To the Creation of Greater Romania, 1859-1918 Dumitru Sugiu
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ROMANIAN CULTURAL FOUNDATION DUMITRU SUCIU FROM THE UNION OF THE PRINCIPALITIES TO THE CREATION OF GREATER ROMANIA, 1859-1918 DUMITRU SUGIU From the Union of the Principalities to the Creation of Greater Romania GENTER FOR TRANSYLVANIAN STUDIES BIBLIOTHECA RERUM TRANSSILVANIAE V ISBN 973-9132-72-3 Copyright © 1993 by the Romanian Cultural Foundation DUMITRU SUGIU FROM THE UNION OF THE PRINCIPALITIES TO THE CREATION OF GREATER ROMANIA CENTER FOR TRANSYLVANIAN STUDIES THE ROMANIAN CULTURAL FOUNDATION Cluj-Napoca, 1993 THE NECESSITY AND THE PREMISES OF BRINGING THE FOREIGN HEREDITARY DYNASTY In the XIXth century, European democratic th inkers stated that the Moldavian and Walachian Romanians, situated between Rusia, Austria and Turkey, countries which didn’t love them, but suspected and exploited them for centuries, watching them step by step, were no objectsof envy atall.as they dwelt, like Dante’sdemned sinner, in the very heart of undergrounds*. In order to put into iigh t and into practice their national programs of the state and political evolution, the Roma- niansasa whole needed the people’s support, the sacrifice and the will to fight, as well as the cool and clear spirit of their policical leaders, their diplomatic ability, the lucid understanding of the stats relations and rapports in Europe. The neigh boring great powers did not only suspect each politi ca 1 move made by the Romanians living in the Principalities, but took serious advantage of the patrimony of their ancient territory, includ ing whole territories and lands into their own borders. Starting from 1775, Austria incorporated Bucovina, Russia - Bessarabia - from 1812, Turkey incorporated Tumu and Giurgiu in the XVth century and Brailain 1540(regained by Wallachia inl829)andDobrudja,in 1417. The Romanians in the Principalities often used to help the Russians and the Austrians in wars against the Ottoman Empire, with a wiew to abolish the Fanariot regime and regain their previous independence. But for many centuries, the Romanian Principalities have been, in a quick and repetated ry thm, the theater of war for Austria, Russia and Turkey, sometimes for the three of them, more often for the later ones, or they were temporarily occupied by one of them, more often 1. La Reforme, 27-th of June, 1 MS spud Olimpiu Boitoș. Raporturile românilor tn Ledrn Rollhi ți radicaliifrancezi f» perioada revoluției de la 1848, București, (f.i annex XI, p.l 10 5 for the latter ones, or they were temporarily occupied by one of them, as follows: 1716-1718; 1736-1739; 1768-1774; 1787-1792; 1806-1812; Turkish intervention and occupation between 1821-1822; the Rus sian-Turkish war 1828-1829 and Russian occupation until 1834; Rus sian-Turkish intervention and occupation 1848-1851; Russian and Austrian occupation 1853-1854 and 1854-1857? Although these wars undoubtfully contributed to the serious and irreversible weakening of the Ottoman sovereignty, they terribly ravaged the Romanian territory, troubled the people’s material and spiritual life and brought about feeling of ceaseless insecurity and fear. More than this, the train or robbery and misfortunes and espe cially the abduction of Bucovina and Bessarabia made the Romanians in the Principalities gainfully regret the former agony of the Ottoman sovereignty, which they hoped toabolish and which was preferable to their being separated and trodden by Austrians or Russsians. The painful dilemmas - of their medieval past-uttered by old voices, who did not know whom to fear more: the cool pagans facing them or the Christian powers behind - seemed to be heard again, in the new forms, structures and mentalities of the modern epoch. Starting with the first half of the XIXlh century, the Romanian people became a modern and dynamic nation. Deep down in the Romanian society structural changes occured in the social-economic life, in institutions, in mentality and political ideas. F'irst, the unprecedent development of manufacturies, crafts, of the internal and foreign trade with cerealsand cattle brought about thedemografic explosion of the urban centers. Creative energies in universities and schools, in education and culture, burst forth and they spread in geometric progression, printings, newspapers and books, all of them 2. Considering chat 1 gold leu = 0,3225 grams, we estimated that, beginning with the XV"‘ century, until 1877, the value of the .tribute payed to the Ottomans amounted to 1,066.305.780 gold lei. Not taking into account the riches taken direcdy from Dobrudja. Tumu, Giurgiu. Brăila, this sum may be estimated at 341,021 kg of gold. The Habsburg Empire, that became Austro-Hungary later, took values representing 857,500 kg of gold while Transylvania (1686-1918), Oltenia (1718- 1739), Bucovina (1775-1918) were ruled from Vienna and Budapest. Russia, only during the temporary occupations of Wallachia and Moldavia, without the income taken from Bessarabia, took hold of 64,515 kg of gold, in money and goods, during 1796-1854. See Mircea Musat. Ion Ardeleanu. De la statulg/M-dac la starul rămân unitar. București, 1983, p.200 6 contributing to the creation of the modern national conssciusness ant ideology3. The modem nation registered a solidarisation for all its mem bers which included and surpassed the confesssional, irrespective of the cultural level and differences in wealth and in affiliation to one party o another. It was the Romanians’desire for independence and the achievmen of national unity which linked them all - along the XIX1*1 century and unti 1916-1919. The ramification and generalisation of the railways, the agro-indus trial development and the development of crafts, all of these doubled ant tripled by the progress registered by the Romanian Academy in Bucharest by theChurches and the partiesof theRomanians from everyehere, by the Romanian universities ofJaszy and Bucharest or by Astra and other cu ltura societies of the oppressed Romanians had made some national leader: express - since the last century - their conviction that by the XXth century - the Romanian people would have its sute unity accomplished. In ; Europe marked by the industrial revolution, by elections and parliamen tary systems, the realistic leaders made it clear that besides the peasants the priests ans teachers the Romanian society had to have all the socia classes and categories which made up Europe’s modern nations, that i intellectuals, workers, merchants, bankers, liberal proffesionists, a moden bank-financial system, together with its industry and agriculture, both ir free Romania and in the oppressed Transylvania and Bucovina. The effort for the modernizing of the Romanian society were made not only sepa rately,. but also in common4, to prove democratic Euope that the Romani ans could and had to achieve their unitary state. The mental and cultural beginning was achieved at the end of th XVIIIth century, under the positive impact of the linguistic and historic; works printed in Blaj, the former small Rome of the Enlightenment of a Romanians, and under the influence of the precios political thinking of th patriotic boyars in the Principalities, when national ideology thought th 3. The phenomenon is throughly presented in the collective volume Națiunea română. Geneză. Afirmare. Orizont contemporan, București, 1984 4. Aspects of the problem in George Barițfi contemporanii săi, vol.HI, București. 1979, p.22O and D. Suciu. “Date privind situația politică și confesional școlară a românilor1 prima decadă a duzlismulux", bt Anuarul Institutului de Istorie din Cluj-Napoca, XXX, 1990- 1991,p.98-99 omanians not to think in an Transylvanian, Wallachian or Moldavian way ly longer, but in a Romanian one, to feel and transm it from one Carpathian de toother or from one bank of the river Prut to the other * their pain and offering and seldom their happines and hopes. Modern Romanians, Ithought living under the threat of Damocle's sword, due to their gco- olitica 1 position, have never been fatalists, they have always had a fighting pirit and mentality, just because they have been fully aware of the real size nd dimension of the evil and they keenly felt the injustice of being the aves of the Turks in Dobrudja, of the Russian in Bessarabia, of the .ustrians in Bucovina, of the Hungaryans in Transylvania, Banat, Crișana nd Maramureș right in the middle of the XIXIh century, when the national »rinciple was strongly imposing itself in Europe. Everybody’s hope was directed towards the Romanian Principali- ies, where the state political being was preserved and practised, where iere have been princes, ministers, community. Meetings, offifcers, and Mdiers, Romanian diolomacy. The Romanian political elite made the itional thinking part of theEuropean thinking, expressed its determined esire for social and economic renewal, for social democracy throught land form, for constitutional govering on the basis of the principle of separa- on of powers in state, for the affirmation of the concept of a protecting otherland - for all classes and categories of society. They fought for the ■netration of foreign capital, for the application of Western patterns in licy and in the organisation of industry and trade in acordance with the •ncrcte Romanian conditions. The same elite generalized and crystal- ed the concept of Daco-Romanianism, proposing and promoting the re- iting of Mihai Viteazu’s work of uification in the contextof totally new editions and structures. This elite came sprang from the boyars, it med the liberal national and anti-Russian party, its members were