-молдавская

летопись Макария 1504ndash1551 гг in Славяно-молдавские летописи XV-XVI вв состав

Ф А Грекул отв ред В И Буганов ed by F A Grecul chief editor V I Buganov Moscow

1976 p 93 Minas Tokatți Cacircnt de jălire asupra armenilor din Țara vlahilor

ed and transl by Gr M Buicliu Bucharest 1895

Victor Spinei 112

164

prototype of the work574 Of wide notoriety was the hagiography of Patriarch

Niphon written by Gabriel the Protos (Gavriil Protul) a high-ranking hierarch at

Mount Athos in the first quarter of the sixteenth century The prototype of the

work is still a topic of contention among scholars in the sense that there is no

consensus on the timeline of the Greek and Slavonic versions The Romanian

translation was made after the latter and survives in several manuscripts575

Μεγάλη Βλαχία is also found in several writings from the Phanariote era

In the second part of the fifteenth century there were composed several

diplomatic and cartographic works that also used the term ldquoGreat Wallachiardquo

for Wallachia and ldquoLittle Wallachiardquo for Moldavia Among these is a text

written around 1480 by the Serbian scholar Martin Segon ( ndash c 1485) of

Dalmatia who listed Valachia maior and minor among the countries

presumably taking part in an expedition against the Turks The latter was

identified with Moldavia576 and the former with Dacia577 Likewise in a

request for Genoese retaliations against Moldavia from May 1455 Petru Aron

was referred to as domino Valachie Inferioris578 and in two similar documents

from 1468 Stephen the Great was designated as dominus Valachie minoris on

January 12579 and as seignor de [la] Velachia-Bassa on January 18580 During

the rule of Stephen the Great the Princely Chancery of Moldavia showed

openness to the seemingly agreed terminology of the era and referred several

times to the Romanian principality south of the Milcov with the translated

version of the name ldquoGreat Wallachiardquo Thus in the treaty agreed with the

Hungarian King on July 12 1475 Wallachia was called Maior Wallachia581

while in a letter sent to the city of Brașov dated January 5 1477 the employed

name was Magna Walahya582 The slightly different variants of the choronym

could indicate that the chancery did not have an established term to be used in

574 A Elian Moldova și Bizanțulhellip 2003 p 44 note 105 575 D Russo Viața Sf Nifon de Gavriil Protul Sfetagorei in Idem Studii istorice

Greco-romacircne Opere postume ed by C C Giurescu A Camariano and N Camariano I Bucharest

1939 pp 21ndash34 D Zamfirescu Gavriil Protul icircn Literatura romacircnă veche (1402ndash1647) I ed by

G Mihăilă and D Zamfirescu București 1971 p 60ndash65 D H M(azilu) Viața patriarhului Nifon

in Enciclopedia literaturii romacircne vechi coord by E Simion Bucharest 2018 pp 958ndash959 576 A Pertusi Martino Segono di Novo Brdo vescovo di Dulcigno Un umanista

serbo-dalmata del tardo Quattrocento Vita e opere Rome 1981 p 99 A Pippidi Documente

privind locul romacircnilorhellip p 39 577 A Pertusi Martino Segonohellip p 98 578 Cerere de represalii a lui Ambroziu Senarega in N Iorga Acte și fragmente cu privire la

istoria romacircnilor III Bucharest 1897 p 34 579 Șt Andreescu Un nou act genovez cu privire la Ștefan cel Mare in Studii și materiale de

istorie medie XXII 2004 pp 133ndash136 580 Cerere de represalii a lui Gheorghe de Reza in N Iorga Acte și fragmentehellip III p 42 581 I Bogdan (ed) Documentele lui Ștefan cel Mare II Bucharest 1913 no CXLVI p 332 582 Ibidem no CLII p 341


165

Latin In the message sent by Stephen the Great to the Venetian Senate on May

8 1478 preserved in Italian the neighboring principality was called Valachia

Mazor583 If in vernacular Romanians had their own rules for writing local

and foreign choronyms for external diplomatic correspondence they had to

abide by the rules sanctioned by the chanceries with greater international

reputation

On the renowned world map produced around 1450 by the Venetian

cartographer monk Fra Mauro (c 1400ndash1464) the inscription vlachia pizolla

was placed north of the Danube Mouths and it was flanked by licostoma and

mocastro which shows that it was identified with Moldavia Placed more

westwards vlachia gr[a(n)]da corresponded to the territory of Wallachia

Muntenia584 The same position was held by the inscription Magna Valahia on

the so-called Borgia Map which was supposedly produced in Southern

Germany in the early fifteenth century Besides the label for Magna Valahia

there was a short explanatory text clarifying the countryrsquos desolation due to the

attacks of the pagans Haec provincia plana est et deserta propter convivia

paganorum contra christianos About the ldquoTransylvania of the Christiansrdquo it

was specified that it lay ldquobetween the forests of the pagansrdquo (VII Castra

christianorum inter siluas paganorum)585 which is contrary to reality as the

Turks had not yet conquered the Carpathian belt

In the case of one of the maps drawn by the German encyclopedist

Nikolaus von Kues Cusa (Nicolaus Cusanus) (1401ndash1464) in 1491 at

Eichstaumldt in Brandenburg also compiled by Nicolaus Germanus we notice a

certain ambiguity Valachia Magna was placed in Southern Bessarabia while

Magna Valachia lay in Eastern Muntenia neighboring to the West on Septem

Castra [Transylvania]586 The map of Nicolaus Cusanus enjoyed a widespread

popularity after his death and it was reproduced as such or adjusted throughout

the sixteenth century by mapmakers from both sides of the Alps including

583 Ibidem no CLIV p 346 584 Fra Mauro Il Mappamondo ed by T Gasparrini Leporace Venice 1954 p 48 and

pl XXVIII P Falchetta Fra Maurorsquos World Map with a Commentary and Translations of the

Inscriptions Turnhout 2006 pp 519 521 Cf also P Zurla Il Mappamondo di Fra Mauro

Comaldolese Venice 1806 p 24 M Popescu-Spineni Romacircnia icircn istoria cartografiei pacircnă la

1600 I Bucharest 1938 p 80 585 I Dumitriu-Snagov Marea Valahie și Transilvania icircn Mapamondul Borgian de la

icircnceputul secolului al XV-lea in Revista arhivelor LXII vol XLVII 1985 3 p 261 M Siponta de

Salvia Geschichte der Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana in Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana ed by

A M Stickler and L E Boyle Stuttgart-Zurich 1986 pl LXXXVI 586 I Kupčik Alte Landkarten Von der Antike bis zum Ende des 19 Jahrhunderts transl by

A Urbanovaacute Hanau M [post 1980] no 24 pp 84ndash85 J Babicz Nordeuropa in den Atlanten des

Ptolemaeus in Das Danewerk in der Kartographigeschichte Nordeuropas ed by D Unverhau and

K Schietzel Neumuumlnster 1993 fig 1 p 109 Lithuania on the Map 2nd ed A Bieliūnienė

B Kulnytė R Subatniekienė Vilnius 2011 pp 26ndash27

Victor Spinei 114

166

Marco Beneventano587 Martin Waldseemuumlller (together with Jakob Eszler and

Georg Ubelin)588 Georg Ubelin589 Fernando Bertelli (via Marco

Beneventano)590 Bernard Wapowski (again via Beneventano)591 and by an

anonymous master592 On all these maps the inscription Vallachia Walachia

was placed north of the Danube Mouths approximately in the area of the

Budjak Steppe while Valachia Magna was placed in Eastern Muntenia In later

periods some cartographers adopted this positioning of the two Wallachias

while others opted for placing Great Wallachia east of the Eastern Carpathians

and Little Wallachia south of the Southern Carpathians (Transylvanian Alps)

as a number of chroniclers and issuers had done

Given that the main mapmaking centers were located far from the

Carpathian-Danubian area this territory was habitually represented with

multiple flaws and errors with respect to the landforms river networks country

borders but also in regards to the terminology even more so as these centers

did not always observe the officially-sanctioned one The cartographers availed

themselves of incomplete and inaccurate information so it is not surprising that

the locations of the Wallachias are ambiguous even in the case of reputed

authors Thus on the map of Henricus Martellus (the Latinized version of

Heinrich Hammer) made around 1490 Valachia was placed in Southern

Moldavia where mon(c)astro [Cetatea Albă] and turlo flu[vius] [Dniester] were

also found593 A century later on a map of Poland and Hungary by Sebastian

Muumlnster published posthumously in 1590 Valachia Magna was placed in the

interfluve of the Siret and the Bacircrlad rivers Mvldavia in the northern part of the

land between the Carpathians and the Dniester and Transalpina in Wallachia

Muntenia594 The placement of Walachia in the Eastern Carpathian area above

Moldavia was adopted by the cartographer and editor Johannes Jansson van

Waesberger in a map printed in Amsterdam in 1680595 The authors of the maps

depicting the Kingdom of Poland and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania ndash

Guillaume le Vasseur de Beauplan596 (c 1600ndash1673) and Huych (Hugo)

587 Lithuania on the Map pp 34ndash35 588 Ibidem pp 36ndash37 589 Ibidem pp 38ndash39 590 Ibidem pp 52ndash53 591 D Talandowa Die Anfaumlnge der polnischen Kartographie im 15 und 16 Jahrhundert

(bis 1572) in Schallaburg rsquo86 Polen im Zeitalter der Jagiellonen 1386ndash1572 Vienna 1987

no 607 pp 546ndash547 592 A E Nordenskioumlld Facsimile-Atlas to the Early History of Cartography Stockholm 1889

map 13 p 25 593 Aacute Papp-Vaacutery P Hrenkoacute Magyarorszaacuteg reacutegi teacuterkeacutepeken Budapest 1989 pp 50ndash51 594 Descriptio Bessarabiaehellip no 13 pp 86ndash87 595 P Bellini Carte geografiche della Polonia (sec XVIndashXIX) Trento 1995 no 21

pp 80ndash81 596 Imago Poloniaehellip I no K 81 p 34 Lithuania on the Map pp 136ndash137


167

Allard597 (1625ndash1692) respectively ndash called both principalities by the

choronym Walachia adding the following for the one located east of the

Carpathians Walachia olim nunc Moldavia This note endorses the opinion

according to which the former name Wallachia was replaced by Moldavia

This claim is justified on account of the fact that before adopting the official

name Moldavia with the founding of the autonomous polity the land bordered

by the Eastern Carpathians and the Dniester was known to foreigners as

Wallachia

Some circulation was also enjoyed by the texts containing incoherences

errors and inconsistencies in reproducing the toponymy of the

Carpathian-Balkan area on which the European scholarly world was focusing

less An example in this sense is among many others the prolific German

chronicler Jakob Unrest (c 1430ndash1500) for whom the terms die Grosse

Wallachey die Gross-Walachey were assigned sometimes to Wallachia and

sometimes to Moldavia 598 On the other hand he considered Little Moldavia

similar to Wallachia which he regarded as obedient to the Hungarian Crown die

Klain Moldaw das ist die Walachey und mer herrschaft der Vngerischen kron

unndertenig gemacht599 Besides these views disseminated in the Oumlsterreichische

Chronik Jakob Unrest also referred to Wallachia and Little Wallachia in a work

dedicated to the history of the Hungarians which survived partially In the

opening part presenting the conquests of Attila (Athyla Etzel) the author

claimed that his first military deed targeted Transylvania Then followed

Pannonia ie Hungary and afterwards other lands such as Burzenland [hellip]

ldquoLittle Wallachia called Moldardquo [Moldavia] etc Der erst anfangk was zu

Sybenbuumlrgn da von wart genott Pannonia das ist Vngerland darnach die

andern landt Wurtzenlannd [hellip] die klayin Balachey gennantt die Moldahellip600

As can be easily seen the paragraph is rich in terms that are anachronistic for the

age of the Hunnic migration

In the work of Venetian Paolo Ramusio (1532ndash1600)601 on the conquest of

Constantinople by the Latins there are several mentions of the Valacchi and

597 Imago Poloniaehellip I no K 88 p 33 no 101 p 35 598 Jakob Unrest Oumlsterreichische Chronik ed by K Grossmann in Monumenta Germaniae

Historica Scriptores rerum Germanicarum Nova series XI Wimariae [Weimar] 1957 pp 44 46 599 Ibidem p 186 600 Jakob Unrests Bruchstuumlck einer deutschen Chronik von Ungarn ed by Krones R v M

in Mittheilungen des Instituts fuumlr Oesterreichische Geschichtsforschung I Innsbruck 1880 p 356 601 About Paulo Ramusiorsquos life and work cf Ș Marin A humanist vision regarding the Fourth

Crusade and the state of the Assenides The chronicle of Paul Ramusio (Paulus Rhamnusius) in

Annuario (Istituto Romeno di Cultura e Ricerca Umanistica) Venice 2 2000 pp 63ndash68

V Tăpkova-Zaimova Bulgarian by Birth The Comitopuls Emperor Samuel and their Successors

according to Historical Sources and the Historiographic Tradition transl by P Murdzhev Leiden-

Boston 2017 pp 215ndash216

Victor Spinei 116

168

Valacchia related to both the realities of the Balkans and the lands north of the

Danube602 Johannitsa (Giouannissa) called Kaloian is presented as Regrave di

Valacchia amp di Bulgaria A single mention is made of Valacchia minore without

any details regarding its location 603 In this case it probably referred to Moldavia

since the term Valacchia was employed two times to designate Muntenia Lacking

notable information on the issue at hand Paulo Ramusiorsquos work raised very little

historiographic interest a much wider reception was enjoyed by the ample work on

travel and illustrious navigators authored by his father Giambattista (Giovanni

Battista) Ramusio (1485ndash1557)604

In the choronym Ulachia mazor which was mentioned in a report sent from

Constantinople by the Venetian Bail Pietro Bembo on April 15 1484 there is a

lack of consistency with the sense provided by the Curia for the extra-Carpathian

area This report informed the leadership of the Serenissima about the preparations

of the Ottoman naval and terrestrial forces for marching ldquoagainst the state of

Stephan Carabogdan the Wallachian Romanianrdquo (contra el stado de Stefano

Carabogdan ulacho) The fleet was supposed to enter the Black Sea up to

Licostomo a marine settlement located ten miles from Moncastro and then to

reach the Danube The terrestrial troops were expected to cross Greece and then

ldquothe country of Great Wallachiardquo as far as the walls of Moncastro The departure of

both armies was planned for [the month of] May (lrsquoarmada intrando in mar mazor

fino a Licostomo luogo maritimo luntano da moncastro mia X intrando per la

fiumera Questo Signor con lo exercito terestre per la grecia per el paese de la

Ulachia mazor fino alle mure de Moncastro La partida de lrsquouno e de lrsquoaltro

exercito sera all intrada de mazo)605 A similar geopolitical view is revealed by an

anonymous description of sixteenth century Europe kept in a library in Parma La

Vallachia [hellip] Si divide in Maggiore e Minore La Minore srsquoapela Transalpina la

Maggiore Moldavia della quale egrave parte la Bessarabia che egrave sopra il Mare ovrsquo egrave

Moncastro606

A close sense to that of the choronym is found in the demonym ldquoGreat

Wallachiansrdquo used in several Russian annals beginning with the end of the

fifteenth century They narrate the dramatic escape of Vasily the son of Dmitri

Donskoi Grand Prince of Moscow from the detention of the Golden Horde and his

602 Paolo Rannvsio [Ramusio] Venetiano Della gverra di Costantinopoli per la restitvtione de

glrsquoimperatori Comneni fatta darsquosig Venetiani et Francesi lrsquoanno MCCIV libri sei Venice 1604

pp 121 139 142 166 173 188 etc

603 Ibidem p 121 604 R P Niceron Meacutemoires pour servir agrave lrsquohistoire des hommes illustres dans la reacutepublique

des lettres avec un catalogue raisonne de leurs ouvrages XXXV Paris 1736 pp 97ndash98 605 O Cristea Campania din 1484 icircn lumina unor noi izvoare venețiene in Ștefan cel Mare și

Sfacircnt atlet al credinței creștine Putna ndash Suceava 2004 p 224 Idem Acest domn de la miazănoapte

Tacircrgoviște 2018 p 273 606 DellrsquoEuropa e sue provincia in N Iorga Acte și fragmentehellip III p 72


169

refuge in the Podolian Country at the ldquoGreat Wallachiansrdquo at Peter [Petru Mușat]

Voivode in 1386 Того же году [6894] князь Василеи великого князя сынъ

Дмитреевъ прибѣже изъ Орды в Подольскую землю в Великые Волохы к

Петру воеводѣ607 The above-mentioned text evokes relevant sequences in the

history of the east Carpathian state and the political ensemble in Eastern Europe

which have not been clarified in an entirely satisfactory manner so far However

this text leads to the clear conclusion that the term ldquoGreat Wallachiansrdquo referred to

the Moldavian Romanians

During the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries the identification of ldquoGreat

Wallachiardquo with Wallachia continued to have numerous supporters (among them were

Felix Petančić608 Nicolaus Olahus609 Georg Reicherstorffer610 Stefano Guazzo611 and

other scholars) Nevertheless an increasingly substantial contribution was brought by

chroniclers and geographers Among them were Italian scholars with good reputation

like Jacopo de Promontorio612 Fabio Mignanelli613 Giovanni Botero614 Giuseppe

Rosaccio615 and Giovanni Antonio Magini616 who accepted the synonymy between

Wallachia and ldquoLittle Wallachiardquo (minor minore piccola) as well as that between

Moldavia and ldquoGreat Wallachiardquo (maior maiore maggiore grande) A similar

opinion was also adopted in the cartography of the seventeenth and eighteenth

centuries617 A clear statement in this regard was made by Stephanus Brodericus

607 Летопись по Уваровскому списку in Полное собраниеhellip XXV Московский

летописный свод конца XV века Moscow-Leningrad 1949 p 213 For the content of other annals

that discuss the mentioned episode and its interpretation see V Spinei Moldavia in the 11thndash14th

Centuries transl by L Teodoreanu and I Sturza Bucharest 1986 pp 219ndash220 608 Felicis Petancii Dissertatio de itineribus aggrediendi Turcam ad Vladislaum Hungariae et

Bohemiae regem in Scriptores rerum Hungaricarum veteres ac genuine I ed by I G Schwandtner

Vindobonae 1746 pp 870ndash871 609 Nicolaus Olahus Ungaria ndash Atila ed by A Gyoumlngyveacuter Iași 1999 p 84ndash85 Cf also

Nicolaus Olahus Hungaria ndash Athila ed by C Eperjessy and L Juhaacutesz Budapest 1938 p 21 610 [Georg Reicherstorffer] O descriere a Moldovei din secolul al 16[-lea] Moldavia [ed by]

I Bogdan in Arhiva Societății Științifice și Literare din Iași IX 1898 1ndash2 p 119 Idem [Descriere

anonimă a Moldovei] in Călători străinihellip I p 193 611 Stefano Gvazzo Dialoghi piaceuoli Venetia 1604 p 48 Cf also A Vranceanu

Pagliardini I motivi di una scelta Stefano Guazzo e il laquoPrencipe della Valacchia Maggioreraquo come

modello morale per la corte in Philologica Jassyensia XIII 2017 1 (25) pp 261ndash273 612 F Babinger Die Aufzeichnungen des Genuesen Jacopo de Promontorio ndash de Campis uumlber

den Osmanenstaat um 1475 Munich 1957 pp 50ndash51 613 Fabius Mignanelli nuntius cardinali Alexandro Farnese Significatio occupationis

Moldaviaehellip no 249 p 295 614 Giovanni Botero Benese Relationihellip p 48 615 Gioseppe Rosaccio Il Mondo e sve parti cioe Evropa Affrica Asia et America Florence

1595 p 131 616 Antonio Magino Patavino Geographiae vniversaehellip p 270v Gio[vanni] Ant[onio]

Magini Paovano Geografiahellip p 197ndash197v 617 J Wolf W Zimmermann (ed) Flieszligende Raumlume Karten des Donauraums 1650ndash1800

Regensburg 2017 pp 354ndash355 357ndash359 365ndash368

Victor Spinei 118

170

Istvaacuten Brodarics Stjepan Brodarić (1480ndash1539) a scholar and high prelate of Croate

origin who had studied in Padua in his young years hellipMaiori Walachiae quam

Moldaviam Stephanus Minori quam Transalpinam vocant Radul wayvodae

imperabant uterque regi Hungariae subiectus618 Based on the authority of foreign

geographers and historians Dimitrie Cantemir did not hesitate to designate ldquoGreat

Wallachiardquo as Moldavia and ldquoLittle Wallachiardquo as Wallachia in the works written by

the end of his life 619

The terminology broadcasted by the Curia enjoyed very limited reception in

the medieval Romanian area and it arrived there only through books that circulated

in the scholarly environments of the modern era In fact the circles around the

Papal Curia did not insist on keeping it as they adopted other choronyms along

time which were generally spread on the continent As they were unofficial names

found only in books the terms Great Wallachia and Little Wallachia did not have a

precise meaning on synchronic and diachronic levels which explains the errors and

missing concordance of their meanings in the various writings The absence of a

stable norm regulating their use results from the fact that these names had not been

consistently included into the official diplomatic language of the Romanian

voivode chanceries nor in those of the neighboring states which preferred a


Towards the end of the Middle Ages and at the beginning of the modern era

a limited circulation was also enjoyed by other regional terminological varieties of

Wallachia Among them are the names Valachia Superior ldquoUpper Wallachiardquo and

Valachia Inferior ldquoLower Wallachiardquo As with the terms Great Wallachia and

Little Wallachia we present a selection of their most relevant written attestations

One of the oldest mentions of ldquoLower Wallachiardquo appears in a chronicle from

Luumlbeck in which a foray into the political scene of Southeastern Europe in 1481

listed Misia as the same with Valachia Inferior620 Several decades later another

attestation of ldquoLower Wallachiardquo is found in a letter of 1520 sent from Buda to

Venice by Francesco Massaro and included in the Diaries of Marino Sanuto the

Young (1466ndash1536) When speaking about the frontiers of ldquoMysia Inferiorrdquo he

618 Stephanus Brodericus De conflictu Hungarorumhellip p 24 Cf also [I] Brodarics Histoacuteriaacuteja

a mohaacutecsi veacuteszről ed and transl by I Szentpeacutetery Budapest reprint 1978 pp 10ndash11 619 Dimitrie Cantemir Hronicul vechimei a romano-moldo-vlahilor ed by S Toma I

Bucharest 1999 pp 270 274 II 2000 p 90 620 Die von der Ratschronik unabhaumlngige Schluszligpartie des Chronicon Sclavicum in Die

Chroniken der deutschen Staumldte vom 14 bis ins 16 Jahrhundert 31 Chroniken der

niedersaumlchsischen Staumldte Luumlbeck V 1 ed by Fr Bruns Leipzig 1911 p 291 For the identity

between Mysia (Mytzyyn) and Moldavia (Walchyen) towards the end of the fifteenth century

cf Die Ratschronik von 1438ndash1482 (Dritte Fortsetzung der Detmar-Chronik zweiter Teil) II

1466ndash1482 in ibidem p 238


171

mentioned that it was called Valachia bassa hellipapud fines Mysiaelig inferioris quam

nunc Valachia bassa nominatur621

Like in other situations when Renaissance scholars used ancient choronyms

their localizations often proved to be equivocal as in this case so that there is no

certainty on whether by Valachia bassa Massaro meant Moldavia or Wallachia

We think it is also possible that the memories of the former Serbian janissary

Konstantin Mihailović kept in Polish translation to contain the confusion between

Lower Moldavia and Lower Wallachia as well At the beginning of a chapter

dedicated to Vlad Dracul (1437ndash1442 1444ndash1447) which also belongs to the text

of this enigmatic author and that was written on the verge between the fifteenth and

sixteenth centuries it was claimed that the Wallachian Romanian Voivode ruled

over ldquoLower Moldaviardquo (O walaskem weywodie drakulowi kteryz drzal Dolnij

Muldawu)622 which is of course an erroneous statement In this case the

confusion between Lower Moldavia and Lower Wallachia seems plausible

This latter choronym was used for designating Wallachia in a work assigned

to Giovan[ni] Maria Angiolello (1451ndashc 1525) In the passage evoking the bloody

confrontation between the armies of Mehmed II and Uzun Hasan sovereign of the

state called Akkoyunlu (ldquoThose with the White Sheeprdquo) in 1473 it was stated that

Mustafa the second son of this Ottoman Sultan had 30000 combatants of which

12000 were Wallachians Romanians from Lower Wallachia and their

commander was called Bataraba (recte Basarab) they formed the left wing of the

Turkish Army Il terzo fu Mustafagrave secondo figliuolo ilqual medesimamente hauca

trenta mila persone tra lequali erano dodici mila Valachi della Valacchia bassa

amp drsquoessi era capitano vno crsquohaueua nome Bataraba amp questo colonnello hauca

da alloggiare alla sinistra del Turco623 Due to the fact that usually the leaders of

the vassal states were obligated to participate in the military campaigns led by the

sultans Radu cel Frumos (the Handsome) prince of Wallachia was forced to join

him Never before had a Romanian army fought in a war that took place so far

away from its country624 The ruler of Wallachia did not appear in the Italian text

with his own name but with that of his dynasty

A similar meaning for the name Wallachia was adopted by Francesco della Valle

from Padua and the French diplomat Delacroix (Lacroix sieur de La Croix) Both of

them had the opportunity to spend more time in the Romanian intra- and extra-

621 Marino Sanuto I diarii 28 Venice 1890 p 539 622 Leben und Taten der tuumlrkischen Kaiser Die anonyme vulgaumlrgriechische Chronik Codex

Barberinus 111 (Anonymus Zoras) transl and ed by R F Kreutel (Osmanische Geschichtsschreiber

6) Graz-Vienna-Cologne 1971 p 146 Konstantin Mihailović Memoirs of a Janissary transl by

B Stolz ed by S Soucek Ann Arbor 1975 pp 128ndash129 623 Giouan Maria Angiolello Breve narratione della vita et fatti del Signor Vssvncassano in

Gio[anni] Battista Ramvsio (raccolta gia da) Navigationi et viaggi II Venice 1583 p 67 (the first

edition was printed in 1559) 624 A Decei Istoria Imperiului otoman pacircnă la 1656 ed by M D Popa Bucharest 1978

pp 127ndash129

Victor Spinei 120

172

Carpathian regions the former by the middle of the sixteenth century and the latter in

the last decades of the following century For Francesco della Valle Moldauia was

synonymous with Vallachia superiore where Petru Rareș ruled and Wallachia

Muntenia with Vallachia inferiore625 According to the memoirs of Delacroix which

are rich in details and meticulous remarks referring to the customs and the political-

administrative system in the extra-Carpathian voivodeships Wallachia was divided

into an ldquoupperrdquo and a ldquolowerrdquo part corresponding to Moldavia and Wallachia

respectively Les Paiumls que lrsquoon appelle presentement Moldavie amp Valachie ne

composoient anciennement qursquoune seule Provinces des Daces nommeacutee Valachie

laquelle estoit diviseacutee en haute amp basse agrave cause drsquoune riviere qui les separoit mais la

haute par succession de temps srsquoest appelleacutee Moldavie amp la basse a retenu son

ancient nom de Valachie aujourdrsquohuy ce sont deux Pricipautes differentes lesquelles

ont chacune sept cens milles ou environ de circuit amp trois mille villages (ldquoThe Lands

currently called Moldavia and Wallachia composed in the past one single province of

the Dacians called Wallachia which was divided into the upper and the lower one by a

river that separated them however as time went by the upper one was called

Moldavia and the lower one kept its old name Wallachia and today they are two

different principalities each with a perimeter of about seven hundred thousand

[kilometers] and three thousand villagesrdquo)626

The opinions of the two diplomats are not consonant with those of the Polish

scholar Marcin Broniewski (Martin Bronovius) (d 1592) author of a thoroughly

documented Description of Tartary published in Latin in 1579 One of its

subchapters entitled Moldoviae seu Valachiae inferioris pars quae olim

Bessarabia dicta fuit627 confirms the identity between Lower Wallachia and

Moldavia beyond any doubt The claim that Lower Wallachia and Moldavia were

ldquoformerlyrdquo (olim) called Bessarabia is inaccurate since this territory represented

only its southern section and not the entire Moldavian voivodeship

Conversely Valacchia inferiore mentioned by Paolo Ramusio is harder to

pinpoint Mentioning the siege of Adrianople in April 1207 by the armies of

Johannitsa (also called Kaloyan) the Venetian author stated that the main allies of

625 Francesco della Valle da Padoa Una breve narracione della grandezza virtu valore et

della infelice morte dellrsquoIllmo Sigr Conte Alouise Gritti ed by I Nagy in Magyar Toumlrteacutenelmi Taacuter

Pest III 1857 p 23 626 Meacutemoires du Sieur de la Croix cy-devant secreacutetaire de lrsquoAmbassade de Constantinople

contenants diverses relations tregraves-curieuses de lrsquoEmpire Othoman II Paris 1684 pp 173ndash174 The

quoted passage is also contained in a manuscript kept in Berlin Cf N Iorga Acte și fragmente cu

privire la istoria romacircnilor II Bucharest 1896 p 735 Secretarul de la Croix in Călători străinihellip

VII p 254 627 Martini Bronovii Descriptio Tartariae in Scriptores rerum Hungaricarum veteres ac

genuine I ed I G Schwandtner Vindobonae 1746 p 815 Martini Broniovii de Biezdzfedea bis

in Tartariam nomine Stephani primi Poloniae regis legati Tartariae descriptio in Auftrag des Koumlnigs

Ein Gesandtenbericht aus dem Land der Krimtataren die Tartariae descriptio des Martinus

Broniovius (1579) ed by S Albrecht M Herdick Mainz 2011 pp 56ndash57


173

the sovereign of the Vlachs and Bulgarians ndash the Cumans ndash retreated to the

northern Pontic area Et questi [Cumans] abbandonato lrsquoessercito amp passata la

Valachia inferiori amp le bocche del Boristene per li paesi di Taurosciti amp della

Russia se ne tornarono alle case loro628 (ldquoAnd they left the camp and by crossing

Lower Wallachia and the Mouths of the Borysthenes [Dnieper] through the

country of the Tauroscythians and of Russia they returned to their homesrdquo) One of

the sources extensively used by Paolo Ramusio for elaborating the volume on the

conquest of Constantinople by the participants in the Fourth Crusade ndash the

chronicle of Geoffroy de Villehardouin ndash mentioned the departure of the Cumans

but without specifying the route they took to reach their abodes629Given that at the

main crossing point over the Lower Danube between the eastern extremity of the

Balkan Peninsula and the northern part of the Pontic Steppe lies the Isaccea

Oblucița area in Northern Dobruja thus avoiding Muntenia we can assume that

the Cuman tribes headed towards their domains through Southern Bessarabia

Accordingly in this case Valacchia inferiore must be placed in Moldavia and not

in Muntenia A similar placement of Lower Wallachia is also inferred from a report

sent from Pera to the Venetian authorities on May 21 1551 in which its

equivalence with the so-called ldquoGreat Bogdaniardquo was claimed Vallachia bassa che

si chiama anche Bogdania maggiore630 As he was less familiar with the terms

pertaining to the region the author of the report equated ldquoLower Wallachiardquo with

the fictitious ldquoGreat Bogdaniardquo a baseless substitution of the name ldquoGreat

Wallachiardquo

In two of Paolo Ramusiorsquos works ndash one written in Italian the other in

Latin ndash there is other data concerning the Romanian regions on the left bank of

the Danube Among other details the author wrote that beyond the Hemo

(Hemus) mountains and Thrace lay Misia Mysia inferior neighboring

Valachia and Moldavia which stretched towards the Black Sea (mar Negro

Euxinus Pontus) and the Ciabi Ciabris River called Sucova (=Suceava) as

well631 Also beyond the Hemo there was Transalpina quasi di lagrave dallrsquoAlpi

quasi trans alpes The author paid tribute to the Western leitmotif concerning

the origin of the Romanian Landsrsquo names claiming that the name Valacchia

evolved from Flaccia which itself derived from the name of the Roman

citizen Flacco At the same time the author was aware that Moldavia

628 Paolo Rannvsio [Ramusio] Venetiano Della gverra di Costantinopolihellip p 188 629 Villehardouin La conquecircte de Constantinople ed and transl by E Faral II 2nd ed Paris

1961 p 289 Josfroi de Vileharduyn La conqueste de Costentinoble drsquoapregraves le manuscript no 2137

de la BN ed by O Derniame M Henin S Monsonego H Nais R Tomassone Nancy 1978

p 109 630 O Cristea Puterea cuvintelor Știri și război icircn sec XVndashXVI Tacircrgoviște 2014 pp 299

311 631 Paolo Rannvsio [Ramusio] Venetiano Della gverra di Costantinopolihellip p 194 Ș Marin

A humanist visionhellip pp 92ndash93

Victor Spinei 122

174

was called Bogdania or Karabogdania minore by the Turks it was a region

that was very rich in pastures grazed by various herds and numerous war

horses632

In a partially synchronous period with that in which the quoted western

texts mentioned the territorial entities ldquoUpper Wallachiardquo Valachia Superior

and ldquoLower Wallachiardquo Valachia Inferior many Moldavian narrative and

diplomatic sources mention the terminology employed for the Romanian

voivodeship between the Carpathians and the Dniester assigned with the

toponyms ldquoUpper Countryrdquo (Țara de Sus) and ldquoLower Countryrdquo (Țara de Gios

[Jos]) which stood for administrative units each led by a Great Headman

(mare vornic) They separated but only for a few years when the sons of

Alexander the Good shared the voivodeship among them Stephen took the

throne in the Lower Country together with Cetatea Albă and Chilia and Iliaș

became ruler of the Upper Country including Suceava and Hotin633 While

evoking

the power takeover in Moldavia by Stephen the Great in April 1457 the

Moldavian-German Annals (Letopisețul moldo-german) stated that he came

accompanied by a group of ldquoWallachians and people from the Lower

Countriesrdquo (mit den Montanen und mit den nyderen lendern)634 In this case the

plural was not rendered adequately As resulting from the text Stephen had

also benefited from the support of soldiers recruited from the southern part

of Moldavia635 The two entities namely the Upper Country and the

Lower Country were mentioned in the Moldavian-Polish Chronicle

(Cronica moldo-polonă)636 as well as in all main local chronicles elabo-

rated by Grigore Ureche637 Miron Costin638 Misail Călugărul639 Nicolae

632 Paolo Rannvsio [Ramusio] Venetiano Della gverra di Costantinopolihellip pp 171ndash172

Ș Marin A humanist visionhellip pp 94ndash95 633 Grigore Ureche Letopisețul Țăricirci Moldovei ed by P P Panaitescu Bucharest 1955 p 76 634 I C Chițimia Cronica lui Ștefan cel Mare Versiunea germană a lui Schedel Bucharest

1942 pp 36 59 Молдавско-немецкая летопись 1457ndash1499 гг in Славяно-молдавские летописи

XVndashXVI вв состав Ф А Грекул отв ред В И Буганов ed by F A Grecul chief editor

V I Buganov Moscow 1976 p 36 635 Șt Andreescu Vlad Țepeș (Dracula) icircntre legendă și adevăr istoric 2nd ed Bucharest

1998 pp 70ndash71 636 Cronica moldo-polonă in Cronicile slavo-romacircne din sec XVndashXVI publicate de

Ion Bogdan ed by P P Panaitescu Bucharest 1959 pp 173176 183 186 Молдавско-польская

летопись 1352ndash1564 гг in Славяно-молдавские летописиhellip pp 112 116 121 124 637 Grigore Ureche Letopisețul Țăricirci Moldoveihellip pp 76 163 210 638 Miron Costin Letopisețulŭ Țăricirci Moldovei de la Aaron Vodă incoace in Idem Opere

ed by P P Panaitescu Bucharest 1958 pp 41 50 67ndash68 133 180 In his works written in Polish

the Upper Country and the Lower Country are called Gorną Ziemią and Dolną Ziemią respectively

(Cf Miron Costin Chronika Ziem Mołdawskich i Multańskich in Idem Latopis Ziemi Mołdawskiej i

inne utwory historyczne transl and ed by I Czamańska Poznań 1998 p 273) 639 Misail Călugărul in Grigore Ureche Letopisețulhellip pp 69ndash70


175

Costin640 Ion Neculce641 Pseudo-Enache Kogălniceanu642 Ioan Canta643 etc In

his well-known Descriptio Moldaviae composed in Latin Dimitrie Cantemir quoted

both Romanian names of the two administrative units of the principality ie Czara de

Sus and with the transcription of the Moldavian pronunciation Czara de Dzios644 as

well as their Latin translations Moldavia Superior and Inferior645 In internal

chancery documents the Grand Headmen from the ldquoUpper Countryrdquo (Țara de Sus)

and the ldquoLower Countryrdquo (Țara de Gios [Jos]) were frequently mentioned646

In some documents written in Old Slavic in the seventeenth century the

terms designating the headmen of the Lower Country are not identical

Besides which dominated clearly647

648 was occasionally used as well This inconsistency

suggests that they were translated from Romanian After analyzing the terms used by

foreign authors for the Romanian principalities and the Romanian terminology

corresponding to the East Carpathian area we conclude that there were no mutual

influences In the diplomatic and intellectual environments of Central and Western

Europe there was no interest in the local manner for designating the administrative

units of Moldavia except in the late modern era Equally in Romanian diplomatic

texts and chronicles composed east of the Carpathians the names ldquoUpper Wallachiardquo

Valachia Superior and ldquoLower Wallachiardquo Valachia Inferior vehiculated by the

scholars of Central and Western Europe were not taken into account


Scrieri ed by S Korolevschi I Chișinău 1990 p 121 Idem Letopisețul Țării Moldovei

(1709ndash1711) in ibidem pp 343 337 641 Ion Neculce Letopisețul Țării Moldovei de la Dabija-Vodă pacircnă la a doua domnie a lui


Bucharest 1955 pp 141 168 184 237 251 400 642 Pseudo-Enache Kogălniceanu ltLetopisețul Țării Moldovei de la domnia icircnticirci și picircnă la a

patra domnie a lui Constantin Mavrocordat Voevod (1733ndash1774)gt in Pseudo-Enache Kogălniceanu

Ioan Canta Cronici moldovenești ed by A Ilieș and I Zmeu Bucharest 1987 pp 66 71 83 643 Ioan Canta ltLetopisețul Țării Moldovei de la a doua picircnă la a patra domnie a lui

Constantin Mavrocordat Voevod (1741ndash1769)gt in Pseudo-Enache Kogălniceanu Ioan Canta

Cronici moldovenești p 158 644 Demetrii Cantemiri Descriptio antiqvi et hodierni statvs Moldaviaelig Dimitrie Cantemir

Descrierea Moldovei transl by Gh Guțu Bucharest 1973 pp 72ndash73 78ndash79 200ndash201 645 Ibidem pp 220ndash221 312ndash313 308ndash309 Cf also Demetrii principis Cantemirii

Incrementorvm et decrementorvm avlae Othman[n]icae sive Aliothman[n]icae historiae a prima

gentis origine ad nostra vsqve tempora dedvctae libri tres ed by D Slușanschi Timișoara 2001

p 389 646 For example see besides other works Documente privitoare la istoria orașului Iași I

Acte interne (1408ndash1660) ed by I Caproșu and P Zahariuc Iași 1999 Ibidem II Acte interne

(1661ndash1690) ed by I Caproșu Iași 2000 Ibidem III Acte interne (1691ndash1725) ed by I Caproșu

Iași 2000 passim etc 647 Ibidem passim 648 Documenta Romaniae Historica A Moldavia XXII (1634) ed by C Cihodaru I Caproșu

and L Șimanschi Bucharest 1974 no 70 pp 75ndash76

Victor Spinei 124

176

Although along time numerous determinative names for avoiding confusions

between the two Romanian states east and south of the Carpathians have been

adopted these norms were quite frequently eluded Sometimes even in the same

text the choronym Wallachia was used for both Lands Such a case is found in an

informing report composed in Cracow on September 9 1595 The fact that the

anonymous author of this report did not refer to just one country (Valacchia

Valachia) is revealed by the statement that Wallachia which designated Moldavia

was located next to Poland (uicino alla Polonia) whereas Wallachia Țara

Romacircnească lay towards Transylvania (nella parte della Transiluania)649

The use of determinative appellatives in state terminology continued in the

periods after the conclusion of the Middle Ages while others were entirely or

partially discarded At the same time the new geopolitical realities prompted the

adoption of novel designations at the global or regional level again foremost by

external actors and seldom for internal use

In the modern period the awareness about the Romanian ethnic unity spread

everywhere both inside and outside the Danube-Carpathian area in correlation

with the enhancement of the international role played by the principalities and the

intensification of interethnic contacts at European scale In the Romanian-speaking

area the respective concept represented generally known evidence so that it was

not necessary to express it anymore The enumerated texts reflect the perennial

character of the concept regarding the ethnic unity of the population in the Danube-

Carpathian area which was natural because it concerned demographic realities that

remained unaltered

Based on their own experience and or according to information taken from

books many European scholars politicians prelates and merchants knew that

Wallachia and Moldavia were distinct state entities without territorial and political

identity However it was clear to them that the populations of the two

voivodeships were ethnically identical beyond any doubt The better informed

authors especially those who had settled for a while in the regions inhabited by the

Romanians or in their immediate proximity in their quality as diplomats

missionaries members of the military traders etc after having lived in direct

contact to local realities they also noticed the inhabitantsrsquo cultural and

confessional similarities Those with a larger intellectual perspective acquired by

reading scientific treatises or as a result of their connections to renowned scholars

of the time also referred to the ancestry of all Romanians reflected in the idea of

their descent from Roman colonists

649 Mihai Viteazul icircn conștiința europeană 4 Relatări și presă coord by I Ardeleanu

Gh Bondoc V Arimia M Mușat Bucharest 1986 no 33 pp 64ndash65


177

The precept stating that language is the most powerful liaison between

human communities had already been expressed in the works of ancient

authors and it was taken further by scholars of the following eras Claudius

Marius Victor(inus) an active author living in Southern Gaul where he also

died around the years 425ndash450 expressed his opinion on the features of

language We owe him a work written in hexameters entitled Aletheia (ldquoThe

Truthrdquo) a paraphrase of the Genesis the first book of the Old Testament in

which there is a suggestive laconic statement ldquoIt is language that makes a

peoplerdquo (gentem lingua facit)650 The same conceptual note is also shared by the

reflection of Isidore of Seville (c 560ndash636) who said that peoples appear from

languages and not languages from peoples (ex linguis gentes non ex gentibus

linguaelig exortaelig sunt)651 The issues regarding the relations of the language with

the ethnic structures remained a subject of constant interest for the European

scientific world benefiting from a multidisciplinary approach along time652

The strictly epistemological aspects of the debates could not be isolated from

the influences of national and social movements that aspired to Europersquos

political and territorial reconfiguration The assessment of language features

which were trenchantly and clearly defined by the illustrious ethnologist and

philologist Jacob Grimm (1785ndash1863) is somehow similar to these tendencies

Die Kraft der Sprache bildet Voumllker und haumllt sie zusammen ohne solches Band

wuumlrden sie sich versprengen (ldquoThe power of language creates peoples and

keeps them together without such a bond they would be scatteredrdquo)653 Ethnic

identity construction requires more than simple linguistic homogeneity and the

consistent scientific contributions of the last decades have provided significant

evidence in this regard654

650 D H Abosso A Translation and Commentary on Claudius Marius Victorrsquos Alethia

31ndash326 (Dissertation) Urbana Illinois 2015 pp 70 81 187 651 Divi Isidori Hispalensis episcopi Etymologiarum in Divi Isidori Hispalensis episcopi

Opera Philippi Secundi Catholici Regis Jussu e vetustis exemplaribus emendate I Apud

Monasterium Conceptionis Hieronyminaelig 1778 p 212 652 H Steinthal Der Ursprung der Sprache in zusammenhange mit den letzten Frage alles

Wissens 4th ed Berlin 1888 R Wenskus Stammesbildung und Verfassung Das Werden der

fruumlhmittelalterlichen gentes Cologne-Graz 1961 Ph Poutignat J Streiff-Fenart Theacuteories de

lrsquoethniciteacute suivi de Les groupes ethniques et leurs frontiegraveres par F Barth Paris 1995 Theories of

Ethnicity A Classical Reader ed by W Sollers New York 1996 Ethnizitaumlt Identitaumlt und

Nationalitaumlt in Suumldosteuropa ed by C Lienau and L Steindorff Munich 2000 M Metzeltin

Nationalstaatlichkeit und Identitaumlt Ein Essay uumlber die Erfindung von Nationalstaaten Vienna 2000

Kommunikation fuumlr Europa II Sprache und Identitaumlt ed by J Schiewe R Lipczuk K Nerlicki W

Westphal Frankfurt am Main 2011 653 J Grimm Uumlber den Ursprung der Sprache in Idem Reden und Abhandlungen Nikosia

2017 p 277 654 A D Smith The Ethnic Origins of Nations Oxford-New York NY 1986 Identitaumlt und

Ethnizitaumlt ed by W Greive Rehburg-Loccum 1994 Border Barriers and Ethnogenesis Frontiers in

Victor Spinei 126

178

The awareness regarding linguistic affinities represented an essential element

in defining the collective identity of the peoples a fact which is entirely valid for

the Romanian population in the Danube-Carpathian regions as well When

communities using a common idiom spread out in different states the tendency

corresponding to a certain stage of societal evolution converges towards the efforts

focused on stopping the process of denationalization and on identifying

opportunities to restructure the boundaries because generally ethnic unity tends to

political sovereignty

Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages ed by F Curta Turnhout 2005 (F Curta M Kulikowski W Pohl)

M Metzeltin Th Wallmann Wege zur Europaumlischen Identitaumlt Individuelle nationalstaatliche und

supranationale Identitaumltskonstrukte Berlin 2010 Sprache und Identitaumlt im fruumlhen Mittelalter ed by

W Pohl B Zeller Vienna 2012 (W Pohl W Haubrichs H Wolfram H-W Goetz)

Victor Spinei 2

54

limited circulation was enjoyed by other regional terminological varieties of Wallachia as

well Among them were the names Great Wallachia Little Wallachia Valachia Superior

Upper Wallachia and Valachia Inferior Lower Wallachia

Based on their own experience and or according to bibliographic information

many European scholars politicians prelates and merchants knew that Wallachia and

Moldavia were distinct state entities without territorial and political identity However

it was clear to them that the populations of the two voivodeships were ethnically

identical beyond any doubt The better informed authors especially those who had

settled in the regions inhabited by the Romanians or in their immediate proximity for a

while in their quality as diplomats missionaries members of the military traders etc

after having lived in direct contact to local realities they also noticed the inhabitantsrsquo

cultural and confessional similarities Those with a larger intellectual perspective

acquired by reading scientific treatises or as a result of their connections to renowned

scholars of the time also referred to the ancestry of all Romanians reflected in the idea

of their common descent from Roman colonists

Keywords Wallachia Wallachians Romanians Ungrovlachia Transalpina Vlachia Transalpina Bessarabia Moldavia Moldovlachia double the other another

Wallachia Great Little Upper Lower Wallachia Parathalasia Romanian identity

The configuration of identity intuition in human collectivities represents a

major issue for the historical development of peoples all over the world

because the feeling of belonging to a certain entity with clearly defined features

confers them individuality The awareness about their own specificity the

individual and especially the collective one can lead to the coagulation of the

internal structure of ethnic groups These two specificities are capable of

stimulating the peoplesrsquo adaptation efforts to the environment and to prepare

them for facing antagonistic phenomena arising from the inevitable contacts

with the diverse demographic ensemble in their proximity which generate

mutual prejudice Particularism consists in a varied range of characteristics

acquired during a long evolution cycle and that do not remain unchanged along

the inevitable passing of time but develop as a result of qualitative and

quantitative accumulations of internal factors and influences permeating from

other meridians

It is not at all surprising that especially during the last decades the general

and particular multifaceted aspects in connection with identity constructions have

triggered a special interest in international historiography resulting in theoretical

accomplishments of the most consistent kind which open new epistemological

horizons1 However so far Romanian historiography has manifested a certain

1 W Pohl Telling the difference Signs of ethnic identity in Strategies of Distinction The

Construction of Ethnic Communities 300ndash800 ed by W Pohl H Reimitz Leiden-Boston-Cologne

1998 pp 17ndash69 Idem Archaeology of identity introduction in Archaeology of Identity Archaumlologie


55













































Victor Spinei 4

56













































57











































Victor Spinei 6

58









































59







determinative terms




































Victor Spinei 8

60











by Rashid od-Din






























61










































Victor Spinei 10

62



In documents for








































63




21 In





















century26













Victor Spinei 12

64









































65







































Victor Spinei 14

66








































67









































Victor Spinei 16

68








































69








































Victor Spinei 18

70

















Romacircnească





















71



































Victor Spinei 20

72





incidental


















)87

















8 1934 no 3 p 5


73






































A Ghermanschi pp 63 64 70 76 77 87 88 92 93 106 108 111 117 118

Victor Spinei 22

74







































75

































A Ghermanschi pp 151 154 157 158 161 169 171 172 174 177 180 194 197 199 202 207





Victor Spinei 24

76















Lands






















p 44 no 16 p 79


77








































Victor Spinei 26

78




































79




























)138








Victor Spinei 28

80






















81


























Victor Spinei 30

82


































pp 306 307 311 313 164 Ibidem p 291


83

























peoples


















Victor Spinei 32

84



































85







































Victor Spinei 34

86





Ugrovlahieirdquo ()

) 188 or








Moldavia191





(1575)192 Ungrovlahia (1598)193


















87
































Land like Muntenia







Victor Spinei 36

88


















lost



















89































Victor Spinei 38

90
































91









































Victor Spinei 40

92



Wallachia227












Sankt-Petersburg



1430rdquo)





















93











































Victor Spinei 42

94








































95




)245












)248


















Victor Spinei 44

96
















Slavo-Romanian one



















pp 302ndash303


97






































Victor Spinei 46

98


























Ї)275













99







































Victor Spinei 48

100








































pp 465ndash469


101



coins had ceased287





































p 609

Victor Spinei 50

102






everywhere abroad

































103





































Victor Spinei 52

104
















Brandebourg307
























105



































Victor Spinei 54

106








107






































Brăila 2012 passim

Victor Spinei 56

108









































109









































Victor Spinei 58

110










































111























Victor Spinei 60

112



































113










































Victor Spinei 62

114










































115








































Victor Spinei 64

116












































117













Victor Spinei 66

118

























119










































spelled laltra)

Victor Spinei 68

120








































1936 pp 38ndash39


121







first time













Moldauia384





















Victor Spinei 70

122







































123

















English ruler
























Victor Spinei 72

124










































125

































traduntur402







1938 p 23

Victor Spinei 74

126










































127












































1964 p 32

Victor Spinei 76

128











































129
















Trajanrdquo)414

























Victor Spinei 78

130




















131







































III no 126 p 198

Victor Spinei 80

132























during his life


















133















Cosmography
























Victor Spinei 82

134







































1595 pp 122ndash123


135







































Victor Spinei 84

136






































137









































Victor Spinei 86

138




















political events





















139








































Victor Spinei 88

140


















vajdaacutet460






















141








Victor Spinei 90

142















states473













143









































Victor Spinei 92

144










the Seardquo)477
































145








































Victor Spinei 94

146





































147







































Victor Spinei 96

148








































149





































Victor Spinei 98

150










































151









































Victor Spinei 100

152









































153








































Victor Spinei 102

154








































155














Victor Spinei 104

156


































157










































Mignanelli etc

Victor Spinei 106

158









































159






































Victor Spinei 108

160








Minoris550

































161










































Victor Spinei 110

162








Konstanz author559




























p 12


163





































Victor Spinei 112

164





































165






reputation



































Victor Spinei 114

166




































167








Wallachia































Victor Spinei 116

168




























Moncastro606







pp 121 139 142 166 173 188 etc






169




































Victor Spinei 118

170








































171








































pp 127ndash129

Victor Spinei 120

172











































173






















Wallachiardquo


















Victor Spinei 122

174



horses632












evoking
























175






































Victor Spinei 124

176























remained unaltered

















177








































Victor Spinei 126

178














55













































Victor Spinei 4

56













































57











































Victor Spinei 6

58









































59







determinative terms




































Victor Spinei 8

60











by Rashid od-Din






























61










































Victor Spinei 10

62



In documents for








































63




21 In





















century26













Victor Spinei 12

64









































65







































Victor Spinei 14

66








































67









































Victor Spinei 16

68








































69








































Victor Spinei 18

70

















Romacircnească





















71



































Victor Spinei 20

72





incidental


















)87

















8 1934 no 3 p 5


73






































A Ghermanschi pp 63 64 70 76 77 87 88 92 93 106 108 111 117 118

Victor Spinei 22

74







































75

































A Ghermanschi pp 151 154 157 158 161 169 171 172 174 177 180 194 197 199 202 207





Victor Spinei 24

76















Lands






















p 44 no 16 p 79


77








































Victor Spinei 26

78




































79




























)138








Victor Spinei 28

80






















81


























Victor Spinei 30

82


































pp 306 307 311 313 164 Ibidem p 291


83

























peoples


















Victor Spinei 32

84



































85







































Victor Spinei 34

86





Ugrovlahieirdquo ()

) 188 or








Moldavia191





(1575)192 Ungrovlahia (1598)193


















87
































Land like Muntenia







Victor Spinei 36

88


















lost



















89































Victor Spinei 38

90
































91









































Victor Spinei 40

92



Wallachia227












Sankt-Petersburg



1430rdquo)





















93











































Victor Spinei 42

94








































95




)245












)248


















Victor Spinei 44

96
















Slavo-Romanian one



















pp 302ndash303


97






































Victor Spinei 46

98


























Ї)275













99







































Victor Spinei 48

100








































pp 465ndash469


101



coins had ceased287





































p 609

Victor Spinei 50

102






everywhere abroad

































103





































Victor Spinei 52

104
















Brandebourg307
























105



































Victor Spinei 54

106








107






































Brăila 2012 passim

Victor Spinei 56

108









































109









































Victor Spinei 58

110










































111























Victor Spinei 60

112



































113










































Victor Spinei 62

114










































115








































Victor Spinei 64

116












































117













Victor Spinei 66

118

























119










































spelled laltra)

Victor Spinei 68

120








































1936 pp 38ndash39


121







first time













Moldauia384





















Victor Spinei 70

122







































123

















English ruler
























Victor Spinei 72

124










































125

































traduntur402







1938 p 23

Victor Spinei 74

126










































127












































1964 p 32

Victor Spinei 76

128











































129
















Trajanrdquo)414

























Victor Spinei 78

130




















131







































III no 126 p 198

Victor Spinei 80

132























during his life


















133















Cosmography
























Victor Spinei 82

134







































1595 pp 122ndash123


135







































Victor Spinei 84

136






































137









































Victor Spinei 86

138




















political events





















139








































Victor Spinei 88

140


















vajdaacutet460






















141








Victor Spinei 90

142















states473













143









































Victor Spinei 92

144










the Seardquo)477
































145








































Victor Spinei 94

146





































147







































Victor Spinei 96

148








































149





































Victor Spinei 98

150










































151









































Victor Spinei 100

152









































153








































Victor Spinei 102

154








































155














Victor Spinei 104

156


































157










































Mignanelli etc

Victor Spinei 106

158









































159






































Victor Spinei 108

160








Minoris550

































161










































Victor Spinei 110

162








Konstanz author559




























p 12


163





































Victor Spinei 112

164





































165






reputation



































Victor Spinei 114

166




































167








Wallachia































Victor Spinei 116

168




























Moncastro606







pp 121 139 142 166 173 188 etc






169




































Victor Spinei 118

170








































171








































pp 127ndash129

Victor Spinei 120

172











































173






















Wallachiardquo


















Victor Spinei 122

174



horses632












evoking
























175






































Victor Spinei 124

176























remained unaltered

















177








































Victor Spinei 126

178













Victor Spinei 4

56













































57











































Victor Spinei 6

58









































59







determinative terms




































Victor Spinei 8

60











by Rashid od-Din






























61










































Victor Spinei 10

62



In documents for








































63




21 In





















century26













Victor Spinei 12

64









































65







































Victor Spinei 14

66








































67









































Victor Spinei 16

68








































69








































Victor Spinei 18

70

















Romacircnească





















71



































Victor Spinei 20

72





incidental


















)87

















8 1934 no 3 p 5


73






































A Ghermanschi pp 63 64 70 76 77 87 88 92 93 106 108 111 117 118

Victor Spinei 22

74







































75

































A Ghermanschi pp 151 154 157 158 161 169 171 172 174 177 180 194 197 199 202 207





Victor Spinei 24

76















Lands






















p 44 no 16 p 79


77








































Victor Spinei 26

78




































79




























)138








Victor Spinei 28

80






















81


























Victor Spinei 30

82


































pp 306 307 311 313 164 Ibidem p 291


83

























peoples


















Victor Spinei 32

84



































85







































Victor Spinei 34

86





Ugrovlahieirdquo ()

) 188 or








Moldavia191





(1575)192 Ungrovlahia (1598)193


















87
































Land like Muntenia







Victor Spinei 36

88


















lost



















89































Victor Spinei 38

90
































91









































Victor Spinei 40

92



Wallachia227












Sankt-Petersburg



1430rdquo)





















93











































Victor Spinei 42

94








































95




)245












)248


















Victor Spinei 44

96
















Slavo-Romanian one



















pp 302ndash303


97






































Victor Spinei 46

98


























Ї)275













99







































Victor Spinei 48

100








































pp 465ndash469


101



coins had ceased287





































p 609

Victor Spinei 50

102






everywhere abroad

































103





































Victor Spinei 52

104
















Brandebourg307
























105



































Victor Spinei 54

106








107






































Brăila 2012 passim

Victor Spinei 56

108









































109









































Victor Spinei 58

110










































111























Victor Spinei 60

112



































113










































Victor Spinei 62

114










































115








































Victor Spinei 64

116












































117













Victor Spinei 66

118

























119










































spelled laltra)

Victor Spinei 68

120








































1936 pp 38ndash39


121







first time













Moldauia384





















Victor Spinei 70

122







































123

















English ruler
























Victor Spinei 72

124










































125

































traduntur402







1938 p 23

Victor Spinei 74

126










































127












































1964 p 32

Victor Spinei 76

128











































129
















Trajanrdquo)414

























Victor Spinei 78

130




















131







































III no 126 p 198

Victor Spinei 80

132























during his life


















133















Cosmography
























Victor Spinei 82

134







































1595 pp 122ndash123


135







































Victor Spinei 84

136






































137









































Victor Spinei 86

138




















political events





















139








































Victor Spinei 88

140


















vajdaacutet460






















141








Victor Spinei 90

142















states473













143









































Victor Spinei 92

144










the Seardquo)477
































145








































Victor Spinei 94

146





































147







































Victor Spinei 96

148








































149





































Victor Spinei 98

150










































151









































Victor Spinei 100

152









































153








































Victor Spinei 102

154








































155














Victor Spinei 104

156


































157










































Mignanelli etc

Victor Spinei 106

158









































159






































Victor Spinei 108

160








Minoris550

































161










































Victor Spinei 110

162








Konstanz author559




























p 12


163





































Victor Spinei 112

164





































165






reputation



































Victor Spinei 114

166




































167








Wallachia































Victor Spinei 116

168




























Moncastro606







pp 121 139 142 166 173 188 etc






169




































Victor Spinei 118

170








































171








































pp 127ndash129

Victor Spinei 120

172











































173






















Wallachiardquo


















Victor Spinei 122

174



horses632












evoking
























175






































Victor Spinei 124

176























remained unaltered

















177








































Victor Spinei 126

178














57











































Victor Spinei 6

58









































59







determinative terms




































Victor Spinei 8

60











by Rashid od-Din






























61










































Victor Spinei 10

62



In documents for








































63




21 In





















century26













Victor Spinei 12

64









































65







































Victor Spinei 14

66








































67









































Victor Spinei 16

68








































69








































Victor Spinei 18

70

















Romacircnească





















71



































Victor Spinei 20

72





incidental


















)87

















8 1934 no 3 p 5


73






































A Ghermanschi pp 63 64 70 76 77 87 88 92 93 106 108 111 117 118

Victor Spinei 22

74







































75

































A Ghermanschi pp 151 154 157 158 161 169 171 172 174 177 180 194 197 199 202 207





Victor Spinei 24

76















Lands






















p 44 no 16 p 79


77








































Victor Spinei 26

78




































79




























)138








Victor Spinei 28

80






















81


























Victor Spinei 30

82


































pp 306 307 311 313 164 Ibidem p 291


83

























peoples


















Victor Spinei 32

84



































85







































Victor Spinei 34

86





Ugrovlahieirdquo ()

) 188 or








Moldavia191





(1575)192 Ungrovlahia (1598)193


















87
































Land like Muntenia







Victor Spinei 36

88


















lost



















89































Victor Spinei 38

90
































91









































Victor Spinei 40

92



Wallachia227












Sankt-Petersburg



1430rdquo)





















93











































Victor Spinei 42

94








































95




)245












)248


















Victor Spinei 44

96
















Slavo-Romanian one



















pp 302ndash303


97






































Victor Spinei 46

98


























Ї)275













99







































Victor Spinei 48

100








































pp 465ndash469


101



coins had ceased287





































p 609

Victor Spinei 50

102






everywhere abroad

































103





































Victor Spinei 52

104
















Brandebourg307
























105



































Victor Spinei 54

106








107






































Brăila 2012 passim

Victor Spinei 56

108









































109









































Victor Spinei 58

110










































111























Victor Spinei 60

112



































113










































Victor Spinei 62

114










































115








































Victor Spinei 64

116












































117













Victor Spinei 66

118

























119










































spelled laltra)

Victor Spinei 68

120








































1936 pp 38ndash39


121







first time













Moldauia384





















Victor Spinei 70

122







































123

















English ruler
























Victor Spinei 72

124










































125

































traduntur402







1938 p 23

Victor Spinei 74

126










































127












































1964 p 32

Victor Spinei 76

128











































129
















Trajanrdquo)414

























Victor Spinei 78

130




















131







































III no 126 p 198

Victor Spinei 80

132























during his life


















133















Cosmography
























Victor Spinei 82

134







































1595 pp 122ndash123


135







































Victor Spinei 84

136






































137









































Victor Spinei 86

138




















political events





















139








































Victor Spinei 88

140


















vajdaacutet460






















141








Victor Spinei 90

142















states473













143









































Victor Spinei 92

144










the Seardquo)477
































145








































Victor Spinei 94

146





































147







































Victor Spinei 96

148








































149





































Victor Spinei 98

150










































151









































Victor Spinei 100

152









































153








































Victor Spinei 102

154








































155














Victor Spinei 104

156


































157










































Mignanelli etc

Victor Spinei 106

158









































159






































Victor Spinei 108

160








Minoris550

































161










































Victor Spinei 110

162








Konstanz author559




























p 12


163





































Victor Spinei 112

164





































165






reputation



































Victor Spinei 114

166




































167








Wallachia































Victor Spinei 116

168




























Moncastro606







pp 121 139 142 166 173 188 etc






169




































Victor Spinei 118

170








































171








































pp 127ndash129

Victor Spinei 120

172











































173






















Wallachiardquo


















Victor Spinei 122

174



horses632












evoking
























175






































Victor Spinei 124

176























remained unaltered

















177








































Victor Spinei 126

178











