AT THE END OF EMPIRE: IMPERIAL GOVERNANCE, INTER-IMPERIAL RIVALRY AND “AUTONOMY” IN WALLACHIA AND MOLDAVIA (1780s-1850s) BY STEFANIA COSTACHE DISSERTATION Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in History in the Graduate College of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 2013 Urbana, Illinois Doctoral Committee: Professor Maria Todorova, Chair and Director of Research Professor Keith Hitchins Associate Professor John Randolph Associate Professor Christine Philliou, Columbia University Abstract This dissertation recreates the biography of several power holders in Wallachia and Moldavia to explore how local, imperial and inter-imperial politics interacted on this Ottoman borderland between the 1780s and 1850s and promoted European imperialist aims in the Ottoman Empire. For this purpose, it provides an analysis of Ottoman rule on a borderland inhabited by a Christian population and located near two Christian empires, the Habsburg and the Russian, the latter of which pursued an active expansionist policy against the Ottoman Empire. It also explores the interplay between the politics of local power holders who aimed to enhance their position and the forms of political intervention that the competing European empires deployed to exert control over the Ottoman Empire in contraction. It suggests that the major turning point in the history of Ottoman imperial rule over this borderland occurred after the European powers devised formal agreements in the 1830s to formally create the notions of European protection of the Ottoman Empire, of restricted Ottoman rule in the Christian Balkan dominions and of local “autonomous” governments, which accommodated the elites on site. The study is divided in four chapters that retrace the interaction of local and imperial interests on the borderland during the Russian-Habsburg-Ottoman wars of 1787-1791/1792, the Napoleonic Wars (1803-1815), and the Russian-Ottoman war of 1828-1829. These chapters reveal the transformation of forms of European expansion against the Ottoman Empire, as tested on the Danube borderlands: from territorial annexation to diplomatic influence, imperial condominium and the creation of a body of international law pertaining to the Ottoman Empire. The analysis of the trade with land estates across the Ottoman-Habsburg-Russian borders between the 1780s and the 1810s, displays the complications that characterized territorial annexation as a form of European expansion against the Ottoman Empire. In this respect, the ii local power holders’ private businesses with land estates challenged the authority of the three empires on the borderland, prompting the imperial central administrations to acknowledge such businesses in order to substantiate their own territorial claims. A study of the information networks that the local power holders operated between the Ottoman, Russian and Habsburg Empires during a period of crisis for the Ottoman Empire, from the Napoleonic Wars until the Greek revolts, reveals how diplomacy on the borderland became an important instrument to promote and oppose European expansionism at the Porte. It also reveals how local elites used their role in the Ottoman diplomacy to survive the political changes that the Greek revolts triggered at Constantinople. The analysis of the local power holders’ involvement in the Russian- sponsored administration of the borderland between 1829 and 1840 explores how European powers competing for control over an Ottoman Empire in turmoil began to promote formal agreements to legitimize their authority in imperial affairs, restrict Ottoman power and co-opt local leaders. The examination of successive European formal definitions of Ottoman, local and international control in Wallachia and Moldavia and of changing local political agendas (1830s- 1850s) explores the continuities between competing European imperial projects in the Ottoman Empire and the elites’ promotion of a unified nation-state on the borderland. iii Acknowledgments This project would not have been possible without the advice and support of many people who have helped me through the challenges of pursuing a PhD degree. I would like to thank my advisor, Professor Maria Todorova for encouraging me to trust myself and my research and for patiently reading and commenting on my graduate papers, applications and dissertation chapters. The members of my dissertation have helped me tremendously during the research and writing stages of my project. Professor Keith Hitchins kindly allowed me to use his impressive collection of books in the history of Eastern Europe and suggested references thanks to which I could keep my research on track in the archives of Iassy and Bucharest. Professors Christine Philliou (Columbia University) and John Randolph offered invaluable feedback on my writing. Professors Maria Todorova, Christine Philliou and Andreas Lyberatos from the Institute for Mediterranean Studies helped me nuance my view of modern Ottoman history and Ottoman history in the Balkans. The graduate courses taught by Professors John Randolph and Clare Crownston provoked me to reflect to the broader, European dimension of my project. As a teaching assistant, I was inspired by Professor Carol Symes to think of history teaching as a means to improve my own research, by making it more accessible to non-historians. Professor David Sansone inspired me to study Modern Greek, which helped my archival research. My fellow students in the History Department at the University of Illinois provided their support throughout my stay at Urbana Champaign. I would also like to express my gratitude to the Romanian scholars and researchers with whom I discussed my dissertation and the archival resources available in Romania. During my visit to Iassy, I benefited from the advice of Professors Alexandru-Florin Platon, Cristian Ploscaru and Bogdan Maleon from the University of Iassy, and of Mihai Mârza at the Romanian iv National Archives of Iassy. While in Bucharest, I had the pleasure to discuss my project with Professors Viorel Panaite and Bogdan Murgescu and with Dr. Constanţa Vintilă-Ghiţulescu, researcher at the Nicolae Iorga Institute. I was also lucky to meet Dr. Tudor Berza, the descendent of one of the characters in my dissertation, who commented on the preliminary work for the last chapter. I also received valuable comments from Professors Christine Philliou, Virginia Aksan, Rossitsa Gradeva, specialists in Ottoman history, from Professor Mark Mazower, a specialist in Balkan history and from other scholars in these fields during workshops of Ottoman history at Columbia University and Central European University, the student conferences in Middle Eastern Studies at the University of Chicago and the conventions of the Association for Slavic, East European and Eurasian studies and of the Association for the Study of Nationalities. The seminars and discussions at the New Europe College in Bucharest provided a great inter- disciplinary setting to present my work to young Romanian and international scholars. The staff members at the National Archives of Romania in Bucharest and Iassy and at the Austrian State Archives of Vienna made possible the timely completion of my archival research. Thanks to their kindness and solicitude I could tap on most of the sources I had planned to consult and to explore additional documents. I am also grateful for the long and short-term financial support that I received from the History Department at the University of Illinois, the American Society for 18 th Century Studies, the Open Society Institute, the New Europe College in Bucharest and the American School of Classical Studies at Athens. v My deepest thanks go to my family in Romania who encouraged me and took pride in my academic work, and to Antonis. More than anyone else, he believed that I could carry out this project and offered me his love through times, good and bad. vi TABLE OF CONTENTS Introduction ..................................................................................................................................... 1 Chapter 1: Buying and selling land on the Danube: wealth, Phanariot politics and inter-imperial rivalry in Moldavia, 1780s-1810s ................................................................................................. 30 Chapter 2: Trading news on the borderland: information networks in Wallachia, inter-imperial diplomacy and the negotiation of Ottoman affairs, 1800s-1820s ................................................. 72 Chapter 3: Running an imperial condominium on the borderland: local elites and the implementation of Russian imperial projects in Moldavia, 1820s-1840s................................... 116 Chapter 4: Politics at the end of empire: European expansion, “imperial suzerainty” and “national government” on the borderland, 1830s-1850s ............................................................ 157 Conclusion .................................................................................................................................. 198 Bibliography ............................................................................................................................... 204 APPENDIX A: Glossary............................................................................................................. 220 APPENDIX B: Family tree of the Rosetti-Roznovanus ............................................................. 225 APPENDIX C: Family tree Samurcas .......................................................................................