religions Article The Donation Act of Hagi Constantin Pop’s Family for the Annunciation Church in Sibiu Constantin Oancea * and Ioan Ovidiu Abrudan Faculty of Theology, Lucian Blaga University of Sibiu, 550179 Sibiu, Romania; [email protected] * Correspondence: [email protected] Received: 21 January 2020; Accepted: 24 February 2020; Published: 27 February 2020 Abstract: This article presents an important document relating to the history of an Orthodox church in Sibiu (Biserica din Groapă), whose construction was possible due to the support provided by the family of the wealthy Macedonian-Romanian merchant Hagi Constantin Pop, at the beginning of the nineteenth century. After a thorough description of the document, we will provide both the German transcription and the English translation of the text. The notes and comments that accompany the document are meant to shed light upon the historical context in which the church was raised and to emphasize the importance of the document, which is the oldest one preserved in the archives of the Annunciation Church. The document mentions the gift of charity by the widow of Hagi Constantin Pop, whereby the land on which the church, its surrounding cemetery, the parish house, and the Romanian school were built would become the property of the Orthodox Church. Thus, the document presents the circumstances under which the patrimony of the foundation patronized by the members of Hagi Constantin Pop’s family was constituted. That foundation continued to administer the patrimony of the Annunciation Church until the establishment of the Communist regime in Romania. Keywords: orthodox church in the Austro-Hungarian empire; Biserica din Groapă; patronized church; Hagi Constantin Pop; Andrei s, aguna; kurrentschrift; C&I Honig 1. Introduction Sibiu (German: Hermannstadt) was founded in the twelfth century by colonists originating from Alsace-Lorraine, Luxembourg, Flanders, and Germany. In historical sources, they are referred to as Saxones. Their mission was to provide military protection to the southeastern area of Transylvania against possible attacks from beyond the Carpathians. The location of Sibiu at the intersection of two main trade routes led to the economic development of the entire region inhabited by the Saxons, called Royal Lands (Fundus Regius) and comprising administrative subunits called chairs. By the end of the fourteenth century, the Saxon patricians managed to turn Hermannstadt into a prosperous city, a commercial metropolis. Sibiu became the capital of the Saxon nation of Transylvania (Roth 2006, pp. 3–57). In 1543, Sibiu became evangelical, with Transylvania being one of the first regions in Europe where the Reformation was adopted (Wien 2017, pp. 9–16). The territory of medieval Transylvania was divided among socio-ethnic estates called nations: the Hungarian nobility, the Saxons, and the Szeklers. The estate of the Romanians, called Universitas Valachorum, was not able to maintain itself and ceased to exist in the fourteenth century. Subsequently, the Romanians no longer had political rights and declined to the rank of subjects or even serfs. For reasons of self-protection and preservation of national identity, the Saxon administration sought to Religions 2020, 11, 108; doi:10.3390/rel11030108 www.mdpi.com/journal/religions Religions 2020, 11, 108 2 of 15 restrict the right of settlement (concivility) in the cities of the Royal Lands (Teutsch 1907, pp. XXII–XXVI).1 During the sixteenth to eighteenth centuries, only Germans were allowed to buy property in the city, and marriages with persons of other ethnicities were forbidden under the penalty of expulsion from the city (Sigerius 1928, pp. 105–6). However, foreigners who occupied important positions and held qualifications that could be performed by no other professional in the city were exempted from that rule (Brusanowski 2007, p. 206). Even Hungarian nobles had to rent an accommodation when attending the meetings of the government in Sibiu. In 1773 and 1776, Empress Maria Theresa confirmed the Saxons’ exclusive right to residence (Sigerius 1928, pp. 108–9). The Romanians lived mainly in the villages around Sibiu. In the eighteenth century, the so-called maieri started to settle into the gardens of the Saxon patricians, located outside the walls of the fortress.2 Although the ethnicity of the maieri was not homogeneous, most of these inhabitants of the suburbs were Romanians. A conscription from 1805 stated that 407 families of Orthodox Romanians were living in the suburbs of Sibiu (Brusanowski 2007). The reforms initiated by Emperor Joseph II (1741–1790) aimed to alleviate the antagonisms existing between the ethnic groups and religious denominationswithin the monarchy. By removing the Germans’ exclusive right to residence, the Edict of Concivility of 22 March 1781 had a positive influence upon the lives of the Romanians living in Transylvania. Hungarian nobles, but especially wealthy merchants, were able to purchase and build houses in Sibiu. Among them was Hagi Constantin Pop (Sigerius 1928, p. 114). The majority of Romanians continued to inhabit the suburbs, as in the case of the Iosefin Suburb (German: Joseph Vorstadt), whose building started around the Gate to Cisnădie. Equally beneficial to the Romanians was the Edict of Tolerance of Emperor Joseph II (8 November 1781). The provisions of this edict allowed the Romanians to build churches in Sibiu and in the suburbs of Sibiu. The Annunciation Orthodox Church is generally called Biserica din Groapă (Church in the Hollow), given its placement on the stream of a little valley.3 This first brick Orthodox church in Sibiu was raised outside the city walls, in the Iosefin suburb, at a walking distance of about 1.3 km from the city center. According to Nicolae Iorga, the new place of worship was built in German style. It was a patronized church, i.e., a gift offered to the community by a single wealthy family. Aspects regarding the history of the church are known from previous research (Iorga 1906c; Bodogae 1981) and from the more recent presentations made byP ăcurariu(2002, 2006), Soro¸stineanu(2010, 2014), and Abrudan(2013). The document we shall present below 4 is less known or probably yet undisclosed. Concluded on 22 May 1814, the notarial document is the oldest document still preserved in the parish archive of the Annunciation Church. It was completed several decades before all the other church documents preserved (writings, letters, and various reports on the wealth, income, and annual expenses for the maintenance of the church and of the school in the Iosefin district), whose registration began to run only in 1850.5 However, as evidenced by a handover report of the parish archive, in which documents issued as early as 1799 were mentioned, it seems that equally old or even older documents than the one we shall present actually existed.6 V. Soros, tineanu used the epigraphic investigation of the funeral monuments in the cemetery of Biserica din Groapă as a historiographical approach (Soro¸stineanu 2014). The method we apply is that of archival research, used in historical investigations of documents so as to gain access to organizations, individuals, and information of earlier time that otherwise could not be acquired (Ventresca and Mohr 2017). Our interest in the archive of Biserica din Groapă increased during our 1 The Saxons believed that their freedom and autonomy would be threatened if the Hungarian nobility received the right of concivility, because the nobles did not obey the same laws. 2 The name comes from the German Meier, by which the free peasants who worked the land of an owner were designated. 3 Other English renderings are Church in the Pit or Church in the Ditch. 4 BG, Donation Act of Paulina Pop, 22 May 1814, Arhiva parohială, doc. 660/1814. 5 We managed to identify only one document from 1845, written in Serbian. 6 BG, Handover report, 27 October 1879, Arhiva parohială, doc. 3022/879. Religions 2020, 11, 108 3 of 15 work at the monography of this monument of ecclesiastical art. In what follows, we shall start from a detailed description of the document, followed by the German transcript and the English translation of the act. Then, we shall include our comments on the document, which are meant both to frame the act Religions 2020, 11, 108 3 of 15 inthe the act. context Then, we of theshall history include of our Biserica comme dinnts Groap on thăe anddocument, to highlight which its are importance. meant both to frame the act in the context of the history of Biserica din Groapă and to highlight its importance. 2. The description of the document 2. ThThee description document of is the written document in black ink on watermarked paper with the following dimensions: 236 356 mm. By folding the paper, two sheets resulted, forming four pages with the dimensions ×The document is written in black ink on watermarked paper with the following dimensions: 236 × 178 236 mm. The bottom edges of the pages are damaged, probably as a result of the way the 356 ×mm. By folding the paper, two sheets resulted, forming four pages with the dimensions 178 × 236 mm. documentThe bottom was edges preserved. of the pages are damaged, probably as a result of the way the document was preserved. TheThe watermarkwatermark is placed in the the middle middle of of the the sh sheet,eet, but but the the act act was was completed completed with with the the watermark watermark inin invertedinverted position (rotated by by 180 180 degrees). degrees). On On pa pagege 2, 2, the the text text “C&I “C&I Honig” Honig” appears appears (see (see Figure Figure 1a);1a); onon pagepage 4,4, oneone can see the representation of of an an emblem emblem with with the the postal postal horn horn on on the the background background of of a a crownedcrowned shield (see Figure Figure 1b).1b).