The Eighth Tribe, 1980 (7. évfolyam, 1-12. szám)
1980-07-01 / 7. szám
ground train just as the doors were about to close. (It really works.) In each case, I was tracked down again within several hours. This is a tribute both to the huge network of security posts around the country and to the strict limits on where foreigners are allowed to spend the night (only in hotels or officially-designated campsites). There are several ways your organization might cut its costs. It seems an awful waste to assign at any one time three police cars and six agents to tail a single foreign journalist. At a more serious level, you might consider why it is necessary to follow foreign journalists at all—or to keep such a close watch over your own people. What is the value of an independent foreign policy when the quality of life enjoyed by ordinary people —measured in terms of either democratic freedoms or living standards—is lower in Romania than almost anywhere else in the Soviet bloc? The example of Yugoslavia’s late Marshal Tito may be relevant here—especially as your president appears to aspire to a similar role. Tito’s defiance of Moscow in 1948 led to a softening in his domestiic regime which won him broad popular support at home and enormous respect abroad. Ceausescu, by contrast, appears to be relying more and more on the twin instruments of personality cult and police repression to remain in power. Thank you for your department’s concern for my welfare. I await your comments with interest. Yours sincerely, Michael Dobbs ☆ ☆ FACTS AND FIGURES In 1600 A.D. Michael, voievod of Wallachia, invaded Transylvania from the South, ravaging Hungarian towns and villages, until General Basta, commander of the Imperial forces of Rudolph 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. In 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”. In 1604, Radu, Vlach voievod, received permission from Rudolph Habsburg to enter the country with his entire tribe and take possession of the devasTHE TRANSYLVANIAN QUARTERLY tated lands. However, the same year Duke István Bocskay and his famous Székely cavalry freed Transylvania as well as the Northern 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 villages in the central region of Transylvania. In 1658, census taken by the Jesuit Fathers showed the total population of Transylvania as 860,000 souls, of which about 240,000 were Vlachs. In 1659 a Tartar invasion from the East devastated the main Szamos valley. In 1664 a new influx of Vlach immigrants entered from Moldova, brought in by Hungarian landowners to settle the empty lands of the Szamos valley. In 1690, Emperor Leopold 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 sent to the galleys in the Mediterranean, 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. In 1968 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 ... represented an alliance between the Imperial conquerors and their Vlach 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 Transylvania with this classic example.” (Reprinted from the book “Documented Facts and Figures on Transylvania”, Danubian Press, 1978) Transylvania and the Hungarian-Rumanian Problem, a symposium, 330 pp. maps, statistics, bibliography, cloth ..............................................................$18.00 Haraszti, Andrew: The Ethnic History of Transylvania ..........................................................$10.00 Zathuraczky: Transylvania, Citadel of the West ......$ 4.00 THE DANUBIAN PRESS Rt. 1, Box 59 Astor, Florida 32002 vn
