Romania’s history is complex and often quite tragic. Romania is made up of three main historical areas; Wallachia to the south, where Bucharest is located, Transylvania in the mountains north of Wallachia, and Moldova to the east. There is also a smaller area of the Danube Delta. Only rarely in Romania’s history have all the regions been united. Because of the influences of so many invaders and conquerors, the culture of Romania can be very different from region to region.
The first people in Romania were the Dacias. Much of the area of today’s Romania was conquered by the Romans, the story of which is told on Rome’s famous Trajan stile. Because the region was rich in gold and silver and was on a trade route, Romania was invaded by nearly everyone around it sometime in its history. After the Romans came the Goths, the Huns, the Bulgarians and the Hungarians. In the 14th century, the Ottomans invaded and demanded tribute. Vlad the Impaler, the inspiration for the fictional character Dracula, refused to pay and was able to successfully fight off a large Turkish invasion. He did this by terror, impaling thousands of captured Turkish troops and leaving their bodies hanging along the invasion route.
The history becomes complex between the three regions as each area was ruled by different kings and was pretty much constantly invaded. When they weren’t being invaded, there were plagues. Basically, Romania was a pretty miserable place to live during the Middle Ages. There were a few kings who succeeded in briefly uniting sections of the country, but nothing lasted, and war broke out again and again.
Wallachia and Moldovia joined together in 1859, even though they were still dominated by the Turks. In 1866, Carol I, the first king of Romania took over the rule. He was a German, from the wealthy Hollenzollern family, but was independent of Germany. In 1878, Romania joined Russia in fighting the Ottomans and defeated them, finally getting Romania out from under Ottoman rule. During Carol I, Romania prospered. Although Romania was initially neutral in WWI, it sided with the Allies, and despite disasterous defeats, at the end of the war, was ceded Transylvania.
Romania had three more kings after Carol I; Ferdinand (Carol I’s nephew), Carol II, and Michael. After WWII, Romania came under control of the Soviet Union. Michael was forced to abdicate and left with his wife to live out his life in Switzerland, dying in 2017. Romania suffered under Soviet rule, and between 60,000 and 80,000 political prisoners were detained. The second socialist leader, Nicolae Ceausescu, instituted a severely repressive regime with the goal of paying back the national debt while also engaging in huge building projects. The country’s economy was destroyed, even as he imposed a cult of personality. Freedom of speech was severely limited, foodstuffs were in very short supply and people were starving, even as he spent billions to build his huge palaces and government buildings.
n December 1989, the people had enough. As he was giving a speech in Bucharest, the people started booing. Instead of the army stopping the unrest, they sided with the people. Ceausescu and his wife fled by helicopter but they were captured, and after a brief trial, sentenced to death. They were executed on national television on Christmas Day, 1989.
After such an abrupt change of government, the country struggled to build a cohesive government free of corruption. It’s still a work in progress. Many people will complain about behind the scene deals, but most people, especially the younger ones, are very glad that the communist days are behind them. Romania is still struggling, but her people are reaching for the chance to grow. One of the indicators of Romanian ambition is that currently, Romanian is the second most spoken language after English among Microsoft employees. There’s a desire to succeed, and Romania is absolutely a country to watch.
