440 B.C.
Herodotos described the SCYTHIANS, inhabiting the "lands East and North of the Danube river". "Scythian" is the collective name of a group of TURANIAN people, supposedly descendants of the SUMERIANS, but certainly carriers and preservers of the Sumerian culture. To the family of Scythian nations belonged the "Dacs" of ancient Dacians, the Huns, the Avars, the Bulgarians and the Magyars or Hungarians.
300 B.C.
Roman historians mentioned the THRACIANS moving Northward across the flatlands of the lower Danube and across the high mountain ranges, into a land surrounded by mountains.
200 B.C.
Greek historians referred to "Upper Thracia" as a beautiful country North of the Danube, and surrounded by mountains "like a natural fortress". These Greek chronicles furnish us with the first geographic description of the CARPATHIAN BASIN.
118 B.C.
Roman historians described the same land as "Dacia", homeland of "The Scythians who call themselves Das".
85 A.D.
The expanding Roman Empire began the invasion of Dacia. 107 A.D.
The war for Dacia ended under the Emperor Trajanus. According to Roman historians" the fierce Dac people put up an astonishing fight. Not even women and children were willing to surrender to the conquering legions, and had to be exterminated one by one".
117 A.D.
Emperor Adrianus ordered most of his troops out of the "completely devastated" Dacia into Asia Minor" leaving only two "legions of the Barbarians" in this North-Eastern outpost of his empire. The term "Legion of the Barbarians" meant army units recruited from the North-Western territories, inhabited by Germanic tribes.
271 A.D.
Yielding to the pressure of the invading GOTHS, Emperor Aurelian withdrew the last remaining legions from Dacia, under strict order to destroy buildings, food supplies, and completely evacuate the land before the oncoming "Barbarians". The Goths were a Teutonic people, referred to by Romans as "Barbarians".
433 A.D.
The HUNS entered the Carpathian Basin by crossing the North-Eastern Carpathians. According to contemporary historians, during the rule of Attila, Transylvania was still partly inhabited by Goths~ and it was marked as GOTHIA on the maps. Goth warriors of Transylvania participated in the Western adventures of Attila.
454 A.D.
After the death of Attila the Hun empire collapsed. 480 A.D.
The Western part of the former province of Dacia was under the rule of the GEPIDS while the Eastern part was still inhabited by a surviving tribe of the Huns, who later joined the new BULGARIAN-TURK tribal federation across the Eastern Carpathians. (Today"s Moldova.)
560 A.D.
The AVARS, a nation having the same language as the Huns according to contemporary Greek chronicles, crossed the Carpathians and occupied the entire Carpathian Basin, including Transylvania.
562 A.D.
Byzantine chroniclers observed the Avar envoy appearing before the emperor Justinian spoke the same language as the Hun-Bulgarian interpreter of the court.
796 A.D.
The Avar empire collapsed. 805 A.D.
Khan Krum "the terrible" created a strong Bulgarian empire on both sides of the Danube, including Transylvania. (Haleczky: Borderlands of Western Civilization. Ronald Press N.Y. 1952, Page 23.)
892-894 A.D.
Vatican, Byzantine and Russian (Kiev) chronicles described in detail the appearance of the Hungarians (Magyars) in the Carpathian Basin and the lower Danube region.
896 A.D.
The Hungarians defeated the Bulgarians and took possession of Transylvania .
938 A.D.
Byzantine historians gave detailed account of CSANAD and GYULAFEHERVAR (today Alba Julia) as strong Hungarian forts and prosperous cities in Transylvania. The name "Gyulafehervar" was even translated into Greek by one of the authors as "The White Fort of Gyula", explaining that Gyula was the name of the "Eastern Chief" of the Hungarian tribes.
946 A.D.
Byzantine documents mentioned for the first time the presence of the SZEKELYS in the Eastern-most tip of Transylvanial describing them as one of the Hungarian tribes settled there as border guards, within well organized military districts called "Szek" - chair or seat, referring to complete administrative and judicial power vested into their own chiefs. These privileges of the Szekelys were recognized later by the Hungarian kings also.
952 A.D.
By compiling all available data, Greek historians gave the first account of the migration of the Magyars (Hungarians) into the Carpathian Basin. According to this account, the Hungarians followed the trail of their brother-nations, the Huns and the Avars, moving first from the Volga-region into Etelkoz, then expanding slowly in a Westerly and south-westerly direction as far as today's Moldova, and finally crossing the Carpathians through three different routes, while a forth unit, in alliance with the Byzantine forces, attacked the Bulgarians at the lower Danube, took possession of the fertile lands between the Danube river and the Southern Carpathians or Transylvanian Alps, and joined the rest of the nation at the Iron Gate: a gorge cut by the Danube through thc mountains, south of the Great Hungarian Plain.
976 A.D.
Greek chronicles (Kedrenos II. 435. Ed. Bonn.) mentioned for the first time the name VLACH, describing a people of primitive herdsmen located between Kastoria and Prespa, near today"s Albanian border, who centuries later became the ancestors of the Rumanians. The name RUMANIAN was created only after the unification of Vlachia (or Wallachia) with the principality of Moldova in 1878.
978 A.D.
Vatican missionaries establish a church in the fort of "Varad" later called "Nagy-Varad" today Oradea. Reports sent back to Rome by the same missionaries described the small tribe of the JAZIG" who spoke "almost the same language" as the Hungarians, and was supposed to be living in the same region long before the Hungarians arrived. The descendants of the Jazig, called today "Jasz", can still be found on the Great Hungarian Plain, west of Nagyvarad. They are the only recorded inhabitants found by the Hungarian settlers in the Carpathian Basin, including Transylvania, except a few scattered fragments of SLAVS, who became assimilated within a few decades, and completely disappeared, leaving behind nothing more than a very few and widely scattered geographical names.
982 A.D.
Byzantine traders reported "rich Hungarian towns" in Transylvania where "good wine, raw gold, hides and various carved tools and art objects" could be purchased in exchange for silk and jewelry. They described the inhabitants as "proud Christians" and the country as "lively towns, cultivated valleys, surrounded by uninhabited mountain ranges and dense forests." Since the wife of chief Gyula, residing in Gyulafehervar was a Byzantine Princess, there was a lively exchange between the Eastern part of Hungary, called ERDOELVE (Transylvania) and the Byzantine empire. Thus, Christianity entered the Carpathian Basin in the same time from the West and from the East.
1002.
King Stephen the Saint, first king of Hungary, defeating his father-inlaw, the Gyula of Transylvania, established Western Christianity as official religion, and introduced the Western Feudalistic System by force. In spite of the defeat, Transylvania served for a long time as a refuge to all those Hungarians who either chose the Byzantine Christianity or held on to the ancient Hungarian faith of HADUR, the Lord of Hosts, a1so called UR, a monotheist religion dating back to UR of SUMER
1038.
In a special letter sent by a Frater Anselmus to the Doge of Venice, Transylvania, called "the eastern-most corner of the Hungarian Kingdom" was mentioned as the main source of salt for the Carpathian Basin. The salt mine of Desakna, near the fort of Des, was referred to as "the royal salt mine of Des".
1064.
Laszlo of the House of Arpad, son of King Solomon, received from his father the title "Prince of Transylvania". From this date on, during the rule of the House of Arpad (10001301( every crown-prince carried this title, with the obligation to reside in Transylvania, either in Nagyvarad, Kolozsvar or Gyulafehervar, and to take care of certain administrative, judicial and military duties.
1097.
Emperor Alexios Komnenos of Byzantium ordered the relocation of the Vlachs from the Chalkidike peninsula to Pelopponesos. With this, the northward migration of the Vlachs, ancestors of the Rumanians, began.
1166
Manuel Comnenus of Byzantium assembled a large number of Vlachs south of the Danube river (today"s Bulgaria) in order to launch an attack against the Hungarian fortifications along the left bank of the river, and to take the rich Hungarian settlement of Hosszumezo, known today as Campulung. (Translated from the Hungarian, meaning "long field".
1167.
Though the invading forces were defeated, and the land between the Danube and the Southern Carpathians remained officially until the invasion of the Turks (end of the 15th century) a territory of the Hungarian Kingdom, migrating Vlach herdsmen received permission to cross the Danube in search of pasture-lands. They settled first the Southern slopes of the Transylvanian Alps (Southern Carpathians) under their own tribal rulers, thus slowly establishing their claim to the land which was later called VLACHIA or WALLACHIA, and was declared in 1878 the "Kingdom of Rumania".
1168.
The first German settlers from the Moselle region were brought in by King Geza II in order to fortify some "empty lands" in the South-East of Transylvania. These new settlers established themselves near the royal fort of Brasso.
1220.
King Andras II invited several other groups of German settlers into Transylvania, settling them in autonomous districts. The royal charter granting these lands to the German settlers stated that they were settled "on the frontier of Transylvania, facing CUMANIA, a land without inhabitants". This Cumania, land without land between the lower Danube and the Southern Carpathians, into which migrating Vlach herdsmen were previously allowed to settle. However, the Vlachs, being nomadic people, kept on roaming with their herds back and forth across the mountains. The CUMANS, another Scythian tribe, also related to the Hungarians, after not being able to invade the Carpathian Basin, established their country East of the Carpathians and ruled over Moldova and Vlachia until the invasion of the TARTARS (1250).
1222.
King Andras II gave the "Golden Bull", the first constitution, to the people of the Hungarian Kingdom, establishing the autonomous district system in "all the countries of the Holy Crown", and thereby granting self-government in Transylvania for the Magyar, German, and the special Szekely districts. The Szekelys, though they were also Magyars or Hungarians" enjoyed very special privileges as "border guards" since their early settling in the 10th century. The new royal decree only upheld and re-affirmed these privileges.
1234.
Pope Gregory IX sent a letter to Bela, Prince of Transylvania (later King Bela IV.( asking him "in the name of God" to grant asylum to "those poor Vlach refugees" who wished to escape the harsh rule of the Cumans.The asylum was granted, and the first three groups of Vlach immigrants entered Transylvania from the South, and were settled, under their own chieftans, in the Forgaras, Hunyad and Bansag districts, on specially designated mountain-pastures called in the royal documents as "Silva Vlachorum", Forest of the Vlachs. These Vlach immigrants, who received asylum within the Hungarian Kingdom, and others who followed later, became the ancestors of the Transylvanian Rumanians. Officially they were called VLACHS, from which the Hungarian name OLAH and the German name Wallach derived, in contradistinction to the Rumelians and later Rumanians who did not enter the Western culture-circle but stayed East and South of the Carpathians under Byzantine and later Slavic influence" finally evolving at the end of the nineteenth century into Rumania.
1241.
The Tartar invasion" led by Batu Khan, swept through Hungary. King Bela IV lost the battle of Mohi, and fled to Austria. After the Tartars left, the king returned in 1242, and began to rebuild the devastated country. Several districts, especially on the Great Hungarian Plain, were left without population, making it possible for Serbians, Vlachs and Slovaks to seep into some of these empty lands, and establish a few scattered settlements.
1247.
New Vlach refugees gained permission to enter the Hatszeg and the Maramaros districts in Transylvania.
1253.
Guillaume Rubruquis" French envoy to Bulgaria described the empire of Zar Michael Aszen as "reaching from the Danube river to Konstantinopel, including Vlachia in lhe lower Balkan Muuntains." Vlachia therefore still existed at that time on the Balkan, under Bulgarian domination, while those Vlachs who tried to move Northward by crossing the Danube, fell under the rule of the Cumans.
1290.
Three Hungarian landowners in the Transylvanian districts of Hunyad and Feher received permission from King Andras III to bring in some Vlach laborers "from South of the mountains."
1291.
The Assembly of Gyulafehervar recognized the Transylvanian Vlachs as a "nation"" with rights equal to other member nations under the Holy Crown.
1314.
After the downfall of Cumania, the Hungarian king Charles Robert incorporated two Vlach principalities (voievodines) "across the mountains" into the "lands of the Holy Crown". The two new principalities were named MOLDOVA and WALLACHIA.
1358.
Mark, royal archivist wrote in his chronicles concerning Transylvania: "lt is the richest part of the Hungarian Kingdom" where "Hungarian and Saxon (German) cities bloom with industry and commerce, while the fertile lands of Hungarian farmers produce good wine, fat cattle, and plenty of grain for bread. High upon the mountains Vlach herdsmen tend to their sheep, and bring down good tasting cheese to the market-places . "
1385.
A new influx of Vlach immigrants was settled into the Szilagy district, establishing ten villages on the royal estate of Aranyosmedgyes.
1443.
Under the leadership of Janos Hunyadi, Duke of Transylvania, the combined armies of Hungarian, Polish, Bosnian and Serbian Crusaders defeated the invading Turks, and Serbia was freed. A.B. Yolland writes in his book "History of Hungary" Chapter X, page 64: "Hungary was indeed fighting the battles of Christendom, and the admiration of the Christian World was lavished on her soldiers." (See Bibliography.)
1456.
Janos Hunyadi won a second victory over the Turks at Nandorfehervar (today known as Belgrade). In order to commemorate this decisive victory of Christianity over the Pagans, the Pope decreed that all church bells were to be rung from then on each day at noon, throughout the Christian world.
1458.
Mathias Corvinus, son of Janos Hunyadi, was elected king of Hungary. Under his rule Hungary again became one of the great powers of Europe. His birth-house in Kolozsvar (today Cluj-Napoca) was honored as a national shrine until the Rumanian occupation of Transylvania in 1919.
1471.
The first book in the Hungarian language was printed by a Transylvanian Hungarian printer.
1505.
Vatican census estimated the total population of Hungary to be about four million souls, of which 77% were Hungarians, and the rest Germans, Croatians, Slovaks, Serbians and Vlachs. (In the same time the total population of England was four million also, while that of the Austrian Empire, including Bohemia and Silezia, five million, and that of France eight million.)
1516.
The first Protestant (Calvinist) congregation was established in Nagyenyed. (Today the Rumanians call it Aiud.) From here on Protestantism spread rapidly throughout Transylvania.
1526.
The invading Turks defeated the army of King Louis II in the tragic battle of Mohacs, where the king himself fell. Hungary was split up into three parts. While the central part was occupied by the Turks for 150 years, the Western section and the Northern section of the country fell into the hands of the Habsburgs, who claimed their right to the Holy Crown or Stephen's Crown on the female line, but refused to uphold the constitution for which the Crown was the symbol. Only the Eastern part, including Transylvania carried on the traditions of an independent Hungary "under freely elected Dukes" until 1690. Many historians refer to this era as the "Independent Transylvania", forgetting that in reality Transylvania was the only free part left of Hungary, a last fortress between the Habsburgs and the Turks, where the elected Dukes, exercising the office of the king, kept the peace by wisely balancing their diplomatic relations with both sides, according to the demands of necessity.
1545.
Gaspar Heltai published the complete Hungarian translation of the Bible in the city of Kolozsvar, which not only served as the Hungarian capital but also as the new cultural center. A few years later Tinodi Lantos Sebestyen published his famous "Chronicles in Verses."
1556.
The Hungarian Congress of Torda (today called Turda by the Rumanians) declared freedom of religion, stating in the new law that "everyone may follow the religion of his choice, and no one may interfere with persons professing any other faith." It was the first such law in the world.
1561.
The four Gospels of the New Testament were translated into the Vlach tongue, and published at the expense of the Hungarian landowner Miklos Forro of Brasso, thereby marking the birth of the Vlach (Rumanian) literature.
1568.
The Reverend Ferenc David established the Unitarian Church in Transylvania. Even today, though the Unitarian religion is widely spread all over the world, the center of the Church is still in Transylvania, where the Unitarian Bishop resides as the successor of the founder of the church, Ferenc David.
1570.
The duke Kristof Bathory established in Gyulafehervar the first Vlach printing shop in order that "culture may spread among those poor mountain-dwellers . "
1576.
The Transylvanian duke Stephen Bathory became king of Poland, creating a Polish-Hungarian alliance against the Habsburg empire.
1582.
The Hungarian nobleman Ferenc Geszthy financed the translation and publication of the OId Testament in the Vlach (Rumanian) language. 1586.
There were 18 Transylvanian Hungarian students enrolled at the Wittenberg University, and by 1640 more than 500 Transylvanians received diplomas from Wittenberg and Lynden. In the same time several world-famous scientists were teaching in Transylvanian colleges, such as Martin Opitz from Germany, John Alsted from England, Henry Bisterfeld and Isaac Basire from France.
1598.
There were 44 printing establishments working in Transylvania, producing up to this date 380 books, of which 18 were in German, 6 in Latin, 4 in Vlach, and the rest in the Hungarian language.
1600.
Michael, voievod of Wallachia, invaded Transylvania from the South, ravaging Hungarian towns and villages, until General Basta, commander of the Imperial forces of Rudolf Habsburg, defeated him. This was the first terrifying encounter of the defenseless Hungarian population with the cruel Vlach (Rumanian) savagery, of which they had to endure so much in later centuries.
1603.
Under Habsburg auspices, the military terrorism of General Basta devastated a large part of Transylvania by massacring entire villages in order to "exterminate all the Protestants."
1604.
Radu, Vlach voievod, received permission from Rudolf Habsburg to enter the country with his entire tribe and take possession of the devastated lands. However, the same year Duke Istvan Bocskay and his famous Szekely cavalry freed Transylvania as well as the Nortl1ern part of Hungary from the marauding Habsburg forces. Radu was ordered out of the country. Nevertheless, some of his people were allowed to remain, and build new Vlach (Rumanian) villages in the central region of Transylvania.
1658.
Census taken by the Jesuit Fathers showed the total population of Transylvania as 860,000 souls, of which about 240,000 were Vlachs.
1659.
A Tartar invasion from the East devastated the main Szamos-valley. 1664.
A new influx of Vlach immigrants entered from Moldova, brought in by Hungarian landowners to settle on the empty lands of the Szamos valley.
1690.
Emperor Luitpold Habsburg of Austria conquered Transylvania, abolished the Hungarian constitution, and turned the country into a province of Austria. The persecution of the Protestants began anew. Clergymen and schoolteachers were killed or tortured and sent to the galleys in the Mediterranian, where they died as slaves. With this, the last stronghold of the constitutional Hungarian Kingdom, Transylvania, fell into the clutches of Habsburg absolutism. All constitutional rights of the established nationalities as well as the established Protestant churches were revoked. One year later, Emperor Luitpold I officially terminated the Transylvanian principality and incorporated it as a province into the Austrian empire.
1698.
The Greek Catholic Church, known as "Uniate Church" was created through mutual agreement of Emperor and Pope. All Greek Orthodox congregations throughout the Empire were requested to join. Those who refused to join, were deprived of all contacts with their mother-church across the borders.
Prof. Haraszti writes in his book "The Ethnic History of Transylvania" (Danubian Press, 1971) on page 87: "The appearance of the Uniate Church, which was actually a handshake between Catholicism and Byzanthinism at the expense of Protestantism, represented an alliance between the Imperial conquerors and the Wallachian subjects against the Protestant Magyars. The "Divide et Impera" policy, which became a very typical Habsburg tactic in the nineteenth century, appeared for the first time in the eighteenth century in Transylvania, with this classic example.
J. Slavici, Rumanian historian writes in his book "Ardea1u1, Studiu Istoric", published in 1893: "The only cultural institution of the Rumanians ..." (meaning the Vlachs or Wallachians, since in the 17th and 18th centuries the word "Rumanian" had not yet been created) " ... was the Greek Orthodox Church, which stood under complete Balkan-Slavic influence. Even its official language was the Slavic. Thus the era of national consciousness began on1y when half of the Transylvanian Vlachs converted into the Greek Catholic religion, and our priests were able to study in Rome and Vienna." (pages 95-96)
Eugene M. Osterhaven writes on the same subject in his book "Transylvania, The Pathos of a Reformation Tradition" (Western Theological Seminary, Holland, Michigan, 1968) on page 18: "However, two thirds of the Transylvanian Rumanians resumed Orthodoxy by the mid-eighteenth century in spite of Habsburg attempts to keep them in the Roman fold."
C.A. Macartney states in "Hungary and Her Successors" (Oxford University Press, 1937) page 261: "The Wallachian mass lived with one foot in Hungary. Most of them were shepherds, whose periodical migration on the high mountains took them regularly across the frontiers. Most of the Transylvanian Wallachians saw Wallachia and Moldova as their real homeland, and even the agriculturalists decamped readily across the Carpathians if times were hard - just as they immigrated, as casually, when conditions were severe in Wallachia or Moldova."
1703.
Under the Duke Ferenc Rakoczi II the Hungarian people revolted against Habsburg oppression. During this famous war of liberty which lasted for eight years" many of the Vlach settlements, instigated by Habsburg agents, turned against their Hungarian hosts and neighbors, looting, burning" and massacring defenseless women and children.
1711.
The war of liberty against the Habsburgs ended in defeat. Thousands of Hungarians who fought for liberty were executed, imprisoned or deported to forced labor. Those who proved to be loyal to the Habsburg throne were rewarded by royal grants to the properties of those who were found in treason. Considerable landholdings were given this way, mostly in the central parts of Transylvania, to Vlachs who led the bloody raids against defenseless Hungarian towns and villages.
1718.
The last strip of Hungary, the Banat, was freed from the Turks. According to contemporary reports, in the entire territory, which supports today nearly one-million people, there were no more than about 700 persons to be found alive.
1719.
From Vlachia (or Wallachia) still under Turk domination, a steady stream of refugees began to migrate into the empty land of the Banat, as well as into other parts of Transylvania, where they were settled by special "Imperial decree" of the Emperor Charles III on lands confiscated from Hungarians for their participation in the liberty war.
1729.
Inocentius Micu Klein, Greek Catholic bishop, demanded for the Transylvanian Vlachs equal rights with other nationalities under the Crown. Emperor Charles III refused the demand on the grounds that "the Crown recognizes only subjects of different tongues and different religious denominations, not nationalities." Bishop Micu Klein was the first to use the word "RUMUN" instead of Vlach, and to claim LATIN origin. Until then the popular concept accepted the Slavic origin of the Vlachs, based on the use of the Slavic language in the Greek Orthodox Church as well as on the fact, established by several linguists (including Prof. Cihac, Rumanian linguist of the XX century) that 48% of the Rumanian language consisted of Slavic words and only 31% of the Latin.
1766.
Empress Maria Therezia, following the advice of her Transylvanian governor, extended the system of "Military Frontier Privileges", enjoyed previously only by the Szekely districts, to three Vlach districts also. This enabled Peter Aron, Bishop of the Greek Catholic Church, to establish from public funds the first Vlach highschool, and the first Vlach seminary.
1784.
The Transy1vanian Hungarian Assemb1y in Kolozsvar petitioned Emperor Joseph II to recognize the Vlachs as a "nation". Instead, the Emperor abolished even the rest of the Transylvanian constitution, dissolving the "three nation" concept. Two months later the "Vlach rebellion", led by Horia, Closka and Crisan, ignited the Central Mountain districts and the lower Maros valley.
Hugh Seton-Watson writes about it in his book "Eastern Europe" (Archon Books, England, 1962) on pages 59-60: "Rumanian historians are inclined today to treat this as a nationalist rising. But the movement was essentially a sociat revolt of the peasant masses against the structure of the feudalistic Monarchy. The rebellion brought unprecedented horror to Hungarian towns and villages. Drunk Vlachs ruthlessly tortured, maimed and murdered thousands of men, women and children. Well informed sources claimed that Horia, the master-mind of the rebellion, received instructions in Vienna from the Emperor himself, who wanted to punish the "rebellious Hungarians" for demanding the re-establishment of the Constitution and the Congress. Though the leaders of the rebellion were finally executed by the Austrian troops, the villages where the Hungarian population was killed out, were donated by special decree to the same Vlachs who did the killing. Another example of the Habsburg methods of playing one nationality group against the other."
1815.
The spirit of the French revolution penetrated the borders. The Hungarian Nationa1 Assembly, finally granted by a reluctant Emperor Francis I demanded among others the re-unification with Transylvania. The Emperor rejected the demand. C.A. Macartney writes of this era in his book "Hungary" (Edinburgh, University Press, 1962) on page 103:"The system of government in all of the Habsburg provinces was autocratic. The Transylvanian Diet was indeed convoked regularly, but it was so tightly packed with ex-officio members as to forfeit any claim to represent the people. The military administration was purely authoritarian. The democratic evolution of the Transylvanian Principality could not continue under Habsburg domination."
1822.
According to the officia1 (anti-Hungarian) census, conducted by Austrian administrative officials the total population of Transylvania proper was -1-,500,000 of which 250,000 were registered as Germans, -700-,000 as Rumanians and 550,000 as Hungarians. A later research, conducted by the newly established Hungarian Academy of Sciences in 1947, proved that about -100-,000 Hungarians who admitted mastering the German or the Rumanian languages also, were registered as Germans or Rumanians.
1847.
Both Houses of the Hungarian National Assemb1y passed unanimously the decision to reincorporate Transylvania into Hungary. However, negotiations with the Imperial Government on this subject became deadlocked.
1848.
The Hungarian Liberty War errupted under the leadership of Louis Kossuth. The Hungarian National Assembly proclaimed the Republic. Transylvania was re-united with the Mother-Land. The Transylvanian Assembly in Kolozsvar voted in favour of equal rights for the V1achs (Rumanians). (See: M. Ghyka "A Documented Chronology of Rumanian History" Blackwell, Oxford, 1941.)
In spite of this, the Transylvanian Vlachs again launched a well organized attack against Hungarian towns and villages, in support of the Habsburg forces. "These Wallachians committed such dreadful crimes against the elderly, women and children" wrote Mme. Lebergere, an eyewitness, whose memoirs were later published in Paris "that even the Austrians were ashamed at what was going on under their authority. The password was: total extermination of the Magyars!"
T. Karsa writes in "Remarks on the Daco-Roman theory", Toronto, 1964 page 4: "The Wallachian peasants totally exterminated the Hungarian popu1ation of Nagyenyed, Abrudbanya and Zalatna. They annihilated one half of the Hungarian population in the district of Hunyad."
1849.
In spite of all the odds the heroic armies of the Hungarian Repub1ic won every battle against the Imperial forces, until the new Emperor, the 16 years old Franz Joseph I called upon the Czar of Russia for aid. One hundred thousand Russian troops stormed into the Carpathian Basin, and the Liberty War was crushed. On October 6, thirteen Hungarian generals were executed in Arad. Thousands of others were imprisoned. An era of brutal terror and oppression descended upon the country, called the "Bach Age", referring to Baron Alexander Bach, Imperial Minister of Internal Affairs.
1858.
In the conference of Paris the powers of Europe decided to establish the "United Principalities of Moldavia and Wallachia" under separate but identical administrations.
These two territories were under Turk domination, ruled by Sultanappointed "hospodars", until 1829, when Russia received full control over them through the Treaty of Adrianople. The Czar became the Head of the Greek Orthodox Church and thereby the "Father of all Wallachians,". However in 1854 Russia was forced to evacuate the two provinces and Austrian forces took over, until the "United Principalities of Moldavia and Wallachia" were established at the Paris Conference.
1862.
Sultan Abdul Aziz allowed the fusion of the two Vlach or Wallach administrative bodies. The union of the two provinces became recognized under the new name of RUMELIA - later changed into RUMANIA.
1866.
With the approval of France and Germany (Napoleon III and Bismarc) the German Prince Charles of Hohenzollern-Siegmaringen was proclaimed king of Rumania, and a new independent country was born between Central Europe and the Balkan Peninsula.
1867.
Due to diplomatic pressure from without and the unique statesmanship of Ferenc Deak from within, emperor Franz Joseph I made peace with Hungary. Austria and Hungary became "equal partners" within the frame-work of the Austro-Hungarian dual monarchy. Constitutional parliamentary system was re-established. Transylvania again became re-united with Hungay. All "special national privileges were abolished, and the equality of all citizens proclaimed, irrespective of race, creed or language." (C.A. Macartney: Hungary and Her Successors, page 262.( The Constitution of Dec.21. 1867 was the masterpiece of liberal ideologists. It contained the complete catalogue of the basic human rights, limited the power of the government, introduced the responsibility of the cabinet, and contained directives concerning the equality of all nationalities. (Haraszti: Ethnic History of Transylvania, page 114. (The well known Rumanian scholar, Onisifor Ghibu writes in his book "Viata si organizatea bisericeasca si scolari in Transylvania" (1915): "As an autonomous body, the Rumanian Greek Oriental Church in Hungary and Transylvania, by virtue of the rights ensured in 1868, administers, directs and manages independently its own ecclesiastical and educational affairs and trust funds in every respect . .. school-inspectors have no authority over our schools . . . parents are free to send their children to the school of their choice. In all Rumanian schools in Hungary and Transylvania the language of instruction is exclusively Rumanian."
1883.
Fearing Russia, the Kingdom of Rumania enters into alliance with the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy.
1907.
Peasants in Moldavia rebel against the cruel treatment they have to endure from Rumanian officials. The insurrection was put down by military force and martial law proclaimed throughout the Rumanian kingdom.
1913.
Rumania declared war on Bulgaria, and took Northern Dobrudja by force.
1914.
World War I. erupted. In spite of the "Triple Alliance" (Germany, Austria-Hungary and Rumania( Rumania proclaimed neutrality.
1916.
Based on promises to receive Transylvania, the Banat, and Southern Bukovina as booty, Rumania declared war on Austria-Hungary, and swept into Transylvania in a surprise attack. Within a few days the attack was repelled. Rumania was occupied by German forces and defeated.
1918.
March 5, Rumania signed the "Treaty of Bucharest", returning Dobrudja to Bulgaria, and giving up all claims to the Transylvanian passes. In October the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy collapsed. Rumania invaded Transylvania, and on Dec.1. in a mass-meeting of 25,000 Rumanians in Gyulafehervar (Alba Julia) declared the "Union of Rumania with Transylvania" in the name of more than five million people who did not even know of the meeting.
Though the Hungarian and the German population strongly objected, the Rumanian army, instigated by the French, marched into Kolozsvar on Christmas Eve, in defiance of the Armistice, which stipulated that all military lines should freeze at their locations until further deliberations and agreements.
1919.
On January 19 Rumanian troops opened fire into a crowd of more than 30,000 unarmed Hungarians who gathered on the Mathias-Plaza in Kolozsvar to ask the representative of the Entente forces, the French general Berthelot, lodged in the hote1 at the corner of the plaza, to order the Rumanians out of the city and back to the demarcation line, which was the Maros river. More than one hundred Hungarian demonstrators were killed, and more than a thousand wounded. In punishment for the demonstration Rumanian troops looted and ransacked the city.
Peter Pastor writes in "The Vix Mission in Hungary, 19181919, a Re-examination" (Slavic Review XXIX, No. 3 1970) and in "Franco-Rumanian Intervention in Russia and the Vix Ultimatum: Background to Hungary's Loss of Transylvania" (1974):
"The Vix Ultimatum, delivered to the Hungarians on March 20, 1919 by the head of the French Military Mission in Hungary, Lt. Colonel Ferdinand Vix, seemed to legitimize Rumanian occupation of Transylvania. The opening of the archives of the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs for 1918 and 1919 in the summer of 1972 shed new and startling light on the affair.... It is now evident that the ultimatum was prompted by a sudden crisis in southern Russia where Allied troops under French command were being defeated by the Red Army. To obtain quick reinforcements from neighbouring Rumania" the French Premier and Minister of War G. Clemenceau had to pay off the Rumanians at once with the Transylvanian territory they coveted ..."
The documents of the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs make it quite clear now that Transylvania, as well as part of the Banat and part of the Great Hungarian Plain were given to Rumania by the French alone, in four separate chunks, with complete disregard of the Wilsonian doctrine of self determination, and without the knowledge and approval of the Governments of the United States and Great Britain in order to buy Rumanian support against Russia.
Already on January 27, 1919, the Peace Conference in Paris had adopted President Wilson's resolution against the use of armed force "to gain possession of territory, the rightful claim to which the Peace Conference is to be asked to determine." (Spector: Rumania at the Paris Peace Conference, page -80-. (Pastor writes in "Franco-Rumanian Intervention in Russia and the Vix Ultimatum: Background to Hungary's Loss of Transylvania", page 17: The Supreme Council referred Rumania's territorial claims to a "Commission for the Study of Territorial Questions Relating to Rumania." The eight-member panel of French, British, Italian and American experts was to examine Rumania"s claims on its four neighbors - Russia, Serbia, Bulgaria and Hungary. But the Rumanians disregarded both: Wilson's call for peace and the new commission. They continued to advance into Hungarian territory."
Thus, long before any desicions were made by the Peace Conference in regard of Rumania's territorial claim in Transylvania, Rumania with French encouragement took possession of Transylvania, the Banat and part of the Great Hungarian Plain. Occupying lands with not one Rumanian inhabitant, whatsoever. Thereby deceiving the Governments of the United States, Great Britain and Italy, motivated by its own greed and by French desire to gain Rumanian military aid against Russia.
1920.
By March 1920 all markers, street-signs, village-signs, railroad-signs etc. were torn down in the entire Rumanian-occupied territory and replaced by new signs in Rumanian language. Rumanian names were created for towns and villages with no Rumanian inhabitants. When the International Peace Commission came to inspect the new border-line proposed by France and Rumania, they were given the impression that not one single Hungarian inhabited the land.
On June 4, the Hungarian Government was compelled to sign the TREATY of TRIANON, by which the thousand year old Hungary was shorn of almost three-fourths of its territory, and two-thirds of its inhabitants .
However, on the insistence of the Allied Powers article 47 was included in the treaty, stipulating that Rumania pledges itself to protect the interest of those citizens who differ from the majority of the population in respect of race, language or religion.
However, by then more than 150,000 Hungarians mostly civil servants and teachers, were expelled from their native country and the "forced Rumanization of Transylvania began." (See: E. Osterhaven "Transylvania ..." page 19.)
As a result of the Trianon Dictum from the 20,886,487 popu1ation of Hungary -13-,271,370 were placed under the domination of other countries.
Hugh Seton-Watson writes in "Eastern Europe Between the Wars" (Archon Books, 1962) on page 300-301:."The Hungarians became second class citizens in Transylvania ... Rumanian officials from across the mountains flooded the province ..."
1923.
The Rumanian government executed a special land reform in Transylvania only, aimed against the Hungarians. A Total of 2,718,146 acres of land was taken from Hungarians, mostly small landowners, and handed over to the Rumanian population and the Rumanian churches. (According to Rumanian statistics, prior to this land reform of the 5,461,200 acres of agricu1tural land in Transylvania only -1-,904,635 acres were owned by farmers possessing more than 100 acres.)
1924.
Discrimination against Hungarians increased. Prof. C.A. Macartney writes in his book "Hungary and Her Successors" page 322: Taxation has undoubtedly been discriminatory. Certain taxes exist which affect minorities almost exclusively. Hungarian shopkeepers, Hungarian professionals have to pay extra taxes for various reasons ..."
Parallel with the economic persecution, the Rumanian government undertook an all-out offensive against Hungarian schooling. Hungarian, as a language of instruction, was abolished and its use strictly forbidden in al1 public schools. In many cases children were cruelly beaten for using their native tongue, even among themselves during the recess.
1925.
Protestant as well as Catholic parochial schools, some of them established in the 15th and 16th centuries, were closed down. The American Committee for the Rights of Religious Minorities reported: "The administrative oppression, the violent enforcing of the Rumanian language, the aggressive hostility ... all these are aimed for the total destruction of the minority school system. The laws of 1925 serve as oppressive political and nationalistic tools against the minorities." (Religious Minorities in Transylvania, The Bacon Press, Boston, 1925.) While in 1911, under Hungarian rule, there were 2,813 public schools in Transylvania in which Rumanian was the language of instruction, by 1925, five years after the Rumanian take-over, there was none left at all for the use of the Hungarian language.
Transylvania"s biggest Hungarian-language daily newspaper, the BRASSOI LAPOK, reported on December 14, 1925 from Csikjenofalva, a 100% Hungarian community: "The new teacher, Mr. Clements Tratiu, who was sent recently by the government to teach in the purely Hungarian village of Csikjenofalva, in his efforts to enforce the new language regulations handed out such beatings to his pupils that on the first day parents had to carry home twenty-four badly beaten children from the schoolhoose who were unable to walk."
1926.
The rigid censorship, instituted in 1919 toward all publications in Hungarian language was reinforced by two new laws. One of them required that even prayer-books and hymnals carry the stamp of approval of the State Censor before they could be printed, while the other prohibited the "import" of newspapers, magazines and other printed materials from Hungary, either by mail or otherwise.
1928.
A special delegation of Transylvanian Hungarians presented in Geneva to the League of Nations a 280 pages long list of grievances proving the breach of treaty from the part of the Rumanian government against the Hungarian people of Transylvania in 166 well documented cases. Rumania was reprimanded, and the Rumanian delegate promised redress. However, nothing happened. Members of the Hungarian delegation were taken off the train as soon as they crossed the border, detained, harassed under false pretenses, and their passports revoked.
1936.
The "Iron Guard", an extreme right-wing organization, secretly encouraged by Hitler"s Germany, staged the first anti-Semitic and anti-Hungarian riots in Brasso" (Brasov), Nagyenyed (Aiud) and Kolozsvar (Cluj-Napoca).
1939.
King Carol of Rumania declared full co-operation with the German Reich.
1940.
Rumania was forced to yield to the demands of the Soviet Union and evacuate Besarabia as well as Northern Bukovina. Southern Dobrudja had to be returned to Bulgaria. In August of the same year the Axis powers ordered the return of Northern Transylvania to Hungary, reuniting 1,200,000 Hungarians with their Motherland, while still leaving about 600,000 under Rumanian domination.
On August 19 of the same year there was a secret deliberation taking place between Dr. Jonel Pop, representing the Transylvanian Rumanians and Count Andor Teleki, representing the Hungarian government. Dr. Pop stated the propostions of the Rumanians in Transylvania in the following four possibilities:
-1-. Part of Transylvania to be returned to Hungary, followed by a population exchange.
-2-. The creation of an autonomous Transylvania" ruled by the three inhabiting nationalities, as part of the Rumanian Kingdom.
-3-. An independent Transylvania.
-4-. A Hungarian-Rumanian Federation under one king and composed of three independent administrative units: Hungary, Transylvania and Rumania.
Dr. Jonel Pop, the aid of the ailing J . Maniu, declared that for the sake of a permanent solution the great majority of the Rumanians would accept any one of the above possibilities. Further deliberation were postponed after the end of the war.
1941.
The German-Italian Officer's Commission, established for the supervision of the implications and applications of the provisions of the "Vienna Treaty" concerning the treatment of minorities, examined 387 complaints of abuses in Southern Transylvania committed by Rumanian authorities against the Hungarian population, and 26 complaints of Hungarian abuses against the Rumanians in Northern Transylvania.
1942.
Rumanian atrocities against Hungarians in Southern Transylvania reached the number of 1372, while registered Rumanian complaints in Northern Transylvania numbered only 87. Cases examined by the Commission in Southern Transylvania included 273 murders" 687 severe beatings by the Rumanian police" the arrests of 48 Hungarian Clergymen, 6 newsmen and 317 professionals.
All Hungarian men in Southern Transylvania" between the ages of 17 to 45 were called into service by the Rumanian army, and sent under deplorable conditions into the labor camps of Besarabia and Bukovina. 1943.
Though Rumania entered the war on June 22, 1941 as full-fledged ally of Germany, and recaptured with German aid Besarabia and Bukovina from the Russians, after the German disaster at Stalingrad the Rumanian leaders engaged themselves in secret negotiations with the Allies.
In the same time the Hungarian Government attempted to make a separate peace with the West. However, the Teheran Conference (Nov. 28, 1943 - Jan 12, 1944) brought about the unfortunate decision that Eastern and East-Central Europe, including Rumania, Hungary, Czechoslovakia and Poland constituted the "special sphere of regional interest" of the Soviet Union, therefore negotiations, concerning these countries, had to be pursued exclusively with the Soviet Union.
1944.
March 19. German forces occupied Hungary.
August 24, Rumania surrendered to and joined forces with the invading Russians. Together, with Russian army, regular Rumanian troops as well as guerilla-bands entered Transylvania, creating the most ferocious bloodbath in history. Thousands and thousands of Hungarians were killed,tortured, imprisoned and deported into forced labor camps.
According to eyewitness reports, from the city of Kolozsvar alone more than -24-,000 Hungarians were herded together, beaten, tortured and deported. Within three months an estimated 200,000 Hungarians were moved out in this way from Transylvania, and placed into labor camps, mostly in the swamps of Dobrudja.
Some of the sworn testimonies of surviving eyewitnesses can be found in the APPENDIX.
1945.
The Soviet Military Administration of Northern Transylvania was replaced by Rumanian administration. Mr. Zathureczky writes in his book "Transylvania, Citadel of the West" (Danubian Press, 1964) page 52: "Stalin gave back Northern Transylvania to the Rumanians under the condition that they would respect the rights of the ethnic groups. With this step he introduced into Transylvania the Stalinist national policy. This policy consisted of the recognition of ethnic autonomies" and it was based on a federation of these autonomies. These autonomies are nationalistic in form, and socialistic in substance."
One of the conditions, under which the Russian Military Government returned the full administration of Transylvania to the Rumanians was the setting up of two or more Autonomous Hungarian Districts in order to secure complete self-administration to the Hungarian population of Transylvania.
This condition as well as many others pertaining to the basic rights of the Hungarians in Transylvania were never fulfilled by the Rumanian government.
1947.
On February 10 the Rumanian Peace Treaty was signed in Paris, of ficially declaring the return of Northern Transylvania to Rumania - in spite of American protest. Rumania again guaranteed the rights of the minorities .
On April 13 the Rumanian People"s Republic was proclaimed.
On August 7 a new constitution was adopted, which again proclaimed equal rights and self administration to the national minorities. However, all religious and cultural organizations were subjected to State control. Roman Catholic opposition led to the arrest of the remaining bishops and to dissolution of all Roman Catholic organizations.
1949.
Lay leaders, priests, ministers of the Roman Catholic, Calvinist, Lutheran and Unitarian churches were imprisoned or sent to forced labor camps.
The Greek Catholic Church was liquidated by law. The congregations of these parishes were automatically "returned into the Greek Orthodox Church and listed on census-sheets as "Rumanians" no matter which ethnic group they belonged.
1950.
Under Soviet pressure the Rumanian government agreed to create an Autonomous Hungarian Region on the Territory inhabited by a compact Hungarian (Szekely) population with the capital of Marosvasarhely Tirgu Mures. In this "autonomous" region, however, the official language remained the Rumanian, the top administrative offices were held by Rumanians, sent there directly from Bucharest, and the police force was kept 100% Rumanian. Those Hungarians who dared to object, were deported into the i1l-famed labor camps in the Danube delta.
1956.
Following the uprising in Hungary, the Rumanian Government availed itself of the opportunity to order new mass-arrests throughout Transylvania. Though only seventeen Hungarians were executed - beside Imre Nagy, premier of Hungary for those few glorious days of freedom and his entourage who were handed over by the Russians for "safekeeping" - more than 200 died from the beatings during the interrogation, and about six thousand received heavy prison sentences in Kolozsvar alone. For eyewitness testimonies see APPENDIX. George Bailey, American journalist, described the situation in THE REPORTER of November 1964: "After the Hungarian revolution thousands of Hungarians were arrested in Transylvania, perhaps hundreds put to death. In one trial alone in Cluj thirteen out of fiftyseven accused were executed. This year (1964) some eight thousand political prisoners were released with considerable fanfare by the Government in a general amnesty."
M. Eugene Osterhaven in The Present Situation of Hungarians in Transylvania, Western Theological Seminary, Holland, Michigan, 1968, page 34, adds to this: " . . . but as far as I could ascertain (in 1968) in my recent travels through Transylvania, not one of the Hungarians arrested during the revolt has yet been released."
1959.
The Hungarian University of Kolozsvar and the Hungarian high schoo1s all over Transylvania became absorbed by their Rumanian counterparts. Thus Hungarian higher education was abolished in Transylvania. Several members of the Hungarian faculty were driven to suicide. (See: "Der Spiegel" No. 45, October -31-. 1966. Also: "National Minority Problems" by George Hay in Kurt, London, ed. of Eastern Europe in Transition, The John Hopkins Press, Baltimore, 1966, page -133-. Also: The New York Times, June 10. 1959.(
The Hungarian Institute of Medicine and Pharmacy, located in Marosvasarhely (Tirgu Mures) lost its autonomy. (See: Robert R. King "Minorities Under Communism", Harvard University Press, Cambridge, 1973, pages 153-154.(
1960.
The Rumanian Government removed two districts from the Autonomous Hungarian Province, both with 92% Hungarian population, and attached them to a Rumanian populated district, while adding to it in exchange another large area with 88% Rumanian population, thus trying to weaken the Hungarian majority of the Hungarian province. The name was also changed from "Autonom Hungarian Province" to "Autonom Hungarian-Mures Territory."
1963.
Edward Crankshaw reported in his article "Hungarian Minority Fears Rumanian Axe" (The New York Herald Tribune, Apr. 15, 1963.) that Hungarian fami1ies are being deported in mass from purely Hungarian districts of Transylvania into other parts of Rumania, mostly to the Danube delta, into huge labor camps, where they die by the hundreds due to lack of food and medical care.
It is being noted also, that those deported or "re-settled" under the pretense of job opportunities - already more than 200,000 people - are immediately stricken from the official records in Transylvania, while in their new locations they are listed by the census takers as Rumanians. The Rumanization of Transylvania was so successful, that in September 1963, when Mr. Georghiu-Dej, party-boss and prime minister visited the so-called "Autonomous Hungarian Territory" and the Rumanian newspapers reported the names of the officials of the territory - there was not one single Hungarian name among them!
1964.
The International Commission of Jurists examined the Transylvanian minority problem, and pub1ished a report entit1ed "The Hungarian Minority Prob1em in Rumania". In this report the Commission stated among others that "Rumania ignores the political clauses of the Peace Treaty, and its own constitution, Art. 82, which clearly provides that "all national groups are entitled to use their respective languages and to have at all levels establishments of public education in which instruction is given in their mother tongue, and further that the spoken and written language used by administrative and judicial authorities in districts where a national group other than Rumanian is in the majority should be the language of this national group. Civil servants in such areas should be appointed from among the members of this majority group ..." This commission found that Rumanian administrative measures, and discrimination in the cultural field" is actually leading to the final genocide of minonties in Transylvania."
On July 4, the same year, the LE MONDE in Paris, France reported of a new wave of deportations from the Hungarian districts in Transylvania to the Danube delta. The same paper estimated the number of Hungarians forced to live in Bucharest alone to 250,000, a figure not included in the official data of any census.
On August 8: "Due to the de-Magyarization policy of the Rumanian government of forcib1y removing Hungarian families from their native districts and deporting them or forcing them to locate in Moldavia, Dobrudja, even Bucharest or any one of the former Vlach provinces, it seems that 35 to 50 percent of the Transy1vanian Hungarians are no longer 1iving in their native land. The vacated houses of the deported or removed Hungarian families are filled with Rumanian families imported from across the Carpathians in order to change the ethnic balance of the purely Hungarian districts. According to Government orders wherever there are two pupils in a Hungarian language school who do not speak that language, the language of the entire school must be changed into Rumanian. Thus, with the settling of these newcomers, all Hungarian language grade-, middle-, and high-schools are being abolished, one by one ..." (CONGRESSIONAL RECORDS, August 8, 1964.)
On November 1964 George Bailey wrote in THE REPORTER: "Rumania has effectively replaced Hungarian at every level as the language of official and public life ... Hungarians are intimidated, they are scared to use their native tongue. The Rumanian authorities have adopted a wide variety of measures to isolate the Hungarian population from contact with the homeland. Foreign tourists in Rumania are allowed the run of the country, unless they happen to be Hungarian citizens . . ."
Robert R. King wrote in "Minorities Under Communism" (Harvard University Press, Cambridge, 1973) pages 156-157: "The 1964 redistricting of the Magyar Autonomous Region into Mures-Magyar Region increased the Rumanian population of the district from 146,830 (20%) to a 266,403 (35%) while decreasing the number of Hungarians from 565,510 (77%) to 473,154 (62)."
1966.
CARE Packages and other aids sent by American, Canadian, Australian or West European church organizations, charitable institutions or private individuals to starving Hungarian families in Transylvania, or to Transylvanian Hungarian Churches were confiscated by Rumanian authorities. See: APPENDIX.
1967.
On October 12 the Mures-Magyar Autonomous Region became liquidated. The previous 16 regions were rearranged into 40 districts and 2,706 communes. The aim was to mix as many Rumanian inhabited regions with Hungarian regions as geographically possible, thus lowering the percentage rate of Hungarians within the administrative units. "The chauvinistic policy of Rumania ... disregards all human rights and international obligations solemnly agreed upon and promised in peace treaties ..." (Osterhaven: Transylvania, page 40)
On December 3, 1967, the NEUE ZURICHER ZEITUNG, Switzerland, reported that in the "Hungarian populated areas of Transylvania the presence of the secret police is still strong. Political opponents (of Mr. Ceaucescu) and troublesome intellectuals are put behind bars without delay ..."
1974.
The "Handbuch Europaischer Volksgruppen" (Reference Book on European Ethnic Groups) estimated the Hungarian population of Transylvania as two millions.
On November 2, 1974, Act 63 of the Socialist Republic of Rumania amended Law -472-/1971, ordering the "nationalization of all documents, books, letters, pictures, art objects, etc. in possession of religious and cultural institutions or private citizens."
This amendment of the law was another decisive step toward the complete Rumanization of Transylvania by eliminating all traces of a Hungarian past, and thus clearing the way for a new, fa1sified history, already in the making.
1975.
On February 1, the NEUE ZURICHER ZEITUNG, Switzerland, reported under the tit1e "Bureaucratic Chicanery Against the Churches in Rumania" that "The intent behind the nationalization of the ecclesiastical archives is to sever the religious communities from their historical roots. A church without a past (tradition) has no future, especially one which represents a religious and national minority in the same time ... the Rumanian government has openly embarked on an escalated campaign against the Church and the Hungarian minority. " "The above mentioned outrages form a part of a systematic effort to re-write Rumanian history ..." (Human Rights Vio1ations against the Hungarian Minority in Rumania, a Committee for Human Rights publication, 1976.)
In the same time THE FINANCIAL TIMES reported: "A favourite device is to "facelift" the tombs and crypts of famous Hungarian families in the Medieval Hazsongard cemetery in Cluj (Kolozsvar) by allotting them to recently dead Rumanians. In this way the ethnic composition of the former population, now dead, is restructured favourab1y ..."
Also The Finaficial Times reported on Apr. 2. 1975 under the title "Transylvania"s Ethnic Strains" that at least 25 students are required to set up a minority class in any school, while a Rumanian class has to be set up as soon as there are two Rumanian speaking students. This report refers to Law -278-/1973 which ca11s for the merger of classes with insufficient numbers of students, and provides that every community with Rumanian speaking students, no matter how few, must establish a Rumanian section. Since most rural villages in Transylvania have only 500 to 1000 inhabitants, there may very possibly not be enough Hungarian students for a separate class (25). As a result of this law the merger necessarily occurs at the expense of the Hungarian section, even if the population of that village is 90% Hungarian.
Protests concerning the oppression of and the gross discrimination against the Hungarian minority in Rumania reached the United Nations Division of Human Rights Office to be submitted to the Commission on Human Rights and to the Sub-Commission on Prevention of Discrimination and Protection of Minorities, in Geneva.
Thirty-eight members of the U.S. Congress condemned the treatment of the Hungarian Minority by the Rumanian Government, and asked President Ford to discuss with President Ceaucescu "the abridgement of human and civil rights of the ethnic and religious minorities in Rumania." (SEE: Congressional Records, May and June 1975. Also: "Documents on the Human Rights Violations Against the Hungarian Minority in Rumania Before the United Nations Human Rights Commission, The World Council of Churches and the United States Congress and Government" published by the American Hungarian Federation, Washington, D.C. 1975)
G. Satmarescu, Rumanian author and scholar, repudiated the published figures of the recent Rumanian census by estimating the total number of Hungarians in Rumania at 2.5 million. (East Central Europe, edited by Stephen Fischer-Galati, University of Colorado, 1975.)
1976.
In June 1976 a joint Memorandum of the American Hungarian Federation and the Transylvanian World Federation was presented to the United States Congress, asking for the withdrawal of the "Preferred Nation" status granted to Rumania previously, until that government fulfilled its obligations toward the minorities as outlined in the peace treaties as well as in the Constitution of the Socialist Republic of Rumania. (SEE: CONGRESSIONAL RECORDS, June, 1976.)
In July 1976, protests against the blatant oppression of minority Churches and ethnic groups in Rumania were entered to the United Nations and the World Council of Churches Assembly in Nairobi, Africa, by Bishop Dr. Zoltan Beky, representing the Transylvanian World Federation and the American Hungarian Federation.
The Committee for Human Rights in Rumania in New York demonstrated repeatedly against the Rumanian Government and demanded the investigation of minority grievances in Rumania.
In October 1976 the United States Government asked the Government of the Socialist Republic of Rumania to grant permission" in accordance with the Helsinki Agreement, to a special investigating committee to enter Rumania and investigate the alleged human rights violations and discriminations against the minorities. The Rumanian government refused to grant the permission.
1977.
In January a new "Five Year Plan" was implemented by the Rumanian government, at the end of which, in 1982 "there will be no more Hungarian minority in Rumania. " (SEE: APPENDIX)
