La Transylvanie et les événements révolutionnaires de 1821 de Valachie et de Moldavie: réactions officielles et mentalités collectives

IOAN BOLOVAN, SORINA PAULA BOLOVAN, ADINA CORNEA
Abstract
The year 1821 definitely a special one had a special character in Transylvania, compared to the previous and following years. There were several tensions, protests and local unrest, without being coordinated. One certainly cannot speak of a revolution, not even of a revolt, an uprising. And yet, the echo of the events of 1821 across the Carpathians, among the Transylvanian Romanians, was obvious. In the Grand Principality of Transylvania and in Banat, the authorities recorded waves of dissatisfaction and unrest, particularly among the Romanians, fueled by rumors that “crăiuţul Todoruţ” (“the little King Todoruţ”) or Todoraş will free the Romanians living in those territories. The local and Austrian authorities noted in their reports the state of mind of the Romanian peasantry. These agitations took place against the more general background of the systemic crisis of feudalism. The accumulation of social and national tensions generated by this reality found its expression in the incessant peasant unrest, which, manifested in various forms, foreshadowed a re-enactment of Horea’s times. The behavior of many peasants investigated by the authorities reveals mental clichés, behaviors that were specific to moments of major crisis, of rupture between two worlds, as we find during Horea’s uprising or during the Revolution of 1848. Our paper will try to precisely present these behaviors, both of the Romanian authorities and the peasants in Transylvania during the first half of 1821.
Keywords: The revolution of 1821, Transylvania, Wallachia, Moldavia, collective behaviours.