All
things considered, the foundation of Romania, as it is today, was laid in early
1859. Specifically, that meant the twofold election of colonel Alexandru Ioan
Cuza, on January 5th and 24th, as the ruling prince of Moldavia
and Wallachia, in then the capital of the two Romanian Principalities. The
person of a single ruling prince was the epitome of a tremendous amount of
effort the elites had made, for two generations, in a bid to build a Romanian
state following the modern European model.
We
have made an attempt to reminisce the key moments of that age at national but
also at international level. Joining us in our endeavour was historian Marian
Stroia, of the Romanian Academy s Nicolae Iorga Institute of History.
Marian Stroia:For the south-eastern space, the most important event with a strong
bearing on the situation of Romanian principalities is the Crimean War,
1853-1855. It was a pretext the Russians resorted to, so that they could put pressure
on th
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