« Activities « Conference Papers
TransCorr team member Constantin Ardeleanu presented his research on the origins and subsequent manifestations of Russophobia in nineteenth century Romania. His paper analysed several episodes that marked the genesis of nineteenth century Russophobia among Romanian elites. In the 1830s, the formation of a national party in Wallachia was the result of a complete distrust of imperial Russia’s annexationist plans in the Principalities.
Western-educated elites had Russophobic prejudices similar to those of Western European public opinion, clearly visible in various polemical pamphlets and especially during the 1848-1849 revolution. During the Crimean War, elites supported the anti-Russian military actions, also regarded as a sort of national liberation. Complete distrust was visible during Russian-Romanian military cooperation in 1877, while the outburst of public Russophobia followed in 1878, with the annexation of South Bessarabia. His talk contextualised several such episodes that shaped Romanian elites’ views of neighbouring imperial Russia as an abusive and corrupting power, a risk for their country’s sovereignty and for the peace of the larger region.
Team member Constanţa Vintilă presented the paper ”Wealth and corruption in Moldova during Mihail Sturdza’s Rule” at the Annual Convention of the “A.D. Xenopol” History Institute of the Romanian Academy (held in Iasi, May 30—June 1, 2024). Her paper investigated how society positioned itself in relation to wealth constructed through abusive means and how it reacted by publicly disavowing grand boyar Iorgu Hartulari, her case study. Iorgu Hartulari was a Greek who settled in Moldova around 1820 and managed to build a huge fortune and an important career by skillfully exploiting his linguistic knowledge, native intelligence, dowry and wife’s networks. The sources, many of them still unpublished, are very generous and reveal his relations with the patriarchates of Jerusalem, Constantinople, Alexandria, with the prince Mihail Sturza (1834-1848), with the Jews and Armenians of Moldavia, with the aristocratic elite of Iasi, with metropolitans, bishops, paschal and other officials.